What is God? Who is God? Does God exist? What is God’s will? Does God love everyone? Does God hate anyone? Is there a hell? Would God really torment someone in hell for eternity? What must one do to be unified with God?
Do you ever ask yourself these questions (or questions like these)? How often? How do you arrive at an answer? Do you think about these questions for yourself, applying reason and logic (including spiritual reason and logic), or do you simply accept what others have said (others being your pastor or parents, church, religion, or society)? What about your own experiences and relationship with God, and the feelings of your own soul—how much do these factor in when trying to answer these questions?
For those of us who believe in God, shouldn’t these be the most important questions we can ask ourselves? Shouldn’t answering these questions be directly associated with our very reason for existence? If so, how does someone even begin to approach a subject as grand as God?
These are good questions; you might as well know that I don’t have all the answers… But I believe that it’s in the very exploration of these questions that the answers begin to be revealed to us.
These answers can come in a variety of ways—through meditation and reading, through the sharing and exploration of questions, ideas, and experiences that we and others around us have had, or through the feelings of our own soul and our own relationship with God; the possibilities are endless.
And when exploring these ideas, I believe two things are of fundamental importance: we must maintain an open mind, and we must trust in God to lead us to the truth. That means questioning both old and new beliefs and experiences, comparing them with all available information, and trying to ascertain their truth and credibility in relation to God and the feelings of our own soul.
— Excerpted from The Truth as I See It: A Collection of Spiritual Writings by Adam Soto (p. 65-66)
Mind / Purpose / Truth 