Why God (Probably) Exists

My wife treats me like God…She takes little notice of me until she wants something. (internet meme)

These days, we have a complicated relationship with God, or with the concept of God. In the old days, we conceived of God as a bearded man sitting on a cloud, smiting people who displeased him. I think it’s fair to say that God (if God exists) is not that. Also, in the old days, many wars and unpleasant acts were committed “in the name of God.” It’s not that God did those things, but that people did them and passed the buck to God. For good reason, many people have shifted away from that notion of God.

Some have even gone as far as to deny the existence of God altogether. However, just because God is not a bearded man on a cloud doesn’t mean that God doesn’t exist. What the bearded man represented to the people of a former age was the notion of a higher power, which at the time, was a very big fatherly guy in the sky. While we are outgrowing that old image, we don’t yet have a new image, but let’s instead focus on the notion that God, if God exists, represents a higher power. Is there a higher power?

The Dog Analogy

Here on earth, we human beings seem to be at the top of heap when it comes to other living things. Surely, we think, there’s nothing above the human level of consciousness, is there? Let’s take the analogy of a dog. Let’s say that you own a dog and that next Tuesday, we were going to take her to the vet to get vaccinated. When next Tuesday comes, you take her to the vet and he gets a shot. Done, simple, easy.

To you that is. What would you say the dog understands of that interaction? To her, it’s likely to be random and confusing. Can a dog understand the concept of “Tuesday”? Can a dog ever conceive of what a vaccine is? From this example, you can see that there are limits to what it can comprehend. To the dog, the human is a higher power, capable of a organzing consciousness that is higher than that of a dog.

We humans are a type of animal too. Do we have limits to our understanding? I would say yes. We may have a consciousness that’s higher than other animals around us, but do we have the highest level of consciousness there is? No. Things happen to us which seem random and chaotic. We chalk that us to randomness, but when viewed at a higher level of consciousness, consider the possibility that it’s all orderly, like taking the dog to the vet next Tuesday.

God does not play dice with the universe. ~ Albert Einstein

The Blood Cell Analogy

From the previous analgy, you may acknowledge that there are higher levels of consciousness, even a “higher power” at least relative to humans, but does make it God?

Humans are living organisms. We don’t exist as a solid, uniform lump but as a conglomeration of other living organisms called cells. Each cell is also a living thing. Beneath cells, there are organisms such as mitochondria, and they go down and down, smaller and smaller.

Likewise, it also goes up and up. From the people to countries to the Earth, to galaxies, and so on. What is the consciousness of a blood cell? It’s limited compared to that of a human being. What is the consciousness of a human? I would say that it’s limited when compared to that of the Earth. Are you saying that the Earth is a living, conscious organism? Yes, I am saying that. I am NOT saying that consciousness only goes up to the human level and then stops, and then everything above the human level is just a dumb pile of rocks.

Using reason, we may surmise that the consciousness gap between the Earth and humans is as wide as that between humans and blood cells. With all the events going on these days, I think there’s a reason for the things that are happening “to us” from the earth’s point of view that is beyond our ability to grasp.

Where It All Ends

Even though the earth is likely to have a much vaster consciousness than that of a human (and all humans combined), it’s not the highest level. There are levels above. But where does it end?

We go up and up and up until we get to a level which encompasses… everything. It ends in everything, all, totality, infinity. That “everything” is God. God is omnipotent and omniscient, not because God behaves like daddy, but because God is everything and encompasses all. God is…One.

Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. (Deuteronomy 6:4)

For some, it’s easier to use the term “life” or “the universe”, and those are just terms to refer to the One. We are all a part of the One, of Life, and of God.

This leads to the natural conclusion: Our task in life is to serve God and love one another, which is one and the same.

One love, one blood
One life, you got to do what you should
One life, with each other
Sisters, brothers
One life but we’re not the same
We get to carry each other, carry each other
One
One
~ U2, One