I've gotten caught up in discussions about "that of God in each person," and whether that means what it seems to, or whether it means what George Fox meant by it, and finally-- Is it true?

It seems pretty clear to me-- that God creates the universe from inside us, that God "lives" us-- that this is the only tenable explanation of how we can truly be alive: having God living our life in us. And yet, in some theological models this is seen as mistaken, as an illegitimate transformation of How Things Be...

And of course the notion of God (or "Christ") as a part of us... is absurdly inside-out, renders the Whole less than its mortal human subset...

Obviously we aren't entirely good, entirely wise, any other virtue we could wish for. Neither do we (personally) possess the attributes of Omnipotence, Omniscience, not even Omnipresence and we've barely gotten started on the Omnies-- not even the relatively easy virtue of Not Making Mistakes.

It seems downright "common sense," to say that [while God and people can hardly be disjoint... How could you imagine that about a Being who knows each person from within?] we can't possibly "contain" God. And yet the observation that God has embodied "Him"self in each human is an ancient element behind every religion I know of-- sometimes only hinted at, behind vehement denials, and sometimes as overtly straightforward as " 'Atman' [the human soul] is 'Brahma' [The Big Guy, The Whole Thing, God]"

How to make understandable sense of this? I like Stephen Gaskin's comparison: A human ego is like a hole in a fence. If you look through such a hole you can see The Universe, at least the portion directly behind the hole. If you look through another hole, you see the same universe (although this portion of it may look considerably different from that first peek.) God is what/who sees the whole universe, right through any fence you care to postulate.

There are mental processes going on-- even in what we recognize as "our" self-- that we aren't conscious of. We don't need to personify them in spooky ways, but it's not at all hard to demonstrate that they're happening. We can focus our "me" down to a very tiny hole indeed-- some people may contain far more woody bits than actual transparency-- or we can work to enlarge our field of vision to include some "unconscious" and even "external" mind-at-work (though not necessarily seeing quite as sharply) and if we could truly tear the "fence" down (Some traditions seem to say that's possible) we wouldn't be "just this little knothole" anymore; there'd be The Whole Thing expressing itself right through that little bod you'd thought was "me"-- and it might be hard to locate or specify your "me" anymore, after that!

Some religions would consider that a desirable outcome. I don't, and I don't believe God does; this position is certainly subject to Correction any time I might be led to a better way of looking at it-- but for now I'll hold to the argument from observation: God didn't make people that way, at least not so far. God evidently wanted creatures, and wanted them to be alive, and God's life is/was the only life available. Each of us consists, really, of our piece of "Godness" (regardless of how completely, or incompletely that may be developed, so far.) But it's the same stuff...

Maybe an irrelevancy... or not... Tonight I was thinking about how much ambition and pride has fallen away from me, over the years. If God is the main event, and I can't add one inch to my stature (beyond God's intention for me) then really I'm in a position of knowing God's "motherly" love (as in, 'Just another one of my enormous family, but I love the little jerk anyway!") but the "fatherly" sort (like "Hey, look at what a great kid I've got here!") seems quite beyond me-- Sometimes I'll get something right & then the next day, it's oy vey!

So I was asking God about this... and sometime later, attempting yoga once again, I was Told: If I'm meditating, and God suddenly lets me feel some muscle that I've always had all cramped up, impairing and disfiguring my body-- and all of a sudden I've been given a new way of moving it, something that feels right, natural, so that that muscle is finally working as a functional part of me... I'm not going to say: "What a great muscle!" I'm not going to say "You've been a Bad muscle!" It's just going to continue doing what feels right as a functioning, coordinated part of me. That, I think, is like the way we're destined to be as functioning, coordinated parts of God.

In some way, a little beyond what we're easily aware of-- We're already like that! & gradually being shown, more and more.