Theist or not: What image of God do you actually have in your mind?

**wynn** · 06-11-10, 01:03 AM

God is waiting around the next corner with a club to punish me.

God has a mean face, I don’t like to think of him looking at me.

These descriptions of God come from deeply committed Christians. Neither person would have signed a doctrinal statement which described God as someone who carries a large club, or as a someone with a mean face. They both would have affirmed that God is a loving and grace-full God. But their private images of God were in direct – and painful – conflict with their intellectual convictions about God.

I have observed in myself and in others that this kind of internal conflict about God is fairly common. It seems that people who believe in a God of love and compassion sometimes experience private images of God which are disturbing.

http://www.nacronline.com/spirituali...-images-of-god

Whether you are theist or not:
What image of God do you actually have in your mind?

**Sock puppet path** · 06-11-10, 01:10 AM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nf6wZFMWJeU

**Cris** · 06-11-10, 01:20 AM

I have thought about this quite a bit but I have no frame of reference of what something immaterial might look or feel like.

My image of a god is simply a blankness. A non-entity without substance or meaning.

**Thoreau** · 06-11-10, 08:53 AM

I don't have an image of god. I don't personify god like most do. My belief is that god is an energy/force or whatever... not an actual being separate from us that takes on human behavior and likeness.

**pavlosmarcos** · 06-11-10, 09:31 AM

Originally Posted by Cris

I have thought about this quite a bit but I have no frame of reference of what something immaterial might look or feel like.

My image of a god is simply a blankness. A non-entity without substance or meaning.

I second that.

**jahina** · 06-11-10, 09:58 AM

Originally Posted by MZ3Boy84

I don't have an image of god. I don't personify god like most do. My belief is that god is an energy/force or whatever... not an actual being separate from us that takes on human behavior and likeness.

I think similar. God is like an idea, like a thought, like an emotion. Doesn't have a physical substance to it as the physical is, to my mind, the end resulf of or the condensation of an idea, a thought, an emotion. Because God and Creation are the source of the end results, things that are physical, they are the original idea that keeps on generating more 'idea'.

If you see what I mean. Which you probably don't!

**Medicine*Woman** · 06-11-10, 10:06 AM

Originally Posted by Signal

Whether you are theist or not:
What image of God do you actually have in your mind?

*************
M*W: When I was a Roman Catholic, I had a vision (the indoctinated one), of a dying Jesus on a cross.

Today, as an atheist, I can't imagine a god, what it looks like.Nothing. It's not there. Nothing represents a god to me. I can't even imagine the old dying Jesus figure as anything but a lost relic of the ancient past.

**Thoreau** · 06-11-10, 11:11 AM

Originally Posted by jahina

I think similar. God is like an idea, like a thought, like an emotion. Doesn't have a physical substance to it as the physical is, to my mind, the end resulf of or the condensation of an idea, a thought, an emotion. Because God and Creation are the source of the end results, things that are physical, they are the original idea that keeps on generating more 'idea'.

If you see what I mean. Which you probably don't!

I think I understand.

**~~John99~~** · 06-11-10, 12:27 PM

God can be anything. Mostly in human form, i believe. When i was dying, i was crawling across the ground and things were goin g black, like someone shutting a light off and then putting it back on, like it was flickering and very much like a stop motion movie. Then i looked out my window, by just turning my head, i say 'compelled' for lack of a better term but i really had no reason to look out the window because i was determined to get to where i was going and fighting to keep my heart pumping with all my mite and mental ability. There was a medium sized white bird, which where i lived at the time cannot remember seeing any white birds but it looked like a pigeon. The bird told me, telepathically, 'if you want to live, just get up.' So that is what i did. I went to sleep after that and everything was fine and the problem i was having just stopped.

You know, these things are like 'who knows what happened. I never tell anyone about this, in real life, i think i was very young and got damn lucky.

This was over a decade ago. The bird gave me a definite impression it was Jesus or someone representing jesus and that is all i know. i am positive i saw the bird but anything else relating to that...who knows, seemed real to me though.

So most likely God, if there is such a phenomenon, has a little more leverage afa appearance.

**~~John99~~** · 06-11-10, 12:48 PM

my impression is that humans are like a painting. You paint this picture and it is really good so you want to keep looking at it. Its too bad that nothing is ever certain so you get these choices to make.

**spidergoat** · 06-11-10, 01:51 PM

Not a theist, but I would picture the universe as His body, with every particle in a state of quantum entanglement with another particle in a centralized collection existing in another dimension. That's how he would know everything, because He is everything.

**jayleew** · 06-11-10, 02:51 PM

Originally Posted by John99

You know, these things are like 'who knows what happened. I never tell anyone about this, in real life, i think i was very young and got damn lucky.

This was over a decade ago. The bird gave me a definite impression it was Jesus or someone representing jesus and that is all i know. i am positive i saw the bird but anything else relating to that...who knows, seemed real to me though.

So most likely God, if there is such a phenomenon, has a little more leverage afa appearance.

You never know. I've had visions that were quite real as well when I was very sick. Though, they were more menacing. There was one where I saw the image in the window, and I ran out grabbing my rifle. I loaded and cocked it...safety off. I was positive I saw the dark man in the trenchcoat in the window.

Also when I was completely healthy, I've heard my name called in a whisper. I was so sure, I went upstairs to make sure it wasn't my mom who called my name.

The mind can play tricks that seem real. Real enough to believe.

If there was a god, I would still have the standard old, but ageless man with white hair and a mighty humanlike body, but not completely corpreal and very bright.

**glaucon** · 06-11-10, 03:00 PM

Absolutely none.
(I keep my mind clean)

**jahina** · 06-11-10, 05:54 PM

Originally Posted by spidergoat

Not a theist, but I would picture the universe as His body, with every particle in a state of quantum entanglement with another particle in a centralized collection existing in another dimension. That's how he would know everything, because He is everything.

Yes, I go with this one too. Except I never give God and Creation a single gender

. I refer to them as He/She/It - precisely because they ARE everything.

**~~John99~~** · 06-11-10, 10:10 PM

Originally Posted by jayleew

You never know. I've had visions that were quite real as well when I was very sick. Though, they were more menacing. There was one where I saw the image in the window, and I ran out grabbing my rifle. I loaded and cocked it...safety off. I was positive I saw the dark man in the trenchcoat in the window.

Also when I was completely healthy, I've heard my name called in a whisper. I was so sure, I went upstairs to make sure it wasn't my mom who called my name.

The mind can play tricks that seem real. Real enough to believe.

I never have episodes like that. In your case there are three possibilities:

1. Mental - Delusion

2. Vision problems. - i know that medical problems (especially relating to vision) can manifest themselves in optical illusions. These illusions can be flashes, shadows (shadow people) or smoke. This is different than #1 because the objects are nowhere near any definition. If there is a doctor (who knows about this then he\she can come in and confirm or deny this).

I believe the 2 above to be accurate.

3. You did see something or maybe even someone.

**Adstar** · 06-11-10, 10:29 PM

Originally Posted by Signal

Whether you are theist or not:
What image of God do you actually have in your mind?

I don't really spend time thinking of what God looks like. Apart from the general descriptions of Him in the Book of Revelation and the book of Daniel there is no definitive description of God making an visible expression.

I try not to project a human face upon God, it's like making an image of God in my mind. It would always be a flawed or false image.

All Praise The Ancient Of Days

**Lori_7** · 06-12-10, 05:33 PM

Originally Posted by Signal

Whether you are theist or not:
What image of God do you actually have in your mind?

i think of god (the father/creator) as the law/force by which things are created and exist.

**Dywyddyr** · 06-12-10, 05:39 PM

Sometimes it's a guy with a jackal's head, sometimes it's a guy with a hammer, or goat's feet and a syrinx...
Depends what I'm reading at the time.

**Medicine*Woman** · 06-12-10, 06:48 PM

Originally Posted by Lori_7

i think of god (the father/creator) as the law/force by which things are created and exist.

*************
M*W: I think of the sun as the creator of life in a frozen sea, but I don't worship the sun.

**Repo Man** · 06-12-10, 07:06 PM

I'll be the first to admit that my idea of God is pretty different. I believe
in a God with a long white beard, a gold crown, and a long robe with lots of
shiny jewels on it. He sits on a big throne in the clouds, and He's about five
hundred feet tall. He talks in a real deep voice like "I...AM...GOD!" He can
blow up stuff just by looking at it.
This is my own, personal idea of God. - Jack Handey