God" is Love; is "God" Light?
While I believe “God” is Love, is God light? I tend to think so. Love is energy; light is energy. It doesn’t seem like much of a stretch. There are many examples of "God" being light found in the New Testament. Many mystics and saints also speak of "God" as light. The following are examples from the New Testament:
1 John 1:5 - This is the message he has given us to announce to you: God is light and there is no darkness in him at all.
John 1:4-9 - Life itself was in him, and this life gives light to everyone. The light shines through the darkness, and the darkness can never extinguish it.
God sent John the Baptist to tell everyone about the light so that everyone might believe because of his testimony. John himself was not the light; he was only a witness to the light. The one who is the true light, who gives light to everyone, was going to come into the world.
John 8:12 - Jesus said to the people, "I am the light of the world. If you follow me, you won't be stumbling through the darkness, because you will have the light that leads to life."
Colossians 1:12 - . . . always thanking the Father, who has enabled you to share the inheritance that belongs to God's holy people, who live in the light.
Ephesisans 5:8-11 - For though your hearts were once full of darkness, now you are full of light from the Lord, and your behavior should show it! For this light within you produces only what is good and right and true.
St. Gregory Nazianzan found this to be true as well. In his Second Discourse:
The angels hardly contain the splendour of God, Who is covered by darkness, for He is light the most pure and inaccessible for most creatures, light which is inside everything and outside everything, which is all beauty and higher than all beauty, which illumines the intellect.
In his Thirty-first discourse, where he speaks of God the Trinity as light:
There was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world that is, the Father. There was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world, that is, the Son. There was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world , that is, the Comforter. There are three subjects and three verbs - He was and He was and He was. But a single reality was. There are three predicates - light and light and light. But the light is one, God is one. This is the meaning of David’s prophetic vision: In Thy light we shall see light. We receive the Son’s light from the Father’s light in the light of the Spirit: this is what we ourselves have seen and what we now proclaim - it is the plain and simple explanation of the Trinity.
St. Gregory Nyssa claims it too. In discussing Moses and the burning bush, Nyssa wrote:
That light [of the burning bush] teaches us what we must do to stand within the rays of the true light: Sandaled feet cannot ascend that height where the light of truth is seen, but the dead and earthly covering of skins, which was placed around our nature at the beginning when we were found naked because of disobedience to the divine will, must be removed from the feet of the soul. When we do this, the knowledge of the truth will result and manifest itself.
And finally, St. Gregory Palamas, of the Eastern Orthodox Church, wrote that when Peter and John witnessed the transfiguration of Jesus on Mount Tabor, that they were in fact seeing the uncreated light of God; and that it is possible for others to be granted to see that same uncreated light of God with the help of certain spiritual disciplines and contemplative prayer, although not in any automatic or mechanistic fashion.
Some say that all this talk of "God" and light is meant as an allegory. Maybe. Maybe not. Just thought I would shed some light on the subject.
Very Few of Us Have Ever Experienced True Love
We all have loves in our lives: our spouses, our children, our parents, our friends. And we all have had (and if we’re lucky, we still have) that one amazing love that rivals no other. But guess what? There is one love that very few of us have experienced that truly rivals no other: the unadulterated, unconditional love of the Divine.
Yes, I know. Many of you are saying, “But you are wrong Scott. I love God with all of my heart.” And you may. And many of us do. But for most of us, even the love we have for “God” or Allah, or Yeshua or the Buddha or whomever, is still the love we’ve only ever really experienced - conditional love.
I love the Divine as best as I know how. I try to act from a position of love in everything that I do. And while Yeshua’s love for me is unconditional, my love for him is conditional. It’s conditional because at this point in my life I can’t love him, or my brothers and sisters of the world, the way I am supposed to. It’s conditional because I have a family, a job, and responsibilities that will not allow me to love unconditionally. They, and it, come first. And it’s conditional because while I do love myself, I love myself with conditions. I love myself except when I do stupid things (which is fairly often, unfortunately); I love myself except when my love handles grow into LOVE HANDLES; I love myself except when my Ego gets the best of me. Until we can love ourselves with all of our faults, we can’t love unconditionally.
Unconditional love means just that: a love with no conditions. It’s a goal that is very hard to reach. But it’s a goal worth striving for.
By Not Acting in Love, We Add to the Illusion of This World
It’s no secret to those on the path that this world is an illusion. But what may be news to some is that anytime we don’t act in love, we are adding to the illusion. Let me explain.
If we lash out at someone in anger for something they have done, Ego is what brings forth the anger. If we are jealous of another, Ego leads the way. If we hate a people or a race, it’s Ego that’s in control. And Ego is the ultimate illusion.
While it is an illusion, that doesn't mean that Ego is not useful. We need Ego to survive in this illusionary world. We need Ego to grow and learn. We need Ego to reflect back to us what our true self wants us to learn. If we become angry, or jealous, or hateful, it’s a reflection of something our true self needs us to learn.
Though Ego is beneficial, it is the ultimate illusion. It’s the ultimate illusion because Ego is not the true self. The true self is Love. Any time we act in Love, we are not adding to the illusion, we are adding to the Truth.
If you want to continue living in a world of illusion, then let Ego be your master. But if you yearn to break through the mist of this illusion, then let Love reign.
