Perception

The Test

What if a question was really a hidden answer? What if every answer was a question in disguise? Could each question lead to more answers than it asked and each answer ask more questions? If this puzzle was infinite could we ever stop learning?

What if every question and answer had something about each that made them all the same? What if every question and answer was meant to help you know God better? Are questions and answers directed by anything other than a person’s deepest secrets and their private motives? Can anybody say with certainty exactly what they mean other than God? What if telling the truth was really telling about God? Is it possible to be honest separate from God? What if everybody was in denial until they involved God? Is it possible to know of God but not know Him? What if everybody knew plenty about God, but few knew Him? Is someone who denies there is a God really being more honest than everyone who knows of Him? Will God respect a bold denial more than a twisted acknowledgment? Does this idea adhere to judgment? Is good enough in human standards, evil in God’s standards? What if all God really wants from us is for us to know Him? What if He only wants us to do things to make us know Him better? What if knowing God were the only answers to life? What if knowing of God were the only questions? Jesus taught, “take up your cross and follow me” (matt 10:38, 16:24, mark 8:34); if we are to confess our sins/ ask forgiveness for our sinful nature, then is it really us following Jesus since our selfish will has died? If it is not really us that are capable of following God; then who is it that is worshiping God? Does God have such an abundance of Glory that a part of Him reveres Himself? What if it were really an aspect of God worshiping the whole God? What if Jesus was worshiping all of God in unadulterated truth through His followers?

If the Bible isn't interpreted literally at every opportunity, isn't that the same as trusting human wisdom? Can the Bible be interpreted in many ways if it isn't literal? How trustworthy is human wisdom? Does literal interpretation of the Bible make the most sense? Do people interpret difficult parts of the Bible figuratively to make it comfortable and easy? Does it not require more trust and faith to believe that the Bible is literal whenever possible? Could literalism be how faith grows continually? What if God created us because He wanted a bunch of friends that He wanted to be with? What if you don’t act like God set you free from your sins; do you really believe He set you free? What if someone didn’t realize that his or her sins are really a problem? What if they struggled with their sins wanting to get rid of them; do they realize yet that the problem of their sins is not a problem they can solve? What if they haven’t realized yet that God is the only one who can solve that problem? What problems can man fix? What if giving to a poor person meant nothing unless God was my friend and I did it because I respect Him? What if teaching people meant nothing? What if everything in life has no meaning, unless it is lived with God? What if all existence, even time itself, relied on God to function? Does God only prove Himself to those who already trust?

What if you could prove God to all skeptics? What if nobody was able to doubt God? Would we even exist? What if we only exist because God created a system for us to be able to choose whether or not to be his friend? Are we really a friend if we don’t choose to be? What if God feels pain when His friends don’t choose Him? What if He wanted everybody to be His friend? Does He still acted like a friend to those who don’t choose Him yet? If everything I did was with God’s approval, what could I possibly do wrong? If I never did anything wrong, would the power and authority of God be on my side? Who could harm ‘who I honestly am’ if God is on my side? If my soul were invincible within the will of God, why would anything else concern me? Can an illness harm my soul? Can prison separate me from God? Can starvation remove me from the Word of God? Could my flesh, food, shelter, treasure, women, or anything else in the world possibly compare to the value of my soul? What if soul was a term that described all our decisions? Can anyone decide anything without desiring it more than its alternative according to his or her private motives? What if desire was another word for life? So if you desired death, would you not be dead already? What if God’s army has already died and only their souls were living; what would stop them? Isn’t death the greatest threat to a person? If a person is only concerned about everybody’s immortal soul, then what threat could possibly make him or her do something that they don’t think is right? What if threat was another word for temptation?

Who would do something for their best friend that they didn’t like? If God didn’t want me to harm those that would’ve chosen Him in the future, would I go out and kill some of them for Him? If doing something causes God pain, is it right for me to do it? Are we really his friends then? Who hasn’t done something to hurt God? Who deserves to be His best friend? Is anyone God’s friend because they choose Him, or is it God’s choice? What if God was so perfect that only He deserved His own love? What if God stopped loving His own type of perfection in order to make us all perfect? What if God put every imperfection of His friends who choose Him, on Himself and destroyed them so He could forget? If God knows everything, how could He forget? What if He was really allowing part of His omniscience to die, sacrificing His type of perfection out of love for us? Since we couldn’t become like God so we could be with Him in His perfect paradise, would He give up part of His full knowledge so He could forget that we don’t deserve and remove anything that could tarnish His paradise? If I looked in a mirror and saw myself, would it really be myself? If God looked at Jesus and saw Himself, wasn’t He really seeing Himself? What distinction can be made between God and Jesus? If our souls were a mirror, what would we see in mine? What could be seen in Jesus mirror? Did His soul ever reflect anything other than God? What reasoning could separate Jesus from God if we can’t reason what our own souls are? What if nobody was really asking whether Jesus is God? What if they were asking what a soul is?

What if I felt pain for those that didn’t choose God? Would I feel any comfort? If God didn’t give his friends a choice, would He really have loved them? What if our ability to choose meant that God isn’t selfish and loves us more than Him? What If I stopped calling Him God and started calling Him “Love?” Would I still make sense? What if every question could only be answered by “Love?” What if everything good thing that I experience was because of “Love?” What if “Love wants me to love “Love” more than anything else? What If God is Love? If I stopped calling Him God and started calling Him “Perfection,” would I still make sense? Is anything really perfect other than “Perfection?” What if God is perfection? What if I wanted to be perfect? Wouldn’t that be the same as thinking of God as my best friend? If a friend doesn’t try to be like His best friend, are they really best friends? What if I stopped calling Him God and started calling Him “Goodness;” would I make sense? Is there anything completely good other than “Goodness” Himself?

What else can there be other than God? He rightly calls Himself “I Am,” so what else is there? What if I stopped calling Him God and started calling Him “Life?” Is there any death in “Life?” Does that make sense? Did God mean “I Am” death? What if I called Him “Peace?” Does it make sense that “Peace” would say “I Am” war and turmoil? Do they have anything in common? What If I called God “Healer?” Does it make sense to say “Healer” made me sick? If I called God “Faithful,” would it make sense to say “Faithful” let me down? Does it seem right to say God brings: death, war, turmoil, sickness, disease, and letdowns? Does “Good” cause evil, or are they just complete opposites? If there wasn’t an evil deed, thought or word, could there possibly be a Good deed, thought or word? If God can only be everything that He is, doesn’t it make sense that our choice is between everything that He isn’t?

What if nobody taught humans about what God isn’t, would it be possible for us to choose anything other than God? If everything that isn’t God were called evil, would it be possible to know any evil unless there was a teacher? Would there be any choice? If God never lies, would he teach us evil in order to give us choice, or would He need to give that responsibility to someone else? What if the one who was given this responsibility of teaching evil became convinced that He could become more powerful than God because of His powers? What would stop him since he is the embodiment of evil? If God became disgusted at how evilness has consumed this teacher and the ones he fools, would He just put up with it and keep loving everybody, or would He destroy wickedness? If God gave the former angel the right to do these things, wouldn’t it be a lie if God just threw Satan out of heaven without obeying God’s own decision? If the only way God could remove this false teacher from his presence was to come into His creation [Immanuel] and drag Satan with Him, would He do it? Is this Jesus’ second coming? Since Satan was able to fool everybody other than God at least once, would God just abandon all the souls He created since they all failed, or would God make a way for the mistakes of some to be removed? Was this Jesus’ first coming?

God is omnipresent, omniscient, and omnipotent, but is He omni-temporal? If God knows the future better than we know what happened yesterday, wouldn't that mean He knows absolutely everything and, to Him, everything has already happened? If God wanted to experience, His creation as it happened, would knowing everything that has and will happen mean that He couldn’t experience things as they happen? Wouldn't this mean that we can't say God exist only in the present since He exists in the past and future at the same time? If God wanted to experience creation as it happened, wouldn't He have to give up some of His omniscience in order to do so? If God desired to experience His creation, wouldn't He do it? If God made it so He could experience His creation as it happened, wouldn’t that be like saying had a son, since the Son has to be taught what the Father already knows? If the term “Son of God” meant the part of God that experiences His creation, would that mean it can’t possibly be God experiencing His creation since He knows everything already? Does God live in the box, which is our current ability to understand? If God wanted to experience his creation as it happened, could He and would He do it? If Jesus is how God experiences the present, is it right to call Jesus God? Is the part of God that experiences the present the same as God, or would that be like saying God doesn’t know everything in the past and future? Can Jesus be called anything other than the “Son of God?”

If God knows the future, does that mean that He has already been there? If God has experienced the past, and Future, doesn’t it make sense that he is experiencing the present right now as well? Are we able to see and experience the past or future before it happens? If we could only see and experience what God does right now, would that mean that God doesn’t really exist in the past and future; that He only exist in our time? Does God live in a box He created? If we are only able to experience and see what God does now even though He exist in past present and future, wouldn’t we think of what God does in the present differently than what He was is going to do in the timeline of our future? If God chose to come into His creation limited to the experience of time, wouldn’t He still exist in the past, present and future as an omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent God? So would His limited self be able to communicate with His unlimited self? Is this what Jesus meant when He said, “If you have seen the Son, you have seen the Father?” Is it possible to see all of God since we can’t exist at all times at once? Doesn’t this mean that only God is capable of seeing Himself in that manner? Would this mean that only Jesus has seen God since He is God partially limited to time? What would it be like to see God like only Jesus has? If seeing the face of God was the same as seeing omniscience and therefore knowing everything for that period, would you be able to disagree with what God thinks of you? If someone can’t answer a question, or can’t even understand the question, is it right for them to say they know anything better, or would this be a lie?

If a question leads you to an answer, then is it a question, or is it really just a guide to an answer? If someone is offended by a question that reveals something, isn’t that the same as if they offended themselves since they are the one who came up with the answer to the question? How many questions can possibly come from each answer and how many answers come from a question? Can a question ask anything other than what it asks? Can an answer tell anything other than what it tells; or do you need to ask more questions to get more answers? Is a parable an answer, or is it a question? Did Jesus make people ask themselves what He meant, or did He just tell everyone what He meant? Was He really asking questions, or was He giving answers? What is a parable? Could a question make you think an answer and believe more easily? Can an answer make you question another person's though, and doubt more easily? So which makes more sense: Does God represent questions, or answers? Is a question the opposite of an answer? Did God make use to live for questions, or does choosing give us answers? Would God say “I Am,” in every question, or only “I Am” to the answers? Aren’t both true? Is there enough of a difference between a question and an answer for God to say “I Am” one or the other, or are they really both the same somehow? I would say “thinking about ‘I Am’ leads me to questions; knowing ‘I Am’ answers them," would you agree?