Looking for God in all the Wrong Places

Maybe if we all went over to the window opened it up and stuck our heads out and yelled, “I’m mad as hell, and I’m not going to take it any more!” , maybe God would hear us down here and fix this mess. Oh yeah, that suggestion was tried wasn’t it? I guess it didn’t work because here we are still.

So maybe if I write a letter that will work. I’ll bet there is a big basket at the post office where they put all the letters that people write to God. It’s probably right next to the one for the letters to Santa Claus. So if I decide to write, when I finish it, I might as well just tear it up, throw the pieces in the air and save the cost of a stamp.

But who knows, it can’t hurt to try…

Dear God,

Wait a minute, this has all been done before too! And it turned into a book called “Conversations with God” and the author, who had fallen on hard times made a fortune from it. So now that you are all set Mr. Walsh, what about the rest of us, what about me!

Ok! I’ll start again.

They told me God, that if I visited you regularly I could get saved, whatever that means. Back then I didn’t even realize I had been lost. I came to your house every Sunday for years but you were never home. Of course I don’t blame you because I finally discovered the place was full of hypocrites. One day I asked them why there were no black people allowed in the church, except on Monday to clean the place. The minister called my mother and said that the devil had me and was making me ask these questions. At that point I left, for good. And I do mean “good”.

My mother told me you were everywhere so I would often go for long walks in the woods to see if I could find you there, maybe hiding behind a bush or in a tree. Sometimes I would lie on a huge rock in a field near my home looking up at the clouds. A couple of times I thought I saw you there but then you turned into something else and blew away.

I always enjoyed looking for you in the places where my mother said you would be. It was a kind of hide and seek game I played. I think my mother was a very wise person or maybe she just wanted to get me out of the house. But some how, I always came home feeling that I had spent time with you even though I never managed to meet you face to face.

Then I tried to see if I could catch you at home again. I had no idea you had so many houses, so many churches where you could just hang out without paying any rent. But if you ever actually dropped by I never saw you in any of them.

Finally, some nice people at a Quaker Meeting House took me in. They told me I could ask all the questions I wanted and say what ever I wanted to say. I really liked that. I asked them if they had seen you around or knew where I could find you. They told me to keep coming back and I was sure to eventually meet you.

Several months went by and I asked about you again. A nice Quaker man sat me down and handed me a mirror. He told me to gaze deeply into the eyes of the face I saw there. After a few minutes, my face began to melt into the background of the darkened room and in its place I saw you there.

I am sorry I haven’t contacted you for so long. I had forgotten how close you are. I don’t need the mirror any more to see you. Now I can find you right where my mother said you would always be, in everything and everyone. Some nice folks I met recently suggested that I write you. I am glad they did. I’ll try not to forget again that you are always right here with me.