A very relavent question for truth seekers.

Who or what is God and what is our purpose on this earth?
I would like to see what your opinions are and later in the discussion I will add my own. Thank you ATS!

As for who or what God is, well, that's above my pay grade. I'm in no big hurry to find out either.

I'm here to learn and to have fun. If I'm not doing one you can rest assured I'm doing the other.

Hope that helps.

You know, I'm starting to think Philip K. Dick got it right:

1. The creator of this world is demented.
   
2. The world is not as it appears, in order to hide the evil in it, a delusive veil obscuring it and the deranged deity.
   
3. There is another, better realm of God, and all our efforts are to be directed toward
   
   1. returning there
      
   2. bringing it here

[edit on 31-8-2008 by Eleleth]

What is God?

1 John 4:8
He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.

Who is God?

God is the Supreme Spirit that has created the entire universe and everything and everyone that is in it.

Why are we here on earth?

God created us in his image to give glory to him. He gave the earth to us to care for. All the trials and tribulations we go through in this life are for the glory of God so in the Ages to come, others will be able to look and see the great love God has shown to us. They will see his glory through us.

Marilyn~

Or maybe "god" is just a basic human response to believe in something to help us get through our day to day life.

Its too scary for people to think there is nothing after our short time on this rock.. hence the need for something afterwards.

Just my opinion.

We are all aspects of God; God being Consciousness. All matter is an aspect of God/Consciousness, and reality is an interplay of expectations. "Lower" levels of Consciousness have very limited expectations; rock, for example, has only the expectation of being Rock. Our purpose is to experience novelty in ever increasing complexity.

That is my Universe; your Universe may vary.

Actually this time on earth is for us to decide whether we are with God or Against God this is why he gave us free will to choose good or evil if we choose God we spend and eternity with him and his son in heaven if we choose evil we spend an eternity separated from God and is love see God chose us it is up to us to choose him.

God is a word used too often to explain that, that cannot be explained.
Beyond our grasp of science lies something that our human minds cannot understand.

So to pacify our insatibale curiosity we gave it a name, 'God'...

God is not a creator, nor is 'he' a loving, omnipotent diety, 'he' cares not for human kind or any life on any planet...

It is merely a word to describe something beyond our scientific understanding, a way of describing the almost infinite elements that exist beyond the earth.

Unfortunately people take this too seriously, and pray to something that cannot hear us.

The best way to describe 'God': A series of seemingly impossible combinations of energy, chance and accidents in the universe.

We are here on this earth as a result of this.

reply to post by bunnytoes1973



I see you quoted Friedrich Nietzsche in your signature so I will tell you who god is, yourself. Thanks for asking even though you already knew, you silly god.

Well, firstly, God is a spirit. This s something that people tend to forget. People talk of God as if he were a human. He's not. He is an enirely diffeent creature.

What is the spirit. I personally view spirit/spirits as being energy. Therefore, God, in human terms, is energy.

Here is a question for your question....actually a few questions....
How did you come to be? (Not talking about Mom and Dad creating you) How did us humans came to be? How life on Earth came to be? How every living organism came to be? Why are we still alive? If you can answer those question with precision then, there is no GOD, otherwise, GOD will always be!
Whether you call it GOD, Buddha or whatever, there is something or someone watching over us.

Those who neglect to believe that there is a higher power is blind!

Hmm - good questions. I get them from my kids all the time.

IMO... God is definitely not my co-pilot (you should see me drive.) And I'd guess he'd delegate (I would if I had a Universe or several to run.) But I think there are "guides" or "angels" or whatever that seem to be hanging around and lending a hand.

I really think that it's possible God is / was / will be the creation out of nothing and then along with all of us ... at all levels of enlightenment energy / density matter... we are creating all that is together. So we are the creator(s) ... God is us. No matter what our species, creed, location, existence in time and space.

But I could be entirely wrong so just think it out loud and if it feels right in your gut, go for it. If it doesn't maybe God has several arms and sits in a lotus position or God is a bearded 33 year old who may or may not have had relations with Mary Magdalen. We all find what we need.

As for Why Are we here... I like the dharma idea (that we each have a unique purpose.) But I don't know if I believe it so much any more. I think the Universe showers the same good idea down and most ignore it, some look at it, and very few will pick it up and usually only one will succeed at it - and that is with help. But there will always be more ideas so I don't think you have to worry about missing your dharma. And some may have more than one purpose.

What I say to my kids is that I think we're all here in Earth lab 101 because we asked to be. That we want the experience because ether is a bit dull. And that we get to create when we're here. Ideally, we can raise the general level of enlightenment, with the help of the bored angels, and move closer to a space where heaven on earth can exist. If this is true, clearly some of us have chosen to learn by harder lessons than others. But I agree with other posts that we're all learning - it can't be by accident.

I'm not so sure it's linear though - amoeba to human to dolphin... I could see that you might bounce around... come back as a dog or an oak... to check it all out.

At least I hope I get to.




[edit on 8/31/2008 by trusername]

The answer to your question is answered in Genesis.

How are you able to tell the difference between hot and cold? If you only experienced 1 temperature in your entire life, then you would likely never believe the temperature ever changed. If the wind never blew, how would you know wind existed? You wouldn't.

You see, intelligence and understanding is only possible when more than 1 thing is apparent. If the temperature never changed, you could always be hot, you could always be cold, but if it never changed you would have no concept of it at all. It is only by feeling hot and cold that those changes become apparent.

And if you look at Genesis, it states very plainly that we are to become like god, knowing both good AND evil. That is why evil is in this world, to TEACH you the difference so that you can understand.

Einstein once said - "Any fool can know, the point is to understand". And I think that is probably one of the smartest things he ever said. That is completely true. As per the example above, someone could tell you - oh your hot, or oh your cold. And then you would "know". But you would never understand what that meant unless you experience both.

And that is what Genesis means when it says Adam and Eve realized they were naked. They realized they were ignorant. And God removed Adam and Eve from the garden of eden until they knew and understood good and evil.

Welcome to school. Lets hope we don't have to repeat this grade.

[edit on 1-9-2008 by badmedia]

[edit on 1-9-2008 by badmedia]

I consider all questions about the purpose of existence to be invalid. It is grammatically possible to ask such questions, but ultimately meaningless. It's like asking, "What does the color blue smell like?" No answer is possible.

Why? Well, bear with me for a moment. When you ask "What is the purpose of XYZ?", the answer must be something outside of/different from XYZ. For example, "the purpose of a hammer is to hammer in nails," or "the purpose of a pen is to write," etc. In these cases, nails are separate from hammers, and writing is separate from pens.

But with "existence" you are talking about something that contains everything. There is no "outside." So there can be no valid answer to the question.

The human mind is constructed to seek out purpose. Looking for purposes is a very good survival tool. But when we apply it to things that are too big, like "the universe," "life," or "existence," we run into trouble.

OP, your question is kind of pointless. You can ask 1000 people and get a few hundred different answers. You might as well ask "what is your favourite colour".

Abrahamic (Christian, Jew, Muslim I think) viewpoint: God created all including us and he just created us to worship him.

Evolutionist viewpoint: Hahahahahahaha

Intelligent design viewpoint: Christians scoff scoff, evolutionists scoff scoff.

Alien ID viewpoint: Aliens created us so aliens are our gods.

My viewpoint: Pantheistic. We learn little bits as we go along, but we will never find these answers: How, when and why it was all created. I say somewhere in between a few billion and a few thousand. I also believe there was major alien interference in our growth.

reply to post by bunnytoes1973


Do you really want answers to those questions ? Let's say I give you an answer, why would you believe me ?

Believe nothing on the faith of traditions,
even though they have been held in honor
for many generations and in diverse places.
Do not believe a thing because many people speak of it.
Do not believe on the faith of the sages of the past.
Do not believe what you yourself have imagined,
persuading yourself that a God inspires you.
Believe nothing on the sole authority of your masters and priests.
After examination, believe what you yourself have tested
and found to be reasonable, and conform your conduct thereto.

Believe nothing merely because you have been told it.
Do not believe what your teacher tells you merely out of respect for the teacher.
But whatever, after due examination and analysis,
you find to be kind, conducive to the good, the benefit, the welfare of all beings -
that doctrine believe and cling to, and take it as your guide.

Buddha

That is beautiful and so right

reply to post by bunnytoes1973


God is the universe/multiverse. Everything composed in this reality is energy, and it is this energy which is ''god'' to me. My god is not really a god. The Tetragramaton. The ineffable...words cannot explain the magnitude of the supreme omniscience which is all the energy in the entire multiverse.

We are only in the 3rd dimension, and you can bet there are plenty more.


We are here on earth to grow spiritually. To water your soul like a plant.
Earth is all of us. We are all from the earth and we have within us, the earth. The spiritual being that is the earth, is everything on this planet and we have a direct ''telepathic'' connection to the earth.

Our everyday thoughts and actions do affect reality, believe it or not.

Earth is hell. Earth is the physical level, the most dense, and it is here where we experience the physical realm. The deepest pit of hell. A living hell, these wars, this greed, human nature, violence, anger, sadistic psychopaths, manipulators, et c.

A person who is immersed in these attributes remains physical and comes back to the physical plane over and over until they learn what it is that they need to learn.
Eventually they will find that love is what fuels the universe, CREATION! Fear, which leads to hate and anger, only leads to destruction.

There will be a time when people will realize that Jesus Christ and his book and stories were just metaphors. Ascension is not truly rising up from the dead, but awakening the higher spiritual aspect of your soul. Living a virtuous life and following the golden rule. Giving selflessly rather than taking selfishly.

There will be a time when people, as a majority, will realize that the most dominant religions have screwed with people's brains and have been corrupted from within, long before anyone here was a twinkle in their fathers eyes.
They will also realize that just because religions are hypocritical and guilt casting, that accessing your higher self doesn't take membership in any religion, cult, or secret society. It doesn't take ritual, worship, and confession.

It takes love. Loving all of creation, because all of creation is really the same thing. ENERGY. All the energy is connected, and the disconnection is what we perceive with our minds as reality. The duality of the universe. This is the matrix.

Follow the golden rule and love creation and you will ascend the physical realm.

I disagree with this thread, but everyone who has posted in it is 100% correct in my opinion.

"God"... "the nature of the Universe"... "the purpose of life"... all of these things are completely subjective and personal... as well they ought to be.

We should ask only ourselves these questions. One's perception and understanding of spirituality (or lack of) is incredibly personal. Look at the problems that have risen simply because people try to communicate such ideas... organized religions which do not allow people to create their own personal beliefs, but instead restrict you to dogma and doctrine... many wars have been waged over these disputes... it's just another thing used to separate us from one another.

For me personally, it's almost impossible to accurately verbalize my spiritual beliefs... it ought to be difficult, because we really have no business sharing our beliefs with others and trying to sway them to our point of view.

As for purpose... I think our purpose is this Moment... "purpose" is not a destination, but something that is active all the time. It's not necessarily "destiny" or "fate", but an awareness of how lucky and/or blessed I am to be here to experience this moment, to appreciate it, and also to be aware of the impact I have on all others I come in contact with. See, even this is too personal for me to verbalize effectively...

The meaning of life is constructed retrospectively and, when one can no longer do this, God is constructed as a delusional alternative, often under the guidance of power interests who can achieve it no other way