March 1, 2020: A Metaphor For The Divine - Michael Hidalgo

Scripture: Exodus 3.14

All language for God is metaphor. How else do we explain the Divine Mystery, the Ground of Being, God? Throughout the Bible there are myriad word-pictures used in an attempt to explain the deepest of all realities in our universe. And there should be limitless ways of talking about God because, after all, we are speaking about the ineffable, the One who holds all things together.

Perhaps the most common metaphor for God is Father. This is how we see Jesus constantly speak of God. However, we have failed to complement Father with the idea of Mother - a picture richly woven into the tapestry of Scripture - but seemingly missed, overlooked or flatly ignored. Whatever the motive and reason, missing this harms us, as we did not give ourselves a more complete way of understanding God. In doing so, we make God smaller and less than. So what can happen if we move toward a bigger picture of God?