Musing #7: God as a slippery fish

I have an image of God in my head as a slippery fish. Let me try to explain! I believe that God is mystery and beyond our comprehension – our words and our thoughts will never capture who God is.  But words are what we have.  So, in our human-ness and our desire to understand we try to explain God: we pull him into our perception and, in so doing, we fail to see who he really is.

I’ve never held a fish that is still alive but, in my head, I see a fish thrashing around as I try desperately to hold onto it.  Until I realise that if I continue to hold onto this beautiful creature, it will die.  I will have the fish, but it will have lost its life.  My experience of God is that when I hold onto him too tightly – when I think I have understood and can explain God – he ‘dies’.  God becomes something else – a set of beliefs and rules - and is no longer alive.  I need to hold on to God lightly and let him slip out of my hands.  The thing with God is that we will never fully understand him.  The point is to keep seeking.

Free from our hands God, the fish, slips back into the water.  Water that spreads and seeps into the tightest of corners.  Water that is deep and broad and holds treasure beyond our imagining.  When God slips out of our hands he doesn’t want us to walk away: stay at the water’s edge and seek him.  As we stare into the depths we may catch a glimpse – the flick of his tail as he dances beneath the surface.  If we keep gazing, he may leap like a flash of silver to capture our attention again. 

Contemplation is in the gazing and the seeking.  Contemplation is coming to realise that God is not just the fish but the whole expanse of water.  And as I seek God I may also paddle in the shallows of his very being. Or take a deep breath and dive into him. Or feel, as I gaze, the spring of his spirit rising up in me.  God can not be held tightly and understood but he is constantly inviting us to dance with him in the waters of his spirit.

Photo by Mael Balland on Unsplash