Colossians 1:16

“For through him God created everything in heaven and on earth, the seen and the unseen things, including spiritual powers, lords, rulers, and authorities. God created the whole universe through him and for him.”

MASSIVE UNDERTAKING

There seems to be an increasingly growing intention of reframing the very grounds of belief in spirituality and how it relates to God.

Many people who don’t associate with any religion, religious organization or belief system, may consider themselves atheistic or agnostic varying on the way they explain the nature of their unbelief.

However, many of these unbelievers seem to be experiencing the repercussion of the massive undertaking it is to live without belief in anything at all, spiritually-speaking. There is in some sense a reconsideration taking place that there must be more to life than the physical nature of our experiences in this world. Unbelievers are calling their somewhat revised, upgraded belief in something beyond their ability to explain—spirituality.

Unfortunately, this is an incomplete thought, and yet it is the final thought for such people. This is the last sentence of their mission statement. They are spiritual and they may even believe they have a soul. But… there is still no room for belief in God.

THE IMMATERIAL SPIRIT

Let me put it bluntly. There is no such thing as spirituality without God. Here’s why.

The word “spirit” is defined by the following: “the nonphysical part of a person that is the seat of emotions and character; the soul.” Soul is in the very definition of spirit. The very nature of there being a nonphysical part of ourselves confirms there cannot be an immaterial part without something or someone from whom it came. Let’s think of it in simpler terms. In the same way there cannot first be a body without there being creators of a new body (Parents), there cannot be a spirit without a spirit Creator—God. And if spirits have a spirit Creator, then spirituality is not without the Creator of that which is spiritual. Refer back to Colossians 1:16 above for reference. 

EVASION OF A CLEARER EXPLANATION

One detail I do not understand about the attempts to evade the admittance that spirituality comes from God, is the fact that people have to deliberately struggle their way through explanation and train of thought (in other words, they must “beat around the bush”) to get absolutely nowhere in clarifying how they came to the conclusion of spirituality without the Biblical God. The only God from any religious belief capable of both creating but also of being all-loving, IS the God of the Bible.

Any other god, according the belief attached to them, merely has relative similarity to the demonstration of God’s power, but any other god makes it appear as though all God is capable of is being all-powerful; He can create and destroy, and He can hold together—but He won’t send someone to die for our sins, or meet us in our hardships and be closer than a brother (Proverbs 18:24). The latter is the Biblical God. But to follow-up, here’s a prominent question we should consider heavily: What other God would we want to believe in if the Biblical one is the only one that offers salvation?

I guess we’d have to believe in sin first, and that is another article for another time.

AN OLD POINT: SOMETHING DOESN’T COME FROM NOTHING

Let’s back up some. We simply cannot say, “There must be an immaterial part of ourselves,” especially if the assumption is that it is just there, the way we are just here. Laws of nature don’t work that way. The laws didn’t create themselves, and the fact that laws function the way they do wasn’t established independently, otherwise we’d be claiming that the laws themselves have intelligent minds. At that point we’re delving into pantheistic territory, the belief that nature and God are one, which is contradictory since there is no argument for creation’s creation of itself (something from nothing). Let’s not run in circles chasing tails.

TRANSCENDENT NATURE

Spirituality, the secular version, is a self-realized belief not shared between ourselves and a Higher Power, because again, secular spiritualists don’t believe in God. They don’t associate with anything deeper than the belief that this physical life is all there is. The deepest spiritual belief unbelievers hold may be considered in the thought that “nature is transcendent.” But if we’re looking at it closely, are we saying nature is an inanimate, insentient and yet transcendent object? How did it become that way? How did the laws of transcendence become applied? Who applied them? Why are those laws of transcendence important, and who placed the importance on them? Did we? If so, who gave us that power to decide what is transcendent?

A FOUNDATION-LESS BELIEF

This rabbit-hole is getting a LOT of different tracks. How can one decide they are spiritual without first answering every single one of those questions with an answer that is coherent, and based in truth? Spirituality, without God, is not founded in any form of truth, nor does it have any coherency. The best answers we come up with only cause more questions to rise, and that really isn’t a great impetus to start believing in something.

What astounds me about this topic is this. We have the capacity to think out and implement the decimation of portions of a human race; we have the mental complexity to become masters at rocket science, but when it comes to believing in God, we choose to arrogantly and vacuously explain how spirituality exists without actually admitting to an intelligent, all-powerful, all-loving Creator. This is mind-boggling, leaving me completely and thoroughly unimpressed.

NUMB TO SIN

This is spiritual negligence. This is the best human attempt to squeeze out every last drop of possibility of God’s existence. And why would that be desirable? It’s simple, really—deplorable to be frank, but simple. Sinners without repentance want to eradicate the notion of the existence of an omniscient God, the Biblical God, in order to continue to sin without belief of eternal repercussion. There is no other motive but to numb ourselves to the inner consequences of living a sinful life. We want it our way and no other way, even if that means living in spiritual ignorance and shrugging off everything pointing to the existence of a God who clearly sustains us right now, and who will always sustain those who believe in His Son, Jesus.

WHY ARE WE HIDING INSTEAD OF REPENTING?

The sole reason God came in Christ was to show us the way back to Himself, despite our sin. There is no way around it: Sin exists because we chose it over Him. And He’s forgiven us, if we have faith in Jesus Christ. But ignorance? Trying every other “spiritual” road besides God? This is the lowest ground we can crouch down to in attempt to hide from the overarching sky of existing reasons to believe in God, to rest our spirit in Christ, to be reborn and live differently. This is humanity acting out “lukewarm” faith (Revelation 3:16), trying to be more than unbelievers while not giving glory to God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength.

RUNNING FROM WHAT WE DESIRE

The purpose of this loop-holed version of spirituality without God is from the idea that we get closer to ourselves; more in alignment with our own spirit. Let’s be clear: There’s nothing wrong with connecting with oneself; that is called self-reflection, and is healthy. But what we’re not looking at, and which exists side-by-side with self-reflection, is that there is more in existence than just us. Since, for there to even be an us, there must be something before us. Why are we not paying any attention to that Source? We are trying to get close to ourselves without understanding the nature of that closeness, or where that closeness even comes from. God is love, and we want love, and to have love for ourselves. Meditation, letting to of attachments, believing in being generous and loving and good are all nice things to want and do… but they’re all empty of substance without God as the foundational reason for any of them.

Think about this. What part of ourselves are we trying so hard to get close to if not the part of ourselves that God placed in us to desire Him?

INDEPENDENT SPIRITUALITY LEADS NOWHERE

If we ignore this point, then we completely miss the point of spirituality. We miss the purpose of prayer, of submission to God, of reverence to His power, of humbleness to His grace and mercy, and gratitude for His forgiveness. We miss everything, all because we’d rather sin and not call it so. But it is. There’s living for ourselves, or there’s living for God in Christ. There’s believing in Jesus, or there’s believing in anything that isn’t of Jesus. There’s purpose that God created for us to have, or there’s a self-fulfilling prophecy to do “our own thing” and consequently live without God for eternity. And it might feel good here on Earth, being independent and pursuing a “spiritual” life without God, but that lifestyle leads to an isolated, horrifying eternity one cannot come back from.

When will we stop choosing ourselves and our sinful ways and start to see that the reason love is so important to us is because God placed in our hearts a desire to be close with Him in Jesus, and by avoiding, ignoring, and trying to push that part of ourselves away, we push ourselves further from the very treasure we desire so desperately. And then we substitute closeness with God in Christ with anything we can fathom under the sun. As long as it’s not God.

SUMMARY AND PRAYER

There is no spirituality without God. There is no soul without God. There is no hope without Jesus Christ as our Lord. I pray for our eyes to be opened, our hearts to be softened to be made of flesh to seek the Lord with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength. No more replacing God with ignorant spirituality.

Jesus, keep us from allowing ourselves to be blinded by Satan, who only wants us to see what we want to see. Let us see you the way you desire for us to. Help us live the way you call us to, and grant us wisdom, courage, love, and discernment as we seek your will above our own. May it be so in the perfect name of Jesus. Amen.

Photo by Wolfgang Hasselmann on Unsplash