It was totally unexpected!
It was a stunningly beautiful day in Paris, the first sunny day since we had touched down in France.
As we snaked our way through the long queue to climb the Eiffel tower, my pensive thoughts about French people’s passionate relationship with their history, one of the brightest leaders in this cohort interrupted my thoughts with this completely unexpected question, “Mr V,” as they affectionately call me, “what do you believe?”
Now we have been in this programme for about two years. We have had many conversations with my cohort about faith and spiritual matters.
Lady M (I’m in the habit of prefixing my salutations with Lady or Master to telegraph that I work with leaders of industries, not students) is a deep thinker. When she asks questions, she has thought about it long and hard.
What I said next surprised even myself. Normally when a question is asked, I explore the contours of the origins of the question. I don’t know if this was the allure of being in the land of passion or being enwrapped in the imposing structure of the Eiffel tower, but I found myself saying something that would not ordinarily make it through my filters unless I had had time to write about it (my thoughts generally get better when I write about them).
I said to her, “I believe that humankind’s conceptualisation of God is wrong.”
Normally quite circumspect, she could not conceal her shock. Surprised myself, I tried to back out of the conversation, saying, “One day, I will blog about this.” But she wouldn’t allow me.
“We have time,” she said. The snail-paced queue meant we were going to be about another 20 minutes in the shadows of the imposing Eiffel Tower. So, I steadied my mind, for I knew what I was about to say would redefine Lady M’s worldview on faith and spirituality, and even her perception of me.
“Since the dawn of humanity, humankind has always had a transactional relationship with God or their gods for that matter,” I cautiously began. “In other words, humankind’s relationship with God or gods has always been on the basis of what they can get,” I continued.
Now whenever I study the relationship of anything with something else in the little that I know about our universe, there is always an evolution of these relationships over time. This is why we have seasons, change in climate, or even an expanding universe… every relationship between the elements is in some state of evolution.
The relationship with my children is not the same as it was when they were toddlers as it is now that they are teenagers or young adults. While they were toddlers, I had to use a fair bit of a transactional approach to teaching them about the consequences of life: if you do this, you will get this or this will happen to you; if you pass, I will buy you something you want.
As teenagers and young adults, I expect some intrinsic motivation from them. I expect them to clean after themselves and the house not because there is a reward, but because it is good to do so.
At some stage our relationship cannot be based on a reward or extrinsic motivation. In fact, I will measure their maturity based on them doing what is good not because they will be rewarded, but because it is good.
Now humankind seems to have a stubborn refusal to evolve their relationship with God from a reward-based system. Religion seems to be bent on imprisoning humanity at the toddler stage of human spirituality; you must believe in God if you don’t want to end up in hell, it asserts.
Now, this is what I believe. Jesus came to announce the evolution of humankind from a toddler-stage transactional relationship with God to an adult stage of transformational fellowship. This is why He said, “You have had it said (toddler stage rule set), now I say (introducing mature adult reality).”
At this stage, we had reached the first check-point where they were checking tickets.
Lady M asked me what I thought about the role of ancestors in faith. I shared with her that there are two kinds of relationships I have observed in how people relate to ancestors. The first is a historical curiosity and learning from their wisdom; the second is the same as all other religions, a transactional one, where people hope that by doing a particular thing, they will attain the thing they desire in their lives.
I shared with her my observation of the trend where many Africans are trading one transactional relationship from what they term a ‘Western God’, with another in what they call African spirituality.
In my view, they are playing musical chairs. It’s just different forms of toddler-level transactional spirituality.
By this time, we had reached the boarding point for the amazingly swift lift up the Eiffel Tower. We mutually agreed our conversation was to be continued.
Since this conversation, I have resolved to include a chapter on transactional spirituality in my next book Liberating Glory! (It’s a long time coming I know… but it will be worth the wait.)
