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Jalāl ad-Dīn Muhammad Rūmī, also known as Jalāl ad-Dīn Muhammad Balkhī, Mevlânâ/Mawlānā, Mevlevî/Mawlawī, and more popularly simply as Rumi, was a 13th-century Persian Sunni Muslim poet, jurist, Islamic scholar, theologian, and Sufi mystic.

He wrote this which is as pertinent to our discussions as any human insight:

“When we talk about God, we are like a school of fish discussing the existence of the sea.”

This great immutable God, omniscient, omnipresent and many more beautiful titles, creator of all, out-with time, is with us around us and as the author of the Book of Acts puts it, “For in him we live and move and have our being. As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’”

If we have learned to see, God can be seen in everything and everywhere and in every other creature. This realisation fills us with awe, with amazement and thankfulness, with love and with joy. We are his children. Our life, our heartbeats are His and His alone and therefore only the blind fool turns his back and denies the existence of the sea.

Wouldn’t it be easier if we could understand God in a more human way? If we could see Him. 

Thus in a moment of time He came to us, not as a mighty roaring in the skies but as a helpless baby, given the name Jesus. Understanding that Jesus was both fully God and Man is hard to grasp, but less hard to accept. It was hard for those who first met him. Yet they weren’t with him and in his presence for very long before they began falteringly to realise that this human being was also the perfect God. That he was walking and talking just like us but was also the mighty God.

Yet he came peacefully, quietly, with love and mercy into day to day life. His words and actions told the story. So he gave us the ability to see all that we can cope with just now with our limited intellects something of the reality of the nature of God.

We may not physically see him now. But he is alive and well and with us and two thousand years of experiencing him lie behind us. Billions have found their way into his loving arms and have enjoyed a joyful union with him. Those of us who have the wonder of this in our own lives can only share with others the joy of this experience. We are the fish that accept the existence of the sea.

There is of course only one God. Yet he is three distinct persons. Father, Son and Holy Spirit. This we have experienced yet we know there is but one God. It is difficult, impossible to understand this and yet it is our experience. It was what Jesus showed us as the truth.

No words can hold or explain all of this. We stumble and fall if we think about it, as such a state of existence, is beyond our ability to put into words. We don’t need to know all the ins and outs, we wouldn’t understand it anyway. It is not however a blind leap of faith, we experience it.

I fell in love with my wife the first time I cast eyes on her when she walked through the school hall. I had no idea who she was or her name but in that instant I knew I would marry her. I was twelve. Five years later we met properly. My love has grown but never altered from the knowledge of that first sight of her. Can I explain that in anyway that makes sense, not a chance!

So it is with God, just as I was blinded by love for my wife so I was blinded by love for The Lord, when finally my eyes were opened and I learned to see.