By Pastor Robert Perez

I believe in diversity in all areas of human existence, with the only criteria for negation being harm to others (humans and non-humans alike) or to the self. In my own one-man space, I am a Christian, by cultural upbringing and by choice, which can be argued means I am biased from the start in any conversation about God. In my defense, I’ve been extremely careful not to allow proclivities to pigeonhole my views. Which is how I learned there are many roads to the same destination.

My quest is simple, find God. Some may take offense in my stating that I am still looking for God when I call myself a Pastor. Shouldn’t I have found Him by now? Yes and no. I’m bonded to God on a deep profound level and know that He exists, but that doesn’t mean that I fully understand God or even barely understand. It is my sworn duty to learn as much as possible and share that knowledge with as many people as I can, in this lifetime and beyond with what I leave behind.

I knew from the start of my quest that I could not believe in the existence of God just for the sake of it. I needed proper scrutiny from multiple sources. My stringent search for God (which is a lifetime pursuit) has me traveling the Universe for answers and the truth by means of science, philosophy, and the study of diverse cultures and religions.

I’m no scientist, but I can understand well enough scientific conclusions when they’re explained with language to a level that is for average intelligence and education, as most scientists can do. As for philosophy, I can scrutinize arguments for myself with careful enough reading, same for cultures and religions. I used this method of mixed information to inform or negate my analysis, careful to not allow bias-reasoning to reinforce my cultural imprinting about God. I wanted the real truth and was prepared to find out the opposite, no God. But instead, the most wonderful thing happened.

My first conclusion is that God exists, for real in the real. He careens through the material and the incorporeal. He is not of matter, but rather exists inside and out of it. He is protean. Next, God is in control of past, present and future. For all of our arrogance as a species, we tend not to take proper account of our limitations. With that said, we cannot calculate on the level by which God is controlling the Universe. We barely see slivers of slivers of slivers. Lastly, God seeks harmony, which gets misinterpreted and mislabel as ‘God is good’. God’s fidelity is to His plan of which we are only a very small part of. There are many more truths, but these are the foundations by which the Universe operates with God as its unifying force.

It’s by design that we felt God and by design that we pursued after Him. How cool is it that as humans evolved across the Earth, independent groups with no knowledge of others, discovered there was more to life than eating, sleep, procreating and dying. Today, science tries to explain it just as the world’s leading religions do, but we’re all looking for the same thing, God, with a capital G or otherwise. Besides, God existed before man, and He’ll exist after we expire from the Universe one day. God is infinite, we are not.

God is real, and I love the road I took to get to that understanding.

These truths are evident by conclusions based on sound reasoning, not biased leanings. I am a devout Christian but with diverse understandings. Let me add, that I am not stating that Christianity is the only road by which you can reach this understanding.

It is not my job to ‘sell Christianity’, but only offer it as a means to get there. I make no claims of arrogant positioning. I’m proud to be a Christian, a believer and disciple of Jesus. Yet I’m saddened by how his life and teachings have been wrongfully exploited. Likewise, I’m saddened how like-minded people of all religions have coveted God for themselves in the same manner.

Just because I know God and arrived there by Christian means, let me state again and again that it is not ONLY by Christian means that I got there. And after careful analysis of other religions and spiritual people, I concluded definitively that it’s not the only bus heading into that town. This doesn’t disappoint me, it excites me! God is the destination regardless of your vehicle.

Ultimately, I just hope you get there, by the only way really possible, privately with your own mind and heart.

Pastor Robert Perez is an Ordained Minister, as well as, a professional artist, photographer, director and writer.

To view the visual work of Pastor Robert Perez visit: Artist Robert Perez™