Many people absorbed a concept of God as a powerful old man with a white beard who sits on a throne and judges you. Even if you didn't grow up with this concept of God, the chances are at some point you absorbed the belief that God is judgmental, punishing and controlling ? perhaps similar to your parents.

Yet The Bible clearly states that God is Love and God is Spirit:

John 4:24

?God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.?

1 John 4:8

He who does not love does not know God, for God is love.?

1 John 4:16

?God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him.

Jesus tells us that God is within us and all around us. This tells me that our essence, our soul, our true Self, is a spark of God within us, and that our soul as a spark of God is both within us and all around us, always guiding us toward our joy and highest good.

How would your life change if you thought of God as unconditional love, wisdom, and comfort?

Imagine for a moment that you are a parent who dearly loves your child. What do you want for your child? Of course you want your child to be happy, joyful, and fulfilled. You want the very best for your child. You do not set up tests for your child that he or she has to pass in order to receive your love, for your love is a free gift. Your child does not have to earn your love. You are always there, ready to listen, understand, and support your child in his or her highest good. You do not judge, and you do not punish. Instead, you guide by loving example.

This is my experience of God ? or whatever you want to call the Source of all that is. My experience is that God as Love is as present as the air we breathe, and that we can experience this wisdom, guidance, love, compassion and comfort each and every moment ? whenever we are open to it.

Many of the people I counsel refuse to open to this love and guidance because they believe they will be controlled by God. ?What if God tells me that I need to leave my family and go on a mission in Africa?? Just as a loving parent does not tell a child how to be, but instead supports who the child is and what brings the child joy, God would never guide you to do something you do not want to do. Yet believing that God is controlling stops many people from connecting with the love and guidance that is always here for them.

In my life, I am always open to learning, with my spiritual guidance, about what is most loving to me. Instead of having to figure this out with my limited mind, I open my heart to my feelings within ? my inner source of Guidance, and to the thoughts that support my highest good ? my outer source of Guidance. It is a great comfort to know that I am never alone, that I am always being guided and supported in my highest good.

If you want to have the experience of God being your friend, then open to learning with God about what is in your highest good. You will know you are being guided in your highest good by how you feel. Your bad feelings are God's way of telling you that you are off track in your thinking and behavior, and your good feelings are God's way of telling you that you are thinking and behaving in ways that are in alignment with the highest good of your soul.