[Book excerpt]: Becoming Like God (ritual, hell, pray, spiritual)

[Jeffery Anderson]

Becoming Like God
by Michael Berg
Kabbalah Publishing; (September 9, 2004) ISBN: 1571892427



Chapter Two:
God Disguised as You

According to the Bible, “Man was created in God’s
image, in God’s image man was created.” Kabbalah
teaches that there are no superfluous words in the
Bible, so why the repetition? It urges the reader to pay
attention. DO NOT MISS THIS.YOU ARE CREATED
IN GOD’S IMAGE.

YOU HAVE THE SAME ESSENCE AND THEREFORE
THE SAME POTENTIAL AS GOD.YOU
ARE DESTINED TO BECOME LIKE GOD, SO
KEEP ASKING YOURSELF, AM I LIKE GOD YET?
AM I MANIFESTING GODLY POWERS? CAN I
HEAL THE SICK AND BLESS PEOPLE? HAVE I
RESURRECTED THE DEAD? THE YARDSTICK
SUDDENLY EXTENDS TO INFINITY. I DON’T
JUST MEASURE MYSELF AGAINST MYSELF.
I MEASURE MYSELF AGAINST GOD.

frail and spoke with a lisp. Greatness is not reserved for
the great. THE GREAT ARE SIMPLY THOSE WHO
HAVE RISEN TO MEET THEIR DESTINY. Everyone
alive has a destiny infinitely richer than they know.

Dullness and boredom come from unmet or abandoned
potential. It’s television ratings soaring. It’s playing
computer games when you were meant to compose
sonatas. IF YOU’RE NOT DOING WHAT YOU
WERE MEANT TO DO—AND EACH PERSON
WAS MEANT FOR SOMETHING ASTONISHING—
YOU’LL NEVER ENJOY CONTENTMENT.
Imagine Dr. Jonas Salk becoming a successful businessman,
a generous citizen, and a wonderful father,
but never going near a lab. What may have seemed a
good life would in fact have been tragic, the pain and
suffering he was meant to remove from the world
never having been achieved.

A great spiritual leader with thousands of students and
many books to his credit once told his story.

When I was eleven, he said, I was a lost
cause as a student. I never minded my
teachers and I played hooky from school at
every opportunity. Then one evening, I
heard my parents in the next room talking
about me. My mother was crying.

“What are we going to do with our son?”
she said to my father. “He has no interest in
his studies. He doesn’t want go to school,
and any day now they will expel him. Then
what will become of him?”

As I listened to her, a strange event
occurred: I could feel her anguish as acutely
as if it had been my own. I burst into the
room and I told her I was sorry. I promised
that I would be a good student and obedient
from that moment on. I made the promise
not because I cared about studying but
because I cared about my mother and did
not want to cause her pain. I kept my word
and changed my ways. I became studious
and never missed a day of school, and I grew
up to be the scholar you see before you now.

My point is this: If I had not overheard my
parents that day, what would have become
of me? Well, I would have been a good person,
since it was in my nature to do so. I
would have prayed, I would have given to
charity, I would have enabled many others
to earn a good living. However, imagine
what would have happened after I left this
world and arrived in the place called the
“heavenly court.”

My judges would say, “Where are your
thousands of students?”

I would gape at them and reply, “What are
you talking about? I was a merchant and
I did good business, but I didn’t have any
information to impart to even a handful of
students, let alone thousands. Let’s talk
instead about the sums of money I gave to
charity.”

And then they would say, “Where are the
dozens of books you were supposed to
write?”

Again, I’d look at them as if they were
unhinged. “What do you mean, ‘dozens of
books?’ I wasn’t illiterate—I could read and
write—but I had no reason to write any
books; I had nothing to teach anyone. Let’s
talk instead about the many kindnesses I
bestowed on my friends, my family, and my
customers.”

Then they would show me everything I
could have achieved, everything I should
have done. Can you imagine the grief I
would feel in that moment? There is no
greater hell than to see what we might have
done, but in fact failed to do.

SO THIS IS THE MEASURE:WHERE AM I, NOT
IN REFERENCE TO OTHERS, BUT IN REFER-
ENCE TO MYSELF? WHERE AM I ON THE
ROAD OF MY OWN POTENTIAL? Growth should
not be linear, but exponential. A little growth increases
our feeling of contentment exponentially and every step
makes the next one easier.

If our thoughts and actions are not taking us toward
God, we need to change. What progress are we making?
That cannot be quantified by anyone outside ourselves.
WE NEED TO ASK OURSELVES THIS: IF
WE CONTINUE IN OUR LIFE’S TRAJECTORY
FOR 5, 10, OR 20 YEARS,WHERE WILL WE BE?
WILL WE BECOME LIKE GOD YET? The answer
should make us rethink our efforts. As we dissolve our
prison chains and merge our essence back into God’s
essence, we reveal our godly nature more and more.
Eventually, we may become immortal, and even resurrect
the dead. It is this vision we keep before us,
immovably.

Copyright Michael Berg 2004

For more information visit: www.becominglikegod.com