Let Us Make Man in Our Image

A question I've had recently and How being an Earth-lover, moon-lover, and star-lover caused my relationship with God to form and strengthen.

Note from the writer: This essay is the first essay I’ve written on spirituality. It’s about my personal beliefs and experiences and nothing else. I am not trying to convince or convert you into being anyone or believing in a certain thing. My faith, knowledge, and beliefs are ever-growing and I would be a fool to reside myself into standing in a belief that does not fulfill me.

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A few days ago, I wrote “Five things I can talk about with zero prep: … How being an earth-lover, star-lover, moon-lover, bettered my relationship with God.”

On February 23, 2023, I woke at 5:30 am. My body calling for me to go outside and cry. By then, my body was turning inward. Physically fighting a feeling. I had sharp chest pains at night and a consistent nausea. Feeling suffocated, I listened to that feeling and went barefoot outside. Once in the grass, I was scared. Anything could come up out of the ground and bite me. All at once, I started sobbing. I realized how fearful I was of the Earth being out to get me. Not only was I afraid of men, but I was afraid of spiders and worms; I was afraid of grass.

I was afraid of being alone, being left. I was afraid of my own emotions.

Tears streaming down my face, I took in my surroundings. A large tree that seemed to be at least 70 years old had branches practically covering the sky, which was a grey hue of blue and subtly fading away as the sun slowly woke. Though the tree was not of bushy greenery, it was one of the most grand things I’ve ever seen in my entire life.

Within nature, there was peace.

A day later, in my journal a prompt I was answering was: What are visible and invisible signs of God’s love? In response, I wrote: “The proof that growth is not linear: trees, vegetation. And the proof that we, as humans, are also creators like God.”

I was talking to my mother the other day. I said, “Who was God talking to when she said ‘Let us make man in our image’¹?”

“I was taught that God was talking to the angels,” Mom said.

“Why would God be talking to them?” This confused me because there is little to no descriptions about angels looking like humans. What would it mean for humans to be made in an angels’ image.

“I don’t know,” Mom replied.

Rereading my favorite passages of the Bible (the entirety of the first verse of Genesis), I searched for who God was talking to. The only things — or energies — with God was the Earth, the sun, and the moon: branches of God, herself. I couldn't even imagine the intricacies of God. But here’s what I’ve concluded within myself:

I’m in the trees, the soil, and the seed.

I am plants: I withhold seed, I blossom, I grow, I move in seasons, I develop roots as I age, I create anew.

I am the ocean, I am every animal on earth all at once. I’m a portal between Heaven and Earth. I am stardust. I am the Earth. And God is within me for He was my original creator, before my Mother and Father.

As I age and approach the time in which I leave Earth and return to God, the Earth appears more and more on my skin, in my eyes, and within the strands of my hair.

Before I return back to dust and back to spirit, stretch marks resemble thunder strikes; pupils: rocks that a nuzzled away into the soil and beach shore or the stars themself; arm and leg hairs: grass, afros, bushes of leaves on trees; fingerprints: stumps of trees and snowflakes; blush: a sweet sunrise; cellulite: puddles and bodies of water; textured skin: the bark of a tree.

The Earth takes care of me, as I take care of it.

My duty to my self and to God is to be a bearer of nurturing and positive energy, a minister-steward of the land, and a lover of the Earth and other people.

I was not put on Earth to change the world. I was put on Earth to love the world.

Love is patient, love is kind². God is love.

For: Father God & Mother Earth.

All the love and goodness within me is from you,

Yulani S

1. Genusis 1:26

2. 1 Corinthians 13:4-8