That’s interesting. You don’t feel closer to God on the political battleground. I wonder how this is on a larger scale. I definitely relate to that. Maybe frustration can lead the mind astray? I’ve also felt that in the quiet places, questions continue to linger even more though. How do you deal with those?
Questions used to linger for me as well, particularly at night time before I went to sleep. I’d lay awake for hours thinking about the big spiritual questions I had, though as you can probably relate, no significant questions were answered from the worrying. Not that that stopped me from doing it for ~5 of so years.
The silence no longer bothers me, though not because I stopped asking questions or found the answers I sought. I have more questions now, but I am content with not having the answers to them all, I now have what I lacked before, faith in God. Faith is not something we first gain from knowledge or comprehension of some secret insight, it starts with a personal decision to trust our creator, to watch and listen, and to remove our personal demands of requiring knowledge now.
Also, this will sound incredibly silly, but it’s a question I’ve really been struggling with. How do we know that I’m praying to the right God? Is it a feeling? An ascension of knowledge? I only realized recently that I don’t actually know what I’m praying to.
It’s not silly dude, these are the sorts of questions many people ask themselves now that we’re exposed to so much information and so many conflicting viewpoints. By definition there can only be one God who is all powerful, in the Christian understanding “God” is a Single Triune divine entity. Think about how when you bake a cake you put flour, eggs and milk in it to make the cake (Father, Son and Spirit) but in God’s case He’s both the cake and all the ingredients all at once. Confusing!
While it’s not Orthodox, I often find the website “GotQuestions[dot]org” to be helpful with these questions. Their post on what prayer is is quite well written and it worth a read: LINK. I would also recommend going to Church regularly and speaking with an Orthodox priest.
My personal thoughts on this topic which may help… For as far back as we can tell, humanity has seen that something is lacking within us at our core. We have been aware of some kind of gap, or a lack of “something”… we have attempted to understand what it is, and thus various religions (both formal and informal) have been formed in the pursuit of spirtual knowledge and understanding. One of the many things which astonished me, was how completely alien racial & cultural groups often had very similar understandings of God to one another, or at the very least an awareness of the spiritual. There were some differences unique to each culture, but often the core concept was similar. For example Norse Paganism, Christianity and the Vedic faith all share a similar overarching narrative of good vs evil (both physically and spiritually speaking), end times, and moral character to name a few. Perhaps most importantly, they share the concept of blood sacrifice for atonement. To me, such incredible similarities did not represent random chance, but rather highlighted the presence of a divine being attempting to draw humanity together, guiding us in the correct direction regardless of culture.
Romans 1: 19-22 - …For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools…
Within the Christian Faith we have the understanding of God which is the culmination of what all mankind has been searching for: Connection with God, made possible through Jesus Christ the ultimate blood sacrifice - filling that gap in our hearts.
How do we know we’re praying to the “right God”? Because there’s only one All Powerful God.
Alhamdulilah
An aside:
I have noticed through your posts a constant seeking for knowledge, which is excellent to see because God granted us minds to learn about the world, about Him. However, I would be hesitant to encourage that thinking alone will lead you to the answers you seek. Sad as it is to say, you would never attain enough knowledge to grant you Faith, never enough to fill the internal void. Surround yourself with Godly people (you will know them by their fruits) and you will learn more about God than studying ancient Greek philosophers (for example).