The official consolation for living in an untrustworthy world, of course, is to trust God. But in the context of distrusting all of one's fellows, "in God we trust" takes on a chilling new inference: God is the ONLY one you can trust. From that, we get this: JESUS (or Mohammed, Buddha, Rama, Krishna, Zoroaster) is the only GOOD person, our only TRUE and reliable friend -- the sole ally of every single soldier on both sides in the "holy wars" of life. What does this doctrine imply?

As the "only friend" of the English Protestants, does Jesus agree with them that Catholics should be killed? And also, as the only friend of the Catholics in North Ireland, does Jesus agree that his other good friends -- the Protestants -- should be killed? OF COURSE it strains our credulity to think that God roots for Protestants over Catholics, Muslims over Jews, or Americans over Arabs. But SIMILARLY: it is hard to believe God wants us to turn to Him out of fear and distrust of all His other children. Apparently, traditional religions want us to accept the doctrine that God is our only real friend WITHOUT reviewing its implications on any of these levels.

Indeed, most people are not at all troubled by these implications. They welcome the news that God is their only friend as GREAT NEWS -- GREAT in three very DIFFERENT ways. First, to the spirit, it is great news that we should put our faith strongly on God. Second, to the ego, it is great news to be able to dismiss the feedback of human companions, and "go straight to God." This makes life EASIER. Third -- this is also great news for the ego -- when the ego speaks of surrender to God, what it generally refers to is surrender to itself.

From the ego's point of view, the beauty of bypassing man and going straight to God is this: if you rely only on God, you are free to make up just about anything you want about what God told you, and maintain total sovereign control over your life. It's a little harder to do that with real human beings. The problem with friends (again from the ego's perspective) is you can't misunderstand what people tell you half as well as you can misunderstand the vague messages you believe you MIGHT be receiving "direct from God." Even if your friends' opinion is not always right, at least you know what their opinion IS.

The alternative of Divine feedback is a little more "flexible." When it comes to consulting with God, precious few people can clearly hear the voice of spirit. In such cases, talking to God is not much different than talking to their own brain. From a spiritual point of view that may sound tragic, but getting advice from your own brain is quite welcome if you really WANT to live a self-directed life. The ego certainly enjoys the chance to run its own affairs without Divine intervention.

Granted, not everyone who seeks God's guidance is egoically motivated. Everybody should make every effort to tune in to Divine direction. But nobody should ignore the fact that the ego loves to co-opt Divine direction for its own purposes. The expressed desire for a GOD-directed life can be a thinly disguised desire for a life that is more fully EGO-directed. You might suspect that's the case when patterns of living demonstrate a STRONG preference for involvement with spiritually clueless people, combined with a tendency to exclude or avoid people of higher consciousness. AVOIDING that pitfall is one reason why two heads are far better than one. Another reason is this: "Where two or more are gathered in my name, there I am also."

The truth is, most people do not truly trust God, either. As we just noted, the "Divine guidance" many people get is little more than ego-steering -- and we all know how well that works. Besides, how trustworthy is a God who would place us on a planet where no one else can be trusted? Ultimately, the only way to truly trust God is to trust Him AND His children.