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I am a pastor and a clinical psychotherapist. My life's passion is defining healthiness from a human perspective and paralleling it to the holiness of God, divine perspective. Shifting perspectives creates a paradigm that is alongside of rather than over and against. The parakalein of God and the paradoxes of humanity are redefined. Humanity is all about winning and yet we are losing ground everywhere. Divinity is all about letting go of the desire to win and the fear of loss. The Divine embraces the world with loving care regardless of anything.

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Sad and Serene day

Posted by Don Paine

Today, I attended my cousin's wife's funeral.  There was sadness in the air.  There was serenity all around everyone especially my cousin Ken and his son Steve and daughter Lauren.

Their pastor told the story of how, just months earlier, Lynn Ewell was a vibrant, faithful, always there Mom attending to her daughter, Lauren's wedding.  A fife and drum parade that usually blanketed another part of the little harbor town of Essex, CT was taking over and shutting down Main Street where the church was located.  A state police officer had stopped the limo with the wedding party.  Lynn told him it was her daughters wedding day and no parade of Fife and Drum Band was going to get in the way of her daughters wedding.  At the top of the hill the wedding party exited the limo and extended their parade in their wedding attire toward the church. As the parade of fife and drum Corp marched up the street, Mom and the wedding party marched down the street.

The pastor spoke of the inconsistencies of life.  You never know what is going to happen.  The inconsistencies meet head on the consistence and constancy of God;s love and grace regardless of anything.  The Fife and Drum Corp celebrating 1814 as history met the consistency of a Wedding of Love celebrating future.  The convergence of the past and the future meet in the present always.  In every present moment God;s grace is abundantly present.  God's presence is the consistency in all life's inconsistencies.

Whenever two opposing forces converge God's presence always wins.  Today life and death converged and life wins.  Mortality and immortality converge and immortality wins. Cancer of the body and communion of the saints converge and the communion of the saints wins.  The corruption and decay of the body meets the incorruption and transformation of the body and transformation wins. Life so short meets life everlasting and life everlasting wins. Earth and heaven converge and heaven wins. Hurts and healing converge and healing wins.  Loss and Love converge and Love wins.

There is one absolute truth:  God is love and Love triumphs over all, in all, through all, and to all.

Lynn is sending another message:  No parade of fife and drum or anything will stop the parade of God's love that welcomes you home where there is healing, wholeness, and consistent loving presence forever and ever Amen.

later on in the day as we drove to the cemetery there was some rain, then some sun, then some rain, then some sun, then we gathered at place where Lynn's loving body would be placed with love in the earth.  As the pastor offered consistent consolation and comfort of God's presence, it began to rain harder and harder until a deluge forced everyone closer together under the canopy.  When the pastor completed the service a voice said, "I think Lynn is again speaking, 'huddle up, get closer together be there for each other".  When the sun is shining enjoy.  When the stormy rain comes consistently draw closer together and find God close at hand.  Consistently right there through all the inconstancies of life.

"And Lo I am with you even unto the end" and in the end we discover that there is no end.  Amen.  Thanks be to God!

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