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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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Darkness and Light

Posted by Don Paine

Last night I spoke at a Lenten Series regarding the darkness of grief and grace.

Darkness is the primordial existence of all things.  Darkness while used to cloak evil is not itself evil.  The psalmist tells us that "though I walk through the shadow of death, you are with me".  Darkness is not the absence of God for God sees equally in light and darkness and God is in darkness and light.  Moses saw that as he approached the "thick darkness" God was there in the darkness. (Exodus 20:21).

God is all around us in the thick darkness of grief, in the thickets of failure, and in the light, the days of wine and roses when all is well.  God is present always in everything seeing and calling forth the light of new understanding and new experiences of presence.

God's light does not dispel the darkness in the sense that we get rid of the darkness but God takes the negative spin and the spell out of the darkness.

When my brother died it felt like darkness gripped my soul as a spell of hopelessness and despair.  It was not the darkness but the fear of being abandoned left alone in the darkness that gripped my soul and put a spell on me.  When grace came into the darkness, I was no longer afraid.  Grace meets grief in its thick darkness and rests in God's being there.  I could be in the darkness of grief and fear no evil knowing truly knowing that God is with me in the darkness. (Psalm 23)

Winston Churchill once said, "If you find yourself walking in hell, keep going".  I would like to add, "If you find yourself in hell, be there knowing that God is with you there and will lead you in and through the hell of today, on your way to the heaven of tomorrow.

 Know that the gates of hell will not prevail and hold you there for God is present in the darkness and in the light.

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