Light Without Darkness

I don't really know if everyone wrests (tortures themselves) with the puzzlement of Heaven versus hell but I know I have thought long about this disparity.

Frankly, it has never made sense. 

Let's say you and your spouse are the parents of 3 beautiful children. 2 boys and a girl. You work hard and buy a house--in fact, you design the house and have it built to your own specifications. You'll need 3 bedrooms plus a Master bedroom. Each of the bedrooms should be a good size to suit each child. You'll need an indoors play area where the three children can play and where you can relax. You'll definitely need an outdoors play area that is safe. Safe for all 3. Safe for you and your spouse. There is no way you would design your backyard so that it dropped off a sharp cliff with no fencing. You'd NEVER stand at the edge of that cliff and choose one child to push over the edge, would you? 

As a parent, I know that I love each of my three children as much as I can. I love each of them 100% even if they do things that really bother me--things that I would not consider in my own life. If one child is mean, angry, or selfish it doesn't mean I love him or her any less than their siblings. It just doesn't. A parent's love surmounts all of that. In the beginning, during and in the end, you love them as much as you can. You love each one 100%. 

Understanding God's love (God, Our Creator, I AM THAT I AM, any name you wish to give to the Source of all in our universe) is much like a parent standing at the edge of a cliff. There is just no way, under any circumstance, that a parent would choose one child to push over the edge. So you create your home's backyard to keep your children--each of them--safe and happy forever. Just like God. 

To me, it's the same situation as Heaven and hell. God had no need to create a hell because he loves each one equally and wants each of us to be safe and happy. Hell just doesn't exist outside the minds of weak mankind. Man who cannot grasp the enormity of a perfectly-loving God. Hell is simply a human mind's exemplar of the absence of Heaven. 

God without the devil. In a similar manner, mankind has used the infinite powers of their brains to imagine a powerful archenemy for God. How does that make sense? If you believe in the devil, then you simply don't really believe in the power of Goodness, Love and Light that is God. In human society there are people who act in ways that are opposite to us. Scribes from long ago imagined a similar nemesis for God because--and this is so lame--if we are created "in the image" of God, and some of us act wickedly, then they must be created in the image of the evil one. Not logical. What does make more sense, is that opposites are merely the absence of their positive counterpart. 

If that is confusing, here are a few examples. There is no dark. All darkness is, is the absence of Light. 

This example comes from Anita Moorjani. In the daytime, you go into a warehouse. You see that there are wall-to-ceiling shelves. On the top shelf are teddy bears. On the next shelf down, are video games. On the next shelf down, are toy cars. You come back to the same warehouse at night, there are no lights, but you have a flashlight. You shine the flashlight on the top shelf and see the teddy bears. Good! But your flashlight's beam isn't broad enough to see all the other shelves at once. Does that mean that the shelves are not there? Does that mean that there are no video games on the next shelf? You move your flashlight beam down a bit and sure enough, now you can see the video games but you can no longer see the teddy bears. Does that mean that the teddy bears are no longer there? No, of course it doesn't. 

You know how it is daytime in Seattle, Washington, but nighttime in London, England? Does that mean that there is no light in London? No, it simply means that it is dark because of the absence of light there at that moment. The Light has not disappeared: only our perception has changed. The Light is eternal. If we move away from The Light we may perceive darkness but really, The Light is still there. Eternally there. Just like God's Love. There is no darkness only the absence of Light. 

There is no devil, only the perception of the absence of God. 

There is no hell, only the perception of the absence of Heaven. Heaven is eternally around us---it's the warehouse in daytime when we can see all the shelves fully laden with everything our heart could desire. Everyone we have ever loved and still love are there, in the warehouse, just waiting for us to perceive them in The Light. 

Nighttime in London. It's like a person turning their back to the Light of God's Love. God's Love is still there...eternally there. Just turn towards it--now or 12 hours hence--and it will be light again because it's always light. Always love. Always Heaven. God loves each of us and would never push anyone...not one...over the edge of a cliff into hell. Sometimes that mystery is too much for puny humans' minds to grasp. 

If you are ever again tempted to give false credence to the perpetuated lies of the existence of darkness, the devil or hell, just remember this phrase: "only the absence of". Darkness is an illusion created by the perceived absence of light. The devil is an illusion created by weak human minds to explain the perceived absence of God. Hell is an illusion created by long-dead scribes to explain the perceived absence of Heaven. 

Don't let illusion rule your beautiful life! Only Love is real.