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Q: Is God the darkness we see in the
universe? And is that the darkness inside of every human when they
close their eyes?
A: My first thought is that the darkness (and light) that we can see
with
our physical eyes is a purely physical perception. Even when we close
our eyes, the darkness that we "see" is simply due to the fact that we
have shuttered our eyes to the outside world.
When we view the sky in daytime, we see plenty of light, as our
perception is that the sky is lighted up - and it is, because of the
sunshine's reflection off of the earth's atmosphere. But when we see
images from space - for example, from the
Hubble Telescope, we see islands of lighted galaxies surrounded by
large areas of
darkness. This can be a confusing perception if we are aiming to "see"
God. One might think that if God is everywhere, that the areas of
darkness must be God as well; and that is true, in a sense.
We know from Urantia Book teachings that God, as the Infinite Spirit,
Third Person of the Trinity - pervades all space.
(9:0.5)
The Infinite Spirit pervades all space; he indwells the circle of
eternity; and the Spirit, like the Father and the Son, is perfect and
changeless—absolute.
(2:1.1)
"Touching the Infinite, we cannot find him out. The divine
footsteps are not known." The blinding light of the Father's
presence
is such that to his lowly creatures he apparently "dwells in the thick
darkness."
But...
(4:1.6)
The Father unceasingly pours forth energy, light, and
life. The work of God is literal as well as spiritual. "He stretches
out the north over the empty space and hangs the earth upon nothing."
All of the space bodies that we can see are apparently suspended in
darkness, and so I can see why one might think that the darkness IS
God. But, so are all the areas of light. However, we need to use our
mind and our spirit to resolve this issue:
(103:6.4)
When man analytically inspects the universe through the
material endowments of his physical senses and associated mind
perception, the cosmos appears to be mechanical and energy-material.
Such a technique of studying reality consists in turning the universe
inside out.
A logical and consistent philosophic concept of the universe
cannot be built up on the postulations of either materialism or
spiritism, for both of these systems of thinking, when universally
applied, are compelled to view the cosmos in distortion, the former
contacting with a universe turned inside out, the latter realizing the
nature of a universe turned outside in. Never, then, can either science
or religion, in and of themselves, standing alone, hope to gain an
adequate understanding of universal truths and relationships without
the guidance of human philosophy and the illumination of divine
revelation.
Always
must man's inner spirit depend for its expression and
self-realization upon the mechanism and technique of the mind. Likewise
must man's outer experience of material reality be predicated on the
mind consciousness of the experiencing personality. Therefore are the
spiritual and the material, the inner and the outer, human experiences
always correlated with the mind function and conditioned, as to their
conscious realization, by the mind activity. Man experiences matter in
his mind; he experiences spiritual reality in the soul but becomes
conscious of this experience in his mind. The intellect is the
harmonizer and the ever-present conditioner and qualifier of the sum
total of mortal experience. Both energy-things and spirit values are
colored by their interpretation through the mind media of
consciousness.
And so, while we see one thing through our physical senses, the actual
truth of what we are seeing has to be modified through the ministry of
Spirit and revelation before we can get the whole picture. We need more
than our physical senses to understand the truth of God.
Please consider this passage from The Urantia Book:
(102:0.1)
Nameless despair is man's only reward for living and toiling
under the temporal sun of mortal existence. Each day of life slowly and
surely tightens the grasp of a pitiless doom which a hostile and
relentless universe of matter has decreed shall be the crowning insult
to everything in human desire which is beautiful, noble, lofty, and
good.
But such is not man's end and eternal destiny; such a vision
is
but the cry of despair uttered by some wandering soul who has become
lost in spiritual darkness, and who bravely struggles on in the face of
the mechanistic sophistries of a material philosophy, blinded by the
confusion and distortion of a complex learning. And all this doom of
darkness and all this destiny of despair are forever dispelled by one
brave stretch of faith on the part of the most humble and unlearned of
God's children on earth.
This
saving faith has its birth in the human heart when the
moral consciousness of man realizes that human values may be translated
in mortal experience from the material to the spiritual, from the human
to the divine, from time to eternity.
It is by FAITH that we see beyond our physical perceptions and come to
know the "Father of lights." The darkness that we perceive when we
close our eyes or view the night sky is deceptive, if this
perception is as far as we go
in looking for evidence of God in our experience.
There dwells within every mortal a "light"
that can only be perceived through the ministry of spirit:
(1:3.3)
The spiritual luminosity of the Father's
personal presence is a "light which no mortal man can approach; which
no material creature has seen or can see." But it is not necessary to
see God with the eyes of the flesh in order to discern him by the
faith-vision of the spiritualized mind.
(107:4.5)
There is a characteristic light, a spirit luminosity, which
accompanies this divine presence, and which has become generally
associated with Thought Adjusters. In the universe of Nebadon this
Paradise luminosity is widespreadly known as the "pilot light"; on
Uversa it is called the "light of life." On Urantia this phenomenon has
sometimes been referred to as that "true light which lights every man
who comes into the world."
So, I would say that while God certainly does pervade that darkness
that we see with our
physical eyes, he cannot be defined as that darkness alone; he is also
a luminous presence - within AND without - that can only be
"seen" with the anointed eyes of faith.
Thanks for this most interesting question.
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