Zephaniah, addressing a slum of Northern Kingdom refugees in Jerusalem (Zephaniah 3:14-18), and Paul, writing to the Philippians from his chains (Philippians 4:4-7), both counsel an unprecedented and unwarranted joy to their listeners. Were they naïve or pie in the sky believers? Probably not, because the whole of anything always contains parts and reasons for joy and contentment. To accept and live in the whole of things is to be “holy.” The unified field of God does not blot out all sadness and tragedy entirely, but it somehow and surely co-exists with it. Joy and sadness can live together within us at the same time, and afterwards we learn to never despair because of the dark sides of things. The dark side is never the whole, although in the short term it often appears to be.
Richard Rohr, Radical Grace, p.9
We so often don't realise what is happening to us. We live in God's hand, in the wounded hand of Christ; truly all we are is his. There is, in the end, nothing else to know.
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