A lot of people are of the mind that the universe is a balance of good and evil…for every light there is dark.  A lot of religions champion this idea as well.  Zoroastrianism, which came about slightly before the birth of Jesus bases its entire doctrine on this idea alone; we are simply the matter caught between two opposing strengths that we have no control over.  Sometimes it feels, and appears very much that way.

     I agree with this to a small, yet differing degree. I’ve pondered this many times in life, and some things said in Church this morning made me re-visit it again today. As a Christian, I believe in the existence of good and evil, but not necessarily in the balance of these things.  I certainly don’t believe that for every single light there is dark, because I’ve read the end of the story and know that light wins.   With this being said, I sometimes ponder why we have the darkness at all. I realize that God wants us to understand the purity of love, and love him by our own freewill, and that in order to do that we must have the choice to disobey…and that in itself is sin, which is evil.  I understand the reasoning…but once we’ve chosen God, why all the trials?

   I’ve come to the realization that sometimes its the trials that make us move.  It is in the winter that we yearn most for summer.  Sometimes we can get caught up basking in the warmth and forget the ones left somewhere the light never touches, a place we’ve been so log ago.  When we have those dips in life when we cannot fathom why such terrible times have come our way even though we feel we’ve done everything right,  its hard to understand why.  When I go through these times, I comfort myself with the typical thought process…”this is in God’s will,” “everything happens for a reason,” and so on.  Even though I know there is truth in those things, just believing it alone gets stale. It becomes common to us.  It starts becoming a broken record, but when I stop, every once in a brilliant blue moon and actually evaluate the situation, good has ultimately come out of every low point of my life.  It’s never been easy, rarely been an immediate turn around, but has always made sense somewhere along the way.  Almost every time I’ve been dragged kicking and screaming out of my comfort zone its felt like being plucked off a warm beach and sat half naked on an iceberg. However, it always makes me appreciate that warm beach and beg to get back.  It makes me have to do something to get there, something I thought I could not do until I look back and I’ve done it.

    I don’t believe in the “balance” of light and dark.  I simply believe the dark can show us what we’re made of when we prevail over it.  It’s there to teach us about our own strength, to prove to us we can triumph over opposition, and remind us how sweet the sun is…and how sweet the son is.  We aren’t a conglomerate of atoms tight-rope walking between negative and positive energy.  We are something made out of divinity, tried by our very flesh, but with a destiny to become warriors.  A warrior doesn’t know his strength if he’s never seen battle.

     I hope the next time I have a trial in my life I can remember this, and I move.  I pray I don’t wallow and wail, but I fight with the sword I was handed, knowing the seasons that lie ahead of me.  I hope I take others with me, and somehow know that the evil in the world doesn’t have to be something I balance myself with…not something I have to fight, but something I’ve proven I can slay.  I have to remember that every year Spring follows winter, and even the coldest January has purpose.  We fight that winter for the sake of Spring, and the sakes of those who’ve never known a true Spring in life.

  I just have to remember I am part of that story, unchanging like the seasons…the one with a happy ending, and it cannot be re-written. 

“To him who overcomes, I will give the right to sit with me on my throne, just as I overcame and sat down with my father on his throne.” Revelation 3:21