can being used lead to being abused?

Several people forwarded David Henson's post, "I Am Not a Drug: Why God Isn't in the Business of Using People". They said it reminded them of me. I appreciate it when people do that. Immediately I saw a cartoon. So here it is. Here's a quote from Henson's post:

"The problem with understanding God's active presence in the world in terms of using humans is that it robs people of their agency, their humanity, their very image of God. It turns creative and thinking people into a fistful of tangled copper wires, conduits for the Divine current to thrum through them. It transforms active and living human beings into marionettes dangling from the hands of a megalomaniacal God."

But then he gets to the point, which I agree with, as is reflected in my title:

"More to the point, using people isn't very far from abusing people. The line between the two is blurry at best, as both are primarily about exerting power and controlling another person."

True! I would go further. We can see the Divine as a metaphor for what is best about our Selves. Saint Irenaeus said:

"The glory of God is a man fully alive."

Pushing that to its logical limits, the glory of God is God, and when we are our truest selves, fully alive, this is God in all God's glory. There is now no separation. There is perfect oneness. There is perfect unity. Henson's last quote is perhaps more telling than he intended when he wrote it:

"Together, God and us."

I would say so together that there is no separation.