THE GIFT WE KNOW NAUGHT OF

I'm guessing that most everyone has a longing to be known...known by at least one other, one special other.

The problem we come late to realizing is that we want to be known as we believe our self to be. We choose to refuse that we are known...by a whole lot of others. Face it, we're not so deep or mysterious or special as to be...what? An enigma? We wish.

Even those of us who do not recognize the fact of our longing...we are usually walking around with a vague feeling that our skin's on crooked...suspect that something is amiss. So we stay focused out there...naming it the world today, the politics of the South...or the North, the friends we have...or don't have, the job we have...or don't have.

The day will come, the dawn will break, when we are gifted by grace into the realization that there is a place deep within us that is known only to God. It takes considerably longer for us to accept that it is always available, always operating in our behalf...ah, but with neither our knowledge nor our consent.

This is the spiritual core of us that we know naught of. It is unknowable but to God. It is The Christ. Amen.

Thank you.

ON FEELING THE LOVE THAT I AM

Ah, it seldom fails...when I'm feeling my all alone-est, then it is that my unloved, unwanted, unneeded, unappreciated calls to my ego Lucy to sing our favorite song, Loving Arms. Especially the line looking back and longing for the freedom of my chains and lying in your loving arms again. That one.

Why, I wonder, doesn't Amazing Grace come to mind? Who hates that one? Or How Great Thou Art? With Elvis singing, to boot. But no, it is an incontrovertible fact, when I'm feeling less than, only sad, sorry and blue songs are allowed. Ah, who's kidding whom...I'm who, what and why it's all about when I'm feeling un.

Out of sheer habit, I turn to my daily readings, and from the cosmos my beloved Easwaran wraps me in reality: [In] transforming consciousness, you have to look for the right spot. In some people it is a particular compulsive craving; in some it is jealousy; in some, blind fury. Some may be fortunate enough to have all three. Each person has to look for that spot where urgent work is most needed.

There it is...God's will direct to me right Now: I have to look for that spot where urgent work is most needed. I do know this, the obvious is rarely the most needed...that's why needing to look requires going to God. In gratitude. For the need.

I can feel the un lifting...I know because free at last just came to mind...that and ain't gonna study war no more. Along with, there will be peace in the valley for me. 

God loves me so much. The Donald, too.

Thank you.

GOD LAUGHS AND WE LET GO

It is our desire, our willingness, our spiritual mindset that begins our journey toward still more spiritual growth. 

And then...and then...after years of pondering and preaching, we slowly begin to detach from our book learning, our original ideas, our striving and seeking. Our self-determined objectives start to fall away. In effect, they crash and burn...and even that minus our will. 

We learn to laugh at our self-determined objectives which were all about us basking in the sunlight of love being showered upon us...or, short form, get spiritual, get love. Then comes the blinding flash of the obvious: We cannot get love, we can only give love.

The original message that God is love changes not, it is merely repurposed.

Love itself takes on a new and deeper meaning...holy, in a word. God and love...invisible, unprovable to the doubting mind...ah, but we realize It for real when It permeates our being. And we start loving our unfriends just as we love our friends. We know we are on the right track when they become interchangeable.

Then it is that we know fear for we hear our self asking, Just how holy do I want to be? Ah, then God laughs, and we relax...we're not there yet.

Thank you.

SURRENDER...AH, THE PEACE OF IT

Of all things, I'm hearing lately that peace, love and joy are getting a bad name. Go figure. There are so many words, acts...thoughts even...that qualify for less-than-wonderful, why pick on the exact opposite to resist?

Maybe that's the why of it...the exact opposite proves individual originality to our ego. Ego will ever speak louder than God...not better, just louder.

The raw wonder of peace, love and joy is that we cannot just do them, or any one of them, on self-will alone. We cannot manufacture them. They are not of our own self. They live within us with God in his hidey hole, and they emerge by grace as needed and without human manipulation.

Now we come to our job...which is to let them, i.e., to unblock or to open the channel from which peace, love and joy flow. Which, according to me, is right next to the eighth wonder of the world. To open our self represents our willingness to allow our own self to grow smaller. In short, to let means we say thank you, and lay down our sword and shield. And that is all. Oh, then wait.

No one knows the day or hour....

Thank you.

TRUTHS AND RANDOM THOUGHTS

Truths, random thoughts and idle words:

When My disciple sees My purpose ahead, that very sight is the power that clears away every obstacle along that range of vision....People waste so much time in seeking to work out what they see. I declare to you that in the seeing My purpose all is done. -- God Calling, April 14

I must take care that my "bad" is not more important to me than God's "good."

To receive miraculous healing and yet to be able to refrain from personal glory in the achievement is most difficult. All that they were entitled to was gratitude that they had been called and that the Power was working through them -- not that they had the power. The Power was working through them, but it could work through them only in proportion to their humility, and the true sense of humility is not any detraction or depreciation of one's self: it is a realization of one's greatness in having been called to be a servant of that power, which is true paradox. -- Copied in my journal from I know not where, dated 10/5/78.

It is our own ego that sees and accepts for our own incoming insults, snarks and put-downs... they are not ours, let them remain undelivered.

Life will give you whatever experience is most helpful for the evolution of your consciousness. -- Eckhart Tolle

There has to be a recognition of an Infinite Invisible...there has to be an inner realization of that Presence. -- probably lifted from Joel Goldsmith

Forgiveness requires inner connection in order to let the other's actions be and then we can walk free with the other or not, as God wills. Only we can give our self forgiveness and that by aborning into Christ consciousness within.

Now comes the part that makes the "belly bitter"...the living of these truths. -- Joel Goldsmith

Thank you.

SHOUT HALLELUJAH!

If we are ever going to get over our want to be right...or at least not publicly wrong...we are going to need to experience the pain of being misunderstood, of being thought wrong, of being the object of gossip, slander and contempt for in there hides our gift of gold.

In learning the ways of still more spiritual growth, that's not all that surprising, is it? We must go beyond reason to love.

It takes a looong time for this to filter without resistance through every fiber of our being. Who's kidding whom, it takes long enough for our brain to just let it in without spitting fire.

Our spiritual gift is the gratitude we experience when we can pray our thank you for whatever is appearing upside down and backwards in our life, and specifically when we feel no resistance to the person we perceive as the root of our pain. (Which may be as close to forgiveness as we get in this world.)

We begin awakening when we recognize that the contretemps is for our own benefit. Then the sun breaks, and we know through us and only through us that this is for the benefit of that other. And there it is...we know it for our own benefit purely because it benefits the other who is accusing us. 

Better yet, they may never realize that. They may go to their grave thinking the less of us, but with their gift of gold intact. Not ours to understand, ours to appreciate that God does indeed move in mysterious ways, his wonders to perform.

Our pure gold. our pearl beyond price, our great stand-up-and-shout gift is our getting over our own self...in loving and laughing and letting it be within. Somebody say Amen.

Thank you.

GOD CALLING US HOME TO GOD

It is the defensive ego that births our negative feelings, that projects negativity. 

All of our negative feelings...fear, anger, sadness, self-pity,  anxiety, pride, envy, jealousy, silent scorn, etc....are ego's self-protective shield. There. That is the shield we must shuck. 

That is the block that stands between our soul and our experiencing peace, love and joy...that is, God's presence...which invites our love and laughter out into the sun.

To our reasoning mind's eye, the path through looks daunting for it sees that we must walk through our very fear and all its companions to reach daybreak...and, who's kidding whom, there is no guarantee that daybreak is going to offer the sunshine and roses we want. 

Ah, and it is not! For we cannot want all that God has to offer. It is beyond our reasoning mind's ability to imagine all that God is, and that is therefore ours.

The pearl of great price is another paradox: It is our ego's defense that is God calling! We resist it not, but walk forward welcoming it with our thank you prayer in peaceful trust that it is God calling us home to God. 

Thank you.