Winter Storm

There is no Monday Message this week. Church was cancelled due to bad weather.

Prosperity Sunday 5 of 12

Here are a few bullet points to jog the memories of those who attended service on Sunday, December 29, 2013. The full text of the service can be read here. 

 

·        What, in your opinion, is your most important asset?

·        In the opening paragraph of this week’s chapter, THE GRATEFUL HEART, Butterworth gives us his answer: (page 85, P1) “What is your most important asset? Conditioned as it is to materialistic values, your mind might begin weighing the relative usefulness of things. However, if you carefully search within yourself, you may come to the awareness that your most important asset is the conscious control of your own life. Nothing else can satisfy or fulfill… unless you enjoy the freedom that comes from control of your inner world of mind and emotions.”

·        Butterworth says, “…though normally overlooked, living with a grateful heart is a key element in the process of achieving prosperity.”

·        In 1 Thessalonians 5:18-19 Paul is counseling the people to, “give thanks in all circumstances.”

·        Please do not misunderstand this. The counsel is not, “Be thankful for all circumstances,” but, “be thankful in all circumstances.” These are two very different suggestions.

·        Here’s what it’s about, plain and simple: be thankful for the awareness of the ever-presence of substance.

·        Knowing this and knowing that you can choose to be aware of the ever-presence of substance (i.e. be grateful) is your most important asset because now you know you have conscious control over your own life!

·        Let me give you a way to extend gratitude on a day-to-day basis that activates the ever-present substance and initiates the process of achieving abundance: bless everything.

·        (pages 92-93) “The power of blessing is not reserved for the holy places, or for the specially ordained persons. It is an act of tremendous power that can be used by anyone. …to bless… means “to confer prosperity upon.” You are always projecting some kind of thought toward everything you have or hold. Sometimes it is negative, limiting, restrictive. But you can bless your home, your job, or your money supply, and thus confer a consciousness of abundance upon them. It is not something you do to these things. Rather, it is a correction of the mentality [you hold]. And the law is that things become to you, that which you see them as being.”

·        Take a moment right now engage in the experience of gratitude, just as we did earlier in our meditation. Close your eyes and just feel grateful. Don’t cast about for something or another to be grateful for, just feel gratitude. This is an exercise in feeling causal energy. Just feel grateful. Let the spirit of thanksgiving flood your whole being with its healing warmth.

·        This week, make a commitment to keep alive your awareness of substance through gratitude in all things. If you are willing, write 10 times each day until our next prosperity Sunday, “Feeling gratitude is a key element in the process of abundance.”

God is Love/ Love is God

Here are a few bullet points to jog the memories of those who attended service on Sunday, December 15, 2013. The full text of the service can be read here.      

·        God is Love and Love is God

·        Life is the experience of Love and the quality of our lives is dependent on how much Love we “have inside.” (and are aware of and extend to other people and circumstances and conditions in our lives) It’s not just about other people loving us.

·        Love is all around us and what we do is fight off acknowledging it; fight off expressing it; fight off receiving it. Love is God; God is love. There is no love to be found; it is ever-present and only known through its expression.

·        If we didn’t spend so much time battling against receiving/accepting Love being offered to us, and giving Love to those who cry out for it, we’d recognize we are awash in endless unconditional Love.

·        Committing yourself to God is not committing yourself to religion. Committing yourself to God is committing yourself to extending love and seeing with love. When you are working with Love you are working with God.

·        Withholding the circulation of love and happiness withers your life; circulation of love and happiness expands your life.

·        Life is a choice

·        “What life do you choose for yourself?”

·        Whatever you’d like your life to be, choose to live it.

I’d like to recommend a video to watch on YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIEIvi2MuEk (West Jet Christmas Miracle)

Here you can experience for yourself the feelings around the giving and receiving of unconditional Love.

Staying Afloat

Here are a few bullet points to jog the memories of those who attended service on Sunday, December 8, 2013. The full text of the service can be read here.      

·        Do you believe immortal life will be found after you die?

·        Do you believe immortal life can be experienced now?

·        Reminder: we were created in the image and after the likeness of God.

·        Therefore, in my opinion, the being part of us is immortal

·        Charles Fillmore: “When we finally understand the facts of life and rid our minds of the delusion that we shall find immortal life after we die, then we shall seek more diligently to awaken the spiritual man (Christ consciousness/ awareness of God) within us and strengthen and build up the spiritual domain of our being...”

·        The one idea I want to focus on from that statement is diligence

·        Proverbs 4:23, “Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it spring the issues of life

·        Our spiritual journey is about what we want to be (rather than what we don’t want to be)

·        God placed Itself in us at our spiritual creation and we have forgotten

·        Be diligent in gently taking your consciousness to task in remembering to express the spirit of God in all things.

·        Proverbs 21:5, “The plans of the diligent lead to profit…”

Prosperity Sunday 4 of 12

Here are a few bullet points to jog the memories of those who attended service on Sunday, December 1, 2013. The full text of the service can be read here.

·        In Mark 9:23 these words are attributed to Jesus, “…All things are possible to the one who believes.”

·        What does it mean to you to believe?

·        Butterworth suggests that belief isn’t believing in something but openness to something.

·        The whole universe of “God-Substance” is centered in you. There is nothing you can do to add to that or take away from it.

·        We may think the above is true of Jesus, but not of us.

·        In John 14:12 Jesus tells us we can do not only the works he has done (because all of the "God-Substance" of the universe is centered in us) but works that are even greater… and he qualifies it with if we believe.

·        Believing is the openness to something.

·        Ohm’s Law is written this was: V = I x R (voltage equals current times resistance). Ohm’s Law is used to perform a circuit analysis.

·        Metaphysically we can say: Experience of our Life = the current of God x (working thru) the resistance (or openness) of our Consciousness.

·        Personalizing this it becomes “Brad’s Law” Experience of my Life = God (working thru) Brad's belief system.

·        When my life isn’t all it could be I can perform a personal circuit analysis by asking myself, “How many “Brad’s” of resistance are present in my consciousness to the flow of the current of God?”

·        Butterworth: “The [belief] required to demonstrate prosperity is not simply a pious pronouncement, it is expectancy. You do not receive what you want; you do not receive what you pray for, not even what you say you [believe] in. What you will always receive is what you actually expect.”

·        The experience of our life is the direct result of what we expect and that is amplified by the ever-present current of God.

Sunday, November 24, 2013

This past Sunday several members of the congregation spoke a little bit about themselves and also shared a meaningful spiritual experience they’d experienced.

          There is no recap of those messages.

          In addition to the bullet points published on this pages, I also publisher the entire text of nearly every week’s talk. My sister Diane passed away on July 2^nd of this year. I spoke about that on Sunday the 7^th but somehow never published my talk.  You can read it here.  It is titled Positive Spiritual Practice.

Responsibility

Here are a few bullet points to jog the memories of those who attended service on Sunday, November 17, 2013. The full text of the service can be read here.

·        What is your primary responsibility in life?

·        Children? But what if you have no children?

·        Your spouse/ partner/ significant other? But what if you are not in a relationship?

·        The planet, humanity, social justice?

·        What, as the saying goes is, “Yours to do?”

·        In regard to the world, I have no idea. In life I would say it’s to be responsible for your consciousness, now. (or as it’s sometimes said, “Know Thyself”.)

·        This is first and foremost, not to the exclusion of anyone or anything else, but always ahead of any responsibilities in the world.

·        Everything you make yourself responsible for in the world is greatly enhanced by “knowing yourself.”

·        When you take responsibility for your consciousness, the world is transformed.

·        You are an important part of the transformation of the world.

·        “It’s not primarily what you do. There is something more primary than what you do and that’s what you express through your state of consciousness. What you do flows through your state of consciousness.” (Tolle)

·        When we get upset about what we perceive others do not know, about them being unconscious, it would be good to put into action these words of Jesus, “Father forgive them for they know not what they do.” (Luke 23:34)