Becoming A Miracle Worker

"Today the promise of God's Word is kept. Hear and be silent. He would speak to you. He comes with miracles a thousand times as happy and as wonderful as those you ever dreamed or wished for in your dreams. His miracles are true. They will not fade when dreaming ends. They end the dream instead; and last forever..."

                                 - A Course in Miracles, Workbook, Lesson 106

Who of us has not longed or prayed for a miracle in our lives.  I can recall several agonizing times in my own life when the consequences of an impending disaster felt unbearable, and I prayed for a desired outcome. One particularly difficult situation involved our youngest son's preliminary medical diagnosis that might have meant his very short life would soon end.  Even though at the time I was ensconced within the faith-lined walls of a seminary, I could not help but ask for the physical miracle. One of my faith-filled classmates took me aside during one insufferable day of awaiting the prognosis, and gently reminded me that the outcome of our son's health was beyond our control, and did I want to pray for peace of mind. I did, and we did. Thankfully, our son survived and thrived.

Who of us can be faulted for becoming attached to our children and wanting them to live long and healthy lives?  Or clinging to preferences for what seems precious and important. Yet we know that the young die, and the good suffer, and the stories of seeming injustices and unfair outcomes can show up on anybody's doorstep. Knowing this common and difficult reality surely has driven me to seek a deeper faith, than one built solely on outer manifestations.

Even though it is much easier said than done, it remains my core belief that finding peace in the midst of challenge is the crowing attainment of a faithful life, and the deepest realization of prayer. Why is peace of mind the holy grail of spiritual effort? Because it is unconditional, unequivocal and immune from the caprice of good fortune and misfortune.  This peaceful abiding place allows for the "good cheer" that Jesus described as beyond appearances. It is the Elysian field where our sense of wholeness is restored. Jesus called it the Kingdom of Heaven within.

No matter how much we may want our life to bend according to our will, such outcomes, no matter how spectacular, do not offer lasting peace. You know the treachery behind the promise. The mind that creates a preference, will only concoct a new elusive desire on the heels of the last fulfillment. No sooner are you satisfied, than you are wanting again. It never ends, and never ends in lasting peace.

The nature of our ego-mind (relentless desire), and the spiritual counterpart (the choice for true freedom and inner peace) are the core teachings of A Course In Miracles.  The Course defines a true miracle "as a shift in perception." This teaching is the true "Secret" if there ever was one.

Even if we can't set it right, with God's help we can see it rightly. By asking for a perceptual shift, and being receptive , we can be shown the way of greater peace, greater love, greater joy, and greater abundance.  From this unalterable, eternal and unambiguous place, we bring a completely new awareness to our lives and conditions.  This is how we become miracles workers ---by releasing our perceptions and inviting the Divine to "look through our eyes and love through our hearts, and serve through our hands." Is this easy? Not at all, but unless we can actually calm the squalls in our lives, this approach is the only way to find the eye within the storm, a place of grace and peace.

  

Journey Without Distance

"I will arise now and go to my Father..." Luke 15:18

In perhaps Jesus' most famous parable, he shared a story about a directionally challenged young man who followed his sense guidance only to end up far from home and miserable.  The prodigal was certain he would find his joy in the world. He followed his desire for a better life, convinced that it could be found somewhere out in the world.  In the end, when he hit the skids, he realized his navigation error: what he longed for was not in the world but back home.

We can all relate to this story because, at least spiritually, we've discovered the errancy of our guidance.  Many of us come to ourselves and realize that we've been looking for our happiness in all the wrong places, in all the wrong faces.  Because this world is such a powerful opiate that dulls our spiritual sense of direction, it is a tough dysfunction to correct. Under the influence of this illusory world, we are convinced that something or someone will give us what we need.  When the quest does not pay off, we usually convince our self that a new something or someone is what we need.  Yet, no matter how many times we set out to find peace or fulfillment or love in the world, our journey is doomed to failure. It can be no other way.  The reason we can't find fulfillment in life is not because we're not looking but because our perspective is backwards.  Our understanding of cause and effect is upside down.  In our confusion, we think the source of our well-being is outside ourselves.

A valid spiritual solution is one that reverses our mistaken guidance and turns us in the direction of our true home, where our needs can truly be met. When we reverse our thinking and turn our attention from the world that constantly changes, to the eternal self (the indwelling spirit) we find fulfillment that is unwavering and unconditional.

This reversal of worldly thinking is the teaching of A Course In Miracles, which I've referenced in many of my Sunday talks. This Sunday we begin a  series of lessons based upon the themes and teachings of A Course In Miracles. A.C.I.M. has been called a self-study program of spiritual psychotherapy and a modern day interpretation of the teachings of Jesus. *A.C.I.M. has many parallels with Unity's philosophy and teachings and we will look at how its teachings can help us turn our lives around, call off the search in the world and return us to our home in God.

Is This Really Part Of The Divine Plan?

There are people who believe that everything happens for a reason and it serves them. I have been one of those believers and yet I admit at times my level of faith in that proposition has been severely hammered by difficult life events. I have clung to that belief by nary a fingernail at times. It has been a tenuous proposition to maintain when dire circumstances decimated perceptible good beyond recognition.

How can we resurrect or even justify our faith in a benevolent universe, a beneficent God that is on our side when we have suffered great difficulty or loss?  I have stared at the surface of my challenges, long and hard with only greater suffering to show for it. So I’m inclined to offer that we must look deeper than the appearances to restore faith in life that supports our greater good no matter how it looks.  Every food of the earth that has nourished our bodies began below the surface.  As a seed of possibility, in darkness, life begins again for the plant, and for us. We often need the reminder that Jesus shared that unless a grain of wheat fall and die it remains only a single grain, but if it die it yields a rich harvest.   Transformation from a tiny seed into a stalk of golden wheat has a price.

I believe it more accurate and satisfying to hold the idea that the universe is on the side of our enlargement, that Life is pushing us to be more of Itself. It is this urge to wholeness that can upset our ego-librium.  In unrelenting fashion, spiritual forces are no respecter of person, demanding transformation of everybody who passes this way. Static states of consciousness are subject to upheaval if not, annihilation.  Of course we see only in part, so what we call loss may indeed be answered prayer to a soul bent on realizing its timeless, formless nature.  If that explanation seems too far out there are ancient and contemporary stories that point in the same direction.

Moses was banished from his privileged life to the desert, where he heard and answered the call that became his life’s mission.  The desert of hardship and separation became the soil of his awakening and the ground where the Israelites went from a wandering tribe to a nation with a covenant and a mission. Through the lens of our mortal sight, we may not see that a divine plan is spread upon the earth where today we stand, and tomorrow we may fall. Yet you and I have seen evidence of the Divine, when the lesser falls away and something greater arises in its place.  It is the season of life having its ways through us.  If I am truly committed to realizing  infinite Life then my attachment to how my life should be, must be released. One way or another.

Our favorite contemporary stories reveal the same pattern. Luke Skywalker, Frodo, Harry Potter all faced major losses, and sacrifices as precedent to their true mission.  Introspection comes easier when the outer fails us. Our reluctance to look inward diminishes in our desperation to know who we are when this or that no longer defines us.

If we embrace the premise that there is a spiritual agenda always working in our lives, we might find this journey more noble, adventurous and ultimately quite satisfying. We might even find ourselves heroically proclaiming at a pivotal moment,  Not my will, but thine be done. We can be enlarged by loss. We can choose Life over life.

This Sunday the bright, articulate and talented Anton Mizerac and Laura Berryhill will bring you the music and message based upon the theme of transformation with the intriguing title, “"Remake my World: Mythic Transformation and Renewal."