Spiritual Solutions

This morning, when I went outside to pick up the newspaper at 5:30, the night sky was clear and filled with stars. I was reminded of when I served in the British Royal Navy many years ago and I was on night watch while we sailed the Indian Ocean; the night sky was filled with stars that looked like huge jewels in the far reaches of space.

It must have been on such a night when the psalmist looked up in the sky and spoke the words recorded in Psalms 8: “When I look at thy heavens the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars which thou hast established; what is man that thou art mindful of him, and the son of man that thou dost care for him? Yet thou hast made him little less than God, and dost crown him with glory and honor. Thou hast given him dominion over the works of thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet.” (Ps. 8:3-6)

As I read those words again, my heart is filled with inspiration, gratitude and wonder at the Divine Order in which we live, move and have our being. In this month of November, the month of giving thanks, there is perhaps no better time to recognize and give thanks for the divine order that permeates every area of our lives.

Even when we are not aware of it, order is here, because God is here. Divine order is the very essence of God which brings to us the experiences that help us learn and grow. Its presence in our lives assures us that all is well, that everything will work out for the best.

Divine order is not something we earn or achieve. We do not have to search for order, because it was there all along. To know this is true, we need only perceive it with the faith of spiritual vision and spiritual understanding.

The former Unity minister and author Eric Butterworth once told of being involved in an experience of square dancing. He said that he was never very good at it, but he remembered the caller giving instructions. Eric was having a difficult time, running into people and generally disrupting the entire group. The caller finally came over and said quietly to him, “You gotta keep in step or you’ll bump into the person next to you. In dancing you either cooperate or collide.” Cooperate or collide . . . Eric said he always remembered that.

Certainly we must keep in step with divine order, the divine plan within ourselves, or we shall find ourselves bumping into people and things all about us. When we fail to operate in accord with the laws of God, we are sure to collide with people or situations or things sooner or later.

And what is cooperation? It is love. It is the attitude of mind wherein we do not work alone. We do not operate, we cooperate. We work with God. We work with people. The same law that guides the planets in their courses is in control right here on earth for those who accept the law. In the scriptures we are told, “Great peace have they which love thy law, and nothing shall offend them.” Cooperate or collide is a good law of life.

Our success, our well-being and indirectly our prosperity are very much dependent upon how well we get along with other people. We are told in Romans 13:10 that “love is the fulfilling of the law.” Love is the expression of the natural law of divine order in the universe as the strongest single force in existence. No other human force is so thoroughly impregnated by the power of God.

“See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are.” (I John 3:1) There is no element of trying to change or make or shape things into a new pattern. Open your eyes and see; recognize something that actually exists. For example, a man in a dark room feeling his way about suddenly touches the light switch. He doesn’t alter anything in the room, he doesn’t make anything, and he doesn’t add anything or take anything away. Yet, suddenly, everything is changed. The things that acted as stumbling blocks in the darkness are found to be the most useful and beautiful. Everything is in harmony which seemed before to be naught but evil to his darkened vision.

The electric switch that transforms and transmutes the miracle before our eyes in the relationships of life is our right use of divine love. It changes our whole perspective. Think of yourself not as a worker, but as a co-worker with God, with the divine law, and a partner with those who work with you. The spirit of love will lead you into the ways of cooperation, and into giving from the abundance and benevolence of divine order. For, as Amy Carmichael said, “You can give without loving, but you cannot love without giving.”

Begin right where you are to turn on the light of love. Love will make you non-resistant, cooperative, and helpful. Love will lead you to a greater spirit of service and a keener sense of fair-play. Love will enable you to have greater drive and more enthusiasm. Love will make you creative and successful.

Remember, God is Blessing You, Right Now!

Rev.  Alan A.  Rowbotham

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Rev. Alan A. Rowbotham, a Unity minister for over forty years, invites you to enjoy more articles and/or subscribe to his free inspirational newsletter, “Spiritual Solutions,” at www.spiritualsolutionsblog.com

Feel free to share this article in its entirety with a friend. You may also reproduce and publish this article if you also include this reference box. Thank you!

If you’d like to receive “Rich Words,” featuring weekday inspirational quotes, you can subscribe at www.alanrowbotham.com
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“Love sails me around the house. I walk two steps on the ground and four steps in the air. It is love. It is consolation. I don’t care if it is consolation. I am not attached to consolation. I love God. Love carries me all around. I don’t want to do anything but love.

“And when the bell rings, it is like pulling teeth to make myself shift because of that love, secret love, hidden love, obscure love, down inside me and outside me, where I don’t care to talk about it. Anyway, I don’t have the time or the energy to discuss such matters. I have only time for eternity, which is to say, for love, love, love.

“Maybe Saint Teresa would have me snap out of it, but it is pure, I tell you: I am not attached to it (I hope) and it is love, and it gives me soft punches all the time in the center of my heart. Love is pushing me around the monastery, love is kicking me all around, like a gong, I tell you. Love is the only thing that makes it possible for me to continue to tick.” – Thomas Merton, from “The Sign of Jonas.”

I love the idea of love pushing me around; it’s so much better than being pushed around by the world or by what’s happening in my life at any particular time. If we could, like Thomas Merton, realize the tremendous importance of love in our ongoing in the world, how much more would we rejoice in the love process within us.

Love is a powerful solvent, melting hardness of heart, quickening appreciation of the mind, increasing the joy of our days and the ease of our passage through them. It is the “open sesame” that opens the doors to the treasures of life. Love often appears to be many things. Indeed, one of the many songs about love tells us that “love is a many-splendored thing.”  Actually, love is one essence distinguished in its various manifestations by the degree of its purity and selflessness that proceeds through the individual from the one great source in God.

In the Scriptures we read that “God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.” (I John 4:16) The quality of love that each person must radiate to clear the path that is ongoing is proportionate to the assurance, security and faith in the omnipresence of God. Love in its highest expression is the certain knowledge of the presence of good in all things, that God is in all, through all, and over all, knowledge that without Him nothing could be made that is made.

Some happy persons have attained the assurance to an eminent degree; they are so imbued with the consciousness of God in omnipresent good that they just radiate love without effort, without even speaking or acting; they just exude this conscious awareness of love. You may pass this person in the street, and be aware of an outstanding personality who seems without words to proclaim as the Scriptures say, “underneath are the everlasting arms.” (Deut. 33:27)

If we really love God, if we love life and ourselves and other people, then we are operating in harmony with the laws of life. Further, if we fulfill the law in this sense then our experience will be happy and fulfilling. If we are not happy, if our relations with others are not harmonious, if our world is not orderly and peaceful, it would follow that we are not as loving as we need to be in order to transform ourselves and our world.

To learn to express divine love is not always easy, but it is so very rewarding and is an accomplishment that brings tremendous satisfaction. It entails facing ourselves honestly, overcoming all the emotional reactions that fall short of the divine love such as pride, greed, resentment, jealousy, inordinate sensitivity, and of course this takes a great deal of effort. When we try to express divine love, we discover our true selves, and we find that we are free to be and to have all that makes life joyous and fulfilling.

The principle is that you cannot escape God’s love. If you ascend to the heights of spiritual consciousness, you find the activity of God. On the other hand, if you wallow in disease and lack, you are still in the presence of God though you are not aware of it. God is omnipresent, ever at hand, in good times and bad. The truth is we cannot get away from the presence of God; we cannot live apart from God. You can’t get away from God any more than you can get away from breathing. God is within and about you as your peace, joy, and life. When you darken your thought by believing the opposite of this, obviously you can’t perceive the truth. But God doesn’t leave you when you depart from Him in thought; His presence is always present.

The most futile thing in all the world is to try to escape God’s love. Many persons find their way in life difficult because they do not accept God’s presence in love. Consequently, they do not have enough love to radiate to others, or so they think. We could never think of the loveless person as one who is conscious of God’s love in his heart. There are those of us who cannot think of God’s love because we are so engrossed in what others say and do. If we hold in mind a wrong that someone appeared to do ten years ago or even ten hours ago, certainly then we cannot very well express love. Many of us hold ourselves apart from love because of our own unpleasant memories.

So, if we would enjoy life and the many blessings that make life worthwhile then we must love. Love is a powerful solvent, melting hardness of heart, quickening appreciation of the mind, increasing the joy of our days and the ease of our passage through them. It is the “open sesame” that opens the doors to the treasures of life. As Thomas Merton said, “Love is the only thing that makes it possible for me to continue to tick.” Let it be so with each of us as, we let God’s love “push us around” and let love lead our way.

Remember, God is Blessing You, Right Now!

Rev. Alan A. Rowbotham
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Rev. Alan Rowbotham, a Unity minister for over thirty-eight years, invites you to enjoy more articles and/or subscribe to his free inspirational newsletter, “Spiritual Solutions,” at www.spiritualsolutionsblog.com

Feel free to share this article in its entirety with a friend. You may also reproduce and publish this article if you also include this reference box. Thank you!

If you’d like to receive “Rich Words,” featuring weekday inspirational quotes, you can subscribe at
www.alanrowbotham.com

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LOVE

9th Day, Friday. Read I John 4:7-21.

Love, in Divine Mind, is the idea of universal unity. In expression, it is the power that joins and binds together the universe and everything in it. Love is a harmonizing, constructive power. When it is made active in consciousness, it conserves substance and reconstructs, rebuilds, and restores man and his world.

As I make a perfect union between my mind and the loving mind of the Father, I realize a goodness everlasting and joy beyond expression. The point of contact is a willingness and a seeking on my part. “Seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.”

Love is that mighty power, that divine quality of God that is expressing through all mankind, and cannot be suppressed by any outside force. I now firmly declare that it is expressing through me, and that no environment or external condition can hinder it. Any unloving condition of the world is no bar to my exercise of love; in fact, it is an incentive.

I am not afraid to pour out my love on all the so-called evil of the world. I deny the appearance of evil, and affirm the omnipotence of love and goodness.

The word love overcomes hate, resistance, opposition, obstinacy, anger, jealousy, and all other error states where there is mental or physical friction. As divine love enters into the thought process, every cell of my body is poised and balanced in space, in right mathematical order as to weight and relative distance.

In quietness and confidence, I affirm: “God, in His love, fills me with new life. In His name I am cleansed, strengthened, and healed.”

Questions:

1. Define “love.”

2. What happens when love is made active in consciousness?

3. What is necessary to make a perfect union between our mind and the loving mind of the Father?

4. Is there any bar to our exercise of love?

I express love to all, love that is balanced with wisdom. My prayer is: “Lord, make me a channel for the expression of Your love, day by day.”

Remember, God is Blessing You, Right Now!

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 Rev. Alan A. Rowbotham, a Unity minister for over thirty-eight years, invites you to subscribe to his free inspirational newsletter, Spiritual Solutions.

Please feel free to publish this article in your blog or newsletter or share it with a friend, as long as you include this resource box.

 If you’d like to receive weekday inspirational quotes, you can subscribe at Rich Words.

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