Harry Houdini, a great escape artist in the early part of the twentieth century who claimed he could escape through any locked door of a cell, vault or submerged trunk in three and a half minutes, explained some of his escape methods in his memoirs.

In one very famous incident, he was challenged to get out of a state-of-the-art bank vault in London. All his clothing was checked before he went in the vault. But it was in his contract that any time he was going to do an escape exhibit; he was able to kiss his wife goodbye because he never knew if he was going to get out again. On this particular occasion as he kissed his wife goodbye, his wife passed a little wire from her mouth to his. So when he went down into the bank vault he had a piece of watch spring in his mouth and, when everyone left him to try to get out, he took the watch spring and started to pick the lock on that vault door.

Usually he could hear the clicks as he worked on a lock but this time after working on it for one minute, he didn’t hear any clicks. He was puzzled. He kept trying, but still no clicks and time was passing quickly.

He got to two minutes and thought, “I’m going to fail this; I only have a minute and a half left. All the press is here, it’s the height of my fame and here I am; I haven’t been able to do it yet.” Usually he would do it in half the time.

It got to three minutes and he was no closer. He was sweating profusely, so he reached in his pocket and pulled out a handkerchief to wipe his forehead and attempt to open the lock in the last thirty seconds. As he pulled out the handkerchief, he accidently leaned against the vault door – and it opened! It wasn’t even locked. The people who put him in there had forgotten to lock the door.

But in his mind even though the door was not locked, until he leaned against it by accident, it was locked.

When we are facing obstacles in our lives we are often in that same state of mind; we think we are locked in to a particular state of being. And yet all we have to do is keep moving forward and push on that door, and we find that it wasn’t locked at all.

Freedom is always present, but we have to be willing to push the door; we have to discover that we can move through that obstacle, through that barrier, or under it, or over it, or around it. We have to keep moving forward.

In the year 1985, twenty-five years ago, I became a naturalized citizen of the United States at Monticello, Thomas Jefferson’s home in Virginia.

We drove our car up to Monticello from Roanoke, Virginia, where we lived and worked as ministers of Unity Church of Roanoke Valley. Forty-two members of our church rented a bus to take them to the ceremony; they all had little flags to wave for this very special occasion.

In the process of applying for citizenship, taking the required tests, and then attending the naturalization ceremony, I had some trepidation; I thought after all that preparation I may not get accepted as a citizen because I had lost my green card.

On becoming a naturalized citizen you have to surrender your green card, or alien registration card, before you can become a citizen. I could not find that card anywhere; it was not in my wallet in its usual place, and I scoured the house but couldn’t find it.

I said to Kathryn, “Well, let’s just go anyway. We’ll just go up there and see what happens. They may not take me, but we’ve got to follow through on this process.” So we went up there and there were people from a great many different countries coming into citizenship. Everyone was in line, getting their papers in order. The Daughters of the American Revolution were helping process the people and I saw everyone handing in their green card.

I got up there and the person before me said, “Have you got your green card?” And I responded, “I’m sorry, but I have mislaid it or lost it somewhere.” She said, “Oh! Well, don’t worry about it; if you find it you can send it in to us.” After all that concern it was so easily resolved.

Our fears often keep us from enjoying the freedom that is naturally ours. Things happen, but we need to know that our freedom can never really be taken away from us because the true freedom is within us.

We often think that things have to be let go of in order to have freedom; we can’t have freedom if we have sickness, we can’t have freedom if we’re tied to a certain job, we can’t have freedom if we’re not getting along with our spouse, or whatever it might be. We relate freedom to escape, of escaping from something.

True freedom is not escape; true freedom is finding spiritual resources within ourselves; we can change our attitude, we can change the way we think about something, and then the situation itself can change.

Victor Frankl, the Viennese psychiatrist, talked about his experiences in a Nazi concentration camp. He said it was amazing in these awful and debasing conditions that the people would not surrender in their minds; they were able to think the thoughts that they wanted to think. He said it was amazing, that there were people who were kind to everyone and would give their last crust of bread to someone else, or would share a kind word or a smile, in the midst of those conditions. They determined what they were going to think; they were not going to let circumstances determine what they thought.

We too can recognize that, in any condition, we can choose the thoughts that we think and we can choose the attitudes we have. We don’t have to be controlled by circumstances or by people; we can choose what we want to think.

The freedom is where you are, not somewhere else. There is a freedom that you can have now, and that’s the freedom I believe Jesus was talking about when he said, “If you know the truth, then the truth will make you free.”

You can make your choice of how you will think about a situation, and that choice can be better or bitter; it’s up to you. The gift of choice that each of us has is a great gift of God.

So let’s be creative in thinking about our freedom. Let’s think about it as freedom to be, freedom to draw on those spiritual resources in the midst of whatever we are facing. When you are facing something, don’t try to escape from it, decide to be strong, decide to understand, and decide to find a way that is transcendent. You’ll move right on through the situation; and find yourself free.

Remember, God is Blessing You Right Now!

Rev. Alan A. Rowbotham

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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.

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Today, Saturday, March 7, is the tenth day of Lent. Lent is the period of time during which we can prepare ourselves for the Easter experience.

Assignment 10

Are you free? You answer, “Yes, I am free. I do as I please, go wherever I desire. I live in a free country.” I ask the same question again, for I don’t believe there are very many free souls. The chains that hold us are so finely forged they are almost invisible but are strong enough that ten thousand wild horses could not break the smallest link.

Freedom is of the mind and soul, this is the highest and most prized freedom. Are you able to think clearly without being hampered by the feelings of others: employer, employees, loved ones, friends, members of groups, those of other religious convictions, political parties, or even the entangling web of the outer world?

Can you control your feelings? I do not mean hold them in by force until you are about to explode. Can you withdraw your feelings? If you can, you have freedom!

Freedom is the power to sustain or refuse to sustain any idea, situation, or condition. Do you feel to withdraw your feelings is a cold, calculating disinterest? It is not! It is refusing to let outer conditions and people make you a prisoner in your own daily life. No one has the power to stop you, but you have the power to let them stop you!

Are you one that cannot live without the approval of others? Even strangers? Then you are not free!

A Power has been given to you to complete every project in life. You cannot have a need, an idea, or a plan that is truly yours by feeling and desiring, that cannot be completed. The perfected good comes with the true desire just as the bush, blossom, and fruit come with the seed. But in the mind we must plant a seed of desire in the soil of believing.

Remember, your feelings, your desire, your inner need to bring forth are the God Power in action. People and conditions are only incidental and part of the environment through which you bring forth – much like hard clods of earth makes a strong plant.

There is nothing as powerful as a God idea that is ready to come through, we are told. So, be free to live, to love, and to express your own perfect self-projects.

(This series of Lenten messages was first developed by Unity minister Dr. Sue Sikking, founder of Unity-by-the-Sea, Santa Monica, California, author of God Always Says Yes and Seed of the New Age.)

God is Blessing You, Right Now!

Rev. Alan A. Rowbotham

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

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The Eastern concept of karma can be loosely translated as “destiny” or “fate”; man is what he is, in respect to his fortunes and his place in life, because of his karma. Karma fixes the consequences of one’s actions; all mistakes, failures and sins must be atoned for in some way, and they become a karmic debt that ultimately, from lifetime to lifetime, must be paid.

Karma explains everything in one’s world: suffering, blessings, sorrow, and joy. According to karma, nothing one does is ever lost; nothing is unaccounted for; nothing is forgotten, discarded, or irrelevant. On the surface, it would appear to be the equivalent of the Western concept of “Whatsoever a man sow, that shall he also reap.” So the law of karma is seen to be simply a statement of the fundamental law of the Universe, one of absolute integrity.

However, the Eastern concept centers its attention chiefly on man’s past and ultimate destiny; there is little hope or promise of freedom today. The individual, in effect, is chained to a relentlessly moving wheel by the accumulated effects of past lives. He is a weary traveler from birth to death and from death to birth.

Jesus accepted the karmic law, but he taught that sequence and consequences, cause and effect, are law for matter and mind only, not law for the Spirit. There is no law of retribution in God. Remember, we are told, “I have loved thee with an everlasting love.” And the great dynamic of Jesus’ teaching is found in the words, “You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”

This insight shows us the way to freedom from karma. Through the Christ indwelling, you can be free. Your debts can be absolved; you can be healed. Remember, Paul said: “For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.” This simply means that Moses was dealing with earthbound man, but Jesus made the great breakthrough into the realm of Spirit, and became a way-shower.

Some years ago I was speaking in Syracuse, NY. After leaving there I stopped at Colgate University and spent a couple of days in retreat at Chapel House. I was talking to one of the students there who had attended a lecture series at the University called “Human Bondage and Divine Grace.”

I thought what a beautiful title that is. It reminds me that bondage, human bondage, all comes out of a sense of separation from the presence of God in our lives. And divine grace is the lifting action of God’s love.  I’d like to expand upon that a little bit, and say to you, “Divine grace is the searching, finding, and rejoicing action of God as well as that which lifts you up in your rejoicing.”

The word “grace” has been the source of a great deal of confusion, and has been surrounded by an air of mystery. We need to demystify it, to understand a vital aspect of God and of our relation to the whole. It is important to remember that God’s will for you is the ceaseless longing of the Creator to perfect himself in and through that which He has created.

God’s will for you is so intense, so continuous, and so great, that it even filters through our willfully closed minds. It is true that as you sow, so do you reap. And yet, God’s desire in you to express completely through you is so great that you never reap the full harvest of error, and you always reap more good than you sow. In other words, there is a bias on the side of life – of health, of guidance, of protection.

This is the factor that is missing in the classic concept of karma. Man is not a lonely pilgrim on the path, trying to reach something in God; he is a dynamic expression of God on the quest to know and to release something within himself. He may, and often does, inhibit the flow of good that is within him; but he can always know the Truth, and the Truth shall make him free.

God’s flow is constant; man’s experience of the flow fluctuates by his consciousness. God is always searching for us through any sense of being lost we may experience. Even though God often seems absent, God is never absent and is always trying to reach through our awareness.

Let me share with you from a classic called “The Hound of Heaven.” Francis Thompson talks about how he felt a sense of God following him, no matter what happened. No matter how much he fled from him, God followed him.

“I fled him, down the nights and down the days; I fled him, down the arches of the years; I fled him, down the labyrinthine ways of my own mind; and in the mist of tears I hid from Him, and under running laughter. Up vistaed hopes I sped; and shot, precipitated, adown Titanic glooms of chasmed fears, from those strong Feet that followed, followed after.”

Now let me take you to the last stanza, where he has a realization of what is happening:

“Ah, fondest, blindest, weakest, I am He Whom thou seekest!”

The restlessness we feel and any sense of being lost we feel is really ourselves searching for God, searching for the one who would open his arms to embrace us.

The law of karma is a fixed law of sequence and consequence. But no person is ever bound to karma, any more than creatures of the earth are bound by gravity. Grace is that which works beyond and in addition to law. You don’t have to earn grace; it is yours by right of the fact that you are a spiritual being. The worst criminal is still loved by God and can find forgiveness through the activity of love that transcends man-made law. By grace, the action of Divine love, nothing is ever completely hopeless.

Help and healing and guidance and overcoming are always as near to us as our faith-filled awareness of Truth. Karma and human bondage is not your lot in life; Divine Grace is always at work on your behalf. Know the truth and the truth will make you free.

God is Blessing You, Right Now!

Rev. Alan A. Rowbotham

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Rev. Alan A. Rowbotham, a Unity minister for over thirty-seven years, invites you to subscribe to his free inspirational newsletter, “Spiritual Solutions,” at Spiritual Solutions. Feel free to share this article in its entirety with a friend.

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From the Fourth Conversation of Brother Lawrence in his book The Practice of the Presence of God, we learned some valuable lessons we can apply in our own spiritual practice, as follows: Let go everything which does not lead to God.

 Recognize God as being immediately present by having a continual conversation with God, with freedom and simplicity, and with praise and love for His infinite goodness.

Seek God’s help in knowing His will when things are not clear, or for your acting rightly when you see things clearly, and to pray for God’s grace with complete confidence.

Don’t do things to try to please others, but do all things purely for the love of God.

Put your whole trust in God, surrender completely to Him.

All things are possible to the one who believes; they are less difficult to the one who hopes; they are more easy to the one who loves; and still more easy to the one who perseveres in the practice of these three virtues. (This is powerful!)

Don’t be too concerned about troubles, temptations, oppositions and contradictions. Bear with them, and know that these things can be highly advantageous to us, making us more dependent upon divine grace – the outpouring of God’s love.

Filled with a sense of God’s immediate presence, do your work as well as possible. Afterwards examine if you did it well and if so, give thanks to God; and if not, ask pardon and set your mind right again as you continue to exercise the presence of God as if you had never deviated from it.

Let your example be a stronger inducement for others to adopt a spiritual life than any arguments for it.

Now we turn to the Letters of Brother Lawrence. Here is the First Letter;

Since you desire so earnestly that I should communicate to you the method by which I arrived at that habitual sense of God’s presence, which our Lord, of His mercy, has been pleased to vouchsafe to me, I must tell you that it is with great difficulty that I am prevailed on by your importunities; and now I do it only upon the terms that you show my letter to nobody.

If I knew that you would let it be seen, all the desire that I have for your advancement would not be able to determine me to do it. The account I can give you is:

Having found in many books different methods of going to God, and diverse practices of the spiritual life, I thought this would serve rather to puzzle me than facilitate what I sought after, which was nothing but how to become wholly God’s.

This made me resolve to give the all for the all; so after having given myself wholly to God, that He might take away my sin, I renounced, for the love of Him, everything that was not He, and I began to live as if there as none but He and I in the world.

Sometimes I considered myself before Him as a poor criminal at the feet of his judge; at other times I behold Him in my heart as my Father, as my God. I worshiped Him the oftenest that I could, keeping my mind in His holy presence, and recalling it as often as I found it wandered from Him.

I found no small pain in this exercise, and yet I continued it, notwithstanding all the difficulties that occurred, without troubling or disquieting myself when my mind had wandered involuntarily. I made this my business as much all the day long as at the appointed times of prayer; for at all times, every hour, every minute, even in the height of my business, I drove away from my mind everything that was capable of interrupting my thought of God.

Such has been my common practice ever since I entered in religion; and though I have done it very imperfectly, yet I have found great advantages by it. These, I well know, are to be imputed to the mere mercy and goodness of God, because we can do nothing without Him, and I still less than any.

But when we are faithful to keep ourselves in His holy presence, and set Him always before us, this not only hinders our offending Him and doing anything that may displease Him, at least willfully, but it also begets in us a holy freedom, and, if I may so speak, a familiarity with God, wherewith we ask, and that successfully, the graces we stand in need of.

In fine, by often repeating these acts, they become habitual, and the presence of God rendered as it were natural to us. Give Him thanks, if you please, with me, for His great goodness toward me, which I can never sufficiently admire, for the many favors He has done to so miserable a sinner as I am. May all things praise Him. Amen.

I am, in our Lord,

Yours, etc.

God is Blessing You, Right Now!

Rev. Alan A. Rowbotham

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Rev. Alan A. Rowbotham, a Unity minister for over thirty-six years, invites you to enjoy more articles and/or subscribe to his free inspirational newsletter, Spiritual Solutions or go directly to the Spiritual Solutions Blog

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