Spiritual Solutions

“Wherever you are is the entry point.” - Kabir

It seems to me there are certain moments in our lives when we have a powerful awareness and clarity about something, so much so that we remember it clearly though it may have been many years ago. And over time it also carries more meaning for us.

I remember when I first went to ministerial school at Unity Village, there was a moment when I felt I had come to and crossed a threshold in my life. All that had gone before, all the disparate experiences were spread out before me. All those experiences, which seemed to have no or little connection with one another, were linked together as a sort of threshold which I had crossed and were now providing a beginning for new experience and a new life as all those past experiences came together to form a cohesive new direction.

At the time it reminded me of the image of what Teilhard de Chardin called a “peduncle,” where all that had gone before had started from the Alpha point and moved in an outward direction and now, crossing the threshold, began to move in an inward direction so that it would all eventually join together at the Omega point at the top of the peduncle.

In the Spring 2000 edition of Parabola magazine, painter and author William Segal, at the age of 96, in an interview, was asked, “What is the nature of a threshold?” He replied, “It is an interruption in the ordinary response of our lives. It is difficult to realize how many reactions are merely mechanical. But smetimes our response to a certain situation can surprise or even astonish us. It is in such moments that a change in consciousness appears and enriches us in a quite unexpected way.”

In his article, Neither Here Nor There, in the same issue of the magazine, author Thomas Moore said of the threshold experience, “A mode of entrance is crucial. A door. A window. We need a chink iin the otherwise unbroken surface of what we consider real and proper.” He goes on to say, “The gap need not be physical, but it is required.”

In the dark wood at the beginning of his cosmic journey, Dante says, “I don’t know how to describe my entering there, I was so sleepy at that point that I lost track of the actual path.” “Standing in a doorway,” says Thomas Moore, “you are forced into the imagination, wondering what you will find on the other side. It is a place full of expectant fantasy.”

“This is the key point about thresholds. . . .” says Thomas Moore. “In their narrow confines you may find fantasy, memory, dream, anxiety, miracle, intuition, and magic. These are the means by which the deep soul prospers – neither in life nor entirely out of life. This is a good place from which to make a decision and get a hunch. It is the true home of creativity. It is also the claustrophobic place of greatest fear. Anything of moment takes place in these interstices – in the tunnels and passages and waiting periods. They are indispensable and yet must be kept tangential.”

Perhaps you stand on a threshold right now.

Jesus said, “Strive to enter by the narrow door..” (luke 13:24) This is the door of faith and trust in the Presence. “I am the door,” said Jesus; “if anyone enters by me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture.” (John 10:9) In Revelations we read, “Behold, I have set before you an open door, which no one is able to shut.” (Rev. 3:8) and “Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him and he with me.” (Rev. 3:20)

So where is this threshold? Where is this door? Where is this entry point to your greater good, to what Jesus called life more abundant? The great Indian saint, philosopher and poet, Kabir said, “Wherever you are is the entry point.” Wherever you are! You are not separate from your good; you are filled with possibility and potential right now.

I would recommend that if you have not already done so, make a habit of taking a little time daily, alone in the quiet place of your heart, in communion with your Source, so that the illumination and guidance of the Holy Spirit may become alive and active in your life. Then go about your daily work, ever open to divine guidance, trusting it and resting in it, strengthened and sustained by its power.

God is always in communion with you, but sometimes you may lose sight of this communion. It is this loss of awareness of your innate oneness that brings a sense of separation. You can solve this great problem simply by the realization of oneness. Then you find that you have the working principle that will carry you through all times and all experiences. In your hour of need, in the instant of realizing your oneness in the Presence, you make the connection – and the separation is dissolved. As the Bible tells us: “You shall renew your strength, you shall mount up with wings like eagles, you shall run and not be weary, you shall walk and not faint.” (Isaiah 40:31)

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-nine years, invites you to enjoy more articles and/or subscribe to his free inspirational newsletter, “Spiritual Solutions,” at www.spiritualsolutionsblog.com

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There are moments in life when a change in consciousness appears and enriches us in a quite unexpected way. I remember when I was first in ministerial school at Unity Village; I was thirty-three years old. There was a moment when I realized that everything that had happened in my life had led up to that moment and come together in a kind of threshold which I had crossed. Henceforth all those seemingly disparate experiences would begin to draw together to form a totally new life experience.

Later, in my studies, I learned of the work of Teilhard de Chardin, a French philosopher and Jesuit priest who trained as a paleontologist and geologist. In his book, The Phenomenon of Man, he set forth a sweeping account of the unfolding of the cosmos in which he describes it as being like a peduncle, a stalk-like formation growing vertically yet with fanning out from the main stalk, and the noosphere, or the sphere of human thought; “some branches wither, some sleep, some shoot up and spread everywhere” (Chardin).

These studies confirmed for me my own realization of a threshold of consciousness that we may cross in our own individual unfoldment toward a new level of being, or the beginning of a transformation in our own life experience. As Teilhard de Chardin has said, “The movement of our souls expresses and measures the very stages of evolution itself.” Julian Huxley had the same insight when he said, “Man discovers that he is nothing else than evolution become conscious of itself.”

Being cognizant of the threshold itself, a kind of stillness appears. And with it, perhaps, a realization that one has been asleep; it is a dawning of a new consciousness, an opening toward a hidden existence. This realization can bring one to view life as consisting of a series of thresholds, in turn bringing a realization of the infinite possibilities of one’s existence.

In the Bible we find it described in this way, “Behold, I have set before you an open door which no one is able to shut.” (Rev. 3:8) And Jesus pointed us to the inner possibilities of our spiritual potential when he said, “I am the door.” (John 10:9) The door is your eternal relationship with the Infinite, your changeless oneness with God.

It is significant that my realization of the threshold came after an intensely challenging experience. We live in a world of change and challenge. But no matter what happens in the world around us, nothing can alter the basic Truth of our unity with God. And nothing but our own lack of awareness and acceptance can impede the flow of life and guidance from within ourselves outward, to meet every need in our experience.

It was Emerson who said, “”There is no screen or ceiling between our heads and the infinite heavens; so there is no bar or wall in the soul where man, the effect, ceases, and God, the cause, begins. The walls are taken away. We lie open on one side to the deeps of spiritual nature, to the attributes of God.”

Last Sunday, I officiated at a wedding held in a courtyard of a hotel on the beach and I was very conscious of the power in the moment and in the experience. It was a threshold for the young couple certainly, but depending upon the awareness of those present and applied to their own lives, it could have been a threshold experience for any one of them. And watching the young children playing and filled with energy, I thought of the never-ending series of thresholds stretching out before them which, brought into conscious awareness, could provide an infinite supply of creativity for every experience.

Then yesterday, I watched much of the television overage of the amazing rescue of the thirty-three miners trapped for sixty-nine days in a mine in Chile, two thousand feet below the earth. I thought about the tremendous challenges they faced and overcame, and how their lives would never be the same again. And I thought about the ingenuity displayed by those involved in the rescue operation, drawing on resources from around the world to accomplish the successful results.

Some people meet apparent tragedy and “suffer the disintegration of personality”; that is, they “fall apart at the seams.” But others see their troubles as challenges to their faith and courage, and they make their troubles work for them. The harder they fall, the higher they bounce. Painter and author William Segal said, “Stillness is a nurturing element to help one rise instead of being entirely subject to the negative principle of mechanical deterioration and its downward path.”

Faced with a threshold of any kind, remember that your attitude toward circumstances is all-important. There is an open door before you which no one is able to shut. But if you resist the changes of life, you create mental barriers. You impede the flow of good, through the open door of the Spirit within, if you dwell on self-pity, resistance, bitterness, despair.

Get still, and remember the Divine promise: “I have set before you an open door which no one is able to shut” No one! No one has the power to shut the door to the real source of your good! There is a movement of good in you that is forever seeking expression through you. This is a force as powerful as gravity. Never lose sight of this great thought. Even in the midst of seeming loss or change, hold fast to the idea that nothing can impede the flow of good to you and through you.

The Victorian poet and priest Gerard Manley Hopkins knew how to release the divine potential that lay waiting, unsuspected, in everything around us. A favorite description of that potential which opens my eyes to the possibilities around me is found in these words:

“The world is charged with the grandeur of God.
It will flame out like shining from shook foil.”

In one of his meditations he wrote: “All things therefore are charged with love, are charged with God and if we know how to touch them give off sparks and take fire, yield drops and flow, ring and tell of him.”

There is a relentless force within you that forever seeks to lead you to, or draw to you, the experiences that will challenge you to release your innate potential, to express and fulfill your uniqueness, as a child of God. Dare to believe that in everything, God works for good. Dare to hope for the best, even when the worst seems to be happening, even though people call you an impractical optimist. Stand steadfast in the belief that a door is always open, and that this is your greatest treasure.

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.

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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This is the day which the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it. – Psalms 118:24

Each day is God’s special gift to you. Great things can happen as you become open to its possibilities.

In the Book of Revelation we read, “Behold, I have set before you an open door, which no one is able to shut.” (Rev. 3:8) You could say that this door represents your eternal relationship with the Infinite, a divine desire to guide you in the complete unfoldment of your inherent potential.

Ralph Waldo Emerson put it this way: “There is no screen or ceiling between our heads and the infinite heavens, so is there no bar or wall in the soul where man the effect ceases and God the cause begins. The walls are taken away; we lie open on one side to the depths of spiritual nature, to the attributes of God.”

All of us experience exalted moments of inspiration, at which times we see greater possibilities for ourselves and resolve to pursue some course of betterment. But often this resolve and this course fade because we do not feel that we have enough to begin. Or perhaps we have just tried something new and are disappointed in the outcome.

If you announce, after a seeming disappointment, “Well, there go my chances of success,” then that is the level of consciousness on which you will be working for the immediate future. Is that what you want to happen? You can close your heart and mind to life this way, but life never closes its doors to you!

No matter what happens in your life, do not forget the promise of the open door. No individual has the power to shut the door to the real source of your good; nothing can stand in your way. Feel the relentless spiritual power within you seeking to lead you to the perfect fulfillment of your uniqueness.

So, how will you spend this precious God-given day?

William James once advised: “Seize the very first possible opportunity to act on every resolution you make and on every emotional prompting you may experience in the direction of the habits you aspire to gain.” When an urge to do or to have something comes to us, we must get into our consciousness that it is but the vanguard of a train of ideas, abilities and substance – all that is needed to make the ideal a reality, the hope a fulfillment. The important thing is to get started; to begin is often half the battle.

Goethe wrote: “Are you in earnest? Seize this very moment; whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.”

If we want anything for ourselves we must accept it in our heart and mind now, today. Remember that there is no future tense in the eternal now of infinite mind. There will be no future time in which to know the truth or to make a demonstration. The only demonstration there is, ever was, or ever will be is God’s . . . and that is right now! Determine for yourself that now is the time.

Print that on a card – “Now is the acceptable time!” – and place it where you will be sure to see it every day. Charles Fillmore, co-founder of the Unity movement, used to say that any time is a good time to start doing something about a good idea. Remember that there is nothing futuristic about your oneness with God.

Build on this realization; affirm your unity, your oneness – not as something you might have, but as the very foundation of your life right now!  Affirm your wholeness now. Affirm that you are now in your right place. Affirm that you are right now God’s perfect child and are endowed with all the potentialities to be – right now – what you desire to be.

Whatever may be the problem confronting you, the door is open to the solution to it and to a greater good which no one can keep from you. Clear your mind of doubt and let God direct your steps.

As a final thought, let me share with you this poem by Hazel Thomas Wright:

The Door is Open

Be still and know whatever may betide;
No door is closed but another opens wide;
A door that opens to a boundless view
Of blessings, rich in promise, vital, new;
Blessings more wonderful than you have known.
Dare to step through the door and claim your own!
Keep clear your inner vision, thus to see
The good awaiting you, and constant be.
Face each new venture with a joyful song;
Lift up your head and heart, be valiant, strong,
With God as your protector, friend and guide,
No door is closed but that another opens wide.

Remember, God is Blessing You Right Now!

Rev. Alan A. Rowbotham

—————————————————–             

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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Remember, God is Blessing You Right Now!

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