“Are not five sparrows sold for two
copper coins? And not one of them is forgotten before
God. But the very hairs of your head are
all numbered. Do not fear therefore; you
are of more value than many sparrows.” Luke 12: 6 & 7;
New King James Bible Version (NKJV). “But
now, thus says the Lord, who created you, O
Jacob, And He who formed you, O Israel:
“Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by
your name; You are Mine.” (Isaiah 43:1; (NKJV). “Can
a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the
son of her womb? yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee. Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of
my hands;” (Isaiah 49: 15-16 to 1st
semi-colon; (King James Bible Version (KJV). Everyone
wants to feel valuable and important to the universe, in some way. We want to be unique. We want to know that something, or someone
‘out there’, loves and values us as a special, individual being, whom others
want to know. Furthermore, we each want
to belong to the universe in a way that recognizes
our own place in it, and everyone’s need for
us to be here. The odd
fact is that we already have all these things we desire to be; we just don’t
realize it because this truth is hidden beneath years of material thinking,
rather than spiritual realization. On a
planet teeming with billions of people, the effort of expressing our own
uniqueness through merely material channels is not an easy task. While viewing our self as just one,
insignificant individual among billions, our contribution to the whole can seem
to be an exercise in futility; for the
general population gives less and less importance to individual
endeavors. As our cities and countries
become more crowded, each individual seems to disappear within the mist of the
masses. No wonder we often feel unknown,
unappreciated, and invisible. Yet, the biblical passages
shown at the top of this article clearly indicate that, to our Creator, each of
us is really a beloved, unique
individual of the divine creation. In
spiritual fact, we are each eternally important. We are important because divine Spirit (God)
includes all identities within Itself; therefore, we are each one of God’s
infinite images, or likenesses. Since
mankind is made in God’s own image (not the image of fleshly mortals) we are
each a spiritual, (rather than
material) child, or off-spring, of the infinite God, in whom all identities
dwell. So, when we fail to
identify ourselves rightly, (as God’s spiritual off-spring, rather than finite,
material beings) we often feel useless and unimportant to the world. And when we don’t yet perceive the spiritual
side of life at a deep enough level, we go on mis-identifying ourselves,
without a clue. We take the material
sense of things as reality, and accept all the gloom and doom mortality claims
to offer. Because of this materialistic
view of ourselves, we, unintentionally, accept, without question, all
the negative turns that our daily lives present to us. So, in order to change
things for the better in our temporary, human experience, we must take our mental
sense of things to a new, more spiritual level; and we need to see God’s place
in our lives, in order to change our human experience for the better. We must add the fact of the divine, invisible
Presence and God’s sovereign, harmonious law into our equation of reality and
allow this spiritual perception to correct our human problems. Then we can stop dwelling upon the material
chaos that is raging around us, and instead, allow the divine Harmony to
operate on our behalf. When we take this
mental step God-ward, positive changes take place that begin to erase the
negative conditions of materiality that seem to be out of control, but are
never spiritually out of divine
Spirit’s harmonious control. So,
how does all this relate to the more positive sense of self that we need for a
fuller, more satisfying human life experience?
Here is an example of just one, spiritual truth that can change our
whole life experience. Ponder this for a
few days, until you remember it: We are each a spiritual creature who needs
to be shared. Don’t
think this is a frivolous statement. Let
me explain it. We each have,
within our spiritual selves, talents that are greatly needed in the world. Yet, we often dis-allow the moment when our own, individual talents and value
begin to shine in the world. This occurs
because we’ve not shared with others our abilities and talents (like painting
that inspirational picture we visualize in our mind’s eye, or finally writing
that inspiring song that keeps coming to our thought, or serving at a breadline
in our city, or whatever else comes to our thought that can benefit
others.) We
often keep our valuable uniqueness,
however humble it may seem to be, away
from the whole world we’re existing in, right now. Unless we share ourselves in some way with
the world, we are still hiding our
unique talents, abilities, love, and self-expression, away from the whole of creation.
Living only within ourselves, sharing ourselves with no one, we will
have impoverished ourselves emotionally, leaving little room for
happiness. Christ
Jesus brought to humanity two Great Commandments with a very simple message: we
should love God, the Creator, and love all others, including ourselves. These two, simple directives replaced the
ancient Ten Commandments, because if we obeyed the great Principle of universal
love, we would automatically be obeying the “thou shalt not” earlier
commands. By loving all, we would
certainly love God, our Creator. Loving
God, all our world neighbors, and ourselves, we wouldn’t lie, cheat, steal,
kill, nor covet what wasn’t ours. Loving
others as ourselves, we wouldn’t violate marriage vows nor destroy our own
children before they are brought forth from their incubation in the womb. Loving
God and all creation is really the whole of God’s sermon. When reversing the ten commandments from the
‘thou shalt not’s’ LOVE covers them all; for, when we love God, all others and
ourselves, we would never break a spiritual principle. LOVE is the great principle that God asks of
us…just that. Love is a giving-out of
the self. It is the sharing of whatever
good is within ourselves. It’s the best
medicine there ever was…not just for the receiver, but for the giver. So, by not
expressing the individual abilities within ourselves, by keeping them out of
the world, we are simply depriving the world of our unique talents, abilities,
and individual value to the whole. But
most of all, by NOT sharing our own uniqueness with the world, we have
buried our own uniqueness and hidden it from ourselves. We’ve kept away all the joy, sense of value,
and fullness of life that we could have had in our human experience…those
things which make us appreciate who we really are (God’s own children). By not sharing ourselves with all humanity,
our unique talents and abilities stay buried within us, to think and dream
about, but never do…and they are lost from the world stage because we didn’t do
them, in our own unique, way. This is one reason why,
at times, depression comes upon us. We
have lived within a false, material sense of self, which is always a limited
view. So, I repeat: We are
spiritual creatures who need to be shared.
We have to let our higher self out, in amongst the greater population,
or we will not do much sharing of ourselves, nor reap the benefits to our own
well-being that is so necessary for us to have.
But, admittedly, our
spirits sometime get down, making us feel that we’ve failed in life, somehow,
and can’t recoup. Mine, too. But this is that dark, material sense
talking; for, our spiritual sense knows better.
When we turn our thoughts Spirit-ward, the sun comes out, so to
speak. So, those times when I feel down,
or a bit depressed, I remember this prayer to God from the Bible: “You
will show me the path of life; In Your presence is fullness of joy; At Your right hand are
pleasures forevermore.”
(Psalm 16:11; (NKJV). Then I follow whatever constructive action comes to me to
do; for I remember that our God-given ‘fullness of joy’ may be temporarily
hidden from our material sense of things, but it is always invisibly present in the universal Christ Consciousness that is
within us all, ready to come forth, in some way. Then I wait a few moments until an answer, or
direction, comes forward in my thoughts.
In many situations, the need to do something loving and caring for
others has pulled me out of some
depressive times when I’ve been self-absorbed.
As I said, like most people, I’m still a work-in-progress. We often do what we believe we have to do to overcome some
lack, or some bad situation, when the only thing we really need to do is
remember God’s ever-presence and unfailing, harmonious control over all. Our right pathway, pleasures and fullness of
joy, come forth in thought when we realize their ever-presence. God is our everlasting Source of being,
within us always. Divine Harmony is only
hidden to our material sight; it isn’t hidden to God. But we have to KNOW that; for, if we accept
the material scene before us as our only reality, then we act out of that
limited, material assessment of our circumstances and miss God’s blessing in
the process. There is no lack, or
bad situations, in the ever-present kingdom of God, which is invisibly present
at all times. When we turn to that
correction of our ‘sight’, the material scene will turn around, back into the
harmony of existence that exists in God’s spiritual creation, and whose kingdom
never ends. Sometimes all it takes is a
tiny leap of faith for a bad situation to suddenly correct itself. As one gets practiced in that realization,
our human lives become more and more harmonious. In God’s invisible, spiritual creation, all things are
good. No ‘bad’ or lack of good,
exists. This harmonious state of being
is our forever Home. But to reach that
home, one doesn’t have to die physically, (although that is the collective
belief of religions around the world) for, in truth, there is no death in God’s
forever Home. We are always living in the kingdom of God, whether or not
we are spiritually awake to that fact.
Just as Lazarus walked out of the grave when Christ Jesus called him to
‘come forth’ and awaken from his sleep, (his dream of death) all can do this
when in a spiritually-enlightened state, as Lazarus was when Christ Jesus
healed him of his belief in
death. Metaphysically speaking, physical death is not a permanent
‘condition’, for it can disappear with the coming of the light (one’s own
Christly-identity dawning in thought, rather than accepting the false Adam or
Eve identity). When responding to the
spiritual enlightenment of Christ Jesus, Lazarus received the mental
illumination that real life is deathless, which awakened him from the mortal
dream of death, and showed that life, itself, is spiritual, not material. This applies to each and every individual’s
eternal, spiritual life, even while still ‘in the flesh’. But, that is the key,
you see. We must realize that our
true individuality is a spiritual identity; it was never, really material
to begin with, so we really don’t have to die ‘out’ of matter to awaken to our
spiritual individuality. When all
humanity finally awakens out of our collective
belief in death and mortality, people will ascend (awaken) to the spiritual
realm of the Almighty, as Christ Jesus, our way-shower, demonstrated. That is the seeming-secret we each must learn, however,
before our human experience changes more dramatically to one of harmony and a
more fully-abundant daily life. We are,
and always shall be, God’s spiritual children, who are currently sleeping in
the collective dream of materiality. As
each one, step by spiritual step, awakens out of this material ‘sleep’, we’ll
discover that we were Home, all along, for the kingdom of God is the only, real
place there is. And although we may not always know the good we do while
here, in this human experience, God’s plan has always included each and every
one of us. So, go your way, sharing
yourself with this temporary, finite world.
For there’s only ONE of you, and the materially-sleeping world still
needs you to shine. |
