Any moment of hating,
Any moment of lying,
Any moment of resentment,
Is a moment of dying.

Any moment of loving,
Any moment of giving,
Any moment of thankfulness,
Is a moment of living.

All our moments add together
Like the digits in a sum,
And the answer tells us plainly
Whether life or death shall come.

                       Martin Cecil

Whatever the human intention might be, the principles of manifestation determine the outcome of any endeavor according to the causative factors in human experience. So we are very interested in a study of the principles of manifestation, and most particularly the understanding of what it takes to bring the manifestation of life through the human form. As that is really happening, we have the basis for creating a thriving world.

Humanity has developed a strange relationship with its leaders, in which it is hoped that leaders will change the way the principles of manifestation work. It is hoped that all the moments of the lives of people at large will be caused to add up differently because of our leaders. In the United States, people look to the President and the Congress and ask that they do something so that the sums will add up to life, and there is anger when they don’t. That scenario shows itself in the national debt. You add it all up, and it just doesn’t add up; and it is thought that Congress or the President ought to do something about it.

Honest leadership requires a realistic accounting of what is going on. The realistic accounting says that you can’t keep hating and lying and resenting and expect to live. And there are certainly plenty of those qualities in the public square. There are principles of manifestation for a person, for any body of people, and for the world as a whole. When those principles are harmonized with, there is life. Loving, giving and thankfulness bring life. But for a person who hates, lies and resents, the same principles of manifestation bring death because they are absolute Laws that bring results according to the causative factors in human experience. We live in a just universe.

There are two life-giving factors that are available from within anybody: inspiration and blessing. Have you discovered that there is actually no lack of inspiration? You can fail to go to the well and drink the water of inspiration; you can become worried, distracted and preoccupied. But anytime you go to the internal well of inspiration, it is there. The well of creative thinking, of vision, of understanding is always available from within. It only takes an internal quietude and an openness to drink from that well.

There is something else that is available from within—blessing, which is a quality of love. Anytime a person stops and opens themselves to receive it, blessing is available. There is the opportunity to know that we are loved by the power within that made us in the first place. We have always been loved, and that has never changed. We can choose not to drink of that love; we can fail to let it flow through us and into our world; we can cut off the flow of it, just like we can cut off the flow of inspiration. But that doesn’t mean it is not there.

It is a happy person who drinks from the well of inspiration and blessing. When a person does that, it becomes available in their world, through them to other people, as night follows day. Where there is a body of people who are drinking from the well of inspiration and blessing, it flows freely among them—unless they start cutting it off.

But there is something more that has to operate, according to the principles of manifestation, if there really is to be life. It’s wonderful to be inspired, but that inspirational thinking has to be applied to bring life. We have to find a way of acting on that inspiration.

Some of you know that I am a songwriter. So this cycle of inspiration and blessing is very familiar in that context. For me, it’s like tuning in a radio station—I tune in songs from somewhere within. The inspiration of those songs comes through as if they have already been written someplace else and I am just being handed the song.

At some point, that flow of inspiration is over, and the message I get from that is “Go sing the song!” Go share the song; go perform it. Don’t be greedy; do not forever be tuning in for more songs. You’ve got a song—go sing it. Share it with the world. It’s not yours anymore. It is time to perform it, and that takes another kind of process. That takes action; that takes manifestation. It is a different phase of the creative process, and it is a fulfillment of the process of inspiration. If I heard the tune, the tune’s got to be sung. It’s got to be written on a piece of paper and somebody has to perform it according to how it emerged.

Inspiration has to take action. It takes action through the direction that we set for our lives—intelligent direction based on how we are inspired. To be creative, that direction cannot just be a knee-jerk reaction to the latest impulse that has entered our thoughts and feelings. It must be a well-thought-out direction, not something half-baked. Not just half the song, not just the melody and no chords, not without the ending. No, the whole song, chords and all. If what we are doing together is going to manifest something that is alive, we have to manifest the whole song, based on the inspiration we receive, so that what comes out still has the life that it began with. It’s not corrupted by our lazy thinking, our distracted or self-interested thinking. It is not altered beyond recognition with an “I’d rather have it this way” attitude. How was it born into consciousness, whatever it was? Did it stay what it was by the time the song was sung? Or did it become something else?

That is how a human life can get. In the actual singing of it, it can become something different from the inspiration that is ignited within us. The complete thinking that allows inspiration to take its true form is true philosophy, which is the love of Sophia, the love of knowing. True philosophy is thorough thinking founded upon inspiration.

And how about blessing? We can receive blessing from Source, but when it comes to what we are conveying to another person, is it still blessing? Is it still love? Is it encouragement? Is it an energy that brings life? Does it still contain the seed and essence of blessing? Or did something else creep into it?

Inspiration and blessing bring life, but only if they come to their natural fulfillment, only if they come all the way through in our thinking and in our feeling. All the way through—not just a moment of feeling good, but a dedication to living a life of compassion and a life of service to other people, so that what comes through is unaltered by whatever resentments and hating and lying we might fall prey to if we let ourselves. So the principles of manifestation require some hard work—the work of thinking things all the way through and acting on that thinking, and the work of allowing what we have received of blessing in our life to come all the way through, intact, to other people—as Jesus said, so that the people of our world might have life and have it more abundantly.

Post from: Emissaries of Divine Light

Principles of Manifestation

Scientifically, when any work is done, force is applied that moves substance. There is resistance in the substance to which the force is applied. That is true scientifically, but it is also true in personal experience. Is there any work you undertake that just happens without the application of energy through you and some resistance on the part of whatever it is that is the substance of your creation? There is the reality of resistance, and that is part of creation. And there is the creative power of the Word, or however else you would want to name the universal power that shapes, forms and energizes matter.

We don’t just wish something would happen and find that it manifests without the application of will and effort. There has to be the creative power of the Word through feeling, thought, words and action, brought to bear on the substance of whatever creative field you are working in for there to be creation. It is true with respect to physical substance, as it is for a carpenter pounding a nail into a board. The board resists the nail. It is true of mental substance, as it is for a politician changing the opinion of a nation. It is true when a great songstress not only vibrates the air with her vocal chords but stirs the emotions of her audience.

There is always some degree of resistance—push-back—on the part of the substance in the field of the creator. That is natural and necessary in the creative process. Inertia, too, is a law of nature. The problem is that there has been a lapse in human consciousness that has caused people to become not only aware of the resistance but identified with it. By the very nature of our human capacity, we contain substance at the physical, mental and emotional level. That substance has within it many properties, including resistance. So of course we are aware of the resistance that is present within us. And not only within ourselves but in other people and in the entire world around us. There is nothing wrong with that awareness. The problem is that the consciousness of humanity has fallen so that it is identified with the resistant factors in the substance of its being, and then has only a diminished awareness of the power of creation. And that power is generally seen as something other than who and what the person is.

Keith Anderson recently addressed a central theme running through the Bible that addresses exactly this issue. It is the story of separation from the creative reality within and the spiritual development of humanity, which has the purpose of ending this separation. Keith traced stories from the Bible, Old Testament and New, which tell of this spiritual development, including the story of Moses. Reflecting on the story of Moses’ spiritual realization—the story of the burning bush—it is the story of a man coming to terms with the wisdom and power within him, and then taking responsibility for being the expression of that wisdom and power in the living of his life.

While Moses was a great man, his own identification with resistance shows up in the story as he questions his ability to carry out his personal mission in life. He is initially inclined to attribute the wisdom and power within him to something separate from himself. He asks how he should name the One who has sent him. The answer he receives resonates with awe and power: “I AM THAT I AM…. I AM.”

For me, it is hard to read these words without a chuckle. It seems that in this ancient conversation with God, Moses is being tricked into taking personal responsibility for being the wisdom and power that is speaking with him. In essence, he is being told that if he is asked who sent him, to answer “I am.” I am now that force and power that compels the substance of my being to act. I am going down into Egypt to free my people because I am an expression of the Living Word, that spiritual compulsion that brings freedom and life to humanity.

This is the same message inside every man and woman on earth today. It asks us to stop identifying with the resistant factors in our own human makeup and in the world, and to own our own reality as the power of creation.

This is the right fulfillment of the conversation with God. Rightfully, conversations with God do not go on forever. The fulfillment of those conversations is us acting as the Creator in our world, bringing the power of the Creator into our world. We then have a different relationship with resistance. Resistance doesn’t go away. For people who aspire to enlightenment, they can become disillusioned when, after being on their spiritual journey for a time, there is still work to do and there is still resistance in their lives. The difference in an enlightened person is that their relationship with that resistance has changed. They’re no longer identified with it—they are the power acting upon it. But resistance has not gone away.

Resistance is natural—it is present by virtue of scientific law related to material things. There is resistance both internally, in ourselves, and with other people. Just because there is creative energy moving through us, does that mean that we are instantly healed? Everything in our body is therefore perfect? I don’t think so. It helps—there is a creative process at work when we are identified with the Creator. But it is a process, and there is resistance in that process.

And how about the things that are troubling in thought and feeling, personally? Where there is spiritual openness, one’s relationship with those things changes. Isn’t that true? Have you ever opened spiritually and not found that how you felt was dramatically affected? Opening spiritually does change both thought and emotion. But it does not mean that we will never have a disturbing feeling again in our life. That is not what the story of Jesus portrayed. Yes, he was an enlightened human being, but that did not make him immune to an experience of the resistance that was present in his life. There came a time when the pressure he was under was so severe that it was said that he was in agony, and his sweat was like great drops of blood.

What’s really needed is a person through whom the Creator can come transparently into the world, so that the awesome power of creation can be at work within the realm of human awareness and in the human world. That takes spiritual transparency. We are designed as human beings, individually and together, to stand at the energetic portal between the power of creation and the affairs of this world, so that we allow the power of creation to be at work—first of all through human minds and hearts, starting with our own, and then through all the rest of creation. We are designed that way and we are functional as human beings when that is the way we function. In fact, everything about us—physically, mentally and emotionally—is made to be a gateway for the things of heaven to be operative in our world.

How do we know that is true? Because when we live on that basis, the rightness of it reverberates through every aspect of who we are. It may not always feel comfortable, but it feels good. And anytime we are doing something other than that, we find ourselves identified with resistance; and it doesn’t feel good, it doesn’t feel right, because we are not making right use of our human capacity, which was meant to be a heavenly portal.

Several years back, we began to name what we are doing here at Sunrise Ranch and through Emissaries of Divine Light as the formation of the Priesthood of the Sacred Veil. That veil is between heaven and earth, and it becomes sacred when it is transparent. The nature of the veil has a lot to do with what is happening in the human heart. So a priest or priestess of the sacred veil is one who has transparency and sustains transparency of heart themselves, and therefore is in position to assist other people to allow their own hearts to turn transparent. The heart goes through a process of being nearly opaque, to translucent—where light can come through but you can’t really perceive what’s on the other side—to transparency, when the forms and shapes energetically at a higher vibrational level come through easily and quickly and powerfully.

Sometime after we named what we were doing here that way, it was called to my attention that Uranda, who founded this Ranch and this program, Emissaries of Divine Light, had used a very similar naming. I can’t really tell you if I’d heard it before and it was sitting there someplace, deep in my subconscious, to be brought up in some way—probably I had heard it. His naming was this: the Council of the Golden Veil—gold relating to love. The Council of the Golden Veil. So we call people today to be members of the Council of the Golden Veil. This is a sacred naming of spiritual function.

There is a lot we do at Sunrise Ranch and all of us do many things in our lives, which have value if approached from the right standpoint. Here we raise cows, cook food and publish literature, among many other activities. We all have the things that we do in our lives that have value. And for us, the most central thing is to participate in and to convene the Council of the Golden Veil.

So, interestingly enough, Uranda had a seal that he used on official documents, and that seal contained this naming. A number of years ago, the seal was lost. Shareen Ewing was very aware that there had been one; it had been used for many years. It is understandable that such a thing would happen, because there was a time here when the light didn’t shine as brightly as it had or as transparently. When such things happen, the manifest forms of our life that are sustained by the shining of the light somehow just leave. And this was one of those forms that left.

Recently we have been clearing the accumulated stuff in some of the buildings at Sunrise Ranch. Adam Castle and Soma Hunter came across this seal in the old granary and brought it to Shareen. So we are reclaiming our legacy, and this seal is a symbol of that legacy. Not only the legacy of Emissaries of Divine Light but of an ancient lineage that has been about the work of healing humanity—The Council of the Golden Veil—men and women down through the ages from around the world, from all walks of life, who have devoted themselves to the healing of the separation that is present in human awareness and which keeps people from knowing themselves as the wisdom and power of the universe that activates the substance of their world. And in claiming our legacy, we are also embracing our destiny to let this work be fulfilled.

Post from: Emissaries of Divine Light

Council of the Golden Veil

You know, there are many names in the Bible for the divine, for God. There’s the word God, there’s the word Lord, Lord God, Jehovah, the Word, I Am, I Am That I Am, and probably quite a few more that I haven’t mentioned. I remember, as a child, trying to figure out why there were so many names for God. What is being spoken about here? And as an adult I came to realize that what we speak of as the divine is singular and plural. God is one and God is many, all at the same time. There is one force that’s animating everything throughout the cosmos; and it is this eternal life-giving force, in which all things move and have their being, that has been given so many names.

In the first chapter in the Bible, as a matter of fact, there’s the statement “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.” (Genesis 1:26) That’s in the plural. Moses, in one of his great talks to the multitude, said, “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one LORD.” (Deuteronomy 6:4) So to the authors of the Bible, in order to explain this dynamic, this Being, they had to use a number of words. But we need not be confused about what’s being spoken about here.

There was a statement made by Jesus. He said when the gospel of the kingdom had been preached and made known to all the children of men, the end of evil conditions in the world would come. I think there was an opportunity missed back in the 1400s to 1500s, when many explorers from mostly Christian European countries traveled in ships, exploring and colonizing various parts of the world. At that time there was an opportunity to actually share something of the truth of this book; but, as it turned out, there were other seeds planted.

For instance, the Black-coats, or the Black Robes, were some of the first missionaries who came to North America, wanting to bring the message of the Bible to the Native American people. However, the message they brought was one full of shame, guilt and fear. One famous Native American, Yellow Jacket, said something to this effect: “If you, my brother, killed the son of the Great Spirit, it is not our concern.” In other words, “You did that. You make amends for that on your own. If he had come to us Indians, we would have treated him well.” So they wanted nothing of the guilt and shame that was being brought.

In Africa, there’s a story that’s told in Kenya. When the missionaries were trying to convert the Africans, the people of Kenya said, “They came with the Bible and we had the land. And a couple years later, we had the Bible and they had the land. And then they built fences and we couldn’t go on the land.” So throughout history there have been all kinds of things done in the name of bringing this gospel. But the gospel really hasn’t been brought.

The Bible is composed of sixty-six books that tell the story of the creation of our solar system, of the earth, of mankind and all life on the earth. And then it tells the story of the fall of man—the fall of man’s conscious awareness of oneness with God. All this is said in about three chapters, or four pages. The rest of the Bible deals with restoring human consciousness to the place that it was designed to occupy. It deals with the lives of men and women who played a part in restoring human consciousness by revealing the divine in their living.

There are various conversations that are had by many characters in the Bible—conversations with God—such as Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Jesus, Elijah… I believe most people in the world have been taught to see these conversations between a human being over here and God over there; God being separate and speaking to this person over here, who is separate.

But I’ve come to realize that these conversations with God were actually portraying human consciousness beginning to awaken to divine consciousness—this separate sense of self awakening to the divine self, the Father within. And so there is a dialogue that happens, and we’ve all had similar kinds of dialogues within ourselves. There’s a process that happens internally to fully accommodate and identify with the truth of who we are.

I’d like to share a part of one of these dialogues with you:

And Moses said unto God, Who am I, that I should go unto Pharaoh, and that I should bring forth the children of Israel out of Egypt?

And he [God] said, Certainly I will be with thee….

And Moses said unto God, Behold, when I come unto the children of Israel, and shall say unto them, The God of your fathers hath sent me unto you; and they shall say to me, What is his name? what shall I say unto them?

And God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you.

And God said moreover unto Moses, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, the LORD God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, hath sent me unto you: this is my name for ever, and this is my memorial unto all generations.

                         (Exodus 3:11–15)

I love that passage. The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob—He’s been around for a long time, a long time. It’s the same God that created this galaxy, this solar system, mankind, speaking to Moses, saying, “I was the one speaking through Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. It’s been Me all along, working this process, looking for human consciousness, human capacity that would avail itself for Me to express through.” There was this one Spirit, all down through the ages, speaking to Moses.

And Moses said unto the LORD [this is still his wrestling with the truth of what he’s sensing within himself], O my Lord, I am not eloquent, neither heretofore, nor since thou hast spoken unto thy servant: but I am slow of speech, and of a slow tongue.

And the LORD said unto him, Who hath made man’s mouth? or who maketh the dumb, or deaf, or the seeing, or the blind? have not I the LORD?

(Exodus 4:10&11)

The one who is capable of building the solar system is definitely capable of controlling his tongue, and that’s what he says: “I will be there with you.” The next statement is “Now therefore go, and I will be with thy mouth, and teach thee what thou shalt say.” (Exodus 4:12)

Jesus said something very similar. He said, “The words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works.” (John 14:10) Most people attribute the words that Jesus spoke to Jesus, but he said otherwise. And this is a profound point—this is the point that is missed throughout the Bible. He said otherwise. He said, “I’m not the one doing the work. There’s a Father, there’s something within me.” He’s speaking of the power that created the solar system. That is what is speaking. And he referred to it as “my Father within.” That’s what does the work.

So if we are to take Jesus at his word, that he knew what he was talking about, if we accept that hypothesis, then we would attribute everything he said to what he referred to as his Father within. And when you read the Bible from that standpoint, if there were no other point made while standing here today, this is it: If you read the Bible from that perspective, then you don’t see Jesus speaking about his Father within. It is the Father within speaking through him. It changes everything, and this is the message that has been missed down through the ages.

Jesus said, “The works that I do shall [ye] do also; and greater works than these shall [ye] do.” (John 14:12) Who is speaking that? Well, Jesus was, but the “works” that he was referring to is revealing the Father. That’s the works. The greatest service that he provided for the children of men, for people, was the fact that he revealed the Father in his living. In the world now, as it is, many think that the great victory he had was being crucified on the cross. Well, thousands of people have been crucified on crosses, but how many have allowed the Father to find expression in their living? That’s the purpose for living, and the main victory.

The Father speaking through Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” (John 14:6) That’s a powerful statement. When you really listen to who is making the statement, one could say that revealing the Father is the way, the truth and the life.

There is the statement in the Bible about preaching the gospel of the kingdom in all the earth. What happens in a kingdom? In order to have a kingdom, you have to have a king. There’s one in charge and that one has the authority and the means to carry out his will. So this is the gospel that needs to be brought to the world as we begin to realize that we individually and collectively have the responsibility of sharing the work of letting that kingdom come into manifestation in our lives, in our bodies, our minds, our hearts, our affairs and circumstances. In other words, Jesus became the Christ. Jesus allowed the complete radiation from the Father within to come forth through his capacities, and that is the Christ. What comes forth from the Father is the Christ. And that’s our responsibility also. Many read that statement in the Book of Matthew—“and then shall the end come”—as if heaven is going to float down out of the sky without human beings having to do anything. Often there has been the idea that “Well, we spread the Word of this gospel by passing out the Bible; we’ll travel around the world and give the Bible to everyone. And then God is going to say to St. Peter, ‘Okay, St. Peter, you can flip the switch and heaven is going to come floating down now.’” But the message that’s being spoken about here is actually letting the Christ spirit come forth in each person, so that the Father’s will is done on earth, as it is in heaven.

I’d like to share something from the Book of John. Bearing in mind what I’ve been speaking about, I’d invite you to hear these words in a new way:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

The same was in the beginning with God.

All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.

In him was life; and the life was the light of men.

And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.

(John 1:1–5)

So what is it that was not comprehended? It’s the glory that lives within each one of us. I’d like to close with this statement from the same book. I’ve substituted a few words, which I think will help in seeing this statement in a new light.

[The Father is] the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.

He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not.

He came unto his own, and his own received him not.

But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God….

Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.

 (John 1:9–14)

Post from: Emissaries of Divine Light

The Father Within

It is a pleasure for me to greet all of you with love, from the bottom of my heart. And it’s beautiful to begin this time with the rhythm of the drumming, with the rhythm of our own hearts.

This is a new beginning, a fresh start, a new cycle. And I think that it’s very auspicious for us to be together, connected in this way, on this first day of the year 2012. I’m grateful for the technology that allows us to get together in this way. I want to acknowledge the different places and locations that are connected in this very moment. It feels like all of us surrounding our beautiful planet with our hands, with our arms extended in a blessing to all the people connected to us and to the places and the countries from where we are calling. Regardless of our location, we are in the here and now in this amazing, precious and magnificent present moment.

I am aware that some of you are experiencing the evening of the day, and here in California we are experiencing almost the beginning of the day, the morning—a beautiful morning filled with sunshine and warmth. It’s hard to believe that we are in winter in the northern hemisphere because it feels more like a spring day.

But I like to come back to the reference of evening and day, because this is a beautiful place where these two aspects meet together. I am reminded of some words by the poet Rumi that speak about the place where the joining of day and night happens:

The breeze at dawn
Has secrets to tell you
Don’t go back to sleep
You must ask
For what you really want
Don’t go back to sleep
People are going back and forth
Across the doorsill
Where the two worlds touch
The door is round and open
Don’t go back to sleep

“The door is round and open” for us to connect at a deeper level, for us to connect in a more authentic way, for us to connect our creative fires so that we can create a beautiful world that works for everybody. This is a great opportunity today, in this new cycle, to walk through the open door. It is a door of new possibilities. It is a door that invites us to reconciliation and forgiveness, to integrity and truth-telling, to a world where the principles of respect and honor have priority in our lives. It is a door open in heaven that is always available to us; it is available now in this very moment, wherever we find ourselves.

I am sure that all of us want to create a world where peace and light and harmony and forgiveness and reconciliation are available to all of us. And yet, with the demands and busyness of our personal and professional lives, our spiritual practice and nourishment might get pushed back without our even being aware of it. Something else always seems to cry for our attention, energy and time—one more thing, one more call, one more e-mail, one more response to a knock at the door—and before we know it, we find ourselves feeling disconnected, depleted, and we burn out.

The power of spiritual practice is paramount in our lives. The purpose of spiritual practice is to realign our consciousness with what is highest and deepest and truest in ourselves—to remember what really matters, to remember who we really are, to remember and reconnect to the source of our Being and to recognize that same source in everyone and everything. The poet Hafiz said this in this way:

Again
The work starts
As soon as you open your eyes in the
Morning.

Hopefully you got
Some good rest last night.

Why go into the city or the fields
Without first kissing
The Friend

Who always stands at your door?
It takes only a second.

Habits are human nature
Why not create some that will mint
Gold?

                   (from The Subject Tonight Is Love -Daniel Ladinsky, translator)

I think that Hafiz is very clear about how to begin our work before we go into the city, before we spring out of bed. It is imperative that we connect with the place within ourselves where the serenity and peace of our Creator dwells. There is nothing more important than that. We believe that not doing this saves us time to do the rest of the things that we think are so much more important. And yet, if we don’t “kiss the Friend” first, then nothing that we do in the world is going to bring the peace that is so needed at this time of confusion, of intensity, of wars.

Some of us will say, “I don’t have time to do that. I cannot afford to do that.” And the biggest question will be: Can we afford not to do this? How much do we care? How important is our own spiritual well-being and the well-being of the world?

Many years ago, when I was learning how to meditate in a formal way, I attended a seven-day silent retreat. We were asked to sit for eight to nine hours a day, with small breaks in between, and we had interviews with the master every day for five minutes. So on the first day I went and was complaining about all the things that were painful in my body. And the master was laughing really loud and said, “Go back to your cushion.” The next time I had an interview, I was complaining about all these imaginary voices and dialogues that I had in my mind. He laughed again and sent me back to my cushion.

The third time I went to see him I said, “You know, it doesn’t matter anymore the pains that I’m feeling in my body and the dialogues that I have in my mind. But what is really challenging at this moment is that I tend to fall asleep in the afternoon. It’s very difficult for me to keep my eyes open.” And he said, “I know that demon myself. It took me seven years to conquer it. I will give you a shortcut.” I said, “If you were able to conquer this demon in seven years, then I’m going to be able to do that also; because if somebody does something, then all of us can do it too.”

So he said, “Do you have somebody you love?” I said, “Yes, I do have somebody I love very much.” And he said, “How much do you care?” I said, “I care a lot—a lot.” And he, as a good Zen and warrior master, said, “Just imagine that you are holding with one arm the person you love, and the person is falling into a precipice. Do you think you will go to sleep? Do you think your eyes will close?” That was enough for me to stay awake. I didn’t go to sleep anymore!

But my question today would be: How much do you care to connect with that serenity and with that beauty and with that peace within yourself? Because we have to care. We have to care if we would like to have a world where there is peace and joy.

The author Laurie Beth Jones, in her book Jesus, CEO, wrote: “At Callaway Gardens, I was amazed to learn that butterflies have to spread their wings in the morning sunshine, because the scales on their wings are actually solar cells. Without that source of energy, they cannot fly.” In the ancient Greek language, the word for butterfly was the same as the word for soul;and, just like the butterflies, our souls need time to be fed and recharged by the light of Spirit if we are to be able to fly. We need to spread our own wings in the sunshine of our Creator.

When we take time and commit to spiritual practices, we develop wisdom, faith, equanimity, kindness, deep honesty and self-acceptance. We cultivate our ability to let go, our capacity to forgive, our capacity to be present in this moment. We learn to deeply listen and to open ourselves to grace.

So may we commit to a spiritual practice every day, in whatever way resonates with us. If it’s meditation, prayer, singing, music, drumming, silence—let’s commit together. Let’s recommit and begin the new and magnificent cycle of this new year of 2012, so that each one of us can bring a healing presence into whatever we are doing and wherever we go.

I’d like to end my time with a poem by Rumi, inviting us to do the same:

Be courageous and discipline yourself….

Work. Keep digging your well.
Don’t think about getting off from work.
Water is there somewhere.

Submit to a daily practice.
Your loyalty to that
is a ring on the door.

Keep knocking, and the joy inside
will eventually open a window
and look out to see who’s there.

                        (from The Essential Rumi, by Coleman Barks)

“And look out to see who’s there”—it’s what Hafiz called “the Friend,” but we can also call it The Great Mystery, the Lord, Allah. Whatever we want to call It, let’s connect with That every day, and I am sure that we can create a beautiful world together.

Post from: Emissaries of Divine Light

Begin Again

Like most people, I have experienced many disappointments in my life—some small, and some large and profound. Like anyone, I have a choice: do I give up, or will I love, and bring the profound transformative power of love into my world? Will I see that what I may find disappointing is an indication of the great need in our world? Our world has great needs and the people in our world have great needs. I can be disappointed by those needs in other people and see them as lacks. Or I can come to the understanding that, as for anyone, the answer for my world is the deep and abiding presence of love in and through me.

I’d like to share a reading from the second book of the Bible, the Book of Exodus. This is chapter 3. It is a story of Moses. It is a story of a spiritual intensification that happened through him and how very quickly he became aware of the great need of his world and of his people. The story goes like this:

Now Moses kept the flock of Jethro his father in law, the priest of Midian: and he led the flock to the backside of the desert, and came to the mountain of God, even to Horeb.

And the angel of the LORD appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed.

And Moses said, I will now turn aside, and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt.

And when the LORD saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I.

And he said, Draw not nigh hither: put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground.

Moreover he said, I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. And Moses hid his face; for he was afraid to look upon God.

And the LORD said, I have surely seen the affliction of my people which are in Egypt, and have heard their cry by reason of their taskmasters; for I know their sorrows;

And I am come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land unto a good land and a large, unto a land flowing with milk and honey….

                                    (Exodus 3:1–8)

As the story goes, the Lord was going to do something. It wasn’t long before Moses figured out that he had a central part to play in that doing. Yes, the Lord was going to do something. As it is portrayed here, there is the Lord and there is Moses; there is the burning bush and there is Moses, as if these were separate realities. But something was happening from within Moses. There was a burning reality, the reality of love, which was intensifying through him. He was listening to that reality, what it was saying to him and what it was asking of him, described as hearing the needs of the people, and then committing to do something about it.

So that is really what I want to talk about today. I want to talk about hearing the needs of the people in our world and then doing something about it—not giving up and not living in disappointment. Hearing those needs, and feeling the commitment from deep within ourselves to do something about them, we do not have to fall victim to what appears to be lacking. Certainly the needs of our world are great. There are all kinds of physical needs, and behind the physical needs are spiritual needs.

What do we mean when we say “spiritual needs”? I am talking about what is present deep within a person and deep within humanity that has caused a rift between the spirit of love that is within us and our experience in the world. It is a separation that occurs when a person looks the other way and yawns in the face of the compulsion of love within. A person can come to a place of living in disappointment instead of living in the intensification of the spirit of love. It is a horrible thing to face, that that could happen to you, but it can. Spiritual need after spiritual need can appear in a person’s life and be interpreted as disappointment after disappointment, to the point that that disappointment is accepted as reality and the person feels that they are a victim of what has happened, instead of being responsible for bringing the intensification of love to their world and to the people in it.

So what are those spiritual needs? In the story of Moses, a primary need was related to bondage. People do live in bondage, maybe not of an external kind but certainly an internal bondage. So there is a need for freedom—but free from what? Largely, it’s free from being bullied by fear. The fact is that most people are bullied by fear regularly. They are bullied into inaction and numbness, bullied into a lack of dreaming, a lack of faith that something more, something better could happen. So a primary need of our world is to be free.

It is the truth that sets us free. So there is a need in our world for the truth—not a religious truth or a political truth or a philosophical truth, but for the truth: the truth that we are creator-beings; the truth that we are wonderful people; the truth that we are meant to live in love and in right relationship with one another; the truth that we are here to create, that the culture that we live in is a culture of our own creation, and that if we don’t like it we can create something different.

Our world has a great need for peace. Yes, a lack of war and conflict, but peace is something deeper. War and conflict are symptoms of the lack of that inner reality. Real peace—people long for it, for an escape from agitation and anxiety. When we turn our back on the impulse of the intensification of love in and through ourselves, we cannot be at peace.

People long for peace. But we know that there cannot be peace without trust enough to surrender to the intensification of love happening in and through ourselves. We cannot be at peace when we turn our back and distrust the movement of the intensification of love, the burning bush that is igniting in us. If we turn our back on that, how could we be at peace? So there is a great need in people to learn to trust enough to surrender, to get down on our knees—as it’s put in the story, to take the shoes from off our feet, in awe of the miracle that’s happening from within us. We can be an example of a person who trusts enough to surrender, who trusts enough to take our shoes from off our feet and get down on our knees, before that great compulsion of love.

People have a need to love and to serve in their life and in their world—to pass on that fire of love from within them and to extend it to others in the living of their life; to be of service, to do those things that would be of assistance to others and to the world. To know that the fulfillment of their life is as they lead a life of service and that when that is put first, the things that need to come to us to nourish us along the way will come, but that we cannot be fulfilled in our life, we cannot be at peace, we cannot be ourselves, without living a life of love and service.

There is a deep and profound longing in people, a hunger that people often attempt to satisfy in all kinds of addictive ways that don’t bring health. So there is clearly a deep hunger in the human soul. And what is the need? The need is to find out, to discover, to know that that hunger is not filled by physical things. It is not filled by things that we can buy or things that we can ingest. It is not even filled because of what other people give to us. Other people couldn’t love us enough to fulfill the hunger of our soul.

The deepest hunger of the human soul can only be fulfilled from within, because we turn and face that burning bush that is within us, and let it consume us—and, in being consumed by it, find that we are not consumed, that we are still present as love. So the world has a deep need to find that the hunger of the human soul is satisfied from within and not from without.

There’s a great need that people have, to know true home. They go looking for it all over. They try to build it by creating bigger and bigger houses, more gloriously decorated. The average size of the American house has doubled since the 1950s. It hasn’t helped. There is still a great need to know home.

We meet that need because we know that we ourselves are the home for the spirit that lives within us, personally and individually, and together. We are the place where the magic of love is at work. Only as that is so do we have the experience of being at home, and consequently at peace. As we have that experience, that knowing, we can invite others: Be home with me. Yes, maybe physically present with me, but be in that space within yourself where you are welcoming the birth of love, the birth of the Christ.

As we are truly home, we fulfill that great need of the human spirit to know its own true stature, to know that we are great people—great people with magical qualities of creation, with a magical capacity to let wonders form in our life and in the world in which we live. We are capable of so much. We are large people. We know our largeness when we do not allow ourselves to be bullied by fear; when we turn and face the burning bush within us and, in letting ourselves be consumed by it, find that in fact we are not consumed—that we are beings of fire and light.

These are the needs that I hear from the people in my world and from the world at large. I choose to live in love and to meet those needs as best I can. Let us be a body of people who hear the cries of our people, the cries of the larger world. And knowing that we individually have only so much capacity to meet those needs, let us band together in right relationship, in love, and in collective yieldedness and collective surrender to the spirit that is at the core of all of us, each of us and all of us together. Let us do our very best and our very most to meet the very great needs of the world in which we live today.

Carried by that spirit that’s within us, let us never falter. Let us never find that our spirits flag or ebb. Let us never accept the falsity that we’re not up for answering this call to bring love into the world, because the truth is that we are up for it. And while there are rightly rhythms to our life—we work and we play and we sleep and we rest and we toil—there is the constancy of the spirit that is within us that never rests and never gives up, that doesn’t give in to disappointment, that hears the cries of this human world and is in the process of answering them. We are part of that answer.

Post from: Emissaries of Divine Light

Meeting the Real Spiritual Needs of Our World

There’s a common atmosphere that people feel when they come to Sunrise Ranch, and that is feeling and touching the experience of magic. We’ve been saying recently, “Magic happens here.” And what I would like to share with you all today is the reminder that magic happens here because magic happens here (indicating her mind) and because magic happens here (indicating her heart) within our hearts.

The fire that burns the most intensely is the one that you can ignite within your own soul—that light and that love are the truth of our being. It’s in remembering the divine nature of who we are that we experience the greatest joy that can come from within and can create an atmosphere of a world knowing peace, a world knowing love.

On this beautiful morning, as we remember the birth of Christ, the birth of Jesus, I wish to share with you a story. It’s a story of another birth, a birth that took place in Australia to parents David and Kate Ogg—the birth of their twins, which happened at twenty-seven weeks. When their son, Jamie, was born, his body was lifeless—which was devastating for the family and for the medical team. The doctor had worked twenty minutes to try to revive and place life back into the body of this beautiful little baby.

When his efforts were not successful, the mother instinctively knew that she wanted to hold her baby. Kate had read about a practice called “kangaroo care,” which is skin-on-skin contact with a brand-new baby. Knowing that there was a good chance her babies were going to be premature, she had read up on the benefits of how it helped maintain birth weight, how it helped enhance a deeper sleep, and how it helped the baby to know that intense love and bond of a mother and a child and their creation together.

So the doctor handed baby Jamie to his mother, and she laid him on her chest. She began to stroke the baby, to allow the baby that she had carried for nearly seven months in her womb to know her presence. As she did so, she went through all the memories that she had already formulated in her mind of the experiences that she wished to share with this child. She shared with baby Jamie that his baby sister, Emily, was doing fine—her spirit was bright and shining.

And as she began to do this, the baby experienced reflexes. There was movement in the hand, a movement in the leg, or a gasp for breath. They asked the nurse to have the doctor come in, and his response indicated it was only a reflex and to not have hope, as they were going through the grieving process.

So they continued for two hours to hold baby Jamie. The father at one point took off his shirt and also experienced expressing a deep love for his child through his warm embrace. And after two hours, something miraculous happened. The gasps for air became more defined, more frequent, and baby Jamie opened his eyes and looked at his parents.

That is the miracle of life. It’s the miracle of not understanding the mystery. It’s the magic—it’s the magic that happens within each and every one of our bodies. We often don’t acknowledge the magic that we hold. We have this amazing ability to be completely present—to hold the presence of love in our hearts; presence in the knowing that the purity of love is held within each of us. And there is a magical gift in being fully present, a magical gift in reaching out, a magical gift in touching another.

We have the magical ability to increase our capacity for expressing the gift of who we are—our innate nature. But so often we’re trying to be like someone else or to be what someone else wants us to be. Remembering the truth of why we’re here together and the magnificence of what we are creating together in this world—that is the gift.

The divinity that we hold within our cells is a miracle—thinking of all the bodily processes that go on, thousands of processes within our body, second to second, and that it happens on a subconscious level. We’re not making our hearts beat; we’re not making the blood flow through our bodies; we’re not making our body and brain cells replicate. It’s something of divine nature that’s happening through us. We’re not consciously aware that we are doing it. So we are the mystery.

One thing I’d like us to consider is, who are you being and what are you expressing into your world? On this day we have the opportunity to be fully present and aware, taking responsibility for what we are choosing to create. Does life happen to you? Or are you taking responsibility for allowing life to flow through you? And how are you responding to life as it’s occurring through you?

I receive inspirational emails called “A Note from the Universe,” by Mike Dooley. A couple of days ago I received this Note from the Universe, and it helped to create what I wished to share with you today:

If it’s not yet obvious to you, the real reason for this, and all seasons, is you. A more perfect child of the Universe has never lived. Until now, only celebrations cloaked in myth and mystery could hint at your divine heritage and sacred destiny. You are life’s prayer of becoming and its answer. The first light at the dawn of eternity, drawn from the ether, so that I might know my own depth, discover new heights, and revel in seas of blessed emotion.

A pioneer into illusion, an adventurer into the unknown, and a lifter of veils. Courageous, heroic, and exalted by legions in the unseen.

To give beyond reason, to care beyond hope, to love without limit; to reach, stretch, and dream, in spite of your fears. These are the hallmarks of divinity—traits of the immortal—your badges of honor. May you wear them with a pride as great as the immeasurable pride we feel for you.

Your light has illuminated darkened paths, your gaze has lifted broken spirits, and already your life has changed the course of history.

Bowing before Greatness,
The Universe

In this message, he speaks of lifting the veils. I’d like you to consider: What veils do you currently wear? What are the masks that you currently wear? Are they colorful ones? (Jacqueline removed a number of scarves, one by one, to illustrate.) Are they filled with flowers, trying to cover up your true emotions? Are they masks that were handed down from our family beliefs? Are they ones that constrict you? It’s time to take off the veils. It’s time to let your true nature come forth and shine, to radiate your light into the world.

The celebration of the mass of consciousness that comes together on Christmas allows us to know the divinity of the truth of who we are—to celebrate the birth of a child, a very special child that helps us to remember who we are and why we’re all here: to honor the presence of Christ within each of us.

Post from: Emissaries of Divine Light

The Gift of Magic is You

I have been going out at night after my work to enjoy the beautiful winter sky with its many shining stars. I have been making relatives with the stars. Scientists tell us that our bodies and the earth are made of stardust. This gives us special connection with the stars. While it seems like each star has its own individual light, I perceive that it is actually all one source of light. This goes back to God’s creative command: “Let there be light.” One light!

Yesterday we had a total lunar eclipse. It was a celestial event and the last total eclipse for several years. Centuries ago a lunar eclipse would strike terror in the minds of people. There was a lack of understanding, with ensuing fear due to a sense of helplessness. The moon has been associated with the mind.

We eclipse our own bright light by entertaining destructive vagrant thoughts. These thoughts are idle and wander about aimlessly. Vagrant thoughts trick you into thinking they are your thoughts. So you invite them in to dine with you, but you become the meal and you are eaten up by that vagrant thought. There is dark energy attached to these vagrant thoughts. They are part of the mass subconscious of the hypnosis of learned helplessness. This is the human conditioning due to hypnosis of the unreal—the lie.

In order for there to be a healthy body of God on earth, shining its creative heavenly light, there needs to be individuals who are spiritually healthy that make up that body.

Research has been done with animals. They were placed in a cage and a mild electric current was sent through the cage. When the animals felt the uncomfortable current, they tried to escape the cage but could not find any way out. With repeated conditioning, the animals became traumatized and stopped trying to escape. At that point, the top of the cage was removed. The animals could easily jump out of the cage but did not. They were conditioned into a docile learned helplessness and continued to endure the electric current rather than leap to freedom.

This is what is occurring with vagrant thoughts within the human condition—a learned helplessness. There is a mass subconscious of learned helplessness that must be evicted from each individual consciousness. This is essential so that the light, the individual light that each of us has within us, can shine brightly as a morning star. As recorded in the Book of Matthew in the Bible, Jesus spoke these creative commands: “Ye are the light of the world.” “Let your light so shine.”

We sang the hymn “O Come, All Ye Faithful” this morning. How do we receive faith and therefore become faithful? It was put this way: “Faith [comes] by hearing.” (Romans 10:17) In order to be faithful you must be able to hear. Hear what? The verse goes on to say, “and hearing by the word of God.” Hear the Word of God through His voice of Holy Spirit.

We can also listen for the voice of Holy Spirit speaking through others. When you hear Holy Spirit speak through other people, let them know. This increases the hearing in both of you. Hearing His voice is imprinted in our spiritual DNA and is natural. Holy Spirit is the central coordinating factor in the body of God. There is freedom in knowing that.

My high school class had its forty-fifth reunion recently. I did not attend in person but spoke with a number of people by phone. To my surprise, a couple of the men thanked me for protecting them from school bullies. My past had caught up with me. Forty-five years have passed and I had long forgotten about this. They told me I had provided an example for them to stand up to bullies. One of the men said, “You were always so encouraging. You made us believe we could do anything. You gave the bullies a break by forgiving them and giving them mercy.” I appreciated these two fine men, now in their sixties, remembering me with gratitude.

What about the bully of vagrant thoughts we entertain now, which we think we are helpless to banish? These bullies can spawn from conscious and subconscious memories of traumas, wounds and disappointments. They can also be activated by a feeling that then stimulates a thought. By the way, I am very excited about this!

Our sacred inner landscape, our spiritual body of light, is our true place of habitation. Here is where our spiritual ears are tuned to Holy Spirit broadcasting. It is from this place that we amplify the still small voice and broadcast, as of a trumpet, outward into the world. While defying dimension, I would venture that our spiritual body is immense compared to our physical body. Perhaps our physical bodies are within our spirit—not the other way around. We are therefore much larger on the inside than on the outside. This is a quantum view to take rest in. Holy Spirit is in us and wants out. Shining our light in a multitude of ways is the means of doing this.

Let’s have a look at the power of gratitude for a moment. A couple days ago I had a coaching session with a doctor of chiropractic. He mentioned that he has been speaking with a physician who runs a cancer clinic. The physician told him that his front desk staff could predict with a high degree of accuracy which patients would recover. Their predictions were not based on the healing modality chosen by the patient, but on the attitude displayed. Gratitude and being proactive were paramount as the best approach. Gratitude releases light from within.

When a destructive vagrant thought is entertained, there is a dark energy that comes with it that does not belong. When you believe that those destructive vagrant thoughts are yours and that you are helpless to banish them, your light is being eclipsed. Your power is being drained away and a plethora of problems set in.

What are the bullying thoughts that have been plaguing you? What thoughts are your Goliath to slay? That is your homework. I have been doing my homework as well. Speak back to those thoughts. Take command of your consciousness. Stay on the offensive. God’s people are never on the defensive—always on the offensive. Self-forgiveness is also essential in this.

Here are a few examples of speaking back to those thoughts. You can come up with your own. “Shut up. You don’t belong. Get out. I am not listening. I am listening to Holy Spirit, not you.” Listen to the voice that brings creative light—not destructive darkness. This remains essential at every new level of consciousness you reach. New level—new devil!

This is not fiction! This is the way to take your peace. Take command with an inner resolve. When you turn on a light, it invades the darkness in an instant and dissolves it. In this way, heaven invades our individual earth and the earth at large through us. In my mind I am speaking to at least three thousand people right now—not just to you. I have had the experience of doing that, so it is in my memory and intent.

I will briefly touch on the anatomy of the brain to further clarify what I have been speaking of. When vagrant thoughts are welcomed in and you are disturbed by them, a chain reaction takes place in your physiology. There is a thingamajig in the brain, named the amygdala. This part of the brain is the equivalent of the lever you pull to set off a fire alarm in a public building. It sends an electric impulse through the hippocampus (an emotional center) to several other points, and it finally gets to the hypothalamus, which is near the pituitary and part of the endocrine system.

The hypothalamus is the fire station receiving the alarm. It is responsible to maintain homeostasis (a state of well-being) in the entire body. It is known as the mind-body connection. Fight or flight impulses are sent from the hypothalamus through the pituitary gland to the adrenals (sitting on top of each kidney). The adrenals are charged with the responsibility of handling the perceived emergency by producing and releasing stress hormones. The stress hormones include cortisol, adrenaline and norepinephrine. While these hormones are useful in a real external emergency, they are destructive when overly produced and released on an ongoing basis in the body.

When you evict vagrant thoughts and listen to no other spirit but Holy Spirit, you take your peace. You might experience a deep natural breath from the diaphragm as part of that peace. That deep breath from the diaphragm sends an impulse from the gut up the vagus nerve and into the brain. The message it gives the brain is “All is well.” The hypothalamus then sends the “All is well” signal to the adrenals to produce and release the hormones of peacefulness, such as serotonin and oxytocin.

Taking your peace, in your sacred inner landscape, in your spiritual body of light, allows the One light to shine out from you. We find that our individual light is part of the one body of God on earth. Having faith to do this comes by hearing. Then you can truthfully say, “I am free at last”—free at last from the hypnosis of learned helplessness. It is natural to hear and to feel the presence of Holy Spirit.

This is a state of grace. We have a road sign here on Sunrise Ranch that reads “Grace Lane.” I looked up the word grace in my very large dictionary. “Grace: the influence or spirit of God operating in man to regenerate or strengthen him.” A second definition: “…the freely given, unmerited favor and love of God.” Each of us has experienced a lot of grace that has been unmerited! It is not about earning it or deserving it. Grace is freely given as we are open to receive it.

Come, all ye faithful. Let your light shine as morning stars shouting for joy.

Post from: Emissaries of Divine Light

Come, All Ye Faithful

I am hearing from people—“people” meaning more than one—who are talking about preparing for 2012, concerned about what might happen. I would ask: How are you preparing for 2012? What are you preparing for? What do you know that I don’t? And if you really know it, I’d be interested in hearing it. But the fact is, I don’t believe we really know anything except what’s going on in the present moment; and in the present moment there is no need for fear. Everything is just fine in the present moment. When we stray outside that, we start getting ourselves into trouble.

I know from past experience—because I didn’t always look at things this way—that any of the fears I had, any of the predictions I had going on in my head, none of those came to anything. It applied equally to the things that I was looking forward to, that I had told life that I wanted to have and would now just wait for them to arrive. Well, nothing ever arrived in the form that I thought it should arrive in. So I’ve had the experience of both—good, bad, who knows, as they say. I can use my own experience as validation for what it is I’m talking about.

There have been lots of occasions in my life where there was plenty of room for fear, and I don’t think I was alone in that. In preparing to speak today, I reviewed some of them.

I remember clearly, although I was a child, the bombing in London in World War II—living at night underground in one particular tube station and coming out to drastically rearranged scenery every morning for quite a long time, as the bombing and resulting fires did their work. I didn’t have the same fears, of course, as the adults would, because I didn’t have the imagination that they would as to potential and actual consequences.

I also lived through the Cuban Missile Crisis, where it looked as if the whole world was going up in smoke at any time. That didn’t happen either.

More recently I, together with lots of other people, lived through the Y2K scare where, as we were going into this second millennium—at least, the second recorded millennium in our civilization—all our electronics were going to quit and chaos would reign. That didn’t happen. There was no more chaos after that date, that January 1st 2000 date, than there had been before—and there was plenty of it before, of course. But there was nothing specifically caused by Y2K.

When I was thinking about these examples, I also noted how many times in how many different places, Old Testament and New, we were counseled to “fear not.” And all kinds of other things were said in the New Testament about perfect love casting out fear. So I’m aiming for perfection in the love department. I don’t want fear in my life—it doesn’t mean I won’t get it; it just means I don’t want it. And I know what to do with it when it comes.

Because of this Christmas season that we’re arriving into, I thought what must it have been like to be a shepherd on the night that Jesus was born? Whatever it was that was being described in the New Testament, something really remarkable must have been happening and it might have looked like the end of the world, because it was so remarkable. Who knows? I don’t know what that was. I just know that it was remarkable. So I can imagine what those shepherds would have felt like. The first words recorded from the angel to those shepherds were “Fear not.” (Luke 2:10) What looked like the end of the world actually was the beginning of something new and wonderful—at least the seeds were planted for that.

This is also in my life story: the things that I have feared most in my life have led to the most extraordinary gifts of blessing. I don’t expect that that will stop, as long as I keep my eye on the main game. It is not actually a game, but nonetheless you know what I mean by that. I choose to keep my eye on the fact that I am not living in a hostile universe. I’m living in a benevolent, loving universe; and whatever I conceive of as being disasters, catastrophes, or any of those things, actually are doorways into some new experience. That is the truth for me.

Something that occurred to me, relating to this topic, is recorded in Job 3:25&26. And in that, Job is saying:

For the thing which I greatly feared is come upon me, and that which I was afraid of is come unto me.

I was not in safety, neither had I rest, neither was I quiet; yet trouble came.

There were some very important clues in there for me when I started considering those statements, because it points out that not only did fear not help anything for Job, but in fact, as it was put, the thing that he greatly feared came upon him. And also, he said, “I was not in safety, neither had I rest, neither was I quiet; yet trouble came.” Hello—isn’t that a recipe for disaster right there? Isn’t that a recipe for blocking a doorway through which assistance would come? I am not meaning to judge Job. Who knows what I would do with what happened to him, as it’s recorded? All I’m doing is making a point about that, that the way to respond to fear is not that way—it’s not to live in fear, it’s not to dedicate my future or yours to fear, which is what you do and what I would do, living in fear. That would mean I’m already destroying the life force that is trying to come through me, because I am not actually allowing it to come through me, because of fear.

Now I would like to turn around what Job had to say. I would like to say that the thing I greatly trust and love is come upon me. “Be still, and know that I am God.” (Psalm 46:10) I am in safety, I am at rest, I am quiet, and I will pay attention to that which is mine to do. Is that not a much more appealing prospect than the other one? It sure is for me. And adopting that stance allows for access to and through me for the spirits of love, truth and life. That is where I want to live, and from that place I can act intelligently. I came here to act—I didn’t come to theorize, learn more from books, and learn more concepts. I didn’t come to do that. There was a certain need to fill in some of that, a lot of that. But the purpose was so that I could act intelligently on this planet, and that is the purpose for you too—I wasn’t selected for special treatment.

Fear is debilitating. I know that from personal experience, and I also know it by observation. Love, truth and life are liberating. I know that from personal experience too and from seeing that in my friends who also believe it. That is where the juice is, and that is where I find joy.

Post from: Emissaries of Divine Light

Choosing to Live in Love

Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth?

Whereupon are the foundations thereof fastened? or who laid the corner stone thereof;

When the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy?

The Book of Job, Chapter 38

We have the opportunity to be a living constellation of morning stars; a configuration of people who are awakening to their spiritual origin. The doorway to that experience is acceptance of the role you have to play in the constellation of people around you. At first, acceptance seems like a very passive thing—it could be seen as giving up. But it is the first step in turning around a pattern of reaction and resistance, and the sense of victimhood that comes with it. It is the first step in transforming the deeply ingrained pattern of saying no to the opportunity before you to saying yes.

The 19^th century American author Herman Melville wrote a short story, entitled “Bartleby, the Scrivener.” Bartleby kept the accounts in a bookkeeping office in an era when such things were done by hand. There came a time when he refused to do the thing that was before him to do. When asked to perform his duties in the office, he replied: “I prefer not to.” As the story progresses, he loses his job and eventually dies. He had refused to eat, and what you realize as the reader is that he said no to life.

In the story, Bartleby is an embodiment of the human resistance to accept the opportunity of the present moment. There is always something right in front of us to which we can say yes. It has cosmic dimensions, and yet it starts with something very simple—that circumstance or that person who is right in front of you. Our acceptance of the facts before us opens up the opportunity to say yes to the role we have to play in relationship to them.

That role can look very humble. When people come to Sunrise Ranch we think it is important for them to do simple things, like washing dishes and weeding the garden, because we know that there is always an opportunity to fill the circumstance full with who we are. Accepting the service we have to offer in that circumstance leads to mastery.

Real spiritual leadership is born out of the consistent acceptance of what is in front of a person, and from embracing the opportunity to be of service. If I knew that someone was ambitious about being a spiritual leader, I would be very suspicious. Wouldn’t you? A person has spiritual leadership to offer because they are humble enough to ask the question “How can I serve here?” Not “How can I play the part that I want to play in this constellation of people?” How can I be of service? And when we approach life with that attitude, we find ourselves drawn to the place that we need to be and to whatever is next in our life. Bartleby never found what was next in his life because he didn’t say yes to the one thing that was before him. To that one thing he said, “I prefer not to.”

It is wonderful to be open to visions of the grandeur of one’s own being and the grandeur of what one has to do on earth. We all need to embrace those things about ourselves. And yet, in the living of life, if our aspiration for grandeur takes us away from that very foundational requirement to be of service, we’ve lost our own soul. We’ve lost something of the core of who we are, because at the core of all people there is a deep desire to be of service. And who we are doesn’t need to find a grand stage, as we might think of it, for that to happen. We already have a grand stage upon which our life is playing out. It is cosmic in scope.

Jesus was a man who accepted the ordinariness of his life, while at the same time accepting the cosmic context in which he lived. Dr. James Allan Francis put it this way:

A child is born in an obscure village. He is brought up in another obscure village. He works in a carpenter shop until he is thirty, and then for three brief years is an itinerant preacher, proclaiming a message and living a life. He never writes a book. He never holds an office. He never raises an army. He never has a family of his own. He never owns a home. He never goes to college. He never travels two hundred miles from the place where he was born. He gathers a little group of friends about him and teaches them his way of life.

One of the grand lies of typical human thinking is this: If we accept the circumstance before us and take an attitude of service in it, we will be denigrated by life. The truth is that in any given circumstance we may or may not be denigrated by other people, but we will be ennobled from within if we will live a life of service. And whatever kind of disrespect other people might show us, whatever social status we might have in a worldly sense, it will matter little because in the end those are small things compared to the greatest privilege a person could receive, which is to live a life of service. To know that experience for oneself and to share it with other people is the highest form of pleasure.

Sacredness and holiness are often thought of in terms of relationship to God, to something invisible. It does begin there. It begins with how we’re relating to the source of our own Being. To have gravity for us, the experience of holiness and sacredness has to be what characterizes what we share with other people. We have the opportunity to share what is pristine with other people, and to be true to a trust in holding the space that is between us and another person in such a way that we guard that space jealously, so that it is sacrosanct as far as we are concerned. All the other kinds of holiness end up being simply words of the mouth if they lack this kind of real backing, if we don’t find a way to be true to a trust with one another. That is an uncommon thing in the world in which we live. How many people do you know that can hold that kind of space, even with one other person?

It is our intention to create holy space among a constellation of people; people who are morning stars in human form. How big is a constellation? I’m not sure. How big could this constellation grow? I don’t know. It is ultimately our intention that it should be all of humanity. But it has to start someplace. There has to be some grouping of people someplace who find out what it is to live in right relationship with each other, and let what is sacred live among them, if there’s any hope for the rest of humanity. I really don’t think it’s reasonable to think it will just plop down from the invisible for everybody, all over the place, all at once, without some number of people being willing to start small and create amongst themselves a vessel, not just for holding Holy Spirit but for letting it pour out and overflow into the world. And maybe if we do that, it will just happen for everybody else all at once. But for that to occur, there must be people who say, “It starts with me.”

So that is what we are about at Sunrise Ranch and with friends around the world, some of whom we know better than others, some of whom we’ve known for a long time, and others whom we have never met. To the thousands of people that are flocking to this place in person, and to our publications and websites, we say welcome. There are people who want to join us and be part of what we are part of, one way or another. Welcome. There are only so many people that can live on this property—we are already beginning to stretch the boundaries of that. But in whatever way people find it right to connect with what we’re doing here, and hold this vision for themselves and for humanity with us, we welcome it. People can do that by living here, by visiting, by attending a service, coming to a program, by signing up for our weekly e-mail message, The Pulse of Spirit. Most of all, we find ourselves together with people around the globe who are awakening to a life of service, and so find themselves connected in magical ways with others who share the same calling. We find ourselves in a constellation of morning stars.

Someplace deep inside for these awakening ones, there is a knowing that it is not so much what is happening around us. It is not even primarily what we are doing or not doing, even though all those things are important. Really, the first question to ask is, Who am I being in this circumstance? Am I being myself? Am I being true to what is within me? And however things turn out in the living of life with other people, with whatever projects we take on, if we can truly say to ourselves, “I have been myself in these things; I am proud of what I expressed; I’m proud of what I gave; I’m proud of how I served other people; I’m proud of what I created—it was an expression of me,” then we have the opportunity to be truly happy and fulfilled. I believe we can figure out all the rest from that point of right beginning. We will have been part of laying the foundation of a new world.

Post from: Emissaries of Divine Light

Morning Stars

• A region of space having a gravitational field so intense that no matter or radiation can escape
• A figurative place of emptiness or aloneness
• A place where money, lost items, etc., are supposed to go, never to be seen again
• (of a system, practice, or institution) A state of inadequacy or excessive bureaucracy in which hopes, progress, etc., become futile

I think what comes to mind for most of us is some sort of dark, scary place, where nothing happens; a place that sucks the life out of the environment. Growing up, my parents at times commented that there were needy people in life that were sort of like black holes—people who consistently intended to cheat others out of what was theirs, and that could seemingly take everything you had, literally or emotionally, and keep on taking.

In space, no one has actually seen a black hole, though scientists believe they can measure its effect in the space around it. Its mass is so densely packed that light cannot escape from its surface. What a metaphor for the state that humanity has come to! It is a miserable state for any person, to be so densely packed with lies, with fear, guilt, shame, you name it, that the light that is truly us can’t move through. That’s just not natural. That’s not the reality we came to bring. There is nothing happening in that black hole, I presume—nothing to work with, nothing creative.

In my meditations of what’s moving in the heaven of my experience and what I share with my friends here, my thoughts have continued to come back to the most elemental of experiences of being. At all levels of creation, what is happening? What is our core experience? It is radiance, no matter what. I’m not a lack of something. I am the projection of something; I am an expression of something. I am radiance; you are radiance. You are not “not here.” You are here! Therefore your natural position is to give of who you are.

The most natural thing about us is our radiance. This seems such a pivotal fact to acknowledge in our lives. The most natural way to live is in giving. To me, it is just face-smackingly obvious. Everything about what I see tells me that it is an expression of love; it is an expression of the source of all light, even though, in the human world, there are black holes that absorb the full expression of that source. We are on our way somewhere because we have already been sent forth from that place of origin. And everything about our lives resembles love. There is only a lack of that experience when our own light is not shining in the world.

The reason to be is so elemental and so often missed. We are here to love, because that is who we are. We are here to express the love from whence we came. It is a projection from the heaven that is our joyous responsibility. Love in action on earth. You know, that is really happening right here, right now, with all of us. We came here this morning so that we could find out what love in action looks like together. When we open a space so that the love that we are actually starts taking shape through human beings, that is magical.

We are stellar beings, creatures of light, in human form. It is an exciting life when you realize that this next moment that you step into is one in which you can offer your radiance. You can give your infinite wisdom into it. You are in joy, because that is who you are. You realize you are a gift from the cosmos. You are a gift from that which is behind the cosmos. You are a gift from the source of all life.

Somewhere along the line, people adopted the silly idea that there was a good choice to be made to forget that—that personal preferences are actually more satisfying and more real than the radiance from within; that an attempt to fill one’s own needs on an arbitrary basis would make one satisfied. That approach just makes you a black hole. The creative process is reliant upon the fact that we remember that our gift is what begins all of creation. It is a gift from that place that lies deep within us. We need only remember that we are here to give, and say yes.

There can be a misunderstanding about what that means, saying yes. I would like to emphasize that saying yes means saying I am here to bring clarity and light and love into this situation in the most accurate way—and in a given circumstance, that might include the statement “No, this is not acceptable.” We are interested in the highest and finest here, and we get to say no to that which would not allow the highest and finest to be held between us. We say no to the old story that lies within our genetic makeup that we inhabited when we came into the earth. There has to be a no to that old story. The old story tries to cover up the truth, tries to cover up our radiance. I am a spiritual warrior, so I say don’t let it win!

We are not here to let those old lies reign supreme in our experience. We are here to create the finest reality because it’s ours. We are here to let the stars of heaven, our heaven, be revealed through our living. That happens when we let the radiance that we are burn through those lies, so a constellation oflight beings starts to become evident. I start seeing an uncovering, truly. The design of heaven, which is our place of origin, is one that we know well. We are looking for it to take shape again, but it is already there. It’s just looking to be uncovered. It is creating our own “personal apocalypse,” and our willingness and our joy burns through the old and anything that would stifle our positive expression of love.

Creation is happening already. We have the incredible opportunity of stewarding it here on earth, so that it may be that gorgeous reality that we have just a glimmer of, really, in human concept. In our heart of hearts, we seek for it to be made real again. We want to see it, here and now. There is no reason to pretend that that is not important to you.

In saying this, I am speaking to the world. When I’m offering up the best that I have to my love, I am speaking to my world as well, and everything in it—my own human capacity included. All of humanity is one capacity, really, with a deep desire for healing.

As we gather our agreement in that, our love for that absolutely, we see more of our true selves happening, more of God happening. That requires us together. Each one of us is that representation of God, and it needs more—to see more of that One.

I relish this present moment when we share together with other awakening ones around the world the recognition of the true nature of divine being—positive, generous, offering love into every moment of our living, for a high creation. It is the birth of light in each moment.

Post from: Emissaries of Divine Light

Birth of Light