 "O gentle presence." How many times I've thought of those words. They open a poem written by Mary Baker Eddy, Mother's Evening Prayer, which begins: O gentle presence, peace and joy and power; O Life divine, that owns each waiting hour, Thou Love that guards the nestling's faltering flight! Keep Thou my child on upward wing tonight. (Poems, 4) “O gentle presence” are words that affirm that God is with us. Now. Forever. I experienced this presence in a powerful way last year. It was the evening before a Memorial service for my husband who had passed on the week before. There were last minute decisions to be made. Some of our extended family had decided views that conflicted with mine. Sitting alone in the family room, I was mulling over the issues thinking I didn't need this problem. I heard my daughter in the next room gathering pictures from photo albums, making plans to frame them. This was one item of minor contention – whether, and which, photos should be displayed. After a short period of ruminating, a tender quietness suddenly settled over me and enveloped the room. I felt a palpable presence that could only be divine. I knew it was God's gentle presence making me calm. Peace reigned in my heart. I felt it. I sat very still in wonder.  Suddenly, all the preparations and decisions were irrelevant to me. All I wanted was to hold onto this divine presence. All that mattered was this feeling of God with me. I encouraged my daughter to go ahead with her plans, assuring her that everything would be fine. This peace stayed with me throughout the service the next day. And, of course, the display of family pictures was perfect, pleasing and comforting to everyone. The peace, joy and power of God’s presence is the Christ, God's action of revealing Himself in unmistakeable ways we can understand, giving us just what we need, bringing healing. This divine presence doesn’t come and go. The Christ is always here with us all, all the time bringing peace and joy and power. To be sure you don't miss something,
you can have new posts delivered to your email inbox. Simply subscribe in the sidebar. And if this post is meaningful to you, it may also help others. Please share! You may also wish to: VISIT MY WEBSITE HOME PAGE FIND LINKS TO MY OTHER PUBLISHED CONTENT LISTEN TO A COLLECTION OF MY "YOUR DAILY LIFT" 2-MINUTE PODCASTS 3/26/2013 Unbroken Friendship In the Bible, a proverb counsels, “A man that hath friends must shew himself friendly.” (Proverbs 18:24) This I love to do. I love all my friends. I love to support, care, and show them they are special to me. I have always had good friends – not just friends, but best friends - those who don’t cling; who are secure in the knowledge that they are loved even if long periods of time pass between contact; those who live their lives and let me live mine; those who come and go over the years, leaving a sweet trail of encouragement, support and kindness in their wake. With all this rich friendship in my life, I hadn’t given much thought to what it would be like to be friendless. But when a close friend “broke up” with me, I felt isolated and alone. It wasn’t that I didn’t have other friends. I was simply confused as to why I couldn’t have that one in my life. I had had breakups before, but none that rocked me like this one. For several months after, I avoided even thinking about my friend, not wanting to hear in my mind those stomach-socking words, “I don’t want to have any more contact with you.” Although her reasons made no sense to me, I respected her directness. I had to let her go. And I learned a few lessons about friendship along the way.  Mary Baker Eddy asked in her textbook on Christian Science, “Would existence without personal friends be to you a blank? Then the time will come when you will be solitary, left without sympathy; but this seeming vacuum is already filled with divine Love. When this hour of development comes, even if you cling to a sense of personal joys, spiritual Love will force you to accept what best promotes your growth.” Further on, she wrote, “Universal Love is the divine way in Christian Science.” (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p.266) My lessons on friendship came from prayer about Love, from prayer centered on getting to know the universal Love that is God as my best and ever Friend. The first chapter of Science and Health, titled Prayer, emphasizes God’s nature as Love – not simply as having a loving aspect, but as Love, divine Love itself – the impartial, always available Love that never puts conditions on His expression of love - “I’ll love you this much if…” Or, “I’ll be your Friend when…” Love loves like the sun shines. No one is left out of the Love-light. Divine Love is not conditional or arbitrary. It is universal, unlimited and freely given. Love can do nothing but express love to everyone, everywhere. Love is all, and we all live in God’s love. Divine Love never quits, never changes, never stops. God is the everpresent Friend that never abandons His creation. As I got to know God as my Friend, I saw that I could trust this Friend to never drop me. In this enormous sense of Love’s friendship, I saw God as my constant Companion and my most faithful Friend.
 Love loves. Love’s friendship blesses in all circumstances no matter what. No one is left out. Nothing is left behind. Our divine Friend is always present no matter where we may find ourselves. Our connection to this Friend, our security in the divine friendship, is not dependent on another person. Knowing God to be Friend helped me lift up my expectations in my human friendships to look for, in myself and in those around me, the permanence, fidelity and other spiritual qualities inherent in God’s creation as His image and likeness. In her autobiography, Mary Baker Eddy once wrote, “There are no greater miracles known to earth than perfection and an unbroken friendship. We love our friends, but ofttimes we lose them in proportion to our affection.“ (Retrospection and Introspection, p. 80) Jesus called Judas “friend” even after knowing that he betrayed him. Jesus knew his true and perfect Friend to be God, and could only see God’s likeness in those he loved. Jesus always loved Judas. While Judas' behavior may have separated him from Jesus, it was a onesided break-up. Even betrayal couldn’t separate Jesus from his friend.  In the case of my friend, I had gone quiet for a period before the break up, slipping away during a tumultuous period of my life. My intention was to protect her from worrying about me, but it was misunderstood and seen as neglect. I am deeply sorry about that misunderstanding, but I would not have handled it differently. I did what I did out of love for my friend, to the best of my understanding at that time. And I cherish the lessons I have since learned about friendship. I now know that it can only be broken if I allow it to be. And I don’t. I will always love her as my friend. No child of God can truly unfriend another. Friendship is an expression of Life as much as an expression of Love. It is not optional. If it should occur that we disconnect and go our separate ways, we are all still linked eternally in life and love by divine Love. And only in love. Not in pain, dishonesty, hate, sadness or fear. I think a line from Shakespeare’s Sonnet No. 30 sums up perfectly what a spiritual perspective can bring to our friendships: “But if the while I think on thee, dear friend, All losses are restored, and sorrows end.” My anguish over that relationship stopped as I realized that nothing has the power to deprive me of true friendship, a divine attribute that God expresses constantly in my life. Since no one can be Godless, no one can be friendless. Now when I think of that friend, instead of pain and loss, I feel love. And loved. We are both loved, moving forward and progressing in Love. No one is left out or put out of Love's circle of friends. No one.
To be sure you don't miss something,
you can have new posts delivered to your email inbox. Simply subscribe in the sidebar. And if this post is meaningful to you, it may also help others. Please share! You may also wish to: VISIT MY WEBSITE HOME PAGE FIND LINKS TO MY OTHER PUBLISHED CONTENT LISTEN TO A COLLECTION OF MY "YOUR DAILY LIFT" 2-MINUTE PODCASTS  Today's Daily Lift, "Resistance isn't personal" is based on a popular blog post. I will say, this one was helpful to me today. I am heading off to London to give my lecture, "Finding God". The lift helped me focus on the joy and momentum of forward movement under the direction of the divine Life that is God, rather than be fixated on weather and travel advisories.
For those of you in the area of London, I hope to see you at the lecture tomorrow evening. It lasts about an hour, and I will be available to answer your questions afterward. Scroll down to find the full invitation with directions and feel free to download and share with your friends, colleagues, and other interested parties. To be sure you don't miss something,
you can have new posts delivered to your email inbox. Simply subscribe in the sidebar. And if this post is meaningful to you, it may also help others. Please share! You may also wish to: VISIT MY WEBSITE HOME PAGE FIND LINKS TO MY OTHER PUBLISHED CONTENT LISTEN TO A COLLECTION OF MY "YOUR DAILY LIFT" 2-MINUTE PODCASTS 3/12/2013 Putting down that heavy fear Last week a story popped up several times on my Facebook page. It involved the variable weight of a glass of water, depending on how long you hold it, and illustrated the importance of dropping burdensome ruminating and old fears. After doing an internet search to track down the source, I came across a slightly different version of the same story used in an essay by Prakash Iyer, Managing Director at Kimberly Clark Lever and an Executive Coach, on the website www.Careers360.com. I am not one to reinvent the wheel. I really want to share the glass of water analogy with you and Mr. Iyer handled both the story and the message it teaches really well. In requesting permission to repost his essay here in full, I happily agreed to link to his website and to mention his recent book, "The Habit of Winning, - full of inspiring stories to help you change the way you think, work and live. Judging from this essay, I think his book is worth a serious look.  Prakash Iyer: Life lessons from a glass of water! Not worrying too much about the problem is the first step to solve it. by Prakash Iyer A chemistry professor decided to teach his students a different lesson one day. Holding a glass of water in his hand, he asked the students, “How much do you think this glass of water weighs?” “500 grams!” came a voice from the back. “600,” said another student. “I don’t really know!” said the professor, holding the glass up to make sure everyone could see it. “And unless we weigh it, we won’t know.” With the glass still in his outstretched hand, the professor continued, “What will happen if I hold it like this for a few minutes?” “Nothing!” came the reply. “Right, and if I hold it for an hour like this, what might happen?” “Your hand will begin to hurt,” said a student. “Indeed. And what would happen if I held the glass in my hand like this for 24 hours?” “You would be in tremendous pain,” said one student. “Your hand will probably go numb,” said another. “Your arm will be paralysed and we’ll need to rush you to the hospital!” said a student on the last bench.  “True,” said the professor. “But notice that through all this, the weight of the glass did not change. What then causes the pain?” The class went quiet. The students seemed puzzled. “What should I do to avoid the pain?” asked the professor. “Put the glass down!” said a student. “Well said!” exclaimed the professor. “And that’s a lesson I want you to remember. The problems and worries in life are like that glass of water. Think about them for a while and nothing happens. But think about it a bit longer and they begin to hurt. And if you think about them all day long, you will feel paralysed – incapable of doing anything. It’s important to remember to let go of your problems. Remember to put the glass down!” We may not have been in that classroom that day, but it’s a lesson we would all do well to remember. Put the glass down! Always.  It’s not just problems and worries. Sometimes, we feel hurt and betrayed by a friend. And we carry that grudge through our lives. It grows and causes us anguish and pain. Learning to forgive – and forget – is not just good for the other people, it’s great for you. Nelson Mandela spent 27 years in jail and when he was finally freed, you can understand how angry and vengeful he must have felt. But guess what? When he became President, he invited his jailers to be present at the inauguration – in the VIP seats! If he could forgive after 27 years of suffering, surely we can, too. It is the same with our fears, too. A failure or an incident in early childhood becomes a deeply entrenched fear over time. Fear of public speaking, fear of Maths, fear of rejection. You name it, and chances are, we have it. Someone gave us that glass to hold when we were little kids – ‘you are clumsy, you are no good, you can’t do it’ - and we have faithfully held on to it all our lives. ‘I can’t’ - becomes a thought that stays in our mind and grows – leading us to complete paralysis. Time to put the glass down! The story goes that there was a hardworking man who lived a contented life with his wife and children. Every evening when he returned from work, he’d follow a ritual. Outside the door to his house were three nails. On the first one, he’d put his hat. On the second he’d hang his coat. And on the third nail, he’d unwrap an imaginary turban from his head and ‘put’ it there. A friend happened to see this and enquired what he was putting on the third nail every day. “Those are my problems, my worries and my anger,” said the man. “I have lots of that at work, but when I come home, I remember to take it off – and leave them outside. I don’t take them home with me.” Maybe you should learn to do that too. Starting today. Put the glass down. And see the difference! This essay first appeared on www.Careers360.com on May 6, 2011. Prakash Iyer is Managing Director at Kimberly Clark Lever and an Executive Coach. For more inspiring life lessons, read Mr Iyer's new book The Habit of Winning. To be sure you don't miss something,
you can have new posts delivered to your email inbox. Simply subscribe in the sidebar. And if this post is meaningful to you, it may also help others. Please share! You may also wish to: VISIT MY WEBSITE HOME PAGE FIND LINKS TO MY OTHER PUBLISHED CONTENT LISTEN TO A COLLECTION OF MY "YOUR DAILY LIFT" 2-MINUTE PODCASTS  A French friend often says to me, “You Americans love to say, ‘I sink.’” That’s her accented version of I think. The French language, rich in vocabulary, doesn’t just settle for “thinking.” In France, we reflect, consider, admit, cogitate, conceive, believe, deliberate, envision, reckon, estimate, imagine, meditate, presume, reason, dream, ruminate, propose, speculate and suppose – but we certainly don’t just “sink”! And wherever we may find ourselves in the world, not every thought is just a thought. It all depends on it’s point of origin. The Mind that is God, thinks; and nothing else does. All real thought is reflected from Mind. Anything else is suggestion. In Scripture, Job spoke of God as the singular source of all thought and action. “He is of one mind, and who can turn Him? and what His soul desires, even that He does. For He performs the thing that is appointed for me.” (Job 23:13,14 King James 2000) God is Mind and holy thought is sending; Man, His image, hears His voice.  Divine Mind is one of seven synonyms for God used in Christian Science to explain the source of real thought. Others are Soul, Spirit, Life, Love, Principle and Truth. Concepts, ideas, inspirations, intelligence, judgment, proverbs, reason, reflections and loving sentiments originate in this Mind, in God, and are reflected in us, Mind’s ideas or creation. Christian Science Discoverer, Mary Baker Eddy explained, "Man and his Maker are correlated in divine Science, and real consciousness is cognizant only of the things of God." (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, 276) Mind is the Thinker and we are His thought. God’s thoughts lift, inspire, promote, envision, advance, move, improve, develop, cheer, comfort, awaken, thrill, calm, and heal. I am talking real-deal thought. We have all heard the adage, “You are what you think.” But that can open a real can of worms, can’t it? “I think I am worthless.” “I think I am scared.” “I think I am sick.” “I think I am a victim.” In my friend’s accent: That isn’t thinking. It’s sinking! Seeded in Mind, true thought expresses intelligence and produces positive results. Mind’s thoughts are invaluable. Mind opens and reveals good and good and more of good, never thwarting or crippling the flow of inspiration, comfort, security and joy. Mind-thoughts are Love-thoughts. They are supported, uplifted, embraced. God’s thoughts are good and they feel good. They don’t hurt, cripple, paralyze or torment. The intrinsic thought of God never wears out, breaks down or quits. And God’s thought, expressed in us, is permanent. So what about all that negative stuff that is often called thinking?  The counterfeit notions of daymares and nightmares, the thinking-posers that have no true claim as thought, are the disposable, changeable, weighted speculations of limitation and fear. They are un-sourced, that is, there is no real mind to think them. They are not God’s. Consequently, since we are God's reflection, they are not mine, or yours, or anyone else’s. Their only claim to place and power is in the realm of suggestion – the fabled dreamland of doubt, darkness and confusion. But they are not legitimate thought. It’s pretty simple. Sinking thinking isn’t your thought. It doesn’t have a real hold on you. Divine Mind does. And Mind’s thought of you is a stabilizing reflection of permanent good. The divine Mind that conceives you, guards and keeps you. It will never let you go. I will know fully just as I also have been fully known. (I Corinthians 13:12 New American Standard Bible) Hey, Peeps! It is a joy to blog for you.
You are invited to join the discussion by sharing your reflections in the comments below. To be sure you don't miss something, you can have new posts delivered to your email inbox. Simply subscribe in the sidebar. And if this post is meaningful to you, it will also be to others. Please share! You may also wish to: VISIT MY WEBSITE HOME PAGE FIND LINKS TO MY OTHER PUBLISHED CONTENT LISTEN TO A COLLECTION OF MY "YOUR DAILY LIFT" 2-MINUTE PODCASTS |
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I have practiced Christian Science professionally in some form since 1979. But my journey with Christian Science started in a Sunday school where as a young child I was taught the Scriptures and some simple basics of Jesus' method of scientific Christian healing. A significant experience at the age of twelve opened my eyes to the great potential of this practice. After impaling my foot on a nail, I prayed the way I had learned in Sunday school. Within moments the pain stopped and healing began. By the next morning the wound had disappeared completely. Having experienced the great potential of Christian Science, there would be no turning back. |
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