What is a powerful thankful prayer?

A prayer for a thankful heart—

Father, I thank Thee for all Thy many good gifts and protection. Father, I thank Thee, again and again.

How is faith expressed through love?

Our Creator, the King of kings, the Lord of lords, thought out the scheme of the race of (wo)men—all those myriad conditions necessary for its involutionary and evolutionary stages. 

Out of the Mind of Love, so Love took expression, and as that expression became life, so the gift was entrusted in that life to do even as the Supreme Creator Himself.

What does the road of life mean to you?

Follow the road of life how you will, and I know it must seem that it is a road beset by pitfalls and traps, but only by the experience so bought can the material be submerged by the spiritual, and only by taking the rough hillside can that spirituality, emancipated and free, triumph over all.

One in Spirit

No end

No beginning

Course of lives

real and unseen

Dimensions

fantastic

beyond

Mind realm

An avalanche

of experience

rich

towards the pivot of 

Onement

Life, life, eternal life

Life, life, eternal life.

In the Father's home are many mansions.

In the Father's House—and the word should be home—are many mansions. 

And that means that being the great parent, not only does He understand the individual heart and mind, but also He has provided many channels through which His children may find Him—unimpeded by those distinctions of thinking, which make such barriers upon the earth.

The Man Who Found God

There seems to be no way, in which I can better teach you about this life, so strange to you, than by telling my experiences and conversations with men and women here [in the world of spirits].

I said, one night long ago, that I had met more saints than philosophers, and I want to tell you now about a man who seems to be a genuine saint.

Yes; there are little saints, and great saints, as there are little sinners, and great sinners.

One day, I was walking on a mountaintop. I say “walking,” for it seemed about the same, though it takes but little energy to walk here.

On the mountaintop, I saw a man standing alone. He was looking out and far away, but I could not see what he was looking at. He was abstracted, and communing with himself, or with some presence of which I was unaware.

I waited for some time.

At last, drawing a long breath, for we breathe here, he turned his eyes to me. and said, with a kind smile―

Can I do anything for you, brother?

I was embarrassed for a moment, feeling that I might have intruded upon some sweet communion.

“If I am not too bold in asking,” I said, “would you tell me what you were thinking, as you stood there looking into space?”

I was conscious of my presumption, but being so determined to learn what can be known, if sometimes I am too bold in making inquiries, I feel that my very earnestness may win for me the forgiveness of those I question.

This man had a beautiful beardless face, and young-looking eyes, but his garments were the ordinary garments of one who thinks little or nothing of his appearance.

That very unconsciousness of the outer form may sometimes give it a peculiar majesty.

He looked at me in silence for a moment; then, he said―

I was trying to draw near God.

And what is God; and where is God?

He smiled. I never saw a smile like his, as he answered―

God is everywhere. God is.

“What is he?” I persisted, and again he repeated, but with a different emphasis―

God is.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

God is, God is.

I do not know how his meaning was conveyed to me, perhaps by sympathy, but it suddenly flashed into my mind that when he said, “God is,” he expressed the completest realisation of God, which is possible to the spirit; and when he said, “God is,” he meant me to understand that there was no being, nothing that is, except God.

There must have been in my face a reflection of what I felt, for the saint then said to me―

Do you not also know that He is, and that all that is, is He?

“I am beginning to feel what you mean,” I answered, “though I doubtless feel but a little of it.”

He smiled, and made no reply, but my mind was full of questions.

“When you were on earth,” I said, “did you think much about God?”

“Always. I thought of little else. I sought Him everywhere, but seemed only at times to get flashes of consciousness, as to what He really was.

Sometimes when praying, for I prayed much, there would come to me suddenly the question,

To what are you praying?

And I would answer aloud,

To God, to God!

But though I prayed to Him every day for years, only occasionally did I get a flash of that true consciousness of God.

Finally, one day, when I was alone in the woods, there came the great revelation.

It came, not in any form of words, but rather in a wordless and formless wonder, too vast for the limitation of thought.

I fell upon the ground, and must have lost consciousness, for, after a while, I awoke, and got up, and looked about me. Then, gradually, I remembered the experience, which had been too big for me while I was feeling it.

“I could put into the form of words, the realisation, which had been too much for my mortality to bear, and the words I used to myself were,

All that is, is God.

It seemed very simple, yet it was far from simple.

All that is, is God.

That must include me, and all my fellow beings, human and animal; even the trees, and the birds, and the rivers, must be a part of God, if God were all that is.

“From that moment, life assumed a new meaning for me.

I could not see a human face, without remembering the revelation, that the human being I saw was a part of God.

When my dog looked at me, I said to him aloud,

You are a part of God.

When I stood beside a river, and listened to the sound of its waters, I said to myself,

I am listening to the voice of God.

 

When a fellow being was angry with me, I asked myself,

In what way have I offended God?’

When one spoke lovingly to me, I said,

‘God is loving me now,' and the realisation nearly took my breath away.

Life became unbelievably beautiful.

“Theretofore, I had been so absorbed in God, in trying to find God, that I had not given much thought to my fellow beings, and had even neglected those nearest me.

But from that day, I began to mingle with my human brethren.

I found that, as more and more I sought God in them, more and more, God responded to me through them.

And life became still more wonderful.

Strive steadfastly in your own little world.

If one purges the Judaism of the prophets, and Christianity, as Jesus Christ taught it of all subsequent additions, especially those of the priests, one is left with a teaching, which is capable of curing all the social ills of humanity.

It is the duty of every man of goodwill to strive steadfastly in his own little world to make this teaching of pure humanity a living force, so far as he can. 

If he makes an honest attempt in this direction without being crushed and trampled underfoot by his contemporaries, he may consider himself, and the community to which he belongs, lucky.

―Albert Einstein

God in heaven is your portion!

There was a poor man whose pious parents left him no heritage, save an honest name, and a good, God-loving heart―

Now, although in this, he had riches without measure, the world accounted him poor.

It went well with him at first, but by degrees, he tasted trouble. 

He lost the small fortune he had succeeded in saving by dint of work. 

And the people pointed to him saying—

Poor wretch!

No; not poor, he said―

God is my portion!

But misfortune pursued him. 

Most of his so-called friends turned their back on him, and those whom he had trusted most proved faithless. 

He was deceived, calumniated, misjudged.

And people shook their heads saying—

How wretched and miserable you are to be sure!

No; he said, though his voice trembled, not wretched, for God is my portion!

But the greatest trouble of all now laid him low―

He lost his loving wife, and soon after, his only child. 

The suffering man stood alone in a heartless world.

Again, the people said, shrugging their shoulders—

Surely now, you will own yourself miserable and wretched―

A very butt of trouble!

No; he cried, repressing the welling tears, God is yet my portion!

And the people turned from him, saying he was singular and strange, and nicknaming him John Comfort, in virtue of his peculiarity.

But he, truly, was not wretched, nor indeed forsaken. 

The last words he was heard to speak on earth were—

God in heaven is my portion!

And he entered into the joy of his Lord.

L. W. J. S.,  Letters from Hell, Richard Bentley & Son, London, 1889

Overcome! For Jesus

Overcome! For Jesus

Learn these valuable lessons—

Humility, and the acceptance of the divine will.

Never allow your physical body to dominate your spirit.

Your time on earth is but a grain of sand when compared to the eternity of the soul. That is why Jesus was able to resist such terrible temptations. He knew that their duration was momentary, and that pain was as illusory as pleasure. By exerting complete control over the material world, he gained power over it. All the miracles he accomplished were natural because he understood the cosmos and its laws.

—Kirkudian*

*Migęne Gonzalez-Wippler, What Happens After Death, Scientific & Personal Evidence for Survival, 1997, Llewellyn Publications, Minnesota, U. S. A., Part Two, Kirkudian, 9, Separation, 224-5

Be guided by the example of Jesus.

Be guided by the example of Jesus.

He came to overcome enmity by love.

Ye shall know the truth.

Ye shall know the truth, Jesus told his followers, and the truth shall make you free, and ye shall be free indeed.

Jesus taught you to look into the depths of your heart―

To test your life―

To try your motives and to weigh all you do.

He told you to be humble, merciful, truthful, pure, self-denying, honest in heart and intent―He set before you a living example of the life, which he preached.

He revealed glimpses of a better life in the hereafter. 

He preached the religion of daily life, repentance for the past, amendment and progress in the future.

He reasoned of life and death and eternity―of the true nobility and dignity of your nature, and of the way to progressive knowledge of God.

He found a world buried in ignorance, at the mercy of an unscrupulous priesthood in matters religious―under the absolute sway of a tyrant in matters political.

He taught liberty in both―liberty without licence―

The liberty of a responsible spirit with duties to God, and to itself―of a spirit corporeally enshrined with a corresponding duty to its brethren in the flesh.

He came as the great fulfiller of the law and showed you the end for which the law was given—the amelioration of humanity. 

He would elevate you to the dignity of the truth―the truth, which should make you free.

There is no end.

There is no end.  

There is no beginning.  

There is only the infinite passion of life.

―Frederico Fellini

I can feel the seed in my hair now!

I can feel the seed in my hair now!

I shall make it a study for a future life.

It is the serene and quiet spots and people who are the anchors for those who must toss and struggle in the thick of things.

You want to believe in the future life.

You want to believe in the future life. 

As the world, in the fullness of time, has received new dispensations, except ye become as a little child, ye shall in no wise enter therein.

If you are true and good, you have your reward in the companionship of radiant souls, and in the joys of the higher life; having here built up the Kingdom of Heaven within you, you awoke at home.

And how sweetly solemn is the thought that for the fallen and sin-sick, there is such saving power!

 

Poor tired boys!

Poor tired boys!

Spirit-lives see them as they fall and hear them call—

Mother, where are you? It is dark and I am so tired and so afraid is what they hear again and again until their hearts ache with the pity of it.

So very many are just boys in their teens and have no more hate in them than if they were ten.

When these incarnate again—and they will soon—they will be born with such a passion for peace that war will be impossible.

They will die for peace, but never again for war.

Their suffering cuts so deeply— it will impress the next incarnation.

Never mind, sister, I used to cry too at first, but I see now that a lasting peace is bought by the lives of those who go out hating war.

Be still and know that God is God.

Give testimony of the truth that is in you but do not attempt to muzzle the hounds that bay the summons to the Witches' Sabbath.

Enter the Holy Temple and shut the door―

Invoke the angels. 

 The baying of the hounds cannot drown the music of the angel voices.

Be still and know that God is God.

Not so with Him.

So little did his ethereal body blind the sense of spirit that He could converse with the angels, as one of their own order, who was cognisant of their life and remembered his own part in it before incarnation. 

Glory to the advantages of spirit-life!

Glory to the advantages of spirit-life! 

Friendship, love and truth characterise spirits of a progressive order. 

Spirit associations are rendered agreeable from the fact that frankness is manifested and participated in by all. 

No deception or disguise is indulged by spirits but each comes to the work with simplicity and unfeigned interest, as manifested in the earnestness of every spirit.

Gathering together those whose opinions are varied and who dissent from each other, for the purpose of hearing ideas adverse to their own is one phase of spirit associations, which produces a stimulus that enlarges the capacity of understanding. 

Spirits know full well that it is for their benefit and reap the reward with feelings of gratitude. 

Many spirits wend their way through a thorough course of instruction by the aid of such associations. 

These call together a class of spirits whose truthfulness, integrity and honour abound in intellectual pursuits; some in one direction and some in another. 

They combine with love of wisdom and of each other.

Nor is this the only phase of association in spirit life.

Spirits are associated with a class whose high moral standing is such as to render them, through congenial and sympathetic regard, accessible to the hearts of all classes; overpowering them with the effulgence of spirit emanations and impressing with a fervour so strong that the impenitent yield as readily as the sun clears away darkness. 

Opportunities are given through this source for all to improve; these spirits delighting thus to work for the good of others, the purity of their lives being freely imparted to those desiring elevation.

Spirit association is a principle from which we may draw many conclusions. 

One among the many is the propriety of being true to yourself, never letting deception mar your spiritual growth. 

Pour a flood of light wherever the feet tread, disarming pride, vain display and attempts to be what you are not. 

Let sympathy greet the feelings with a flood of intelligence, pouring the balmy effulgence of light into the hearts of all, and lifting the veil of estrangement.

Diva Dance from the Fifth Element