Like Water

We are spiritual beings, who - being conscious of itself has chosen to experience itself through extension.  I like to tell people of a great truth that came to me during my meditation.  I have had a number of these life altering experiences.  I had the dawning that there was not a singular voice that said "let there be.."  it was a chorus of voices that said "let there be."  My voice was in the midst of those voices, as was yours. 

We have such limited perceptions of ourselves.  We some how think that we are small and powerless when in reality we are one with all that is.

 

I love science today, it proves the very existence of God in my mind.  Let me see, I can describe this to you in a number of ways, but the quickest would have to be to look at the molecular break down of water  H₂O, no matter where you find it or in what quantity you find it it's molecular structure is still the same.  Ice, steam, snow, however.  Accordingly, there is a limited number of elements found on this earth, right?  At the atomic level they are known to consist of a proton, neutron and that stuff - follow me now because I am rusty at this stuff, its been a while.  

Atoms are the smallest basic element of the universe according to science.  The universe is made up of these tiny atoms constantly splitting and dying on and on into infinity.  Is this not the same thing that happens on the back of your hand?  Is it not the same thing that happens in your life?  People reproducing - giving birth to what will eventually die.  Is it not the totality of all God.  G-O-D is the subatomic structure back of all of life, the energy that orders and animates life.  Not just sub-atomically but it is the totality too.  

So the analogy I use is that we are to God as a drop is to the ocean.  Oh and here is another thought - if you could capture a wave, a single wave, out of the ocean and brought it on land maybe put it in a tub or pool.  It would be just be water right?  The ocean in combination with the moon and countless other factors is what creates the energy that makes a wave.  Apart from which its just a puddle of water. 

What is funny is that even as I write this, I realize that so many will say that this proves nothing.  Is that not what faith is for?   Faith is visionary, knowing  what is without vision or proof.

       

Anyway those are my thoughts for the day.  Well probably just my reflections for the moment.  I may revisit this again or may not who knows.  Here's my disclaimer.  This is brain drain for me and the thoughts are just that thoughts.  Sorry, I hadn't planned to polish them for you with a good editing job.  I realize that I don't own thoughts but like anyone else I like credit for what comes through me.  I had a friend who said to me that everyone who shares their great gifts receives great gifts by acknowledging them as such and passing them along.  You know how it goes - a gift is not a gift until you give it away and in your giving you open yourself up to receive more and therefore to give more.  There is truly a flow, a rhythm to life.  

Copyright© 2001 By Sandra Bishop Ministries

Give Me God

I want to have a gripe session today.  I don't know exactly why this bothers me, maybe you will after I explain.  I have found that many people have a "gimme" relationship with God. 
I constantly talk to people who see God merely as an ATM machine.  "How do I put the right code or energy in, so I can get out what I want?"  It is as if the entire relationship is built upon satisfaction of a need.  "Need a healing?"  "Need money?"  "A relationship?"  "In trouble?"  Whatever you need turn to God!  Don't get me wrong, it works, but the question is: "is that all it's about?"  Tell me this, would you want to deal with a person whose sole reason for interacting with you was because they want something all the time?  
Let me digress for a moment, I want to stick in a quick story here.  A few years ago I decided that I needed a financial planner.  (It is the "in" thing these days.)  He was going to help me find ways to make the little money I have work for me.  He assessed my expenditures.  He talked about everything from how much I tipped my hair stylist to how much groceries should cost for a single person.  Then he really got personal.  He asked me about my dog "Hani."  How much on the vet?  On boarding?  On food? (Now, I don't know if you have pets, but he was treading on thin ice, and this was before I got my two aquariums.)  He said, "Sandra, as often as I have come to your house I don't think I have ever heard Hani bark."  To which I replied "he never barks when I'm at home, if someone is at the door he jumps to his feet and starts running back and forth between me and the door until I get there.  He gets excited because we have company."  Personally I thought it was cute.  He jots something down on his note pad.  The he says "I think you may come out cheaper with a home security system, because your dog really doesn't serve much of a purpose here.  Let's be rational, (he saw my face) Hani can't help around the house, he doesn't seem to protect the house and probably is more trouble than he is worth since you have to feed, clean and pay for all those other miscellaneous things that vary from month to month."  I am going to stop there because my reaction is not the point here.  Let me go back to what I was writing about.
People often maintain relationships because they think they can benefit from it in some tangible way.  Some of us have friends more so for what we perceive the advantages of the friendship may be rather than for the shear pleasure of the friendship itself.  This would be precisely how some of us view a relationship with God.  Serve out self-interest.  Examples:

• To get their prayers answered.  "God gimme" like He's an ATM machine.
• It makes them a good person.  Belong to this group and you too will be good and everyone else is bad.
• They can get into heaven in the end.  

Maybe its me, I guess I don't get it.  What happen to just for the hell of it?  I know that sounds like a pun, but if God never gave or did a dog-gone thing for me I would love Her no less.  
This example may piss you off but. . .Let's take my dog for example.  No matter what I do.  If I scream at him, hit him, not feed him, stay out all night or any of a thousand other transgressions - he still loves me.  It is unconditional!  I've learned a lot about love from having a big family yes, but I have also learned a great deal from my dog too.  I love my friends the same way.  Not because of who they are, what they have or what they can do for me but simple because.   People are not simply a means to an end neither is God.  ACIM says  something like man is generous out of self interest but check this out. . 
God loves us all through extension.  We are what God is.  God express Itself as us.  I love God by loving me, which means loving you.  Seeing you as wrong or flawed or seeing you as anything less than a perfect expression of God means that I am not loving myself or God, since that would make God flawed.  Get it?
Leading the spiritual life is about seeing the face of God - yes!  Know that that face is everywhere, in whatever your eyes can see and in what they can not see too.   We are immersed in God.  Knowing that despite what you think God does or does not do for you, love anyway, be thankful anyway because God is You!  Gimme God?  Gimme Me!
Oh and for those of you that were wondering.  Hani is still with me, I have about 20 beautiful fish in two tanks, a bunch of plants, I feed the birds and hug the trees, but the tree thing is free.  What I don't have now is a financial planner.
Copyright© 2001 By Sandra Bishop Ministries

The Encounter

I have to tell about something that happened to me recently.  I was out with one of my students from my ACIM class.  We'd gone to eat and were taking a walk in order to finish our conversation before going our separate ways.  I smiled and spoke to a small group of people sitting on a bench as he continued to talk.  I didn't think he even noticed the group because we had passed them when he suddenly stopped, turn around, and said to one of the men, "I know you."  In fact it was a man he'd not seen in twenty plus years.  So there was a warm embrace, quick catch-up info exchanged and then introductions.  

I was introduced as a minister.  It happens sometimes because of what I do, I rarely introduce myself as such.  I don't like the barriers that titles like minister or talk show host elicit.  Others become overly self-conscious and often change the level of their conversation.  It is not as if I am offended by the respect or reverence that they may be trying to show, its that authenticity goes out the window.  Try as I might to just be my fun loving self  when someone adds a title, it is as if there is an expectation that I'm judging, assessing or desire to have the last word.  I don't claim to be an authority or think that I have some corner on God.  

Most of friends know that at best they'll be fodder for a show or a sermon topic at some point, that's it.

Back on the bench normal conversation continued for a few moments while each person tried to establish themselves given the introduction of my "so-called" title.  One was a pianist for a Baptist church, raised Apostolic and now attending a Pentecostal church with ministerial aspirations, his girlfriend and the guy my friend knew who use to do radio back in the early seventies.  Uh-oh I thought - two talkers one of which was what I call a holy-roller here we go, so I said a quick prayer surrendering the conversation and its outcome to God.  Suddenly, it was as if I was consumed in a haze as I heard the aspiring minister ask both of us were we born again Christians?  

I don't recall what was actually said because there was another scene being played out in my mind.  As the man I was with stepped forward and began talking, a scene of Star Wars proportions rolled in my head.  Like a Jet-I knight he pulled out his light saver sword, and began batting down and blocking every bullet they shot in my direction.  Their bullets were in fact just scriptures, shouted out like machine gun fire.  I watched not saying a whole lot, but simply asking questions what I got back was more scripture.  The man I was with seemed engaged by the banter.   I, on the other hand, watched and listened a lot, bewildered that the woman  seemed upset and that the aspiring minister never expressed a single independent thought.  Everything was "the bible says."  

As we walked away I was struck that this man from my class wanted to protect me.  I learned a lot during that exchange, but also used it as a teaching tool as well.  First thing I said to him was that God does not need soldiers, contrary to popular belief.  While I appreciated his gallantry I did not need protection.  To respond to someone as if I am being attacked means that I believed I could be attacked.  That's self attack.  Only in my defenselessness can real strength be found.  I had no investment in being right or trying to sway their opinion.  If I have a ministry it is a love ministry, that does not mean I focus on where we are different but rather where we are one.  Therefore it matters not to me whether one is Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu or Atheist bottom line is LOVE.  The second thing I told his was all minds are joined,  so I need not say a word.  If I make the correction in my mind it can't help but effect theirs.  Talk is just a bunch of words its our works that matter, what are you doing he kept asking them.

When the one man had stood up, the scripture thrower, he puffed up as if to stand taller and be bigger.  I myself was caught up in and awed by my own thoughts.  I felt love for this man not the condescending kind that would say he'd get it one day.  No, it was the kind that wanted to simply bow down and wash his feet. 

Love waits on an invitation, not a time.