Gods Lily and me

I love this lily and what it represents.

My friend has so lovingly been growing flowers in her yard for decades. This particular blossom called my name and asked me to grab my camera. :-)

Today is a brand new day, fresh with inspiration and goodness.

This lily doesn't have to think about anything. It doesn't worry about food or clothing or shelter or its love life or its offspring.

Flowers just exist. They blossom into their full beauty, ever so gently and naturally.

We, as Gods ideas, are like this flower. We gently and naturally blossom into what God intended us to be. Those around us have the privilege of partaking in the beauty we are expressing.

Through us, others catch a glimpse of the beauty of divine Love. I cherish thinking about the idea of God being Love. As Love, She naturally gives us all good imaginable.

There can never be a moment in time where we do not have all we could ever possibly need.

While the lily may only be in bloom for a week or two, we have a much longer lifetime to express our qualities to all those with whom our paths cross.

Today I rejoice in the fact that I get to blossom as this lily so easily does. You and I get to bring smiles to those who look upon us. May your day be filled with so much inner beauty and joy that all those whom your thoughts rest upon may be blessed!

God Never Hangs Up on You!

Tonight I was talking to my children on the phone while they were at their Dad's house and for the millionth time, he abruptly hung up the phone while the kids were in the middle of a sentence.

The tears were streaming down my face once again until a friend gently reminded me that God never hangs up on us. She is always on the line!

Never for a moment can we be separated or disconnected from divine Love.

Mary Baker Eddy wrote an article in the late 1800's entitled "Love Your Enemies." In it, she wrote:
"We have no enemies. Whatever envy, hatred, revenge - the most remorseless motives that govern mortal mind - whatever these try to do, shall "work together for good to them that love God."

The seeming bad things that happen to us really shall "work together for good to them that love God" as long as we demand to turn our suffering into blessing for the good of mankind.

By turning to God in every situation and demanding to get to know Him/Her better, we have no choice but to grow.

Mrs. Eddy also writes in the same article:
"If you have been badly wronged, forgive and forget: God will recompense this wrong and punish, more severely than you could, him who has striven to injure you. Never return evil for evil."

Forgiving and forgetting often seem nearly impossible. But it is requires of us. When we don't forgive, it is only ourselves we are hurting. No good can come from us holding on to hurtful thoughts.

My children, or your children, can never be cut off from their Father/Mother God. THey can't be forced to be without their true Mother.

My grieving heart has resulted in world-wide prayers for all mothers and children who seem to be separated for one reason or another. There truly can be no separation from divine Love. Her embrace spans all space and is felt every moment of every day.

As mothers, we can never truly lose our children. no good can ever be withheld from us. God created us as totally complete and with all good imaginable. We should never ever accept anything less, nor label ourselves as victims. It may seem someone has done something horrific to us, but the more we identify with this, the more we will experience it.

So, I love the thought that God never hangs up on us. She is "on the line" speaking to our consciousness every single moment. The connection can never be lost or cut in and out or disconnected all together. There is no way to be without Her call.

I was eating in a restaurant the other day and a song was playing by Josh Groban that is so awesome. Here's the first part of the song:
When I am down and, oh my soul, so weary;
When troubles come and my heart burdened be;
Then, I am still and wait here in the silence,
Until you come and sit awhile with me.

You raise me up, so I can stand on mountains;
You raise me up, to walk on stormy seas;
I am strong, when I am on your shoulders;
You raise me up... To more than I can be.

First of all, when we are down, we have to be still and wait and God comes to us (really because God never left us!) I love it because God DOES raise us up to more than we can be. He raises us up to walk on the stormy seas. He lifts us up to be and do more than we could ever do on our own.

So, I'm going to rest in the knowledge that God never hangs up on me or my children, or on you.

God, Thank You for creating every child in your image and likeness. Thank you for giving us an eternal abundance of everything we could ever need. Thank you for loving us with an indescribable Love than can never be taken or diminished. I love you, God!

May all the women and children and yes, men too, feel the inseparable love of our Father/Mother God and rest in the understanding that She is never disconnected from Her ideas. Loss or grief are never options in Gods creations. All good is yours and mine right this very instant. Demand to experience it! Demand to be free from any sense of anything unlike good.

New Years Resolution... Be a Window!

You may be thinking... What?? Be a window? What kind of New Years Resolution is that?

:-)

I was sitting in my living room this afternoon and pondering the notion of a New Year's Resolution. Tonight, possibly millions upon millions of people are making resolutions to be better, thinner, healthier, etc.

In attempt to put into words the extent of my resolution to be a better woman, a better Christian, a better mother, etc., I looked out a window. The idea was there... This year, I want to be a window!

I want to be a window that people look out and say "what a beautiful day!", not "what a nice pane of glass." My job as a follower of Christ, is to live my life the way He exemplified, including forgiveness, compassion, grace, unconditional love, peace, etc.

This year, people will be able to look at me and not see a woman, but my goal is for them to see the beautiful qualities of God that are shining through. When a glass gets fogged up or dirty, you can't see the true beautiy of what's on the other side of the window. My resolution to be a window includes keeping that window spot free so the glory of God can so easily shine through and bless all who care to take a look.

My hope is that we all take the time to put our human wills out of the way and step aside to let the Love of God shine through us... be a window! Less focus on "me" means more focus on "Him." Every smile, every nice gesture, every act of kindness... they will be the light in someone's life. They will in turn go on to be a light to someone else. It's truly exciting to think of the countless ways we glorify God in our day to day activities.

Four Year Old has Instantaneous Healing

A four year old has instantaneous healing
By Julie Paulk

My daughter and I were riding in the car together on our way to attend the Wednesday evening testimony meeting. When we were about a mile away I realized her window was open a bit. Since it was in the 40’s outside, I rolled her window up using my control on the drivers’ side door.
However, when the window went up I immediately heard a crack and then a scream. I turned around and saw my daughter’s fingers rolled up in the window. I immediately put the window back down so she could get her fingers out. She was screaming and crying, saying “Mommy hurt my fingers, Mommy hut my fingers.”
I told her I was so sorry and was looking for a place to pull the car over so I could comfort her. However, the thought came to me “you are prepared to handle this situation.” I knew it meant through prayer. So through her tears and crying, I said “Karen, let’s pray together.” So I began praying out loud. In Christian Science, we learn how to have effective prayers. One of my favorite passages by Mary Baker Eddy, the discoverer and founder of Christian Science, reads:
“Jesus beheld in Science the perfect man, who appeared to him where sinning mortal
man appears to mortals. In this perfect man the Savior saw God's own likeness, and this correct view of man healed the sick.”

We see that Jesus healed by seeing God’s likeness instead of seeing “sinning mortal man.” So we began our prayers this way: “God, thank you for making Karen in your image and likeness. Thank you for making her complete, whole, healthy, intact. Thank you for making her peaceful.” We went on and on. (Mind you we were only one mile away from church, so this prayer wasn’t very long.)

With each part of the prayer, Karen was increasingly calm. We ended our prayer with a little song. It only has one verse “There is no spot where God is not.” But then Karen added a second verse “and God made my fingers all better!”

With that, we arrived at church and she jumped out of the car completely joyous and healed.

This incident got me thinking… When we are in any situation and panic, or guilt, or other negative thoughts creep in, we can remember to change that at once and turn to God in gratitude for what He’s already done. All eternity ago he created each and every one of us in His image and likeness and nothing can ever change that. All we have to do is bear witness to His Truth.

Prayers that heal, are prayers that don’t beg God to do something or change something or heal something. God already made us whole and complete and healthy in the first place. The prayers that heal are ones that affirm what God has already done. We are bearing witness to Truth.
Christ Jesus said “And Ye shall know the Truth, and the Truth shall make you free.”

I witnessed this first hand in so many situations, including this instantaneous healing of my four year old daughter. It was such a joy for her to learn, once again, what happens when you turn to God in prayer and gratitude.

Freedom - a Spiritual Quality

Freedom, a Spiritual Quality
I’m sitting here on the 4th of July – better known as Independence Day. It’s dusk and the sound of fireworks are randomly exploding from all sides. The laughter of neighborhood children brings a smile to my face, as my two children are already fast asleep.
The word independence stays in my thought. What does it mean? Freedom! One dictionary definition says “freedom from the control, influence, support, aid, or the like, of others.” Freedom from the control or influence of others means we’re upholding the first commandment, which reads “thou shalt have no other gods before me.” Or as I like to think about it “thou shalt not let anything else have power in your life except me, God, good.”
So, if we’re free from the control or influence of others, that means we don’t let anyone influence or control us but God. We refuse to let others control our moods, our actions, and even our reactions. What an incredible sense of freedom that must give us. What wonderful independence!
More and more I’ve been understanding the importance of this. Another way we seem to let people have control over us is when we’re looking to another to be our source of happiness, our source of fulfillment and love. The people we often look to for this is our spouse, our children and our parents.
While this may seem like a natural thing to do, it’s actually believing that God didn’t create us complete in the first place. That something was missing – happiness, love, completeness – and that we need someone to give us what was missing.
The more I’ve been able to stop thinking of people as my source of happiness, the more unconditional love I have for them. I’ve noticed the sense of condemnation and judging disappearing. Instead I’m able to see my family members as pure, innocent ideas of God on a more consistent basis.
This brings freedom to not only myself, but all those around me. It becomes obvious that I’m at peace and not looking for others to give me what may seem to be missing.
Knowing God made us in His image enable us to understand that we automatically come with everything we could ever need. Since God is all harmony, we automatically are created with unlimited amounts of harmony. This is true for every good, wonderful, satisfying quality you could ever think of.
As I’m finishing this article, the fireworks are booming all around and I’m really feeling the sense of freedom. I’m looking forward to being with each family member – knowing they are completely independent of my happiness. They are not my source, God is!

For more, visit www.GodDoesHeal.com

The Lost Element of Healing

The Lost Element of Healing
by Julie Trevor-Roberts, CS

Mary Baker Eddy, the discoverer of Christian Science, author of the best selling book Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, publisher of The Christian Science Sentinel magazine, The Christian Science Journal magazine, Der Herald of Christian Science magazine, and founder of The Christian Science Monitor newspaper, also founded a church, The First Church of Christ, Scientist. This church was “designed to commemorate the word and works of our Master, which should reinstate primitive Christianity and its lost element of healing.” (Church Manual p17).

As a member of this church, I am one among thousands who are in communities just like yours who have discovered the “lost element of healing” and help bring this healing to families, local communities and to the world.

What is the “lost element of healing”? It is the Science of Christianity, also known as Christian Science. Mary Baker Eddy discovered there were divine laws behind the way Christ Jesus healed. Jesus says in John 14:12 “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do.”

Right there he’s telling us, all of us, that if we believe in Christ Jesus we can not only do what he did, but even greater things. The question is how. How can we do the healing that Christ Jesus did?

Mrs. Eddy explains the Science of Christianity in her best-selling book, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures. It’s a book that has been studied by millions of people all around the globe for over a century. The book is 700 pages filled with healing truths about God and your true identity as the image and likeness of God (which of course we learn in Genesis 1).

For me, I’ve always been a “Cliffs Notes” kind of girl. (For those of you who aren’t familiar with Cliffs Notes, they are available in bookstores and are a series of booklets. In high school we would be assigned to read various works of literature. I would go to the book store and get the Cliffs Notes version of the required reading and study it because it was a summary of the book I was supposed to be reading. It explained the given text in easy to understand summaries.)

One day I prayed to God to give me the “Cliffs Notes” version of Science and Health. My desire was to know the basic, simple, easy to understand summary of this Science. Within minutes the answer came. It came in the form of four statements. Two were from the Bible and two were from Mary Baker Eddy’s writings.

First: “And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” John 8:32
Second: “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus.” Philippians 2:5
Third: “Jesus beheld in Science the perfect man, who appeared to him where sinning mortal man appears to mortals. In this perfect man the Saviour saw God's own likeness, and this correct view of man healed the sick.” Science and Health 476:32
Fourth: “Beloved Christian Scientists, keep your minds so filled with Truth and Love, that sin, disease, and death cannot enter them. It is plain that nothing can be added to the mind already full.” My 210:2

Now, let me expand a bit. The first one talks about knowing the truth and it will make you free. The question is – what is the truth? The truth is what God knows. Mrs Eddy explains that Truth is a synonym for God. So, the more we know about God, the more we will be free. As God’s image, the more we know about God, it naturally means we will know more about our true identity as His reflection.

The second statement talks about having the mind which was in Christ Jesus. In other words it says to me “Think the way Christ Jesus thinks”. Oh! I get it! Think the way Jesus thinks. To get a better idea of the way Christ Jesus thinks, we can study the Sermon on the Mount. He talks about forgiving, not judging, not holding grudges, etc. If we’re not thinking along those negative lines, then we are thinking in terms of forgiveness, unconditional love. We are seeing ourselves and our fellow beings as the image and likeness of God.

The third statement talks about how we see our fellow man versus the way Jesus saw our fellow man. We see “sinning mortal man” and Jesus “saw God’s own likeness”. And “this correct view of man healed the sick.” What does it mean to see sinning mortal man? Well, don’t we end up going around holding grudges, being upset by other people’s actions, becoming irritated at things, thinking and talking about illnesses?

That’s not how Jesus saw us. He knew we were “God’s own likeness.” Genesis 1:27 tells us “So God created man in his own image.” Well, if we’re Gods image, we can only have those spiritual, God-like qualities such as harmony, wisdom, unconditional love, strength, honesty, integrity, joy, etc. And not just a little bit of these qualities here or there. Isn’t God unlimited? Isn’t God infinite? Then we, as His reflection, automatically have an unlimited amount of each and every good and wonderful quality! Woo hoo!!! That’s exciting! So, it’s our job to not only see ourselves this way, but to also know it’s true for our family, our neighbors and the entire universe.

The fourth statement talks about keeping our mind so filled with Truth and Love. Then, what happens when we do that? Eddy says “sin, disease, and death cannot enter them.” Wow. Wouldn’t you like those things to stay out of your thinking? Keeping my mind so filled with Truth and Love is easy when I’m truly living by Jesus’ teachings in the Sermon on the Mount, found in Matthew 5-7 in the Bible.

All four statements come down to knowing the Truth, thinking the way Christ Jesus thinks, knowing who God really is and who we are as His image and likeness. Knowing this enables me to be a better healer, a better Christian, a better citizen. This works not only for physical healings, but brings healing to all areas of your life. See how you too can take part in the “lost element of healing” and bring peace and freedom to the world. As each one of us takes a stand to know the Truth and behold that in our fellow man, the entire human experience will be lifted up to a more spiritual, peaceful existence.

The Sermon on the Mount Heals Lifelong Emotional Pain

The Sermon on the Mount Heals Lifelong Emotional Pain

I’ve been in a life-long quest to find freedom from the past. Ever since I was 14 years old I’ve been trying to heal a relationship with a close family member. When I was in college I finally came to see this person as Gods beloved child. However, the emotional distress this person was causing continued. It seemed that she consistently found ways to belittle me and degrade my choices and my family.

Recently I was asked to confront this person, along with a family counselor. I was told I had better go because this person really wanted to find a way to stop doing the things that were so hurtful. So I was supposed to go and tell her and the counselor what behaviors I wanted her to change.

I found in even thinking about having to confront her, I would get sick to my stomach. Of course I wanted her behavior to change, but I knew that if I actually told her the things she did that were hurting me, it would really hurt her (as there were so many things).

However, I came up with a list of things that were hurtful and needed to be changed. But, on the drive out of town to go to this meeting, it came to me to study the Sermon on the Mount. In it I found the answer to letting go of the past.

Jesus stressed over and over the importance of forgiveness. Forgive every single person of every single thing – and quickly. No holding grudges, no condemning or criticizing, no judging. He was very clear on this. Suddenly, I knew that if I was to bring up the past, it was directly against what Jesus taught about living a Christian life. It was my duty to forgive her immediately and let go.

This is what I had been trying to do for so long, but reading it in Jesus’ words, hearing it from his mouth finally made it clear. If I was to be a Christian, I had no choice but to let things go, forgive, and refuse to judge or condemn or criticize.

What a freeing thought. Christ Jesus commanded us to love our enemies, and even to pray for them! How can you pray for someone and be holding on to hurtful things at the same time. It was impossible!

From that moment on it became very clear that I could not go into the meeting with the list I had come up with (which was 4 pages long!). Instead I went to the meeting expressing gratitude for the progress this person has made and was able to make very general comments about letting go of the past and having us both only talk about loving things from now on.

A wonderful thing happened. For the first time ever, I was completely free from holding on to the past. Never before had I found a way to completely let go of the things that had happened in the past. Now, I was just free of it all. Before, it seemed like such a part of my identity, of who I was. But now I saw that it was my duty to stop holding on to painful things from the past because that wasn’t in line at all with Jesus’ teachings.
The process of letting go of the past was natural and quick. I’ve never felt freer. I felt free from the need to confront this person and point out how she nearly ruined my life. I felt free from the need to hold on to the hurtful things and continue to be hurt by this person. I felt free from the need to ever think about those things again. They were NOT part of me. I had to live by the teachings in the Sermon on the Mount and boy was it freeing!

If you’d like to learn more – see Matthew 5-7 in the Bible. Study it, ponder it, apply it to your life and see the tremendous healings that emerge.
also visit www.GodDoesHeal.com