5/20/2009 8:35 AM
two feathers wrote:
It's great to be a part of this community of those who are like-minded. We're blessed by each other. Thanks again, my brother. Reply to this
5/15/2009 7:10 AM
Peggy wrote:
TRUTH, my favorite subject! It is of utmost importance to remember that our religious doctrine (or story) is simply a finger pointing to the truth and not the truth itself. Here is an excerpt from an article I wrote for YouthWorker Journal in 2006. "God" is Absolute Truth “The Truth man needs is not a philosopher’s abstraction, but God Himself.” Thomas Merton, Ascent to Truth
When God made life He did not separate himself from it. He poured himself into it. God is Life. Life happens at every functional level. Everything about God happens on as grand a level as you can possibly imagine (macrocosmic) and on as minute a level as is understandable (microcosmic). Theologian Karl Rahner on God Truth: “The world does not reflect God simply by pointing to God as its creator. Our world with its evolution and history, is the place and the process in which God himself means to become “all in all,” in Word and Spirit.” Life requires synergy, symbiosis, and the unified effort of all organisms and forces if it is to live on. The forces and functions we call life are, in essence, the physiologic intricacies of the Creator Himself, and His purpose rests upon these harmonious interdependencies. Decisions we make and actions we take are far more wide reaching with regard to Life on this planet than we assume from where we stand at this moment. This is cosmic truth. This is God Truth, and it is absolute and eternal.
1 Tim 2-4 “God wants you to know the truth. The truth is: everything God created is good. Godliness gives value to all things and it is false to reject elements of Gods creation.”
You and all life are God’s creation. This passage from 1 Timothy cautions us to see ourselves, not as separate from Him, but as part of His creation. God does not reside outside of us or outside of our world. He is both the creator and the life itself.
“It is not a speculative science of nature, but rather a habit of religious awareness which endows the soul with a kind of intuitive perception of God as He is reflected in His creation,” states Trappist monk, Thomas Merton. Merton paraphrases the message of Timothy, “…it is false to reject elements of Gods creation” when he continues, “There is vanity and illusion of all things as soon as they are considered apart from their right order and reference to God their Creator.” Reply to this
11/15/2006 8:05 AM
peggy wrote:
This is probably the most important Secret to Peace that Elliott has written. It is the hardest thing to convince people that they must introspect in order to change themselves (if that is what they seek) and to "realize" God. It seems opposed to the dictum, "to find God you must lose yourself". The latter speaks about selflessness, a stage of maturity of the spirit which is actually found through introspection (knowing yourself). A true seeker must always be examining her motives for her thoughts and reactions. She must objectively consider her goodness and her darkness (most of which arises from what we know as selfishness), and take responsibility for both. Only then can she truly reach the kind of selflessness that God imparts to us; the kind of selflessness that returns us to Him; that heals us and through us, heals others. The self you must lose is the self that keeps you from knowing your true nature as divine goodness; the self you must lose is the self that rises, often in hostile ways, to protect you from a hostile world, the defensive self. the ego-self, the protector.
Jesus talked about who he was and who we are many, many times. And his human disciples had a hard time understanding that they were of God, just as he was. This is not heresy, it is truth. We are spiritual beings. God's realm is not outside of us, or waiting for us at the end of our lives, it is within us and through us and all around us. We are part of it and it exists in eternity...infinity in all dimensions. 1 Corinthians 2:6 etc. is the the most accessible example I can give of a scriptural dialogue on who we are:
"The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the man's spirit within him? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God, except the Spirit of God. We have not received the spirit of the world, but the Spirit of God that we may understand what God has freely given us. THis is what we speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words. The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned.....but we have the mind of Christ." Reply to this
