Walking Into The Loving Embrace of God

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baby, creativity, dreams, God, inspiration, mind, possibility, prayer, Spirit, thoughts, truth

 “The LORD will guide you continually, and satisfy your needs in parched places, and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters never fail.” (Isaiah 58: 11)

Our spiritual daily walk can be very challenging. From the highs we experience in life, when it seems everything is going great, and we fly without effort, we often then have times when we stumble and fall down. Either because of circumstances thrust upon us, or because in a moment of not thinking too clearly we have made a bad decision, sometimes our life can be overwhelmingly difficult. I have discovered, as I suppose you have as well, that when things are going great it is easy to see the presence of God working in our lives. In those times it is easy to pray and give God thanksgiving for all that we are experiencing. But, when the difficult times come upon us God can seem very far away. Sometimes we can even question if God still loves us, or cares about us, or will ever lift us up again. We fall down sometimes. What we do when we fall down is so very important.

I love to watch a baby learn to walk. It is so exciting to see the accomplishment on their little faces. They stand up and the look of happiness on their little faces is beautiful. They take a wobbly step forward, smiling, then, they usually fall down. Boom. From what started out as such a victory suddenly fell apart and they are back to where they started. But what do they do? They get up again. They try again. They don’t stop and decide their effort is in vain, they don’t decide that walking is for “other people” and not them. That others are blessed in life with this gift and not them. I have never seen a baby who decided getting back up and trying to take another step was too difficult and not worth the effort. They get up again and take another step. The journey is too important and the reward is too great not to proceed. Maybe they will fall again, but that doesn’t matter. With each step, with each effort, it gets better. With each effort they show themselves that they can do it. Usually there is a loving adult steps away encouraging the baby on. Holding out their arms saying, “come on, you can do it. Take another step. Come here.” And guess what. The baby does. The baby keeps its eyes on the eyes of the adult and soon the baby walks into the loving arms of the waiting adult.

That little baby is each and every one of us today – and that waiting adult is God. God is present with us, encouraging us on in life. Take another step – you can do it. You can learn how to walk. You can move from where you are to where you would like to be if you keep your eyes on the unconditional love of Spirit/God that wants you to succeed, thrive and soar to new heights. Your success is God’s success and your success, navigating through the challenges of life, proclaims to the world that those who believe in God’s possibility are never defeated.

Keep your eyes on the gaze of Spirit today. The borders that would try to keep you down will become your wings of victory.

Affirmation: “Keeping my eyes on the gaze of God my journey of life is rich, abundant and filled with new and exciting possibility.”

Rev. Jefferson Beeker

http://jefferson340.wix.com/index

We live our lives one thought at a time. Let each of those thoughts really count for something wonderful.

Be prepared to change your thinking and change your life.

Follow me on Twitter @jeffersonbeeker for daily affirmations of uplifting and positive faith.

Moving through the darkness to visions of light

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action, Christian, creativity, dreams, faith, inspiration, journal, mind, miracles, possibility, prayer, Spirit, thoughts, truth

“As you do not know the path of the wind, or how the body is formed in a mother’s womb, so you cannot understand the work of God, the Maker of all things.”   (Ecclesiastes 11:5)

It takes courage to be Christian. It certainly did in the first century when one could be put to death because of new beliefs that challenged the then status quo, but even today, to really live a Christian life is not easy. It takes faith and trust in God at those times when one can be so easily discouraged. Looking at our current circumstances, our personal challenges, or the state of the world, calls upon us to remain steadfast in our belief that through the ever-present Spirit, Light, Divine Energy of God, we forever remain loved, cared for, and lifted up with new vision to seeing a different reality from the one the world would tell us must be our experience.

The biggest enemy of courage is fear, worry and anxiety.   It is hard to have courage and to trust in the presence of God working in our lives when our thoughts are consumed with events in our lives that are contrary to the way we would like for them to be. It takes courage to continue in the face of disappointment. I love what author Steve Covey has said, that all things are created twice. First in our minds as we think them, conceive them as thoughts, visions and ideas, and secondly when we put those thoughts into action.

Stop for a moment and look at the direction your thinking is going. Has been going. Do you immediately go to the negative, the “this will never change, get better” place, or do your thoughts see clearly what is before you and yet you can affirm a new possibility through the presence of God working in and through your life? Seeing with an affirmative attitude is powerful, and it can get discouraging when things don’t change for us overnight. This is where we must remain committed to moving toward what we truly desire to experience. Affirmations of the positive power of Spirit/God working for good in your life are powerful in creating the first steps toward a new goal. Thoughts are important, but then we must also take action and move forward confidently that Spirit will provide all that we need when, and as, we need it. From thoughts of darkness we can move to visions of light. Turning on the Light will always start again with your very next thought.

Having courage is facing our fear, worry and anxiety. Our spiritual disciplines that we practice (prayer, affirmations, journaling, meditation) are the surest way to affirm the presence of God and to move us through any dark times. We don’t have to know how God will get us through, we just need a to affirm that God will. The how will show up just when and as we need to know it.

Let Spirit/God create miracles in your life today. You don’t need to know the HOW (let God handle that) you just need to accept the WOW.

 Affirmation: “I step out in faith today knowing that Spirit/God blesses me with courage to see all things with spiritual eyes.”

Rev. Jefferson Beeker

http://jefferson340.wix.com/index

We live our lives one thought at a time. Let each of those thoughts really count for something wonderful.

Be prepared to change your thinking and change your life.

Follow me on Twitter @jeffersonbeeker for daily affirmations of uplifting and positive faith.

 

Compassion+Faith=Change

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action, change, compassion, dreams, faith, inspiration, light, peace, possibility, Spirit, thinking, thoughts

“Jesus said to her, ‘Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease’.” (Mark 5: 34

COMPASSION. As I thought about this word this past week I wondered what all it means in our lives as we move forward. Forward into the unknown, forward into making a difference for justice and peace in our world. Showing a compassionate heart for others and for receiving compassion so that we might model that more fully to a fragmented and hurting world.

God is the definition of compassion, but for compassion to be truly experienced by us, and sent forth to others, it must involve something that gives it action and moves it forward. That something I believe is FAITH.

We all live our lives in this modern world with varying degrees of fear. It would be difficult to not do so. Much of our world is scary and uncertain and much of our world is so unpredictable. Our lives are not always made up of eliminating fear entirely, but of learning to live with it so that we can exist the best that we can with productive, fruitful lives. Living with fear does not mean we accept that those causes of fear define us or that we must always look for that which brings us fear. Living with fear means that we are receptive to noticing those things that are fearful so that we can, by letting God be present in those situations, begin to see what triggers that fear in us in a way that allows us to move through it and into a greater truth of God’s abiding presence.

Degrees of fear may always be a part of our modern world and our human experience, but living a life that is not always coming from a place of fear, but a place of peace and compassion through the grace of God, can begin to change us, and our world, to a place we can really call home.

So, Compassion, lived through Faith, becomes the action that moves us forward to new understanding of God working in our lives. COMPASSION+FAITH=CHANGE. This becomes for us “A Blended Wholeness” and takes all of our experience, our thoughts and our beliefs, and brings them together so that our fears and doubts are diminished. If we think of fear and doubt as darkness, and compassion, faith and trust in God as light, the blending of our experience can begin to move us from one of despair to one of hope and peace. Adding the Light will always remove the darkness. When we add that Light in our minds, (in all of our thinking) with thoughts of God’s strength, courage, peace, comfort, wellness and compassion, we manifest the beautiful change we desire to experience, and our souls have always longed for.  It is then that we realize we are living with one another in the true Light of God’s kingdom of heaven lived on earth as it is meant to be lived.

Affirmation: “I flourish in the grace of God and experience a renewed belief that all is well.”       

Rev. Jefferson Beeker

http://jefferson340.wix.com/index

We live our lives one thought at a time. Let each of those thoughts really count for something wonderful.

Be prepared to change your thinking and change your life.

Follow me on Twitter @jeffersonbeeker for daily affirmations of uplifting and positive faith. 

 

Who are you really? Where do you really live?

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action, dreams, faith, humanity, mind, peace, Spirit, thought, thoughts

“For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God.” Romans 8:19

“Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children.” Ephesians 5: 1

So, to answer the question above, how do you define yourself? Gender? Race? Sexuality? Where you live? (Southerner, northerner, mid-westerner?) Your job? Marital status? Church affiliation? Or any other definition you can think of?

We are indeed one or more of those things as we define ourselves as human beings, but that is a classification that is created and lived out in human terms. In human-thought. It has whatever reality in our lives that we choose to place upon it. Each of these things can, if we choose to solely use them to define us, hold us back from the full potential and expression we were placed on this planet to realize and live.

Regardless of how we may identify ourselves – race, gender, sexuality, education – God has created us in, and with, a marvelous Spirit that awaits our acceptance as our true vision in our going forth. God’s life, lived within and as us, is who we really are. God’s presence, as well as where we truly live as spiritual beings, is so much more than our human thought can ever imagine.

Our thinking – our humanness – as wonderful and filled with choices as it is – often clouds the truth of what we are capable of achieving and where we truly live. We live in the presence of an awesome God. Our true home – our ultimate address – is in God’s presence. Your true address is not your street, your city or your state, your true address is in the kingdom of God, lived and experienced on this earth with enormous potential and good. In this place there can be no fear – for there is no darkness. We live, first and foremost in a spiritual kingdom that we are right now experiencing as our life on planet earth. As humans we place conditions, labels and definitions on things so we can understand them, and our understanding is more often a false one. The real truth of who we are is as God’s children, God’s perfect creation. Our creation has come upon this earth for a marvelous expression, to enjoy life, and also, to aid all humanity. We are not meant to label things with an intention to divide and feel superior. Those things only have the meaning we choose to give them and that meaning is more often than not a false meaning created from our own perception of lack and limitation. When we see ourselves, and others, as spiritual beings first, the human labels we would attach in our thoughts have less impact on how we choose to react and live here. We are meant to experience living “on earth as it is in heaven.” We can only do that when we celebrate the mutual creation that is our very core. This becomes for us the essence of living our lives in pure love. This for us eliminates our need to fear.

When we turn our thoughts to love, the opposite of fear, and when we trust that our true spiritual home, breathing and living in God’s presence, is where we really are, we discover that in doing so the natural result of that is that we are living in peace.  It can begin with each one of us, and as we live that, and model that for one another, soon our world can make the shift into seeing a truer picture of who and where we are.

When we move from fear to trust and love – realizing the true kingdom in which we live – our real personal address – God gives birth to something new in us. God gives birth to a resurrection spirit of hope, a passion for justice and a bright light of truth that can lift us from any challenges we may face in life.

It all begins with your choice, your decision. So, who are you really and where do you really live?

Rev. Jefferson Beeker

http://jefferson340.wix.com/index

We live our lives one thought at a time. Let each of those thoughts really count for something wonderful.

Be prepared to change your thinking and change your life.

Follow me on Twitter @jeffersonbeeker for daily affirmations of uplifting and positive faith.

 

Reaching Out To Connect With The Spirit That is Always Right Where You Are

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action, community, dreams, focus, inspiration, mind, possibility, prayer, reflections, Spirit, thought, thoughts, truth

“When the spirit of truth comes it will take you by the hand and guide you into all the truth there is.” (John 16:13)

Divine Spirit is without age. It is always consistent, the same. It is always young and vital, alive and energetic. Knowing that this perfect Spirit is always available to us, at any time, always full of just what we need, is indeed very comforting.

Spirit is hard to understand at times because we don’t meet it with our five senses. We don’t touch, smell, taste, see or hear Spirit, but we do experience it. We experience it to the degree that we are willing to connect with it. Spirit is there, it is willing, it is always powerful, but in the midst of the many things that may burden us, bringing us stress or fear, we fail to allow this Spirit to meet our needs, heal our lives and lift us up to new heights of perfection in God. This Spirit, although universal, is also individualized for each and every one of us. Individualized to give us each a wonderfully unique expression of life.

In place of allowing fear to create the roadmap of our lives we can shift our thinking and belief to knowing we are always in the presence of the Divine atmosphere. The Divine Spirit is within you, in the 15 feet around you, and in the larger space around you as well. That space that includes your home, community, city, and our world. This presence is the true home in which you live. We should move in and make it our own with our belief and trust that fear has no place, but Divine unconditional love does.

Connecting with this perfect Spirit is as simple as it is stated in our scripture. Reach out your hand by directing your thinking and let this Divine Truth take hold of you and lead you to experience a new awareness of possibility for your life. We all long for this connection, so why the hesitation in accepting its power and presence right where you are? Why hesitate when our soul (our individualization of Spirit) longs for connection?

Theologian Richard Rohr has written: “Your soul is your participation in the eternal life of God.” I love that statement and it is one I certainly like to meditate upon.

Affirmation: “Reaching out my hand I am divinely and lovingly led to new and wonderful experiences with God.”

Rev. Jefferson Beeker

http://jefferson340.wix.com/index

We live our lives one thought at a time. Let each of those thoughts really count for something wonderful.

Be prepared to change your thinking and change your life.

Follow me on Twitter @jeffersonbeeker for daily affirmations of uplifting and positive faith.