Joy Beyond the World

I define Spiritual Joy as the state of exceptional pleasure derived directly from our conscious connection to Spirit, to God. That is only my definition. I maintained last Sunday at Unity Center that every one there probably had 4 or 5 definitions all their own at any given moment. And as each moment becomes the next, it’s possible, even likely, that each of us will have another 4 or 5 definitions.

So I see Spiritual Joy as an infinite continuum. And though it is endless, I take the liberty of putting a label at either “end”: peace at one end, ecstasy at the other. For me there is a spiritual rapture when I know and love the Peace of Spirit filling me and surrounding me at the same time. And for me there is an ecstatic high when I feel a hard-wire connection with God.

My topic for Sunday was to be the Joy that is greater than anything we know physically in or of this world. Admittedly, I was playing on the beautiful carol, Joy to the World.

And admittedly, I incorrectly flip-flopped the last two Advent themes: love and joy. Justifiable because love is joy, joy is love. Justifiable because next Sunday will be just a good a time to speak about The Love Within.

Justifiable to talk about joy beyond the world, especially in the aftermath of the tragedy in Newtown, CT.

The horrific events in Newtown caused all of us a host of negative emotions, too many to list. I do not maintain we should avoid those emotions or abandon them or ignore them. Emotions are part of our humanity. Feeling, knowing, even sharing our emotions humanizes us.

But we always have the opportunity, the gift, the blessing to turn to Spirit and remember that we are creations from All That Is Good. And so we can bridge the human tragedy and our Spiritual Joy. In doing so, we realize our Oneness and the strength and power and joy it offers.

Deception of Evil
Charles Fillmore, co-founder of Unity Church states clearly that evil is an error of thought.

In Divine Mind there is no recognition of evil conditions.
Such conditions have no basis of reality.
They are conjurations of a false consciousness.
Apparent evil is the result of ignorance, and when Truth is presented the error disappears.

Granted, it takes more than a little effort to place our attention, or strong focus, on the Truth that dissolves our mis-perception that evil is. Time helps. Allow yourself to distinguish Truth and all Goodness as eternal, infinite, separate from the time-bound “reality” in which we live as humans. Accept that tragic events are of this very finite, very brief, very human time by which we measure so much of “life.

Awareness of Good
Ernest Holmes, founder of Science of Mind, emphasizes the power of good…in a non-combative way.

All our work should be built upon the supposition that good overcomes evil,
not by combating, but by transcending it.
The non-combativeness of Spirit is the principle back of the law of nonresistance
that Jesus so plainly taught. The Spirit has no opposites; It is always joyous,
perfect, and free. There is no difference in the essence between our spirit and the Spirit.
Our spirit is the Spirit of God in each of us — the two are one.

I appreciate that Holmes refers to all our work, for surely living the non-combative transcendent faith that Good is Truth is not an easy task. Not in this human world.

Ah, but Charles Fillmore makes it sound almost a snap:

When we establish an enduring consciousness of good, evil disappears as darkness before light.
I immediately remember my granddad Papaw’s advice whenever I complained of a task being too hard: “Just put your mind to it!”

Presence of BE-ing

Almost every major religion of the world instructs us to put our minds to the Truth that are made from Divinity and we possess that Divinity. The Unity Church believes that each of us is the Christ Spirit. That Divine Goodness is more than something external we need to believe in. That Divine Goodness is what and who and how each of us exists.

The Gospel of Thomas offers this statement by JesusThe Kingdom is inside of you and it is outside of you.

When you come to know yourselves, then you will become known,
and you will realize it is you who are the son of the living father.
But if you will not know yourselves, you dwell in poverty and it is you who are that poverty.’
The Kingdom is the holiness, the Spirit, the Christ in each of us.

Prayers of Joy
As we surely pray for solace and comfort for those in Newtown, we are praying to and with the Spiritual Joy we are blessed to know and to feel. The Joy from which we come; the Joy of which we always are.

We pray for the Spiritual Joy that is, forever, each of these beautiful BE-ings:

Charlotte Bacon   Daniel Barden   Olivia Engel   Josephine Gay   Ana M. Maquez-Greene   Dylan Hockley   Madeleine F. Hsu   Catherine V. Hubard   Chase Kowalski   Jesse Lewis   James Mattioli   Grace McDonnell   Emilie Parker   Jack Pinto   Noah Pozner   Caroline Previdi   Jessica Rekos   Aviele Richman   Benjamin Wheeler   Allison N. Wyatt   Dawn Hochsprung   Rachel Davino   Anne Marie Murphy   Lauren Rousseau   Mary Sherlach   Victoria Soto   Nancy Lanza   Adam Lanza

With love and blessings,

Posted on December 17, 2012 at 8:40 pm by Tim · Permalink
In: Christ Spirit, Forgiveness, God, Joy, Oneness, Peacefulness, Prayer, Unity Principles · Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,