Meditation on a quote by Dennis Wholey

"Expecting the world to treat you fairly because you are a good person is a little like expecting a bull not to attack you because you are a vegetarian." ~ Dennis Wholey

Yes, being a good and kind person doesn't quite guarantee that we won't be treat unfairly by the world because we may at times come across or encounter people who are at war within themselves, and we may be unfortunate recipients of their own self-hatred and jealousy. Even for the peacemakers who seek to do good and bring justice and freedom to the oppressed, such as Martin Luther King Jr, Gandhi, John Lennon, Rob Bell and so on, they have been attacked by those who are jealous of them. Perhaps we have to accept the fact that we live in a world system that is influencing people in a negative way through the separatist and egoistic mindset, and remember we are not of the world. This will help us remember to keep a distance from those who tend to hurt us/others, and remain focused on who we are and what we can do to help make the world a better place in our own ways.

Be aware of how you feel at all times

"Be aware of how you feel at all times. Your feelings will point out where the subconscious blockages of pain are."-Jason Hairston

 I suppose being aware of how we feel at all times is part of living and being in the present moment, practising mindfulness and meditation. We can watch our feelings pass by, just as we observe our thoughts come and go, like passing clouds in the sky, without necessarily engaging or acting upon our thoughts or feelings. Our feelings may or may not be validated, depending on how we perceive things, since I learnt that life is a matter of perception. I am not sure what the quote meant by subconscious blockages of pain - if they refer to guilt and regrets about the past, I would say it is only human to experience such feelings, since we all tend to do some self-reflection and wish we could have done something better (I tend to do self-evaluation from time to time, such as in the area of my work). 

 I believe even as we embark on this inner journey, it is also good to remember that our past - whether shortcomings or achievements - does not define us since our true identity is based on that which is unchanging and eternal - beloved, blameless, beautiful and perfect spiritual beings on a human journey - we are here to have a human experience. This is how we can reconcile to our highest self (the Father) whenever we come home and remember who we really are and awake to our innocence, being embraced in divine unconditional love. Being aware of our feelings at all times thus becomes a meditation practice in which we make peace with ourselves, and experience inner bliss. 

As the verse goes, "Having been made righteous by faith (awakening to our true identity of innocence and perfection and wholeness), we have peace with God (our highest self) through our Lord Jesus Christ (representative of our human race, our true identity), in whom we have access in this grace (divine favour) through faith." We can continue to expect wonderful things to happen to us because we are beloved and precious children of the universe.

"Behold, now is the day of salvation. Now is the time of favour." Every day is a good day because we are accepted in the Beloved.

The gospel and our consciousness (Video transcript)

The following is a transcript of my video "The gospel and our consciousness" which I posted online on 4 July 2011.

Hello, here am I again. I am going to talk about the gospel. The gospel is the power of God to save those who believe the good news, and what is the good news? It’s simply that we are righteous, or another word for “righteous” is “innocent”, that we are, before the beginning of time, we are already seen as innocent and righteous, holy, blameless before God, and that is the good news.

God does not want us to be afraid of Him

There is no bad news in the good news, and that is why there is much concern, especially in the “Christian” world about the mixed gospel because there seems to be some bad news in the good news, the so-called “good news”. But we know that God does not give any kind of fear or condemnation because 2 Timothy says that “For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind”, and also we learn that Jesus always said “Do not be afraid.” 

He doesn’t want us to be afraid of Him at all, and He is the same as God, and there is a misquotation (or rather misinterpretation) about “Do not fear those who can kill the body and can do no further, but fear him who has the power to destroy both body and soul.” But that is actually not referring to God. That is actually referring to the enemy. The enemy is not God; He is always our Friend; He is our Father in heaven. 

The enemy is actually that part of our conscience, our human psychology, that caused us to feel condemned, and that is actually a symbolic representation that is simply called Satan or the devil or the accuser of the brethren in the Bible. Now, for every interpretation of the Bible, I think a safe guideline to go by is: Whenever it ministers peace to us, that is a safe bet to say that it is “scriptural” because we know God always wants us to be at peace with ourselves and with Him. 

If there is any interpretation of the Bible that seems to generate some fear or condemnation or guilt or shame, then it’s probably, most definitely actually, not from God. If you disagree, that is ok because I think we all have the freedom to discover for ourselves what the Bible says or what any other holy scripture that we deem to be “scriptural” to ourselves, because after all, we are made to have our own freedom to pursue the path that we think what God is like. 

One person’s understanding may differ from another person’s understanding of God, and I don’t claim… and I don’t think other people also would have the same… would have the full understanding of what God is really like, and I definitely don’t have all the answers, but I can only share what I have studied so far in my journey of faith because I believe that I am a spiritual being on a human journey, and vice versa. I am a human being on a spiritual journey as well.

How does the good news affect our consciousness?

So, what I am going to talk about, as I mentioned, is the gospel. I think the power of the gospel is when we believe the good news. The good news is simply that God is love and He sees us in His image, and it is because the first Adam partook from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, he felt alienated from God, but God has never alienated Himself from us down through the centuries. So that is the reason Jesus came to show us that God is all the while with us. He is one with us, as He said in the prayer of John 17.

How can we apply this practically because theoretically and theologically we can go into a lot of details to explain the gospel and the salvation story? But, practically I would say, in my life, when I believe God is good and only good – He is love – His love endures forever, somehow good things also happen to me in my life, practically, realistically.

I think there is something to do with the – maybe you can call that – vibrations. New age and… ya, this might raise some alarm bells from some of the more conservative Christians, but actually new age thinkers and new paradigm thinkers, or we call that new thought philosophers, they are actually… they have something that is quite close to what we so-called know as the truth or the reality – whatever you call it – or quantum physics or quantum science.

We actually live in a matrix kind of world, and I am sure some of you would actually be able to tell the parallel between "The Matrix" and the gospel story, that we actually live in a world that is something like a holographic universe. So, how we perceive the world to be actually will play out in real life. So, it is very important what we believe in our consciousness because the battlefield is in the mind. 

And I’m going to just talk about one passage from the Bible before I go long-winded and go into other rabbit trails. It’s 2 Chronicles chapter 20 where King Jehoshaphat and his army were facing a huge dilemma because they seemed to be outnumbered by the enemies from Moab, Ammon and some other countries. 

I would say there is a spiritual significance to this story because in our lives, there seem also to be some instances where in our mind or our consciousness, we may imagine that some things are overwhelming us. They are overwhelming to us especially when we go through some challenges, but even if there are no challenges, our mind sometimes can still sabotage us and think that “Hey, something’s bad going to happen.” Maybe we’ve done something wrong. Or even if we have done nothing wrong, somehow there is a voice that seems to tell us that “Hey, don’t expect too much. Sometimes bad things do happen.”

Well, what happened in the story in 2 Chronicles chapter 20 is that King Jehoshaphat and his army, they actually learnt to sing “Praise the Lord, for He is good. His love endures forever”, and I believe they sang this over and over again. They were actually building in their mindset or their consciousness how good God is, who is all the while with us, who is our heavenly Father, who loves to bless us, who is already blessing us actually all the while. So, the more we are aware of that, the more we actually become conscious of God’s goodness and love that endures not just for a moment but forever. We can also believe that at every moment, we can expect good things to happen to us.

Yes, it has nothing to do with our performance because the moment we think it has something to do with our performance, we are actually going back to the law mindset, to the tree of knowledge of good and evil where Adam used to eat, and that’s how he felt alienated from God. But Jesus came to bridge the gap, not in terms of the actual separation but in our mind, to show us that God is all the while with us, to show us that He is our true identity – “as He is, so are we in this world” – accepted, beloved, favoured, prosperous, completely healed, whole, healthy, peaceful – that is shalom. 

Jesus is our Shalom. And I would say the battle is in our mind. The only way to overcome, to fight this battle is to actually be at rest. “Be still and know that I am God.” We are actually gods, according to Psalm 82,  which Jesus actually quoted to say that we have the divine nature in us because we are all made in His image, which has never changed and will never change. So this is the battle that we continue to fight, not by struggling, but by resting.

Rest is the greatest work that we can do in order to stay victorious. This is spiritual warfare, and probably it’s not like what some of the traditional Christianity has taught. So, this is basically the gospel, the aspect of the gospel which I want to focus on in this message. And keep on fighting the good fight of faith, believing that we are righteous, we are innocent, we are holy, we are blameless. 

Christ is our wisdom, righteousness, holiness and redemption. We are redeemed from the sense of alienation because by one man’s disobedience – Adam’s – he made all sinners. “Sin” is not a moral thing; “sin” is simply ignorance about our true identity, ignorance of the love of our God. But by one Man’s obedience – Jesus’ obedience – all were made righteous. The word “many” there means “multitudes”. So, it actually means “all” – the multitudes of everybody. We are ALL made righteous, in our mind, and God has all the while seen us righteous because we are all wrapped up in Him – the new Man, Jesus Christ, the second Adam or the last Adam.

This is the gospel, as I believe it, and I’m still on a journey. If you are blessed, I am glad to know that because I am also blessed by knowing the gospel, and it is my privilege and pleasure to share this with you. God bless you. Know that we are loved by God always unconditionally, universally, individually, personally forevermore. Amen.

Ripples of Love Bring Unity and Peace

No acts or words of love--or thoughts--or any kindness is ever wasted. In fact, every such act or word or thought flows and ripples, as Living Water, into the universe to expand, include and transform every appearance that calls for love.

So, the sandwich you give to a homeless person; the help you give to the one who needs it; the word of uplifting wisdom you offer; or the ray of light you shine into the silent darkness could be the thing that snowballs as the OMnipresence and helps to find a missing child in the rubble of an earthquake or give hope to the hopeless or bring comfort to those who mourn.

I AM-WE ARE Light and we are Love in our true being. Let's all do what we do so well and let who we are ripple out in ever-increasing circles of Blessing, Love, and Light. Hand to hand and heart to heart we share the Living Water of the LOVE in which we live and move and have our Being.

Be still and know that I AM LOVE. REST! It is in the stillness and silence, listening and receiving from the ONE, that we are resurrected AS Love. When we share this Love-Self (Christ-Self) in any way, however small, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil is withered at its root.

- Loving Unity

Yes, as we share this love-self (Christ-self), in any way, whether online or offline, the tree of knowledge of good and evil - the system of duality and separation - is withered at its root. We are witnessing the transition of global awakening to our true self and common humanity indeed.