An online magazine of faith based on a free and responsible search for truth and meaning. The mission of Unitarian Universalism: A Way Of Life ministries is to provide information, teach skills, and clarify values to facilitate the evolutionary development of increasingly higher levels of spiritual development for human beings around the world.
God comes to find us but we are rarely home. We are either in the past or in the future. We rarely enjoy the present, what A Course In Miracles calls the "Holy Instant."
God comes looking for us, but we aren't home, and we go looking for God and God is not in the past of the future only in the present. God has no time. God is outside of time. Time has no meaning for God. Today is a gift. That's why we call it the present.
At this time of advent we refocus and remember the divine within us and among us. It fills us with peace and joy. This remembering and the consequent peace and joy is the gift of the season. Share it.
Osho said, "Jesus said, "God is love." I say, "Love is God."' What do you think of this idea? Is God far away up in the sky requiring priests and rabbis as an intermediary or is God in your own heart of which you are a part?
Neale Donald Walsch suggests in his Conversations With God books that if we don't like the word "God" we substitute the word "Life." Instead of saying, "God loves us," we say, "Life loves us."
During this Christmas season we reflect on the Life we have been given, what it means, what we should do with it, how we should respond to this gift.
During this contemporary time of materialism we are constantly encouraged to grasp for more. Nothing is ever good enough. We are satisfied momentarily and then want something more. The technical term the psychologists use for this phenomenon is "hedonic adaptation."
The stoics tell us that what we should strive for is contentment. We should eschew desiring what we don't have and focus on satisfaction with the things that we do. During this advent season we re-focus on what Life has given us and as we feel the increase in gratitude and appreciation we are then able to allow our gratitude and appreciation spill over to others. We are reminded, forcefully, during advent what it is we have received from Life that we can share with others.
Sheyrl Crow sings
My friend the communist Holds meetings in his RV I can't afford his gas So I'm stuck here watching tv I don't have digital I don't have diddly squat It's not having what you want It's wanting what you've got
I'm gonna soak up the sun I'm gonna tell everyone To lighten up (I'm gonna tell 'em that) I've got no one to blame For every time I feel lame I'm looking up I'm gonna soak up the sun I'm gonna soak up the sun
The idea that humanity's biggest fear is the fear of God is a staggering idea. As human beings we are very willful. Like three year olds we say to God, "You're not the boss of me. I can do it myself." And in our separating from our Divine source, we have to ask ourselves in all humility, "How is that working for us?" If we are honest, we probably either laugh or cry.
It is hoped that during the Christmas season, the air will be filled with more laughter than with tears. This will take our acceptance of the Divine source of which we are an extension. We welcome this recognition and some, if they are in the spirit and not engaged in "hum bug," will rejoice in peace and love for all human kind. It is a blessed time of year in the remembering of the divine incarnation in ourselves and our brothers and sisters.
