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| WINGS Book Study Group: Tue, 12:00 PM Lessons in Truth Class (Zoom): Tue, 7:00 PM
Wednesday "Faith Lift" Meditation: 7:00 PM Table Talk Thursday (Zoom): 12:00 PM
Exodus Class (Zoom): Thur, 3:00 PM
Sunday Service: 10:45 AM
Sunday Social (Zoom): 12:00 PM |
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Hi, Everyone!
This week I am thinking about prayer. As the days and weeks of the pandemic march on and there seem to be so many ways to get caught up in the “troubles” of our community, our country, and our world, prayer seems ever more important. But in Unity, we have a unique way of praying for/with others and our world. I know I had questions about it when I first became a Truth Student and to this day I sometimes need reminders of how to think “rightly” about people and situations. So, I was so happy to read last Saturday in the Daily Word about prayer in behalf of others. I was taught in Unity that the highest and best prayer concerning any person or situation was “Thy will be done.” So, I really liked the affirmation which began the Daily Word reading: “I release my loved ones to their highest good.” That is, basically, Thy will be done. This is easy to say, but perhaps difficult to put into practice.
The reading tells me that the first thing I must do is to see beyond the challenges of those about whom I feel concerned. Focusing on the problem increases the problem. So, as I pray, I place them in the care and keeping of God – taking my hands off. This brings about a peaceful state in my mind and heart so that the “worries about worldly circumstances fall away as I affirm health prosperity and peace” for all concerned. Hmm . . . . I already feel better. This tells me that the process of prayer changes me and when I change the way I see and think about something the outer circumstances will change!
I know that we may come from various faith back grounds and there are as many ways to pray as there are faith communities. However, in Eric Butterworth’s book Discover the Power within You, he has a powerful chapter entitled “The Forgotten Art of Prayer.” At the top of page 106, he goes through all of the ways that the Christian family of denominations practices prayer. He also says it is revealing as to how far some Christian traditions may seem to have strayed from the teaching of Jesus on the subject of prayer. Some of us may have been taught that prayer is a pleading or bargaining or praise and flattery or of “coaxing a miracle from a reluctant God.” Instead, Butterworth reminds us that we are thinking beings and that “the mind is the connecting link between God and man.” He reminds us that Jesus is saying that prayer is not a matter of the words alone; it is a matter of consciousness, “of concentrated, rightly directed, spiritually oriented positive thinking.” So, prayer basically changes me and when I am changed everything changes. Jesus famously told us that when we pray we are to “enter the inner chamber and shut the door;” in another words, we are to enter the silence: “the secret place of the most high.” That is where our consciousness can be lifted and where we will be changed.
I have just touched the surface of this chapter, which is filled with wonderful enlightenment concerning prayer. Hopefully I have piqued your interest to learn more. My experience with prayer is that it is a dynamic living process. It takes practice and persistence and a willingness to let go of a lot of old notions about prayer that were taught to me in childhood. Those notions were not necessarily wrong, it is just that I have outgrown those concepts just as I outgrew my little girl Sunday School shoes. If I try to force my feet into those limiting shoes, it would hurt. If I cling to my old concepts about prayer and spiritual growth in the light of new information, that would also be painful.
Thank you for reading this week’s letter and “I envision the highest and best unfolding” for all of you!
Please feel welcome to join me and many others on Tuesdays at 12:00 noon on zoom for our Wings Book Study – we have unlimited room in our virtual gathering place! We read and discuss these ideas together.
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| | If you'd like to join us on Zoom, the login info is:
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81007092426?pwd=SlUrRzU3MWhpZEx2bW96NTNlbW1tZz09
Meeting ID: 810 0709 2426
Passcode: 865284
Peace, Love and Your Highest Good!
Cynthia
Today’s
photos are of a variety of different churches I have visited all over
the world. During almost every trip, I visited churches in France, the
United Kingdom, Ireland, Scandinavia, Italy, and, of course, also in the
United States. Though we know that God is everywhere and one certainly
does not need to be in a church to pray, I always get a special feeling
when I visit these places where so many people have prayed, perhaps
over many centuries. Sometimes we seem to feel the power of all those
cumulative prayers, there in the Presence!
The first picture is of the interior of the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris taken in 2018 before the fire.
The second picture is of the interior of the modern church in Rouen, France, built in the 1970’s to honor Joan of Arc.
The third picture is of the partially buried Church in the Sand in Skagen, Denmark (half of the church is beneath the sand).
The fourth picture is the pipes of the organ inside the Church in the Rock in Helsinki, Finland.
The last picture is the interior of the partially restored First Church in Jamestown, Virginia, USA. |
| | | | | | | | | | | | | Your Weekly Affirmation:
"LIFE IS CONSCIOUSNESS. GOD IS MY SOURCE OF STRENGTH, SUPPLY, AND SUBSTANCE -- INFINITE, AND INEXHAUSTIBLE. I HAVE THE FAITH TO PERCEIVE ALL-SUFFICIENCY BEFORE IT APPEARS IN THE OUTER. GOD IS MY RESILIENT WEB OF FAITH."
THANK YOU, GOD! |
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