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Archive for May, 2010

God Works With Joy

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on May 26, 2010| Leave a Comment »

Don’t pray or meditate as a duty. Realize that prayer is a visit with God and should be joyous.

Neither must you pursue your secular activities as necessary duties to be gotten over, that you may return to your prayer. In the light of Truth, there are no secular activities.

You must have regular recreation or you will become stale. Recreation, also, is to be enjoyed – as an expression of God – and not as a task to prepare yourself to pray better. An understanding joy in living is the highest prayer of all.

…in thy presence is fullness of joy… (Psalm 16:11).

It is God’s desire that we live in joy, peace and hope each day. It is right, good and a joyful thing to pray in celebration and realization of God’s desires for us and God’s gifts to us. When we manifest God’s desire for our joy, we are giving the strongest witness to our faith. It is the beacon of light which we can not hide. It will enlighten our gardens and those of all we touch. So smile, enjoy and thank God for this day and for our gardens.

Joy to the world,
Stan

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Don’t Hurry the Chicken

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on May 22, 2010| Leave a Comment »

A city child was spending his vacation on a farm. They showed him a hen sitting on a nest of eggs, and told him that some day a little chicken would come out of each egg. Their child was delighted at this dramatic idea, and every morning he went around expecting to see the miracle.

Days passed and nothing happened. The eggs still looked exactly the same. Not the slightest change occurred in the appearance of things, and gradually his faith waned. At last one day he told himself bitterly that he had been deceived.

Next day, however, from habit he went around to the nest as usual, but without any hope; and behold, what was his joy to see a flock of little chickens running about.

Of course wonderful changes had been taking place all the time behind the shells, but there was nothing to show for it until the very last moment. Some of our greatest demonstrations come to us like this. In this story it was the spectator who lost faith, and so it did not matter. If the mother hen had lost her faith – well, there would have been no chickens. Give your demonstration time to hatch.

And let us not be weary in well-doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not (Galatians 6:9).

Many times we make our judgements based only on what we can see in the physical world. Like the child looking at the egg, all we see is the outer shell instead of the inner reality. Unlike the inexperienced child, mature believers have seen many chicks hatch from eggs. We know, because we have seen, but the child must have faith without experience. Yet all of us need to have faith without physical affirmation because much of God’s work takes place hidden form our view. Just as the egg hides the chick, the outer appearance hides the inner truth of God’s hand at work.

When we truly have faith, God will grant us the patience, strength, hope and confidence that God’s will is being accomplished even when we don’t experience it with our senses. So, like the patient Mother hen, we must stay on our nest and keep our eggs warm until that day when our chicks will appear to fill our gardens with new life, new joy and the fulfillment of our prayers and dreams.

Keeping our eggs warm,
Stan

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Your Own Brand

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on May 20, 2010| Leave a Comment »

You cannot claim too much for yourself provided you claim the same thing for all other human beings. In fact, it is our duty to claim all good things and to continue claiming them until they demonstrate in our outer experience. Of course, this law works both ways and therefore you must be very careful not to claim the negative things that you do not want.

On the western ranches the owner of a steer brands it with his name, “Bar A Ranch” or some such cipher. Then if it should wander into strange territory, it will always be returned to him. On the other hand, when an animal without his brand wanders into his corral, he says, “Than is not my steer,” and out it goes.

Many a foolish person puts his mental brand on a steer that he does not want in the least, and is surprised when the animal stays obstinately at home. People say my rheumatism, my forgetfulness, my poverty, et cetera, branding the steers they do not want instead of turning them out of the corral.

When you really want something, brand it deeply with your own name and it will be yours.

… but every one … shall keep himself to his own inheritance (Numbers 36:9).

It may sound simplistic to express such serious concern over what could be interpreted as mere phraseology. That is where human logic and perception fail us. Except for God’s power, there is nothing more powerful than our thoughts, which become our words that manifest themselves in our actions. The Bible reminds us that our sins originate in our hearts(thoughts and feelings). Similarly, so do our mistakes, such as claiming a disease or problem. Thoughts and words are powerful things and should be used wisely and with respect for their power.

In the positive corollary of this truth, just think how much good we create when we claim kind, forgiving and merciful thoughts as well as the words and actions that flow from them. So, when we claim love, peace and hope as ours, they will bloom into a thousands joys in our gardens.

Claiming the good,
Stan

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Tackling that Bugbear

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on May 19, 2010| Leave a Comment »

When what seems an especially difficult problem or a great emergency presents itself, many students of the Truth start by thinking, “This is very serious,” and then proceed to brace themselves mentally for a supreme effort; and plan to pray exceedingly “hard” in order to meet the difficulty.

All this is quite wrong. It simply builds up the problem into something far bigger that it was originally. The right attitude, the one that brings Victory, is to think “God can and will solve this problem.”

Instead of speaking the Word from the low altitude of fear and limitation, and trusting to effort to magnify the Lord, stop thinking of the problem altogether, and rise in consciousness. Having now attained a higher level – speak the Word gently from that level, and your problem will be solved.

For the word of God is quick, and powerful … (Hebrews 4:12).

When faced with a dire threat, do we really believe “God can and will solve this problem”? The answer to this question lies in the way we pray about the problem. Those who truly believe, pray in a quiet and confident way, accepting God’s power to eliminate the threat and sure that any outcome will be for our best good. This does not mean that our prayers should be devoid of emotion and fervor. It does mean that the praying harder or more often is a human-based activity that implies a belief by the supplicant that God has some weakness or inability to act without our continuous and strenuous cries for help.

God knows of our needs that even we do not know. So when we pray, let our faith in God and confidence in God’s promises exude peace and certainty in God’s help. Then, we should roll up our sleeves and get to work on what we must do in the physical realm to address that which concerns us. Just as we pray today that God will keep a mighty hand on this oil spill and continue to push it away from our shores, we must also work to protect and prevent it from fouling our shores if it does come ashore. If we pray and work, then we can live in our gardens in assurance that God is protecting it and empowering us.

In confident prayer,
Z gardener

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Bulb and Flower

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on May 14, 2010| Leave a Comment »

Who has not at some time or other planted a bulb and enjoyed the pleasure of waiting for the plant to appear and develop, and ultimately produce the glorious flower itself? Notice here that you naturally plant the bulb and expect the flower – the hyacinth or the crocus – to follow. No sane person would dream of planting the flower and expecting a bulb to come up; yet in our general life many of us do just that! We expect to begin with the flower. We think that we shall have desirable states of mind or body – happiness, freedom, health – if only we can change outer conditions in some way. Yet this is really trying to plant a flower, because we are trying to put effect before cause.

The law of the universe is thought first, and then expression; and never can this law be reversed.

Let all things be done decently and in order (Corinthians 14:40).

Let us spend each day planting the seeds that will become in time the gardens we live in.

Planting,
Z gardener

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Let Down Your Bucket

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on May 12, 2010| Leave a Comment »

We live in the Presence of God. The Bible says, In him we live, and move, and have our being (Acts 17:28). This limitless Power, which is Intelligence and Love—God—can be contacted at any time by turning to Him in thought, and allowing Him to fill our hearts. Whenever we do this He at once begins to influence our lives for peace and harmony and freedom.

A party of shipwrecked sailors were drifting in an open boat on the Atlantic Ocean. They had no water, and were suffering agonies from thirst. Another small boat came within hailing distance, and when the shipwrecked mariners cried out for water, the newcomers said, “ let down your bucket.” This sounded like cruel mockery. But when the advice was repeated several times, one of the sailors dipped the bucket overboard—and drew up clean, fresh, sparkling water!

For several days they had been sailing through fresh water and did not know it. They were out of sight of land, but off the estuary of the Amazon, which carries fresh water many miles out to sea.

Closer is he than breathing; nearer than hands and feet. —Tennyson

We often act on fear and ignorance without actually trying to determine the true nature of our challenges. Its like the child who nearly drown trying to swim, only to put down their foot to touch the bottom. When faced with a problem or threat, first take a rational look at it, truly determine the full nature of it and then put you foot down or lower your bucket. Then ask for God to help and act as if that help is immanent. God will do the rest.

Feet down,
Z gardener

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Be Specific!

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on May 11, 2010| Leave a Comment »

Man has dominion over all things when he knows the Law of Being and obeys it. Do not put off your study of the law any longer. Take stock of your life this very day. Write down the things you really wish for. Be specific, not vague. Then write down underneath the conditions that you wish to remove from your life. If you do this candidly, you now have an extremely valuable analysis of your own mentality. In course of time this will tell you a great many things about your self that you do not at present suspect, and as your knowledge of spiritual Truth increases, you will be able to handle the new knowledge about your self in a surprising way.

Having forgotten your main points in front of you, work on each one separately with all the spiritual knowledge you possess. Remember, it is not really very important how much of this knowledge you have so long as you make use of all that you do have. Repeat this treatment every day for a month, and by the end of that time it will be very unusual if a change for the better has not manifested itself in your conditions.

For those unfamiliar with spiritual treatment, an effective method of working is this: Claim gently but definitely that the great creative Life Force of the universe is bringing each of the needed changes into your life in its own way, in it own time, and in its own from. Do not try to dictate the exact form in which the new conditions shall come about. Do not be tense or vehement. Do not let anyone else know that you are doing this. Do not look impatiently every day for results.

Keep therefore the words of this covenant, and do them, that ye may prosper in all that ye do (Deuteronomy 29:9).

This advice compels us take an inventory of our hopes and needs. This is very practical advice that is applied by every successful business person. A George Harrison song says “If you don’t know where you are going, any road will get you there. How can we know where we are going if we don’t know where we are, where we have been, and what we need to get to our destination.

So, each of us should take this inventory and then pray for God’s help to guide us to our destination and our destiny. If we work on this each day, just as we would work on our business each and follow the truth revealed by God’s word, then we will find our garden and the joy it holds.

Taking stock,
Z gardener

Author’s prayer request – Please pray unceasingly that God’s mighty hand will continue to push this oil slick away from our coastal shores and will continue protect our gardens. Thank you

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Making Your Dreams Come True

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on May 10, 2010| Leave a Comment »

Most people indulge in some form of daydreaming. There is no harm in this so long as such daydreams are positive and constructive in character. You are always thinking, when you are not asleep, and you know that it is in the selection of your thought that your destiny lies.

Do not let your daydreams take the form of an escape from actuality. A daydream is an evasion when it consists in fantasying something pleasant that nevertheless you believe could never happen. Such a daydream debilitates the whole mentality.

Some people daydream about all sorts of unpleasant things. They rehearse imaginary quarrels, imaginary injustices, accidents, and misfortunes, and because they do believe that such things could happen, and because thought is creative, they actually bring them upon themselves.

See to it that your daydreams are concerned with such happenings as you would really like to find in your life. Know that anything good is possible; remember the creative power of thought; and your daydreams will come true.

A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways (James 1:8).

When we use our imagination, it is like creating a script for our future. If we focus these imaginings on beauty, truth and peace in our lives, they will express themselves in that reality, if we believe our daydreams are possible. Imagination focused on doubt, fear and other negative emotions will fill our futures with problems created by us. To free ourselves of this negative yoke, we must trust and obey God, discipline our thoughts and effectively manage our imaginings, words and deeds. We must perceive and believe that we exist in the Eden God created for us. Then we will make our dreams come true and those dreams will ensure that our lives are spent in our gardens.

Author’s note: Please welcome a new sister to the garden. She is a delightfully free spirit on a life-long spiritual journey, and she works in the community of faith each day helping others on their journey. Welcome to the garden!

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Protecting Our Garden

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on May 6, 2010| Leave a Comment »

The Good Morning Messages have been suspended because the author working to support local, state and federal response to the oil spill. The picture of the author on the profile page was taken on one our our beautiful barrier islands that are part of a National Park wilderness area.

Please pray unceasingly that God’s mighty hand will spare us from this calamity. And please pray that peace, comfort and strength be given to all those affected. The messages will resume when the author has finished the work to be done. With God’s help and your prayers, we shall overcome.

Peace,
Z gardener

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