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Archive for the ‘Good Morning’ Category

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on March 13, 2013| Leave a Comment »

Self-Analysis
Jesus has told us that we always demonstrate our consciousness. We always demonstrate what we habitually have in our mind. What sort of mind have you? Do not let anyone else tell you, because they do not know. People who like you will think your mentality is better than it is; those who do not like you will think is worse. Just examine your conditions and see what you are demonstrating. This method is scientific and infallible.
If an automobile engineer is working out a new design for an engine, for instance, he doesn’t’t, say:  “I wonder what Smith thinks about this. I like Smith. If Smith is against this I won’t try it.” Nor does he say, “I won’t try this idea because it comes from France.”He is impersonal and unemotional about it. He says, “I will test it out, and decide by the results I obtain.”All that anyone can do for you is to help you change your thought. You yourself must keep it changed. No one else can think for you. “No man can save his brother’s soul or pay his brother’s debt.”
…and I will put a new spirit within you… (Ezekiel 11:19).
As within, so without.
Looking in,
Z gardener

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An Inexhaustible Supply

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on March 12, 2013| Leave a Comment »

As far as God is concerned, there is no check of any kind upon the amount of divine energy that we can do or be. Yet, for practical purposes, you can draw from the inexhaustible Source only in accordance with the measure of your understanding, just as you can draw water from the Atlantic only in accordance with the size of the vessel that you use. Almost everyone is foolishly content to fill his pitcher, small as it may be, to somewhere very short of the top.
The true manner of God’s working is illustrated by a simple anecdote. A certain man was working in his garden, assisted by his little girl who had undertaken the task of watering the lawn by means of the usual rubber hose. Suddenly she cried out:“Daddy, the water has stopped.” The father looked over, and, taking in the situation quietly, said, “Well, take your foot off the hose.”
The ultimate cause of all our troubles is just this. Behind all secondary and proximate causes lies the same primary mistake. We have been pressing our feet and the whole weight of our mentality upon the pipe line of life, and then complaining because the water does not flow.
And the Lord shall guide thee continually, and satisfy thy soul in drought…and thou shalt be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water, whose waters fail not (Isaiah 58:11).
Lord, let us not restrict the inexhaustible flow of your divine energy. Let it flow through us freely into the world to nourish those we touch. Then we can water our gardens and the gardens of the one’s we encounter each day.
Letting it flow,
Z gardener

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Your Own Place

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on March 11, 2013| Leave a Comment »

If you say that you are unhappy, dissatisfied, perhaps ill or impoverished, a failure, this is simply another way of putting the fact that you are not allowing the will of God to have free play in your life—you are not doing the thing that He meant you to do.
Discontent is not necessarily a bad thing. It is your duty to be discontented with anything less than complete harmony and happiness. A wholesome discontent with dullness, failure, and frustration is your incentive for overcoming such things. Whoever you are, your true place is calling, and, because you really are a spark of the Divine, you will never be content until you answer.
Remember that this call is the call of God, and when God calls you to His Service, He pays all the expenses. Whatever you may require to answer that call—all will He furnish, if you be about His business and not your own.
Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain (John 15:16).
Whatever the price, wherever the path leads; if we follow God’s will, arrival at the destination for which we were created is assured.
So, let us not gauge the price or question where the path leads: for God is directing our steps when we follow God’s will. These steps will lead us to our gardens and to God’s love, protection and his destiny for us.
Following the spark,
Z gardener

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Self-Condemnation Keeps Us Back

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on March 8, 2013| Leave a Comment »

 

 

 

People who are honestly trying to follow the spiritual life often make the mistake of being too hard on themselves. Because they do not seem to be progressing as fast as they would naturally like, or because they find themselves repeating some old fault that they thought they had completely overcome, they feel discouraged, and condemn themselves mercilessly.

 

 

All this is foolish. If you are doing your best to use what Truth you know, at present, you are doing all that you have a right to expect of yourself.

 

 

Don’t be impatient with yourself—but this does not mean that you are to be lazy or complacent. Handle yourself as a wise parent handles an obstreperous child—kindly, patiently, but with gentle firmness, not expecting too much too quickly, but foreseeing inevitable growth and improvement.

 

 

…and all of you are children of the most high (Psalm 82:6).

 

 

Let us rid ourselves of self-condemnation once and for all. Yes, we should review our thoughts, words and deeds objectively to identify things we do wrong. That does not mean we are to condemn ourselves for our shortcomings. We are to recognize them and use them as tools to rise above them. This creates good to replace bad, instead of focusing on that of which we are not proud.

 

 

Rising above,

 

Z gardener

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Karma

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on March 7, 2013| Leave a Comment »

Just as like attracts like, so like produces like. This is a cosmic law, which means that it is universally true throughout the whole of existence right up through the higher planes. As Jesus put it, you do not gather grapes from thorns or figs from thistles; and he also said,
Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit… (Matthew 7:17 ).
So it is with our thoughts and words and deeds. As we sow so shall we reap, sometimes almost immediately, sometimes after a long interval. But always, sooner or later like produces like.
… In the East this law of sowing and reaping is known as karma and the term is a convenient one.
Note carefully, however, that karma is not punishment. If you touch a red hot stove, you will burn your finger. This will hurt you, but it is not punishment, only a benign and reformative consequence, for after one or two such experiences in childhood, you learn to keep your fingers away from hot iron. So it is with all natural retribution—you suffer because you have a lesson to learn.
How many times must we burn our spiritual fingers before we learn our lessons. Negative human reactions born of human weaknesses of attitude, spirit and behavior will unerringly produce negative results in our lives. They are meant to reform our thoughts, words and deeds so we will correct them.
As long as we are touching our spiritual fingers to bitterness, resentment, regret, scorn and all other negative reactions to life, we will continue to create negative outcomes in our lives such as doubt, fear, worry, anxiety and all the other harmful human reactions that rob us of peace, joy and hope. They also rob us of the joy God created in this place to provide for his family.
So today, let us apply our fingers, hands and lives to those things that cause us to feel happiness, spread joy and live  peacefully in the Eden God created for us.
Sowing peace,
Z gardener

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All God’s Universe

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on March 6, 2013| Leave a Comment »

What is nature? What we call nature is a small part of God’s universe that we are able to see at the present time, and much of which we see awry. All the wonderful things that are going on in the woods, all the marvelous happenings that take place in the depths of the ocean, the whole sublime story of the heavens, are all parts of God’s self-expression. Above all, our own bodies themselves are part of nature, perhaps the most wonderful part of all; and probably the part about which we ourselves know least.
But ask now the beasts, and they shall teach thee; and the fowls of the air, and they shall tell thee: Or speak to the earth, and it shall teach thee: and the fishes of the sea shall declare unto thee. Who knoweth not in all these that the hand of the Lord hath wrought this? In whose hand is the soul of every living thing and the breath of all mankind…With him is wisdom and strength, he hath counsel and understanding.
(Job 12:7-10, 13).
If we are to truly show respect for God and obey God’s will, then we must respect God’s creation. As the self expression (pressing out) of God into the physical world , it is part of God and therefore due all the sanctity that we invest in God. God’s creatures are part of that same self-expression and due the respect and protection due to all of God’s creation.
When we follow this truth, we will find that this creation and all its creatures can indeed reveal truths to us that we can not otherwise learn and will whisper understandings that we can not alone perceive otherwise. Then, we can walk in the garden that God created for us in peace, truth, wisdom and strength.
Listening to creation,
Z gardener

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Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on March 5, 2013| Leave a Comment »

Peace, the Miracle Worker
Regeneration means building a new mentality; that is, creating a new soul in place of your present one. It does not mean merely improving your present self—it means producing (through the power of God, of course), a new self.
If you do this, everything else in your life will rapidly change for the better. Other people will become much more friendly to you. Because your soul will be filled with peace, you will radiate peace, and other people will get it intuitively. Everybody likes peace and harmony and they are attracted to any source from which it comes.
Naturally you cannot radiate peace if you do not first possess it within yourself. You cannot radiate anything from the outside. To radiate any quality, that quality must be within yourself.
True peace of mind is the short cut to regeneration. The Master said,
Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you (John 14:27).
Are we truly ready for peace? Are we ready to create a new soul? If so, then we must look to God’s will for how to build it. Then we must build it day by day. It will start with the hardest part…the decision.
Today, let us decide for peace and begin building our new souls.
Radiating peace,
Z gardener

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Step by Step

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on March 4, 2013| 1 Comment »

When you are praying for your true place, it is well to remember that the full demonstration may not come in one move, but more likely after a series of stages.
Now, If you despise these intermediate steps, and think “this is a little better, but it is not really what I want,” you will keep the demonstration back. Neither should you accept a small improvement as being all that you can hope to get. The scientific attitude is to see the stepping stone as a stepping stone; to bless it, and give thanks for it, and to continue praying for the next step.
For precept must be upon precept…line upon line, here a little, and there a little (Isaiah 28:10).
Very few worthwhile things are accomplished in one fell swoop. This is especially true of spiritual developments and its demonstration in our lives. We begin as spiritual infants and spend our lives growing up metaphysically just as we mature physically.
Just as we must learn to stand before we run, we must also achieve our spiritual growth one development at a time. Each is a blessing, each brings joy and each step brings us closer to the Eden that God created for us.
Let us today bless those steps that brought us thus far, look with anticipation and hope to the next steps and live a life of peace and love in the process. It is the way God planned life in the garden.
Stepping up,
Z gardener

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Raise the Shades

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on March 1, 2013| Leave a Comment »

We do not have to create good. We do not have to persuade God to be Love, or Life, or Truth, or Intelligence. We do not have to ask Him to remember us. We could not ask for any good. Fundamentally, evil is a false belief about the power and availability of good.
If we draw down the shades in every room in a house, that house will be in darkness, and is likely to become damp and unhealthy as well, no matter how brightly the sun may be shining outside. Salvation consists in raising these shades and opening the windows—then He does the rest.
…walk as children of light (Ephesians 5:8).
This is another way of saying that God has already provided for our best good. We just have to claim it. The way to claim it is to seek and follow God’s will.
When we do this, we open our shades and let God’s ever-present light to enter our lives. Then, all that we need for our best good will manifest itself in our lives. That is when we can walk as children of light in the glorious garden of the Kingdom of God.
Walking in light,
Z gardener

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Mental Assent

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on February 28, 2013| Leave a Comment »

When you give your mental assent to any idea, good or bad, you associate yourself with that idea and you incorporate it into your consciousness—to the extent that you realize it. When you read a passage of Scripture you will, if you assent to it mentally, incorporate it into your life to that extent.
This law, of course, works the other way too. If when you hear or read of some piece of injustice or cruelty, you approve it mentally by thinking that “it serves him right,” you are associating yourself with that deed, and making it a part of your own life, even though you do not speak a word. It is the mental assent that counts.
Give your assent only to Truth.
For I delight in the law of God after the inward man: But I see another law in my numbers, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity….So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God…. (Romans 7:22, 23, 25).
Regardless of the fact that we may ascribe to a certain theology or morality, if we give mental approval to something contrary to that theology, then we are not practicing what we believe. That mental approval is more critical than our “beliefs”.  In fact, it will override our “beliefs” and undermine them and our ability to follow our beliefs. In biblical language this is called a stumbling block. Such mental assent will trip us and make us fall from our true path.
So, when our selfish human spirit is causing us to mentally accept something contrary to our faith, we must turn to God in thought, word and deed. Then we will rise above our selfish wrongness and discover selfless rightness (righteousness). Then we must follow that path to find the garden God created for us.
Seeking rightness,
Z gardener

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