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Posts Tagged ‘Faith’

The True Witness – THE NINTH COMMANDMENT

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on January 9, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor (Exodus 20:16).
First, the obvious meaning is very important although it is only the beginning—do not tell lies about people
We have to apply this principle of not bearing false witness right throughout our lives. It is very important to practice because whatever you say about another person will happen to you, yourself. If you lie about another person—that is an unpleasant word but I am using it because is the right word—someone will lie about you. Jesus says so in the seventh chapter of Matthew, verses one and two:
Judge not, that ye be not judged.
For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.
However, the fundamental meaning of this commandment, “Thou shalt not bear false witness,” Is that you always express what you are. You cannot be one thing and express another. Emerson says, “What you are shouts so loudly that I cannot hear what you say.” We are always witnessing to what we are. So again, “Thou shalt not” really means “You cannot”—you cannot permanently bear false witness.
The true witness is the full expression of God’s man. You will be bearing true witness to your neighbor when you are regenerated in soul. What does regeneration mean? It means the building of a new soul, not correcting the old one. When you change the soul, automatically the flesh changes, the skin changes, the blood vessels and the nerves and the bones change. But regeneration must begin with a change in the soul, not with anything in the outer world.
When we really know these things, we shall be bearing true witness.
In this season of the Epiphany, let us all see and recognize the true light that is our relationship with God. And let us commit to being a true witness to and for God. First within; then without.
Regenerating,
Z gardener

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By Right of Consciousness – THE EIGHTH COMMANDMENT

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on January 6, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Thou shalt not steal. (Exodus 20:15).
Many people will say, “We always knew that we must not steal. If we do we shall have trouble and probably wind up in prison.” All through the ages it is only the smallest percentage of human beings who have stolen. Respect for other people’s property was learned early in the history of civilization. However, this most fundamental law of life means that actually we cannot steal. Your consciousness of the presence of God in other people would have been so strong that no one can take from you what belonged to you by right of that consciousness.
These ten laws of life are things that cannot be done, and so, says the great prophet in effect, do not waste yourself or your life trying to do these things. They cannot be done. They conflict with the fundamental Law of Being.
When we give up trying to steal, then we shall begin to have our own. We shall come into our own rights, and when we get that, liberation will not be very far off.
There is nothing we could steal that is more precious than what God gives us freely. Also, we can never gain more from taking something that is not ours, than it will cost. Just as giving sews exponential returns of love; taking that which is not ours  creates multiplied negative returns and loss.
Let us be about the business of giving, so that the fruits we harvest from our gardens yield multiple returns of love, peace and hope.
Giving for living,
Z gardener

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False Allegiance – THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on January 4, 2012| Leave a Comment »

False Allegiance

THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT

 Thou shalt not commit adultery (Exodus 20:14).
Naturally, this commandment means what it says. The Christian standard of conduct with regard to personal purity will never be improved on. Not to commit adultery is fundamentally important because on it is founded the sanctity of the family. But, of course, there is a great deal more in it than that.
One of the most common Hebrew synonyms was adultery for idolatry. In the Old Testament these two words are almost always interchangeable. The worship of false gods was described as adultery. The fundamental idea behind this commandment is to have one God. As you read through the Old Testament, you will find that the idea of the adulterous woman who is unfaithful to her husband constantly means the human soul that is turning away to some other god.
There are many temptations and false idols that seek to separate us from God. Among the greatest of these is adultery. Our bond and communion with our spouses is just below that with God. Our earthly family is the physical equivalent of our heavenly family.
To place someone or something above our spouse is the earthly equivalent of placing someone or something above God. It is the  idolatry of self in which  the personal gratification of lust, vanity, pride, ego, unrestrained emotion or all of the above, cause us to put our desires above our love of God and our spouse.
To walk with God, we must put God first. To walk with our spouse. we must put them above everyhting but God. That does not mean we worship our spouse. It does mean that worship God by respecting our spouse and living with them according to God’s will. Then we and our spouse and familieis may walk together with God in the gardens God created for us.
Walking with God,
Z gardener

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Expressing What You Are – THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on January 3, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Expressing What You Are
 
THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT
 
Thou shalt not kill (Exodus 20:13).
 
As rules of conduct, the commandments are just such “thou shalt nots” as you see written up, “No smoking” or “No thoroughfare.” But when you get behind the surface meaning, then “Thou shalt not” becomes “Thou Canst not.”
 
So this commandment, “Thou shalt not kill,” is fundamentally an expression of the cosmic law that you cannot kill, and the sooner you find that out the better. We are always trying to kill. However, this commandment is here to tell us that to think we can kill anything is to lay up trouble for ourselves that will have to be met and wiped out some time or other.
 
Nothing ever dies from the outside. No one can kill your character. No one can kill your peace of mind. No one can kill your business, or your reputation, or anything that is yours. You can, but nobody else can. No man or woman was ever yet destroyed from the outside.
 
Many people waste their lives in thinking how they are being hurt, or damaged, or injured by other people; how good they could be, what marvelous things they could do, if it were not for others. So long as you believe that, you cannot progress. As soon as you know that nobody can hurt you, then you are free to overtake any mistakes, and to be and do the thing you want.
 
Let us spend our time this year nurturing life and light. First we must accept these things for ourselves, so we can live in peace and success with character. Then we can share them with and shine them on those around us.
 
As we turn our backs on old mistakes and hurtful ways of thinking, let us look to God for a new way of expressing what we are; God’s children! Then we can rise above all challenges while walking with God each day in our gardens. May each of our Edens be filled with life, love and joy this year.
 
Expressing God,
  1. Z gardener

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Polarity – THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on December 29, 2011| Leave a Comment »

Polarity
THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT
 
Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee (Exodus 20:12).
 
We should respect our parents just because they are our parents, but that teaching is just the very outer layer of this commandment. Underneath it is instruction in divine metaphysics because your real father and mother is God. When this commandment says, “Honour thy father and thy mother,” it brings in the two poles, the male and the female, and, of course, polarity is the motive power of the universe. In the bible, mother means the feeling nature, and the father is the knowledge nature. Most people have one side or the other more developed. When our prayers fail and we do not demonstrate, we fail because we are not honoring our father and our mother.
 
Thoughts, feelings and knowledge are intangible, yet they define our reality. When we respect each of these aspects of our existence and understand how they shape our world, we have begun real understanding of truth. When we learn to direct and control these activities, then we are on the path to being a true child of God. When these activities are disciplined as directed by God, then we can walk in light and joy each day. Then we honor our earthly and heavenly parents.
 
Thinking and knowing God,
Z gardener
 

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Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on December 21, 2011| Leave a Comment »

A Time to Rest
THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT
Read Exodus 20:8-11.
Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy (Exodus 20:8).
This commandment about the Sabbath Day was given to the people at the time of their leaving Egypt and going into the desert, and on the surface it meant what it said for that age. It was a wonderful thing in Moses’day to insist that everyone set aside one day a week to think about God or at least to oblige him to stop his secular activities. No rule can make a man religious, or give him faith, but it can help.
Like all the other commandments, this one is instruction in seeking the presence of God everywhere, particularly where the trouble seems to be. Where there is fear and doubt He brings faith, where there is lack He brings abundance.
But here in this commandment about the Sabbath Day there is a still deeper meaning. When you are praying every day and recognizing that God is working in you and in all your affairs, there will be a sense in which every day will be a Sabbath, because for you every day will be a holy day. One of the most wonderful things about the Bible teaching is that we get rid of the distinction between the sacred and the secular. That is one of the most important steps in the whole history of the soul.
God is present everywhere. For those who understand Jesus’ teaching, it is always the Sabbath Day, and the place whereon they stand is holy ground.
Just imagine; every day we can be in total communion with God and walk in the garden with God as in the beginning! Our Eden’s await us. How much of our time would each of us like to spend in paradise each day? It is our decision to make.
This writer’s prayer is that each of us walk in the light more every day. Then, just as the winter’s darkness now fades and more light fills our days, so may our lives be filled with the light of God’s love; spent with God in our gardens.
In light,
Stan

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Thoughts Are Things

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on December 19, 2011| Leave a Comment »

THE THIRD COMMANDMENT
Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain; for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain (Exodus 20:7).
Now this law of life really means you cannot take the name of the Lord in vain. If you try to do so you will fail because when you take the name of God unto yourself and implement it, then consequences will follow. It is a pity more of us do not realize that fact because constantly we are trying to take the name of the Lord in vain. The name of God is your conviction concerning God. Your idea of God will determine your whole life. If you believe that God is good, God is love, God has all power, God is intelligence, all the conditions of your life will steadily improve.
If you believe God is intelligent but not good—I know people would not dare to say that, but people who think that God sends sickness and trouble really believe in a God who is not good—if you believe in a God who has all intelligence, but is not loving, then your idea of the nature of God must work out. Troubles will come to you, and you will not overcome them because you are saying, “God sent this trouble for a good purpose, and I must put up with it.” You will put up with it. Your idea of God cannot be in vain. It will work out for you in accordance with your belief.
All of us are limiting God in some respect in our thought, and because of that, we are going to suffer limitation in some way, for we cannot take the name of God in vain.
The only ways we can truly limit God is by thinking of God in limited human terms, or by closing our spirit, will and consciousness to God’s divine will, holy spirit and universal consciousness. All of this begins with our thoughts. Those thoughts then become words and ultimately become deeds.
If we are to live in the Eden God created for us, we must accept God’s reality and how that reality directs us to think. To do that we must open our  spirit, consciousness and will to God, who will then demontrate divine will, holy spirit and universal consciousness through us.
Then, the hope, peace and joy that fills our gardens will be available to us and for our best good. In this fourth week of Advent, let each of us turn from the darkness and doubt of the human self; to be clothed in the light and faith of divine love. And let us remember the season we celebrate is the ultimate dispensation of divine love that we know as Christmas.
In light and faith,
Z gardener

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Pocket Gods and Graven Images

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on December 19, 2011| Leave a Comment »

 
THE SECOND COMMANDMENT
 
Read Exodus 20:4-6.
 
 
Thou shalt not take unto thee any graven image…(exodus 20:4).
 
 
A primitive people needed to be thus instructed because they were much given to making idols of a palpable sort. We do not do these things, but whenever we give power to anything but God, we are making that thing into a graven image. For example, we give power to ailments, particularly if it is a favorite ailment. We all know people who say, “My rheumatism,” and they say it quite lovingly. Been with them a long time! Has become a conversation piece! Others say, “My indigestion.” We are making a graven mental image of these things. It is only when we take power away from them that we can heal them.
 
 
If you forget God and worship graven images of any kind, you are going to suffer. You can demolish a stone statue; you can burn a wooden one. The way to destroy mental images is to stop thinking of them and giving them power.
 
 
This commandment goes on to say, “For I the Lord thy God am a jealous God.” Moses does not mean that God is jealous like a man, but that God must have first place. The trouble with many pious people is that they want God to be vice-president, keeping the presidency for themselves. So the Bible uses the word “jealous” in the sense that if you give power to anything but God, you have lost God altogether. You cannot have a percentage of God. Either God is the only power or nothing at all.
 
There are many idols and images that society raises up and that we worship. Money, success, power, positions, etc., are all forms of idolatry when they replace God’s love as the center of our lives.
 
While all these idols bring human approval, they do no provide hope, peace, joy and they do not gain admission to Eden. To live in the paradise God gave us, we must put these idols where they belong: subservient to our faith and our trust in God. Then we will have all that money can not buy.
 
God first,
Z gardener
 

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Raised Consciousness

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on December 14, 2011| Leave a Comment »

THE FIRST COMMANDMENT
I am the Lord thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.
Thou shalt have no other gods before me (Exodus 20:2,3).
Moses lived in Egypt over three thousand years ago, and he led some six hundred thousand people out of Egypt and through the wilderness. That is historical. But, Moses also stands for a faculty in yourself, and the things that Moses did typify your state of mind.
The mountain means prayer—the elevated consciousness. We are told that the general public were not allowed to go up Mount Sinai, but that does not mean that certain people were not good enough to go up. It means that if we want to go up the mountain—if we want to raise our consciousness, if we want to get closer to God—we must prepare ourselves by prayer. If we want to go up the mountain, we have to become a high priest spiritually and we must rid ourselves of our faults and weaknesses—otherwise we cannot elevate our consciousness and get our contact with God.
Moses had his revelation, and then he realized it as the experience that God and man are one. When he got that revelation, Moses brought back the laws of life, beginning with the First Commandment, as we call it.
What is the beginning of the First Commandment? I am the Lord thy God. Our trouble in our religious life nearly always is that we think, “In the beginning Me.” That is very human but is does not get us the revelation that Moses got. After affirming I am the Lord thy God… the First Commandment says thou shalt have no other gods before me.
All of our troubles begin when we separate ourselves from God. When divide ourselves from God, we put our “selfs” before God. This separation forces us to live in the world we create instead of the Eden that God created for us. That world we create exposes us to every form of human weakness; weaknesses that subject us to every form of negative behavior. When we engage in this negative behavior, it cause the words, thought and deeds that hurt us and hurt others.
It is only through prayer, confession and repentance that we lift our consciousness above the earthly world of our creation. When we put God first we are forgiven and reunited with God and the garden God created for us. Then we are one with God and can walk in paradise each day.
God first,
Z gardener

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The Ten Commandments

Posted in Good Morning, tagged , on December 13, 2011| Leave a Comment »

And God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant…and had respect unto them (Exodus 2:24-25).

Moses grew up as the adopted son of Pharaoh’s daughter with all the privileges and training of royalty. As the years went by and he witnessed the oppression of his people, he determined to lead them out of their bondage into a better life—their Promised Land. We are told “that their cry went up to God” (Exodus 2:24) and God Himself led them safely through their wilderness. Then at the time of their uncertainty, their moral laxness and emotional confusion, He gave Moses certain basic rules of life, which we still know as the Ten Commandments.

The Ten Commandments at their face value are true and valid, but that is only the beginning. If people are going to escape from the continuous strife and struggle of life, they must have something more. So within these commandments he concealed the deeper laws for those who were ready for them. And within those again, he concealed the deepest and highest spiritual teaching for those who were ready for that.

In other words, Moses designed these laws of life so that the higher we go spiritually, or the deeper we go intellectually, the more we can get out of them.

It is this writer’s prayer that the coming messages on the Ten Commandments will reveal each layer of meaning contained therein. When we fully understand these commandments, our gardens will bloom with the love, peace and hope promised by God to those who would obey them.

In obedience,
Z gardener

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