BOOK OF TRUTH 19

P. 310-318

When we affirm and acknowledge who we are, falsehood, scarcity, separateness or any thought or emotion that projects these things cannot exist.

I keep reminding myself of the difference between my older view of affirmation as compared to the work we are called to do here and that is to affirm, to claim a truth that is already here. We are not attempting to create something or even convince ourselves of a truth. We are reminding ourselves of what is already here. When I bring the words to mind either out loud or within myself, “I know who I am, I know what I am, I know how I serve,” I am affirming the truth of who I am beyond my thinking mind beyond my intellect, and as I do that, as I align myself to that truth, nothing else but that truth can exist in that moment.

If I were to affirm for myself “I am a Divine Child of God, but I hate you,” it just doesn't work. Now my personality self might want to hate you and might have very strong emotions of separation about you, but when I affirm the truth of my Divine self the other stuff just cannot stick.

The small self, however, does not go away and still needs to be attended to at times. Even though it is not who you are, it is an aspect of your physical existence, your form. It is a  part of your uniqueness or your unique expression of the Divine.

 “Now the action of fear you have been expressed as in truth will not attend to it. And as you say, “Yes, I am here in truth,” the invitations of fear will be released, as long as you do not agree to them. If you can imagine that you are sitting in a chair and the worst thing you can imagine is whispered in your ear, align to the truth of what you are and sing the song “I am here.” If the fear that you would imagine is expressed in your world, use it as an opportunity to claim the Kingdom, which is the awareness of the Creator in all manifestation regardless of what presents. And if the small self who seeks to be comforted requires it, hold her, teach her, but do not give her fear because she will be known in it. There is no need.”

This is such a beautiful reflection of the Divine self taking care of the ego/personality, this limited wounded part of ourselves. It is not simply being gentle with ourselves, although that is a piece of it, it is more about bringing our limited understanding of self to the Divine within so these perceptions and judgements might be healed and released.

I don't think I ever quite understood that's saying of Jesus about new wineskins until connecting with this passage from the book again.

“No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. If he does, the patch tears away from it, the new from the old, and a worse tear is made. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins—and the wine is destroyed, and so are the skins. But new wine is for fresh wineskins. Mark 2:21-22

My personal challenge here is that my mind,my intellect, wants to understand, and the way it understands is by attempting to fit new information into previously known categories. If you were a librarian and a new book came to you, you would diligently work on fitting it into your Dewey Decimal system. Even if you created a new category or sub-category, you would still be using pre-existing information to create a “slot” this book would fit into.

Or when we are studying a work like this we would say, “Oh, that's just like…” The mind is then satisfied, but the soul is left hungry. A Course in Miracles helps to create a discipline that pushes us to let go of the minds limited understanding. For instance, when one of the meditations in the workbook states, “I don't know what anything means.” Now The Book of Truth will make a distinction between thinking and knowing. The knowing it refers to is the awareness of the soul of what is true even though it might defy logic and the self-imposed limitations of the thinking mind.

Another Insight is that the thinking mind is very goal-oriented and wants to finish things. Whereas the soul is continually evolving in love and has no created goal in mind other than the continuation of its evolution in love.

“The action of this text so far has been reclamation in manifestation. You must begin to expect that, as you attend to our words, as you attend to the teachings, as you witness your life, that the transformation of it will be in accord with what you require to know yourself in truth. There is no object here, no finish line, no trophy at the end. The gift of the Kingdom is the gift of union, and it is here and will be known by you as you say, “Yes.”
**********

“Q:  Can the Guides elaborate on the reference to the thunderbolt? They also talked about the facing of the self is not something to be frightened of, that it’s in glory. Can they add a little bit more about how this may present itself so we can work in congruence with the Divine Self as it embodies?”

(The thunderbolt referred to is on the bottom of p. 308:

“And in this alchemy, “I am agreeing to serve,” the thunderbolt comes and claims you each in an illumination in your field that will progress and reclaim you in the Kingdom. We have said it.” [Service is a reflection of the knowing We are all One])

“To know means to realize, and you only realize in the moment you stand in. You cannot know tomorrow, you cannot know yesterday. It happens in the now.”

“The stages of awareness and progression that one aligns as, as he calls the Kingdom into manifestation, will be highly dependent on the individual’s needs for evolution.”

“As we have taught you all, the small self’s investments about what should be will be seen by you. And as they are released, the True Self comes forth and witnesses the Kingdom that is already here. ”

“Q:  When I feel the contrast in others and when I see the small structures that you 

were talking about, instead of feeling blame or shame should I take that opportunity to see that as my bigger self?”

“Now, the old self seeks to re-create the known at every opportunity and it includes your reactions to the things in your world. As you move to the authority of the True Self as what you are, while the temptation may be there to recriminate, to fear, to blame, to argue, the tendency will be moving away because it is not in truth. ”

“Now Paul is interrupting us. “But sometimes we need anger.”

We reflected a bit on the biblical encounter of Jesus and the money changers in the temple 

John 2:13-16 New International Version (NIV)

13 When it was almost time for the Jewish Passover, Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 14 In the temple courts he found people selling cattle, sheep and doves, and others sitting at tables exchanging money. 15 So he made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the temple courts, both sheep and cattle; he scattered the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. 16 To those who sold doves he said, “Get these out of here! Stop turning my Father’s house into a market!”

Here is the same passage from The Holy Spirit’s Interpretation of the New Testament:

“(v 15 – 19)1 That day in the temple, the apostles noticed a change in Jesus as he looked on at the money changers and merchants. 2He had been laughing and talking with the apostles on the way to the temple, but now he stood quiet and stoic, watching the activity there.

3“Master,” an apostle asked, “is something wrong?”

4Jesus did not answer the apostle, but stood quiet, alert to judgments in his mind. 5He did not believe these judgments, and he did not react based on them, but he noticed them and let them go from his mind. 6Then Jesus left the temple without saying a word. 7The apostles were surprised, for they had expected him to pray and to teach.”

I’ll let you sit with that.

“Q:  If the small self makes a decision out of fear or anger, how come the True Self doesn’t step in and show them something different or allow them to go through with that choice?”

This is a great question!

In past language we might have said, “Why did God let this happen?”

In our continuing process of growth we are constantly learning. Situations arise (which we might say have been created by the higher self--in other words, these situation and the lessons they contain have been chosen by us) that we are challenged to respond to.

So much of our choice, and our learning is involved with how we respond to these life situations. Both the ego/personality self/small self and the Divine Self, Higher Self, Christ consciousness  make choices.

This day, we are becoming more and more aware that the personality self will always choose in limitation, separateness and fear. For so many of us, this is the only way we knew ho to make choices. 

Personally, I knew that I had a soul that was made in the image and likeness of God and yet this soul of mine, this spiritual nature, seemed to have very little to do with my interaction with the world and situations I found myself in. Without me realizing it totally consciously, the majority of decisions I made were coming from this limited perception of myself.

It was not until fairly recently on this plane of learning, that I realized my Divine self also chooses. As my awareness grows, my ability to allow the Divine within me to choose becomes stronger and more obvious.

Now I do not want to go into that old imagery of an angel on one shoulder and the devil on the other. That is just another childish perception of duality. There is, however, an aspect of self which A Course in Miracles refers to as “the decider.”

“The decider” is an aspect of self that moves either in the direction of Love or of fear. If we are in limitation, if we are living in a state of limited awareness, of separation, with our personality selves, then there will certainly be a major influence in deciding to align with fear or safety or protection. When living in a deeper awareness of the truth of who we are, “the decider” will much more easily flow to that sense of unity and love.

Again, a personal reflection here, when confronted with numerous life situations I still find that my first reflexive response is often one of fear or  reflections of fear as anger, blame, shame, guilt. For years I made a valiant effort to attempt to eradicate all of these old knee-jerk reactions. To my dismay all of them still remain. 

I sense that my work now is not about eradicating some lifelong reflexive reactions to people, places, and things but to recognize immediately after a reflex or knee-jerk reaction occurs that I have a choice to either go in that direction of fear and separateness or to hold the situation and to respond to a differently. My work has raised my level of choice to choosing higher vibration rather than lower, even though my first inclination might be to be upset or angry or heard more ashamed.

Peace, in love and gratitude.

BOOK OF TRUTH #18

P. 303-310

Only the Divine can each the divine, but in truth no reaching is necessary— the Divine already IS.

However, on this earthly plane we(the Divine within us) have chosen an instrument, a form, through which the Divine will manifest itself uniquely. This form is made of our body, mind, personality self (and if we want to get really far out, we could say this form or vehicle is also made up of the many learning’s and karmic energy from past lifetimes s well).

Now it is suggested here that our created form needs to agree with our Divinity to be in alignment with it in order for this whole thing to function as it “should.” The personality self would attempt to make this agreement by brute force, creating an endless cycle of anger and frustration. Another example of the ego/personality taking on an impossible task. Cooperation/agreement/alignment are processes generated by love. The Divine loves the ego/personality enough so that it gently flows into its most useful and functional space. (Like loving n angry fearful three year old until they are calm and safe enough to e OK).

How that happens is the meat of tonight’s lesson.

Essentially through the inner work w  e have been doing and participating in, we realize that the personality and all its stuff is not who we are—we don’t throw it away, we simply realize “the package is not the same as the present.” The menu is not the meal.

Once we realize this, despite the personality/ego’s objections, we can consciously contribute to this process of alignment.

There is a beautiful example in Christian scripture when Jesus was in a boat with the apostles and a storm arose. As the story goes, Jesus was asleep in the boat

 and of the apostles became very afraid and woke him up and said, “Lord save us we perish!” Jesus calmly woke up, stood up in the boat, stretched out his hands and said to the wind and the raging waters, “Peace be still,” and immediately there was calm. The apostles were awestruck and said to one another, “Who is this man that even the wind and the sea obey him?”

The reason I bring up the story is it is a perfect example of alignment. Because Jesus was in the Christ Consciousness, everything else around him could be affected by that Peace. It was not the creation of something outside but it was a recognition of what already is inside.

Those are some of my own reflections on tonight's work. So let us take some time to work with it step-by-step.

This is a great one-liner:

“the Kingdom itself, (is) the awareness of the Divine in all things,” p. 303

You(your Divine self) have chosen the form (body, mind, emotions, personality, karma, etc.) that is to be your unique expression of the Divine. When you realize this is your choosing and you take responsibility for it, rather than letting it run the show, you are coming into alignment with the truth of who you are.

“Now the aspect of you that already comprehends that everything you see before you is consciousness made into form can align to the potential that the Divine as what you are may also be the same. But how do you know it? How do you claim it as true? How do you know your inheritance until you are experiencing it? This is the teaching of the night.”

We have created sort of an upside down world we are we have bought into an overwhelming sense of limitation and then presumed that those limitations are real.

“Now imagine, if you wish, for the sake of this teaching, that you stand in a room as a pillar of vibration, that what you are in fact is a level of frequency being expressed or manifested in what you know as a body. Imagine, then, that the vibration that you hold is not in agreement to physical law because the aspect of it that knows she is of God actually bypasses law that exists in lower vibration. This is the first step to this claim of agreement.”

We say “No” to limitation and “Yes” to the infinite possibilities that are an aspect of our Freedom.

“As long as you believe yourself to be bound by the laws of man and the exchanges of men that have decided what these laws should be, you will be tethered to the laws at the cost of the vibration that you truly are knowing its full expression.”

Manifestation is the movement within from idea (in the mind God) to experience—and that means experience on and within this material plane. The way I heard it put years ago is, “It is not our task to get rid of the world, but to make all things sacred.” Now the paradox here is that everything is already sacred, but for us to realize that we must be in a high enough vibration to “see” it that way.

“The jurisdiction you have now as the Divine Self is to recognize divinity and, in truth, you alchemize what you see. And by this we mean, in the claim of truth you are, you express as, you acclimatize the vibratory field of what you witness in the same vibration. Light illumines darkness, truth eradicates lies. And they work together to claim anew.”

This last piece summarizes what has gone before:“You have agreed sequentially, first and foremost, to deny fear as the active article in your life. You’ve chosen anew and then you have agreed not to bear witness to history in the agreement that it’s true, but what was. And then you have decided to reclaim the self in agreement to truth in a way that you may uncover, or unmask, or release the small structures that you’ve endowed with great power. And finally, we say, you are agreeing to serve. And in this alchemy, “I am agreeing to serve,” the thunderbolt comes and claims you each in an illumination in your field that will progress and reclaim you in the Kingdom. We have said it.”

For me, sometimes, this idea of service is confusing. I fall into my little self’s understanding—that I must be doing something—I need to put on my healer’s hat, or some such.

The essence of service is the realization that we are all One, that by raising my vibration—thoughts of love, gratitude, peacefulness, prayer, etc. I raise the vibration of all beings—and that “work” can be done anytime any place.

“On this night I choose to be enabled in all ways to be in full service as my True Self, and in truth I claim this, and in agreement to truth I witness it. And as I say, ‘Yes,’ to this, all aspects of my being will be claimed in the higher vibration and all I have known and will know, all I have seen and will see, all I may believe and may know and may bear witness to from this moment forward is in truth, in alignment to truth, in agreement to truth. I am here. I am here. I am here.”

In love and gratitudeB

THE BOOK OF TRUTH 17

(this is the next reading in line--I think I skipped a number some place.)

P. 301-304

“The manifestation of God as you that is here as you now seeks its expression by you, but she is stuck in some ways by listing a self within a frame that in some ways cannot align to the prospect of eternity. You see, the small self knows she will not be here one day. She fears her demise, and the Divine Self that you are that seeks to express as her in the form she holds must enlist the agreement of the small self to embody. But in order for this to happen, you cannot hold the level of fear that the small self has accrued in her lineage as a small self.”

Here we are attempting to explain the unexplainable.. These teachings must use words to convey some necessary human understanding, and at the same time, to move us beyond the intellect. We are using dualistic language to convey a concept beyond duality. So let us first simply accept the limitations of language and to know that the deeper understanding of these truths comes from a place within that is beyond language and thought.

In our limited language we describe ourselves as having a human self/personality self/ and ego consciousness, all of which are somewhat interchangeable. And we also say that we have a Divine Nature/Christ consciousness/ we all come from the Source from the One.

Our personality self, our Earthly consciousness, including our body, is a unique vehicle of expression of the Divine. The Divine light shines to us and through us. Depending upon how aware and open and willing I am is a measure of the quality of life that shines through me. So that an individual such as Mother Teresa or Peace Pilgrim, when we come in contact with them, the veil between their human consciousness and the Divine that shows through them is quite flimsy and practically non-existent. They are not attached to any form of limitation or to their definition of who they are. If we were to compare them to a lens on a camera, the aperture would be letting the most light through as possible. (Another image that is used quite often is that about an old style lantern with the light inside and yet the panes of glass around it are covered in dirt. So that we can only begin to see the light as the lens or the glass is wiped clean.)

On the other side of the spectrum we might have Hitler or Stalin who appear to be so wrapped up in power and control  their identification as being this personality self, that there seems to be very little light shining through.

But let us add another layer to this awareness. 

If you happen to be in a high state of consciousness will you definitely know the truth of Who You Are so then you will also see through all of these other disguises that even Stalin or Hitler might be wearing. Mother Teresa put it beautifully when she said that she looked at her task on Earth as “Seeing Christ in all his distressing disguises.” Or as that marvelous Sufi saying teaches, “The pickpocket looked at the saint and all he saw were pockets.” 

As we grow in awareness and evolve in our acceptance of the truth of Who We Are, We become more and more aware of the choices we have of raising or lowering vibration. I shared a story which I believe is a marvelous example of how a vibrational change in thinking not only affects the individual who is consciously working on that process but they can also affect others around him or her. 

Jack Kornfield relates this amazing story. A woman’s only son was murdered by another “child.” The murderer grew up on the streets of Washington, D.C. with no guidance or direction, only the gangs and the streets for his home and family. At his sentencing, as a juvenile, the woman came up to him and said very simply, “I’m going to kill you,” and walked out of the courtroom. Not long afterward, she would go visit him in the juvenile home, bring him home made cookies, and other comforting gifts. She would talk with him and showed interest in his life. When it came time for his release, she helped him get a job, and petitioned the court to let him live with her. The court agreed.
After some time, she asked the young man I he remembered what she had said to him at his sentencing. He said he certainly did, he would never forget those words, “I’m going to kill you.”
“Well,” the woman said, “I succeeded. That boy no longer exists.”
And since the old person is dead, I want to ask you if I can officially adopt you, and let you be my son.”

We also realize as we grow in awareness that we have created or contributed to the creation of this earthly vehicle--our bodies and our personality selves. We have created this unique channel or form through which the Divine is meant to flow through. So here is another layer of understanding: the body and the mind and the personality are not the enemy. Even though they seem to get in the way of our desire to express our spiritual nature, the lessons or the hindrances or the obstacles we encounter are lessons that we ourselves have created to contribute to our own learning and evolution. Once we realize this, life becomes more of a flow rather than a struggle. That does not mean that difficulties disappear. We will still grieve; we will still have pain; we will still be pushed to stretch, but we will also realize every step is simply part of the dance. 

“The Infinite Self that you are, asking you in your permission to be received as you—and “as” and “through” you means as your expression—has come as you for one reason: to anchor the Kingdom into manifestation on this plane of experience. And, as we have taught, the Kingdom itself, the awareness of the Divine in all things, is here now, but exists in a higher octave than the physical form has agreed to thus far. In the alignment to truth—“I know who I am in truth, I know what I am in truth, I know how I serve in truth”—the manifested self, which means the form you hold, goes into an alignment with the truth of what she is so that even the form itself is assumed and realized as of God. If the God Self is not expressed in form, it remains an idea.”

BOOK OF TRUTH 15

P. 292-302

I am taking a few liberties here and sharing some reflections that are not as “linear.” These thoughts might not neatly follow paragraph by paragraph from the book.

The challenge here is to go beyond the abstract understanding of love, to go beyond physical and emotional understanding of love, to go beyond personality’s understanding of love. Each one of these carries its own baggage, its own weight its own definitions and its own limitations.

A cynic one-time stated, “We are told to love our neighbor as ourselves and unfortunately most of us do!” Conditional love, or limited love or love that is defined my expectation, is the personality self’s way of understanding this energy. It does not have the ability to comprehend unconditional love and because it does not have that capability as yet, it's sense of love, its experience of love, will always remain in limitation.

You cannot love unconditionally with a vehicle that cannot experience unconditional love. So that you can neither give nor receive unconditional love through the personality self. I believe there will come a time in our evolution when the personality or ego-self will be able to allow itself to be loved unconditionally, but even in that high state of vibration, the personality or ego-self will not love unconditionally. The creative power of unconditional love flows only to and from the divine nature the truth of Who You Are.

As long as we are identified with our limited nature, then our experience of love will also be limited. We are like beings with blinders on but we do not know we have blinders on and so we do not realize that we are hindered buy our own created limitations.

I would suggest that there are many more experiences of unconditional love then we give ourselves credit for. Moments when we are simply still, devoid of conflict; when we are communing with nature or sitting with a child or simply experiencing our heart being open, when we are being in the present moment. This is Love without any labels.

“When we say something is too vast to be explained, it is never too vast to be known.”

I would like to share a few “definitions” of love that might help.

From Robert Heinlein's book A Stranger in a Strange Land; “Love is that state where someone else's happiness is essential to your own.”

I have a long history with that description.

When I first came across it in the 60’s it seemed to make perfect sense to me. When I got into recovery, it began to sound very co-dependent and not very healthy at all. Today it vibrates within me in a whole different way.

Years ago I was viewing thr concept of happiness in an emotional and personality sort of way. Today I would translate that concept of happiness on a deeper level of understanding to mean more to be at peace with.

I can certainly relate that to ones whom I love, but is not about me controlling them. In the old way, I might have thought, if you were not at peace then I needed to do something to make you be at peace. Today it is more that if I perceive you not at peace, “how can I love you? how can I help you raise your vibration to a level of peacefulness?” And if you are in a state of consciousness that pushes me away, “how can I still hold you in the light of love?”

And then there is the entirely different or new awareness that we are all One, As the Mahayana school of Buddhism would say, “The boat does not leave until everyone is on it.” Or the poignant image from A Course in Miracles of Jesus or the Christ Consciousness standing at the open door to Union with the Father and saying  to all beings, “I will not go through the door until everyone else enters.”

From Sheldon Kopps’ book If You Meet the Buddha on the Road Kill Him he states, “Sometimes love means living with the helpless knowing that I can do nothing about another person's pain.”

I will add an extension to that quote in the moment, but I learned the essence of that truth when I was consoling my mother after my father made his transition. What I discovered was that as much as I wanted to take her pain and her grief away, it was necessary for her to do whatever it was she needed to do. I could be with her in love and compassion; I could also be with her in her pain, but I could not take it away. What I would add to that quotation is, “Sometimes love means living with the helpless knowing that I can do nothing about another person's pain, but I  can be present to them. I might not be able to take your pain away but, I can be with you in your pain; I can remind you that you are not alone.

Scott Peck in The Road Less Travelled  describes love as being “The ability to stretch oneself for one’s own spiritual growth or  the growth of another.

With Peck’s definition we enter into the realm of Spirit more deeply. We come to the awareness that we know exactly what he means, and yet it would be very difficult to try to explain or define his words any further .

Again: “When we say something is too vast to be explained, it is never too vast to be known.”

Two instances from Christian scripture that describe the “stretching” that Peck refers to is Jesus famous quote about turning the other cheek-- Matthew 5:38-40 New International Version (NIV)

38 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’[a] 39 But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also. 40 And if anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, hand over your coat as well.

Most of us would not be tempted to do that literally, But… this is what thousands did in India as Gandhi was leading them to freedom.

When Jesus was challenged about which was the greatest commandment, the Scribes and the Pharisees thought that they were trapping him into a corner--you would have to pick one of the 10 and then of course they would find all sorts of objections. But as usual he had the upper hand. Quoting from older scripture, he said the greatest commandment is “to love God with your whole heart, your whole soul, your whole mind, and your whole strength and the second one is like unto to this, love your neighbor as yourself.” then some wise-ass asked, “And who is my neighbor?” The answer was given through the parable of the Good Samaritan. Here is a modern-day version of that metaphor:

There was once a man who was planning an act of violence and terror. As he was traveling, he was jumped, beaten and robbed by a gang who cared for only themselves.
They left the man at the side of the road, bloody and dying.
A priest, a man of God, walked by, and saw him there and moved to the other side of the street. The man cried out for help, but the priest pretended he did not hear. He needed to get to his church, his congregation was depending on him.
In the same way, a doctor, a healer, walked by on his way to the hospital where he worked, and saw the man who was now moaning in pain. The doctor too moved to the other side of the street. He could not afford the chance of a malpractice suit.
A construction worker came by, saw the man and heard his cry, he started going over, but he decided not too, he just couldn’t get involved. I mean who knows what that person might have been involved in.
A family went by, Dad, Mom and the kids; they too saw and heard the man, they were tempted to help him, but someone said, “maybe it’s a trap, a setup; we better not stop.”
And finally an off-duty policeman walked by. He was thinking about his brother officers he lost on 9/11. He saw and heard the man. He went over, saw the man, and knew what and who he was. Initially he was filled with anger and the urge to inflict more pain and revenge, but he also remembered he was Christ in Training, and so was the wounded man in front of him. The officer got a blanket, wrapped the man in it, and carried him to his car. He tended his most serious wounds and then drove him to the nearest hospital emergency room, where he enlisted the care of a physician he knew. He said treat him as you would a fellow officer, I will come by later and check on him. I’m good for any expenses.”

Too far fetched” Too impractical?

“As each one of you comes forth in the announcement of being—“I am here, I am here, I am here”—you have claimed the Kingdom, but you don’t understand yet what being in the Kingdom means. And it does mean you become as love, and not in a convenient way, because the idealization that you would make for love is still imprinted by those who’ve come before you.
If you can imagine loving with the depth of your being each human being you encounter because you know what they are, you will understand what this means. The idea that love could be known in convenience, could be impartial to the needs of another—the idealization of what you think love is—must be met now to re-create you as the conduit for its expression. And we will use the teaching of truth to support you in this.”

“On this day I decide that any belief in love or any attributes to love that I have decided upon that are out of alignment with truth will be re-created in a higher way. And as I claim these words, I support my entire being in attuning to the frequency of love as may be known as and through me. On this day I claim that I am in alignment to love, and the vibration of love as what I am in its expression will reclaim a world through my being. As I say these words, I know them to be so. I know who I am in love. I know what I am in love. I know how I serve in love. I am here. I am here. I am here.”

“Now, as we give you love as the instruction of the day, once again you balk. “How am I to be love?” Paul asks.

You are love already is what we respond as. You are love already. You all are. It is the truth of your nature as being of God. You don’t learn love, you learn behavior. You allow love to be as you, and in the agreement to be as it, it is as you in all ways. The depth of love we hold for you will not be described because there are no words. The depth of love that is you cannot be articulated because it is so true, in such truth, that nothing else exists at that level of vibration. And the being as this calls the world to you, and you become its shepherd.

Yes, we use the word intentionally. You become its shepherd. The being that you are in love teaches others by being as you what they can be and what they truly are. This was always the teaching of the Christ, and it always will be. The one who says, “Follow me,” and is in love is encouraging all to be as they can be in the same truth in union with its Source.”

And I would be horribly amiss if I did nto include thsi marvelous passge from Paul: 1 Corinthians 13:1-13

1If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames,but have not love, I gain nothing. 4Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

8Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. 9For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. 11When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. 12Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

13And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

In love and gratitude.

Peace