Tag Archives: prayer

How Should We Then Pray?

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How should we then pray?

Many religions offer prayers of one form or another. Many religions offer guidelines as to how to pray. The New Message is no exception. One error that the New Message rebukes is the idea of praying for every preference.

How should we then pray?

“They want God to provide so many things for them without asking anything in return. They do not want their lives to be directed or impacted or restrained. But they want God to do so many things for them, as if God were a kind of servant, an errand boy [emphasis mine] for the shifting desires of the individual.” (Volume 4, The New God Experience, Experiencing God, Verse 2)

How should we then pray? Many religions direct their students to pray to the Lord of the universe, the Creator of all life. But if God is the Creator of a billion billion billion races and more, don’t my prayers have to “go through channels?” Is God micromanaging my life? The New Message says “No.”

“God is not micromanaging your affairs, and changing the climate, and bringing about catastrophe and good fortune. This is something that is just living in the process of life—a process that was initiated at the beginning of time. In this, there is no conflict or contradiction between Creation and the evolutionary process.” (Volume 1, The Time of Revelation, God’s Plan for the World, Verse 8)

How should we then pray? I never pray for individuals or events on other worlds. But what about individuals and events in this world? Should I strengthen particular outcomes? Oscar Wilde observed that when the gods wish to punish us, they answer our prayers. Maybe I should limit my prayers to giving strength of character and strength of faculty of mind. Such a prayer will never be punished.

“You will have a special practice two times today where you are to think of someone in need and then give them a quality that you wish to receive yourself. Send that individual that quality. Send them love or strength or faith or encouragement or determination or surrender or acceptance or self-discipline—whatever they need to bring about resolution in their lives.” (Volume 3, Steps to Knowledge, Step 121 “Today I am free to give.”, Verse 2)

How should we then pray? I pray that my prayers may be launched and guided by Knowledge, the deeper spiritual intelligence that God has placed in every person. I pray that my prayers my be of noble intent. And to the extent that they are, I pray that they are prayed and shared by other people. I pray that they become part of the culture around me, and part of the culture beyond my awareness.

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Welcome to Mystery of Ascension! We are students and advocates of the the New Message from God. We are members of a worldwide community. We seek to assist the world in successfully navigating difficult times ahead. We seek to assist the world in successfully emerging into a greater community of intelligent life. You will also find some poetry. Find out more about us here. Contact us here.

How Long Will You Be Frightened Of The Future?

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whirling2Why wait any longer for the world to begin?

Coleman Barks. How long will you be frightened of the future?I am recalling this poem by Rumi, translated by Coleman Barks as I ponder the rejection by the New Message from God of the idea of strengthening preferred outcomes when praying for people.

How long will you be frightened of the future?

Why do we seek to strengthen preferred outcomes? If the chain is followed back far enough, is it because we believe that we will not survive if we don’t?

In the context of this poem, the word “sheikh” refers to a more spiritually advanced individual, and the disciple is a disciple of the sheikh.

A sheikh and a disciple are walking quickly toward a town
where it’s known there is very little to eat. The disciple
says nothing, but he is constantly afraid of going hungry.

The sheikh knows what the disciple thinks. How long
will you be frightened of the future
because you love food? You have closed the eye
of self-denial and forgotten who provides.

Don’t worry. You’ll have your walnuts and raisins and special desserts.
Only the true favorites get hunger for their daily bread.
You’re not one of those. Whoever loves the belly
is brought bowl after bowl from the kitchen.

When such a person dies, bread itself comes to the funeral
and makes a speech: “O corpse, you almost killed yourself
with worrying about food. Now you’re gone and food
is still here, more than enough. Have some free bread.”

Bread is more in love with you than you with it.
It sits and waits for days. It knows you have no will.
If you could fast, bread would jump into your lap
as lovers do with each other.

Be full with trusting,
not with these childish fears of famine.

How long will you be frightened of the future? Until the day when the one who provides, provides new eyes with which to see. In the meantime, please pass the trusting.

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Welcome to Mystery of Ascension! We are students and advocates of the the New Message from God. We are members of a worldwide community. We seek to assist the world in successfully navigating difficult times ahead. We seek to assist the world in successfully emerging into a greater community of intelligent life. You will also find some poetry. Find out more about us here. Contact us here.

Will You Hear My Confession?

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Night Writer, Night Visions and Tiger Lily, Minneapolis, Minnesota, August 2005 Will you hear my confessionSince I make this request to whom it may concern, please understand that I’m not seeking absolution from you, at least not in the formal sense.

Will you hear my confession?

It has been my blessing to know John Stewart and his family for about ten years now. I first met him in the glory days of the regional blogfleet called the Minnesota Organization of Blogs (MOB). This picture was taken at Keegan’s Irish Pub in Minneapolis, a MOB gathering place in 2005. At the time, I only knew John by his nom de blog of The Night Writer. There was a season where his wife and two daughters were blogging as well, earning them the well-deserved title of “Minnesota’s first family of blogging.”

In the time I have known John, I have read many blog posts he has written. We have had a number of conversations, both in person and online. I have never read or heard an unkind word fall from his pen or his lips. I consider John to be an unashamed, unapologetic Christian, but he’s not a stuck-up sticky-beak or a pompous puffed-up pea-brain about it. I consider him as someone who has successfully navigated between the Scylla of spiritual timidity, and the Charybdis of spiritual pride and arrogance. As far as I know, he is doing his small, necessary part to forward the gospel, and is content to be doing his small, necessary part. I am grateful that he is in my world.

John recently entered a new season in life when he was diagnosed with ALS (“Lou Gehrig’s disease”). As ALS is but one of a family of diseases, John has decided to call it “Uncle Lou.” He is blogging about it here. He seems to have a certain conviction that he will confound this disease. Will he? I don’t know. But even if he doesn’t, I believe he will sing his noble death song and die like a hero going home. I believe he will live his life the way he has lived his life in the presence of many witnesses (including me).

Will you hear my confession? I confess I am disquieted when I consider the possibility that there are “Job’s comforters” out there, people thinking, “Well, if John really was a man of God, he wouldn’t get such a weird, scary disease.” Fortunately, if such people exist in my world, they are keeping their mouths firmly shut.

I confess that I want the words of Mark 16:18, “they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well” to be true in my world, but they are not.

Will you hear my confession? I confess dissatisfaction as to why that should be the case. Was Mark 16:9-20 an extra addition, as some people claim?

I confess I don’t want there to be “fine print,” provisos or qualifications to the promises of God.

Will you hear my confession? I confess I don’t want fine print to be necessary, but it seems like it is.

I confess that I want to be the one that lays hands on sick people, and they will get well, but I’m not. Everyone has different gifts.

Will you hear my confession? I confess that I want it to be a practice of the New Message from God to pray for sick people to get well, but it is not. There definitely is a practice of praying for other people, but it focuses on the qualities I believe the other person needs for resolution, as opposed to strengthening a preferred outcome. I haven’t written about it yet because it is addressed in a later Step.

I confess that I want Marshall Summers to heal the sick, but he does not. He has never advertised to do so. I don’t believe he ever will. I can only imagine how difficult it would be for him to share his message if he did.

Will you hear my confession? I confess a certain lack of clarity as to what tool to take from my spiritual toolbox. I like the “I will forgive, and this will disappear” hammer from Lesson 193 of A Course in Miracles. But if I use that, I’m strengthening a preferred outcome, aren’t I? John seems to be doing well as far as inner strength is concerned.

I confess to inflicting the argument that past and present versions of me are having, upon an undeserving reader.

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Welcome to Mystery of Ascension! We are students and advocates of the the New Message from God. We are members of a worldwide community. We seek to assist the world in successfully navigating difficult times ahead. We seek to assist the world in successfully emerging into a greater community of intelligent life. You will also find some poetry. Find out more about us here. Contact us here.