Unity of Vermont

Eternal Life by Rev. Lane Williams

       We are beginning a New Year and ending the first decade of a new millennium. I affirm that 2010 promises a new energy, a new consciousness and awareness of who we are, where we are going, and what is ours to do. All this is set in the realm of time – that human construct that so rules our everyday existence. Our lives are so often lived dominated by time, schedules and appointments to keep, to do lists, timelines, and alarm clocks. As we get on in years we mark each birthday with mixed emotion as we see the wrinkles and stray gray hairs emerging on the youthful, free and healthy, joy-filled and vibrant being that we truly are. How could this be? I don’t feel older; I feel wiser and calmer maybe on my good days – not OLD!

         In the realm of the Divine, the Allness, the Oneness of all life, there is no time. For time needs the idea of separateness to exist. Time is linked to the concept of space between objects. There has to be a beginning of something and the end of another – separateness. When this is what we operate in, there is time. It takes time to move from one thing to another. I hold the image of a rainbow in my mind and it helps me understand this idea. If I imagine a rainbow seen from the Earth there is an array of color – bands of yellow, orange, red, violet, and blue. This is separateness – yes? But when I imagine myself IN the rainbow there is only white light – there is only the allness of all color possible. There is no separation. Being in the rainbow is like being in the Divine Realm of all things possible. It is from this realm that all in the physical realm is created. From the field of all things possible come all that we see around us – and separateness and time. We do this from the perspective of Earth – that time-space continuum.

         So knowing all this, how can we, the metaphysical truth students that we are, hold the concept of aging and death? Yes, it is true that we humans age, wrinkle up, turn gray, and even sometimes feeble and addle-brained. We all then pass on from this physical plane. The challenge is to at the same time – note the humor in that – hold that we are timeless spirits whose lives are eternal, constant and unending. We are not separate and apart from any of life, we are immersed in the eternal life of Spirit, this white light of the rainbow image.

         There is no death in the Allness of Divine Life. There is the transmutation of form, the transition from one form of energy to another. When we burn a log in the fireplace, where does it go? Does it disappear – is it gone? No, it is transformed into heat, light, charcoal, and ash. Just as the young mammal emerges from the warm cocoon of its mother’s womb, in effect dying to fetus-hood, it then is birthed into a new realm of life. It changes form from a parasite living off the host who is its mother- in cold and analytical terms – to a free-standing independent being. Just as the caterpillar transforms from creepy crawly thing to a winged one, upon death we shed this body form to fly with the angels. We haven’t changed who and what we are at the core. We are the continuing essence of Allness in new form.

         So when we affirm these truths of our innate, constant connection to eternal life, we can manage that monkey mind chatter that worries over our aging and the approaching end of our physical life. As we affirm uplifting statements of truth we take ourselves to the experience of peace, calm and experience eternal life. All is well.

I am a spiritual being, a whole and perfect expression of God. I am; God is.

I am One with the One. I am an eternal expression of the All that Is.

And so it is. And so it is. Amen.

Conscious Spiritual Evolution by Rev. Lane Williams

            There is a theory that all parts of life break down, fall apart, and naturally dissolve into disorder; that all systems eventually break down. It’s called entropy. Anyone who owns anything, a car, a house knows that is true. It seems that there’s always something that needs repair or replacement. And this is true of our relationships also. There is another theory that all of life is continually evolving into more complex and defined systems. This we call evolution. These are both happening – two seemingly contradictory forces happening simultaneously. When we look at how far mankind has come in just the last 250 years we see this is true. We have ended slavery in most of the world. Child labor has largely been outlawed. Women have the right to own property, receive inheritances, and vote in much of the world. So there has been an evolution in the consciousness of the world. And we also see how along with this evolution in society and in the global social consciousness, there has been a breakdown in our environment, and for many, in our family systems also.

            In chaos theory at a point in an organized system, when the forces of change become so great that the system cannot handle it, chaos breaks out, and the system is forced to restructure itself. In order to accommodate the new situation the system must develop new ways of handling its new environment and thus evolution occurs. As we look at history and even our own lives we see that the challenges, the horrible events that have happened to us have also ushered in the changes that brought forth our spiritual growth. Through our challenges we have matured emotionally and spiritually.

            Spiritual maturity is expressed through wisdom and compassionate action. Spirit-ual Intelligence or S.Q. measures the ability to integrate the inner life of mind-spirit with the outer life of the world. And its principles include:

• Self-Awareness: Knowing what I believe in and value, and what deeply motivates me
• Spontaneity: Living in and being responsive to the moment
• Being Vision- and Value-Led: Acting from principles and deep beliefs, and living accordingly
• Holism: Seeing larger patterns, relationships, and connections; having a sense of belonging
• Compassion: Having the quality of “feeling-with” and deep empathy
• Celebration of Diversity: Valuing other people for their differences, not despite them
• Independence: Standing against the crowd and having one’s own convictions
• Humility: Having the sense of being a player in a larger drama, of one’s true place in the world
• Tendency to Ask Fundamental “Why?” Questions: Needing to understand things and get to the bottom of them
• Ability to Reframe: Standing back from a situation or problem and seeing the bigger picture; seeing problems in a wider context
• Positive Use of Adversity: Learning and growing from mistakes, setbacks, and suffering
• Sense of Vocation: Feeling called upon to serve, to give something back

      Jesus spoke quite powerfully on this subject. He called upon us to develop our SQ. Maybe you might not recognize it as such, but He did say, “Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you.” When our enemies come to mind, (not just people, but also circumstances or situations that are challenging and that feel like our enemies), bless them. See them as blessings, because they will reveal things about ourselves that our friends will never tell us. The friendly circumstances in our lives will never reveal to us. Hardship, obstacles, even pain and suffering, can serve us if we let them.

      When I think of someone who demonstrates a high SQ, I think of Dr. Martin Luther King. Here is an excerpt from his letter from Birmingham jail. He writes:

“…though I was initially disappointed at being categorized as an extremist, as I continued to think about the matter I gradually gained a measure of satisfaction from the label. Was not Jesus an extremist for love?…  And John Bunyan: ‘I will stay in jail to the end of my days before I make a butchery of my conscience.’ And Abraham Lincoln: ‘This nation cannot survive half slave and half free.’ And Thomas Jefferson: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal…’  

      So the question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be. Will we be extremists for hate or for love? Will we be extremists for the preservation of injustice or for the extension of justice?

      In that dramatic scene on Calvary’s hill three men were crucified. We must never forget that all three were crucified for the same crime — the crime of extremism. Two were extremists for immorality, and thus fell below their environment. The other, Jesus Christ, was an extremist for love, truth, and goodness, and thereby rose above his environment. Perhaps the South, the nation, and the world are in dire need of creative extremists.”

      We too can choose this path which many may call extremist – the path of Spiritual growth, and thus raise our S.Q. It can happen when we choose to view life from a higher perspective than a judgmental and critical mind. We too can be extremists for love, peace and compassion when we choose to do the kind and loving thing, when we consciously choose to see the good in the situation, when we know that despite the appearance of disorder, chaos and the rumors of calamity around us, we can stand for the conscious evolution of our Divine Spirit. And through this stance, aligned with divine beings throughout the world, it shall come forth. And so it is and so it is.