"Jesus said: When you give rise
to that which is within you, what you have will save you. If you
do not give rise to it, what you do not have will destroy you."
- The Gospel of Thomas
"The Mind of man is the Mind of God. ... The
Life of man is the Life of God. ... The Soul of man is the Soul of God.
... The Spirit of man is the Spirit of God. ... Mind, Life, Spirit, are
names of God. They are the Substance of God. They may
represent to our way of thinking very different things, but being all
names of God, they are one. ... There is a call in every heart for
something that will endure. Only Spirit is eternal." -
Emma Curtis Hopkins, Scientific Christian Mental Practice
And so it is Christmas ...
2011 ... and as we celebrate the life of Jesus, how many of us can truly
say that we understand this man who was so complex, so radical. If
we study all that was written about him in just the Holy Bible alone, we
will find a man of numerous contradictions. Is it because the
authors of the books that wrote of him, or the people who heard his
words, lacking his spiritual awareness, did not understand him at all?
Are there words that can identify something that the limited human mind
cannot grasp the awareness of? We have all heard the affirmation,
"let the mind be in me that was in Christ Jesus" ... yet,
reason tells us that this can never be. Not that we don't have the
availability of the same level of intelligence ... we just don't have
the availability of the same personality.
Our identification with the philosophy of
Jesus is dependent on our own level of awareness of spiritual truth.
There are 38,000 different Christian religious sects in the world.
And so we know that no one knows all that Jesus was teaching ...
although there are those who are reaching out in their minds, hearts and
souls to realize more of his philosophy ... and many are not Christians
... but people who are being "called" by that Something
Greater than we are to gain a higher awareness and understanding than
religion can supply. These are the ones whose soul yearns to
understand the fragments of transcendent consciousness that are written
beyond the words attributed to Jesus in the Gospels. There is no
clear definition, but a way that is shown to all who believe that there
is more to this man Jesus than the Christ within him, more to his
philosophy, more to his life, more to his soul, than we have realized
and understood.
What are we to think of his words, "I am
the Light of the world" and then he tells us, "You are the
Light of the world" .. who else has gone before us that can explain
this to us? Other enlightened ones have n ever expressed such
confidence and faith in our individual ability. Are we willing, to
discover that which is within us, that is greater than that which is in
the world? How do we begin to "let your Light so shine"?
... and so we realize that we will never know until we find this Light
within ourselves and allow It to express through us, out into our world
of experience.
This year we celebrate what makes us feel good
... until ... we have that deeper realization of the Christ in Jesus and
the Christ that is within us, which may take us into a realm of
possibilities of indescribable joy. The "baby in the
manger" symbolizes the birth of an infinite hope within our
consciousness that makes our soul sing with gladness as we trim our tree
for Christmas, light the Hanukkah candles in remembrance of Jesus'
cultural heritage and let the promise of a greater experience of the
Light compel us to look forward to the New Year with a peace-filled
heart.
No rational person can help but love Jesus ...
no matter what our religion or lack of religion may be. No one has
placed themselves at odds with so many to demonstrate what they believed
to be G-d's will for them ... Jesus defied the religious leaders, the
government, the infidels and the culture of the era, yet his message of
hope and love and healing has survived the ages and few of us can even
name one of his detractors. Emerson stated it so simply,
"that which I am to do best, only my Maker can teach me" ...
and this is what the radical Jesus demonstrated over and over again ...
and asked us to "follow him" and do likewise.
And so we identify Christmas not only as the
Christ revealed in Jesus, but we celebrate our awakened mind to the
discovery that this Christ is within us too ... "when
you give rise to that which is within you, what you have will save
you" the radical Jesus said ... and what we have this Christmas is
determined by how much value we have put on this "pearl of great
price" ... the Christ ... and our ability to give rise to it.
AND
SO IT IS!
Keep
the faith!
Rev.
Dr. Henry Lee Bates
Visit Rev. Bates BLOGS: Living
the Way to a Wonderful Life
Rev
Bates en Espanol
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