Learning Grace
Nathan Zafran
(This was posted on hu-chat several years ago, and was originally
given as a short talk at at worship service)
LEARNING GRACE
The grace of God, or God’s grace is a common expression, which
seems to mean a free gift of something needed by a person who is
worthy to receive it- a gift of love, which may come quietly as an
inner feeling or even an outright miraculous event.The expression “he
has graced us with his presence” is another way of showing how the
presence of a loving individual can radiate the gift of love needed to
help or uplift someone. God’s grace, therefore, offers a kind of deep
spiritual nourishment. In the early stages of our unfoldment as Soul,
we starve for it. This is when we are poor in the spiritual sense of
the word. We are mainly conscious of experiencing some kind of
lack-typical, of course , of the human condition. We expend a great
deal of energy to fill these lacks. Sometimes we are successful,
sometimes not. We are most successful when we fill these lacks from
within by expanding ourselves through some inner spiritual
contemplation or meditation. Have you ever had a moment or a time in
your life that you experienced God’s grace suddenly out of the blue?
Were you going through a rough time or a dark night? Did this
experience provide enough joy and nourishment to allow you to see
things from a higher viewpoint, and allow you to go on living in spite
of the hardships you were facing? Did you glimpse the cosmic purpose
and benefit to you behind the suffering? What was your state of
consciousness at the time the experience happened?
We move gradually from the state of need where we are
desperate for this “grace” to the state of mastery where we bask in it
continuously and re-radiate it to all of life. This is known as being
a co-worker with God,and is exemplified by the Vairagi Eck Masters.
Those of us who have come in contact with them, either in the physical
body or through Soul Travel in the inner worlds, have seen that these
beings are living the Grace of God virtually all the time. They are
still stretched and challenged with new opportunities all the time,
but the heavy struggle and suffering has ended. We are striving to
become like these beings, to live a life without anguish, filled with
unending joy. How can we learn to invite “grace” into our lives?
Grace and gratitude come from the same root word. We can’t
control grace, but we can learn to be always grateful, although it’s
much easier to be unhappy over what we don’t have than to be happy
over what we do have. A blind person that suddenly sees reaches the
highest happiness, regardless of any other difficulty he may still
have.This is because he has placed his attention on an uplifting
thing, and is disregarding anything less. Perhaps we should learn the
art of putting our attention on the good things in our life and ignore
or put little energy into the things we aren’t happy with. This is
living a state of constant gratitude.
Some of us may win that lottery jackpot, but the rest will
still fall short of having an unlimited supply of money. This high
tension world provides more opportunities to experience pain and lack
than to gain pleasure and abundance. However, we can guarantee
ourselves an unlimited spiritual abundance if we learn to expand our
consciousness into the higher spiritual worlds,eventually becoming
self-realized and God-realized. The grace of God is not an exclusive
gift to a chosen few. It is like the water in the faucet- always ready
to pour out without end. We merely have to learn to open the tap and
keep it open.
The key lies in the ability to open up ourselves and create a
vacuum whereby God’s grace has no choice but to flow in. Apart from
gratitude, it helps if we eliminate the stress that comes from forcing
life, or trying to control it. We do this by getting out of the way ,
or surrendering- giving in to God’s plan for us, flowing with the
current of life instead of against it. It’s no easier than learning to
be always grateful. The negative forces of life encourage stress,
negative thinking, depression, loneliness, and other symptoms which
prevent us from truly letting go. However, it can be done, and one
great result of that is that our heart centers open up, which makes it
easy for the love of God to flow in and fill us up.The rewards are
well worth the efforts, and the teachings of Eckankar provide us with
tools to achieve these goals.
With Love in ECK,
Nathan
Bkouris
forgot to laugh. I learned a long time ago that God is actually for sale at a
pretty cheap price. Get some Eckankar books real cheap at a garage sale and
enlighten yourself. Hey, it works for me, so it might for you too.
Prometheus
Nathan Zafran
I prometheus you that if you don't stop this insulting behaviour, I'm
going to treat you like the spoiled little brat you are and put you
into a corner and force you to stare at the wall for 30 minutes.
Is that clear, boychickle?