The Principles of Spiritual Living
GOD’S HEALING LOVE LIFTS ME
By Nirvana Reginald Gayle
In the midst of the Trayvon Martin murder brought back to our fresh awareness by the acquittal of his murderer, George Zimmerman, and even our President saying, “this could be me,” all of my old ghosts, hurts and pains were raised to the surface. In the midst of my own anger, hurt and downloading the great anger and frustration of the masses, particularly Black Folk, and the great divide this was causing in our nation, I searched for more. I searched for that healing that could take me higher.
Of course I turned to Gods love to take me higher. Jesus profoundly reminds us to love your enemy and those who despise and abuse you. He tells us that it’s easy to love those who love you and to love family, because even sinners do that. But to love those who have done you wrong, offended you, betrayed you, wounded you, or triggered deep unhealed wounds, now that’s to truly love as God loves.
I turned to the great mystic Dr. Howard Thurman, teacher of Dr. Martin Luther King, in a passage from his book “For The Inward Journey.” In one passage he talks about “I want to be being more loving in my heart,” and in another passage he breaks down “Keep open the doors of thy heart.” He talks about if I keep moving through my heart a genuine love for you; it bypasses all your hatred and indifference and gets through to you at your center. As I keep open the door of my heart it matters not how many doors are closed against me. The word that love is stronger than hate and goes beyond death is the great disclosure.
OMG, what power in these insightful words of the great Dr. Thurman. It is the reminder of our own fundamental belief in the New Thought tradition that people at their core are God beings, one with and inseparable from God. Because of that, we are bypassing appealing to their fear, their conditioned mind, their brainwashing by the ways of the world. We are charged with going straight to the center of their being and calling them out, holding them accountable to their true nature, essence and being.
Sometimes folks are afraid to love because they think it lets folks off the hook and condones letting people get away with their wrongdoing and unjust acts. Nothing could be further from the truth. It doesn’t let any-1 off the hook. It actually cuts deeper to the core of their being and makes them inwardly confront the degree to which their actions are out of alignment with the core of who they really are as a love being ordained by God.
However, more importantly, loving them, loving your enemy is not really about them at all. It’s about you. It’s about the inner healing and alignment of your own soul and being. It’s about ensuring that you let know one and nothing, no incident, condition, circumstance or situation get in the way of you and your God. That you allow nothing to take you away from your center, your truth, and your power. It’s about standing boldly in what you know and believe and letting nothing have power over you other than Gods love.
Let us understand that letting Gods love lift us higher is not about whitewashing the Trayvon Martin tragedy and condoning the actions of Zimmerman or the mislead and misguided jurors. They’re all still accountable for their actions. This event is still a tragedy, a travesty of injustice. An innocent 17-year-old child is still dead for no good reason. It doesn’t change or belittle that one iota.
It does not make excuses for this type of behavior and actions, bury our heads in the sand like an ostrich and pretend it didn’t happen, hoping it will just go away. Standing in God’s love and true power is about the most effective tool we have for change, transformation and healing. At some point we have to move beyond the anger, hurt, fear, rhetoric, old wounds, pointing fingers and blaming. We have to move to empowered action, healing intent and the revealing of Gods Kingdom/Queendom here on earth now.
In fact, I’m not as interested in holding folk accountable to the wrong or unjust actions they have taken. I’m more interested in holding them accountable to their divinity, their sacred truth, their Godliness. In the New Thought tradition we believe what scripture says when it declares in Genesis that we are created in the image and likeness of God. We stand on what it says in Psalms 82:6 and later reiterated by Jesus in the book of John, “You are gods, all of you are children of the most high.” Rather than subscribe to the mistaken belief that humanity is the original sin and unworthy, we hold to the reality that we are holy, sacred, divine beings by nature who have lost our way and come under the influence of mass mesmerizing and propaganda that has convinced us all of the Big Lie. So I’m here to remind and hold folk and primarily myself, accountable to the reality of our true identity as God-beings.
As part of my process I believe in expressing my anger, not repressing or burying it. I express where I am without pretending to be somewhere that I’m not. Just for appearances, to fit in or to front off some notion of quasi-enlightened spirituality. I know that at my core I am very loving, that I am guided by a deep and profound love of God, myself, all people and all of creation. This is the core, my ground zero, my north star and guiding principle of being. I don’t hold grudges and I am quick to forgive and let it go. So I can be where I am at any given moment with the awareness and understanding that I will quickly snap back into my core beingness.
Part of the reason is that I love inner peace. I don’t like, nor do I function well with the specter of hatred, anger, resentment, animosity or fear hanging over me and percolating inside my being. It robs me of my juice, my vitality, my power and ability to truly be effective in the world. I value my well-being and like to be able to operate at what I consider to be my optimum best. So I will do what I must to ensure that I get back to inner peace and equilibrium where I can be at my greatest power and effect the greatest change, healing and transformation.
Thus the work of letting Gods love lift me higher, is not altruistic at all. It’s not about another person. It’s actually rather selfish. It’s about keeping me in my center, my place of power, in my truth so that I can be free. If I’m going to help others to freedom, to healing, to justice and the love of God, I can’t do that unless I’m already there myself. More importantly, I have to know how to get back to that centered place of Love & Power when I have swayed away.
So Zimmerman doesn’t get a pass. Racism in America doesn’t get to live on unabated. We don’t get to turn our heads and pretend the ugly specter of racism, sexism, homophobia, religionism, nationalism, hatred, bigotry, violence and all separation consciousness mess doesn’t exist. We don’t get to dismiss the life of Trayvon Martin and all the Trayvon’s who have ever lived or died in these great United States of America. We are held accountable to our highest standards, our highest humanity, our greatest truth and to act from that place.
We get to stand in our power. We get to stand in our strongest place of being to effect the greatest healing, the greatest justice, the greatest transformation and resurrection of our souls. We get to bring forth our greatest enlightenment and illumination. We get to stand in the only place that can bring about the change and healing we seek; Gods love, which is our love, our true nature, essence and being.
God’s love is what lifts us higher and is the salvation for the human race and this beloved planet upon which we live and move and dance in grace. Our only hope for salvation is to stand in the Love of God and find ways to love one another through all the hard times, turmoil’s and difficulties. To not be fooled by folks insecurities and fears that make them do foolish, hurtful, cruel, violent and tragic things. Yes we must hold them to the fire for that but more importantly remind them of their sacred truth as God-beings and hold them accountable to that. They don’t get the pass or excuse that they are the original sin and unworthy and couldn’t help themselves. You are responsible precisely because you are a being of love and light. Now feel that, process that, reconcile that and step up to who you really are.
To be a way-shower means I must show the way. It means I must be able to see a way out of no-way and lead to the Promised Land. Even if like Moses or Martin Luther King it means I may not physically live to see the day we are all living in paradise, I must lead the way anyway. As Gandhi once said, “I must be the change I want to see.” This means that at the citadel of my soul I must already be in paradise, utopia, Shangri-La, Brigadoon, Shammbhala. I must already be living in the Promised Land. I must already be the waking, walking, living expression of Gods love made visible in form. It must be alive and well and the very fiber of my being. It must be the fabric of which I am woven. Only then can I truly lead, only then can I truly be an instrument of Gods will and a beneficial presence unto the world.
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