Pioneering Mystic Sermons 2011

The Fruits of Repentance

Linda Mihalic sermon transcript; Palm Sunday, April 17, 2011, Cleveland, Ohio. Scriptures: Malachi 3:7, Matthew 3:1-2, 8, 10, Matthew 7:19-20, Luke 13:1-9.

“Even from the days of your fathers ye are gone away from mine ordinances, and have not kept them. Return unto me, and I will return unto you, saith the Lord of hosts. – Malachi 3:7.

“In those days came John the Baptist, preaching in the wilderness of Judea, And saying, Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. … Bring forth therefore fruits meet for repentance. … And now also the axe is laid unto the root of the trees: therefore every tree which bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire.” – Matthew 3:1-2, 8, 10.

“Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them.” – Matthew 7:19-20.

“There were present at that season some that told him of the Galilaeans, whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. And Jesus answering said unto them, Suppose ye that these Galilaeans were sinners above all the Galilaeans, because they suffered such things? I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish. Or those eighteen, upon whom the tower in Siloam fell, and slew them, think ye that they were sinners above all men that dwelt in Jerusalem? I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish. He spake also this parable; A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard; and he came and sought fruit thereon, and found none. Then said he unto the dresser of his vineyard, Behold, these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and find none: cut it down; why cumbereth it the ground? And he answering said unto him, Lord, let it alone this year also, till I shall dig about it, and dung [fertilize] it: And if it bear fruit, well: and if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down.” – Luke 13:1-9.

The dictionary defines repentance as “penitence, to feel remorse, contrition, or self-reproach for what one has done or failed to do, to be contrite, to regret past conduct and to change one’s mind for the better regarding it.” Today’s texts are all about changing your mind, deciding to hold a new idea instead of the old. Your old ideas are all too often nothing more than opinions or prejudices, dusty mental bric-a-brac that you no longer even notice.

When Jesus dined in Matthew Levi’s house, with tax collectors and sinners, the outraged scribes and Pharisees questioned him. Jesus said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance.” – Mark 2:17. The scribes and Pharisees, the lawyers and legal nitpickers, were righteous in their own eyes, full of spiritual smugness. Because they were already so full of opinions and prejudices, they had no room for new wisdom or illumination.

Luke 13 begins with a discussion of current events. Someone told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. We don’t know why Pilate killed them, but his act was blasphemous, desecrating an altar. Jesus adds that their sins had not brought this horrific end upon them, but that all needed to repent or perish also. Then he mentions the men who died in a building accident at Siloam, and makes the same statement about them. Jesus’ main point is that one repentance is not enough. You never know when death will come, so your repentance must be constant and ongoing. You must continue changing your mind into the “mind that was in Christ Jesus,” the upright Mind of God.

Then Jesus taught a parable about a barren fig tree: “A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard; and he came and sought fruit thereon, and found none. Then said he unto the dresser of his vineyard, Behold, these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and find none: cut it down; why cumbereth it the ground? And he answering said unto him, Lord, let it alone this year also, till I shall dig about it, and dung it: And if it bear fruit, well: and if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down.” – Luke 13:6-9. The vineyard is earth. The keeper of the vineyard is the Begotten Son. The owner of the vineyard is God, the Father. Old ideas use up your share of heavenly resources but produce no fruit. Unless you repent, you dry up into a desiccated barrenness unable to bear the fruit that symbolizes a fertile relationship with the Source of all Life.

Righteousness is moral uprightness, alignment, being in syzygy — alignment — with your Creator. You always have a line of Light up to your Source, or you would not be alive. Imagine your line as a water hose for a moment; visualize it. The waters of the River of Life cannot flow through a kinked hose. Wrong thinking twists a kink that shuts off your supply, leaving you to become a dried up husk. Only repentance can straighten your line of Light to renew your mind.

Immediately in this chapter of Luke, on the Sabbath, Jesus heals the woman suffering a “spirit of infirmity” that left her unable to unbend her body and stand straight. Her body had a kink in the hose. When the indignant rulers of the synagogue complained, Jesus called them on their hypocrisy, saying that they would do as much for an animal on the Sabbath.

Then he taught the parables of the mustard seed and of the leaven in the meal: “Unto what is the kingdom of God like? And whereunto shall I resemble it? It is like a grain of mustard seed, which a man took, and cast into his garden; and it grew, and waxed a great tree; and the fowls of the air lodged in the branches of it. And again he said, Whereunto shall I liken the kingdom of God? It is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened.” – Luke 13:18-21. The mustard seed and leaven both need room to grow. Mustard seed represents wisdom and leaven symbolizes love. You must make room for love and wisdom to grow within you, and you do so by evicting whatever you have permitted to fill their space. This is repentance. You must change your mind about what you believe.

Luke 14 records that Jesus dined that day with many lawyers and Pharisees. He deliberately healed a man with dropsy in their presence and asked them, pointedly, if healing on the Sabbath was legal. He used the same “saving a donkey” analogy he had earlier taught publicly. They remained silent, not answering him. Jesus spoke of the arrogance of wealthy men whom others viewed as righteous. Then he taught the parable of the great supper. The wealthy and self-righteous declined the invitation, so the master of the feast invited the “poor and the maimed and the lame and the blind” instead.

Luke 14 ends with Jesus rejoining the throngs of poor who were waiting for him outside. He teaches them the requirements for being a disciple, followed by two brief examples of using planning as foresight to map the path ahead. Jesus then says, “Salt is good: but if the salt have lost his savor, wherewith shall it be seasoned? It is neither fit for the land, nor yet for the dunghill; but men cast it out. He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.” – Luke 14:34-35. Righteousness is a requisite for discipleship and walking the Via Christa. However, self-righteousness is flavorless salt, worth nothing. Luke was the Greek physician who wrote his Gospel based on what he had heard from Mary, Jesus’ mother. He recorded the healing stories, from his viewpoint.

Chapter 15, a continuation of the same day, starts with, “Then drew near unto him all the publicans and sinners for to hear him. 15:2 And the Pharisees and scribes murmured, saying, This man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them.” – Luke 15:1-2. Their prejudice was greater than their righteousness. Jesus shows marvelous patience with these people. He teaches them the parable of the one lost sheep, saying, “Joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine just persons, which need no repentance.” – Luke 15:7. Then he shares the parable of the lost coin, ending with, “I say to you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.” – Luke 15:10. He immediately proceeds to the parable of the prodigal son.

Each of these parables and stories is about some facet of repentance. Repentance is a law of being (you must be repentant), and a law of doing (you must repent). Repentance is your sole avenue to redeem misspent or unwisely invested soul substance, to amend your foolish choices. When you repent, you request to be permitted to repay your debts to law. Most important, repentance must precede forgiveness. Forgiveness is the line of credit that God extends to you to pay your debts. You must practice repentance yourself and grant forgiveness to another who repents: “Take heed to yourselves. If your brother sins against you, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him.” – Luke 17:3.

You must become the righteousness that the scribes and Pharisees, the legal experts of Jesus’ day, imagined they were and claimed to be. The lesson in this is profound. Your righteousness must exceed that of the Pharisees, or you cannot enter the kingdom. How righteous is righteous? Does righteousness come in degrees? Not really. You either are righteous, or are not in syzygy with God. Daily, you lose alignment and must return to your Father in heaven. “Return to Me, and I will return to you, said the Lord of hosts.” – Malachi 3:7.

Hourly, the world etches its mark on the integrity of your being. You must repent and renew that perfect wholeness of the Christ Mind within yourself. You learn to prune your own barren branches, without waiting for law to force you. You dig around your own roots to remain receptive to the Word, and fertilize your soul with reading and study of scripture. If you keep God at the center of your being, as the focal point of your consciousness, He will renew you and you will become more like Him. Forbid self to impose any veils of illusion between you and reality. Instead, become a perfect mirror of His Light, reflecting that glory into the world. Repentance cleans the mirror daily, hourly, moment to moment. In the mirror you see truth reflected. With practice, you find every flaw, every smudge.

The great souls who have gone before us serve as the newer founts of inspiration along the way of the Christ. Those who live by the Via Christa are the Master’s proof of his message of love, repentance, redemption, forgiveness and life immortal.

After the Resurrection

Linda Mihalic Easter Sunday transcript, April 24, 2011, Cleveland, Ohio.

“For he taught his disciples, and said unto them, The Son of man is delivered into the hands of men, and they shall kill him; and after that he is killed, he shall rise the third day. But they understood not that saying, and were afraid to ask him.” – Mark 9:31-32.

“Then he took unto him the twelve, and said unto them, Behold, we go up to Jerusalem, and all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of man shall be accomplished. For he shall be delivered unto the Gentiles, and shall be mocked, and spitefully entreated, and spitted on: And they shall scourge him, and put him to death: and the third day he shall rise again. And they understood none of these things: and this saying was hid from them, neither knew they the things which were spoken.” – Luke 18:31-34.

Jesus told them he would be crucified, and they did not believe him. They did not understand what he was saying. He told them that he would rise again on the third day. They had seen him resurrect Lazarus, Jairus’ daughter and the poor widow’s son, but they could not comprehend that he would also raise himself.

Christmas and Easter are the two greatest Christian holidays, but they really are not the most important, only the most relatable. We can relate to birth and death because we see it in our own lives and in the lives of those around us. Birth is so joyful, but death seems so final. For the bereaved, it is the loss of a loved one, accompanied by sorrow and grief. Only those who have had a near death experience have reported that another, perhaps higher reality exists beyond what we ordinarily live to see.

The scoffers and atheists maintain this is a delusion and not logical; that when you are dead, you are dead, that’s it. The agnostics are unsure of any truth and blow about in the winds of opinion, like tumbleweeds across the prairie states, piling up along the fences of stronger opinions and beliefs. Resurrection is miraculous, but most people write it off as a miracle story about something that happened long ago. They believe more in medical miracles of surgery and drugs than in miracles of faith. The world is firmly fixated on the physical aspect of things, possessions, events, people, doubts, fears, hopes, and dreams.

Throughout his ministry, Jesus was busy eliminating his need for the world. His death by Crucifixion was simply the culmination of that surrender to the truth of God’s reality. While he acknowledged that we are obviously in the world, he stressed that we need not and indeed should not be of the world. The entire Sermon on the Mount in Matthew, chapters 5, 6 and 7, is all about breaking the world’s hold on our view of reality.

Jesus taught us that God is our Father, close, personal and approachable. He painted word pictures of the kingdom of heaven in homely terms that the poorest of the hard-working classes could understand and relate to in their poverty. Heaven is the reward for obedience to divine law and the fulfillment of their dreams of fairness, an equity we rarely find in the world. Jesus’ entire life served as the template for our spiritual development and accomplishment in earth life. He lived and embodied the lessons and experiences of seven great Degrees of Initiation, as a Neophyte, Disciple, Adept, Mystic, Master, Priest and finally, he became Christos, the Christ.

The Resurrection was the opening of a forty-day period in which Jesus, now the Christ, walked and talked with his disciples and closest followers, many of whom were women. Don’t you wonder what they must have thought and felt about their teacher, who could suddenly appear in their midst? We know that Thomas doubted, until Jesus invited him to touch the wounds. Thomas remains our perfect example of someone who must see to believe, even while we strive to overcome this limitation and believe to see the truth.

Jesus was preparing his beloved followers for the Ascension. Right here, on this point, religion has failed us significantly. We believe that religion has failed to teach us meaningfully about ascension because the religionists do not understand what it really means. The Ascension is nearly a non-event, tacked onto the end of the Gospels of Mark and Luke. Matthew and John do not even mention the Ascension.

“So then after the Lord had spoken unto them, he was received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God.” – Mark 16:19. “And he led them out as far as to Bethany, and he lifted up his hands, and blessed them. And it came to pass, while he blessed them, he was parted from them, and carried up into heaven.” – Luke 24:50-51. What does all this mean to us today? We may best understand the Crucifixion, Resurrection and Ascension in metaphorical terms. We have all experienced crucifying events, whether they are physical, emotional, mental or perhaps spiritual. Illness, divorce, death of a loved one — we may view all these as crucifixions. A humiliating experience may crucify you as well.

The world only poorly understands that each such experience is a death of our former being, a complete transformation of our identity, whether we wish it or not. Your task, on waking up the day after some tremendous crucifixion, is to allow your soul to resurrect the working part of your former identity. Then you must keep what still has value, and go on with the journey of living. If you refuse to do so, you simply prolong the crucifixion and pain. Most of us know how difficult this is. The only way you may succeed is by ascending your consciousness to dwell in the kingdom of heaven right now. The Ascension is not yet a matter of visibly being raised out of sight.

You must do all the hard work of ascending your consciousness internally. None of this work is really visible to the world. Others see only the effects of your ascension of consciousness, and only if they are looking for it. So, if you are in it for the admiration and the praise of others, it will be a thin gruel. Yet if you work in silence for the exaltation of your soul above the self of the world, you shall know the true feast, the glory of the Ascension to be with the Father of all Lights, in whom is no variableness neither shadow of turning. This is the true meaning of the Resurrection, to redeem and reclaim all the glorious bits of soul that you may have mistakenly invested in believing that the world can grant you heavenly joy.

Jesus the Christ has told us that we will do the works he did and greater works also. Ascension of consciousness is the greatest of the greater works and is essential if you are to do any of the others. The world now stands on a point of choice, between belief and unbelief, obedience and disobedience to divine law. As believers, we are perhaps better equipped to understand the full significance of these truths than are others. To act on the truth, however, is the greatest challenge you will ever face.

Your struggle is invisible, mostly internal. You must ascend your consciousness above the world of appearances and fix your gaze on the beauties of eternity, the eternal reality created for you by God the Father. Let us all follow the magnificent pattern placed before us in the life, the choices and personality of His Ssn, Jesus the Christ.

Endued With Power From on High

Linda Mihalic Pentecost Sunday transcript, June 12, 2011, Cleveland, Ohio. Scriptures: Luke 24:49-53, Acts 1:4-9, Acts 2:1-8, 10-21.

“And, behold, I send the promise of my Father upon you: but tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem, until ye be endued with power from on high. And he led them out as far as to Bethany, and he lifted up his hands, and blessed them. And it came to pass, while he blessed them, he was parted from them, and carried up into heaven. And they worshiped him, and returned to Jerusalem with great joy: And were continually in the temple, praising and blessing God. Amen.” – Luke 24:49-53. “And, being assembled together with them, commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father, which, saith he, ye have heard of me. For John truly baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence. When they therefore were come together, they asked of him, saying, Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel? And he said unto them, It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in his own power. But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth. And when he had spoken these things, while they beheld, he was taken up; and a cloud received him out of their sight.” – Acts 1:4-9.

“And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.And there were dwelling at Jerusalem Jews, devout men, out of every nation under heaven. Now when this was noised abroad, the multitude came together, and were confounded, because that every man heard them speak in his own language. And they were all amazed and marvelled, saying one to another, Behold, are not all these which speak Galilaeans? And how hear we every man in our own tongue, wherein we were born? … we do hear them speak in our tongues the wonderful works of God. And they were all amazed, and were in doubt, saying one to another, What meaneth this? Others mocking said, These men are full of new wine. But Peter, standing up with the eleven, lifted up his voice, and said unto them, Ye men of Judaea, and all ye that dwell at Jerusalem, be this known unto you, and hearken to my words: For these are not drunken, as ye suppose, seeing it is but the third hour of the day. But this is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel; And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh: and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams: And on my servants and on my handmaidens I will pour out in those days of my Spirit; and they shall prophesy: And I will shew wonders in heaven above, and signs in the earth beneath; blood, and fire, and vapour of smoke: The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and notable day of the Lord come: And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved.” – Acts 2:1-8, 10-21.

The Milky Way, our home, is a spiral galaxy, containing perhaps 400 billion stars. It is one of around 200 billion galaxies in the observable universe. Our solar system is halfway out from the center of the Milky Way, on the inner edge of the Orion-Cygnus Arm, moving toward the star Vega. Observers believe our galactic orbit is roughly elliptical, spanning about 225-250 million years. The galactic center holds an intense radio source named Sagittarius A, thought to be almost exactly at the galactic center. It coincides with a supermassive black hole also at the galactic center. Accretion of gas, flowing into the black hole, releases energy to power the radio source, itself much larger than the black hole, which is too small to see at present.

Dr. Paul A. LaViolette, a PhD in physics, authored the galactic superwave theory in 1983, proposing that supermassive waves of energy explode from the galactic center at regular intervals. He believes that we are overdue for one. Galactic core outbursts are the most energetic phenomena in the universe. For example, the quasar-like core of one spiral galaxy radiates seven times as much energy as from all of its stars. Most of this energy is in high energy cosmic ray electrons, accompanied by electromagnetic radiation ranging from radio waves to X-ray and gamma ray frequencies. The supermassive waves travel at the speed of light and their arrival time defies prediction.

Cosmic Power has everything to do with Pentecost because it describes how the Power waves of the Holy Spirit engulf our solar system and planet. Science believes in what it can measure with instruments that provide repeatable results. Science can measure manifestations of Power, acting as energy in radio waves, high energy cosmic rays, X-rays and gamma ray frequencies. Yet science cannot measure wisdom, love, joy, selflessness, or the Word of God. As an Emanation and a member of the Supreme Trinity, Power is everywhere, acting as the action behind and in each of Wisdom’s plans and the Father’s thoughts. Power carries the will of God to all reaches of the universe by traveling through the medium of the Mother’s Love as Substance. Power carries faith to fulfill the Mother’s desires, as well. Mind, Substance and Power act as one, always, although the Emanations of Wisdom, Love and the Word constantly alternate in ascendance. They really are the Three as One.

As we sail along in spaceship Earth, orbiting our Sun, which is orbiting the galactic core, we travel an ocean of energy of many kinds and wildly varying degrees. Science loves to claim authority in visible and measurable matters, just as religion and atheism proudly claim leadership in the invisible spiritual world. Yet, both science and religion remain largely unaware of the true nature of physical energies, and the mysterious aspects of spiritual energies. Both fields have pretended that their hypotheses are accurate for so long that they believe their beliefs are true, and have closed important questions. To study any subject thoroughly, we must examine it in light of five different categories of expression. If we do not study Power, for instance, in the contexts of psychology, metaphysics, science, philosophy and mysticism, we will never grasp the many facets of universal Power’s true nature.

The Pentecost story is all about the arrival of raw Power, direct from the Source of All Life, manifesting as the Holy Spirit. Jesus knew it was coming and told them to return to Jerusalem and to wait for it there. Jerusalem is the City of Peace. He did not tell them to go into Galilee or to Capernaum, Bethany or any of the other towns where they had friends and supporters. The civil and religious authorities were strongest in the capital, and he instructed them to go there and wait in the presence of their enemies. Pentecost had another meaning for the Judean Jews. It coincided with Shavuot, the Feast of Firstfruits, which falls fifty days after the Passover, and commemorates the giving of the Law at Mount Sinai.

Moses received and gave the Law to Israel, but Jesus embodied the Law in his life, body and affairs. As the template for living the Law, he showed us how to do as the Christ would do. He sent his disciples and followers to Jerusalem, knowing that their actions would become the first fruits of his three-year ministry. He sent them not to an easy place, but one filled with enemies and tension. They went in joy and worshiped in the temple continually, right under the noses of the Sanhedrin, the Temple Supreme Court of Israel, which had tried and condemned Jesus to death by crucifixion. They were obedient and cheerful, two soul virtues we polish as Christos candidates.

When the Day of Pentecost had fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. – Acts 2:1 The moment had arrived, but they did not know that in advance. Jesus had simply told them to go there and wait. Waiting is hard to do. People become bored, tense, and doubtful and full of complaints when they must wait indefinitely. They were in a city bustling with noisy pilgrims converging to make their offerings at the great Temple. The crowds everywhere would have been irritating. Jesus’ followers persevered because he had told them it would not be too long, and they trusted in his word. One hundred and twenty of them had gathered in the upper room where Jesus and the twelve had celebrated the Passover supper. The location was symbolic and comforting.

Judas had killed himself after the Crucifixion, so the disciples elected Matthias to take his place. He had witnessed the Crucifixion, the Resurrection and the Ascension, and could testify about what he had seen with his own eyes. Peter was acting as their leader, and they were returning to normal after the shocking events of previous days. By filling their ranks to number twelve again, they could stabilize themselves in prayer together. They brought their group dynamics into a much higher common degree of receptivity and joy. This could not have been easy. Yet Jesus had named Peter the Rock upon which he would build his legacy of surrender and sacrifice.

This was a very different power structure than men had ever devised. Instead of one or a few having power over others, they were all to be power-full, filled with Power and used by Power together. It took all Peter’s strength, which is the soul virtue he represents, to hold to the goal Jesus had outlined in his orders to them, go to Jerusalem and wait. No one knew exactly what it meant to be “endued with power from on high.”

Like them, we hear the promise, “You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you.” Yet, how can we know what that will be like until we experience it, as they did? Several other factors become obvious through the Pentecost story, when we pause, step back to regain perspective, and examine it. They were all of “one accord.” That means no one had an agenda separate from the one Peter presented as their leader, prayer and rejoicing.

Ten solid day and nights filled with prayer and rejoicing would have raised the common rate of vibration of that group to a nearly unbearable pitch. This is how they brought their desires and will into one accord. Thus, they became receptive enough to surrender the self and ascend in consciousness. They had accepted one leader, one agenda, had sacrificed personal and selfish desires for the one goal, and surrendered their will to God in determination to fulfill the Father’s promise. Determination, said Edna Lister, builds the pipeline that allows God’s Power to flow through you freely. Then, at the pinnacle of a group marriage of the Lamb, a wedding of desire and will, it happened. The Power descended with the sound of a mighty rushing wind to possess them. Some of us once witnessed such a descent of Power in the Idaho Rockies. We heard the wind sweep into a valley on a perfectly calm, still day. The sky was clear, and not a breath of breeze stirred. We all heard the wind roaring before it arrived, as loud as a freight train passing 10 feet away.

Jesus had said that Power would come upon them through the Holy Spirit. Through the ages, Bible translators have rendered the meaning of Holy Spirit in several ways. Holy Spirit is the overall divine animating principle. The Father and Mother act as one through the Holy Ghost, which is the essence of their supernatural being. The Christ principle acts in us as the universal Christ consciousness, as the Holy Spirit. This is the presence of the Son. God breathed the Holy Breath into our nostrils when we became living souls, and this Holy Breath is the Christ Life within us.

David, the Psalmist described it this way: “Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from Thy presence; and take not Thy Holy Spirit from me. Restore unto me the joy of Thy salvation; and uphold me with Thy free spirit.” – Psalm 51:10-12. The Pentecost Power appeared as tongues of flame, pure energy to burn up the dross in each person’s aura. With the dross gone, we are usable. Yet we must be prepared for this with perfect discipline. The Power manifested through the faithful as speaking in tongues, which means more to the person hearing his own language spoken than it does to the ecstatic speaker. In another place, Paul rightly points out that interpretation that edifies is more valuable than the gift of tongues itself. Speaking in tongues is a sign of Power being present, but other gifts, such as to prophesy and healing, are even more desirable.

Science can measure certain degrees of Power as it manifests in the electromagnetic spectrum. Yet science largely scoffs at the idea of spiritual Power. Yet only one Power exists in many different degrees of manifestation. People believe in the power of a lightning bolt and fear it, but question the truth of the Pentecost flames. A person can hold a fluorescent light, and serve as the conducting agent of power through the electromagnetic field generated near a high tension power line. The fluorescent tube glows without being plugged into a power source. It is all a matter of degree and kind. Power is real. It is everywhere present and available. The Pentecost story is true.

Christ is our leader. He showed us how to do what he did. We can do everything that he did. We know this because he told us so, and he is the infallible Word made flesh. Power is arriving on Terra in unimaginable degrees and kinds 24/7. We are breathing it, eating it, moving though it as it moves through us. We are the step-down transformers of Power, its transducers. Believing only in the degrees and kinds of Power that science can measure is foolish. We are approaching the next “end of the world” date in December 2012. The date in May 2011 failed, and has been “recalculated” to fall in October 2011. It will not happen then either. Only God knows the time and the season for such an event, and He is not telling us.

All sorts of teachers and writers have quoted self-proclaimed enlightened beings, and Dr. LaViolette’s superwave theory. They use the scariest parts to impress their audiences and readership. Yet he has written that earth’s atmosphere will most likely block most of the supermassive wave radiation coming our way. We can avoid what does get through, he says, by staying indoors. We, as a culture, are addicted to fear and fantasy. Just this weekend, one channel ran at least two disaster movies, one dealing with reversal of earth’s magnetic poles, and the other with the effect of earth being grazed by a huge comet. The poles are shifting. We can see the effects of this in the increase of vulcanism and plate tectonic activity in the Ring of Fire and resulting earthquakes. All of this needs plenty of prayer, and we are uniquely well-equipped to speak the Word. By the Power of the Word, we can declare that God mitigates the effects of these manifestations of Power. We cannot stop this natural process, but we can declare and decree for as little loss of life and damage as possible.

According to Edna Lister, this polar shift process began in 1953. The only difference is that now science is beginning to measure it and make hypotheses and predictions about it. Storms on the sun, cosmic rays and polar shifts are not new, but are naturally-occurring events. Finally, prophecies have told us repeatedly to seek the Lord, and this “shall not come nigh thy dwellings.” God has equipped the Elect to deal with this, better than any other group on earth. “And it shall come to pass that whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.” – Acts 2:21.

Here is what we can do: Put on the whole armor of God, daily, and keep it on. Do not poke holes in your armor from the inside. Pray without ceasing. Praise God without failing. Sing to increase your joy and the Power moving through your praise. When you doubt or fear, say, “Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from Thy presence; and take not Thy Holy Spirit from me. Restore unto me the joy of Thy salvation; and uphold me with Thy free spirit.” – Psalm 51:10-12.

You have the power of speech and access to divine Mind to form the right words into the right declarations and decrees of “This is good. Let there be Light.” Our Master left us his joy that our joy might be full. We need only accept all this with perfect faith, and truly, only good and Light can come. Let there be Light.

On the Tablet of Your Heart

Linda Mihalic sermon transcript; August 7, 2011, Cleveland, Ohio. Scripture: Jeremiah 17:1, Mark 7:20-23, Jeremiah 31:33, Matthew 6:19-21, Jeremiah 24:7, Jeremiah 32:39-41

"The sin of Judah is written with a pen of iron; with the point of a diamond it is engraved on the tablet of their heart." – Jeremiah 17:1.

"The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; who can know it? I, the Lord, search the heart, I test the mind, even to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his doings." – Jeremiah 17:9-10.

"And [Jesus] said, "What comes out of a man, that defiles a man. For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications; murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lewdness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within and defile a man." – Mark 7:20-23.

"I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts." – Jeremiah 31:33.

"Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal; but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." – Matthew 6:19-21.

"I will give them a heart to know Me, that I am the Lord; and they shall be My people, and I will be their God, for they shall return to Me with their whole heart." – Jeremiah 24:7.

"They shall be My people, and I will be their God; then I will give them one heart and one way, that they may fear Me forever, for the good of them and their children after them. And I will make an everlasting covenant with them, that I will not turn away from doing them good; but I will put My fear in their hearts so that they will not depart from Me. Yes, I will rejoice over them to do them good, and I will assuredly plant them in this land, with all My heart and with all My soul." – Jeremiah 32:39-41.

The human heart is an excellent example of God's creative perfection. As a double pump design, the heart has four chambers, the lower left and right ventricles, and the upper left and right atria. Your heart is a powerful muscle that beats nonstop throughout your life. It pumps more than 1,500 gallons of blood daily, about one-third cup of blood with each beat in adults. On average, the body contains about five quarts of blood, which circulates continually. When your heart stops, the blood supply to your brain fails, and you die.

The heart functions under the autonomic nervous system, which is involuntary, meaning that its actions are not under conscious control of the central nervous system. However, we've proven that by breathing slowly, deeply and rhythmically, you can slow the heart beat. The autonomic nervous system powers the smooth muscle of the inner organs, such as the heart's cardiac muscle, the digestive tract, the bladder, blood vessels, glands, and ciliary muscle of the eyes. The autonomic system maintains homeostasis, a state of dynamic equilibrium. The autonomic system uses the "fight or flight response" to prepare the body for dealing with threatening situations. It is the only part of the nervous system in which synapses occur outside the protection of the skull or the vertebrae. Synaptic responses occur primarily between the neurons of the brain, within the golden bowl, Thus, the ancients accurately referred to the "wisdom of the heart."

The heart is your organ of mediation between earth and heaven-consciousness. Its pumping action exactly patterns after the expansion and contraction of the Creative Impulse, like a fist opening and closing. The heart is electromagnetic in operation. When you, as a soul, are ready to incarnate in a body, your great guardian angels assist you in plugging the forked end of your silver cord into the parent cells provided by your mother and father, the ovum and sperm. In later development, these cells become the site of the heart's sinoatrial node and the atrioventricular bundle. The node and bundle use Purkinje fibers to maintain the heartbeat.

Everything in the universe operates under the laws of number and name, which dictate the rate of vibration in the varying manifestations of Mind, Substance, and Power. The electromagnetic spectrum perfectly illustratess this. Each soul has its own particular name and number, different from everyone else. From the moment you plug in the silver cord at birth here, God writes upon your heart all the laws you have ever been exposed to, learned and which you are responsible for obeying. Along with these laws, He writes your remaining sins, which are all the choices you have made against God's Light and not paid.

As Jeremiah said, "The sin of Judah is written with a pen of iron; with the point of a diamond it is engraved on the tablet of their heart." – Jeremiah 17:1. Jeremiah had much to say about the heart, truths given him by the Lord. "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; who can know it? I, the Lord, search the heart, I test the mind, even to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his doings." – Jeremiah 17:9-10.

This passage startlingly foreshadows Jesus' speech in Mark: [Jesus] said, "What comes out of a man, that defiles a man. For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications; murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lewdness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within and defile a man." – Mark 7:20-23.

Mind is a primary principle. We are constantly bathing in the River of Life, which is a stream of principles, such as Mind, Substance and Power. The primary patterns for all objective thoughts exist within the River of Life. Plato called these patterns Forms or Ideas. Your individual mind, being bathed in this river filled with ideas, fishes in the stream and catches thoughts. Thoughts, in turn, can cause your brain to release or suppress neurotransmitters. These are the brain's chemicals, and they affect the endocrine system through the hypothalamus and the pituitary gland.

Emotions are body-based, arising from the chemical intersection of the primitive drivers in the brain's limbic system and the endocrine gland hormone secretions. The limbic system regulates stress, the emotions and sexual and physical drives.

Objective thoughts may produce feelings of joy, excitement or sharpened curiosity, but this is a sticky issue. Before you say that thoughts produce emotions, you must determine whether limbic system's primitive drives are the culprits.

The body-based emotions all too easily influence your thoughts, usually creating subjective negativity. The extremes of this are depression and compulsive negative thinking.

Stress, fueled by negative emotions and thinking, can wear the heart out. Humans are subject to 70 or more heart problems, syndromes and diseases, medically. The leading cause of death worldwide is coronary artery disease, basically a hardened heart, one filled with plaque. People say, "I'm broken-hearted, just heart-sick" and they are. They speak the Word and their declaration comes to pass. Every day is a new beginning. You awaken in the morning and God grants you the glorious opportunity of changing your mind and heart to be more like Him.

God has warned us that the heart is "deceitful" and "desperately wicked." How does this wickedness come to fill the heart? Is a newborn wicked? Not intrinsically, yet your sins are written on your heart from birth, so the potential for choosing wickedness exists, right from the start. "Desperately wicked" sounds like that devil, the self. The frontal lobes of the brain are the seats of higher cognition and creativity, of objective thinking. The self cannot use the frontal lobes directly, but can clamor so loudly that the conscious mind, the soul, can hardly hear itself think. Self usurps the thought processes – it hijacks the conscious function and enslaves the soul with its jabber.

The Father searches your heart and He tests your mind. You receive exactly what you have created, earned and deserve, based on your thoughts and emotions.

Jesus so emphasized the importance of this that Mark and Matthew recorded it. The Gospel of Matthew lists seven soul taints: "evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, and blasphemies." Mark expands that list to thirteen, adding "covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lewdness, an evil eye, pride, and foolishness." If you indulged any of these sins in your past, this life or previously, these sins are written on the tablet of your heart with a diamond-pointed pen of iron. The law is exact. As Jeremiah said, "I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts." – Jeremiah 31:33.

So, God also writes the laws upon the tablet of your heart. If the sins are too many, they leave little room for law, and the soul is in danger of becoming a "lawless one." If the soul persists in sinning in this life, the sins can overflow to blot out the knowledge of law. Again, the soul is in danger of becoming lawless. A fully lawless soul can no longer discern the difference between right and wrong, between good and evil. This describes a sociopath or psychopath. This is how people damage or destroy their moral compass. When that happens, they can no longer find their soul's home in the courts of heaven.

Your soul knows the truth. You are the children of God, sons and daughters of the greatest Father and Mother. You are destined to become a creatorslike your heavenly parents, and this is your soul's treasure. Knowing the truth of this mystery, we can now easily understand what Jesus meant in the Sermon on the Mount: "Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal; but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." – Matthew 6:19-21.

Our heavenly Father assures us that this is true. He says, "I will give them a heart to know Me, that I am the Lord; and they shall be My people, and I will be their God, for they shall return to Me with their whole heart." – Jeremiah 24:7. When you repent of earth's bondage, you remember your Source and your divine heritage. Our Father gives you a new heart, by cleansing the record of your sin from your heart. You are no longer a slave to your past sins, but you must still pay the debts associated with it. God gives you a whole heart with which you may love Him more and whole-heartedly. This is the perfection of spiritual healing through the Holy Spirit.

This is an astonishing promise, yet you may trust in its truth, for as Jeremiah also prophesied, "They shall be My people, and I will be their God; then I will give them one heart and one way, that they may fear Me forever, for the good of them and their children after them. And I will make an everlasting covenant with them, that I will not turn away from doing them good; but I will put My fear in their hearts so that they will not depart from Me. Yes, I will rejoice over them to do them good, and I will assuredly plant them in this land, with all My heart and with all My soul." – Jeremiah 32:39-41.

The human heart, in Hebrew, is spelled lamed-vav-vav, and the word has a numerical value of thirty-four. The root of the word means "joined." In contrast, the heart of an angel is spelled lamed-vav, with a numerical value of thirty-two.

The human heart is double, while the angel's heart is single. The human heart is attracted by heaven while remaining bound to earth. In this text, God is saying that He will give man a single heart like the heart of an angel, bound only to heaven.

God is also promising to give you "one way," the way of the Christ. The fear of the Lord is respectful obedience to His law. This is the Christed covenant of surrendered devotion and sacrifice of the self in ascension.

Finally, the Lord is promising to plant you in the land with all His heart and all His soul. This describes the endowment of your complete Supreme Oversoul.

This is no far-off event, distant in time and space. Our Father is ready to give you this soul endowment right now. This gift of a new whole heart is yours for the giving up of the selfishness that leads you into the paths of desperate wickedness.

Self: All you need to do is to give it up to God in exchange for your record of sin. When the record is erased from your heart, all the laws you have known and learned emerge for your devoted obedience.

This becomes easier as you choose to cling to God and His Christ rather than the world and its cheap imitations of glory, its illusions of happiness. The world can give you nothing of value except the experience of lessons well-learned.

How often you must take the same tests because you failed is strictly up to you. God cannot break His own laws to force you. You operate strictly according to will, choosing whether it will be God's will or your own self-will.

Discerning the difference between God's will for you and your selfish will to do as you please is the work of your lifetime. The worst thing you can do is to project your will onto God, saying that what you want must be what He wants for you. This only delays the day of your soul's freedom and lengthens your bondage to earth.

August 10 is all about freedom, the period set aside for lifting darkness and evil form earth and from individual souls. This August 10, God is giving us the matchless gift of soul freedom from sin.

All you need to do is to boldly approach the throne of grace and ask. Your wishes shall be granted, and for your loved ones, too. Ask for forgiveness and know that God erases the record of sin as you pay your debts.

From August 10 to September 19, special Lights are upon you to highlight and reveal your every need in lifting and obedience. The results will set the rate of vibration for your conquering and ascension until October 20, the beginning of the next initiatory year.

Imagine for a moment what this may mean. God is interceding on your behalf with the greatest outpouring of mercy in all history. He is doing so because our Lord Christ has petitioned on your behalf, on behalf of the Elect everywhere. We have merited this extension of mercy and grace.

With freedom from the weight of sin, you symbolically open the Gates of Light to freedom for every God-centered soul on the planet. What could be greater?

This is our service. This is our destiny. This is God's will for us, to shine as His brightest Lights in the face of a rising tide of darkness. When the Elect of Christ choose to shine forth, no darkness can remain in the world, for our Light shall be too bright.

Let there be Light!

Perfect Love

Linda Mihalic sermon transcript, October 16, 2011, Cleveland, Ohio. Scriptures: 1 John 4:7-21, Song of Solomon 8:6-7, 2 Timothy 1:7.

“Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. He who does not love does not know God, for God is love. In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has seen God at anytime. If we love one another, God abides in us, and His love has been perfected in us. By this we know that we abide in Him, and He in us, because He has given us of His Spirit. And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent the Son as Savior of the world. Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God. And we have known and believed the love that God has for us. God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him. Love has been perfected among us in this: that we may have boldness in the day of judgment; because as He is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves torment. But he who fears has not been made perfect in love. We love Him because He first loved us. If someone says, I love God, and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen? And this commandment we have from Him: that he who loves God must love his brother also.” – 1 John 4:7-21.

“Set me as a seal upon thine heart, as a seal upon thine arm: for love is strong as death; jealousy is cruel as the grave: the flames thereof are flames of fire, which hath a most vehement flame. Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it: if a man would give all the substance of his house for love, it would utterly be contemned.” – Song of Solomon 8:6-7.

“God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.” – 2 Timothy 1:7.

The dictionary definition of perfect is “whole, complete, sound, flawless, exact, precise, pure, utter.” To perfect a thing means to make it complete. Edna Lister often exhorted us to love God enough. Given these definitions, she was obviously showing us the way to perfect love. Further, much of what she taught instructs us in how to perfect our love.

The Scripture from 1 John is all about love, which is the second of the three Emanations, together with Wisdom and the Word. To say, “Love is of God” is saying that love originates with and comes from God. John says, “Everyone who loves is born of God” and “Everyone who loves knows God.” Love is how we fulfill the initiation of Rebirth, being born again in God. Love is the action by which we open our hidden knowledge of God, as we knew Him in the beginning. We have this knowledge of God, but we have hidden it from ourselves. Christ, by being born in the flesh and living among us, points the way to God. His life is the template for the mysteries we have forgotten.

Jesus mentioned love thirty-five times during that last supper before his crucifixion. These were his final hours with his disciples. It was his farewell message, and he spoke to them at length of love. John’s first letter proves that he had been listening to everything that Jesus taught. He soaked it in and recounted it faithfully in his Gospel and Letters. Bible historians tell us that John lived to a “great old age,” many years longer than the other disciples, all of whom were martyred. He lived and taught in Ephesus, which was then an important Mediterranean merchant port and cultural hub. The Temple of Artemis in Epheus was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. Undoubtedly, John had to deal with pagan and Gnostic teachings and it shows in his Gospel and Letters.

John’s Gospel was the most mystical of the four, and its opening is a perfect reconciliation of Jesus’ identity as the Logos, the Word, with the Gnostic thinking of the time. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life; and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.” – John 1:1-5. John consistently and systematically presents Jesus as the embodiment of Light, life and love. The stories he chose to tell all reveal Jesus the man as possessed of and by the Divine. He viewed Jesus through the lens of love.

Peter portrays Jesus through his lens of steadfast faith. Matthew took the legalistic view, interpreting everything through the lens of the law. Mark, whose Gospel probably came first, is almost a Cliff Notes version, terse and brief. Paul, the intellectual Pharisee, was the most verbose, often waxing long-winded and didactic. James was a master of logic and reason, who never bored his audience or put them to sleep. To John, “God is love,” which he states twice, in 1 John 4:8 and 16. Eight is the power number that ties our earth to our heaven, and love is the power that ties us to our Source. God manifested His love, John says, by sending His Son as the atonement for our sins, so that we might live through Him. This teaching is a tenet of Hebrew mysticism, Kabbalah. Without the atonement for sins, we cannot maintain our vital circuit of life in God.

Yom Kippur is the Day of Atonement, the most solemn and sacred day of the Jewish religious year. Without rigorous soul searching, repentance and seeking and granting forgiveness, we gradually disintegrate the link between body and soul. The result is illness, aging and death of the body. “For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled.” – Matthew 5:18. A jot is the size of an apostrophe, while a tittle is the size of a period. The phrase “jot and tittle” emphasizes that the slightest detail has been noted.

Jesus taught that we should go to our Father daily, not waiting for that once-a-year Day of Atonement. He did not dilute the law, but made it more rigorous while tempering it with love that fulfills the law. “Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law. For this, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not kill, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness, Thou shalt not covet; and if there be any other commandment, it is briefly comprehended in this saying, namely, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. Love worketh no ill to his neighbor: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.” – Romans 13:8-10.

John goes on to describe the two-way reciprocal acting of loving: Because God loves us, we must love Him in return to maintain the circuit. He goes on to say that no one has seen God at any time. We must love God although we cannot see Him. This is the SuperGlue that unites our faith with our love, a purely Christed teaching. God lives in us and His love is perfected in us when we love one another, John says. To perfect a thing is to make it complete. When our love is complete, we are loving enough. As we love, we reach every higher degree of integration of all our scattered parts into the whole that is God.

God has given us of His Spirit. As Job said, “There is a spirit in man: and the inspiration of the Almighty gives him understanding.” – Job 32:8. This endowment of Spirit is how we may know that we live in God and He lives in us. When we confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in us, and we live in God. Paul said it this way: “The Spirit itself bears witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: And if children, then heirs — heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ.” – Romans 8:16-17. “God is love.” John deliberately repeats this pronouncement in verse 16, and immediately repeats his previous premises to complete his perfectly logical syllogism, his argument: When we live in love, we live in God. When we live in love, God lives in us.

Step by step, John continues building his argument: Because we live in love and in God, and God’s love lives in us, we may say that love is perfected in us. Because love is perfected in us, we may have boldness in the day of judgment. Because God has given us of His Spirit, we are as He is and we are in this world. His conclusions are masterpieces of deductive reasoning and logic. Aristotle would have approved. Yet John has not finished with the lesson. Next, he explains why the sublime power of love can work its omnipotent wonders: There is no fear in love. Love admits no adulteration, thus, perfect love casts out fear.

Fear involves torment. Love is joy and creates peace of mind. As Paul wrote to Timothy, “God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.” – 2 Timothy 1:7. If you fear, you have not been perfected in love. You fall into and out of perfection as often as you fall into and out of love with God and His law, dozens of times daily. If you are not perfected in love, you are choosing to not live in God, or permitting God to live in you. This is why you wear your body to the nubbins and begin to age.

When fear encroaches, boldly use this declaration: “The Lord is my helper, and I will not fear what man shall do unto me.” – Hebrews 13:6. Love is reciprocal: You must love God because He loves you. He has given you part of His Spirit, which is the potential wisdom, love and joy within you. Your capacity for these principles is unlimited. If you say that you love God, but hate your brother, you are not perfect in love. God has commanded that we must love our brother. Jesus explained this explicitly when he said that our brother, and our family in God included everyone who does the will of the Father (Matthew 12:50). If you do not love your brother, whom you can see, how then can you love God, whom you have not seen? We, the Elect who love God, are commanded to love our fellow man. “This is my commandment,” Jesus said, “that ye love one another, as I have loved you.” (John 15:12). If we love one another, others will know we are his disciples. Love is our password, our insignia, our code of honor, the very life sparks of our soul substance.

The Kabbalists teach that the Song of Songs is not about the carnal love of man and woman, but describes the love of the Breath of Life, the Holy Spirit that animates us, soul and body. It is a love song that describes the paradise gravity that attracts and draws us home to God, our Source. The Holy Breath of Love sings: “Set me as a seal upon thine heart, as a seal upon thine arm: for love is strong as death … the flames thereof are flames of fire, which hath a most vehement flame. Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it: if a man would give all the substance of his house for love, it would utterly be scorned.” – Song of Solomon 8:6-7. The anonymous author of the Epistle to the Hebrews proclaimed, “Our God is a consuming fire.” – Hebrews 12:29. This unquenchable fire of love engulfs us each time we pray with fervor. Love’s unquenchable fire bathes the whole earth in the flames of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, and whenever and wherever the faithful Elect gather.

We live in a challenging time. Wars and rumors of war fill the air waves. Many have loved ones in the armed forces, in harm’s way. The economic news is a roller coaster, and shows few signs of real recovery. We all know someone who is unemployed or underemployed. Our parents are aging or have passed away. The care for a patient with senile dementia averages nearly $100,000 annually. Almost daily we hear of someone who has been diagnosed with some illness, or is being treated with devastating chemotherapy or other drug regimens. When you must deal with such issues, you find that fear tries to move in to consume your peace of mind constantly. Yet God has not given you a spirit of fear, but of power, of love and of a sound mind. Declare this is so, and speak the Word to uplift yourself and others as often as you must, dozens of times a day as needed.

John was also the writer of the Book of the Revelation of Jesus Christ. In it, he records the Christ’s messages to the churches. Among them is this: “Fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer: behold, the devil shall cast some of you into prison, that ye may be tried; and ye shall have tribulation ten days: be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life.” – Revelation 2:10. No devil of self or otherwise can get a grip on you if you are always loving God, which perfects your love. When your perfect love casts out all fear, you are being faithful unto the death of fear. When fear creeps in, go to God. Tell Him you love Him a thousand times an hour. Love fulfills the law, pays your debts heal all wounds and illnesses, and commutes your prison sentences.

When a crucifixion comes, or a time of tribulation opens, you just have to love God more today than you did yesterday. You must love God enough to get the job done. It’s time you made an appointment to be fitted for your crown of life. It is yours for the earning, and it consists of the perfect love you are learning how to give. A crown is a circle. It protects the thousand-petaled crown lotus center and is the living symbol of your two-way circuit of Love with God. Perfect love is what you are and what you must do. Let us all learn how to love one another as our Lord and Master loves us.

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