What Is Love?

From Rev. David McArthur (edited by Mike McGuire, not reviewed by the speaker)

What is love, really?  Charles Fillmore, that great American mystic, said that the faculty of love is the greatest power of man, the greatest of all our capacities. “The pure essence of Being that binds together the whole human family... that joins and binds in divine harmony the universe and everything in it; the great harmonizing principle known to man. Divine love is impersonal; it loves for the sake of loving. … Like the sun, its joy is in the shining forth of its nature. … Love is the great harmonizer and healer.”

Compassion.  A woman, Nettie, remembered that when she was 12 she joined other kids in meanly ridiculing her twin sister, who was severely disabled and seen as a freak in their small town. So her mother put her alone in a room with only a photo album. It was filled with pictures of the twins since they were small. Nettie saw the pain that her sister had endured over the years. One picture was inscribed, “The doctors give me pain. Nettie makes me laugh.”  She realized what she had been doing and the hurt she had caused her sister. At that moment she changed.

Flow.  Love is always there. It flows like a spigot that's always dripping. We can choose how much to turn it on. That flow takes you to intelligence. It is intelligence, a capacity to understand that helps us resolve the differences, that illuminates and harmonizes. What unifies us rather than separates us is love. You don't have to know how.

You know what to do.  A four year old liked to go to the house next door. One day his mother watched as he crawled up beside the neighbor on the front porch swing. The man had recently lost his wife of many years. As she watched her son coming back home, she asked what he did there. He answered, “I helped him cry.” If a four year old knows what to do, so do you. Remove that which separates us. You are love. It takes us from that place of separation to that place of wholeness and harmony. It goes far beyond the walls and heals and harmonizes. Feel the spigot open as you say, “I am a radiating center of divine love.” YES YOU ARE!

Love In Action: Commitment to Love

From Rev. David McArthur (edited by Mike McGuire, not reviewed by the speaker)

The divine presence within.  In a monastery in a beautiful valley, the monks were growing older. The abbot was concerned about the monastery surviving. His friend the rabbi couldn't think of any way to help, but told the abbot, “I dreamt one of your monks was the messiah.” The abbot shared this with the monks. Silently, each wondered which brother it might be, or even if it might not be himself. So each one resolved to do better. As if a special wind had blown through the monastery, activity increased. The monks' efforts to serve others and the surrounding community increased. Once again men from the community became interested in joining the order.

What a difference it makes when we see the beautiful divine presence in each other and within ourselves!

The real source of abundance.  Another community saw how their old buildings no longer served them. After seeking guidance they decided to renew their place. There had just been enough money to meet existing needs, but different members pledged to do more. Then in their country a great recession hit, and fear gripped everyone. Some in the community lost their jobs, some lost their houses. They again prayed. “Should we go forward?” A curious answer came back that yes, they should go forward. They knew the real source of their abundance. In the face of the fear, they each committed to give from their resources. They built a beautiful center for themselves and all who hear of it. And the times got better for all. It had to start somewhere.

The change came from how they began to see each other—how they saw the divine in each other—and, what's even harder, seeing the divine within themselves. It is easy to see who that was, as today we are celebrating our second year in our new buildings. The commitment we made was to honor the divine love that we are. Say to each other, “I commit to honor the love you are.” “I commit to being Divine Love in action.”

Power. Wholeness. Wisdom. Abundance.  You cannot choose to be divine love—it is what you are! You cannot get away from it. But you can commit to putting divine love into action. That is what is the power! The wholeness! The wisdom! The abundance! You are!

Open other possibility- a whole other level of power

From Rev. David McArthur (edited by Mike McGuire, not reviewed by the speaker)

Whatever is within our awareness is part of our consciousness. This is not always comfortable now that we know we are one with the power that makes us. Remember the good old days when we could blame our problems on someone else? Now it's, “What is this that shows up in my world?”

Healing power.  Byron and Marsha Smith were shocked when Byron's MRI came back showing inoperable cancer. He was given a month or two to live. The following day was spent sharing their special memories of their love together. Then friends and relatives remembered them in prayer, including Marsha's father who told them when he prayed he clearly got the feeling everything would be all right. By going from fear to love Byron and Marsha opened another possibility, a whole other level of power and energy which healed Byron—he was subsequently found to be cancer-free! With darkness gone, full potential was embraced.

Eastern philosophy says this world is transient illusion. The Bhagavad Gita says that for those who love Krishna, he will dwell in their hearts and destroy darkness born of ignorance with the shining lamp of knowledge. But isn't there something missing, something more?

The ultimate experience of understanding and love.  Jesus went further, saying, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind... And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself.” He also said "...as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me." When you see someone else with a problem, it is part of your consciousness. So ask, “What is mine to do?” If Krishna is in the heart, who have you loved when you love your neighbor? 

Whatever is going on now in your world where there is a limit—physical pain, poor relationships, financial difficulty—if you choose to love, the barriers will be removed. No matter who or what it is, just send your love. That is the greatest teaching. Then what is there is filled with light. You are divine light. That's what you are. Call it Krishna, Jesus, or God, it is love. Affirm, “I am divine love. I am transforming my world.” We have work ahead, and it's going to be fun!

O Holy Night

The birth of the Christ child was the beginning of a spiritual awakening continuing to this day. The love and care of Jesus’ birth inspires a rebirth of our own spiritual connection.

As we express our love for family and friends, as we select gifts for loved ones, we are each affirming the value of love in our lives. God is love. The more we allow ourselves to feel and express our love, the deeper our spiritual rebirth becomes.

The Christmas carols, the manger scene and our beautiful Christmas services each call us to remember what is really important. They call us to recommit to living the love we really are. Let your heart enjoy the birth of your love into a whole new level of living this Christmas.

—Rev. David McArthur

Who is Santa

The commercialization of Christmas is one of the most sacred parts! Thank goodness Spirit doesn't confine itself to just the religious community. Perhaps you do not like God at all. Yet, Santa gets to you.
 
 Metaphysically, Santa shows up Christmas Eve when we celebrate the birth of a new baby, which represents the birth of a new consciousness. Santa comes from the sky-- from that greater consciousness. And it doesn't seem possible that Santa can come to every house in just one night, but, metaphysically, the higher consciousness is omnipresent, and Santa (the God figure) responds to every one of us. Within the house (your state of consciousness) Santa enters through the place of light and warmth. That is the greater consciousness coming through the heart-- that child place of fulfilling dreams and desires. And you don't get to see Santa, you just get to see the gifts he leaves.

How God – Santa – shows up in an even greater way is the experience of the amazing consciousness of Christmas. It is one of the deepest and most important parts of Christmas. It happens through us. We are the love that happens, that touches, uplifts, and blesses. We are Santa. We understand that Jesus came to give us the awareness of the love that flows through us. Now we get an opportunity to bless. You can be Santa.
  
 You are invited to give to a Santa fund in the sanctuary or in the book center. The second way you can experience the amazing consciousness of Christmas is to open and accept that which blesses you. Express your need or the need of someone you know. Make out your Christmas list. Email Unity Walnut Creek or call the office with you request.
 
Who has the greater joy-- the giver or the receiver? Give and receive. Allow the flow. Budgets are not as important. Let the love be your only guide. Because of you, “Santa Claus is coming to town!”

from Mike McGuire, Prayer Team
Summary of Rev. David's sermon

Love God in all things

Jesus taught that the greatest commandment is, You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind, and that the second is like it, Love your neighbor as yourself. The experience of love for self is experiencing God because God is love. Appreciating the frequencies, the energies, the textures of life is part of the experience of heaven. The sweetness of life is God; the wonderful flavor and richness of life is God. God's love is the only way that the richness of life is open to you. Your body is love with a physicality to it, so that you may play in the things you love. Every moment there is divine energy moving through you – you don't even have to be right! It's absolute love. God is everywhere and in everything. God is abundant. Let the love of God in.

The people in your life are God expressing, asking you to step up to be who you can really be. You are loved. There's not people and God, there is only God. The child falls, and gets up, it does something wonderful, it makes a mess. Regardless, the parent delights in the child. And God delights in us, messes and all. We are so blessed.

So let in that which fills your heart. You are loving yourself; you are feeling God. You don't have the power not to have it, only not to feel it. Let it in, fill you up, overflow in and through you, as you. You are the love.

from Mike McGuire, PrayerTeam
Summary of Rev. David's sermon

Experience the Now Moment

When we react to events, we project our past experience into the future. But there is a different potential that can be brought forth, another dimension in which we live, in which we access an amazing goodness and love. The doorway is through the heart. Go into the Silence. It is a place with the most amazing power to it, a place where we step through dimensions of consciousness.

Be present in the “now moment”, and add in appreciation. And for the power, add to the moment your awareness of the presence of God. Right now that amazing everywhere-present life force is flowing into you, filling you with life and illuminating your mind every single moment. It is there loving you. It has been in this eternal moment of now since you stepped forth into being. It folds you in infinite love. Even as you breathe, It breathes you. It is so unlimited that we literally cross dimensions of consciousness and activate higher levels of our soul purpose and bring forth higher creation. It is how we create with unlimited possibilities. In the now your higher purpose has nothing to stop its full expression as you bring it forth, and it has the power to transform whatever it is that's before you because it is not limited in the mind.  It is the unlimited presence of divine love moving in and through you. You are one with that. And when you open to that, when you say yes to this moment and this Presence in it, you are blessed ... There is no limit.

from Mike McGuire, Prayer Team
Summary of Rev. David's sermon

Care is applied Love

When we love, the One we are really loving is God. When love is present, the limits we normally see do not bind us. The state of love can change us from moment to moment. Commit to love and care.

Care is applied love. How powerfully we care expresses our love. Our first assignment is to be the love we are and care for ourselves and others.

The gift of love opens us to see others as they truly are. However, they do not need to choose to bring forth the truth we see. We often combine our vision with our expectations, but love need not return through the ones we love.

The gift of love frees us. Through the feeling and practice of care, we are being the instrument of love. The gift can come any way. Sometime it gives us time to be alone. The assignment is the same, to love and care for someone, even if it is yourself.

from Mike McGuire, Prayer Team
Summary of Rev. David's sermon

Transform barriers to your good

To prosper, we have to transform that which blocks out our good. We need to remove or transform the barriers of anger, resentment, hate, and fear we have built which block our propserity from flowing. We need to unburden ourselves, to free ourselves. Forgiveness is not about the other person, it is about letting go of our pain again and again until it is gone. To do this, we need to bring the awareness of the goodness of God into the feelings of hate, etc. You must really want to be free of the burden. Ask for the pain to be healed. Bring the love and compassion, that Divine Presence into the pain to be healed. Find it in that deep peace. That Divine Love has the power to free us, to lift us.

Affirm: “Divine Love lifts me, frees me, and prospers me.”

from Mike McGuire, Prayer Team
Summary of Rev. David's sermon

The Power of Thanksgiving

You know this amazing power because you have used it many times. You have felt the transforming experience of your deep gratitude for something in your life. It may have been your heart recognizing the beauty in a moment with a special friend, or receiving the blessing of a break-through that you had long desired. It may have been as simple as feeling the warm sun on a crisp fall morning, or the touch of a little one’s hand in yours.

When your heart opened to that very special feeling of thanksgiving, you felt uplifted, blessed, renewed and filled with hope. Even if it was a dark rainy day, you felt an inner glow.

The power that lifts us, opens us and blesses us is the presence of Divine Love. When we experience true thankfulness, the power of Spirit flows into our lives. In that sacred moment we have opened to consciously perceive God’s goodness. That goodness desires to pour itself through our lives in every moment. The feelings of thanksgiving have the power to open our lives to this unlimited goodness.

Rev. David McArthur

This Prayer's for You

Many people were moved by the video below that we played at the April 5th Sunday Service. So I am posting it here on my blog so that you may conveniently veiw it again whenever you need a moment of inspiration.
--Rev. David McArthur

Moving from Fear to Love

"There is no fear in love; but perfect love cast out fear..."
1John 4:18

The change in our world from a world of fear to a world of love doesn’t just happen. It is a change that I participate in creating by my choices.

When I hear of frightening events, do I blame or seek to understand?

When people at work are mean or unreasonable, do I justify myself or communicate with care for them?

When people are uncommunicative, do I reject them or communicate because I care?

When I disappoint myself, am I judgmental, or forgiving?

When I am criticized, do I attack or understand my attacker?

When I see a need, do I help or avoid?

In ordinary events, do I choose to feel true care for those I’m involved with? Will it work?

With love,
-- Rev. David McArthur

Greater Goodness is Calling

A greater goodness is calling all of us. The caterpillar that is in the transformation process does not know that it will emerge from the cocoon as the beautiful butterfly. Yet within it is the divine pattern that guides it through the process because the result, the greater expression of its true self, is calling it into the process of change. The divine pattern within each of us is calling us to a new state of consciousness. Change is happening in our personal lives and in the world. This change is not caused by the failure of old systems; rather it is because the greater expression of our true selves is being called into being.

How do we attune to that greater presence and wisdom that is calling us to our next level of living? We attune by turning to that indwelling light, love and goodness that is who we really are. Prayer and love are the timeless tools of transformation. Let them open each of us to the greater expression of God’s goodness that is calling us forth.

--Rev. David McArthur

Let it shine

Let it shine... and have fun!!

Every Sunday, after singing our peace song, we remember our true state of being, the presence we choose to be. We are the love, the light and the peace in the world right now. We remind ourselves as we go forth for the rest of our week to “let it shine… and have fun!”

Yes, fun is spiritual! God gave us the most wonderful spiritual biofeedback device. It’s designed to tell you if you are in touch with the Divine. It operates on a simple principle: when you are in touch with your spiritual nature, you feel good. Wow, is that simple!

This marvelous feedback device is the human body. When you are in touch with the Divine, you feel good because Spirit is flowing into and through your body. You feel clear (which feels good) because Spirit is flowing into your mind. Even in difficult situations, spiritual connection takes us from the state of frustration or despondency to purposeful, intelligent understanding and wise action (and that feels good).

When you are learning about God, your heart fills with meaning. When you are connecting with others, you feel the flow of God through you (and that feels good). When you are loving, you are expressing God (and that feels the best of all).

—Reverend David McArthur

A New Level of Consciousness

This year at Unity let us bring our focus to the potential that love holds for us individually and collectively to bring forth a new level of consciousness. It is time to develop fully within ourselves and within our world a true consciousness of peace.

As you stop to linger at the peace wall, look at the hope that is there. Look at the ideals that are captured in the symbols. Experience the desire, common to all our hearts that is enshrined in those words that keep appearing again and again—“Peace” and “Love.” It is time for us to go to our next step of bringing forth that vision. Let us find within ourselves the heart of nonviolence. If not us, who? If not now, when?

—Reverend David McArthur

Let There Be Peace on Earth

Let There Be Peace on Earth... and Let it Begin with Me

It is often a startling discovery that peace is not the result of being peaceful. It’s not that being peaceful isn’t helpful—it certainly is. However, the dissolution of the discord that removes our peace requires an even more powerful state of consciousness than peace. It requires love. Charles Fillmore called love the unifying, harmonizing power. That is because when we actively engage conflict with love, we release that which has the power to dissolve discord. Love actually creates a higher state of consciousness in which harmony and unity can exist.

Love has the power to transform those parts of ourselves that have not yet been brought into wholeness. In one of the translations of the Tao Te Ching, it is spoken of as the tiger having no place to put his claws. I understand this to mean, that the parts of me that would have sustained conflict have been transformed as I became the expression of Divine Love to those around me, regardless of their position or peacefulness.

We become involved in the pursuit of peace because our love compels us. It asks us to journey into that experience of connectedness in which another’s well being is crucial to our own. Love flows through us, creating harmony around us. The change of consciousness is not because we avoided conflict to be peaceful. Rather it is brought about because in the midst of conflict we let love flow from our hearts so that we were transformed and others uplifted.
­—Reverend David McArthur

Choosing Love

What Is Our Center About?

Several years ago, I was walking down a narrow street in a city far away. I was a stranger there on business and there was a palpable tension. It was a city where recently there had been violence and everyone there knew from the frequent presence of soldiers and police that this was not a peaceful place. Even though I wanted to enjoy my time there, I couldn’t help glancing nervously around, keeping defensive vigilance and feeling concern as I walked.

I was passing two women talking, one an older woman looked beyond her friend and looked directly at me. She smiled at me. It wasn’t that polite “I’m a nice non-threatening person” smile. It was a smile of someone who sends out love—powerful, delighted, and personal. It was for me and meant for me. From twenty-five feet away I felt impacted and changed. I felt that love from an old woman I did not know, a person I have never spoken a word to.

I became aware that I was no longer afraid. I was walking in a world where love existed. I felt my heart open, grateful, full. I was at peace. I no longer looked at the people around me as possible threats, but rather as people. We were all just people there, with our concerns, our schedules and our destinations. The difference was, I suddenly was not absorbed in my fear, my safety, protecting my world from them. I was no longer contributing fear and separation to the world that existed around me as I walked down that street. I was contributing peace. My mind was at peace with the world I was in. I was aware of the presence of Divine Love around me. I found I cared about those around me and enjoyed the vibrancy of their presence.

This is true, and it was just that simple. An old woman made a choice to send love, and changed me at depth. I became a presence of peace because I chose to accept the love she reminded me of. Love freed me from fear. It is simple. In our world where fear seems so strong, we can choose to love and become the presence of peace. The choice is ours.

I believe this is what our Center is about. At this time of tension and fear in our community, our nation and our world, where separation and mistrust is the norm, we are here to choose love, choice after choice, moment after moment. We know how to find the power of love that creates peace and our world hungers both for that knowledge and even more so for people who will live that choice.

~ Choosing love, creating peace, one heart at a time ~

—Reverend David McArthur