Unity Church of Castro Valley
Sunday Message for September 14, 2008
Living In The Now
Today we are going to talk about Living in the Now. This is such a simple and important concept for spiritual students. This current moment and this very place is the only thing that exists. In this moment, in this place, you don't know whether the rest of the world exists. And when you learn to live in the moment - you will find that you are more alive than you have ever been.
YOU'VE GOT IT ALL
Right where you are, in this moment, is as good as it gets. God created you perfect, with a potential for happiness that does not change over time. Happiness doesn't need to develop; it just needs to be called forth from within you. It is fully developed and it is always available.
We're not aware of that perfection within us if we are living in the past or the future. How many people do you know that think their happiness is dependant on something else. They lament, "If only I were richer" or "If only I weren't sick" or "If only I were thinner" or younger, or prettier - THEN I would be happy.
But it says in The Quest, "Actually, you will never have more potential for prosperity and wholeness than you have now." There never will be more of an opportunity for peace or love or compete happiness than exists for you right now. When God created you, you were given all that you needed. But it is your life choices which decide if and how you use those gifts. And you can decide to use them right now. Ralph Waldo Emerson says: "Every soul is not only the inlet, but may become the outlet of all there is in God." We can only be this by keeping ourselves consciously in open communication with God in the now moment. Because the now moment is where God exists.
We are free now but we don't know it. You may be the child of a king, but if you don't know it, you may live in poverty and squalor all your life. We are all, today, this very hour, free from all sickness, because God, who is perfect life, abides within and completely fills every atom of our body. If God, divine substance, fills every part, every place and space as the atmosphere fills the room, there is certainly no absence of Spirit-life in any part.
In the domain of Spirit there is neither time nor space. What is to be and already is must be spoken into visibility. Practice thinking and realizing omnipresence, that is, practice realizing that all good that you desire is here now, all-present; it is not apart from you and its coming to you does not require time. There is no time or space.
There is not God and--a body.br>
There is not God and--circumstance.br>
There is not God and--any sort of trouble.
There is only God, through and through and through all things, in our body, in our seemingly empty purses, in all our circumstances, just waiting as invisible Spirit substance, for us to recognize and acknowledge Him, and Him only, in order to become visible. All else is a lie.
ONLY NOW EXISTS
No time exists other than now. The past is history, it is over and gone. It will never be in your life again. Whatever happened has already happened. The future is not yet here and when it does arrive it will no longer be the future. It will be now. So now is all you have.
The Jafolla's wrote, "The past is compost, the future is a seed not yet planted, the present is the only soil in which you can grow." So feeling bad about a missed opportunity in the past or worrying about some future need is wasting the opportunity for good in this present moment.
Why don't we step into the now moment and begin doing the best we can right where we are? You can't grow from where you were yesterday, and it's impossible to grow from where you will be tomorrow. The only growing has to take place exactly where you are planted.
And you are planted where you are because that soil is best for you at this time on your path. The situation and circumstances that surround you right now contain all the elements that will make you grow best. If you trust God, you will trust this process of growth. Live in the now moment so that you can pay attention to all the details of your life now. Then you will do the best you can in every challenge that comes up.
But, don't misunderstand what I am saying. I am not saying that you should accept the limitations of your present circumstances. Even a flower planted in the shade seeks the sun. Any problems you are now facing, though, should not be taken at face value. It is possible to see them as a chance to grow and to accept more of God's good. God created you with the potential for absolute good, so don't accept any less than that.
GOOD OLD DAYS
Did you ever hear your parents or grandparents talking about the 'good old days'? If this is your focus you are walking backwards through life. And when we are facing backwards, we can't possibly know where we are or where we are going. We only know where we have been. We glorify the past because we don't remember all the details of it. We think it was so much better, 'back then.' And so, we have trouble seeing the blessings in the now because we see everything through a filter of the past.
Also, our past can contain a lot of dysfunctional drama. These things have a devastating effect on us, and we allow them to affect us throughout our entire lives. When we are anchored in these past events, we cannot stretch into the newness that each day presents. When we are stuck in the past, we kill our present potential.
KINGDOM OF GOD
Paul said in (Philippians 3:13-14) "forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the heavenly call of God." In other words, seek first the kingdom of God.
The kingdom of God is not in the past. Staying in the past is meandering in the dark caverns of the mind. The past is illusion, mere memory. It is only what our mind is able to selectively recall. The longer something stays in the mind, the more it changes and the less it resembles what really happened. The past, like the future, is only our perception.
THE PAST IS YOURS TO USE
The past is what it is, and it got you to this point. The past is the raw material of the present, but it isn't a blueprint for the present. Give thanks for the lessons of the past. No matter how painful they were, they have given you an awareness of who and what you are.
Don't fear the past or resist it or resent it. Instead, use all of the raw material of the past, the good as well as the "bad", to design a new blueprint for the present. If you fear or resent the past, you are tightening your grasp on it. You will drag the limitations of the past into the now moment, and that's a heavy load to haul.
Life is progress, and each now moment is a stepping-stone that leads to the next now moment. You can't change the past. In fact, there is no need to, because the real you doesn't live there anymore.
THE FUTURE IS YOURS TO CREATE
So, what about the future? Can you really believe that if you keep on thinking the same thoughts, saying the same words, doing the same things, going in the same direction, the future will be any different than now? If you think the future will save you without your changing the present, you are badly deluded.
You can change the direction of your life, but changes can't happen in the past or the future. They can only happen in the now. In each now moment there exists an unlimited amount of possibilities. This makes anytime a good time for a new beginning. In fact, every moment is a new beginning.
You don't have to wait for January 1, 2009 to resolve to make a new life. You are right now at the junction of what you were and what you can be. This moment is the first moment of the rest of your life. This junction of your life, this now moment, is ripe with possibilities. This now moment contains all of the good that you can ever hope to have. YOU decide what road you will take.
When you think of how you want your life to unfold, it may seem overwhelming, but when you are in this now moment everything is possible. Just remember that God is with you, because God lives in the now. The God which dwells within you and has given you a new vision of yourself will keep you on course. The God which has allowed the vision will, with your cooperation, fulfill that vision.
BEGIN WHERE YOU ARE
Look for the seed of good in every situation, and you will see that the fields are already ripe for harvesting. All you will ever need is yours - Now.
If you want to manifest the perfect Christ, affirm with all your heart and soul and strength that you manifest now, that you manifest health and strength and love and Truth and power. Let go of the notion of being or doing anything in the future. God knows no time but the eternal now.
You can never know any other time, for there is no other. You cannot live an hour or ten minutes in the future. You cannot live it until you reach it, and then it becomes the now. Saying or believing salvation and deliverance are to be in the future, will forever, keep them, just a little ahead of you, always to be reached but never quite realized.
"Now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation," said Paul. He said nothing about our being saved from our distresses after death, but always taught a present salvation. God's work is finished in us now. All the fullness abides in the indwelling Christ now. Whatever we persistently declare is done now, is manifested now, we shall see fulfilled.
Begin where you are. Do what you can. Even a small effort to change, to grow, to improve, will bring astonishing results. When you desire to change and you make an effort to change, God rushes out to meet you. Like the story of the Prodigal Son, God waits for us to return "home." When we do, God immediately responds to us with an outpouring of everything we need - Now.
So walk forward and don't turn back. If you want to discover the genuine you - the person that you really are - release the person that you were.
When you yearn for the past, you make yourself a slave to the past.br>
When you learn from the past, you become a master of the present.
You can choose to build on what you were, but you are not what you were. You can focus on what you will be, but you are not what you will be. What you are is what you are right now - the inheritor of all of God's gifts.
Now, this moment, is the first moment in the rest of your eternity. You can start it fresh with God.
SCRIPTURE: Philippians 3:13-14
REFERENCE: The Quest Richard & Mary-Alice Jafolla; How I Used Truth H Emilie Cady
--------------------
