Sunday Message for September 4, 2022

WORKING WITH ALL MY POWERS

WHAT WE WANT TO LEARN & PRACTICE
This month we will center on the Faculty of Order. What we want to learn and practice this week is how to work with ALL of our marvelous Twelve Powers to do the mighty mission of the Christ consciousness in our everyday lives and work.

Order is the harmony of law, logic, and adjustment. The power of order is linked with faith, the perceiving power; with will, the choosing power; and with renunciation, the releasing power. Order is the affirming power, the recognizing power that God is in charge, and all is well. In New Thought, we often say, "Divine Order" when we mean to affirm that God's will is being done.

It is time to put our lives in order - in Divine Order. We have gone long enough telling ourselves, "Well... I'll try... (whine, whine) to get my life in order. (big sigh)" or "Well... I'll work on trying to do God's will - but you know how hard it is for me."

As a minister once said - this is all just B.S. - Belief System. You were created in the image and likeness of God. You ARE the Christ, the Enlightened One. It is time to give up your 'littleness' and accept the reality of yourself.

You have been through enough in your life to know that you are a survivor.

A HIGHER ORDER
So let's look at a higher order in our lives. During this week of Labor Day in America, we often reflect on the meaning of work. Let's put our work into the context of a Divine Order, which employs all the Twelve Powers with which we are innately endowed. We often consider our work as "giving orders" and "taking orders." So, let's take and give Divine Order as the successful way to work spiritually.

There is an African-American Proverb that says the Ladder of Success is to
Plan purposefully.
Prepare prayerfully.
Proceed positively.
Pursue persistently.

The full and balanced use of all our spiritual powers or faculties we are learning about is the Divinely Ordered way to live. These are the spiritual tools with which we are building our lives, under the inspiration and supervision of the Christ in us. Then we are working with God. In (John 4:34) Jesus said to them, "My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to complete his work."^a

Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote, "look on that man as happy, who, when there is a question of success, looks into his work for a reply."^b

THANK GOD IT'S MONDAY!
Would you like to feel TGIM rather than TGIF? Thank God It's Monday? (Unless you're a minister!) Do you know when more heart attacks occur during the week than any other time? That's right - Monday morning. Do you see work as your enemy or your friend?

Kahlil Gibran wrote that:
"Work is love made visible
And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy."^c

If you are not thrilled with your work, then quit - because you obviously have someone else's job - someone who would be thrilled with it.

How do you feel about yourself at work? We are more interested in your worth ethic than in your work ethic. Is your self-worth fully employed or out of a job?

We learned last month that we are all God's executives, seeking to carry out God's orders, promises, and will of Infinite Good. We are empowered (within powered). We are in the business of living - of building a life. We are creating an orderly, organized life experience. Our business is to be effective and prosperous - to be productive and profitable. Our creation is a fulfilling, useful, helpful, and worthwhile life.

So why do we need order in our lives? Well... let's look at the many life departments that we are in charge of. Some of them are:

The department of Administration. You are in charge of your department of Transportation. The department of Production, Human Resources and On the Job Training.

Contracts & Agreements
Accounts & Budgets
Research & Development
Public Relations
Career Development
Community Relations
Quality Control & Education
Health Care
Quality of Life
Legal
Environmental & Planetary
Investments
Retirement Plans
Maintenance & Repairs
Food Services
Chaplaincy
Career Development
Governmental Relations

Quite a lot to manage in an orderly way, are they not? Do we need to have lots of good order to make sure our Life In-Corporation is well managed by us?

So use these affirmations to organize and order your life experience and all it's departments.

I work with faith.
I work with love.
I work with strength.
I work with wisdom.
I work with power.
I work with imagination.
I work with understanding.
I work with will.
I work with order.
I work with enthusiasm.
I work with freedom.
I work with life.

MAKING A LIVING & MAKING A LIFE
Let's take a look at making a living and making a life. Albert Schweitzer said, "I don't know what your destiny will be, but one thing I do know: the only ones among you who will be really happy are those who have sought and found how to serve."^d

The Dalai Lama said that the purpose of life is to be happy.^e And if you look at that - you realize that service to others is the source of happiness.

The second of the Four Noble Truths of the Buddha can be said this way: the cause of suffering is the unappeasable desire of the mind to have things "its own way."^f The Buddha actually used the word tanha, which means craving. He said that the mind that craves - that feels it can't be happy unless it gets something it wants or is unburdened of something it doesn't want - is the mind that suffers.

Does your work provide you with a payoff or just a payday? Eric Butterworth adds to the traditional role of "entrepreneur" the work of being an "intrapreneur."^g The entrepreneur develops or builds in the outer realm. The intrapreneur builds within. If the entrepreneur is not also an intrapreneur, he or she will not be successful no matter how much money he or she makes.

Intrapreneurship is concerned with the business of living fully and helpfully. Studs Terkel, in his book, Working, tells of a waitress, Delores, who moves among the tables with a special gracefulness. She says such things as, "How can I make your day brighter?" instead of "Whadda ya have?" An intrapreneur bus driver says to people as they board his bus, "Enjoy your day. You owe it to yourself." And when they get off he says, "Step out into a wonderful day!" The waitress and the bus driver are both working with all their Powers.^h They are concerned with what Tom Peters calls, "PPQ" - People, Profitability, Quality Service. They are not just making a living; they are making a life. They are making their positive contribution of service to others.

You can be an intrapreneur - a channel for Good in the world by working with all your Twelve Powers.

Joseph Campbell said, "If you follow your bliss, you put yourself on a kind of track that has been there all the while, waiting for you, and the life that you ought to be living is the one you are living."ⁱ

So commit yourself to authentic growth. Tell yourself
I Will have a passion for excellence.
I Will ask, listen, and hear - to determine the wants, needs, and possibilities of all with whom I come in contact
I Will provide an example of commitment and integrity
I Will follow a path of continual empowerment for myself and others.
I Will constantly focus on the strengths of all with whom I come in contact
I Will cultivate optimum physical, mental, and spiritual fitness.
I Will lead as I would like to be led.
I Will savor the flavor of each passing moment
I Will infuse every thought and relationship with faith, hope, love, and gratitude.

MYRTLE FILLMORE
Myrtle Fillmore wrote that "God has much to be done, and He will reveal the plan to those who seek it, and will open the way of progress and success to those who are really willing to give up preconceived opinions and to grasp the Truth as the Holy Spirit reveals it."^j

We have worked for money or labored to make a living. But we are moving into a time when we will have to recognize that work is for the purpose of expressing God-given faculties and powers and loving service in the way that is truly beneficial. When each thought and each move is divinely inspired, the results will be satisfying and permanent.

We have to be not only good but good for something in this world in which we live. The work that God appoints us to never demands of us more than we can do comfortably. And He never obliges us to neglect our own unfoldment of the Christ pattern within us. When we are doing as God would have us do, He takes wonderful care of us, not by bringing supplies and placing them at our feet always, but by showing us how to use our own resources in a way to convert them into whatever we need or would use.
We are God's beloved children. But we are also His brain power, and His hands, and His voice: it is through us that God expresses His ideas, His blessings, and brings forth the unmanifest good in the forms in which we use it. Knowing this gives us a better attitude toward work and makes us confident that we can and will have plenty to do and will get paid for it. As we realize that we are helping God to bring forth His blessings and order, our work becomes interesting and joy-filled.