December 3, 2024

• When loving is difficult

It is the God to whom you pray that walks beside you, that helps direct your every step. All human lives are given direction and purpose through the participation of their guides, but as you are human beings, your awareness and understanding of that guidance that is constantly with you is never fully engaged at all times.

We who live in the energy-form of spirit are without interruption engaged in an open heart that sees, that grows, that moves with greater clarity and understanding. As your guides, we speak to each of you whether in words or through other means from the perspective of a full understanding of your unique sacredness. We speak of the oneness of creation, but you are in your own way a unique component of that magnificent singleness. The fingers and the ears have unique features, unique potentials, unique capabilities, but they belong equally to the human form.

In your quest to find the connection that you have with all others, even those with whom you are in great disagreement, it is important to respect that uniqueness. You can give value to the uniqueness and yet affirm the unity of those unique characteristics. No two paths operate or are directed in parallel. All paths have their unique characteristics, a unique sense of stones and dirt, a unique content of all that nature can bring. You will never find two life paths that are identical, and yet despite the uniqueness of each journey, all paths reach the same objective. You reach that objective because of your belonging to the singleness of all that is, the singleness that is God. All paths lead to God by their own unique trajectories.

We understand your concerns about the future, your concerns about the divisions in society. It is easy to discredit another pathway as somehow intrinsically wrong, but God does not create a reality where some paths take a traveler to a place of utter confusion and total loss. All paths, and we underscore this, all paths lead to God. Where the tension arises, it is essentially because of one’s inability to acknowledge the end of the paths that seem utterly unique and utterly wrong. There is no human being, there is no spirit center to each human being that traverses a path leading away from God. Some paths seem more direct. Others may appear to be filled with more detours. But there is no standard for a given life journey to proceed toward.

Human life is brief. It may not seem brief to you, but you must remember that there is human life, and there is spiritual life. Human life is defined in great part through the physical condition, the physical reality. That physical expression or manifestation is not the grounds upon which to base a sense of belonging or not belonging, of being good or not being good, of being guided or not being guided.

Where and how to proceed from where you find yourself currently while pursuing your own objectives of a closer walk with God: first, embrace the uniqueness that you observe. Embracing does not mean idolizing. It only means a recognition that what is seen is merely a small point on a true trajectory of spirit. Just as someone observing you can never fully understand what drives you to be who you are and what you are, you cannot fully understand and fully know what burdens and influences reside with another. But you can at the very least acknowledge that wherever others are in your perceptions has meaning and is an important step along their own pathways. Wherever you are should be viewed by others as but a point in your own unique spiritual journey. Judgment does not mean being blind to uniqueness but embracing it, welcoming it, acknowledging its place in the lives of others.

Your journey through life continues far longer than what is observed physically, and it is that spiritual journey that is the only journey of substance. Don’t turn your back on those whom you feel may be behaving in a manner you feel is not consistent with God’s presence. Accept those differences. You may even welcome them because it creates an environment for the spirit to embrace another in love. It is very easy to be feeling love toward another whose path at least resembles your own, but being loving, being affirming in such situations does not strengthen the spirit. It merely exercises the strength that is already present.

It is the pathway of spirit to grow, to become stronger, to become clearer in heart vision. That growth, that expansion of the capacity to be loving occurs when you reach out in loving ways to those whom you feel to be the most difficult to love. You are asked to be loving, and in that process of being loving, you are growing in your capacity ultimately to become all love. That growth that is necessary in the process of being loving occurs when you are asked to be loving to someone who may be defined as not lovable. Your offer to love can never be conditional. There are no rules of when one can be in a particular condition to receive love. It is for you to be loving because you accept the reality and the necessity of the uniqueness that you observe.

Truly, loving can only be described as an energy from within that reaches outward. The direction of that love is always outward. It is not directed outward because of anticipation of something in return. If you offer a loving spirit to another whom you find difficult to love, that offer is never made with expectations of what’s in it for you. It is just given out.

So often we say that you are loved by God not because you earn it but because you are part of that creation of God. If God and your perception of that Spirit Center love is one of full acceptance of uniqueness, then if you wish in some way to be reflective of God’s presence in your life, you must love and accept without condition. You can not really feel loved by God and yet be judgmental of others because of perceived differences. What is essentially part of you is identical with what is the essence of everyone else. There is no real difference. The uniqueness may be recognized, but it has ultimately no significance. How can you feel grounded in an environment filled with hate speech? First, find stability by acknowledging those differences, the uniqueness that you see, but also find grounds to send out loving energy toward another.

Yes, there is a big difference between understanding you must not be judgmental and exercising that belief, but it is precisely in its exercise that it is strengthened. Your capacity to be loving is strengthened because it is exercised in ways that may feel undeserved. A perfect stranger or someone well-known does not have to deserve your love any more than you need to deserve God’s love. There is no deserving when it describes receiving love. Love is the grace that is bestowed upon you, and it is therefore a grace that you bestow upon another. There is no sense of deserving. There is no sense of worthiness. There are no conditions to be met. There is an acknowledgment of uniqueness, but that uniqueness provides no grounds for withholding an outreach of the spirit.

You can embrace one you have never met. You can embrace someone whose name you don’t know. You can embrace someone who has done you wrong. You can embrace someone whose actions may appall you. Embracing does not signify approval. Embracing means full acceptance. You accept the differences that you observe. It is not a matter of approving or disapproving, for those are then conditions that you place within the calculus of who deserves to be loved, who deserves to be embraced.

Accepting all others is the most fundamental principle of being grounded in the midst of chaos. It is the true strength that all human beings are endowed with, and yet it is seldom used. It requires a conscious decision on your part to recognize and accept as part of the journey. You are not asked to approve or set conditions or expectations. Simply acknowledge that another’s journey is their journey, and although it may seem to be a path in the opposite direction that you pursue, it is still appropriate for the individual on that pathway.

That individual has guides. That individual has a spirit center. That individual has an awareness of what creates pain as well as joy. Another’s pain, another’s joy may not be your pain or your joy, but it is part of another’s pathway and the validity of that journey must always be acknowledged.

You seek peace, a peace of spirit. Choose to be that peace you seek. You seek justice and equality. Choose to acknowledge the equality that is indeed present. There may be times when you feel the need to speak out to oppose whatever you find to be offensive. It is certainly human to reach out in that way, but in that opposition, avoid the judgment of conditional love. Love is not to be withheld; love is only to be given. It is not something to be deserved; it is a grace that is offered. Just as you are loved without condition, you are loved as a form of grace.

Take that energy, internalize it, nurture it, find ways of recognizing its source, and send it out with an open heart in the full knowledge that it is given in the spirit of God’s presence.

Amen.