Message from Light of God Ministry • Reverend Mary White
Dear Friend,
I wonder how you handle the hurts that others put upon you. Slurs, accusations, badgering, judgements, gossip can all leave us feeling insignificant for a very long time. We play the broken record over and over in our mind until the fragmented thoughts become how we self-identify. Forgiveness means letting go of the hurts that we are carrying so that we are free to think clearly and not be ruled by false beliefs. Thinking clearly allows us to see all sides of situations even the ones that oppose our choices. When I am criticized or treated unfairly, my go to is my Higher Power, God. It is God whom I believe can handle situations that are a heavy burden and who releases me to continue along the path to which I have been called. I state out loud “You handle this God and continue to lead me as your will be done.”
With Love,
Rev. Mary
All Are Welcome With Love
Family Fun with Brenda Pielle
Reading: by Tom Stella
Because disappointing and hurtful occurrences are frequent, and because many of us are so prone to feeling them, learning to let go of the self that is offended is crucial. It reminds me of the Far Side greeting card that pictures two bears standing beside one another. One of them has a target on its chest and the other bear says to him, “Bummer of a birthmark, Hal!” Many of us are walking targets. We are super-sensitive. We are easily hurt. I find it difficult to get through a day without something happening that leaves me feeling hurt, upset, or miffed in some manner. Depending on my mood, I can feel attacked, ignored, misunderstood, unappreciated, and sometimes all of those things, even when none of these reactions are appropriate to the situations that trigger them. But rather than attempting to develop “thick skin,” or deflecting or denying what offends me, I am trying to look upon every offence as an invitation, an opportunity, a catalyst for growth, because I am convinced that the best approach to dealing with the reality of being offended is to embark on a spiritual journey, one that enables me to identify with and respond to life from a deeper place within myself – a place offences cannot reach.
Because my ego will always be with me, I expect to feel hurt to varying degrees my entire life; to be otherwise would mean I had become hardened and insensitive. However, as I grow to realize that I am more than my ego, and as I progress in the process of identifying with my soul and letting go of the self that is offended, I’m convinced that the offences I experience will wound me less severely, and that forgiveness will occur more readily. It was growth of this sort that enabled humorist and philosopher Mark Twain to say, “Forgiveness is the fragrance the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it.” When our ego takes its appropriate place in the backseat of ourselves, it may become possible for forgiveness to emanate from us as naturally as does the aroma from a crushed flower.
Reading excerpt from “In Sync with the Sacred, Out of Step with the World”
Poem: Today I Shall Dream
by Joy Mead
Today I shall dream of people together, loving, sharing, eating, dancing. And at the end of the day, when things are much the same, I shall continue to hope.
I shall remember that the personal is always political, that inner peace cannot be separated from wholeness and health in community. That small acts of beauty by small groups of people still carry the potential to change the world.
OUR NEXT PRUC Online Worship Service • Sunday, July 24th
May your spirit be filled with grace, and may your future embrace you with loving kindness.
P R A Y E R
Creating, Forgiving One, save me from this frivolous self which misuses creation; this ego-centric self; this tight-fisted self; this self which throws the thick shadow of its own purposes and desires in every direction, so that I cannot see what it is that you, my Foundation and my God, are showing to me. Teach me to stand out of my own light and let your daylight shine.
Amen
~ by Austin Farrer (1906 – 1968)
Navigation Team Meeting Minutes ~ July 8, 2022
Powell River United Church, 6932 Crofton Street, Powell River, BC, V8A 5H4, Canada