SPIRITUAL HEALING

There is too much misunderstanding about spiritual healing and the average person does not grasp its full meaning.

Spiritual mind healing is not vague, mystical, mental performance in which one wraps himself with soberness or ponderosity and call it thinking. Spiritual mind healing is based on the theory that there is an intelligent and creative Power around us and flowing through us; a Power greater than we are but a Power which we can use. At the same time it is a Power that must be consciously used if It is to do anything definite for us. It is like electricity. The universe is full of electrical energy. Machinery is run by this energy, but not a wheel will be turned by it unless it is first properly connected.

Spiritual mind treatment for healing, then deals with a Power greater than we are and a Power right where we are, around and within us. We cannot change this Power. It exists from eternity to eternity. We might liken it to gravitational force on the surface of this Earth, which automatically holds everything in place, but the force of itself does not change the position of things. We have the freedom to walk about in the gravitational field, to change our position in it.

We can stand on our hands or our feet – and gravitational force will never ask, “Are you a Methodist or a Baptist?’ or “Are you educated or uneducated? Are you cultured or crude?’ It holds everything in its place. Gravitational force is intelligent; it is a power greater than we are that operates upon us and through us.

There is in the universe that which we can call infinite Intelligence and a creative Law surrounding all things, which in its original state permeates and penetrates the interspaces of the universe and every object we see.

I guess someone will ask, ‘is that God?’

It is God in the same sense that everything is God. It is God in the same sense that our minds are God. It is God in the same sense that God, as the creative Cause of all things, is in and through everything and surrounds everything.

One of the mistakes we make is to think that if we say, ‘I believe in God, God is Good, God is the only Power there is, God is right where I am,’’ this is a spiritual mind treatment which is a definite and active thing. Treatment is the activity of our consciousness, our awareness, based on a belief in the Divine Presence, used for a specific purpose, and identified with the purpose, place, or thing we wish to help, to change, or to heal.

A spiritual mind treatment must not be confused with meditation. However, meditation is a good preparation treatment or prayer. For instance, we might meditate upon the thought: “God is love, God is life, God is truth, God is beauty, God is power,’ until we feel the presence of life, truth, beauty and power. This increases our awareness of life, love, beauty, and power – and that is good.

But if it is to be a treatment, then there must be added to it:”This life, this truth, this love, this beauty, this power is now consciously active in my affairs,” or “is eliminating from me what does not belong,” or “is establishing in me a poise, a calm, a sense of peace, a sense of belonging, a feeling which is free from fear.” In this manner we are passing from the contemplation of the meaning of words, the meditating upon that meaning – all of which is good and essential – to the active application of our words to a specific problem.

For a moment let us consider the act of prayer. It is the finite reaching out to the Infinite of help. It may take the form of supplication or active faith according to our state of consciousness. But when the prayer passes from supplication to active faith, what happens to the mind or the thinking or the one engaged in prayer? The change that takes place is from the idea of “God, please do this, “to “Thank You, God, that You are doing this,” or “that this is being done.”

Then we discover that the reaction in the mind of the one praying in this manner is that he accepts his own statement: he passes from hope to faith, to conviction and acceptance. This is called a prayer of affirmation. It is a prayer of acceptance; it is the effective prayer. Whenever one has prayed effectually it has always been because somewhere in the prayer the mind of the one praying has become convinced!

The effective prayer is one that has so much faith that the one praying no longer doubts! It is evident that this must be true because we have to convince either ourselves or God. Now, it stands to reason we cannot tell electricity to be energy; we cannot tell gravitational force to hold things in the places. We can only use the energy and change our position in relation to it. Neither can we tell God anything. As Whittier said: The Lord is God! He needeth not the poor device of man.

It is evident that we cannot argue with the Almighty and tell Him to be good, tell him to be life, to be truth, beauty or power. We may only accept that there is a Power greater than we are and that It is operating this way. We must recognise that people who have prayed with fervour and with faith have had their prayers answered. But they were not answered by a caprice or nature, a whimsical fancy of the Almighty, or by some law which is a law of chance in that it might or might not answer.

Prayers have always been answered because, knowingly or unknowingly, they have complied with the condition Jesus laid down when he said that when you pray believe that you have and you will receive.

Jesus introduced the use of a principle that has been overlooked until the last hundred years; but it now is the foundation of modern metaphysics. What was it Jesus announced? He said, in effect, there is a creative Intelligence surrounding us that operates on our word. Let us add, It operates on our word as gravitational force operates upon an object to hold it where we set it. It operates upon our word as a creative Intelligence operates on a seed that we put into the ground. We do not coerce It, we do not beseech It, we do not supplicate It, we cannot concentrate It; we do not hold thoughts out to influence things, people, or conditions. Instead, It is Principle, acting as a principle, and therefore acting mathematically and impersonally as all principles must.

Someone might ask, “Is this manipulating God? Not at all. This Principle is a law in nature just like other principles. But is it creative. Someone else might ask, “Well, is this merely a mental science? Where is the spiritual value?” The answer to this is: This Principle reacts to us at the level of our action in It. What It doe for us, It must do through us at the level of our conviction, belief and thought. If this Power seems to have reacted chaotically it is because consciousness has been chaotic. Therefore, the spiritual quality of a treatment or prayer is of vital importance. We must not only be aware of the Power, we must tune the mind to a spiritual realisation of Life – the embodiment of beauty, of love, of tenderness, of kindness, of compassion, of goodness, and of faith.

It is impossible, then, to divorce the spiritual consciousness from prayer or treatment. The primary step in spiritual mind treatment is an awareness of God. The person who gets the best results is the one who has the most conviction of the Divine Presence, and the deepest consciousness of spiritual harmony.

The treatment must embody that inspiration, that feeling which comes alone from the Source of all life. The treatments must touch the seamless robe of unity and wholeness with conviction and feeling. The higher the spiritual awareness, the more Power will flow through it.

There is a part of us that dwells eternally with the most High. We cannot divorce spiritual aspiration, spiritual realisation, or meditation from a scientific technique. It is still necessary to use the technique. Therefore, at any given moment, if we watch ourselves carefully, we will see that the effectiveness of our treatment will depend on how much of an embodiment there was of love, of compassion, of life, of what I choose to call the abandonment of the mind and the soul to the Spirit. This is not something chaotic. It is something actual and real. It is the acceptance of the availability of the Power greater than we are.

Therefore, say to yourself, quietly and with deep conviction: I am now waiting upon the Spirit within me. I believe that I am so close to It that It can reach out through me and govern my life in harmony an in peace. I believe It can be a blessing to myself and to others. I am lifting up my mind, in faith to the conviction that the Spirit of God within me is my real Self. I am inviting this Spirit to enter my mind, to direct my thoughts and my acts, and I am expecting It to do this.

Believing that I am an individual in God and a Divine person in my own right, I am inviting new circumstances and situations into my experience and I am waiting on the Divine Presence within me to make Itself known, to reveal Itself to every person I meet and every situation I contact, to bring life, joy, and happiness to everyone, And so it is. End

Source: Ernest Holmes : Science of Mind