The Information Channel Felist.Com
-*--------------------------------------------------------------------------


Unity Way

January 29, 2006

------------------------------------------------------

Prayer for Others and Freedom

by Andrei Yashurin

When we pray for others in the spirit of Truth, we respect 
their freedom of choice. We have no intention to manipulate 
them. We never condemn. We never dictate. We never coerce 
them to "follow the right way". We know that some people have 
to grope in darkness for some time before they will see and 
appreciate the light.

One of the greatest stories in the Bible is the parable of 
the Prodigal son. We all heard it so many times, but not 
all of us realize that, above all, it is the lesson on 
freedom. The father from this parable never prevented his 
erring child from going away into "a far country". He made 
no attempts to rescue him when he got into serious troubles. 
He did not rush. He waited for son's return. Some would 
call it indifference, but Jesus undoubtedly called it love. 

We come back to our point: certain people will never realize 
their need of inner transformation unless they they go through 
negative experiences. We won't help them if we will try to deliver 
them from those experiences against their will, or if we will 
try to fix effects of those situations without dealing with 
causes. Just look at the elder brother from the same 
parable. 

Elder brother never ventured to leave his home and to go to 
"a far country", but still was prodigal in his heart. I am 
not sure whether he was able to overcome his resentment toward 
his father and his younger brother at the end. Chances are, 
he choose to stay offended for many years and to feel miserable. 
He lived alone with his self-justifying thoughts. But the realm 
of love and freedom is higher than the realm of limited 
and deterministic "justice".

Freedom implies freedom to stumble and fall. If we don't give 
that freedom to others while we think about them and pray for 
them, our attitude have nothing to do with divine love. 

Even our loved ones are not "ours". No matter what controlling 
religion says, we are not their keepers. This truth was 
vividly expressed by Kahlil Gibran:  

"Love one another, but make not a bond of love:
Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls...
Give your hearts, but not into each other's keeping.
For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts.
And stand together yet not too near together:
For the pillars of the temple stand apart,
And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other's shadow".

As we pray for others, we should respect their freedom - 
and, at the same time, believe in them. We need to believe 
that God abides in them. They are endowed with great powers, 
waiting to be expressed. Those people aren't as ignorant as 
they occasionally seem to be. They aren't as powerless as we 
may judge by appearances. They aren't as miserable as they 
themselves tell us. All these things are but shadows which 
cloud their minds and obstruct their potential. All these 
things have no substance, and we should not accept them 
as facts. 

As we pray for others, we may affirm:

"You are one with God. God is always in you, waiting to be 
fully expressed through you. You are free to determine 
the course of your life and to follow it through. Let the 
light if Truth shine brightly in your mind, and you would 
know yourself as the master of your life and the captain 
of your soul. I bless your personal soul journey, knowing 
that sooner or later it will bring you back home, to 
the full realization of your oneness with God".   

(to be continued)

------------------------------------------------------

To be unsubscribed, click the link at the bottom of this message,
do not write to the author.

------------------------------------------------------

http://unityway.net ~ Unity Way

http://www.livejournal.com/users/unityman ~ Talks on Truth Blog

Andrei Yashurin: yashurin@gmail.com

If you like our list, please recommend it to others.

All messages (c) 2006 by Andrei Yashurin

-*--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Unsubscribe: http://felist.com/member/unsub?grp=lit.unityway&email=

http://felist.com/                                   mailto:ask@felist.com