When I was a child, there was a well-known
advertisement for V8 Juice. Someone would
drink something else and then realize, "Wow, I
coulda had a V8!" As an adult, I've
realized many times, when situations have not turned
out so well, "Wow, I coulda had a
miracle!"
I could have had a miracle. . . except.
. . ! Except that I didn't think miracles were
possible. I didn't think in a miraculous
way. I didn't stand firmly on the principle
that God can do anything. In the words of A
Course in Miracles, "There is no order of
difficulty in miracles." No problem is
too hard for God to solve. This is a very
important point to remember, as it's hard to have
deep faith in a kinda-sorta-powerful God.
Faith in God, however, is inseparable from faith in
love. To say that there is nothing God cannot
do is to say that there is nothing love cannot
do. It does little good to ask God's help, if
we ourselves remain unwilling to open our hearts in
places where they are closed. It is not just
God's love for us, but our love for each other, that
paves the way for miracles.
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If we fail to express God's love through
faith or compassion or forgiveness, then the problem
is not the absence of God's power but rather our
failure to align our will with His. He cannot
do for us what He cannot do through us. A
house might be wired for electricity, but it still
needs lamps if it's to be lit.
With every thought of miraculous possibility, the
lamp is plugged in. A miracle is simply a
shift in perception. The more we align
ourselves with the principles of love, the more
empowered we become.
Children memorize
the alphabet so they can learn how to read; we should memorize
mystical principles so we can learn how to live most
creatively. Each of us can live in the victory of spirit,
claiming for ourselves the miraculous power that has been given
to us as children of God. It is our faith that
miracles are possible--that the very fabric of the universe is
miraculous-- which opens the mind, and thus the future, to
unimaginable possibilities. "Dear God, please send a
miracle" is a powerful prayer for cosmic support. To
pray is to take spiritual action.
The earth is dominated by thoughts of fear, and we are
conditioned by these thoughts to forget the power of our
Source. Having not been taught the grandeur of our
heritage, we do not remember the grandeur of our mission.
We forget that we have the extraordinary power to work miracles
in the name of God. Illusion and fear tie up the
Prometheus inside us. No, we cannot do this or that,
because we don't have enough money, or enough talent, or enough
intelligence. No, we cannot change the world, because it's
been the way it's been too long. No one needs to hold us
down if we believe we're down already. As long as there
are walls inside our minds, we're bound to remain behind
them. For if you think you can't, you can't. If you
think you can, you might. And if you think God can, you're
on your way to a life of spiritual triumph. You have
claimed His power on your own behalf, which is what He would
have you do. God is not stingy with His
miracles; it's a pity we ask for so few.
It's neither arrogant nor overreaching to ask for a
miracle. Miracles aren't possible because of anything we
do; they are possible because of the nature of God. We do
not personally work them; rather, they are worked through
us as we open our hearts more deeply to love. The mystical
heart is a loving one, and thus a conduit through which God
naturally reveals Himself. We have a power in us, but not
of us, that can miraculously heal the entire world.
Perhaps the miracle arrives in the form of an insight that
unlocks a riddle in your life, a reconciliation with someone, or
the opening of a door that has long remained closed. Try
as you might, your efforts to break through using your talents,
your power of rational analysis, or sheer force of will had
remained fruitless. It was only when you put God
first--when your heart softened, you stopped blaming, you
stopped talking so much and started to truly listen--that some
wall of resistance began to crumble. You had not done
anything so much as you had released the energies of
self-will. You had asked, in a way, that God's will be
done. A miracle occurred not because you caused it but
because you allowed it. In the words of writer Willa
Cather, "Where there is great love, there are always
miracles."
Mystical consciousness is humble, but self-confident. We
are not relying on our own strength, but on God's.
Science, technology, economics, military force, and social
prestige--all of which are seen by the mortal mind as sources of
genuine might and strength--might have the power to affect
situations significantly. But they cannot work
miracles. They cannot transcend the time-space
continuum. They cannot transform the human heart.
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