If the "inner you" says NO every time you say your affirmation, use that information to ask yourself, "What do I really believe about this?" "How is this showing up in my life?" You might want to do some exploration of these questions in writing.

Frequently, we are operating from an "early life belief." Take that belief out -- look at it; write about it. What purpose does it serve? If you no longer need it, give it up. THEN your affirmation will be clear.
 

For more work on affirmations, read the book I Deserve Love by Sondra Ray, or Creative Visualization by Shakti Gawain.
 

Take a few minutes this week and think about your personal belief system. Fill in the questions on the following page.

1. Some of my beliefs from childhood that might still be functioning are:

a._________________________________________________________

b._________________________________________________________

c._________________________________________________________
 

2. Some of the beliefs I have about my career are:

a._________________________________________________________

b._________________________________________________________

c._________________________________________________________
 

3. Some of the beliefs I have about relationships are:

a._________________________________________________________

b._________________________________________________________

c._________________________________________________________
 

4. Some of the beliefs I have about my body and my health are:

a._________________________________________________________

b._________________________________________________________

c._________________________________________________________
 

5. Other beliefs I discovered during this exercise are

a._________________________________________________________

b._________________________________________________________

c._________________________________________________________
 

"God is All, both invisible and visible, One Presence, Knowledge, and Power is All. This One that is All is Perfect Life, Love, Intelligence and Substance."

--Statement of Fundamentals

1. We do not attempt to prove that God exists; neither does the Bible. Unity teachings and the Bible both proceed from the assumption that God does indeed exist. In scientific terms, you could call this our basic working hypothesis.

2. We attempt to describe the nature of God by using various names and attributes to express our awareness of Gods infinite and indescribable reality; so does the Bible. The various names applied to God emphasize the various phases of our relationship to God. The various attributes (such as Love, Life, and Truth) ascribed to God express the qualities that are always present in the activity of God, whether in visible or invisible realms of Being.

3. We find that one of the most effective ways of communicating Gods Presence and Power is to relate what He has done, or is doing; so does the Bible. Demonstration and experience teach lessons in the reality of God which cannot be learned so effectively in any other way.

4. We do not attempt to tell all that God is or all that God has done or can do; neither does the Bible. "Greater works shall ye do."  The revelation and understanding of God continues to grow down through the ages. Within the Bible itself we find men's ideas of God expanding and growing more spiritual and more refined. Our ideas of God continue to expand and grow, though the last page of our Bible was written over 1800 years ago. Therefore, you will find Unity sometimes describes God in terms not found in the Bible. This does not mean that we differ from the Bible in spirit or in essence. It simply means that language, philosophy, and science are constantly growing and changing. Therefore, in order to preserve that original intent of Bible writers, we must speak in terms that make sense to modem man. Below is a partial list of names for God commonly used in metaphysical writing, with brief annotations as to origin or meaning.

Divine Mind: Infinite, immortal, invisible, loving intelligence.

Superconscious Mind: That part of our own being which is an exact replica of the nature and qualities of God.

Universal Mind: Cosmic intelligence; the God-thinking that exists everywhere, and maybe experienced anywhere.

Spirit: Found in Genesis 1 and John 1 -- God as the Conscious Life-Principle which is everywhere present and active; the Creative Activity of Conscious Good: the inspiration or "wonderpart" of all reality.

Father: So called by Jesus to indicate a loving nearness of Divine Mind which becomes a personal relationship with the infinite.

Creator: God in us but greater than we; God is "all that we are, and more!"

I Am: The name of God revealed to Moses. showing that God is Pure Being, causing a. things. but Himself having no cause.

The Christ Within: Paul's description of the realized presence of Divine Mind as both a Pattern and a Power; the liberating, transforming inner reality.

The Father in Me: Jesus way of saying the unseen power and presence in His life was neither environment nor heredity, but only God, always!

Our statement of Fundamentals (which is not a creed, but a summary of the working hypotheses of the science of the Spirit) begins with the bold, bare proposition that GOD IS ALL. We often say that God is "in everything and everyone." We need to understand that this does not mean that God is somehow bottled up inside, while the outside is something other than God. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that God manifests or exists as everything and everyone, and the only real form and substance of anything is the presence of God.

My name is John: "John" is really simply the name we give to that part of God which is present wherever I appear.  l am not all there is of God, yet all there is of God is present wherever l am, and I can "prove" or express this as my understanding of it increases.  And everyone else can do the same!

Developing spiritual understanding includes the retraining of our reasoning processes, so that we do not automatically assume that what our physical senses report is true. After all, the sun never "sets," though our physical senses tell us every day that it does! Now we must learn to think from the platform that "God, the Good, is all there is." Myrtle Fillmore says, "We must learn to trust the logic of truth." As we practice this way of thinking, we begin to see that all that we have named evil is either a misuse or a misinterpretation of the Good. Jam is good, carpets are good; but jam on the carpet is misplaced good, which we have been in the habit of calling evil.

What germs? Someone once asked a prominent Truth teacher, "Do you believe in germs" She replied, "I do not believe that there are any disease germs." She meant that the germ in and of itself is a form or expression of life (which is good); and if that germ becomes a factor in our dis-ease or discomfort, it is because we have allowed two good things (germ bodies and human bodies) to come into a wrong relationship.

God is free, and He made man free so that he could grow through the use of his freedom. Since man is still learning how to use his freedom. he sometimes makes unwise use of it. which results in suffering for himself and/or for others. But even mans most serious misuse of his freedom and the results thereof are SUBJECT TO THE DIVINE LAW OF ADJUSTMENT, which will be discussed in the next lesson.

An increasing number of scientists and philosophers are coming to accept the proposition that atomic structures of nature also have a degree of freedom. If so, then decisions are being made on a sub-human level (earth, sea, air) which would go far to explain in appearance of "natural disasters" such as earthquakes, typhoons, hurricanes, and floods. However, God gave to man the dominion to rule all subhuman creation. If human disaster occurs through the irresponsible subhuman creation, it only means that man is still learning the Truth about his environment and has not yet learned enough to exercise all his God-given power to control it.

In any and all events there is no need for the conscious child of God to suffer loss, injury, or calamity of any kind unless he chooses to do so for the growth of his own understanding or for the understanding of others.

To all appearances, the Truth student may seem to suffer the same lot in life as others. To understand this, we need to understand these things:
(1) He may have neglected to do according to all that he knew;
(2) What is really happening to us at any tune is what happens within our thoughts, not the occurrence of outer change; therefore we rarely actually know what is happening "to" (within) another person, and cannot judge;
(3) The Truth student is so aware of the eternal-ness of Life, that he knows every temporary loss or lack will be compensated; he is not even always concerned about just when -- he simply knows that he has never "lost" anything but that God will more than made up for it at exactly the best time.

So we continue to stand firmly on our initial premise: GOD IS ALL. Outer appearances may contradict this, but cannot change it. If God sometimes wears a repelling mask, we remain in confident contact with the Real Being behind the mask of visible circumstances

Our statement of Fundamentals continues: "God is all, both invisible and visible." Some people are quite ready to agree that the invisible, spiritual level of life is all Good, but are not prepared to agree that the visible realm is equally divine. However, the principle of consistence requires that we reason in this way:

Every visible thing is an expression of some invisible idea: God as All, is the only Mind, and the only source of ideas: therefore, every visible thing is some expression of the Mind of God.

Three other terms, reflected in the Statement of Fundamentals, are commonly used in Unity teaching to describe the nature of God:

Omnipresence -- The MIND-Presence of God-Presence everywhere:
Omnipotence -- All the Power there is, the only real Power;
Omniscience -- All the Knowing there is, the only true knowing.

Next Chapter is: Class 3       Previous Section was:  Class 1

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