Category Archives: Spirit

THE IMPORTANCE OF MEDITATION, PART I

February 26, 2014 #lovingfactor 1 Comment

Meditation is the most important way to experience God.

The only way to silence our voices – both within and without – and connect with the divine everywhere present is to be still. In the stillness, we realize the presence of God expressing as us.

“Who are we,” you might ask, “to commune with the creator of heaven and earth?” We are God’s image as wisdom and God’s likeness as love: an amazing creation of God expressing as us.

Each time we breathe, we are given a gift to perceive God in a new way.

Meditation is the silence that we breathe God in and the moment in which we know that we are God.

We are one with the same creative consciousness that breathed as us the breath of life, endlessly expressing as one.

Without meditation, we forget we are more than the bodies that give shelter to Spirit. We are more than the body temples that dance in the soul.

The Psalmist said the “meditation of my heart shall give understanding.” (Psalm 49:3)

Understanding does not merely come through endless expressions of source everywhere present, it comes from source itself.

We can do a holy dance and pray loudly all day, but until we surrender to the silence, we cannot hear God.

But when we meditate, we transcend the physical realm and reconnect with the great power that is always available to us. God is here. God is inside each pause. God is on the back of dreams.

God is in the channel re-opened. God is between the cracks of every prayer. God is the incredible moment when we forget both words and thoughts.

Meditation is home no matter where we are. Meditation is the open door where all that we have sought lies waiting.

The truth is that we don’t meditate enough. We slow down long enough, and go within further enough, and get quiet long enough, and listen deeply enough,
and surrender well enough to participate in God’s meditation as us.

Meditation aligns us with the spiritual energies that support our co-creative work of love, peace and liberty for all.

Perfect divine opportunity energizes us. Perfect divine order guides us. Perfect divine abundance blesses us.

Meditation is the place where perfect divine miracles await us.

Spirit

WHAT IS “GOD IS A BROWN GIRL TOO”?

September 29, 2013 #lovingfactor Leave a comment

For our 100^th blog, I decided to re-visit the genesis of God is a Brown Girl Too. God is a Brown Girl Too is a spiritual movement that was born when I was in seminary and the Holy Spirit revealed to me that one aspect of my calling was to uplift the divine nature of women and girls of color everywhere. This movement is called God is a Brown Girl Too because it is not limited to Africa but to brown women and girls worldwide. Why? Because we have been marginalized, demonized and denigrated throughout history and need to reconstruct our understanding of Spirit as us – not as some old white man who could care less about us. We need to recapture the beauty, grace and power of our divine birthright.

God as Mother, Father, Creator of us all is always present as us all, always loving, always continuing to express as us.

The Brown Girl represents the daughter of all beginnings. Genetic studies and fossil evidence show that humans in Africa, between 200,000 and 150,000 years ago. Based on our knowledge to date, our foremothers left Africa between 125,000 and 60,000 years ago, and that over time these humans replaced earlier human populations such as Neanderthals. And yet, because those who re-wrote history and science and religion left us obscured, worthless, shameful, or – at best – comely, we fail to realize who we really are: made in the image and likeness of the creator of all.

God is a Brown Girl Too exercises the power that we all have to re-claim our legacy as God’s image and likeness for ourselves.

Womanist Alice Walker understood the significance of Brown Girl-ology when she wrote The Color Purple. Celie is the downtrodden Spirit within, who does not find her fullest expression in life until she finds out that God is not a man – but is everything, even the color purple! Shug Avery sings, when you feel the truth and love what you feel, you have found God. Understanding our Oneness with the heart and purpose of the Brown Girl, who merely sits in the shadows of scripture, dances on the edge of time, nonexistent or irrelevant to most – is a challenge worth pursuing because it is by seeing beyond her face-lessness, name-lessness and voice-lessness that we find ourselves.

People from all races, religions, nationalities, and cultures flock to hear the Brown Girl’s voice in The Color Purple on Broadway and to witness her story of realizing that God is within her and everyone else – not merely to be entertained but because there is a ministry in her message.

When I arrived at New York Theological Seminary, I met Drs. Delores Williams and Anne Elliott, in a course that I took on the Spiritual Traditions of Nineteenth Century African American Women. These two womanist theologians taught me that theology is not just how the white man sees God – but how we each walk and talk with God; that African American women have a special relationship with Jesus; that we are moved by the Holy Spirit in a particular way; that we fail to question the messages that we embrace as gospel – like the rape of the slave girl Hagar at the bidding of Sarah; that black women through time have defied death and slavery to bring the word of God; that we have a heritage which not only anoints us with salvation but also with hope.

Drs. Williams and Elliott laid part of the foundation for the beginning of this discourse with acknowledgement of how God expresses as me, along with my background in Unity.

Unity is a nondenominational faith, which teaches that there is no separation between the human spirit and God: that in this eternal Oneness, the “I AM”, we are a living expression of God. Some may find this heretical or blasphemous, but in 2 Corinthians 6:16, the Bible teaches us that “God hath said I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and will be their God.” In 1 Corinthians 3:16, Paul said “Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you.” He said that “we live and move, and have our being” in God (Acts 17:28).

In Romans 8:9, the biblical witness said “Ye are not the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you.” In John 10:34-35, Jesus said, “it is not written in your law, I said, ye are Gods.” In John 14:12, Jesus said “He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do.” These scriptures and similar passages form the foundation for the church that Spirit formed through me: SPIRITMUV. SPIRITMUV is the spiritual birthplace for God is a Brown Girl Too.

Like Unity, SPIRITMUV teaches that we have the same consciousness that Jesus Christ had, “Christ Consciousness.” Therefore, it is imperative for us to seek and embrace the kingdom in our lives through our conscious connection with the Spirit of God: in every word that we speak, every vision that we have, every breath that we breathe, every inch of space that we take up. God dwells within us and does not depart from us. We are the temple of God and we live and move and have our being in God. We are not only flesh but also Spirit; there is no separation between us and God.

In 1997, when I was recuperating from surgery, I began to write a collection of poetry called “Plain Brown Girl,” thinking not only about myself but about all black women, asking who is there to tend our wounds and comfort us when we are healing. The Brown Girl spoke through me through centuries, reminding me of that she is the face of God. She expressed herself as a Brown Girl partly because of the limitations of the use of the word “black” to embrace people who are not only the most beautiful deepest, darkest brown but are other endless shades of beautiful brown.

Brown also embraces cultures that do not fall under the “black” rubric – many Asians, Hispanics and Latinos and Native Americans whose darker color is indigenous to their land but no different than all of the darker sisters who populate this world and have been marginalized and condemned as always less than.

Brown Girl-ology is the daughter of womanist theology, born to fashion a God from a past that was before history; courageous enough to create her own myths; inventive enough to question the founding fathers of a faith that is largely prejudiced and racist and sexist; daring enough to remember God as Mother, as well as Father; prophetic enough to celebrate Spirit as herself rather than as a God that does not embrace her image and likeness. We embrace the Spirit in us through the power of community.

To date, there are been five retreats: the Opening to Consciousness Retreat in 2009; the Awakening to Love Retreat in 2010; the Creating Outside the Box Retreat in 2011; the Tell a New Story Retreat in 2012; and the Hope of Glory Retreat in 2013 aboard the Carnival Glory Cruise Ship to Nova Scotia. In 2014, we will have the Reclaiming the Vortex Retreat in Sedona, Arizona.

We are grateful for those of you who have joined us on these retreats as they cannot exist without you.

We look forward to you joining us on future retreats. We also invite you to celebrate yourself and become more aware of Spirit expressing as you by attending our Sunday Worth-Ship Services at the Unity Center of New York City, at 2:30 PM, at 213 West 58^th Street, near Broadway.

We meet in the Upper Room to meditate, pray, teach, sing, grow, listen, embrace, and uplift the divine within.

Hope you can help keep our community strong by supporting the you in us.

Much love and many blessings on the path,

Reverend Cecilia Loving

Spirit

THE BEGINNING AND END OF YOUR LOVE STORY by Cecilia B. Loving

February 18, 2013 #lovingfactor Leave a comment

Marlon and I are huge romantics.
We enjoy every love story.
We have probably memorized the script to Pride and Prejudice.
We are huge fans of Masterpiece Theater, especially the award-winning Downton Abbey series:
we couldn’t wait for Mr. Bates to join his beloved Anna.
We have enjoyed Enchanted April countless times and have seen it on stage and screen.
If Love Jones or Princess Bride is on, there’s no getting Marlon to budge;
if Daddy’s Little Girls or Love Holiday is on, there’s no getting me to budge.
The red roses, the Godivas (especially those chocolate-covered Oreos)
and the Cupcake Prosecco are plentiful.
But we both realize that the beginning and end of our love story
is not about romance.

Love is Spirit.
Whether in life or death, love is the eternal energy
that connects us, draws us, manifests us, and expresses as us forever.

Love never fails. Love is not merely flesh but is the most powerful energy there is. There is a reason why the Biblical witness John wrote in his letters that love never fails because love is God.

1 John 1:5 says “God is light”: a light that purifies us – as love does – from all sins.

This is not worldly love, as 1 John 2:15 indicates, not lust of the flesh or egotistical pride but the eternal love of Spirit. This is not a fleeting love, a seasonal love – or a love that dissolves or fades like the petals of a rose or melts like chocolates – but a love never, ever changes. We are required to love – not with words or speech but with action and truth (1 John 3:18).

Love never fails because “love comes from God” (1 John 4:7). As John says, “[w]hoever does not know love does not know God” because God is not an engagement or a boyfriend or a girlfriend or a date or a promise or a marriage or a desire – God is the divine in us, the truth as us, the infinite, inexhaustible good in us. “God is love” (1 John 4:8), a love that can never ever fail.

We don’t need to love for love because love is here – living in us (1 John 4:12).

“There is no fear in love,” no hatred, no jealousy, no anger, no resentment, no despair, no failure because perfect love – the love of Spirit – cannot, does not and will not fail.

No matter what challenge you have before you, love will take care of it. No matter what you perceive as the enemy, love will remove it. No matter what you fear, love will turn it on its head and make it serve – rather than harm you, protect rather than hurt you, prosper rather than rob you.

Love will turn bitterness into support. Love will turn catastrophe into success. Love will turn the enemies into friends. Love will wrap you in a circle of power so protective that those who thought they meant you no good will succumb to your greatness or distance themselves so completely they no longer remember who you are.

No matter what the situation, what the circumstance, what the complication, love will heal you, love will lift you, love will shield you, love will guide you, love will direct you, love will strengthen you, love will feed you, love will completely re-order your affairs because love cannot and will not fail.

As I say in the book God is a Brown Girl Too, on page 44, “You are the beginning and end of your love story”: a story that will bless you, heal you, prosper you, and never, ever fail.

Spirit

DON’T FORGET TO REGISTER

February 29, 2012 #lovingfactor Leave a comment

TAKE ADVANTAGE OF THIS WEEK, THIS DAY, THIS MOMENT — THERE WILL NEVER BE ANOTHER ONE LIKE IT

During this Lenten Season, we often talk about what we are going to sacrifice — the chocolates that we are going to give up; the alcohol that we are going to refrain from drinking; the something — anything in the material world that we are going to deprive ourselves of in order to establish our connection to God. But the only thing that we really have to do in order to practice the presence of the divine in our lives is what Jesus taught us, and that is to seek first the Kingdom of God. When we get still — even for a moment and re-connect with the loving energy of the Holy Spirit, everything else falls into place. We attain the serenity, peace, harmony, focus, and renewal that we need to be our best.

Once again, we will slow down and listen to the divine within at the GOD IS A BROWN GIRL TOO Retreat at the Mariandale Retreat Center in Ossining, New York, during the weekend of April 20-22. This year’s theme is TELL A NEW STORY and focuses on how we can go within, listen to what God tells us to do, and re-create ourselves. THIS WEEK IS THE ONLY WEEK THAT YOU CAN ATTEND THE RETREAT FOR HALF PRICE: $225 per person for the entire weekend. This Saturday, March 3, the price will go up again. To register and learn more about the retreat schedule, go to www.godisabrowngirltoo.webs.com. For this week only, there is a PayPal link for this special price. You can also purchase the God is a Brown Girl Too book on the website and begin the journey of finding the Kingdom of God in yourself.

In the interim, join SPIRITMUV every Sunday, at 2:30 PM, at the Unity Center of NYC, located at 213 W. 58th Street, near Columbus Circle.

Spirit

THE FATHER IN US By Cecilia B. Loving

June 18, 2011 #lovingfactor Leave a comment

In the book, God is a Brown Girl Too, the Father speaks in and as the Brown Girl.

Listen as God speaks through a black woman:

The Psalmist says, “the Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want.” How many times have you read that passage from the 23rd Psalm and never paid attention to its meaning? This single line is one of the most powerful affirmations that there is. It means that I am your Shepherd. It means that the divine vibrations that I express as you, the indwelling Christ consciousness in which you are reborn, the Holy Spirit — which lives in you, guides you, comforts you, and teaches you, is your Shepherd. It means that I am always present, always constant, always watching over you, always making sure that you are protected, that you are fed, that no danger or harm comes near you. But most importantly, it means that because you live and move and have your being in infinite source, you have everything that you need. It means that there is no limit to my good.

I am always blessing you, always watching over you, always embracing you, always empowering you. You need to learn to see beyond your physical eyes. I am the substance, the catalyst, the creativity from which all life springs and all ideas evolve. You cannot even begin to imagine my greatness and the abundance of my Kingdom that is always available to you.

I am greater than miracles. I am greater than desire. Your difficulties arise when you believe that you are separate from the power that I give you. Pray with me. Meditate with me. Sit with me. And I will bless you with the opportunities that you need, the people who will help you, and the divine ideas that will bless you.

I am your Shepherd, providing you with the ability to create good for not only yourself but to be a constant blessing, inspiration, and resource to others. Spirit is always leading you to the pasture of opportunity. . . if you listen.

If you need a teacher, I am there. If you need a client, I will send them. If you need an answer, I will give it. If you need discernment, I will shepherd you through what you need to do. No matter what you are up against, no matter what the appearances look like, no matter what the threat — it better beware because I am with you: the Good Shepherd, the Infinite Power, the Almighty, the One who says that the battle is mine, the One who says touch not my anointed and do my prophets no harm, the One who teaches that all you have to do is believe.

Your weapon is your faith. I have a rod and a staff that you can lean on: the right person who just shows up and says, I will do this for you, the closed sign doors that just open, the towering wall that is removed, the difficult passage that opens a way out of no way.

I will bless you from the top of your heads to the bottom of your feet. The good will flow to you from so many different directions that you cannot even begin to imagine what will be in store for you.

The highways and the byways will just pour, rain down blessings on you because — as the song goes — your “God is a good God!”

When we realize that the Father is in us, we know that we have everything we need.

This entry is an excerpt from the book God is a Brown Girl Too, which can be purchased on www.godisabrowngirltoo.webs.com or from www.amazon.com.

Nothing may be used from this blog, or any other blog, without Ms. Loving’s written permission.

Reverend Loving is the spiritual leader of SPIRITMUV: Transforming lives one soul at a time.
Learn more at www.spiritmuv.com. Follow her blog at http://www.spiritmuv.wordpress.com.

Services are held every Sunday from 2:30 PM to 3:30 PM, at 213 West 58th Street, at the Unity Center in NYC.

Spirit

SEE WITH A NEW LIGHT By Cecilia Loving

June 7, 2011 #lovingfactor Leave a comment

This is an excerpt from the book GOD IS A BROWN GIRL TOO, available on the God is a Brown Girl Too website, Amazon and wherever books are sold.

Here God speaks as a black woman — Listen!

She sings melodies from psalms
only she can hum,
Galilee on her tongue.
speaking from that city on a hill,
singing “this ‘lil light of mine —
I’m gon’ let it shine.”

***

Many of you have been telling the same stories for so long that you no longer know truth from fiction. By that I mean, you have no idea who you really are versus the you were in the past. The “you” who has been hurt, abused, neglected, rejected, or condemned has been given a starring role in your life story, while you have taken a back seat. You will never be able to see me, if you keep holding up the past to impair your vision of all who you are. The only way you are going to see me reflected in your image and likeness is to tell a new story. Throw away the mess you’ve been wading in forever and start looking at yourself with a new light.

You are not who you were yesterday. Let me say that again, the you who just opened this book is not the “you” who did all of the things that you believe held you back from accomplishing your goals. You are different; you are reborn; you are free. Begin to see yourself with a new light.

Read the Book of Matthew, Chapter 6, Verse 22. It says that “The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.” It is providing you with a new vision for seeing all of the circumstances and people that I have placed before you in this life. The things in the flesh are around you but they are not of you. I am the only thing that matters. Look only to me. Seek first my kingdom. Wait upon me.

If you see with a new light, you will know that I am in the midst of everything and everyone, and you will be able to discern my presence. But you can’t have it both ways. You can’t see me half the time and get stuck in a rut the other time. Your eye must be single and focused on me. Otherwise, you will multiply your errors, lose your perspective, and do foolish things. You will say what you later regret. You will waste time that could have been well spent in a more focused, productive, enjoyable fashion. You will act out of negative emotions rather than with confidence and purpose.

When you fail to keep your focus on Spirit, you will find yourselves like that beggar on the roadside — blinded by your lack of faith. Remember what Jesus told the blind man? Jesus said your faith has made you whole. The blind man’s faith in me had made him see. If your eye is single, your whole body shall be full of light. But if you are not centered in my light, your direction, your intuition, our divine compass will be off, and you will find yourselves stumbling in the darkness. Without my light, it’s difficult to recreate a new story for yourself because you cannot see who you really are.

Spirit is the light that unifies you in consciousness and centers you in peace, clarity, creativity, joy and abundance. Only when you are centered in me do you realize your oneness with the entire universe. If you achieve this going forward, you will not be limited the way that you were in the past. You will realize that the heartache or the pain that you experienced can be released and you can stop re-living it again and begin to recreate who you want to be rather than who you used to be.

One way of centering in my presence is through the third eye, which can be accessed by focusing on the center of your forehead. The pineal gland — located in the brain behind the eyes — is said to be the physical entry of spiritual enlightenment, and through that illumination, it is also known as the gateway to faith. It is the home of higher consciousness, healing power, and psychic perception. Some say that this is the place where you see God face-to-face. When you practice looking deeply into your third eye, you will behold my light emanating from infinite source, what many of you call a cosmic vibration. When you are centered in this divine light, you can be even more open to my presence — beyond words and thoughts. When you focus your spiritual eye, your inner eye, your third eye on my presence, your entire being — mind, body and soul — will be filled with light. This is the energy and the concentration that will also build and develop your faith — so that you don’t have to spend a long period in tapping in or tuning in to me.

In our connection, you will feel the super-consciousness of absolute good and trust that whatever you ask for has already manifested. With a single eye directed to divine source, you will be catapulted beyond asking to believing that whatever you ask for, you receive. You will be able to walk by faith in me, which is more important than mere physical sight.

Copyrighted 2011 by Cecilia B. Loving
All Rights Reserved.
Nothing on this blog can be used without the author’s written permission.

Spirit

GOD IS BLESSING US RIGHT NOW By Cecilia Loving

April 28, 2011 #lovingfactor 1 Comment

Right now, in this very instant, God is blessing us with so much good, so much joy, so much love, so much abundance, so much success, so much wisdom — that we cannot even begin to imagine it. Right now, right here, we are living, moving and having our being in unlimited source, infinite possibility and inexhaustible supply. Right now, we have the choice to move beyond the confines of fear, beyond the belief of lack, beyond the limitation of doubt to be the expression of God that we desire. So the real question is — what are we waiting for?

We are all guilty – at one time or another – of wanting to postpone our good for another day – perhaps after our knees get better, after the pain stops, when we get that new job, when we connect with a lasting soul mate, when we lose 50 lbs. But the truth is that God has never stopped blessing us. The only thing that blocks God’s blessings is our lack of receptivity to them.

We block the flow of God’s good with doubt. Doubt is that nagging
suspicion that God seems too good to be true. Doubt is that feeling deep in our hearts that we really won’t succeed. Doubt is that feeling that the illusion of the barriers that we have placed around ourselves will confine us forever. But we create the insurmountable mountains that we see before us. The things that we believe limit us are really an illusion.

God, however, is so extraordinary that these illusions bless us as well. Even doubt serves to teach us the difference between what is false and what is real. What is real is not our past – it’s gone, or our future – it’s awaiting our creative energy. What is real is the sacredness of each present moment. What is real is our oneness here and now – with the pure potential of Absolute Good. It’s so good that it’s hard for us to name it. We call it God. We call it Love. We call it Spirit. We call it the Holy Ghost – but what it really means is that right now – we have all that we need. We have an Inexhaustible, Infinite Power that breathes as us – a power that creates as us in each moment.

Meister Eckhart, a 13^th century mystic, said “There is no greater obstacle to God than time.” We don’t need to wait for Jesus – as Jesus himself taught – I am in the Father, and you are in me, and I am in you (John 14:20). We don’t need to wait for the Holy Spirit. Jesus taught us that the Holy Spirit lives in us forever as our counselor, our teacher and our guide (John
14:16-18). We don’t need to wait until we get to heaven because Jesus taught that right here, right now — the Kingdom of Heaven – the Kingdom of God — is in us (Luke 17:21).

Doubt should be like a companion that we have outgrown. That means that we have to bless the doubt that tries to remain in the cracks and crevices of our lives and release it because it has served its purpose. It taught us to believe in God more than ever. Doubt was simply part of the wrapping that we had to remove in order to see the gifts that await us.

In the space where doubt used to be, we can welcome a new energy of excitement. We can feel a new commitment rushing in – filling us with new understanding, new compassion, new direction, new hope, new love, and brand new creativity. In the moment that we release doubt, we can be filled with the truth that what we ask for – we already have. We really are in the endless stream of God’s good. Manna really does pour into our life each moment. The door of God’s good really does open for the accomplishment of our deepest desires. We really are blessed. When we tear off the wrapper of doubt and release worry to the wind, we begin to see the glimmer of a diamond in the rough – that glows around our souls with new hope. We begin to know that we are more radiant than we ever imagined. We open our eyes and see that God really is here.

We don’t worry about mistakes. We don’t worry about failure. We know that we are healed. We surpass the expected. We stop being afraid to walk the water. We realize that we can multiply fish and bread. We realize that we can call it all good. Nothing but good is paved on the road before us. Doubt was just a stepping stone. Overcoming our fears just pushed us further along the path. The challenges that we faced merely served to make us open the doors to our good.

I empty my heart of doubt today so that I can dance to the edge of pure potential right now, so that I can fly with the wings of new hope. I lay my burdens down by the riverside. I study war no more. For the first time, I cross over Jordan, and I get to the other side because I know that God is blessing me right now.

JOIN US THIS SUNDAY AT 2:30 p.m. FOR THE NEXT PART OF OUR “WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR?” SERIES AT SPIRITMUV, 213 WEST 58TH STREET (AT THE UNITY CENTER OF NYC)
NEAR BROADWAY, NEW YORK, NEW YORK.
SPIRITMUV IS A NONDENOMINATIONAL COMMUNITY OF SPIRITUAL ENLIGHTENMENT, MEDITATION AND PRAYER. WE MEET EACH SUNDAY WITH A SINCERE HEART AND A WARM EMBRACE OF LOVE, LIGHT AND CREATIVE CENTERING.

Spirit

Leap and I Will Catch You By Cecilia Loving

March 5, 2011 #lovingfactor 3 Comments

You are the breath of the wind.
Your freedom is inside your soul.
You leap in and out of spaces wearing the songs of endless creations.
You cannot be measured, defined or contained.
Your season is here.
***

You are enough — right where you are. You are beautiful enough. You are rich enough. You are creative enough. You are wise enough. You are good enough. You don’t have to find your so-called “soul mate“: I AM your soul mate. Nothing in the external world completes you. Your job doesn’t complete you. It is but one of many paths to give and grow in consciousness. Your cars don’t complete you. Your clothes, bags, shoes don’t complete you. Your titles don’t complete you, nor do the degrees, nor do the trophies of life that you collect. When you let go of all of the stuff that you use to validate who you are, you will begin to see that your mission, your calling, your deepest desire will always be enough to sustain you. All you have to do is leap, and I will be there to catch you.

I AM your season. I am not based on the economy. Quit shaking from the illusion of instability. I am the only stable force that there is.

Release the material. Be courageous enough to recreate your life with a new consciousness. You are emerging from old wine skins imply because they can no longer contain you. You are new wine.

Your new wine is bold, unrestricted, imaginative and daring enough to walk, dance, step, leap beyond the person that you thought you were to express the infinite possibility that I AM calling you to be. You have not yet begun to taste the joy that my Spirit is blessing you with, the good that I long to unfold through you, the light that the universe needs to shine as you.

Your new wine pushes you outside of complacency — to unfold a new vision — one that no longer compares you to others but realizes that I made each one of you wonderful, unique beings, blessed with the abundance of inexhaustible supply.

This is your season. I am calling you to let go of everything and everyone, to leave the mediocre, the mundane and the material, and to stand fully and completely as you are — aware of your greatness. When you are in tune to me expressing as you, you will find yourself above the fray. Your gifts and

talents will be expressed in greater ways than you can yet imagine. You will give more. You will be better. You will know that you are one with a power that is stronger than anything in the physical realm. This awareness is the only thing that you need for wings. You are the blessing that you seek.

Even if you feel pressed, pushed against the wall, blinded by the debt of defeat, now is not the time to fear, or worry, or wallow; now is the time to be the children of God, the heirs to the throne, the greatness that you are. Now is the time to know within every aspect of your being that you are made in my image and likeness, and that right where you are standing is holy ground.

Right in your soul is a love without boundaries, a love that beckons you to experience who you really are instead of who you used to be.

You may be forced to discard old jobs, old conditions, old circumstances, old relationships, old places, old doubts. But your release of the old is merely allowing you to take a leap to new heights.

You don’t need a big space to take off from. All you need is the space in your heart to trust that I am not simply inside of your prayers. I am inside of all that is –– appearing in the vortex of your clasped hands.

I am the air. I am the sky. I am your wings. All you have to do is leap, and I will carry you the rest of the way.

Learn more about God is a Brown Girl Too at www.godisabrowngirltoo.webs.com.

Spirit

WE NEED TO CLAIM GOD FOR OURSELVES By Cecilia Loving

March 2, 2011 #lovingfactor Leave a comment

I finally moved myself out of the way and let Spirit finish God is a Brown Girl Too through me. I was surprised by the outcome. It was not what I expected Spirit to do. I thought that “I” was supposed to narrate the book. But God pushed me aside and told “me” to shut up. Instead of “me” reading chapter and verse, or some other character from the spiritual ethers speaking, God speaks directly through the souls of women of color. God is our voice. It should come as no surprise that God doesn’t speak in monologues or sermons. God speaking as a brown girl does not speak through the belts and suspenders of tradition but as bold new teachings, mythical scrolls and poetry. “Move beyond the sound where your voice asks God, and go to the space where your soul listens,” God tells women of color everywhere.

We need to believe in ourselves again, rather than what someone else says, or what someone else thinks, or what someone else does. We, as temples of a living God, must begin again to see beyond traditions that marginalize and denigrate us. We need to claim God for ourselves. If we don’t, we will always think of ourselves as less than, as unworthy, as scorned. We have been denigrated for long, despised for so long, marginalized for so long that if we don’t embrace our divinity – that kingdom of God that Jesus says is within us – we will never receive the salvation that we need for true deliverance.

“This is not a story,” the book begins. “This is the truth. This is how we glue the pieces back together that have fallen from our center of spiritual oneness. This is how we re-member ourselves. This is how we get back on our feet. This is how we believe again.”

The following is an excerpt from God is a Brown Girl Too, on love, from a chapter entitled “Love with a New Heart.”

I bless you with the power of regenerating love and by so doing, I ask that you love with every aspect of your new heart. Your new heart does not carry condemnation. Your new heart is only filled with love and its presence and its power. With a new heart beating as me, you will breathe love as your breath, love as your energy, love as the me that you exude, radiating exquisite beauty.

Your new heart will remind you of who you are. Your true roots are not of a place or a people; they are the energy out of which you were formed and made –
and that energy is love. You are not limited; you can shape and mold and create out of anything that I give you.

Your new heart will not allow you to sit on the power that you are. That’s what is creating the shake-up that you are experiencing in the physical realm right
now. You have given your power away. Balance will not be restored until you love with a new heart – by using your ability to create, to manifest, to produce, to generate. The universe needs you.

I am not talking about romance. I am not talking about sex. I am not talking about the glitz and glamour of your exploitation of the gifts that I have given you. I am talking about the deep penetrating love that you must have for yourself, for your proper place in my kingdom. All of my children must stand hand-in-hand, side-by-side in the deliverance of this world. Only the harmony that you create will calm the raging seas and stop the global shifts, not to mention the pointless wars, the hunger, the health epidemics and the despair.

You have become complacent consumers – collectors of stuff – someone who just lives to purchase shoes and bags and designer wigs – forgetting your own callings. You have become lazy couch potatoes, zoned out internet surfers – greedy, selfish, and foolish enough to think that someone else should create for you and be loving for you – instead of tapping into the deepest powers of the universe that are always there – awaiting your instruction.

You are the love that you seek. You do exist to give without an agenda. Your love is secure. It has no need to scheme because it is not here to take – or to profit from anyone. Your love is here to give.

But you have forgotten who gave you birth. You have forgotten your parents. You have forgotten that the world around you in the flesh is an illusion because you really dwell in one place, and that is in my heart. You are not separate from the infinite force and inexhaustible source of creative energy that called you into being to express the love that I AM – everywhere present and emanating from every pore and every divine vibration and every spirit-infused idea that gives shape to you. How can you refrain from being anything less than the love that created you. When you emanate in the powerful energy of all that Love is and allow yourself to be its co-creative channel of good – it will open way to all that you need, and all that you want, and all that you desire. When you love with a new heart, you will always be filled with my good.

When you shine your light as Love, the love that you seek CANNOT be withheld from you. If someone is bothering you, send love their way and watch what happens. If you have an injury or an ailment, send love its way and watch what happens. If you have a desire or a dream or a goal, keep sending love its way and watch what happens. If you want a divine partner, send love to the universe and the right person will manifest for you. Love cannot withhold from you what you need. Withholding your good defies the very nature of all that love is; it cannot happen. The good that you seek through the power of love will always be radiated back to you. Love cannot help but attract the right people, situations and circumstances to you.

If you love with a new heart, one that doesn’t hold back, it will infuse you with a bliss that you have never felt before. Because you won’t hold back, neither will I.

I am grateful to unveil the book at this year’s God is a Brown Girl Too Retreat “Creating Outside the Box of Conventionality.” It is going to be held at the Mariandale Retreat Center, right outside NYC, during the weekend of April 1 -3, 2011. We are going to have a fabulous time, so I hope that you can join us during this three-day celebration of the divine in us on the peaceful pastures of the lovely paradise overlooking the Hudson River. For more information, go to
www.godisabrowngirltoo.webs.com. You can also pre-order the book there. Also stop by SPIRITMUV, www.spiritmuv.com, 213 West 58th Street in NYC, where we always uplift the God within — each Sunday from 2:30 PM to 3:30 PM.

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This is an excerpt from the book GOD IS A BROWN GIRL TOO, available on the God is a Brown Girl Too website, Amazon and wherever books are sold.

She sings melodies from psalms only she can hum, Galilee on her tongue. speaking from that city on a hill, singing “this ‘lil light of mine — I’m gon’ let it shine.”

***

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The Divine is Within Each and Everyone of Us

She sings melodies from psalms
only she can hum,
Galilee on her tongue.
speaking from that city on a hill,
singing “this ‘lil light of mine —
I’m gon’ let it shine.”