Tag Archives: Spirituality

SELF-EMPOWERMENT SESSION ONE: REDISCOVER YOUR TRUE SELF

July 11, 2014 #lovingfactor Leave a comment

Next Saturday, July 19, God is a Brown Girl Too will enjoy a virtual retreat via the phone, at 8:00 to 9:00 A.M. Just dial 567-314-3648; use pass code 48201.

Here is the excerpt from the God is a Brown Girl Too book that we will be discussing, which can be purchased from Amazon and Barnes and Noble, and wherever books are sold.

Re-Discover Your True Self

When you know that I am you,
and you are me –
you will begin to realize who God is.

***

Do you remember who I am? I am the Absolute Good that breathed you into being. I am the Divine Mind that gave you consciousness. I am the Endless Source that formed your soul. I am the Inexhaustible Supply that continues to feed you out of the eternal cosmos of the universe. Nothing came before me. I AM that I AM. I am the Creator here to remind you that my image and likeness is reflected as you. Creation is not something that happened and then stopped. Creation is something I did, and am still doing. Wherever there is creativity, there I am.

In order to know me in the Spirit, you will have to transcend the box of tradition in which you are locked. You will have to remove those strait-laced handcuffs of dependence, fear and shame. You will have to be bold enough to leave doctrine and diplomacy to embrace your own power. If you want to reclaim your life, acknowledging me – the Divine within – is not an option; it is a necessity. Men have so dominated your religion that most of you believe that I am an old white man.

Perhaps if you close your eyes and center your thoughts in a past that transcends the world as you know it, you can remember a creation that is older than European biblical tradition. Try to remember a beginning where ancient Africa was the Motherland of creation. Meditate on what Moses told the Israelites. He said “you forgot the God who gave you birth” (Deut. 32:18 NIV), or recall that Isaiah said God carried you since your birth (Isaiah 46:3). Imagine me from Hosea’s perspective, who said that I taught you to walk, that I healed you, that I lifted you like a child to my cheek and bent down to feed you (Hosea 11:3-4).

I cannot be limited to words, but you may prefer to call me Spirit. Like “Love,” Spirit is a term that you can use interchangeably with “God.” The elusive sound of Spirit will help you stop picturing a person with a long white beard. Picture me as you growing in all directions at once instead of a person with a long white beard. I am greater than you can imagine, comprised of everything that is. I am that point at which you find yourself. I am far greater than any pre-conceived notion of human sexuality or gender. If this is confusing, call me whatever you like. Call me “science” or “chance” or “coincidence” or “miracle.” I am everything that is.

Throughout time, the bodies of women have carried and delivered my souls, those fragments of me from now to eternity. I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last. These are my mountains and my valleys and my trees. This is my thunder and my rain and my river. You are all that I am. You cannot be limited, or minimized, or marginalized or demonized. You are my seed of life. Come and reclaim your rightful place as equal heirs to my throne.

True liberation of the oppressed, the imprisoned, the disenfranchised, the denigrated and the despised will only evolve as each individual evolves. It is up to each one of you to realize that you are more than your flesh, and to re-discover yourself as God. I am your liberation, your freedom through Spirit, and your connection to unconditional love. It is up to you to allow my light to glow in all of its magnificence as you. My beloved Jesus said “Í am the Light of the world” – but also that you are the light of the world. Let your light shine.

Through you, I teach, nurse, build, draw, sell, purchase, divine, uplift, heal, nanny, negotiate, arbitrate, lawyer, doctor, sweep, mop, clean, cook, pray, baptize, massage, water, write, dance, model, sing, invent, farm, design, birth, pastor and encourage – not only the hearts of the privileged few but of the entire world. I fight for freedom. I abolish apartheid, genocide, lynch mobs, gas ovens, prostitution, slavery. I lead protests, I die for justice and equality. I go to jail in order stand up for what I believe is right. I refuse to give up my seat. But I have not stopped killing and maiming and abusing and destroying because you have not. You have forgotten your true self worth. You have given up your power. You have yet to realize that you are my co-creator. You choose. You decide. You deliver. I can only do for you what I can do through you.

I send manna constantly, but you refuse to pick it up, or you still attempt to store it for yourselves. No matter how much you horde, you cannot be nurtured by it until you stop being afraid and be in my moment. You don’t need to be greedy, or jealous, or spiteful – especially of one another. Imagine how foolish that looks to me, knowing that you have all that you need. I am your way out of no way, your Jesus on the main line, your calm in the storm, your gangster, your hook-up, your constant supply. Stop judging by mere appearances. Remember that you really are God.

Step Into Your Greatness

When you stand on the edge of pure possibility,
you can use your prayer as the impetus to fly.

***

It is important for everyone to study and know the truth – especially you. Disregard those who believe that you have no right to God – for they want you to believe that you have no right to yourself. No woman or girl should be oppressed because of those who misinterpret the truth to mean that God is male and therefore, only men are God. I am inextricably part of each one of you in the same way that a breath is part of the wind. You, too, are the energy of life. There is no separation between all that I am and all that you are. Paul was right when he said that you live, move and have your being in God. You are my offspring (Acts 17:28).

All of you who see me in Jesus should be aware that Jesus acknowledged me in you when he said “I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you” (John 14:20). Jesus said that the “kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:21). Jesus not only said I and the Father are One, he also said, “you are gods” (John 10:34). This is called oneness. This means that there is no separation between you and Spirit. This means that your greatness is you waiting for you to express the Absolute Good that you are.

Feel me at the bottom of your feet. I am stepping through divine vibrations that I am sending from the tip of your toes up your muscles and bones –through your veins and glands – to the top of your head. I am always in your midst as your teacher, your companion and your guide. I always direct you, move you, lead you, speak to you, create through you, act through you, dance through you, and sing through you. I am always there, always here, always now.

I sing“Jesus loves me this I know” because it is Jesus whose teachings have taught many to step into their greatness. Jesus is the perfect manifestation of Spirit in creation. Jesus is the divine idea of God fully expressed as humanity. There is nothing like the blood of Jesus. But focus less on his crucifixion and more on his resurrection. Jesus has never stopped reminding Brown Girls everywhere that you will do “even greater things” than him (John 14:12). Eat those words with as much joy as you would a trip to Red Lobster, and let them slither off your tongue like those hot cheese biscuits.

Christ is not a person. Christ is the salvation, the stature that Jesus attained to show you that God dwells in all humanity. Paul said “Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Col. 1:27), teaching you that Spirit is your birthright.

I sing, “Jesus on the main line, tell ’em what you want.” But Jesus does not merely teach you to ask for what you want. He commands that you do so – commands that you be in the right consciousness to receive it. Jesus is teaching you to step into the kingdom of God that is within you, and know that all else – every single detail of my good will be added to you (Matt. 6:31-33).

Believe in Yourself

STEP INTO YOUR GREATNESS

April 16, 2014 #lovingfactor Leave a comment

When you stand on the edge of pure possibility,
you can use your prayer as the impetus to fly.

***

an excerpt from the book God is a Brown Girl Too, where God speaks as us to us, from the kingdom within . . .

“I sing“Jesus loves me this I know” because it is Jesus whose teachings have taught many to step into their greatness. Jesus is the perfect manifestation of Spirit in creation. Jesus is the divine idea of God fully expressed as humanity. There is nothing like the blood of Jesus.

But focus less on his crucifixion and more on his resurrection.

Jesus has never stopped reminding Brown Girls everywhere that you will do “even greater things” than him (John 14:12).

Eat those words with as much joy as you would a trip to Red Lobster, and let them slither off your tongue like those hot cheese biscuits.”

Christ is not a person.

Christ is the salvation, the stature that Jesus attained to show you that God dwells in all humanity.

Paul said “Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Col. 1:27), teaching you that Spirit is your birthright.

I sing, “Jesus on the main line, tell ’em what you want.”

But Jesus does not merely teach you to ask for what you want. He commands that you do so — commands that you be in the right consciousness to receive it. Jesus is teaching you to step into the kingdom of God that is within you, and know that all else — every single detail of my good will be added to you (Matt. 6:31-33).

I sing “Yes, Jesus loves me, yes, Jesus loves me” because Jesus taught you that if you don’t have the good sense to ask in your own name, ask in his. He said that he will serve as your proxy and your healer and your friend.

But he taught you these things so that eventually you would become wise enough to touch the hem of your own garment.

There is fish and bread for you to multiply. There are oceans for you to walk.

There are dead among you who need to be raised. There are stones that need to be redeemed from accusers.

There are wellsprings of living water to drink. But I need you to stand up my daughter — in a consciousness that realizes you have whatever it takes. You will never be successful if you do not grasp the unlimited power that I am as you. I don’t care about your weave, your Gucci, your rock or the glitter of your rims — even your millions don’t matter.

Only when you awaken to your true self do you step into your greatness.

It is important for everyone to study and know the truth — especially you. Disregard those who believe that you have no right to God — for they want you to believe that you have no right to yourself.

No woman or girl should be oppressed because of those who misinterpret the truth to mean that God is male and therefore, only men are God. I am inextricably part of each one of you in the same way that a breath is part of the wind.

You, too, are the energy of life. There is no separation between all that I am and all that you are. Paul was right when he said that you live, move and have your being in God. You are my offspring (Acts 17:28).

Jesus not only said I and the Father are One, he also said, “you are gods” (John 10:34).

This is called oneness.

This means that there is no separation between you and Spirit.

This means that your greatness is you waiting for you to express the Absolute Good that you are.

Feel me at the bottom of your feet.

I am stepping through divine vibrations that I am sending from the tip of your toes up your muscles and bones — through your veins and glands — to the top of your head.

I am always in your midst as your teacher, your companion and your guide.

I always direct you, move you, lead you, speak to you, create through you, act through you, dance through you, and sing through you.

I am always there, always here, always now.

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WALK IN YOUR LIGHT By Cecilia B. Loving

April 6, 2013 #lovingfactor 3 Comments

Your light is your legacy. It is so inseparable from you that you are obligated to let it shine. In Matthew 5:14-15, Jesus said: “You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a candle and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before men that they may see your good deeds.” You cannot pick and choose who will benefit from your light.

You must be generous enough to share it with everyone. How? By simply doing what I have called you to do – walk in your light, walk in your purpose, and walk in your calling. Do what you love to do, what you do best, what harms no one else – and the joy that you give will be beyond your comprehension. Sharing your gifts and talents has a viral effect that will flow through the universe and bless millions for ages to come.

What you don’t realize is that even after you make your transition from this life, your light will still shine so brightly that it will lead people everywhere. Paul told the Ephesians (5:8), to walk as children of Light. Walk in obedience to Spirit. Walk in the beauty of discipline. Walk in the power of faith.

Walk beyond the confines of your self-imposed limitations, so that I can shine through you. Walk as an unlimited expression of all that I AM. You cannot judge your gifts and talents. You cannot see the fullness and wholeness that you contribute to the Universe simply by being the best that you are. Don’t lose your way because of what other people say or do or think. You are uniquely you for a reason. The lack of support, criticism or condemnation by some of my other children is like the wind. It is as fleeting as a single breath.

Don’t be fooled by cowards and haters to be a second-rate you. You are more than a diva, you are the divine. Walk in the beauty of your light. Otherwise, you will never give me the life that you have promised me in the Spirit, and the Promised Land will always be a distant reality.

Your greatest achievements began as divine ideas that no one else believed in. Jesus said (Matthew 25:34), “Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world.” Come you who no longer care what others think. Come you who are no longer afraid to move forward into the greatness that you are. Come you who believe in the magnificence of Spirit. Come you who have brought oil for your lamp and are willing to let your light shine through.

Come all ye faithful. Come ye, O’ come ye to Bethlehem – that house of bread, that place of substance, that center of Truth. O’ come Beloved, from the far country, and behold the Christ within. O’ come Spiritual Rebirth, come with the Light of a new day. O’ come embrace the power that you were given, the true gift of transformation, the joyous deliverance that you can attain through a consciousness of Spirit.

You were called before your birth. The Buddhists ask “do you remember what your face looked like before your parents were born?” Jeremiah said before we were formed in the womb, God knew us. Before we were born, God set us apart (Jeremiah 1:4-6).

You may not remember exactly where you are going or know how you will get there, but I will lead the way. I will give you the voice and the vision and the victory that you need. I will part the Red Sea so that no one will deter you from your path.

As I told the Psalmist, “Do not touch my anointed ones; do my prophets no harm” (Psalm 105:15). Just stay on the path, as Denzel Washington said in The Book of Eli. Stay on the path of righteousness, regardless of evildoers. Return from the far country. Go on about my business. Don’t just get a glimpse of the Promised Land, but be in the right consciousness to enter it. Be a believer – not just in somebody else’s testimony, but know me for you. Shut up and listen to Spirit for yourself. Be liberated in the unlimited power of all that you are.

Walk the walk and talk the talk – with the sword of my power. Watch a thousand fall at your side and ten thousand fall at your right hand and nothing come near you (Psalm 91:7).

This reminds me of the Israelites who were at the edge of the wilderness, when Moses blessed them as they journeyed into the Promised Land. They were not just standing on the bank of a river to cross. They were on the threshold of a new consciousness. They were not just leaving the wilderness because they had traveled a certain distance, or mapped out a particular strategy, or had served a certain amount of time. They were crossing over because they were ready.

The Promised Land is not a physical place. It is a place in consciousness that gives you spiritual food that feeds your mind, soul and heart, the unlimited feast of my Kingdom. It is a place where you will no longer be captive to the wilderness of your own negativity, grumbling, and strife.

It is a place where materialism and greed will no longer enslave you. But you cannot get there until you are ready.

The number forty in the Bible symbolizes preparation rather than a specific number. Forty years in the wilderness means as long as it takes to get ready.

You are ready when you realize that I AM always working with you for your greatest good. I will always feed you enough manna – enough spiritual food to sustain you.

You are ready when you stop worrying about what other people say or think. As Terrie Cole Whitaker says, What You Think About Me is None of My Business. You are ready when you are willing to make the sacrifices that need to be made to accomplish what you want. You are ready when you learn that I AM within.

You are ready when you can bless even the appearances of life – whether they are bad or good – because you realize that they are the motivation that you need.

You are ready when you understand that love is the spiritual law that supersedes all others.

Love does not judge but is unconditional.

Love has an all-encompassing heart that fulfills Karma with Grace.

You can accomplish anything with the power of love.

If you are worried or doubtful or in need, all you have to do is bless the situation with the power of love.

Love is my energy in its most powerful form.

Love allows you to be compassionate toward everyone, even when they second-guess you, because you know that they are part of your blessing.

Even when others mean something for evil, I mean it for good (Genesis 50:20).

They serve as the catalyst that pushes you beyond your comfort zone and make you aim higher than you ever aimed before.

You cross over to the other side when you know that you are blessed with my anointing.

You never know how you are going to make it there.

But you can trust that I will put the right people on your path to push against your resistance and pull you across the threshold to something better and greater.

You have spent enough time in the wilderness.

You are ready to do what I have called you to do – ready to walk in the newness of life,

and nothing and no one can stop you.

EXCERPT FROM GOD IS A BROWN GIRL TOO

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100 Reasons Why You Should Celebrate God As Yourself

March 6, 2013 #lovingfactor Leave a comment

In the book GOD IS A BROWN GIRL TOO, I explain why we should listen to the divine within. It’s the first time God speaks to us as ourselves and not someone who we can’t relate to. I’ve been over these reasons for uplifting the God in you before, but Spirit tells me that it’s time to share them again. It doesn’t matter who you are — or what your sexual orientation is — or your race and ethnicity: the divine is celebrating you. We will continue to lift up this consciousness on our 2013 HOPE OF GLORY CRUISE, leaving from NYC on July 29 to sail to Nova Scotia. I hope you can join us. To get more information, contact Robert at (800) 619-1694 OR (71 8) 673-9003.

1. We are created in the image and likeness of God.
2. We live and move and have our being in God.
3. We are temples of the living God.
4. It is written in our laws that we are Gods.
5. We are the first and the last, the beginning and the end, the alpha and the omega.
6. If we, whose mother is older as Lucy’s bones, have become disembodied from spiritual Oneness, then so has all of her creation.
7. The Kingdom of God is neither here nor there, it is within us.
8. God is in the Messiah and the Messiah is in us and we are in the Messiah.
9. We ask and receive.
10. We seek and find.
11. We knock and the door is opened.
12. Spirit lives in us and breathes in us.
13. God’s infinite possibility is expressing as us.
14. We have a conscious connection with Spirit that goes before us to do the work that we are appointed to do.
15. We manifest the right people, who show up to help us when we need help.
16. Even when we can’t see the finish line, the road rises up to meet us, and shows us the way.
17. We make a way out of no way.
18. We speak truth to power.
19. The Lord is our Shepherd, there is nothing that we want.
20. We are the pure potential of God expressing as us.
21. We are children of God.
22. We are heirs to the throne.
23. We are answers to prayers.
24. We are responsible for our lives, moving from where we stand now to experience the best possible moment.
25. We walk by faith and not by sight.
26. We do not fear the terror by night, nor the arrow that flies by day.
27. We are creation constantly re-inventing itself.
28. We are beauty in the souls of every beholder.
29. We are vision moving past pain.
30. Angels guard us in all our ways.
31. Tables are prepared for us in the presence of our enemies.
32. Manna falls from our heavens.
33. New stories re-tell our lives from new pages.
34. There is nothing that we cannot do.
35. We are the light of the world, a city upon the hill that cannot be hidden.
36. We are the steps, moving into the greatness that we are.
37. We are endless potential pulling dreams through infinite possibilities.
38. Divine Mind is always guiding us in perfect harmony, always praying us in loving grace.
39. We dance in the dawn of magical ideas, listen to the call of unharnessed love, welcome the realm of inexhaustible source.
40. We fly with the wings of faith.
41. We know the way, and we walk in it.
42. We dance with the hips of deliverance, push past the poison of doubt, rise above the fray of appearances, and give with a love that never, ever holds back.
43. We leave old wineskins and pour ourselves beyond the bottles, boxes and bags that can no longer contain us.
44. We stand on the shoulders of our ancestors, full of new hope
— finding its way beyond the whispers lost between clasped hands.
45. We breathe the breath of God.
46. We are everywhere and always present.
47. We are the light of God radiating back as Herself.
48. We are the consciousness of Truth, speaking nothing but itself.
49. We are the fullness and completeness of all that our Mother-Father-God is.
50. We are daughters of all beginnings – always pure, always graceful, always dynamic, always blessed.
51. We are prophetic voices lifted from the dust of dreams deferred – culminating in divine love awakening.
52. We are not limited by flesh, but are glorified by Spirit.
53. We will do even greater works.
54. Who is God and what does She look like, if not us?
55. We are mountains high enough, rivers wide enough and valleys low enough; we are the center and the circumference.
56. We have not forgot the God who gave us birth.
57. We are as old as time and as young as those who have yet to born.
58. We are the pulse and the flavor — the talented and the wise: “How you doing?”
59. We are – our past, our present, our future, and our dreams.
60. They try to bury us, but our bones just keep rising up.
61. We are the greater wholeness — always seeking expression.
62. We are still.
63. We are endless motion, stretching forward, taking the limits off, and removing the boundaries.
64. We are the time before, the been has, the was then, the until now.
65. We are the breath-filled space, the light-filled hand, the love-filled heart, the joy-filled dance.
66. When everyone is busy looking for God, as something more extraordinary than themselves, they will miss us, even though we are here.
67. Just like “I AM that I AM,” we are that we are.
68. We are the healing balm, the burning bush, the living water.
69. We are the infinite flow of substance.
70. We are the wisdom of our highest self.
71. You live in our heart.
72. We do all things through the Spirit as us.
73. We run the race and don’t get weary.
74. We move mountains with our faith.
75. We can leap and the net appears.
76. We bring good tidings to the afflicted; we bind the broken-hearted; we proclaim liberty for the captives.
77. We are greater than what our humanness can even imagine.
78. We are the cup that never stops flowing.
79. We are Christian, Buddhist, Hindu, Moslem, Jew — all religions and none at all.
80. We are ancient wisdom and new thought.
81. We are all languages and none at all.
82. We are sanctified, saved, and serene — singing our own sweet song of freedom.
83. We envision past appearances, dream unlimited possibilities, and recreate ourselves.
84. We grow from the consciousness that we create.

85. We surrender all.
86. We stand at the edge of always, in a new season of victory,
a sacred truth that just keeps directing us back to the vortex of our own power.
87. We are the sweetness in all fragrance.
88. We are the interpretation of all dreams.
89. We are the rhythm underlying all motion.
90. We are the glory in all hallelujahs.
91. We are the wave in every ocean.
92. We are the boldness in all courage.
93. Nothing and no one can contain us.
94. God’s face could be no more beautiful.
95. Our power is not the devil; it’s not Satan; our power is the God in us.
96. The God in us prays and moves her feet.
97. The God in us knows that all things come together for our greatest good.
98. The God in us knows that we are worthy.
99. The God in us allows us to leap — knowing that the net will appear.
100. The God in us is our constant victory — even before the race is ever won.

Namaste, Reverend Cecilia Loving
Pastor, SPIRITMUV (www.spiritmuv.com )
(All of the materials in God is a Brown Girl Too® email messages are copyrighted by and may not be used without the written permission of Cecilia Loving. )
JOIN US FOR PART II OF OUR 10-PART PROSPERITY 2013 SERIES at the Unity Center of NYC at 2:30 PM, located at 213 West 58th Street in NYC.

Speak the Truth

X2theL Interview of God is a Brown Girl Too Author Cecilia B. Loving

December 23, 2012 #lovingfactor Leave a comment

Hope you enjoy this slice of food for thought, and interview by Drake Colley, co-creator of X2theL, Neo-Soul.

Rev. Loving shares her vision of absolute good and infinite supply, and journey through God is a Brown Girl Too, Prayers for Those Standing on the Edge of Greatness, God is a Lawyer Too, and what’s next.

Retreats

God is a Brown Girl Too 2013 Cruise

October 8, 2012 #lovingfactor Leave a comment

Click on the link below to enjoy the video presentation on the upcoming God is a Brown Girl Too Cruise.
Contact CRUISE ONE at (800)619-1694 or (718) 673-9003 for more information.

God is a Brown Girl Too 2013 Cruise.

Speak the Truth

TELL A NEW STORY

June 6, 2012 #lovingfactor Leave a comment

Psalm 102:2 says “let the redeemed of the Lord tell their story.”

At the 2012 God is a Brown Girl Too Retreat, which was held at the Mariandale Retreat Center in Westchester County, New York, we all did just that. We told our stories, and the more we told them, the more we realized that the stories that we tell are not based on what we experience but on what we believe.

We realized that we had the power to decree a thing and make it so. The most powerful thing about the retreat is that the story that I really hoped and prayed would unfold – did unfold: The words we decreed and the stories that we told when we arrived on Friday, the first day of the retreat, was not the story that we told and the words that we decreed when we departed the last day, the following Sunday.

Each one of us decreed, spoke, claimed — told a new story.

God is a Brown Girl Too teaches us that we have been telling the same stories for so long that we no longer know truth from fiction. We have no idea who we really are in the Spirit as opposed to who we appear to be in the flesh. Most times, the person who was abused, neglected, rejected or condemned in the past – is given a starring role while our real selves take a back seat.

The only way that we are going to see ourselves reflected as God’s image and likeness is to free ourselves from the past limitations that we imposed upon ourselves, and tell a new story. We have to throw away the regret and the pain and the hurt that has been passing for fulfillment and see ourselves with a new light.

In the book God is a Brown Girl Too, God speaks for the first time as a woman of color to women of color, saying:

You are not who you were yesterday . . . . You are different. You are reborn. You are free. Begin to see yourself with a new light. . . . Matthew, Chapter 6, Verse 22. . .says that the light of the body is the eye: if therefore your eye is single, your whole body will be full of light. The light is the wisdom that is providing you with a lens through which you can see all of the experiences that I have given you with a new insight.

What you see in the flesh is around you, but it is not you. Jesus tried to explain this when he said, “I am not of this world” (John 8:23). Spirit is the only thing that matters. Look only to me. Seek first my kingdom. Wait upon me, and I will heal your wounds and allow you to move forward with them as a blessing rather than a hindrance. 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.

Without my light, it’s difficult to tell 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 my light 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. You can begin to recreate who you want to be rather than who you used to be.

One of the Tell a New Story retreat participants, Pamela James, blessed us with a powerful affirmation. She said, “I AM the Great I AM.” We are indeed the Great I AM, and the stories that we tell about ourselves should reflect nothing more than that.

In 2013, our Fifth Annual God is a Brown Girl Too Retreat, entitled “Our Hope of Glory” — will be aboard a cruise ship, the Carnival Glory.

It’s our maiden voyage because it’s the first time that we will bring our energy to such a relaxing and wonderful environment. We know that it will energize us. We are cruising to Nova Scotia on July 29, 2013, for five days during which we will lift up that profound mantra that Paul inspired when he said, “Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Colossians 1:27).

This is an opportunity like no other to reconnect with the God in us.

You can find more details about the cruise at www.godisabrowngirltoo.webs.com. But you have to book by July 13, by putting down a deposit as little as $25.00.

Just call Bert Vigueras at CRUISE ONE –(800)619-1694 OR (718) 673-9003.

In the interim, join us for our “Spiritual Boot Camp” for the next seven Sundays, starting June at 2:30 PM, at the Unity Center of New York City, located at 213 West 58th Street, near the Time Warner Building, right off Central Park.

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.

Spirit

NOT AGAIN By Cecilia Loving

January 27, 2011 #lovingfactor Leave a comment

Okay, I admit it. Just before Christmas, I prayed for snow. It wasn’t a long or involved prayer — just a mantra that I kept on the edge of my tongue, a vision that lingered at the forefront of my thoughts. And perhaps just once, I actually said: “I wish it would snow.” Or maybe I said it twice. At this point, I can’t remember because now I just wish it would stop. Yes, I am actually knee-deep in the answer to my prayers sighing — “not again.”

Prayer opens a spigot of God’s good that can’t be turned off at whim. The Universe wants to give us what we want — especially if there is no harm to anyone else. Why shouldn’t we want snow? Agriculturalists tell us that it is an excellent insulator for gardens, protecting natural landscape and animal inhabitants against low temperatures.

We may get tired of putting on our UGGS, but the wintery white stuff provides the necessary moisture to plants that would be at a risk of injury without it.

My favorite drink is water, which is also what I use in my showers and baths — not to mention for cleaning dishes and doing laundry. While some may think that 10 inches of snow equals 1 inch of rain, it can actually contain as much as 5 inches, depending on the snowflake’s crystal structure. Slow snow melts cause trickles that seep into the earth to purify water for drinking.

Calm winter snows wrap God’s grace around us, reminding us to go within. Beneath the snow, we transform. We wait. We learn to ask for what we want and to be courageous enough to receive it. We remember that we are no more than tiny specks in the cosmic flow of spiritual breath. We slow down, like each unique crystal dancing from heaven to the ground, realizing that we need to enjoy the process before we melt in the crack of someone’s boot. Our journey shows us the presence of God in everything: laughter at falls when we know we can get up again; releasing the past when we trust that we just move forward; brushing ourselves off when we discover patience with each step that we take.

Proverbs doesn’t say “not again”; it says “[s]he is not afraid for her household when it snows, for all in her household are doubly clothed.” When we are clothed in the Spirit, we have all of the protection that we need. I was outside yesterday when the first flake fell. I saw the Holy Ghost pull the good out of souls, saw them help each other push cars, balance over piles and navigate subway stairways.

Isaiah doesn’t say “not again”; he says “[m]y word . . . is like . . . snow. It will not come back to me without results, but it will accomplish whatever I want and achieve whatever I send it to do.” When we speak God’s word, it always returns a blessing. When we give of ourselves, God throws “open the floodgates of heaven and pour[s] out so much good that there is not room enough to receive it.”

How are you embracing this extraordinary manna of God? Are you ready for living water to fall into your life? Do you stop long enough to grin at the spectacular show of new life unfolding in the air around you? Watch what you say and what you wish for: words always have a way of returning. The universal ethers are full of your hopeful longings, just waiting for the right nudge into manifestation.

So when you see the snowflakes cover every shape and form, say with assurance “in God we live and move and have our being.” When you feel the first flakes melt on your tongue, say “be still and know that I am God.” When you realize that you are knee-deep in Absolute Good, refrain from mumbling “not again” — just spin an angel out of flapping arms, fashion white balls of cold slush, or step gracefully through the abundance of this season, and say “glory, glory, hallelujah.”

Namaste,

Reverend Cecilia Loving

About SPIRITMUV: Spiritmuv® is a trans-denominational church, which means that it transcends the confines of religion and teaches unconditional love for one another regardless of race, creed, culture, or religion. At the heart of its teachings is what Jesus taught — that we love one another, as well as the community that Mahatma Ghandi inspired when he said, “I am a Christian and a Muslim and a Hindu and a Jew.” Reverend Cecilia Loving is the founder and creator of Spiritmuv, which was formed in 2007. Services are held for an hour every Sunday, from 2:30 P.M. to 3:30 P.M. at the Unity Center of NYC, located at 213 West 58th Street.

Rev. Loving, author of Prayers for Those Standing in the Edge of Greatness, is the sole owner, creator and administrator of God is a Brown Girl Too®, which holds annual retreats and workshops. The next God is a Brown Girl Too Retreat will be held April 1-3, 2011, at the Mariandale Retreat and Conference Center.

None of the content herein may be copied or otherwise used except with Reverend Loving’s written permission.

Join the Spiritmuv Community at www.Spiritmuv.ning.com for special postings by Rev. Loving.

GOD IS A BROWN GIRL TOO® “CREATING BEYOND THE BOX OF CONVENTIONALITY ” RETREAT
will take place in the Spring of 2011
from April 1 at 5:00 P.M. through April 3 at 1:00 P.M.

Don’t miss this wonderful opportunity to enjoy the peace, serenity and creative consciousness of a like-minded group of women of color at the Mariandale Retreat and Conference Center, located at 299 North Highland Avenue, in Ossining, New York. All rooms are single and surrounded by the loving prayers of the Dominican Sisters who own the facility.

The cost of the entire weekend, including rooms, workshops and three delicious meals per day, is only $450.00. There is a $100 discount for senior citizens, so seniors pay $350.00.

Registration has already begun at http://www.godisabrowngirltoo.com/or you can mail payment directly to God is a Brown Girl Too, 376 President Street Unit 2H, Brooklyn, New York 11231. But act fast because rooms are sellling and there are now only 13 rooms left.

Re-Discover Your True Self

Step Into Your Greatness

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The Divine is Within Each and Everyone of Us