Oasis Rising Center Audio and more... Weekly  Lesson  Talks Guided  Meditations Prayers and more ...

Come Celebrate Life with us!

Come Celebrate With Us every Sunday:

Meditation 10:45 am
Celebration at 11am

Join us:

Oasis Rising Center 8125 West Sahara Avenue, Las Vegas, NV 89125

Texts from Oasis Rising Center

Come and enjoy talks at our Sunday Services or get a midweek pickup on Wednesday at 6mp

 

Texts are one of the ways Oasis Rising Center supports members.

“Money as an Aspect of God’s Love”              By Rev. Phillip Smedstad

This past Sunday was the fourth in our “Summer Prosperity Series’ based on my book Real Wealth.  In my book I included a chapter with the above title.

Many of us grew up believing that money and spirituality are separate.  In my own case, the minister of the Lutheran church in which I grew up used to refer often to the statement by Paul:  “The love of money is the root of all evil.”
(By the way, if we think about this statement for more than five seconds, we realize that it is nonsense.  For example, the love of money is not why certain parents abuse their kids, or why someone commits the crime of rape.)

This minister also used to like to refer to money as “filthy lucre.”  I did notice, however, that it wasn’t so filthy when the church needed a new roof.

Contrast that view with that of another pastor, a famous one from the first part of the 20th century named the Rev. Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick.  Here is something Dr. Fosdick wrote that I shared with people on Sunday:
“A dollar is a miraculous thing.  It is a person’s energy reduced to portable form and endowed with powers the person himself does not possess.  It can go where he cannot go; speak languages he cannot speak; lift burdens he cannot touch with his fingers; save lives with which he cannot directly deal, so that a person, busy all day at his job or business, can at the same time be working in boys’ and girls’ clubs, hospitals, childcare centers, and churches all over the city.”
Then, in another part of the article, Dr. Fosdick says, “My definition of money is that it is God’s idea of circulation.”

Money really is God’s idea of circulation, and you deserve to have all the money (and other resources) you need to accomplish your personal ministry and live an abundant life.

Many of you have read in my articles that, regarding relationships and life in general, we all have an inner child, one who made decisions early in life.  Until we heal any of the mistaken beliefs that child made, he or she is still running our life, and the situations we are manifesting in current-day life are the out-picturing of those beliefs.

This same concept also applies to money, of course.  For example, consider the people who, as children, constantly heard:

• “You can’t have that.  Do you think money grows on trees?  (Possible decision:  “Money is scarce.”)
• “Your mom or dad worked very hard for that money.”  (Possible decision:  “And so will I work very hard for my money when I grow up.”)
• “Your mom (or dad) and I sacrificed a lot so that you can have a better life.”  (Possible decision:  “When I receive or prosper, others lose, so I’ll keep myself from having very much.”)

I’ve had my own process of healing mistaken decisions about money.  Once, at the first Prosperity Workshop I attended, the instructor asked us to do two sentence completion exercises.  We were to write “Rich people are...” and then complete the sentence with whatever thoughts we had.  Then, we were to do the same with “Poor people are...”

I had judgments about both rich people and poor people.  I wasn’t all that surprised about the ones I had about rich people.  In those days, I had judgments about nearly everyone.  What did surprise me was how angry I felt toward poor people.  I realized that I had the thought that if I had more money than any one person, I was supposed to give part of it to him or her.

The spiritual truth (and, joyfully, my experience these days) is that I can love both those who have more than I have and those who have less.  My thought for those who have more is, “Thank you for demonstrating prosperity and being an example for me.”  For those who have less, my prayer is, “I see you being guided by Spirit into having the life you deserve.”

Also, I do give money to organizations which empower people and teach them how to “get off the street,” practice loving themselves, and live productive lives.

Another part of healing my relationship with money was when I was in a training to become a Transformational Breath Worker.  In order to remain in the training, I was asked to have at least one client, and to charge $35 for a two-hour breath session.

This brought up more unresolved issues, especially concerning what is and is not “God’s work.”  I first thought, “This is God’s work.  God’s work is supposed to be free.”  At the time, as a Minister, any time I saw someone for counseling, it was on a love-offering basis.
My next thought was, “Wait a minute, Phil.  Don’t you think that farming is God’s work?  How about plumbing?  Owning a hardware store?  All of these people charge a set fee for their goods or services.”  What I eventually realized was that my judgments about charging for counseling had everything to do with low self-esteem.  Would someone actually value his or her time with me enough to give me what I asked him or her to pay?

That led to a whole other layer of healing low self-esteem.

There are at least two possible purposes for money.  To our ego mind, money is a device to reinforce our belief in separation and to prove that our ego’s belief system is real.  That belief system says, “If you have more, it means I will have less,” and vice versa.

To the Holy Spirit (fortunately, the Holy Spirit can re-interpret anything so that it supports our highest good), the purpose of money is to facilitate ease.  As you know, it is much easier to pay for a bushel of wheat with some form of money than it is to trade a certain number of chickens for it.

Money is an aspect of the Divine Idea of ease, as well as God’s idea of circulation.

When Lura and I used to teach Prosperity Workshops together, we would always share two ideas which often seemed shocking:

• Money never solves prosperity problems.  (Only inner healing and changing our deep beliefs can do that.)
• The focus of the workshop we were leading was spiritual principles, and knowing that money is an aspect of God’s love.

God’s love can be experienced as a lot of things – ideas, guidance, service, affection, compliments, support (as in counseling or coaching), and also as money.  The better we get at receiving any form of love, the easier it gets to receive the rest of them.

I personally love money, and it doesn’t make me either “evil” or “immature.”  (Immature is the real meaning of the word we translate from the Gospels as “evil.”)

I love God or Spirit – as the one Source of everything I want in life.  My experience of oneness with God (what Jesus called the Kingdom of Heaven) is absolutely my most valuable possession.

I also love money – as a valuable resource, a way to have more ease in my life, and a tool to help me participate in circulation.

As part of our summer prosperity series, I invite you to let this week be about healing your relationship with money, and to release any sense you’ve had that money and spirituality are separate.  You deserve to have all the resources you need to live your vision and have an abundant life.