Reverend David McArthur

Valentine’s Day is when we touch the spiritual support that is within us all. We celebrate the one thing that is in all our holidays and within us all – love.
God is not a being that loves; God is love. When you are loving you are Godding. It is in the feeling where transformation happens. What is the feeling of Love?
It is in romantic love. When you see in your partner the spiritual being– when you see the beauty, the power, your heart goes into delight. That feeling is like when light hits a prism and shows all the colors, all the vibrations it is. Feeling the presence of God in the vision, it brings forth all the feelings – like appreciation, like harmony – the feeling taking us into the Presence.
It is in care for those you love. It is brought forth in action, the expression of feeling. As was taught: Then the King will say… ‘Come…take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink… Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink?…The King will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’ (Matthew 25:34-40) Love becomes care, and translates into expressions of care.
It is in compassion, as in the story of the “Good Samaritan”. Jesus asked, “Which…do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?” The expert in the law replied, “The one who had mercy (compassion) on him… (Luke 10: 36, 37) Even in world news, we are invited to go into compassion, as if Spirit is saying, “Love one another. My love I give to you.”
And in happiness, where there’s also a feeling of peace. A feeling of peace that is a part of love. Like exquisitely sitting together quietly in peace. That is experiencing the Presence and at that point you are love.
Amazingly, you enter into that Consciousness of love. You are that love. In that the divine is as you. You are the radiant love of God. Affirm, “I am the radiant love of God.”

Sermon, February 13, 2011 - The Feelings of Love Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Reverend David McArthur

How beautiful it is to grow in a world governed by spiritual laws!
However, GOO so often comes before GOOD. Not good as opposed to bad, but the good that is the very nature of God, the very nature of the universe, the very nature of being. Not the good of an omnipresent being, but of omnipresence, the nature of all life. Not that of an omnipotent being, but of omnipotence – the all-power that moves through you and all life. Of omniscience – not a being which is omnipotent, but the all-knowing that is you. That is the goodness and there is nothing outside of it. Remember that when you are in your “goo”. You get the choice of how much you let in when you are in your “goo”. We got to let in a little more God. Even a child knows that more love eases the way.
And we are so impatient. We want to to change our “goo” now. A middle school boy in Miami did. When he was facing another boy to fight, he remembered that he was taught that he could change things. He felt that in his heart. He spoke to that and there was no fight. He and the other boy worked it out and became friends.
Lao Tsu, in the Tao te Ching said, “She who is centered in the Tao can go where she wishes without danger. She perceives the universal harmony even amid great pain because she has found peace in her heart.” Only good is real. Only God is real. Only love is real. Touch that – there is nothing else. The middle school boy was centered in his heart. He “touched the Tao” and change was immediate. He transformed the physical body, and the emotional stuff was transformed from conflict to harmony – a higher state of intelligence. He transformed his state of being and changed the result.
He knew what to do, but perhaps not how it’s done or why. It is love. We paint people as “wrong”. Love transforms the perceptions we have. Love transforms reality. The way is the feeling of love. He touched that love – the Divine Presence – and got out of the “goo”.
The heart is the place where the Power and the Presence moves through and transforms your being. Some ideas we have of love aren’t really love. Learn how to love when you don’t want to. Spiritual transformation is stepping to where you are connected to the Divine Intelligence.
Then life really gets fun!

Sermon, February 6, 2011 – From Goo to Good with God [ 21:12 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Reverend David McArthur

The archetypal patterns of our spiritual journey are found in our ancient tales, like “Rapunzel”. In the beginning the woman who will become Rapunzel’s mother wants a beautiful garden flower very badly, thinking, “if I get that, I’ll be just fine.” But there is a cost for relying on the outer world for fulfillment. It will not fulfill who you are. It does not have that power.
Losing control of Rapunzel, the witch puts her in the tower. Her hair represents the long-focused thought or out-pouring of the brain. But our brains focus on fear. When we’re in fear we don’t connect with the whole of life. Rapunzel herself represents the feminine in all of us, the feelings of beauty and harmony (for which the men in our society get no support). Our growing spirituality – feelings of the Presence – are isolated in lots of us, as is Rapunzel so isolated in the tower. So she sang, her beautiful voice symbolizing attunement gained through meditation in silence. Her beautiful singing attracts the prince, who symbolizes thought, mind, knowledge. He lives with the King (God) and so the prince knows he a child of God. I’m a child of God. Rapunzel learns from the prince that she’s a child of God. I’m a spiritual being, living in a spiritual world, governed by spiritual laws. We come to awareness through focusing on spiritual things. We awaken to the power of choice.
The witch cut Rapunzel’s hair and sent her to the desert. The desert is depression. So Rapunzel no longer had choice or the support of her knowing. There is no stimulus in the desert.
The prince again climbed up the braid of hair only to find the witch, not Rapunzel. He does not choose to be with fear and so he leaps out the window. He falls in the thorny bushes below. He feels pain. He goes blind. When we run into pain we go blind – not seeing the divine, not seeing the truth. We say, “Why did God do this?” “How come I have to go through this?” It is painful. Giving up fear means you have to give up the drama. That is painful for many of us.
We must move from knowing to being. Rapunzel returns to singing, to being in harmony, to attunement. So the beauty she is comes back into her life. The prince hears her. When she sees the pain and blindness of the prince she responds with tears of compassion. Compassion heals pain. You find healing. Vision is restored. We’re able to know and understand. The power comes from within, not from anything without. Choose a greater state of being. Experience a new state of consciousness and live happily ever after.

Sermon, January 23, 2011 - Rapunzel: Journey to Wholeness [ 25:28 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download