Audio from PLIR Prayerful Living Internet Radio. https://prayerfulliving.com/healingmusic/inspiration-weekly.html.
My book is now published and available on Amazon in Kindle and Paperback formats. “Out of darkness, Into the Light.” By Michele Frantz
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Through my spiritual studies, I was learning that I am God’s image and likeness as stated in Genesis I. Later I learned that I am the Idea of God. This got me thinking. My image or likeness would be something outside of me, like a reflection in a mirror, and I thought that idea was something different as I considered it within my thought. I was wrong, they are both in thought.
I read an article about reflection and discovered it was much more than I previously thought. Webster defines reflect as “to consider mentally, specifically to attend earnestly to what passes within the mind; to attend to the facts or phenomena of consciousness.” Reflection is defined as “any state in which the mind considers its own content.” This puts a completely different slant on what I thought it was.
If I live and move and have my being IN God, I would be His idea, inseparable from Him. As stated in the definition, “any state in which the mind [God] considers its own content [Man and the Universe]. He is thinking us into consciousness, considering His content. Now I like that. Of course, as His image and likeness, I am His spiritual Idea and reflect all His qualities. WOW, that’s a big responsibility, I need to reflect who God is, bring out His qualities in my life. That is how I express His creation here.
I am an individual spiritual consciousness, an expression of divine Spirit, an idea, not a material body or a mortal mind although that is what I appear to be. But my mission in life is to learn to see myself as God’s spiritual idea and doing that will change my life experience. I have already experienced many changes.
God maintains His own creation, but the human mind tries to blur our perception of who we are as God’s Idea. As it states in Genesis II, a mist came up. That mist tries to prevent us from seeing the truth of who we are. It wants to keep us firmly grounded in matter where we feel we can keep our human identity safe. The so-called material creation believes it will lose something if it gives itself over to the spiritual creation. In truth, it will only lose the unreliable and unpredictable human experience and gain spiritual harmony and eternal life. Which would you rather have?
I found that the mist lifts as I give up my grip on matter and grasp my reality as a spiritual idea of God, and my life and surroundings change, and I see God’s creation. But to do that I needed to let go of my belief that matter is all there is. As Hamlet said, “There are more things in heaven and earth Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy. [science].” So true, there is way more going on in God’s universe than what we see with our eyes.
“Life is, always has been, and ever will be independent of matter; for Life is God, and man is the idea of God, not formed materially but spiritually, and not subject to decay and dust.” (Science and Health) I had a hard time getting my mind around this. All I could see was the matter. I had to learn a new way of thinking and seeing the universe around me.
Jesus tried to reveal this truth to us, it was his mission to all mankind, including those that rejected him. He was here to teach us how to overcome those thoughts that bring us discord and despair, by giving us an understanding of who we are as God’s spiritual idea, which changes those thoughts and brings us peace. “Jesus was the highest human concept of the perfect man. He was inseparable from Christ, the Messiah, — the divine idea of God outside the flesh.” Science and Health
God’s man reflects infinity, and this reflection is the true idea of God. But I can’t know who I am until I know and understand who God is. I have been working on this for over thirty years and I have only scraped the surface. Occasionally, I get a peek below the surface, and I get a flash of light and it changes me. If I keep my thought receptive, the truth of God will forever unfold in my consciousness, expanding my understanding. Then my human capacities are enhanced as I understand more about my relationship with God.
“The human mind, imbued with this spiritual understanding, becomes more elastic, is capable of greater endurance, escapes somewhat from itself, and requires less repose. A knowledge of the Science of being develops the latent abilities and possibilities of man. It extends the atmosphere of thought, giving mortals access to broader and higher realms. It raises the thinker into his native air of insight and perspicacity.”(Science and Health)
I had to look up perspicacity. 😊 It means keen judgment. I have a dictionary at hand all the time. It is so important to have a correct understanding of words.
We have all been programmed from birth that we are mortal human beings. I found the need to wake up and declare I have never been mortal, I am the spiritual image and likeness of God, although it appears I’m having a mortal experience. I found myself many times arguing on both sides of that issue. At times I would be declaring my spirituality and then saying, yah but, what about this and that. It was brought to my attention that I could not argue on both sides. I needed to take a stand on one side of the other. I must choose. Did I want to be part of God’s creation or give Him up and live in this material creation with no help from Him? That was a no-brainer. I tried it and my life was a mess. I chose God.
I found that I needed a good understanding of God and man to overcome mortal beliefs that claim I am a fallen sinner. If I held my beliefs and thoughts on myself as a sinning mortal being, I couldn’t make “perfect God and perfect man,” the basis of my thought and demonstration. The fallen sinner is a mortal man, not God’s man. Keeping a higher view of the Godlike man helps me reach a complete demonstration of who I am as God’s child, His idea, His image, and likeness. God and His idea coexist. Neither exists alone, they are dependent on each other for their existence. Understanding this removes fear.
“God, without the image and likeness of Himself, would be a nonentity, or Mind unexpressed. He would be without a witness or proof of His own nature. Spiritual man is the image or idea of God, an idea which cannot be lost nor separated from its divine Principle.” Science and Health.
All thoughts pass from God to His idea, so I need to be always open to His still small voice, and follow my instincts and intuition, which keep me on the right path.
Jesus demonstrated the Christ Idea in his life. And I endeavor to learn to express the Christ idea in my life. I may not reach Jesus’ level of understanding in my lifetime but trying brings me great freedom, joy, and peace. I highly recommend it. We are God’s Idea.
Out of Darkness, Into the Light 