The Abundance of Things to Celebrate | Rev. John Riley

Well, good morning and welcome. We have been on a journey of exploring and claiming and today we are going to be celebrating. We began a couple weeks ago with the idea of claiming our good. Instead of coming to the world, instead of awakening and coming to life from the mindset of needing something, we begin our day by claiming our good. All around us we have good. It’s in expression all the time. So, it’s our opportunity to really look and find our good and to claim it as our own so that we can have a consciousness of knowing our good as we enter the day.
Then the next week we talked about exploring. Explore it, where we have the opportunity to really move out and into the world, to look for new opportunities and new ways to think and new ways to do and be in the world, exploring new opportunities both in consciousness, in our relationships, in the way we think and in the way we speak. Explore new ways and things we are doing in the world. Whether it’s in our job, maybe there is a new way to try and do things, looking at something from a new perspective so that we are looking for the opportunity and we have a consciousness of infinite potential instead of the consciousness of limitation.

Celebrate

Today we are going to be focusing on the next step which is celebrating, celebrate it. Now the idea, there’s this idea of celebration. And when you hear the world celebration, what do you think about? The first thing that comes to my mind is a big celebration, a big gathering, maybe like a Super Bowl celebration with fireworks and confetti and noisemakers and people screaming. If you were watching the Super Bowl and you were a Rams fan then perhaps you had that sense of celebration, or maybe you were just waiting for your box on the grid to come up at the end of the quarter so you could win whatever the prize was for each quarter. I have to tell you we were one missed extra point away from winning the grand prize but I am not upset about that, not at all.
But you see this kind of celebration — while fun and exciting and it’s a great escape – it’s a celebration that engages our sense consciousness. The fireworks, the confetti, the noise makers, the screaming and sometimes we have to step back from the big celebration because it’s just too much. But this celebration is really an escape for us from the rest of life. So that is one kind of celebration, but it’s all about the outside.
There is another kind of celebration. Perhaps it’s a religious celebration, where we come with intention, with rite and ritual, where we come to be a part of a process so that we can be in that celebration and be a part of that celebration. But unless you are looking at it from the perspective of an inner experience, if you are coming here just to be in the experience and it’s still the outer experience, it’s a little quieter. It’s a more pious experience perhaps. But what we really need is a quiet celebration, an inner celebration and to help us develop a consciousness of celebrating life.
There’s so many ways in which we can look at life and the world today. One of the first things that happens is that when we wake up and go out into the world we start being bombarded with the things in our lives. We might be exploring other things but it’s an opportunity for us to remember that consciousness of celebration is a consciousness of celebrating that divine spark that is within you. As we like to talk about it here, as Eric Butterworth said, God is in you like the ocean is in the wave, and so celebrating and living from that allness of life.

The Infinite Potential That You Are

When we look at it that way, it may seem a little overwhelming. Maybe we think, “Well I’m not that, I’m just John. I’m limited”. Certainly, we do have limitations in the world. We are limiting that infinite potential to be here but when we can come to it with the celebration of the infinite potential that you are, then you have the opportunity to live into your dreams and your goals. You have the opportunity to get unstuck. I know the “yeah but’s” come in, “Yeah, but I’m stuck in this relationship” or “Here’s the problem in this relationship.” That is an opportunity to celebrate the fact that you have a relationship with somebody, to celebrate the connection between the two of you for as two or more are connected, are together, that is where God is. That is where Spirit experiences and expresses amongst the two of you in that connection.
“Yeah but” maybe you feel stuck in your job. You are in a dead-end job. You are locked into it because of whatever conditions are going on. You might be looking for another job. You might be under-employed. You are stuck in some situation. What’s to celebrate about that? Well, look for things in the idea of it to celebrate. Maybe there is an opportunity for you to grow, for you to look at new ways or new skills that you can add. Maybe it’s an opportunity for you to turn within and say, “Where would I really be happy and if I’m going to stay here how can I be happy in it?”, and finding ways to celebrate it along the way. Every step along the way of your goal, of your dreams, of your vision, one step at a time, celebrate it.
As you begin to celebrate life, there becomes more for you to celebrate. You begin to see the good in your life more clearly. You begin to attract and move towards those things that will create that excitement to celebrate. I think it was Oprah Winfrey who said once, you should celebrate every day because as you do there will be more things to celebrate.
So, take a moment to just think about what you have in your life. When you wake up in the morning and you walk outside, take a moment to take a breath and look outside and see the glory, as they say, of what the Lord has done. See the glory of what the infinite potential has created. See the beauty in the wisteria as it’s starting to bud. See the beauty in the daffodils that are already peeking out. Take a moment to be in it, in the world, to be in that experience of God and celebrate that moment. As you are walking down the street, as you are driving towards, celebrate the clouds. Celebrate the sunshine. Celebrate the cold of this winter. It’s hard. If you can do it, celebrate the joy of the heat in the winter. Find things in your life to really celebrate.
There is a wonderful opportunity each day to really come from that consciousness of celebration and celebration is really the center of love, that love center within you. We talk so much about this idea that you are one with the infinite flow of life, love and wisdom, that you allow that energy to flow through you with ease and grace, that you are one with it. As you begin to learn and seek that consciousness, as the master teacher Jesus told us, seek first that consciousness of God, that God consciousness within you, then all else will be added unto you because you are coming to the world from a celebration of life. Take a moment to feel your pulse. Feel your heart beating. Hear the heart beating within you. That is God beating your heart. That divine energy is flowing through you. Listen to your breath. Celebrate your breath as the universe breathes you. If you are having trouble with a relationship sometimes, “Yeah but I am feeling lonely and distracted”. Well, who isn’t during these crazy times of COVID? It’s an opportunity for us to turn within to find that inner peace, that self-worth and self-love and then be that connection to other people. Reach out and be that connection with other people.

Change

Sometimes we are afraid of change and I have to tell you after two years I am ready for some change. Aren’t you? I think it’s time for us to stretch out a little bit, to have a little more change, a little more activity, a little more something different than what we have been experiencing during this idea of the pandemic.
Now, some people are afraid of change. I hear a lot of people say, “I’d love to change and get rid of the masks. I am so glad we don’t have to wear masks anymore and if we have to go back I might just, you know, blow a gasket. But I really don’t want to change. I am used to working at home. I don’t want to change that.” We get stuck in those patterns again. So, be willing to stretch out and change your patterns. There is no growth without change. So, when we live into that and just celebrate change, celebrate, “Oh, here’s something new.”
We ended last week’s talk with a quote by Dr. Maya Angelou who said, “This is a wonderful day. I’ve never seen this one before.” What wonder and celebration can we bring to each day? “This is a wonderful day as I am driving into work. This is a wonderful day as I am sitting, waiting to go to the store. Maybe I can get out and just look at the flowers, do a little gardening.” If that’s not your jam maybe do a little reading or whatever it is, but do it with a sense of celebration. “I get to do this, I get to live a life of meaning”, if we choose to. It really takes the effort of moving into that consciousness.
One of my greatest, I think, stories for me as an example of this is my son Ethan, who is 16 and a sophomore, and makes mistakes all the time but he has a sense of balance in it. A sense of certainly, we celebrate his successes but, more important, I think we celebrate his awareness of, “Oh, I made a mistake. Okay, here it is. Sorry.” What if we celebrate that instance of being a kind person, of owning his own stuff? Now he is 16 so it doesn’t happen all the time but the times that it does, what a wonderful way to celebrate it. How often, as adults, do we do that? How often can we take ownership over our own stuff and then set it aside, quit telling stories about it and go back to celebrating our life? “This isn’t who I am. This stuff is just an experience. I can set it aside. I don’t need it anymore.”

Take a Moment to Breathe

Let’s breathe and allow ourselves to be breathed into this present moment and remember that infinite source of love that is within you, that ocean that is in the wave. God is within you. It’s not that we’re like an individual, it’s not like God is in us and we are out in the world, but we are an individualized expression of it. We are here to be it. That celebration that we feel, that excitement that we feel outside during that grand celebration is us being willing to say, “Okay I can feel that right now”, and allowing it to flow. In those moments, just take a moment to recognize, “Oh this is what it feels like when I let it all, when I let God flow through me, safely and sanely”.
So, this opportunity for us, is a way for us to build a consciousness of celebration into our lives so that we can, as they say, joyously sing unto the Lord, joyously make a joyful noise and allow that joy for life to come out, allow it to be who you are. It’s okay. Don’t be afraid of being that person. “Oh, that’s that person who is always happy. That is the person who is always …”. You know, we may not be always happy but even in those situations when we are feeling down, lonely, discouraged, frustrated, hurt, if we can just allow that feeling to be, without the story, it will burn off and then we will find in it something to celebrate.
We will find again our own truth, that divine flow. It will just naturally come up. And as we let it naturally come up, we celebrate it. Claim it. Claim your good. Explore life. Explore new opportunities, new ways to do things. Change those old behavior patterns so that more of life can be expressed as you, so more of that infinite supply of love, divine love be expressed as you as that individualized expression of God, so that each day you can find a way to live a more joyful and abundant life by seeking out our good, by exploring new opportunities and by celebrating every step of the way, for we are walking in Spirit. We are walking in the footsteps of the divine. Every moment of the day is your opportunity to just be in it.

Claim Your Good

So, I invite you this week as we move into that idea, is to just notice things when you wake up and you claim your good and you start to explore, notice where God is and celebrate it. Notice where the beauty of the universe is. You can hear the beauty in the wave, in the birds calling. For me, it’s 4:00 in the morning and my cats jumping on top of me. There is some beauty in it. I don’t know what it is but if I can celebrate that life then I can get back to sleep easily, as opposed to running a story about it and how many of those cats do we have in our lives that are jumping at us. Just allow it to be what it is and move back to your breath. Move back to your center of being and allow yourself to find a place to celebrate even if it’s just humor, even if it’s just a laugh, like “Okay, I’ve got this”. That is when we celebrate life and then more and more good finds its way to our consciousness.