Prayer & What it Means For You | Rev. John Riley

Prayer & What it Means For You

Well, what a joy it is to have you all here today. And you know, our, our, I think our theme, what’s emerging anyways for me is our theme for Ford. I was about to say February. Is it February yet? No, no, it’s November. That’s the word I’m looking for. I was gonna say Thanksgiving. Boy. Okay, let me, lemme start over. It’s nice to see you all here today. I think our theme for Thanksgiving for November is this idea of connection, is an idea of connecting with one another and connecting in gratitude and connecting with Spirit. Last week we talked about the idea of being in that present, bringing in that moment, that experience of change, because there was a lot of change happening in our lives these last few years and in this present moment. And the key to to that was to remain balanced and remain resilient and get creative and to say stay centered in that which is unchanging amidst all of the change, stay centered in that which is always consistently the same.

That experience of Spirit, that loving presence, that that idea of that divine essence that is the truth of your being, never changes. God’s divine love is always available, always flowing. And so it’s a matter of us to center in on it and connect with it and be a, be one with it. And so one of the ways that Unity teaches the best way to do that is through meditation and affirmative prayer is through creating a sense of attuning our thoughts, our ideas, our our words, our actions with that harmonic energy, with that divine love, with that energy of Spirit, with the intelligence of the universe, connecting with that so that we can stay grounded, stay centered in all of the stuff that happens during the holidays, and to be that shining light now. And Unity, of course, we look at it from a metaphysical perspective and the way we look at metaphysics, metaphysics is it’s a way of thinking.

What is Prayer? 

It’s a way of being, it’s a way of living and acting in the world and being in the world from that idea of consciousness that within us there was Spirit. And when we attune ourselves to Spirit, then we are living more from that perspective. So metaphysically, prayer is conditioning your life with the activity of Spirit. It’s conditioning your life, conditioning your thoughts, conditioning your words and actions with the activity of Spirit that causes a change in your tendency, in your consciousness, and in your awareness so that you can acknowledge that which already is such deep meaning in that metaphysically prayer is that idea of conditioning our thoughts to be in alignment with Spirit all of the time.

Now there’s the key to doing this of course is consciousness, because it’s all about our consciousness, regardless of what’s happening around us. It’s in our consciousness that we’re really having this experience. And it’s the awareness that God doesn’t come in. God doesn’t do stuff for you. God is the energy, the allness of life, that energy that’s always there and we tune into it. So prayer isn’t about – in Unity – prayer isn’t about beeching or asking or seeking something. Prayer is aligning ourselves into the recognition and consciousness that it is everywhere present. It is. It’s like the ocean. It’s like the fish swimming in the ocean, not realizing that it’s, it’s all around it. God is all around you and God is in you. Like the ocean is in the wave. As Eric Butterworth once said,” God is in you. Like there’s no separation.”

There’s no separation except for our ego thinking that we’re not it, our shadow thinking that we’re not that divine essence. And so prayer brings us back to that awareness and that presence that’s always there. It’s like electricity. It’s just always there constant. All we have to do is flip the switch so that that current can flow through us. Prayer is the science of being, not the science of doing. Prayer is the mental attitude that we create to get us in alignment with spirit. And it’s a matter of consciousness. It’s becoming consciousness, consci of the allness of life. Love and wisdom and looking at life, looking at God from that perspective and being willing to try it out. You know, not, not everybody, you know, this isn’t the truth for everybody or not how they understand it, but if you try it out and see how it fits for you, you might find that it’s very powerful in your life.

Allness and You

It’s the consciousness of allness of not getting more, but of being more, not doing more, but of being more. And in that beingness, having enough so that the doing comes naturally. I think that’s really part of the meaning that of the daily word, the, the quote that Brenna said at the end there, “seek first the kingdom of God”. Seek first that consciousness and then everything else gets added onto you because we’re, we’re approaching life from a, a new perspective, from a perspective of joy and gratitude and possibility and creativity, regardless of what’s happening around us, regardless of what’s happening inside of us, that energy is always there and we can learn to adapt to whatever the situation is. The allness is seeking to express itself as you. Wow, take that in. The allness is seeking to express itself as you. Now for some of us, you know, we’re gonna throw that aside because that’s just too much to think about, but it, it’s really quite simple if you look at it from the perspective of, you know, do good things just that, you know, be in alignment with the things that you know that, that are affirming for you.

The Purpose of Prayer

So prayer is really affirming the truth of who you are so that you create the conditions within your consciousness so that getting the results, getting yourself into a yes consciousness with Spirit. And yes, this is the way to go, not second guessing it, just keep moving forward in the direction of that which uplifts you, which creates good in your life, that which, um, is, you know, is kind and compassionate. That which you know, is helpful. Getting into that yes mentality so that it is a foregone conclusion. It just, it is what it is.

Prayer is lifting your awareness to the divine level while synchronizing yourself with the divine activity. So lifting our awareness up to that unchanging allness, that unchanging piece, that unchanging harmony so that you can be that expression so that you are creating the conditions within that make the results inevitable. It just is. So how then shall we pray? How is it that we get into alignment with this? And what I wanna share with you is something that Eric Butterworth wrote around this idea of the Lord’s Prayer. Because every once in a while, um, you know, I hear people talk about, well, you know, growing up in the religion of my childhood we always said the Lord’s Prayer and it had so much meaning for people and and that’s fabulous if it has meaning for you, what Jesus was talking about, whenever his disciples would say, Okay, teach us to pray, He would say things like, “Well, don’t do anything you don’t want to do.”

Do What is Right For You

And you know, so always do good things. And it was like, well, wait a minute. Why are you, why are you putting it in that context? Why are you putting it in like my daily life? How are we supposed to pray? And he said, “Okay, first off, use not vain repetitions for your father knoweth that ye have need of these things even before you asked him.” So use not vain repetitions for divine intelligence knows what you need before you even do use not vain repetitions. So it’s not God doing unto you and it’s not you just saying something rote over and over again so that you’re pleasing God. It’s not you doing anything for God. It’s about you getting into alignment with spirit. It’s something that we do in ourselves to let that which God already has done, be expressed in and come to fruition through us.

Prayer is something that is done within us to let spirit, to let that which spirit already knows, which spirit is already expressing, to let that flow through you. And whenever you pray, Jesus said, “go into your inner chamber and shut the door.” So it’s about going within, going to that inner chamber, that state of consciousness where we turn off all of the thoughts and worries and complaints. We turn off all of the fears and doubts and and lack statement. We turn off the, you know, I don’t have everything I need. God please give me something. We turn off that mentality, we let it go. We let go of all of those ego thoughts. God please take care of my boss because that person needs to change. Anybody have one of those thoughts in one of those prayers? God, please tell my brother and sister and uncle that they’re wrong and I’m right. Okay, Sorry, I gotta get a little too close to Thanksgiving. I guess <laugh>, when we’re trying to change other people or change the experience or change something out there, we want them to change. But as we heard, this is about us changing in here so that we can have compassion, understanding for where they’re coming from. We may not agree with them,

We may have a process that works better for us, but it’s about aligning ourselves with that so that we can stand strong in our faith and know this is what’s working for me and no spirit is, and know that we are the expression of it amongst it all. What a beautiful way to go into Thanksgiving. Wouldn’t it be to just be a loving presence, to just seek first that loving presence within you and then to express that in the world regardless of what happens around us, to be joyful and to be grateful in all of those things. So what I’d like to do is take you through the Lord’s Prayer

As it has been recreated by Eric Butterworth. And we’ll take it slow and maybe we can have a little music underneath it if you guys don’t mind. If it feels comfortable, if it feels right, so that we can have a felt sense and maybe a different experience of this idea of the Lord’s Prayer and maybe a new way to look at it. If it’s something that you’ve thrown out with the bath water, maybe it’s something that you can bring back to your understanding. Maybe if it’s something that has great meaning for you, it will give you even more meaning. It’ll be even more special for you. So invite you first to take a nice deep cleansing breath and to just be in this present moment. You may close your eyes if that feels comfortable or soften your gaze, whatever it takes for you to move into your inner chamber, to move into that place within you where there is pure peace, pure love, pure wisdom. Whenever any thoughts or concerns or emotions bubble up, we just allow them to float by blessing them, honoring them, and returning to that sweet inner stillness.

And in this space, let us pray this way. Our Father who art in heaven, I am now conscious of the infinite and eternal presence in whom my love and by which I think create hall would be thy name. This presence in me is whole and complete. It is the activity of health that heals the intelligence, that inspires of substance, that prospers and of love, that harmonizes thy kingdom come, thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven. I am God’s glorious possibility and I now let his perfect idea of me unfold in me and through me. My desire is for betterment. My desire for betterment is God’s desire to perfect that which it is expressing as me. And I intend to let it have its way. Seeing myself as doing that which it sees me as being. Give us this day our daily bread. I have no existence outside of God’s presence. For I am that presence expressing as me. Therefore, I could never be separated from the all sufficient substance of the opulent universe. I claim I divine inheritance and I daily perpetually manifest abundance supply. Forgive us our debts as we have forgiven our debtors.

The presence in me is my potential for dissolving all conflicts of transgression, the presence of love. And it loves in me and through me as love. It forgives in me and through me as I forgive. It releases me as I loosen and let go of all my limited thoughts about myself and others. Leave us not in temptation, but deliver us from evil. The presence in me is my light and my deliverance. There is no darkness in the light and there can be no darkness in me. When I am established in my spiritual unity with the presence within which is better than light and safer than the known way for thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever in all that I seek to be or do or have. I humbly recognize that in the presence is my own power to think, my very aspirations, my will to commence my strength. Strength to keep on, my power to achieve and the glory of my accomplishment. This is the truth. So be it. Ah, Amen. And with a nice steep cleansing breath, let us return our attention to this time and space.

Rejoice & Give Thanks

That wisdom, that harmonic energy, that piece that passes all understanding is the bliss that we experience when we open our heart to spirit, when we open our mind to divine intelligence, when we open our relationships to being present to one another, to being the presence for one another. In his first letter to the Thessalonians, Paul wrote, “Rejoice, always pray without ceasing and give thanks in all circumstances.” And that’s our practice for this week. Rejoice always for spirit is always available. Just like the electricity in our walls, we just turn on the switch and we are illuminated. But you have to choose to turn on the switch. You can choose to live in the darkness. The electricity’s still there. It’s just waiting for you to say yes. So rejoice this week, find the reason to rejoice the reasons in your relationships, the reasons as you’re leaving the parking lot and admiring the incredible trees, they’re my favorite trees in the world. They get fluorescent.

Rejoice in the things that we have in the, in the good that’s in your life. And pray without ceasing. You know, Unity’s perspective about prayer is that it’s not an activity, it’s not a thing that we do. It is a state of consciousness and awareness. It is the highest form of mind action. That when we are in alignment with spirit, that is prayer. When you are in alignment with spirit, you can be praying ceaselessly throughout all of your activities by bringing that consciousness to everything that we do. And in that, give thanks in whatever situation you’re in, give thanks. No it is. He didn’t say for everything, give thanks like those relatives and colleagues that we all want to change.

But if you want the advanced teaching, you can give thanks for them as well. For they are your master teacher. Everyone take a nice deep prick cleansing breath. Yeah, that’s a hard one. That’s another talk. We’ll get to that later. But in everything in the expression of life, because you are in the expression of the, you are the expression of it. Be grateful for it. Be grateful for that breath. I’ve had, I’ve had a cold the last few weeks and you know, my breathing hasn’t been the best and yet I’m breathing. And thank you spirit for each and every breath. We’re gonna take a just a moment now to turn within again as we allow that experience to anchor itself within us.