Sunday Sermon [Salvation]

¡Hola! Everybody…
Sometimes I’m a captive of my own talents. Yesterday, I was at a neighborhood affair that had quite a few politicians attending. Now, normally, politicians hate to come after me when speaking. Many people don’t like to follow me at public speaking venues. LOL!

I speak from the heart.

Sorry I couldn’t make your BBQ Tony, I got caught up in my work, and Cambria Heights is a long way from Gowanus, Brooklyn. It would be great if the NYC Chapter of Y 360/ The ‘Ply got together before the summer’s over in a more centralized location.

* * *

-=[ Salvation ]=-

Salvation is undoing.
-- A Course in Miracles

I used the following story yesterday as part of my pitch. It’s funny, but it also has a message…

A man who had done much wrong in his life had finally embraced a life in which he did works for good. As part of his return to a life of some measure of sanity, he decided to get a gift to his mother, the sole person who never turned her back on him. Not knowing what to buy her, he passed a pet store and it dawned on him that perhaps getting his aging mother a companion would be a great idea.

He entered the pet shop and explained his situation to the proprietor and he suggested he buy his mother a pair talking birds. Not convinced, the man asked why this would be such a great idea.

Well, for one thing, these birds are fluent in English, and they could keep your mother company through the gift of language. I could sell you a dog or cat, but they’re often more trouble. The birds will talk to your mother and the maintenance and care will be negligible compared to a dog or cat.”

“Fantastic!” exclaimed the man and he asked that the birds be delivered to his mother.

Later, he called his mother and asked if she had received his surprise.

“Oh yes son! I loved the birds. Thank you so much!”

Ecstatic, the son went to see his mother, but when he entered her apartment, he didn’t hear the chit chat of the birds.

“Moms, where are the birds I sent you?” he asked his mother.

“Oh son, those birds were the tastiest birds I’ve ever had. Thanks so much!”

Horrified, the son exclaimed, “Ma! What have you done?!! Don’t you know those birds were very expensive and rare talking birds?!! How could have you eaten them?!!”

The mother, looking a little perplexed, asked her son, “Son you say that these birds were talking birds?”

“Yes, moms! They were very expensive and rare talking birds.”

The mother, now picking her teeth with a toothpick, said in that patient tone all mothers reserve when addressing confused children, “Well, maybe one of them should’ve said something.”

LOL!

I use this story because sometimes we’re like the talking birds in the story. Too often, we find ourselves in difficult situations, but we find it hard to ask for help in a way that people can understand. Too many of us live lives of quiet desperation, looking “as if” and “going through the motions,” but deep down inside, we’re being eaten alive.

Most often it’s not even our pride that stops us from reaching out. More often than not, we’re prisoners of our own concepts of how things should be. When we scratch underneath eh surface and we look within without fear or defense, we come across a constellation of thoughts and belief systems that act as barriers to our own salvation.

Salvation asks for nothing except substituting forgiveness for fear. The work of salvation is removing the obstacles toward freedom and that is nothing less than an escape from our preconceived notions that are merely illusions. Those who endeavor to lift the veil of illusion from their minds are truly the world’s saviors.

Love,

Eddie