Month: July 2023

That Quickening Moment: Part III

/ Darlene Franklin-Campbell / Leave a comment
That Quickening Moment

That Quickening Moment

 

EGO and THE SHIFT

In his book, The Shift: Taking your Life from Ambition to Meaning, Wayne Dyer speaks of ego. He says ego stands for:

E-edge

G-God

O-out

Ergo, Ego=doing things our way instead of God’s way.

If you think about this, it goes all the way back to the story of Cain and Able.

Cain wanted to do things his way, to take shortcuts and circumvent the laws of the spiritual universe.

EGO says, “I am what I have.”

In other words, if I earn more money and have nicer things, then I am more valuable in this world.

EGO also says, “I am what I do and what I do leads to achievement which leads to the idea that my worth depends on what I have and what I do.”

EGO further says, “I am what others think of me.”

It believes itself to be separate from others and goes to great links to manipulate, control, intimidate, interrogate, and coerce others into behaving the way we need them to so that we feel better.

NEW CREATIONS

new creation

new creation

When we experience a quickening moment, we realize that what we used to believe no longer lines up with the new creation we’ve become.

Things like winning and getting ahead take a backseat to finding inner peace and living with purpose.                                                                                                           –Wayne Dyer

We start to gage everything on the basis of, “Is this the path that feels like inner peace in my life? Is this God’s best path forward to me?”

We may suddenly find ourselves not wanting to go places we used to go or do things we used to do or even hang around with people we used to hang around with. We discover that we are existing in a whole new reality as if we are literally vibrating on another plane of existence.

If we make a choice out of ego, it takes us away from finding meaning and purpose. It takes us off God’s best laid path for our lives, our inner callings.

When we experience a quickening, we know in the depth of our beings that there is something more and nothing else, no matter how amazing it may seem, can fill us or give us meaning.

 

WHEN WE CHANGE, OUR WANTS CHANGE

Photo by Keegan on Pexels.com

We get to a place where we are guided by something bigger than ourselves. The key is to stay in harmony with the Spirit of God, to walk in the Way. Once we stay there, purpose and meaning start to take over and we no longer chase the blessings. They chase us!

It’s these quickening moments, born again experiences, that transform us into new creations, that help us wake up and become more Christ-like.

Paul says that if anyone is “in Christ’ then he or she is no longer the kind of being they once were but has become a brand-new creation, something that they’ve never been before.

In Christ does not refer to keeping religious laws or adhering to some external standard in order to be deemed worthy of heaven. It is not about what we do.

What kind of being do we become when we undergo this massive internal transformation?

We become the kind of being that Jesus was when he was on this earth and we start to get our memories back, to wake up to who we really are, where we’re really from, why we’re really here and where we’re really going. We start to see this world as transient. How do I know this?

Well, the disciple, John, says, “Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness (confidence and assurance) in the Day of Judgement (justice); because as He is, so are we in this world.” 1 John 4:17

In the study that Dyer quotes, he speaks of the characteristics of a quickening moment.

  1. It’s vivid, intense. It stays with you forever. You may try to walk away but you can’t unknow the truth once you know it. It will always be inside you, always calling you back. Once you’re born, you can’t be unborn.
  2. It’s surprising, unexpected, uninvited, and unforeseen. (Like when Walking Deer saw the neon sign in a previous blog post.)
  3. It requires surrender, letting go of ego and acknowledging that it is the higher, better way.
  4. It is benevolent; peaceful and blissful, serene.

SHIFTS IN VALUES:

Dyer talks about a study that found that both men and women begin to have a change in values when they experience this shift. He lists the top five values of each before and after.

MEN’S TOP FIVE ‘BEFORE’ VALUES

  1. Wealth—so often men are taught from youth to believe their worth is found in what they can accumulate, in their possessions, positions, and how much money they make. EGO–I AM WHAT I HAVE. 
  2. Sense of adventure (travel, novelty, experiences, food, excitement)—This is a type of machoism and/or wanderlust, always looking the next great experience, never being satisfied with “enough.” EGO–I AM WHAT I DO. 
  3. Sense of achievement— (accolades, admiration, envy) Many men are led to believe that their worth is tied up with their accomplishments, setting goals, competing and “winning.” EGO–I AM WHAT OTHERS THINK OF ME. 
  4. Personal pleasure—Whatever indulges the senses or feeds a sense of triumph to the mind. EGO–I AM WHAT I DO.
  5. Status/to be Respected/Admired/Envied by other men/Desired—have admiration of other people, affection of women, envy of men. EGO–I AM WHAT OTHERS THINK OF ME.

My Note: Notices that spirituality and family are not even on the list! They are somewhere down the line.

MEN’S TOP FIVE ‘AFTER’ VALUES

  1. Spirituality/relationship with God–(Wow! What a transformation from not in the top five all the way to number 1!)
  2. Personal peace—not needing to impress anyone or prove anything or teach anyone “a lesson,” a sense of contentment. Now, the true measure of success is about knowing inner peace!
  3. Family— (again, wow! It wasn’t even in the top five before.) After the shift it’s about spending time with the kids, valuing the wife, making lasting memories with the grandkids. It’s about teaching the children the true meaning of success and planting seeds of spirituality. It’s no longer about man toys and trips. It’s no longer about being seen with attractive women and being the envy of other men. It’s about building a true legacy, not a legacy of getting and gaining and waste.
  4. God’s Will—Again this wasn’t even on the list before! This one is the total opposite of EGO! Not your will, but mine, God. I ask you to direct my path. It’s not about what I think I need, it’s about your best laid plans for me. That’s what I want—your way only. Show me your ways, Oh, God, that I may walk in them! Talk about a total turn-around! EGO is out the door. Instead of edging God out, they’re inviting him in.
  5. Honesty—this is not a demand that everyone else hand over their secrets as a means of power and control but rather an honest look at oneself and a humility before God. It means being honest in transactions, not conniving and deceptive in speech, not underhanded in actions—not manipulative.

WOMEN’S TOP FIVE ‘BEFORE’ Values:

  1. Family—Women are raised to be supporters and are often taught from an early age to deny our own inner instincts in order to please others. While this doesn’t seem like ego, it actually falls under I AM WHAT OTHERS THINK OF ME, prompting most women to measure their worth by what others say and think about us. 
  2. Sense of independence—because women are trained to be supporters, we often feel trapped, enslaved, to the needs of others, to husbands, siblings, children, and parents. This feeling of being trapped, of not being able to pacify the ego, this suppressing of personal wants and dreams, often causes hidden seeds of resentment to grow within. EGO–I AM WHAT I DO. 
  3. Career–feeling guilty about having one and feeling guilty about not having one. EGO–I AM WHAT I DO.
  4. Fitting in—women are judged HARSHLY by other women when they don’t fit in. EGO–I AM WHAT OTHERS THINK OF ME.
  5. Being attractive—Women are told from the time we’re babies that we need to be “pretty” in order to have worth. Sometimes, the message is subtle, sometime blatant, but it’s always there. For some women their entire sense of self-worth is wrapped up in how attractive they are. Magazines, videos, movies, etc. feature women who are “beautiful” and therefore worth more in society. EGO–I AM WHAT OTHERS THINK OF ME. 

WOMEN’S TOP FIVE ‘AFTER’ VALUES

  1. Personal growth— She begins to work on her psychological well-being. Maybe she takes courses on things she has always been interested in but never had the confidence to try. She starts to care less and less what other people think.
  2. Self-esteem—she realizes that she has value beyond how she looks or how clean her house is or how many years she’s worked without missing a day or whether or not she hosted the family reunion this year. This is the time when a woman realizes that she is a an individual, that she is not so and so’s wife or mom or sister or aunt, she is an actual person with an actual set of gifts and God-given ideas.
  3. Sense of spirituality—It becomes more and more important to her to walk according to God’s purpose and plan for her life whether anyone else approves or not. She carves out moments to spend alone in meditation, contemplation, and rest.
  4. Right to happiness—Because of her personal growth and her increased bent toward spirituality she now realizes that she has a right to be happy, too. Happiness looks different to different people, but she learns to identify what feels joyful to her and to go in that direction.
  5. Forgiveness—she lets go of the resentment she has felt against her husband and others who have taken advantage of her generosity throughout the years.

THAT QUICKENING MOMENT: Part 2

/ Darlene Franklin-Campbell / 2 Comments

YE MUST BE BORN AGAIN

rebirth

Rebirth means coming out differently than you went in.

If you want to enter–

–to know

–to percieve

–to experience

the realm of the spirit,

the kingdom of God,

you have to spiritually be born anew, regenerated, from on high.

The only way to do this is to hear, see and encounter truth,

truth about who you are, why you’re here and where you’re going.

The moment you wake up, it’s like a new birth, as if you’re spiritually coming alive. This is that quickening moment.

Some quickening moments happen in an instant. Some happen over the course of time and as a result of culminating events, but regardless of how it happens, you will never be the same again.

In the New Testament, book of John, third chapter, Jesus does the best job I’ve ever heard of describing the quickening to Nicodemus. Let’s look at what he says.

In the following passage, I am using the New International Version with the King James of the Book of John as a reference. I’m also reading from the Greek linear Bible and consulting Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance. Bolded areas are my own thoughts.

…………………………………………………………………

FLESH IS FLESH. SPIRIT IS SPIRIT.

Night sky

That which is born of flesh is flesh. That which is born of spirit is spirit.

Now there was a Pharisee, a man named Nicodemus who was a member of the Jewish ruling council. 

2 He came to Jesus at night and said, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the signs you are doing if God were not with him.”

He came to Jesus at night because Nicodemus was a religious teacher of Judaism and Jesus had no credentials in the religious or academic circles of his day and culture. In other words, Nicodemus was a member of the “experts” and Jesus was just a guy from Nazareth.  

3 Jesus replied, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see (perceive, comprehend) the kingdom (realm, way) of God (the Supreme Divinity) unless they are born again (from above, on high).[a]”

4 “How can someone be born when they are old?” Nicodemus asked. “Surely they cannot enter a second time into their mother’s womb to be born!”

5 Jesus answered, “Very truly I tell you, no one can enter (come into) the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit (God’s spirit). 6 Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit[b] gives birth to spirit.

A person is born into this world via the flesh, the physical, and we live in a body made of flesh, but we are not flesh. We only live in flesh. We are spirit and when we are born into the flesh body, we can only comprehend physical things unless we are reborn, regenerated, awakened from on high to spiritual things, i.e. The Kingdom of God, the Eternal Way.

YOU CAN’T IMPRISON THE WIND

who can control a tornado?

You can’t imprison the wind!

 7 You should not be surprised at my saying, ‘You[c] must be born again.’ 8 The wind (Spirit) blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.”[d]

The Greek word used for wind here is identical to the one used for Spirit, “pneuma” and it means a current that is breath or a breeze, a life spirit, a divine spirit.

You can hear and see the effects of the Spirit of God, the Way of Life, but you can’t contain it, control it, or determine which direction it is going to move, just as you can’t control or predict the wind.

I am thinking of how, even with all our modern technology, we can’t always accurately predict the activity of hurricanes and tornadoes. We don’t know exactly where they’re going to touch down or what they’re going to do. Sometimes tornadoes pop up that weren’t even on the forecast and newscasters can only assess them after the fact.

There is a line from the movie, China Cry, where Lam Nang Ye tells the Chinese military general that in order to lock God away, you’d have to imprison the wind. It can’t be done, not with force, not with coercion, not with technology or threats. You can’t imprison the wind. And you cannot control the Spirit of God that resides in each of us and when we are regenerated, reborn, awakened from on high, we are like a wind.

9 “How can this be?” Nicodemus asked.

10 “You are Israel’s teacher,” said Jesus, “and do you not understand these things? 

Again, Nicodemus was the “expert.”

 LIGHT HAS COME INTO THE WORLD AND DARKNESS JUST DOESN’T GET IT!

light has come into the world

Light has come into the world but those who live only for this world do not understand it.

11 Very truly I tell you, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still, you people do not accept our testimony (evidence given, stated).”

I find it interesting that Jesus uses the term “we” in this statement. Why? Who is the “we” and “our” of which he speaks? Could it mean all those who had come and tried to explain the Way of God? In another place he spoke of how the Jews had stoned the prophets and messengers from God instead of believing them. Could he be speaking of all those who bring messages of eternal truth? When he says, “You people do not accept our testimony.” In the Linear Greek Bible it reads more like he is saying, “And still, you people do not get it.”

So, I understand this verse as thus: “I tell you. Here’s the way it is. All of us who have come from God (including the prophets and teachers who came before me) have tried to explain the way the Realm of the Spirit, the Kingdom of God operates, and still, you people, with your man-made degrees, religious doctrines, rules, laws, and credentials, just don’t get it.” That which is born of flesh is flesh and that which is born of spirit is spirit and the earthly mind will never comprehend spirit. Spirit speaks to spirit.

 12 I have spoken to you of earthly things, and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things? 

LIFTED UP

13 No one has ever gone into heaven except the one who came from heaven—the Son of Man.[e] 14 Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up,[f] 15 that everyone who believes in him should not perish but may have eternal life.”[g]

From the Greek: No one has ever entered into the abode of God except the one who came from there—the Child/Offspring of the Human race. Just as Moses hoisted up the serpent in a desolate place, so it is necessary that the representative of the Human race must be hoisted up so that all people who adhere to, trust in, and cling to his words would not destroy life, lose life, or perish, but have perpetual (continuously renewed) life because of him.

The life Jesus offers those who trust him isn’t just in the hereafter, but in the now. The peace he offers is NOW. The promises he offers for those who trust him is far superior to anything we can gain in this world; the peace surpasses any and all amounts of human understanding. I am thinking of an old song that says, “I’d rather have Jesus than anything this world affords today.”

A PURPOSEFUL, HAPPY, FULFILLED LIFE–NOW AND FOREVER

16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

Because the Supreme Divinity agapao (valued, accepted, and appreciated without regard to conditions or circumstances) the inhabitants of earth he brought forth and delivered his sole offspring that all people who committed to and trusted him should not lose life, destroy their lives, or be lost from their way, but have perpetual existence.

17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn (punish) the world (people), but to save (heal, deliver, protect, make whole) the world (people) through him.

LOVE

Wow! What a departure from things so many people have heard. Do you hear this? Jesus didn’t come into this world to start a religion.

He didn’t come to punish people for their errors.

He came as a result of LOVE, and he came from LOVE because God is LOVE.

He came so that anyone who hears his words and believes them, who follows the Way, would have a blessed, happy, healthy, complete, and fulfilled life.  No matter where you’ve been, what you’ve done, what lie you’ve believed, Jesus brings this message to you. GOD IS FOR YOU, NOT AGAINST YOU.

LOVE is not an emotion. LOVE is the WAY! And the ONLY means to having a truly happy life is to walk in the WAY. If we live only for ourselves and what we can attain in this life, if the only hope we have is in this life, we will be miserable people.

BE IT UNTO YOU AS YOU BELIEVE

18 Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.

If we refuse to believe the message of Jesus, if we refuse to trust him, to commit to following his words, to walking in the Way, we are punished already, not because God is punishing us but because we are choosing to walk contrary to the guidance of the Divine Spirit. The only way to have inner peace, joy, fulfillment, and contentment is to walk according to the Way. If we choose not to follow the Way, we end up punishing ourselves.

19 This is the verdict (justice, condemnation): Light (illumination) has come into the world (inhabitants of earth), but people loved (valued and appreciated) darkness (obscurities, shadiness) instead of light (illumination) because their deeds (efforts, toil, works, acts) were evil (hurtful, degenerate, diseased, derelict, malicious, grievous, harmful, facinorous, guilting, culpable—unkind, unmerciful.) 

20 Everyone who does evil hates the light and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed.

21 But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God.

Think of ANY, and I mean ANY, thing that people do to others that cause pain, destruction, hopelessness, etc. (evil) and I will tell you there is a lack of love, i.e., a lack of God’s Way. Love does nothing to cause intentional pain to others.

Whenever we ignore that inner gnawing that we have stepped off the path and continue, little-by-little, transgressing our own moral boundaries, our own souls, we start down a slippery slope that can explain away any immoral behavior until we find ourselves doing things we never imagined we would do and involved in things we never imagined we’d be involved in.

Yet, no matter where we are or what we’ve done, if we come to our senses IN THAT QUICKENING MOMENT and realize we’ve been walking the road of pleasing self and/or others instead of the road of LOVE (the Way), doing things God’s way, we can make a shift. We can change. We can surrender to the Way and the Way is LOVE. When we do, God, LOVE itself, meets us and wraps spiritual arms around us and all the forces of the universe work together for our good, to bring us to a place of inner peace, which is the true and only measure of success.

Jesus said, “I am the WAY…” Do you know why he said that?

Because he is LOVE. He is LOVE because he came from LOVE.

For John 4:7-8 says, “Beloved, let us love one another, for everyone that loveth is born of God and knoweth God. He that loveth not, knoweth not God for God is Love. So, beloved, let us love one another.”

When we make that shift, that change, our entire perspective on life and all our values shift. In the next blog post I will discuss what these changes might look like.

………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

  1. John 3:3 & 7: The Greek for again also means from above.
  2. John 3:6 Or but spirit
  3. John 3:7 The Greek is plural.
  4. John 3:8 The Greek for Spirit is the same as that for wind.
  5. John 3:13 Some manuscripts Man, who is in heaven
  6. John 3:14 The Greek for lifted up also means exalted.
  7. John 3:15 Some interpreters end the quotation with verse 21.

John 3 NIV – Jesus Teaches Nicodemus – Now there was – Bible Gateway

(33) China Cry (1990) | Trailer | Julia Nickson-Soul | Russell Wong | James Shigeta | France Nuyen – YouTube

 

That Quickening Moment: Part I

/ Darlene Franklin-Campbell / Leave a comment

 

To Quicken Means to Bring to Life

To Quicken Means to Animate, to Bring to Life

The Quickening

I’m sitting here early on a Sunday morning, sipping coffee at the kitchen table, listening to two of my favorite sounds, the clicking clock and the humming fridge. Outside it’s been drizzling rain. I take pleasure in slow rain. It brings me a sense of calm, like the ticking clock and humming fridge.

I think about my life and smile. Lately, I’ve experienced a life-altering moment of profound clarity. Every action that I’ve taken in the days since then have been because of that life-altering moment, a moment that changed my entire outlook on myself and on my life. I call this moment, the Quickening.

I take the word quickening from Romans 8:11 where the apostle, Paul, uses the Greek word, zoopoieo (quickening) to refer to the way the spirit of God makes a person “alive.” So, to quicken something is to make it fully alive. 

The last time that happened, I was thirteen. Can a person have more than one life-altering moment, more than one moment of coming to life, more than one awakening? more than one quickening?

I believe they can. 

A quickening moment is best described as an awakening. We all wake up every day in the natural, so too, we can re-awaken in the spiritual sense. We may need to re-awaken because we allowed ourselves to be lulled to sleep.

Some people wake up in an instant and spring into their day. Others wake up slowly and go through a morning ritual of sorts before they’re truly alert. Well, spiritually, it’s the same way. However, it happens for you, a quickening moment is a spiritual awakening that shifts the entire meaning of your life and outlook on everything and everyone. It’s a moment when you wake up and are “born again.”

TWO REALITIES

Pink Clouds

There are Two Realities

There are two realms of existence.

We will call one realm the physical realm and the other realm the spiritual realm, (Kingdom (realm) of God (Supreme Magistrate, Divinity). We could even say that there is God’s reality and physical reality.

The spiritual realm has no starting point and no stopping point. The laws of physics do not apply to this realm. They apply to physical reality. The physical reality is inferior to the spiritual reality in that it is temporary and subject to the laws of thermodynamics.

The laws of the spirit realm operate on principles of a particular kind of energy and that energy is the creative force behind all that exists in the physical realm.

That energy is God, love, the source of all.

The physical realm is like parentheses in eternity. The beginning and ending parentheses are time. Or we could think of the physical realm as a bubble floating in the vast expanse of the spirit realm. The spirit realm is so much more expansive that everything inside the bubble is minute in comparison.

Now beings from the spiritual realm can take on a carnal, physical form and enter the physical realm for a time. While they’re there they experience what it means to be finite, to have a beginning and an ending.

So often these beings come into the physical realm and experience trauma, hardship, and pain, because they forget who they are and, just like Adam and Eve in the garden, they believe a temporal lie that enslaves them while they’re here.

ONE SPECIAL BEING

However, there was one particularly unique being from the spirit realm who came with all of his memories and awareness of his true origins still intact. This being defied the laws of physics at every turn, starting with his birth. He was born to a virgin. He walked on water. He raised the dead, healed the sick and confounded the most brilliant and highly educated minds of his day.

He never sought earthly credentials and was unmoved by both praise and criticism. These things meant little if anything to him because he knew who he was, where he was from, why he was here and where he was going.

Nonetheless, his final demonstration of the origin of humanity was when he allowed himself to be crucified and laid in a grave. Then he left his physical body for three days before returning to it, healing it, and reanimating it. (see Romans 8:11) 

Open our eyes

He came to open our eyes and show us who we are and the kind of life we are meant to live while we’re in this physical realm. He said, “…he (those) that believes on me (trust me, adhere to what I say) the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father.”

In another place he said that he had come to give us life and life more abundantly. He said he came to seek and to rescue those who were lost, off their path, wandering around with spiritual amnesia.

So, now that we’ve established that there are two realms of existence and that we are really spiritual beings having a physical experience, let’s look at how to get our memories back! What happens when that occurs?

I will discuss this in the next blog post.