1999-03-30-Mota, Action Achieves Strength

Session

Opening

MEDITATION: Will's lesson of March 30 (see discussion page)

TOMAS: Good evening, berries. This is Tomas and I tell you it is thick here this evening. The density is peculiar to your dinner hour. I am sure we will be able to forebear and transcend in due course if we but commence, for it is in our best interest that we commit and then follow through.

Lesson

For many, many centuries, as your world was awaiting its next evolutionary epochal step, the status quo was on a par with a state of dormancy. Evolution transpired, yes, but only rarely did it surge forward meaningfully. Your world now is seriously surging forward, as each of you allow it.

There is a mota that speaks of "Action achieves strength; moderation eventuates in charm." (48:7.11) There is talk also that "religionists act". If you were to continue to put off until tomorrow what you could do today, you would remain dormant and you would perhaps eventuate in charm, but these times evoke action, impel excitement.

You have been admonished for many months to be mindful of the stillness, to find your foundation, to remain true to your trust, to be yourself, to be true to your understanding of your place in the universe. All of these are strengthening and stabilizing, and in an integral and vital way they are active also. How could you acknowledge that the kingdom of heaven is within you if you did not act upon that thought and allow the realization to occur, thereby revealing to yourself the incredible truth of your association with the living cosmos?

We call you to step out into your arenas and serve, to take risks, to be fearless, not to worry about whether you make a mistake in your service, but your many, many centuries of dormancy and plodding evolutionarily forward disallows the courage necessary to stand out front, to act according to your impression of what you would do if you could, if you would.

Are you waiting for someone else to do it? Are you waiting for them to do it for you? Are you waiting for them to do it with you? Are you reluctant to do it because if you do you will stand alone? You will be alienated? You will be misunderstood? You will be feared? You will be crucified and persecuted?

Sister Will reminds us in the meditation you read this evening that fear is a master intellectual fraud practiced upon the evolving mortal soul, and so you have come to be so accustomed to this unreasoned fear that you restrain yourself from stepping out in faith to act, to be strong.

Here I am speaking to you of being active, being courageous, taking risks, while you sit complacent and dormant . ..

Dialogue

RACHEL: You are dessert.

TOMAS ... with your bellies full and your creature comforts intact. To the contrary, my dear, I am not dessert. I am the appetizer. I have come to whet your appetite for truth and for thought and for action. I have come to parallel your life to the Life that hails from Paradise so that in this connection you too can conceive and act upon it, allowing a greater reality to come into being.

The act is yours. What will you do? Joniel?

JONIEL: I don't know.

TOMAS: Have you aspirations and inspirations in your quiet time? Have you dreams and hopes for humanity and for those you love? Do you have ambition for your own growth and development?

JONIEL: I just wish it was faster.

TOMAS: I urge you to act, and what is the first thing in action? Making a decision. Once you have made a whole-hearted, consecrated decision, you will be assisted. If it is Father's will, it will be. If it is not His will, if it does not come to pass, what have you lost by the effort? Face? Who cares! You get up and try again. I did not mean to pick on you, my dear. I wanted to incorporate you in the process.

Perhaps some brainstorming. Community action is often a way to get a toe-hold on service work because you have the strength of your companions. Of course when you have companions you have to reckon with their personalities and sometimes this makes the job slower and you might find it easier if you had done it by yourself. That is an experiential lesson also.

That is the kind of experiential lesson that may help you to learn your own effectiveness, or again, it might just bring you back to the realization that the group can do more than the individual if they all work together. This is the meaning of community. Have you talked about joint efforts, inasmuch as you are a group here?

RACHEL: Not really. Joint efforts. In what way?

TOMAS: Oh, a service project, shall we say.

RACHEL: That hadn't even entered my mind, but it's a great idea.

TOMAS: I happen to know that Angus and Gerdean have discussed joint efforts and even group efforts and we are scheduled to have some further discussions along those lines.

ANGUS: We will get to that.

RACHEL: Keep me informed! It could be fun.

TOMAS: We will discuss it again and further, and your support and cooperation are noted and appreciated.

ANGUS: Can I ask a little question here on action?

TOMAS: Yes, Angus.

ANGUS: I know the kind of action that I need to take, but it's not just a one level kind of thing. There are so many ways to act. I guess my biggest concern would be not seeing the places where I should act and being more interested in the things that I am conscious of acting on and maybe I'm missing something.

TOMAS: There are things that you are quite gifted at, things that you can see very clearly. There are, at the same time, areas where you are not clear or where you have blinders up, but as you trust the process, trust The Father and your place in your own action, as an extension of His action, as you also develop trust for your companions, you will be delighted to find, as you have already, that many times that area that, for you, appears cloudy, is for them quite clear, and so between you, you have 20/20 vision. Now multiply that by as many as are engaged in the project, and if the group is balanced, focused, and united in purpose, the workers indeed become a dynamic organism of service. You can see where it requires trust because if you could do the whole thing by yourself you wouldn't need them. But as you need them, as they need you, in this unity of purpose, your strengths are multiplied exponentially. Trust is a vital factor.

ANGUS: Okay. I know I have difficulty trusting, for some reason.

TOMAS: You have trouble trusting for the same reason as everyone on Urantia has trouble trusting. You have lived a legacy of betrayal. You are surrounded by self-serving, fear-based humanity reinforcing the same old value system. Here again I remind you of the value of your own peer group, your own spirit family, wherein you learn these valuable lessons that will allow you to forge ahead in faith and accomplish great works.

Distrust is a residue reaction that can be corrected. It is interesting to hear mortals say, "Oh, I'm not good at that." It is a simple way of closing the door on all opportunity.

RACHEL: That's true, but somebody TOLD us along the way that we weren't good at it.

TOMAS: I will tell you now that that was a lie.

RACHEL: Yes. I know that. Now.

TOMAS: And you believed these lies. Perhaps everyone wants to believe it because it would be easier if you denied yourself the opportunity to succeed or fail. Challenge yourself to discover the things that you can do, the things that you are good at, the things that you need help with, based upon your own understanding of yourself, rather than what somebody else has told you.

RACHEL: Well, I am doing that now and I'm having fun.

TOMAS: Yes. All of the growing ones are, but don't fall prey to the generalities that pollute your environment intellectually. Fear is a master intellectual fraud practiced upon the evolving mortal soul. It's a fraud.

ANGUS: The way to break up the fraud and expose it, I'm assuming, is that by taking action, it's the only way that we can unlearn what we've learned and prove it wrong.

TOMAS: Precisely. To PROVE it wrong, for you can know in your heart, in your spirit, in your soul the truth, but when you ACT upon it, you have solidified the truth, you have contributed to God, you have given to the Supreme, you have given this light of truth into the cosmos, you have made it real, you have proved it, yes. This is why you are urged to act.

To sit, perpetually, in stillness, to remain unmoved, allows you to have inner strength, inner calm, allows you to be the eye in the hurricane, but it is through your actions that you advance your realm. You prompt thought. You effect change. You co-create.

If it is not time to advance, you will be shown how to advance moderately, but there are no backward steps built into your destiny path, and you are never called upon to be neutral, for therein is a danger of crystallizing. Inching forward is okay, but why inch forward when you can take giant steps, in confidence that the angels themselves are in support of your desire to be of service to Michael's dominion?

ANGUS: Something you just said about truth struck me that . .. I know in my mind I think about the truth, you know, it's always in quotations and it's something special and large and maybe even grandiose. The Truth. It's even more simple than that. When you said, if you do the right thing, you've corrected a wrong and you've added to God's perfection. That could be the simplest of right things, not necessarily something grandiose.

TOMAS: This is true.

ANGUS: And being ourselves is the ultimate truth for us.

TOMAS: To thine own self be true, indeed. This is a big job! A supreme order. To be yourself. To find out who you are and have the courage to be it. To take orders from On High. To respond to the prompts of your superiors. To willingly, humbly, learn from those who know whereof they speak.

ANGUS: Which could be anybody.

TOMAS: Providing you have a clear understanding of the Spirit of Truth. And, of course, the ultimate authority of your indwelling Adjuster.

ANGUS: Orders On High that come from within.

TOMAS: That are affirmed and confirmed, that reverberate with the light of truth. Now, it is understood, the relative degree of all this, but don't let relativity stop you from advancing. It is in discovering how far to the left or how far to the right you have gone that brings you back to the straight and narrow, so to speak, and eventually you will find your path is smooth sailing. You will know your course. You will follow the Wayshower, in confidence of His leading and your desire to follow wherever He will take you.

These confidence levels come from being out there (tape turned)...

ANGUS: That's an awesome campaign slogan.

RACHEL: "Fear for faith". So true.

TOMAS: Well, we have an interesting campaign afoot. We have the banner waving. We are out there now soliciting voters. In fact, there is only One on the docket.

RACHEL: Uh-huh.

ANGUS: And they said yea or nay and our job is for them to make it a yea.

TOMAS: Yea. It has been challenging for me this evening to instill in you enthusiasm, given the lethargy of your systems, but I am very pleased that we have gone as far as we have and that in your placid states you have been so receptive and responsive to these seeds of encouragement.

RACHEL: It was a good lesson and it was well absorbed. It was a very good lesson.

TOMAS: You are such an eager student, Rachel.

RACHEL: Right along the lines of my thinking lately, you know? Having the fear to realize my dreams . .. but I'm going to have the faith to do it! So . .. I'm in.

ANGUS: I've had the privilege, Tomas, of experiencing getting a taste of the positive results of faith and trust in my relationship with Gerdean, and I can feel that transferring more into my faith with The Father. I've always had undeniable belief and faith and trust in God, but it's reaching a different type of personal level.

TOMAS: Indeed it has, my son, and this is the wonders of the kingdom in action. Your prayer, the Master's prayer, that says, "Thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven" is a good indication that the kingdom on earth is inclusive of fellow believers wherein you can see The Father personified in your mortal associates. This is also the beginning of Light and Life.

This is one of my favorite themes, how each of you in your own realm of perfection can reflect the Father's light to each other, thereby encouraging and helping one another as you expand your individual spheres of influence to harmoniously abut the spheres of those surrounding you, ever enlarging the light of truth and Light and Life itself. It is in these relationships that you are made aware of the divine favor of the Father that reflects His love to His children.

ANGUS: You made a lot of sense . .. Excuse me, Tomas.

RACHEL: (Laughter)

ANGUS: What you said has allowed me to make a lot more sense about the Fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man because of what you just said about the reflectivity, that . .. I mean, it's like the brotherhood is the organism. I mean there's God and there's creation, and for some reason the way you said that, it just all made it seem so real about how it's all one unit and one can't operate effectively without the other one, and it just all makes sense all of a sudden.

TOMAS: Congratulations. I am also going to congratulate myself. We made a point. We saw the light of truth. This is what the Teacher Base is for. We can do it, you see. We will not fail. As we reflect to each other the truth of our Being, we reflect The Father and His goodness, even His greatness, and His mercy. All of these things are infinitely possible because we are each embraced by and indwelt with His love and His presence.

As we allow this divine love to dominate our lives, we radiate greater glory to Him, thus inducing and encouraging others to yearn to know this same clarity of mind and soul, ever expanding and ennobling His creation in the spirit and in the flesh.

Well, perhaps we have had dessert after all.

RACHEL: Yes, thank you.

TOMAS Are there questions?

RACHEL: No, not from this end of the couch.

ANGUS: I have a question, and this is probably going to have a subjective kind of result to it, but I am naturally curious about the possibility of events that have happened in the recent past and are happening now and are going to happen in the future, although we don't know when and I don't care to know exactly when, but I do have a lot of interest and natural curiosity about how all the things that are going on tie in together and what the future might be and how to make sense of historical events and that kind of thing. A lot of people think that that's a total distraction and I'm wondering if it's possible to get some kind of an idea from you if it's a natural thing and if it's a good thing and it doesn't detract with my personal relationship with my TA and The Father.

TOMAS: Are you speaking of global, political situations?

ANGUS: That and taking it to the celestial/global/political level eventually. There's a lot of things that are going on and I think all of us are trying to make sense of this millennium nonsense in one way, shape, form or another, and then you tie in the Correcting Time with that and all the other machinations that are coming down the line, trying to figure out what they all might possibly mean. At the same time, there are indications that I see from all around the planet that the Father is at work in hundreds and hundreds of different ways, and I would love to be able to help make sense out of that, just for myself and for others' sake, too, and I'm wondering if that's a waste of time. I mean, there's the whole idea of, well, you should just pay attention to your inner self and take care of your own relationship, but yet somehow that seems like hiding the candle under the bushel a little bit, too.

TOMAS: I would like to respond.

ANGUS: Please.

TOMAS: I would like to refer earlier to my admonition to you to disbelieve those who say, "You can't" and so it would be silly of me to say, "You can't" but part of me wants to say, "You can't understand everything that's going on." Even so, you can certainly look for sense and seek to find some way of congealing all of these many diverse factors that comprise life on your world as you perceive it in your mind's eye today.

I encourage you to trust Universal Mind to help you formulate those reality levels that are pertinent to your piece of mind insofar as these understandings are concerned. In the long run, from the farther view, everything is related. The emotional and psychic pitch that has been mounting having to do with your calendar is having a tremendously distorted effect on most people, because most people are only aware of their time-space limitations. Those of you who are aware of the greater universe, who live in the neighborhood of your cosmos as much and more than your global neighborhood, have the perspective to see that this is a temporary hysteria, but even in the face of its fever pitch, there will be spirit activation because of it. Spirit can be brought into being because of the catalyst of the day and time in which we are here in 1999 on Urantia. All of it relates, but it's a relative thing.

I know my answer may seem terribly obscure, but I'm trying to help you put in perspective, if you could but see how you have stirred yourselves up, like a top that has been pumped and pumped and pumped and then let go, it is spinning, swirling, madly all over the floor, bouncing into furniture, spinning, spinning.

RACHEL: No direction.

TOMAS: Eventually it will wind down. In the meantime, a calendar birth date will have come and gone. Political situations will have risen and fallen. Souls will have been reborn. All of that. After the millennia celebration has come and gone, it will once again settle down, and like the top, will hum for a while and purr for a while and then lie down on its side and need another trumping in order to perform in its normal function.

Much of what you see is the result of calendar hysteria, but it is a symptom of the spiritual situation and a symptom also of Correcting Time.

ANGUS: Are those coincidental?

TOMAS: Certainly not.

ANGUS: Okay. I would like to be able to look at all of this from the view of the cosmos, as you said, and that's the only place that I feel comfortable coming from on the issue because, as you said, things are crazy here on this planet. It's very difficult to tell what's really going on at any particular time. You can hardly believe anything that you see, read or hear any more.

TOMAS: We discussed this earlier, that your guidance needs to come from your understanding of the Spirit of Truth and your relationship with your Indwelling Adjuster. Now I want to add to this that it is also appropriate for certain ones among you who feel motivated, who feel the call, to go ahead and become involved in any number of these things, these enterprises or intrigues or scenarios or situations, industries and conflicts, that you feel led to do, as an individual, based upon your understanding of what The Father has in mind for you.

ANGUS: Thank you.

TOMAS: As a general teacher of spirit concept, however, it behooves me to stress the over-all picture, the generic, if you will, so that you can see or begin to see, and as you take these matters in confidence and prayer to the Master, he will disclose to you that which you would do well to understand, and relieve you of that which is not for you to worry about.

ANGUS: I could use less stress.

RACHEL: Couldn't we all! I think we create our own, though.

TOMAS: When you trust that there are those who will do willingly what you find stressful, you will let it go, in order that they may more readily serve -- and vice versa. Your tendencies, as humans, to be a self-sufficient island, as we discussed recently, has interfered greatly in your ability to become one with your fellows.

Closing

We will continue our studies and our development of the soul as a result of life's experiences in conjunction with our relationship with our Divine Parents. In the interim, I will embrace you for this evening, commend you for your efforts, appease you for your presumed failings, and look forward to your week with interest.

Amen and farewell.

RACHEL, ANGUS & JONIEL: Thank you, Tomas. Good night.