"Praying"

Good Morning My Confidants!

Have I told this story before? Forgive me if I have, but heck, it’s a good story….

I knew someone who wanted to work for the city. He knew it would be a terrific springboard to better things. He was young and he thought working for the government for a while (maybe a decade or so?) could only do him good.

In those days you went downtown, and you took these tests—only one of them a typing test—which took hours, and when you were all done—if you passed—then you got three interviews with various branches in city government. If you didn’t get one of the three jobs, you had to start over again and take the tests again.

So my friend asked me to pray for him, because we both believed….

John 14:13-14: Whatever you ask in My name, that will I do, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask Me anything in My name, I will do it.

Then my friend got his interviews. He was one of those people who interview well. We knew he would get one of those jobs. We knew it!

And he didn’t.

He was devastated. "We prayed in Jesus’ name," he cried. We were told that if you ask Jesus anything in his name, it would be done.

“I feel like Jesus has slapped me in the face,” he told me.

I reminded him that we never know what’s waiting…and we have to trust.

Then a funny thing happen. My friend got a fourth interview—which you are never supposed to get.

So he went, he interviewed…and he got the job!

Now this is where the story really rocks.

A few weeks later Kansas City did the biggest layoff in the city’s history. People were let go in every single department by seniority…except for one department.

The water department, which was who hired him, the one and the only department that made its own money. The layoffs didn’t affect them.

If my friend had gotten a job in any other department, he would have lost his job.

When we prayed? We prayed he would get the best job with the city for him.

Well, that is what happened.

We can't see around the bend in the road. The Universe did answer our petition! His request.

I have to remember—I believe in leaping and nets appearing. It’s not something I pretend to believe in. I believe that “God,” whatever God is and whom I tend to call the Universe, is in all things and that all things are "God." I believe the Universe perceives things in a non-linear way. We see them from yesterday to today to tomorrow. But "God" sees all things and times at once. It knows what is "around the corner" because of that.

The Law of Attraction—what we think about and thank about we bring about—a Law created in the same way that gravity, cause and effect, relativity, were all created, did exactly what it was supposed to do for my friend. And by the way, the Law of Relativity, among other things, says that physics are the same for all observers in any inertial frame of reference relative to one another. The Laws of the Universe are not arbitrary. They work the same for all of us.

I pray. I simply don't pray the way I was raised.

I don't beg or postulate myself or try and bargain with the Ultimate force, the Creator of All. It's silly. I don't make deals. If "God" sees all times and one, then It knows if I am going to honor my end of the bargain, right? God can't be tricked into anything. Pleading doesn't help.

But I do believe that loving intent and full concentration does. Sending out those thoughts attracts like vibrations which come back to us. If I say I am praying for you, I don't mean getting down on my knees and sobbing and rocking back and forth. I mean I am seeing the person or persons in my mind glowing with light and seeing them as happy and well. I am SEEING them happy and well.

Then I let the Universe handle the rest, that force that sees around the bend, I let the Law of Attraction do its job. I know it that I know it that I know it, just as I know that the Law of Gravity always works for everyone. If one jumps off a building, they are going to fall, no matter if they are John or Alice, priest or serial killer, lover or hater, male or female or any other gender, dog or cat. I "pray" with that assurance. It is usually something like this....

There is only one Life. That Life is God's Life. That Life is my life now. I am one with the Universe, and I am made of God stuff/star stuff. Everything that is true of the Universe is true of me.

Then I state my intention. I picture or use words or imagines of the results that I believe is already being manifested right here and now.

And then I am grateful, knowing that what I prayed for is in effect, I give thanks. I radiate thanks.

And then with a deep breath and peace, I release it all "into Law." With all the confidence I can muster. Knowing it is so. I often finish with, "And so it is," or, "blessed be."

Utmost, I am not using a particular version of God onto anyone. I keep that "God" Universal. I am not imposing my view over the view of the person asking for prayer/juju/good thoughts/well wishes. I am not calling on a "God" that might have, through humans, have caused harm. I am not praying to a human version of God. I am calling to the Laws above it all. No agenda other that good, and I am leaving it up to something that I can't understand to answer.

I am leaping and trusting that the new will appear. And the more I practice that trust, the more often it does appear.

And there you have it. Some of my thoughts on prayer.

Done. Complete. With love.

I try and start every day this way.

And now I am sending my love to you all.

Namaste,

BG "Gentle Ben" Thomas

PS: I have barely touched on this subject.