I Am In You; You Are In Me

Today’s post is a follow-up to last week’s. As I was preparing for the lesson I gave this past Sunday (listen here), new insights came to me. I thought I would share them here to further elucidate the ideas I presented earlier.

“Unity is a link in the great educational movement, inaugurated by Jesus Christ. Our objective is to discern the truth in Christianity and to prove it. The truth that we teach is not new, nor do we claim special revelation or discovery of new religious principles. Our purpose is to help and teach mankind to use and prove the eternal truth taught by the master.” – Charles Fillmore, Cofounder of Unity

The foundational truth of Christianity is that we are one. The paradox is that even in our apparent diversity we are one. The master, Jesus, knew that. He knew it intimately. He not only knew it, intellectually, but he knew it energetically. He experienced it. He was not teaching oneness from learned knowledge, but from his own mystical experience of union. He knew his unity in the One, as the One.

When he said things such as, "The Father and I are one;” “Those who have seen me, have seen the Father;” and “I am in the Father and the Father is in me, as I am in you and you are in me” what did Jesus mean?

Traditional Christian interpretation is that Jesus was proclaiming his divinity; that he was claiming to be God incarnate - the word made flesh - as it says in John’s Gospel. Traditional Christianity would tell us that those claims can only be made by Jesus, and that our salvation lies in believing in Jesus as the only begotten son of God.

What Mr. Fillmore was saying in the above quote is that our purpose in Unity is to discern the deeper truth. And, not only learn it, but also apply it in our lives. In short, ours is to believe Jesus, believe what he said and taught, and live it, not just believe in Jesus.

What Jesus knew and was teaching is that God, the Father, is not somewhere out there living in a place called Heaven looking down and capriciously choosing who to bless and who to curse. God is not the consciousness of judgment and punishment. Rather, what Jesus called the Father, and often referred to as Abba, a term of endearment, is indeed the Source, the One Life Energy that imbues and infuses all that is. God, rather than a being, is a “beingness” of energy. We perceive God expressing as intelligence, order, harmony, divine law, or principle.

In New Thought, we sometimes refer to God as ‘Principle.’ Unity Minister Eric Butterworth, in his book "Breaking the Ten Commandments" says,

"Principle is principle, not caprice. In principle, every person is an eachness within the allness of God. This means that God is expressing as you. That was Jesus' great discovery. The divinity of humanity.”

I would extend that to include the divinity of all creation. Jesus knew that the Divinity of God is infused in all creation, not just in humanity. Humanity's gift is the ability to obtain conscious recognition of that truth. God is expressing as you -- that which is the real spirit and substance of you -- which is the same spirit and substance of all.

God is Spirit. When we say that God is spirit, we mean movement, life, energy, vibration, frequency. God is substance. Substance is that which stands under what we perceive as form. It forms the foundation for all creation. God is the foundational building block and the animating Life Energy of all; all that is in form and all that is formless.

Everything, or every so-called thing, is inextricably linked. Even in what we perceive as the empty space between things, God is present. We often say in New Thought, “There is no spot where God is not.” The Allness of God is present everywhere and in everything.

Everywhere, which is nowhere, and everything, which is no thing, when we consider that in Truth there are no things separate from the One; therefore, no distance between things. There is no you or me separate from the life of God. God is all life. All life is God. The Father is in me, I am in the Father. I am in you, you are in me.

Why does the understanding or the discernment of that truth and the use of that truth matter?

It matters because when we know it, intellectually first, and then take in into the depth of our being and experience it, that Truth shifts our perspective. As the apostle Paul might say, it renews our minds and transforms our lives. It returns us to a place of reverence, and respect, and value for all life. It restores us to a deeper connection with the Earth and all her inhabitants. It opens us to greater compassion for each other and ourselves. The truth of our oneness is the truth that sets us free.

Jesus said, "You shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free." Traditional Christianity would tell us that the truth which sets us free is that Jesus, the only son of God, died to save us and if we believe on him then we are free. In Unity, which we often refer to as a positive practical approach to Christianity, we say that Jesus came to teach us. It is up to us to learn and apply his teachings and by doing so we save ourselves. So, in a way we might extrapolate that Jesus is our savior, because he taught us the truth about salvation.

Why do we appear so different?

We appear to be separate from each other and everything around us because we, in our humanness, predominantly give our attention to what we perceive as form. This is normal. It is a natural aspect of our humanity. It's our primary focus in this dimension. Focusing on form and learning the names for things is how we learn to navigate in the world around us. It is how to have relationships with our environment and with each other. It's a part of our human experience.

We learn about the law of gravity so we don’t fall down and injure ourselves. We learn about heat, so that we don't burn ourselves. We learn our names, so we can interact with each other. We learn the names for things, such as ‘tree,’ ‘dog,’ and ‘snake.’ We learn all of this. We accept it as truth. We believe it. The trouble is that we allow all of those concepts of things to separate us from the world around us and to separate us from each other.

We forget that those are just concepts. They are names for things that are intended to help us, but none of that is real. I know you're going to say, "Yes, it's real. The tree is real." Yes, it is real and yet, what is real about the tree is the spirit and substance of the tree. It is all God. Our labels, our concepts, our names for things are not real. They are our way of relating and navigating. Everything is real, in the sense that it is Radiant Eternal Abundant Life - the life of God - the Life that is the only Life of all. Even our beliefs, our religions, are not real. They are concepts intended to connect us with the deeper reality of God.

We seem different because we are God showing up in different ways. Scientific research has shown that humans are 99.9% the same when comparing our DNA. While that is true, there are more than 3,000,000 differences between any two person’s genomes. We are born into different families, cultures, religions and races. Further, since we are in a never-ceasing relationship with everything and everyone around us, we develop different beliefs, traits, and cultural customs. Yet, who we are, what we are at the very core of us, God expressing as the Spirit and Substance of us, is the same. We are One.

When we know that basic Truth, we are free. The truth of our oneness sets us free from our own struggle with each other, nature or any aspect of creation.

How do we apply and integrate this Truth?

Spend time daily in prayer, meditation, and contemplation connecting consciously with the awareness that the Mind of God is your mind (your real mind), allowing Divine Ideas to fill your mind, and inviting the alignment of this Truth in mind, body and spirit. Connect with the reality of Life that lives as all life.

Also, actively question your concepts and beliefs. Do not accept that everything you have been taught is truth. Allow the connection with the One to reveal to you what is Truth. Let your mind be blown wide open by new insight and revelation. Write down what is revealed to you. Or, record it. You may be amazed and delighted.

Explore all that you perceive as form. Use something as simple and commonplace as a plant. Stare at it. Soften your gaze. Look beyond the form. Observe the movement of the energy and light that emanates from the plant. Allow the reality, the spirit and substance of the plant, to reveal itself to you. Then, see if you can observe the field of energy between what you perceive as your body and what you perceive as the plant. Notice that, in Truth, there is no empty space. There is no void between you and the plant. There is energy, there is life; there is God in the midst of all.

Why is it important for us to know the truth that sets us free?

Knowing the truth dissolves all that we allow to separate us from God, each other and all creation. It awakens us to our common bond. When we know the Life of God, the life that we are, is living itself in everything, in everyone, in every moment, we return to conscious union and a place of reverence. We embrace reverence for all life, knowing that all is sacred.

From that consciousness, we begin to create a world that reflects our awareness of oneness. “I am in the Father, the Father is in me. I am in you, as you are in me.” Take Jesus' words as your own. I am in the Father, the source, the substance and spirit of life. That substance and spirit of life is in me, and I am in you. Whatever the “you” happens to be. Whatever you are observing, whether it be another person, a plant, a dog; it can be the sun or a car, know that you are in it and it is in you.

I am in you and you are in me. There is no separation. There is only energy. There is only life. In that Truth, we are One.

Join us on Sunday for our 10:00 service as we further explore the bond that connects us and how it draws us together in community.