In preparation for my message this coming Sunday, July 4, I was guided to revisit the first chapter of Dr. H. Emilie Cady’s seminal text, Lessons in Truth. This chapter is entitled “Bondage or Liberty, Which?” I have facilitated classes on this book and read this chapter many times. My copy of the book has all manner of notes in the margin, underlined passages, asterisks, and highlighted texts. As I read today, I was particularly drawn to the only pink highlighted section of this chapter. In it, Dr. Cady says,
"We
have come to a place now where our search for Truth must no longer be for
rewards; it must no longer be our seeking a creed to follow, but it must be in
living a life…We must learn to lose sight of results that are the “loaves and
fish” (Mt. 15:36), we must, rather, seek to be the Truth consciously, to be
love, to be wisdom, to be life (as we really are unconsciously), and let
results take care of themselves.”
In
traditional Christianity, in which I was thoroughly indoctrinated, the ultimate
reward in the “search for Truth” is finding Jesus and gaining a place in heaven
by making the decision to believe in him and give him your life. If one is exceptionally
good, it may also result in Jesus interceding on their behalf with his father,
God, who may choose to heal them of an illness, deliver them from some
unwelcomed life situation, or make them rich as the prosperity gospel of Pastor
Joel Osteen and others tells us.
In New
Thought, I learned that the “search for Truth” would transform one’s
consciousness thereby changing one’s life. Rather than believing that Jesus can
do it for us, we learn to change our thoughts and feelings so the universe can
deliver to us all that matches our frequency. While it is a different approach,
it is much the same concept as in traditional Christianity. It is about
attaining a desired result. When we say things like, “Change your thinking;
change your life,” ¹ we are most often doing so while
focusing on the result.
We teach
that changing our consciousness can bring us more money, health, loving
relationships, perfect jobs, or anything that we focus on. We teach it as the
“law of cause and effect,” “the law of correspondence,” and “the law of
attraction.” And while all these laws are aspects of Truth, how and why we
apply them matters.
In the
passage above, Dr. Cady says that it is time for us to stop focusing on
results. When we focus on results, we remain in bondage. We can become enslaved
to our ambitions, our desires, a consumeristic culture, others’ opinions, our self-interest,
and all manner of attachments to the world of form.
When,
instead, we focus on living the Truth by being love, being wisdom, being the
life and letting go of the results, we will find that our lives are much freer.
We are no longer in bondage to the world or the things of the world. We are
free to live in the joy of the moment. We are free to be in peace with what is,
rather that worry about what is not. We are free to be in love with everyone
and everything around us. Is not that the life that we all desire? Dr. Cady
reminds us that the world cannot satisfy the deepest longing of our souls.
As we look
forward to celebrating July 4th as the day the Declaration of
Independence was signed and America declared her freedom from the tyranny of an
oppressive king, let us observe this day also as our personal day of freedom.
Let us set ourselves free from our self-imposed bondage to the world of form. Instead
of focusing on results, let us focus on being love, wisdom, light, joy, and
life “(as we really are unconsciously).” As we do that, we can celebrate the
freedom that comes from discovering that the Truth has always and will ever be
within. That is True Freedom!
¹ Change
Your Thinking, Change Your Life – Brian Tracy, often attributed to
Norman Vincent Peale, Wayne Dyer, Joyce Myers and others
Beautiful and powerful. Thank you!
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