Mind Boggling
By Njeri Mucheru-Oyatta
Chapter 87
Human beings place value on money and power or influence. The more money you have and the more influence or power you have, the more valuable you are.
What about spiritual beings? What qualities make a spiritual being valuable? Only one thing makes me valuable as a spiritual being and that is: LOVE. My money, my car, my house, my clothes, all my material possessions are meaningless to me as a spiritual being. They are of no consequence to who I am. The only thing that matters to me as a spiritual being is Love. If I know love and I have love in me, then I am the most valuable being.
In other words, to get to Heaven, what matters is whether I know love and have love in me, full stop. Nothing more.
As human beings, we are taught that what matters in life is to get a good education, get a good job, make lots of money, amass wealth, settle down into family life, have kids, retire, then wait to die. All meaningless things because once you die, the education, the job, the money, the wealth, the family, the kids, all cease to exist and all that is left is you.
The only thing you take with you when you die is your knowledge of God or lack thereof. If you know God, welcome to Heaven. If not, welcome to Hell. Simple. How much easier can it be?
What is so hard about following Jesus and getting to know God? You don’t need money, you don’t need a house, you don’t need a car, you don’t need anyone, you don’t need anything. You just need to think. Use your God given mind to think. Simple. How much easier can it be?
And if you follow Jesus and get to know God, you will NEVER FAIL. Love never fails. So in the process of following Jesus and getting to know God, all your humanly needs satisfy themselves. I wrote that the pursuit of the things that money can never buy generates money. See?
Poverty as far as spiritual beings are concerned has nothing to do with money. It has to do with the knowledge one has of Love. A poor spirit is one who is fearful, anxious, apprehensive, worried and uncertain. A strong spirit is one who is confident, firm, unwavering and sure. The difference between the two spirits is the knowledge they have of who God is. A poor spirit is focused on worldly pursuits while a strong spirit is focused on Heavenly pursuits.
I asked myself a funny question: In all honesty Njeri, without kidding yourself, which is easier to pursue, money or love? I had to laugh at how simple the answer to that question is yet its taken me so many years of living to get here.
I think the difficulty we experience as human beings is our parallel existence as spiritual beings. Separating your human self from your spiritual self is no easy task. But I think that it is the essence of our being alive. Learning how to control your mind and train it to focus on what matters and what doesn’t is the means by which we get to know who we are and who God is.
There is a lot that does not matter in our lives but it has been packaged to appear more important than what actually matters. In this world, making money is a much more valued achievement than learning how to control your anger. There are so many angry bosses out there whose money making abilities keep them wealthy and so many polite employees whose kindness keeps them from being promoted.
I have found that life is much more exciting when I focus my mind on what I feel and think about the situations I find myself in and train my mind to respond in a way that corresponds with love. Every such experience brings with it a feeling of enlightenment and satisfaction that making money has never given me because the outcome of my actions is always a pleasant unexpected surprise.
I am convinced that becoming a person who: suffers long and is kind, does not envy, does not parade herself and is not puffed up, does not behave rudely, does not seek her own, is not provoked, thinks no evil, does not rejoice in iniquity but rejoices in truth, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things - a person who never fails, is what gives my life meaning.
Truly, without love, I am nothing.
Chapter 87
Human beings place value on money and power or influence. The more money you have and the more influence or power you have, the more valuable you are.
What about spiritual beings? What qualities make a spiritual being valuable? Only one thing makes me valuable as a spiritual being and that is: LOVE. My money, my car, my house, my clothes, all my material possessions are meaningless to me as a spiritual being. They are of no consequence to who I am. The only thing that matters to me as a spiritual being is Love. If I know love and I have love in me, then I am the most valuable being.
In other words, to get to Heaven, what matters is whether I know love and have love in me, full stop. Nothing more.
As human beings, we are taught that what matters in life is to get a good education, get a good job, make lots of money, amass wealth, settle down into family life, have kids, retire, then wait to die. All meaningless things because once you die, the education, the job, the money, the wealth, the family, the kids, all cease to exist and all that is left is you.
The only thing you take with you when you die is your knowledge of God or lack thereof. If you know God, welcome to Heaven. If not, welcome to Hell. Simple. How much easier can it be?
What is so hard about following Jesus and getting to know God? You don’t need money, you don’t need a house, you don’t need a car, you don’t need anyone, you don’t need anything. You just need to think. Use your God given mind to think. Simple. How much easier can it be?
And if you follow Jesus and get to know God, you will NEVER FAIL. Love never fails. So in the process of following Jesus and getting to know God, all your humanly needs satisfy themselves. I wrote that the pursuit of the things that money can never buy generates money. See?
Poverty as far as spiritual beings are concerned has nothing to do with money. It has to do with the knowledge one has of Love. A poor spirit is one who is fearful, anxious, apprehensive, worried and uncertain. A strong spirit is one who is confident, firm, unwavering and sure. The difference between the two spirits is the knowledge they have of who God is. A poor spirit is focused on worldly pursuits while a strong spirit is focused on Heavenly pursuits.
I asked myself a funny question: In all honesty Njeri, without kidding yourself, which is easier to pursue, money or love? I had to laugh at how simple the answer to that question is yet its taken me so many years of living to get here.
I think the difficulty we experience as human beings is our parallel existence as spiritual beings. Separating your human self from your spiritual self is no easy task. But I think that it is the essence of our being alive. Learning how to control your mind and train it to focus on what matters and what doesn’t is the means by which we get to know who we are and who God is.
There is a lot that does not matter in our lives but it has been packaged to appear more important than what actually matters. In this world, making money is a much more valued achievement than learning how to control your anger. There are so many angry bosses out there whose money making abilities keep them wealthy and so many polite employees whose kindness keeps them from being promoted.
I have found that life is much more exciting when I focus my mind on what I feel and think about the situations I find myself in and train my mind to respond in a way that corresponds with love. Every such experience brings with it a feeling of enlightenment and satisfaction that making money has never given me because the outcome of my actions is always a pleasant unexpected surprise.
I am convinced that becoming a person who: suffers long and is kind, does not envy, does not parade herself and is not puffed up, does not behave rudely, does not seek her own, is not provoked, thinks no evil, does not rejoice in iniquity but rejoices in truth, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things - a person who never fails, is what gives my life meaning.
Truly, without love, I am nothing.
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