Be Peace

Posted on February 19, 2020 by billtonnis

Before reacting – pause, reflect, then respond from a place of non-violence.

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Listen to my song “Make Me a Channel” on YouTube by clicking HERE.

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James 1:19-20

Know this, my dear brothers: everyone should be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger, for the anger of a man does not accomplish the righteousness of God.

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What great advice!

We need more attentive and open listening these days.

Deep listening is the place of deep, sacred presence.

Jesuit priest Jean-Pierre de Caussade is credited with coining the phrase the sacrament of the present moment over 300 years ago.

It seems there are far too many impulsive reactions leading to harsh words.

What if we all took a thoughtful pause before responding?

Stop and observe any strong emotions that have risen.

Perhaps someone has just pressed one of your emotional buttons.

Before responding, take a break.

Observe your initial emotion.

Let it subside.

Open yourself to a more peaceful Spirit.

Contemplate what Jesus might say.

Calmly think of a response that conveys the truth you believe without making any accusations or assumptions.

Ask for clarification to be sure you understand what someone else is saying.

Be willing to reassess your position based on new information.

Be a channel of peace and non-violence.

God is about making all things new and whole…not tearing down and dividing.

Enter into the flow of that Spirit.

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Listen to the song of the day “Make Me a Channel” on the Listen to Your Heart album by clicking HERE.

Stream and/or purchase my songs on Amazon Music by clicking HERE.

Remember…God loves you!

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Bathed in Glory

Posted on February 18, 2020 by billtonnis
Image by Sven Lachmann from Pixabay

The light of God’s love is constant and eternal.

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Listen to my song “I Stand in the Light” on YouTube by clicking HERE.

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James 1:16-17

Do not be deceived, my beloved brothers and sisters: all good giving and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no alteration or shadow caused by change.

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As I’ve said over and over in my writings: God is love.

And, of course, these are not my words but scripture (1 John 4:8)!

Being Love itself, God is also Goodness itself.

God is perfect in goodness and love.

So, today’s passage above is urging us to not be deceived into thinking God wants to punish us or that God would pull the rug out from under us!

As the thousands and thousands of Near Death Experiencers have testified, they were bathed in the most brilliant Light of love beyond any quantification.

Wake up from the human-created delusion of greed and fear.

Let down your defenses and allow this Light to shine upon you!

Close your eyes, sit in the sacred silence of God’s love, and feel the radiating peace.

You are loved and forgiven right now.

Accept it!

Live in that Light.

Then, pass it on to all you meet and all of creation!

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Listen to the song of the day “I Stand in the Light” on the Mercy Reigns album by clicking HERE.

Stream and/or purchase my songs on Amazon Music by clicking HERE.

Remember…God loves you!

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Compassionate Presence

Posted on February 14, 2020 by billtonnis
Image by John Hain from Pixabay

Ponder how you might be an instrument of healing.

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Listen to my song “Make Me a Channel” on YouTube by clicking HERE.

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Mark 7:32-35

And people brought to Jesus a deaf man who had a speech impediment and begged him to lay his hand on him. Jesus took him off by himself away from the crowd. He put his finger into the man’s ears and, spitting, touched his tongue; then he looked up to heaven and groaned, and said to him, “Ephphatha!” (that is, “Be opened!”) And immediately the man’s ears were opened, his speech impediment was removed, and he spoke plainly.

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Jesus definitely was a healer.

But as this story shows, his healing ability seemed very enmeshed in the organic messiness of our humanness.

Jesus didn’t just wave a magic wand.

He used spit and his fingers – and even “groaned” while in the process.

What do we make of this?

I’m not sure.

But Jesus is also quoted as saying, “Whoever believes in me will do the works that I do, and will do greater ones than these, because I am going to the Father” (John 14:12).

Could it be that we all have abilities to heal when we connect to the Sacred Unity of God?

Could it be that this Sacred Unity, this Love that has created everything and continues to create, purveys all that is and we simply need to be in touch with it?

I am excited about the possibilities!

But let us remember that we are only instruments of healing.

God is the Healer.

We are the ones to open the channels of healing between the Healer and the one in need.

The healing that occurs might not be a physical cure.

Healing happens on many levels…some of which we know nothing about.

The goal is our spiritual wholeness.

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Listen to the song of the day “Make Me a Channel” on the Listen to Your Heart album by clicking HERE.

Stream and/or purchase my songs on Amazon Music by clicking HERE.

Remember…God loves you!

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One Body

Posted on February 13, 2020 by billtonnis
Image by Noah Haggerty from Pixabay

Each person is a child of God.

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Listen to my song “All Are One” on YouTube by clicking HERE.

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Mark 7:25-28

Soon a woman whose daughter had an unclean spirit heard about him. She came and fell at his feet. The woman was a Greek, a Syrophoenician by birth, and she begged him to drive the demon out of her daughter. He said to her, “Let the children be fed first. For it is not right to take the food of the children and throw it to the dogs.” She replied and said to him, “Lord, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s scraps.”

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Why do we ostracize people?

It’s likely all about scapegoating…when a person or group is made to bear the blame for others or to suffer in their place.

We pick out someone to blame for our problems.

It’s easy to just blame a whole group of people who are somehow different from us than to look at ourselves and make changes.

The woman in today’s scripture verse was the scapegoat.

She was not part of God’s chosen people…at least that’s what the Jews would have thought.

But God has no boundaries.

Whether Jesus was simply testing the woman’s faith with his rude treatment or it was a transformational moment for him…who knows for sure?

But the woman was not going to accept that her daughter wasn’t worth healing!

Jesus would later become the scapegoat, the one blamed by the religious and government leaders as the problem that needed to be eliminated.

He showed us quite clearly the horrendous sin of the blame game.

We are all called to look past our differences and to see Christ in each person.

May we each do so!

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Listen to the song of the day “All Are One” on the Mercy Reigns album by clicking HERE.

Stream and/or purchase my songs on Amazon Music by clicking HERE.

Remember…God loves you!

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Listen

Posted on February 12, 2020 by billtonnis
Image by Henryk Niestrój from Pixabay

A healthy dose of silence could be the cure you’ve been looking for.

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Listen to my song “Turn off the Noise” on YouTube by clicking HERE.

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Mark 7:14-15

Jesus summoned the crowd again and said to them, “Hear me, all of you, and understand. Nothing that enters one from the outside can defile that person; but the things that come out from within are what defile.”

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Jesus is talking in the spiritual sense – not physical.

He was instructing his listeners to pay attention to their hearts because that is source of evil acts.

“From within people, from their hearts, come evil thoughts, unchastity, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, licentiousness, envy, blasphemy, arrogance, folly” (Mark 7:21-22).

Much of what we listen to or watch can indeed be toxic to our hearts.

There is such negativity, anger, vitriol and divisive language.

It would seem that we all need to be more discerning of what we are ingesting through our ears and eyes.

Jesus said the greatest commandment is to love.

Love unites…it does not divide.

As St. Paul put it: “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free persons, there is not male and female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28).

Sacred Unity is who God is.

One of the last things the monk Thomas Merton uttered from his lips was that we have to recover “our original unity.”

Allow God’s words to nourish your heart.

Remember, as St. John of the Cross stated, “God’s first language is silence.”

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Listen to the song of the day “Turn Off the Noise” on the Listen to Your Heart album by clicking HERE.

Stream and/or purchase my songs on Amazon Music by clicking HERE.

Remember…God loves you!

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Compassion Rules

Posted on February 11, 2020 by billtonnis
Image by Sajjad Saju from Pixabay

Love takes precedent over law.

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Listen to my song “Radically Okay” on YouTube by clicking HERE.

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Mark 7:9

“How well you have set aside the commandment of God in order to uphold your tradition!”

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The religious leaders had just observed some of Jesus’ followers violating purity rules by eating with unwashed hands.

So they questioned Jesus about why he allowed them to violate the tradition.

That’s when Jesus gave the answer above.

Laws and religious traditions have a needed place in molding our behavior but the commandment of God is first and foremost to love.

As Jesus said quite clearly elsewhere in scripture when asked what the greatest Commandment was, he said to love God with all your heart, soul and mind. And the second greatest was to love your neighbor as yourself (Matthew 22:36-39).

That means that love should always be the deciding factor in what we do or say.

Jesus was well aware of the hypocrisy of the self-righteous Pharisees who often strictly enforced rules but did little to lighten the load for those who were in need.

Love needs to be our top priority in not only what we do with our lives…but in each moment.

Since we are also called to do what is right and just…we must filter every conversation or action through the lens of love.

We must confront wrongdoing and injustice but always with non-violence and truth.

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Listen to the song of the day “Radically Okay” on the Mercy Reigns album by clicking HERE.

Stream and/or purchase my songs on Amazon Music by clicking HERE.

Remember…God loves you!

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Healing Underway

Posted on February 10, 2020 by billtonnis
Image by Павлина Макеева from Pixabay

The Love that is animating all that exists is drawing you to wholeness.

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Listen to my song “Heal Me” on YouTube by clicking HERE.

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Mark 6:54-55

As Jesus and his disciples were leaving the boat, people immediately recognized him. They scurried about the surrounding country and began to bring in the sick on mats to wherever they heard he was.

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Anyone who is sick or has any ailment would want to be cured.

Of course you would.

But as I’ve often thought…you can’t evade death forever.

When Jesus brought Lazarus back to life…he had to die again one day!

Death is not the end.

It’s the birth canal to eternal life…to a life in the spirit.

Scores and scores of people who claim to have had a “Near Death Experience” agree that there is nothing to fear when we die.

The vast majority of such people, especially the ones who had the longest experiences, report being in a realm filled with love beyond anything words could describe.

But even if you’re okay with dying…most people say they’d rather it happened later than sooner.

I think the deeper meaning of Jesus curing the sick was that he was restoring them to wholeness.

He wanted them to be restored to their communities from which many were ostracized because of their illness.

And I think Jesus wanted each of them to experience Sacred Unity from which his healing flowed and from which they would one day experience its Fullness.

May we all open ourselves to this Sacred Unity and channel that same healing flow to everyone and everything.

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Listen to the song of the day “Heal Me” on the Live to Love album by clicking HERE.

Stream and/or purchase my songs on Amazon Music by clicking HERE.

Remember…God loves you!

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Let Love Define You

Posted on February 7, 2020 by billtonnis
Image by Free-Photos from Pixabay

May our lives give glory to God.

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Listen to my song “Glorify You with me on YouTube by clicking HERE.

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Psalm 18:47, 50

The LORD lives! Blessed be my rock! Exalted be God, my savior! Thus I will praise you, LORD, among the nations; I will sing praises to your name.

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There is one God of all no matter what name we use.

Names made up of letters of the alphabet cannot contain the ineffable meaning of that which we can only speak of in metaphor.

God is Love.

Each of us is created by this Love to love and be loved.

This is a challenge while we are in our physical bodies because we are in the realm of free will which is necessary for love to be possible.

You have to choose it.

You can also choose to simply satisfy your ego.

That is not love.

But God continues to love us either way because that’s what Unconditional Love does.

How amazing is that!

Our task is to do the same – to love without conditions.

And when we share love by sharing our talents and gifts, we are being our true selves.

This is the most genuine act of praising God.

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Listen to the song of the day “Glorify You with Me” on the Give Praise and Thanks album by clicking HERE.

Stream and/or purchase my songs on Amazon Music by clicking HERE.

Remember…God loves you!

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Preach

Posted on February 6, 2020 by billtonnis

How are we sharing the good news of God’s unconditional love?

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Listen to my song “You’ll Lead Me” on YouTube by clicking HERE.

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Mark 6:7-8

He summoned the Twelve and began to send them out two by two and gave them authority over unclean spirits. He instructed them to take nothing for the journey but a walking stick—no food, no sack, no money in their belts.

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Jesus clearly was teaching his students that words and beliefs alone were not enough.

Action was required.

As St. Francis is credited with saying, “Preach the Gospel at all times. When necessary, use words.”

Jesus expected us to follow him.

Jesus wanted people to be doers of the word.

He expected them to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, care for the sick, visit the imprisoned and welcome the stranger.

Jesus expected his followers to bring the message of God’s unconditional love to all in words and actions.

And he didn’t want possessions to get in the way.

Possessions in and of themselves aren’t the problem.

It’s our attachment to them.

So maybe we should all take an inventory to see what possessions are taking precedence over our desires to spread the love of God to the least of these?

How are we sharing the good news of Jesus with the world?

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Listen to the song of the day “You’ll Lead Me” on the Listen to Your Heart album by clicking HERE.

Stream and/or purchase my songs on Amazon Music by clicking HERE.

Remember…God loves you!

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Prophets Needed

Posted on February 5, 2020 by billtonnis
Image by Free-Photos from Pixabay

Who will stand up for those who have no power or voice?

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Listen to my song “Salvation” on YouTube by clicking HERE.

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Mark 6:4

Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his native place and among his own kin and in his own house.”

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A prophet calls people out for behavior that is opposed to the ways of God.

This will not win the favor of the movers and shakers.

Nor will it win the favor of those who grew up with that prophet.

They will likely look down upon him or her and say in derision, “Who do they think they are?”

This is not a calling for the faint of heart!

Prophets must be people of prayer and humility.

This cannot be about their egos or desires to be proven right.

So, just how does a prophet know the ways of God?

Jesus put it this way: “For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me” (Matthew 25:36-36).

And then he said, “Whatever you did for the least of these, you did for me” (Matthew 25:40).

He also said that blessed are the peacemakers, the merciful and those who are persecuted for the sake of righteousness (Matthew 5, The Beatitudes).

Who are those speaking out today for the poor and the imprisoned?

Who are the peacemakers and the merciful?

Who will God send?

Why not you?

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Listen to the song of the day “Salvation” on the Live to Love album by clicking HERE.

Stream and/or purchase my songs on Amazon Music by clicking HERE.

Remember…God loves you!

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