Imagine With Me

News flash: We will be livestreaming at the 10 a.m. service this coming Sunday to Facebook and YouTube. There will be no early service.

Where does one begin to put into words the feeling that “love” elicits when your heart is full? I am writing this on Sunday afternoon following our first in-person service since March of 2020.

The energy in the building was electrifying… smiles and hugs were happening everywhere I looked. Old friends seeing one another for the first time in over a year. For some it was even longer. Neither the Board of Trustees nor I knew if folks were ready to come back; however, we have said all along we will follow CDC guidelines and it was clear that it was time to reconvene. And it is evident you were ready to come back. Thank you for making it a special and important day in our ministry’s history. This will be talked about for years to come.

A shout out to Michelle Neas and Kim Cowperthwaite for the festive atmosphere that welcomed us home. It truly was a time of great celebration!

The topic for the message on Sunday was “Imagine with Me!” The power of imagination is one of our 12 Powers that our co-founder Charles Fillmore identified and that we all have. Imagination is the faculty of mind which “lays hold of” spiritual ideas and translates them into material form. It also “beholds” material forms in their spiritual essence, or reality; that is, as ideas in mind. Imagination is the great symbol interpreter of the mind.

I decided on this topic imagination because as we begin to step back into the world after COVID-19 we are at a choice point. We can go back to business as usual, or we can use these last 15 months to inform us as to what is important to us and what can we leave behind. We can use our power of imagination to reimagine an expanded version of ourselves as a community. We can discern what is important to us and will want to continue and what were we doing because we have always done it that way. I heard in the sharing on Sunday the word “space” and we have had the opportunity to put some space into our lives and like it.

I have also heard it said, “I am more about being now instead of doing.” I get that and both are needed. It is in the being that we open to the possibilities to lay hold of spiritual ideas and then the doing is to bring them into reality.

The questions I pose to you are these:
• What are you most hopeful about going forward with in your own life?
• What do you see your role is in the life of this community going forward?
• What would you like more of, or less of, as we reimagine Unity Center for Spiritual Growth?

Please send me your thoughts.

On Sunday I will begin a series called Tales That Teach. It begins with Jesus, Master Teacher.

Sacred service opportunity… let me know if you are willing to prepare coffee and tea for next week’s hospitality.

You are a blessing in my life,
Rev. Patricia Bessey