I was recently reflecting on an issue in my life. I found myself thinking, What do I do? What do I do?

It can be a reasonable question to ask. But in my reflections, I began to think about something else. What is there for me to receive in this situation? I thought about the people involved. Had I fully accepted them? Was I grateful for what was coming to me?

This is from a teaching story from Jesus of Nazareth. It is the story of a son coming to be with his father.

And he arose, and came to his father. But when he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him.

Luke 15:20

What strikes me about the story is that the father saw his son when the son was still a great way off. That is such a vital attribute—the ability to see who is coming to be with us. Do we see people coming? Are we grateful for them? Or are we too obsessed with What do I do? What do I do?

We might even become aware that the person is coming near to us before they do. Seeing them coming, gratitude is a natural response. Most people wouldn’t appreciate it if we kissed them on their neck as the father did to his son. But if the spirit of welcome is there, they might feel it.

It is significant for anyone to see and acknowledge who is coming near to them in their life. But think of us as Emissaries of Divine Light. As a participant in this ministry, do you see people coming?

Sometimes when I see people coming, and I speak of it to someone else, they say, What? Them? And then they go on to list all the flaws of the person. They are keeping people at a distance and judging them.

Do you see people coming? I do. And I think, I want that person with me. I want that person with us. I want them on my team, on our team.

I could be disappointed. They could decide to go in a different direction in their life. It might not work out. But I see the person coming.

This leads to another matter—having faith in those who are coming.

This is from Uranda on the subject:

Now the thing that will help that person get well is not just faith that he is going to get well in that sense, or trying to get him to have faith that he is going to get well. The development of faith in himself, the fact that he begins to realize that you have faith in him or her as a human being—once that begins to percolate in consciousness you have started.

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Now if you try to persuade someone to have faith in you above or beyond or without regard to the development of a consciousness of your faith in him, it will not work. Just remember that. It will not work. You will never get far enough to really accomplish anything. That is your first responsibility as a server.

The Reciprocity of Faith

Uranda

If we do not place our faith in those who are coming to be with us, we have nothing. Nothing will happen. I can guarantee it. If we, as servers of this ministry, do not practice putting faith in people, there is no way to include others as leaders.

If we choose to put our faith in the people who come to be with us, much can happen from there. That can be the beginning of a reciprocal generation. But it begins with us putting faith in that person, believing in them. And if we can’t do that, we are not going anywhere.

Does that mean we’re too ignorant to see their faults? Sometimes people think they’re being wise when they identify a person’s faults. They’re too quiet. Too loud. Too smart. Too ignorant. They’re egoic. They’re weak. Hearing such things, I think to myself, Brilliant! That’s brilliant! You’re doing what everybody else in the world is already doing. Probably what every other person in that person’s life has done to them for years.

If we are to truly be of service, we are bringing something different. We’re placing faith in them. That faith is an intercession in whatever is going wrong for the person. It’s not that there’s nothing that is going wrong. It’s that our faith intercedes in that pattern and disrupts it. It disrupts whatever is going on that isn’t creative for them.

We can speak about the power of faith. It’s often spoken about by preachers on a Sunday morning. You gotta have faith. But what does it really mean? We have faith when we learn that the Source of Life has put faith in us. It has put faith in us by the mere fact that we are alive. And maybe somewhere along the way, a person put faith in us. And then there’s something for us to do to invest our faith in others. And that is what changes the world.

Do you see the empowerment that’s given to us in our ability to truly have faith in another person? It is a self-help remedy, meaning you don’t have to ask anybody for permission, authority, or to do it for you. You don’t have to hope and pray that it comes from somewhere else. You, for yourself, and I, for myself, have this self-help remedy to boost the people in our lives—the ability to place faith in them.

It is a much better way to live than doubting other people. That doesn’t mean that we have to be silly about it. That doesn’t mean that we’re oblivious to people’s faults, or even the risk that something could go wrong. We are not stupid people, so we are conscious of those things. And yet, in the middle of it all, we bring something disruptive. We place the kind of faith in another person that could change all that. And then we’re true to that faith and invite them to be true to it, too, knowing that we have something to do together.

Faith is not just a compliment or a pat on the back. It is far deeper than that. It is an affirmation of what is beautiful, strong, and true about another person.

We might feel empathy and compassion for a person in whom we place our faith. But that is different than sympathy, which so often amounts to a lack of faith in another person. Sympathy sounds so nice. Oh, you poor, weak, ill, incapable person. Oh, I have such sympathy for you. Being sympathetic is antithetical to having faith in another person.

We see the virtue, the power, and the loving nature of another person. And I don’t care what happens, and I don’t care what the person does. I won’t stop seeing that reality and calling a person to know that within themselves.

I celebrate the new pope, Leo XIV. Or Bob, as his friends know him. I’m not Catholic, and so, in that sense, he is not my pope. But in another sense, he is my pope. I support whatever is creative and inspiring that he brings to the world. This is from a talk he gave two years ago.

We are often worried about teaching doctrine… but we risk forgetting that our first duty is to communicate the beauty and joy of knowing Jesus.

Pope Leo XIV (as Cardinal Prevost), May 2023

Whether or not you would speak of God in quite those terms is not my point. But he is talking about knowing the Divine Reality as opposed to teaching a doctrine. I believe in the importance of teaching. I believe in the importance of philosophy, which is sometimes known as doctrine. I believe there’s a place for philosophy and for teaching it. But that is no substitute for knowing. And knowing involves not only a mental concept of Reality, a theory about Reality, or a philosophy or doctrine. Knowing involves something not only of the mind but of the heart and of the spirit. You cannot know Jesus Christ through the intellect alone. To know that Spirit takes your spirit, my spirit. It takes my heart and your heart to actually know.

If we live solely from a place of doctrine, dogma, philosophy, and belief, when we look to another person, we are very likely to relate to them the same way. We look at them intellectually and judge as to whether they are following the proper doctrine. You’re not doing it right. You aren’t following the philosophy I am invested in. We do not know them. We do not see them. We’re not placing our faith in them. Why? Perhaps because we don’t know that Jesus Christ, or Spirit, by whatever name we want to call him or her, has placed faith in us, and we haven’t learned to live a life of placing faith in Spirit.

We’re here to have faith in Spirit and know it for ourselves. We are built to know Spirit in all the dimensions of how we’re made—in mind, heart, spirit, and body. By the nature of Spirit, we can let it come so close that it enters us, moves through us, and enters the world. As that actually happens, Spirit is inviting people who are open to it to come close to Spirit themselves.

An Emissary server is instrumental in this process—they are an instrument of Spirit, allowing it to be operative in the world. Knowing Spirit and embodying it yourself, people are coming close to you as you identify as Spirit. But while your humanity is involved, that is not the point. They are joining with what you have allowed to come through you.

Consciously participating in this process, we are calling people to come near and join with Spirit. We see them when they come. And we place faith in the reality in them that has responded.

When we are open to it, the power of Spirit is moving through us and calling the world to come home. It’s a rather silly picture to be calling the world home, but then not see it when it comes. And of course, the point is not just the world at large but the people who inhabit that world. If you care, you see. If it matters to you who is coming, you see them coming. You see them afar off. You see the potential. You see who they are. You know they are being called by something that’s bigger than you and bigger than me.

Yes, we have the honor of giving expression to that calling. We get to express the calling of the Most High, to invite His people home, Her people home.

Have you ever been let down by people? We could have a pity party and compare who’s been let down more. If you get let down enough, perhaps you get a little weary. Or if you’re just operating on human faith alone, you could begin to lose faith in people. Our God doesn’t work like that. The Almighty has faith abounding—never-ending faith. And when we’re in touch with the Almighty, we know that faith. It’s unconditional. We don’t place faith in someone because they behaved properly according to our doctrine or dogma.

I once had someone take me aside to talk to me about the services I was offering at Sunrise Ranch. The person said, I know you’re really well-intentioned in these services that you’re giving. And you really have a very good message. But I don’t think that people have really gotten the message that you’re giving to them. I replied, That’s why I’m giving it. If they had already gotten the message, I wouldn’t be offering it. It was my own way of saying, That’s why I’m here.

Whether it’s a group of people or an individual, that’s why I’m here. This person has these certain limitations of character. That’s why I’m here—to help them through that. I’m here to disrupt that pattern. I’m here to intercede. Or they are radiant and on fire with inspiration. That’s why I’m here—to be a friend to them in their victory.

I’m empowered to place my faith in people. We are all empowered, or at least we have the opportunity to be empowered.

How about considering the awakening body of servers that we’re associated with? How do we see that body? Do you have faith in it? I’m sure we could all list the deficiencies. And still the question arises, Do you have faith in that body? And where does that faith come from?

Is it because you’ve got your doctrine and your dogma, and you’ve looked down the list of the Ten Commandments or whatever doctrine it is that you have? You’ve rated this body of people according to that doctrine? And it’s either “yes” or “no,” based on that? Faith doesn’t work that way. That’s not faith. That’s judgment.

Faith works on a wholly different basis. We place faith in a person or a body of people, not because we’ve judged them to be good enough to deserve our faith. By the very nature of what faith is, it’s an act of faith. And do you think it could work on any other basis? Do we all just decide that these people are now good enough so that we’ll place faith in the body of Emissaries of Divine Light? Or the community at Edenvale? Or Sunrise Ranch?

That’s not how we are operating. We’re here to bring faith to this body of people. To have faith, place faith in it, and to let this body feel our faith. You might say that’s something that would be important for a leader—to place faith in the body of people that they’re leading. But I say it’s important for every last one of us—for the health of this community—to place faith in it; to place our faith in each other, and in us as a collective body.

Why should we do anything different than what the source of Love and Life within us does? Do you ever think about the fact that every moment of our lives, we are given Life? We are given Love. Is that not an act of faith? We are given the power of the universe in this moment, no questions asked.

That’s faith. And it’s up to us to receive that gift and to do something good with it. But it’s given without question.

We are here to live in that faith and bring it to the world. This is not just believing in something that we cannot see. This kind of faith is putting our faith in something that we do see. We see others. We see people coming. I see people coming, and I truly have the desire and vision that they could join us in this work. I want them on this team. I want them near, close, and part of this that we’re doing. How about you?