Writer Dylan Morrison

In the last post I suggested that something unique was happening in world history when the Nazarene prophet was brutally executed or ‘got rid of’ by the religio-political powers of his day. Many of his followers interpret this death to be a payment for ‘sin’ that suddenly makes everything ‘right’ with our Source Divinity, somehow allowing Spirit to commune with us once again.

I believe that Yeshua himself demonstrated the fallacy of such a limiting view during  time spent with those deemed ‘sinners’ by the ‘righteous’ of his day. Surely the nature of the Divine Father never changes even when we judge ourselves to be unworthy of his unconditional Love. Ego is the condemnatory judge waiting for an Atonement that  makes sure never comes.

Divine Love’s Atonement or Union began outside the restrictions of linearly perceived space-time and is such, an ‘always’ fact. The Divine heart does not switch its acceptance of its created children off and on like some transcendent light switch. No, whatever was happening in that far out distant and largely insignificant outpost of the great Roman Empire was much more earth shattering; a barbaric demonstration of the innocence of God and his refusal to join the scapegoating power games played by His dysfunctional children.

For perhaps the first time in human history the Roman gibbet acted as stage for the Divine revelatory drama. Shockingly there was and is no gulf between God and man from the Divine perspective. Guilt and blame are the ego’s tools to keep the illusory separation alive. The Nazarene, with his talk of a welcoming Father and a new Kingdom/Queendom had to be silenced by the powers that be. Bad for religion, bad for politics, and bad for their monopoly of human culture, the Galilean’s radical message had to be gagged and no better way to do it than the efficient Roman way.

So wasn’t Yeshua just another deluded and utopian religious leader who had thoughts way above his station as a travelling holy man? Hadn’t the enforcers of human society well and truly demonstrated that the sacrifice of the scapegoat was always the tragic final word. Isn’t mankind trapped in the prison of mimetic desire with no Kingdom/Queendom of God providing an alternative. A melancholic ending for a righteous man? I believe not.  

Bizarrely, the close followers of the Nazarene claimed that he’d been seen alive, albeit in a ‘different’ and only slightly recognisable bodily form, a form that walked through wooden doors and teleported itself at will. Not a spirit as in previous manifestations of the dead, called up from the depths of Hades but in some rearranged form that appeared physical without the normal restrictions.

Many many books have been written by those on both side of the religious fence regarding this mysterious claim of resurrection. I don’t want to go into all the tennis like arguments regarding the claims of the early Yeshua movement and the reason for their belief that Yeshua was back, at least temporarily. Instead, I want to view their claim as a Divine validation. If, as Yeshua had always claimed, Divine Source is the god of the scapegoats then what better way to demonstrate the fact than by raising the victim beyond all victims from the jaws of decay and death.

The Greek for ‘raised from the dead’ suggests a rousing or awakening of the psyche/soul from Hades, the place of the dead. United with the reconstituted body and the living essence or spirit of the Galilean what better way to demonstrate that he’d been right all along. The return of Yeshua was the totally unexpected Divine stamp of approval on the One who’d claimed union with Divine Source, the One who claimed to speak only what he heard the Father speak.

In the long line of spiritual teachers, both within and outside Judaism, the Divinity hadn’t intervened in their passing from this vale of tears. Yet suddenly, catching both the Nazarene’s followers and the authorities totally unawares, the One with the creative power of life burst the murdered Lamb victim back onto the metaphysical stage. An earth shattering statement that revealed the authentic nature of Divine Love for all time.

So why did sacrificial religion and its inherent violence make such a comeback following such a Divinely orchestrated game-changer?

More on that in future posts.

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Breathe In ~ Breathe Out

In my last post I examined the common but highly psycho-spiritual phenomenon of tobacco addiction interpreting it as a religious experience of sorts based on body sacrifice.

In this post I wish to consider the whole idea of breath and its application to spirituality and its earthy counterpart, cigarette smoking.

Breath is one of those things in life that we aren’t aware of most of the time, unless we’re forced to run up a steep hill against our will. It’s a bit like God then who for most of us doesn’t encroach too often onto our daily consciousness. Yet Breath is always there keeping our body alive on Planet Earth. Run by the software of the unconscious, breath continues its in/out output without much thought.

Occasionally, breath’s routine operation comes under the spotlight of our consciousness e.g. in the middle of a panic attack when it seems to nearly shut down altogether. In other words, our breathing operates under the influence of our emotions, which lie hidden in the cellar of our lower unconsciousness. Our breathing then is a tell-tale indicator of the state of health of our inner world. The more healing within the fractured ego-psyche the easier our breathing. The more stress there the more staccato and unpredictable the rhythm of our breath.

Eastern practices like meditation and yoga emphasise  breath as a conveyor of spiritual experience. As we learn to breath correctly there appears to be a kick back into the psyche allowing for the release of an inner peace and ofttimes enlightenment experience. Conversely those  who have had spiritual experiences find that their awareness of breath and its hypnotic rhythm dramatically improves.

Interestingly the Hebrew word for breath, ‘ruach’ is commonly translated as Spirit or spirit in the religious writings of the Jewish Old Testament. It would appear then to the ancient Jewish spiritual writers that breath and Divinity are in some way linked. Adam was said to have received the ‘Breath of God’ and become a living soul or psyche. In His spirituality teaching Yeshua promised that Holy Spirit or Holy Breath would come INTO his followers after His departure. Clearly there is some mysterious link between human breathing, a balanced, restored psyche and Divine contact. When all three are in harmonious alignment then Divine Life flows into, through and out of the person concerned. Like our physical breath we breathe in Divine Love, draw life from it  and send it back out into a broken world.

So where does smoking figure in all of this? Well as I suggested before, it is a highly religious if ultimately destructive experience. Let’s look at it from a breathing point of view. The smoker is edgy due to the nicotine addiction – a symptom of their fractured  fearful unconscious. The answer is to give time and space to the god of nicotine. Stepping outside a public building parallels the withdrawal to the prayer closet for the religious believer, or the meditation room for the spiritual devotee. Here the psycho-spiritual practice of breathing takes place. Yet unlike the inhalation of spirit breath by the Divine seeker, the smoker inhales in hallowed puffs the associated chemicals that bring disease rather than wholeness. The god nicotine once again delivers its shot of chemical love, accompanied by its dark agents of destruction. The fractured soul is once more reassured that it is not alone, but in the caring embrace of its pharmaceutical friend, sharing a fellowship of millions worldwide.

The self-righteousness of we, the non smoking fraternity, only bolster the sense of  persecution that the smoking loner feels, like a cult member ostracised by their family. The lines of demarcation have well and truly been drawn. The them and us of smoking dualism established.

The smoker’s experience is therefore, I’d suggest, deeply religious in nature; the dark alter-ego of a genuine encounter with Spirit Breath. A chemical worship feast that enslaves rather than frees; a short-term fix for a psychic problem. The tobacco event is, I believe, the smokers cry for genuine Spirit Breath contact; a contact with Other that seems so far away. Yet it is a sad counterfeit at best, with temporal serenity granted, paid for with poor self-esteem and continual restlessness. So what is to happen to the tobacco addict?

Thankfully, like any addict, religious or chemical, the tobacco slave can expect a visit from Holy Breath, an opportunity to let the Divine healer rewire the wounded psyche and bring fresh life-flow to the soul. Love, and Divine Love at that, is the only One to blow away the stains of imprisonment, replacing them with the etchings of unconditional acceptance and exploding new life.

After all that let’s just take a deep breath. One never knows who may come in!

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No Smoke Without Fire

‘Blessed are the poor in spirit for they shall find comfort in cheap smokes and liquor.’

One of the things that puzzles me the most in this space-time dream in which we find ourselves, is why so many of us are addicted to the dreaded nicotine! Oops ~ before proceeding I’d better set the record straight; I use the word ‘us’ figuratively, trying not to appear as some form of self-righteous Puritan to my faithful blog readers.

One of the few benefits of my sheltered, Northern Irish Presbyterian upbringing was that I never have, presently do not and hopefully never will smoke the diabolical invention known as the cigarette. Instead, my addiction of choice became Charismatic religion but that’s another story that you might have already come across in my little memoir, ‘The Prodigal Prophet’. No, I write here as a recovering religious junkie, though hopefully one with a deep compassion for those chained to the cancer inducing weed.

We’ve been bombarded with all the dreadful facts regarding the ill effects of tobacco smoking and yet multitudes the world over are still hooked on the experience. This loyalty to the ciggies reminds me of my loyalty to religion and it ‘s got me thinkin’ outside the box.

Here goes with my conclusion!

Tobacco smoking is a religious experience

‘No, Dylan. I think you’ve got it mixed up with the wacky backy, weed, grass puffin’ of the Indian Holy men and their contemporary chilled imitators.’

Yes, I’m aware of that kind of holy smoke, but I really do believe my statement above. Let me explain why!

Smoke and Fire have always been around the religious scene. Burnt offerings were at the very birth of attempts to keep the gods happy. For some reason these divinities were understood to love the frenzied smell of cooking dead meat, human or animal. Generally these deities were assumed to be ‘pissed’ off with the human race and could only have their anger averted by a bloody death and the sub-sequential roasting of flesh ~ clearly the gods above weren’t vegetarians but real meat approving guys and gals. Projections of ourselves perhaps!

The fallacy in this whole religious model of course is that the gods weren’t there in the first place and that the genuine Source of all wasn’t and never could be ‘at enmity’ with His/Her/It’s creative extensions.  viz. us. At its basic essence the religious sacrifice can be seen as a self inflicted death sentence transferred onto some poor sheep or in the worst case scenario, human child. Why such a need for these barbaric rituals?

Simple ~ human guilt. A deep sense of inner loathing interpreted as a consequence to displeasing the deity above. Yet, I believe, such a guilt is not based primarily on ‘wrong actions’ but on a wrong perception viz. that we are or can ever be separate from Divine Love, the Oneness that embraces all within. ‘I have left the Divine and if I were Him/Her/It I would kill me’ is our constant cry within, the ego’s broken record to keep us from awakening to baseline truth. ‘In Him/Her/It we live and move and have our being‘ No hatchet’s being sharpened there!

So, lets get back to the cigarettes. Smoking, like the common man’s ritual sacrifice that it is, carries out the sentence of our ego jury. ‘You deserve to die so die, but do it slowly and be your own firing squad’. Each little 5 minute puff seems to pull the trigger that little bit more, bringing with it a reassuring sense of calmness where the inner angst is stilled under the illusion of justice done.

Unfortunately, like all religious acts of self sacrifice, the psych-spiritual effects are temporary as the ego jury once more sits to pass judgement.

What is the solution? Like religion, it’s better given up; but how?

For some folk sheer self-will seems to do the trick, breaking them free from the psychic attachment involved. However how many folk return once more to the ritual when the inner going gets tough?

I believe that nothing less than a dramatic psycho-spiritual shift is required at the very roots of our being.

Someone needs to turn the Light on, deep within, where the unconscious self loathing that energises our addiction lurks in the shadows. For some therapy may be the road to recovery but ultimately only an overwhelming Spirit encounter will dissolve the lie. ‘Awaken! You are my beloved, loved within and outside time. You dwell within my House, never having left. What separation? Only a fantasy of the night – the time of your slumber.’

Blessings upon all of us who walk in the darkness of addiction. May the morning come as we ditch our religion dressed up as the friend of freedom.

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I hope you enjoyed my little parable  regarding ‘Will’ in my previous two posts.

I’m sure that as many interpretations came to my readers’ minds as the number of readers themselves. Truth comes at the right time and in an appropriate guise when our hearts are thirsty for further Light. All revelation is deeply personal as it swirls around the caverns of our Son starved psyches.

However, let me just share a little something that been doing the rounds of my own unconscious since I last posted.

Many of us believe our wills to be a unique gift given to us by a separated and distinct divinity or in common parlance by a god. Such has been the traditional take on will in the Western religious mindset of the past two millenia.

This model of the will tends to suggest that it is something that constantly requires alignment with Divine purpose; otherwise it will easily slip off and do its own thing i.e. selfishness. The result of such a mindset is big psychic pressure, an intense vigilance that destroys rest and a sense of genuine self-esteem.

So here’s what I’ve been pondering:

Rather than having a will are we not in fact the Divine Will itself?

Our encounter with Spirit hasn’t dragged us back to the Divine Will but rather enlightened us to the fact that we never possessed a separate will in the first place. The sense of individual will is, I suggest, an ego illusion, projected onto our consciousness screen in order to maintain the myth of separation, the very fuel of all religious thought and practice.

Within faith communities separation and rebellion are the necessary prerequisite to conversion and return to Divine Union.

‘Once I was lost but now I’m found!’

However, suppose the story of  return and redemption are only etchings on the surface of an even deeper reality i.e. we never really left Divine Will in the first place for we can’t leave ourselves.

Our dream-like state of separation, rebellion and redemption are, instead, virtual tutorials serving the greater purpose of our deepening Awareness of Divine Love and our place within it.

Such a shift in our thinking, especially if we’ve been programmed by a traditional religious model, can have an enormous and life changing effect on our daily life.

We, including all that we seem to experience, are in fact the Divine Will. We always have been, presently are, and always will be within our space-time world. Much of our internal suffering comes through resistance to the reality presented before us, to the storms seemingly coming our way. Awakening to the realisation of our virtual world we afford to ‘go with the flow’ thus paradoxically enabling a change in the reality facing us. In other words, the more we resist the programme, the more we suffer, or appear to suffer.

All power and resources fill the storehouses of Divine Will. As part of that Will may you drink today of your birthright, sharing your Light with those still convinced of their struggle defined separation.

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We continue our little parable of Grace Sophia and the trials and travails of her flagship company ‘Self Incorporated’.

Within 24 hours Grace was sitting in the CEO’s office at Self Incorporated’s crystal like headquarters.

In front of her stood an anxious Will, accompanied by a young stranger who looked vaguely familiar.

‘Will, you can relax – I’m here to take a big load off your shoulders.’

Will wasn’t sure what that meant, tending to the belief that he was about to take his place among the great mass of unemployed that walked the streets of broken humanity.

‘Come here’, Grace whispered firmly, beckoning the shell-shocked executive closer with an outstretched arm.

What happened next was not what Will had expected.

Getting up from her classy CEO chair Grace flung her arms around Will as she began to cry.

‘Thank you Will for trying to keep ‘Self’ afloat in the absence of Ruach.’

A stunned Will automatically fell to his knees, sobbing deeply as he collapsed further into a crumpled heap on the luxury pile carpet. A long angst filled wail eerily pierced the surreal atmosphere as Will felt the burdens of the past months fall away, replaced by a lightness flooding back into his dark empty being.

Glancing upwards Will could just make out the form of the stranger leaning over him as he became aware of his salty tears trickling their way onto his parched tongue. Somehow he sensed a familiar energy flowing from this man, now embracing him in his brokenness. Where had he felt this strange connection before?

‘Will, I want to introduce you to someone; meet Rukah, Ruach’s younger brother. He’ll be taking over his position as from today.’

Yes, now it all fell into place; the strange knowing and even stranger flow of energy. Will had first felt it, the day ‘Self’ had been launched; an introductory handshake from Ruach being the channel for the empowering Life surge. During their time together in management it had never left him.

As Will tentatively rose to his feet a new management team was birthed that would restore the fortunes of ‘Life Incorporated’. Will’s gifts would come back into play alongside the new boy Rukah and the wise oversight of Grace Sophia.

‘And now gentlemen, let’s go see my workers. Will, you lead the way.’

As the three executives walked onto the shop floor, the employees of  ‘Self Inc.’ couldn’t believe their eyes. They’d never expected to see their founder Grace once more walking among them. Their hearts were pulled this way and that by the turbulence of conflicting emotions; the fear of losing their jobs and the sheer relief at seeing the missing entrepreneur back in their midst. The stranger and a freshly confident Will, only added a sense of puzzlement to the psychic cocktail.

Grace looked around the hushed gathering with a knowing gaze before striding purposefully towards the recent participants of the shop floor confusion. Her dancing eyes sparkled as she unexpectedly reached out her hand to each and every one of them, ignoring the reflexive stuttering, that attempted to issue from their dry mouths. Words, however, seemed meaningless in the reactivated chemistry that once more flowed between ‘Self Inc.’s’ founder and her creative and skillful workforce.

As if by magic a harmonious cry rang out, echoing its way around the shiny factory walls.

‘Welcome back mam. We’re sorry we let you down. You know we’re proud to work for you.’

And so the once great company was reborn; a restored enterprise in creativity and unity.

Of course changes were made. Grace granted the workforce an even greater role than before, each employee enjoying the freedom to walk into her office and share his/her creative ideas for ‘Self Inc.’ Rukah and Will unsurprisingly hit it off together as Grace’s charisma flowed through the pair to permeate the whole company.

Competitors were amazed; ‘Self Incorporated’ were well and truly back in business; back where they belonged.

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One of the most confusing, yet potentially empowering elements of the human psyche is the will – the part of us that, at a superficial glance, seems to control our lives.

For those of us who’ve entered onto the spiritual path following an encounter with ‘Other’ a few pertinent questions regarding the role of will may need answered. These are:

How does the Divine Will interface with human will?

and secondly

What psycho-spiritual role does our will play within the complexity of our internal wiring?

In this chapter I want to explore some possible answers to these two questions through the medium of parable.

Here goes.

Once upon a time there lived a dynamic entrepreneur named  Grace Sophia; a charismatic inventor who had come up with some of the most mind-boggling creations ever seen in her world.

People said that they couldn’t remember a time when Grace wasn’t doing her thing; she appeared ageless having been at the top of her game for as long as the businesses world existed.

Grace’s pride and joy was her flagship company ‘Self Incorporated’ which when launched into the world of Cosmic marketing, had quickly risen to the coveted number one position in its field. The opposition was flabbergasted!

With multi-directional creativity bursting from her fingertips Grace quickly handed over the oversight of her pride and joy enterprise to her newly appointed talented CEO Ruach. He appeared to be a chip off the old block in the eyes of many of Grace’s competitors; an exciting and spirited pioneer with a love for the product and the workforce.

Employed by ‘Self’ as its day-to-day, hands-on manager was Will, an altogether different kettle of fish from both Grace and her delegated protegé Ruach. Decisive and with great organizational skill Will complemented the flamboyant visionary gifts of his new appointed CEO. Corporate commentators interested in the fortunes of Self Inc., wisely observed that the boardroom pairing seemed like a match made in heaven.

Self’s workforce was the hidden jewel of the company; a well motivated group of skilled artisans who thoroughly enjoyed working for the Sophia brand, rolling her exemplary products off the production line.

At first all went well for this most innovative of companies, mainly as a result of the high levels of industrial harmony that permeated all aspects of its complex operations.

Sadly however it was not to last.

One Monday morning Will received a call from Ruach’s wife informing him that her husband had been taken ill overnight and rushed to the intensive care unit of the local hospital. A severe heart attack had been diagnosed. Ruach’s doctors had recommended that he take a break from ‘Self’ for the forseeable future. Grace had already authorised Will’s promotion as acting CEO of her flagship company.

News of Ruach’s departure, hit the workforce badly. Within a few weeks, questioning and dissension began to break out within the Self shop floor. A disconcerting rivalry began to spread, virus like, among the previously harmonious team.

Will himself, having previously been a decisive manager when yoked with the inspirational Ruach, began to have trouble making simple decisions. On most days Will, now uncharacteristically insecure in his new CEO position, called in the most vocal members of the shop floor for their advice. Unfortunately such consultations became the battlefield for warring hotheads, with Will being dragged to and fro across the fractious terrain in the struggle of the workers’ soul. Will was now a shadow of his former self ; a puppet pulled by the all too obvious strings of his workers’ fragmented desire; an executive being slowly executed by the rumblings of those in his care.

Unsurprisingly it wasn’t long before such a topsy-turvy situation brought the once proud company to its knees, as output fell and Self began to tumble-down the market share rankings.

Unfortunately, the once decisive Will had surrendered his position as Grace’s representative to the strong personalities among the now out of control rivalrous employees.

Word of Self Incorporated’s rapid demise quickly got back to Grace.

She shed a tear before purposely picking up her cell phone.

It was time to exercise her Will.

To be continued …………

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This is just a little post to thank you  for visiting my blog throughout 2011. It’s most appreciated.

I love interacting with you all and have enjoyed hearing details of your personal Journeys into Divine Love.

Something is definitely stirring in the affairs of man across the Planet – it’s drawing together all those with an open and honest heart. I believe that an informal network of seekers is taking shape world-wide – a network of equals without the need for guru, method or organizational structures – a living organism that pulsates with the vibrant creativity and compassion of Source as revealed by Yeshua and all enlightened teachers.

Over the Christmas holidays I hope to write on two topics that are presently stirring in my own psyche; ‘Soul friends’ and ‘The Will’s role in the spiritual life’. I hope the posts bring some fresh thinking on these two important features of our Journey Home.

May you have a blessed, restful and authentic Christmas period enjoying the healing of your own particular holy day.

Blessings

Dylan

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Welcome to my last and possibly most controversial post on some little known sayings of Yeshua that generally lie hidden from mainstream religious thought.

Today we look at the whole concept of violence and religion, and how, without the insights of Yeshua they can be surprisingly strange bedfellows. Please feel free to comment, disagree or ask any further questions as a ‘sacred can of worms’ lies behind this history changing quote.

Blessings

Dylan

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“For you took away the ‘key of knowledge’. You yourselves didn’t enter and you hindered the ones entering in.”

In this provocative statement Yeshua turns the Divine spotlight on the religious mindset of His day, indeed on the mindset of all religious systems throughout the ages. The sacred skeleton in the cupboard can no longer remain hidden in the pseudo-respectability that it attempts to clothe itself in.

What exactly is the ‘key of knowledge’ that Yeshua claims the religious top brass were holding back from the common man? In order to answer such a defining question we need to examine the context of the Nazarene’s debate with His Jewish elders.

Yeshua has just fired both barrels at the number of excessive laws extrapolated onto the Torah by the Jewish Scribes. In other words He was confronting the timeless issue of religious legalism that always reduces the big picture to the minutiae of religious duty.

Yet in His discussions Yeshua unearths a deeper problem that lies at the foundation of the religious mindset viz violence and its covering hypocrisy; the elephant in religion’s ‘holy of holies’. The revelation of violence at the heart of the sacred is, I believe, the key referred to by the Nazarene, the key that opens the door to a new perception of the Divine.

In first century Palestine the construction of tomb memorials to the prophets of past centuries helped consolidate Jewish identity in the face of Roman occupation. The religious authorities appeared to honour the pioneer spokesmen of their evolving faith whilst honouring their forefathers who’d murdered them. Yeshua went for the sacred jugular in exposing the blatant hypocrisy of His fellow debaters, claiming that all prophets throughout history ( Abel to Zechariah) had been murdered by the status quo religious representatives of their day.

Yeshua’s declaration that we cannot serve two masters appeared not to have registered with His audience. The religious violence of the past was repeatedly hushed up and literally whitewashed over in the victims’ memorial tombs, a good gloss being painted over the religiously motivated murders.

The Nazarene, a prophet Himself, ominously exposed the spirit that maintains the religious game throughout human history. He well and truly flushed the violent genie out of its shiny sacred lamp thus determining His own prophetic destiny.

“You are sons of your father who was a murderer from the beginning” elsewhere exploded the myth of a violent, angry God, the father in question being the “Satan” or “Adversary” of human desire. No wonder Yeshua’s listeners responded with violence further confirming their spiritual parentage.

The murder of Abel, the first brother, is a telling prototype of all religious rivalry and its resulting violence; the striking out of a jealousy birthed by a dysfunctional perception of the Divine. The first murder is interpreted as the first fruits of a Divine rejection – the secret  mechanism that keeps the religious show on the road.

“For God and Ulster”,~ a paramilitary groups slogan for war in my homeland of Northern Ireland, says it all. The Divine has been mistakenly woven into the very fabric of human violence since Cain lashed out. Jealous of Divine approval the sons of God go to war carrying a dualistic view of His character deep within their wounded psyches.

No matter how good the cover up, the violence at the heart of religion will always rear its ugly head given time – like a Jack-in Box that must release its energy by popping up. “Look how they love one another” has become the taunt of  non-believers as they witness the often bitter rivalry at the heart of sacrificial religion.

The revelation of  religious violence by Yeshua quickly resulted in His own murder dressed up in the guise of a political and religious expediency; the Satanic genie hit back in its time-honoured modus operandi.

Further unmasked in the Crucifixion of its Divine whistle-blower the violent godfather quickly hit back dressing the risen Saviour in violent clothing of His own. A Father and Son who’d dispatch non believers in their conditional love to a place of eternal torment. A violent God ridding Himself of violent men.

Could it be that the religion of Yeshua has also does a tomb job on its dispatched prophets over the past two millennia? Is this ‘key of knowledge’ still important in our walk with the Divine? I believe so, for the essential nature of religion is still the same – under its Jesus layer lurks sibling rivalry that negates the very message of the Nazarene, the unconditional Divine Love that welcomes and accepts all.

Thankfully Spirit will always be heard outside the rivalry and ultimate violence of religious systems, the dualistic world of ‘them and us’. Let’s be on guard that we don’t mistake such a religious mindset as the Way of Yeshua.

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If you’ve been a regular attendee of the faith communities commonly known as ‘churches’ for any period of time you’ll have heard plenty of sermons, talks, exhortations, homilies, addresses from the teaching pastor, minister, priest, lay preacher regarding the Christian faith.

My pastor used to go on for an hour or so perhaps twice a week so I guess that over the 16 years or so that I listened to him I’d absorbed 1664 hours of ‘bible exposition’ between the ages of 15 and 31, when I decided to move on.

Folk now wonder why I can’t drift along to a ‘church’ each Sunday morning, sing a few songs, observe a few necks, hand in my money and listen to a little inspirational message from a professional preacher. Now you know.

Anyway, over those years I’ve never once heard a preacher teach or expound the following series of Yeshua sayings that we’re going to revisit. If you can figure out why send me your thoughts.

Enjoy!

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Is it not written in your law ‘I say you are gods’?

This little statement from Yeshua is truly a religious shocker. It stirred his listeners to pick up stones for a sacred ritualistic assassination. I suspect it would also have the same effect among those professing to be His followers today. Let’s have a look at the context in which these seemingly ‘disturbing’ words were spoken.

Yeshua was bang in the middle of a heated debate with the religious experts in the outer courts of the Jerusalem Temple. He was being accused of blasphemy by those who believed that Yahweh was the only Divine Presence in Jerusalem that winter’s day, holed up in the dark Temple room known as the Holy of Holies. Such a belief was safe and gave some order of  predictability to the Jewish way of approaching the Divine.

Yeshua claim to be at one with His Divinity, the Father, challenged the whole mindset of  Jewish religious and political life. Judaism was unique within the Mediterranean world for its monotheistic belief system. In Jewish eyes Yahweh was the only genuine divinity to be found  in the Roman marketplace of assorted deities. No wonder they were appalled and angered by the Nazarene rabbi’s seemingly outrageous claims.

In an act of sheer brilliance Yeshua pulls out of his spiritual repertoire an explosive text from Psalm 82.

I said “You are gods; and all of you sons of the Most High,”

The Hebrew word ‘elohim’ translated ‘gods’ is found over 2500 times in the Jewish Scriptures and almost always refers to the Jewish Divinity, even though it’s the plural  form of the Hebrew noun ‘El’ meaning ‘the strong one’. There was no mistaking Yeshua’s intention in quoting this text. He was claiming that the Scriptures, the final authority for his learned listeners, suggested that humans were in some way gods or divinities, all being sons of their monotheistic God. The term ‘Son of God’ within Jewish history often referred to the ruling sovereign or High Priest of the time. Was Yeshua’s claim to be at one with the Father so out of tune with mystical Jewish tradition. I believe not.

Unfortunately Yeshua’s audience didn’t enjoy being theologically outplayed by the itinerant Galilean preacher. The crowd immediately tried to arrest him but Yeshua as always somehow made his mysterious escape. When it came down to the wire, the orthodox theologians chose tradition over a clear statement from their authoritative Scriptures. I believe we spiritual seekers may find ourselves in a similar position today. Do we read Scriptures with the spectacles of tradition rather than those of an honest and searching heart?

Clearly Yeshua used this text to justify His claims to be at One with the Father and to shake up his listeners Divine limits. Later formalizing such claims, early Church theologians, strongly influenced by Greek philosophy, evolved the intriguing doctrine of the Trinity. Did they stop short of what Yeshua really revealed? Was Yeshua’s use of  Psalm 82 only to justify His personal claims of  divinity or to shed radical light on what it is to be fully human? Was he suggesting that humanity once realigned with the Father, have their god-likeness sharpened into focus? What does it really mean to be made in the image of God? Have we a spark of  Source Divinity buried deep within us during our sojourn in this seemingly humdrum existence? Are we living like paupers when we are meant to live as gods?

What are the implications of Yeshua’s claim for a restored humanity? Here are a few suggestions:

We are creators.

Like the Divine Father, we possess a creative gene within our rewired psyches. The Divine gift of consciousness is the screen where we can project the  desires of the realigned heart and see them manifest in our 3D world.We are part and parcel of the Father’s creative expression, able to flow in His creative power. Why is it that what we fear usually comes upon us? It’s the unaligned creative power within. Fear, a negative form of creative flow produces its own dysfunctional manifestation.

Once retuned by Spirit our creative facilities again produce the desires of Divine Providence. Yeshua claimed that we’d do greater works than He achieved and He achieved some awesome works. What an exciting way to live!

We are free to be.

One aspect of divinity is the ability to rise above all. In other words to be unaffected by the storms of life; to sit in the eye of the storm and wait for the turbulence to pass. The ability to see beyond the stresses of our ego battles and tap into the peace of Ultimate Reality. The freedom from the desire control of others to confidently say ‘I am that I am’, the very nature of our Divine Source.

We are channels of Divine Love.

God, we are simply told, is Love. If  we, like Yeshua, are now at one with the Divine, sharing something of His God nature then surely it is Love that we have dwelling within as the Divine spark. Could our godness be this Divine essence? Are we not designed to love as God loves, unconditionally and without return.

Such is the nature of Spirit within now joined and at one with our spirits. Like a repaired pipe we now have the capacity to be channels for  the flow of  Divine compassion and healing. Could Paul’s claim of being in The Anointed One ( Yeshua) be a much greater revelation than we have yet grasped? Can it not point to an adoption into divinity for those awakened and consumed by Divine Love? A return to Source, a return to the Father’s heart from which we sprang before space- time began.

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If you’ve been a regular attendee of the faith communities commonly known as ‘churches’ for any period of time you’ll have heard plenty of sermons, talks, exhortations, homilies, addresses from the teaching pastor, minister, priest, lay preacher regarding the Christian faith.

My pastor used to go on for an hour or so perhaps twice a week so I guess that over the 16 years or so that I listened to him I’d absorbed 1664 hours of ‘bible exposition’ between the ages of 15 and 31, when I decided to move on.

Folk now wonder why I can’t drift along to a ‘church’ each Sunday morning, sing a few songs, observe a few necks, hand in my money and listen to a little inspirational message from a professional preacher. Now you know.

Anyway, over those years I’ve never once heard a preacher teach or expound the following series of Yeshua sayings that we’re going to revisit. If you can figure out why send me your thoughts.

Enjoy!

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‘Father, forgive them, for they are not being aware of anything they are doing’

What an amazing statement from the Galilean prophet as he suffers the horrendous experience of Roman execution. The whole ‘Kingdom of God’ thing now seems to be another religious fad that’s proven to be just wishful thinking; no big spiritual, religious or political changes that many had forecasted; just a tortured body painfully hanging on a bizarre execution device.

No wonder the Divine appeared to have deserted Him; the embarrassment for the Jewish God Yahweh would have been too much for Him to bear. Rather than a messenger of God, those pietistic Jews, who could be bothered to stay around, believe the Nazarene to cursed by the judging Jewish Divinity. Another false Messiah, another dead-end.

The most radical of sayings to come out of Yeshua’s mouth, are uttered in the midst of  the darkest experience of His now dwindling life. Desolation and despair are knocking at the door of His battered psyche, hoping to gain entrance. Three aspects of  Yeshua’s words blow me away. I now wish to look at each of them in turn.

‘Father’

Yeshua’s form of address to the Divine in such circumstances seems like the word of a simpleton or madman. ‘Come on now Yeshua’ we reply.’Your Abba God seems to have been a monster all along. So much for your sparrows and flowers of the field stories. I wonder if He knows how many ferocious military lashes you’ve suffered, as well as the number of hairs on your blood stained head?’

And yet the intimacy of  the bond between prophet and Divine commissioner remains. The trust of a Son remains despite the approaching end of the religious road. Refusing the judgement of humanity, Yeshua clings to His Divinity’s love for one last request.

‘Forgive them’

What an unbelievable request from an innocent victim. It must have been unique in the history of crucifixion. The hardened execution squad must have been shocked by the Galilean’s words. The remaining religious dignitaries probably didn’t even hear them.

The Jewish Torah’s cry of  ‘an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth’ was superseded by the dying Yeshua. The days of the Law were over. Loving one’s neighbour as oneself had been fleshed out in this final dramatic request. Yeshua seemed to believe His own teaching to the bitter end. Why should his military executioners and their political and religious handlers receive such an outrageous forgiveness?

‘For they are not aware of anything that they are doing’

Yeshua answers this deeply disturbing question for us in the above words.He claims that all involved directly or indirectly in His violent end are unaware of what they are doing. What a seemingly preposterous statement from the Nazarene holy man.

Didn’t these hardened Roman soldiers know exactly what they were doing in carrying out their orders? They’d done it often enough in occupied Palestine. Did the  Temple High Priest and his academic religious advisors not know what they’d initiated with Yeshua’s arrest? Didn’t Pilate as Roman Governor know how to stop a rebellion by taking out a populous charismatic leader ?

According to Yeshua they were all mistaken, indeed radically asleep regarding their role in His death. Like  sleepwalking actors they stumbled through their roles in the unfolding drama. On the basis of such a lack of awareness Yeshua requested the Divine Father to forgive or dismiss their barbarous actions as He Himself had done.

What a revelation of the Divine nature in a dying man’s last words. Followers of Yeshua were to later claim that the actions and words of Yeshua corresponded exactly to the actions and words of the Divine. If true then the words of this saying are truely shocking, turning on its head our concept of Divine justice.

Are we asleep and unaware of our ‘sinful’ or ‘broken’ actions as Yeshua seemed to suggest? Does our free will only operate within the realm of such a dreamlike state? Is personal responsibility a phantasm of  our unaware consciousness?

If so, then the answer to mankind’s predicament is an internal awakening,when dark scales fall from our dimmed eyes, enabling us to see the true nature of the Divine, as an unconditionally loving Presence and our own level of dysfunction in need of healing. Such an awakening, often following a transpersonal crisis, is the gift of Divine Breath or Spirit and the beginning of the spiritual journey.

As followers of Yeshua we too can forgive our enemies, knowing that they dwell in a demonic sleep from which we ourselves been graciously awoken. Thankfully Spirit within provides the power for such a seismic shift in our dualistic mindset. Resigning from our self-appointed role of judge is the key to our continuing freedom.

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If you’ve been a regular attender of the faith communities commonly known as ‘churches’ for any period of time you’ll have heard plenty of sermons, talks, exhortations, homilies, addresses from the teaching pastor, minister, priest, lay preacher regarding the Christian faith.

My pastor used to go on for an hour or so perhaps twice a week so I guess that over the 16 years or so that I listened to him I’d absorbed 1664 hours of ‘bible exposition’ between the ages of 15 and 31, when I decided to move on.

Folk now wonder why I can’t drift along to a ‘church’ each Sunday morning, sing a few songs, observe a few necks, hand in my money and listen to a little inspirational message from a professional preacher. Now you know.

Anyway, over those years I’ve never once heard a preacher teach or expound the following series of Yeshua sayings that we’re going to revisit. If you can figure out why send me your thoughts.

Enjoy!

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

The Son of Man came eating and drinking and they’re saying ‘Look! A gluttonous human and tippler, tribute collectors’ and sinners’ friend’.

In the next few posts I hope to examine some of the relatively unknown sayings of Yeshua, the Galilean prophet whose teaching challenged the civil and religious powers of His day.

If the Divine exists then surely He is an inclusive God. A Being, responsible for the Cosmos and beyond, must love variety and welcome it into its place in the Divine scheme. A Creator Source must by nature, embrace all that has flowed from His Divine Will and Energy. If He is responsible for it all, He must embrace and welcome it all in its totality.

Such was the view of Yeshua bar Yoseph, the first-century, itinerant, Jewish preacher, who burst onto the religious scene proclaiming the inclusive reign of God to his Galilean listeners. However, many of His early followers eventually walked away, disillusioned by such an inclusive vision. The people wanted a Warrior King, steeped in the dualistic Jewish mindset, who’d get rid of the Roman occupation force (them) and restore Jewish independence (us). Yeshua wasn’t going to play their game.

Within the Middle Eastern social norms, hospitality and especially sharing meals with strangers was high on the list. If you ate with someone you liked them and were making a profound statement of relationship. The only trouble was that not everyone got invited. The ‘us’ and ‘them’ mindset had undermined traditional Jewish hospitality in the guise of religious and political morality. Society was split into the never the twain shall meet groupings of ‘the righteous’ and ‘the sinners’. Into such a social scene stepped the Nazarene with His radical message of Divine inclusiveness.

Traveling around as an itinerant preacher, Yeshua got many dinner invitations from His listeners. Sometimes, a call from a curious Pharisee to share a few hours theological discussion around a nice meal. Sometimes a call from the local brothel, where the girls wanted to hear more about Yeshua’s take on His Abba God, through his gift of storytelling.No matter what the host location, Yeshua would have been wined and dined.

However,in accepting the invitation of Jewish sex-workers and swindling government custom officials Yeshua was making a big, big statement. He and His Abba God didn’t wait for moral change before accepting such ‘sinners’. Their invitation revealed their true spiritual condition. That was enough for Yeshua and He believed, for His God.

Unfortunately this new radical inclusion, outside the moral conformity of Torah observance, wasn’t welcomed with open arms by all God followers. The rule-keeping brigade were distraught. This couldn’t be right! Yahweh had given the Torah to separate the sheep from the goats! Now this Galilean upstart was eating and drinking with the goats!

The insightful tale of Yeshua lodging for the night at Zaccheus’ richly furnished  apartment, backs up this radical new approach to religious ‘outcasts’. The vertically challenged Zac had no qualms about welcoming the Galilean rabbi into His family circle. The amazing fact is that Yeshua wanted to stay with him in the first place. As a top customs official, Zac would have milked the average Jew for as much as he could, by fair means and foul. No wonder he was rich. Such a national traitor and extortionist would have been classified well outside the ‘righteous’ camp.

I wonder what the two men talked about over dinner? Anyway the outcome was almost unbelievable. Zac decided to clean up his life by offering half of his wealth to the local poor. If he’d defrauded anyone, he promised to return four times as much cash to his victims. Amazing! What had triggered such seemingly reckless behaviour? Had Yeshua laid some religious heavies on the little rich guy? I think not. What caused the change then?

In my opinion it was the simple fact that Zac felt comfortable in Yeshua’s presence. He enjoyed the holy man’s company and somehow felt fully accepted for, perhaps’ the first time in his life. Yeshua’s reply to his criminal host changed the religious world forever. ‘ Today salvation has been coming to this home’ What a reply. No rules, baptisms,rituals,temple-attendance were required. By welcoming the Divine Presence resident within Yeshua, a heart transplant had occurred; a Divine rewiring of Zac’s tortured psyche, leading to the surrender of his ill-gotten gains.

I believe that such a welcoming of Divine Presence in the form of Holy Breath/Spirit  is the antidote to the paralysing poison of  any religious legalism we may be locked into. The power to live free of attachments is in the welcome, the outstretched arms of the human heart. May I suggest that ‘salvation’ or wholeness is less to do with Christian creeds and belief systems but an openness to the whispering approach of the Divine.

Isn’t it ironic that religious systems that claim the name of Yeshua, practice the very dualistic model of  human classification that Yeshua Himself loved to break down. The believer/non believer Christian paradigm helps no-one, only reinforcing the old self-righteous religious judgement of one’s fellow-man. In my experience, we’re all children of the Divine Father whether we know it or not. It’s more fun knowing so why don’t we enjoy our birthright and let the ‘righteous’ do their own thing.

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Over the last few weeks I’ve had some interesting and often instructive dreams. Last night I’d a dream within a dream.

In my dream’s dream I saw a portal through which appeared hieroglyphics of some kind. As I looked I became aware that the mysterious markings were from outside the normal human sphere and belonged to a higher level of beings.

I then awoke from the ‘dream within a dream’ only to find myself relating it to an unknown stranger who stood beside me, gaining an interpretation of the unknown text as I spoke.

Suddenly, I awoke from  this ‘shell’ dream only to find myself  lying in the silent darkness beside my soundly asleep wife, Zan.

I’ve meditated on this dream today and have a strong sense that I’m to repost my ‘Dream On’ blog from some time back to encourage others to take their dreams seriously.

I’m also willing to interpret any dreams sent to me, especially repetitive dreams or particularly striking dreams that you feel contain a spiritual/psychological message.

Please forward any puzzling dreams to me at dylanmorrison@live.co.uk and I’ll see if Spirit reveals an interpretation that may help you.

Be assured that I don’t charge and never will for this service as I believe that as I’ve freely received so I’m to freely give. Your dream will not be published in any form and any correspondence regarding it will be held in total confidence.

The interpretation of dreams is, I believe, nothing ‘spooky’ but an often neglected aspect of the spirituality of Yeshua, birthed in the Jewish tradition.

Blessings

Dylan

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‘ In the dream, in a night vision, when deep sleep falls upon men, in slumberings upon one’s bed; then He opens mankind’s ears and seals their instruction….. ‘

Job 33 v 15-16

In the last post we looked at the whole idea of visions and their place in the spiritual walk, if any! In today’s post I want to examine the place of dreams in such a journey.

I’d been a follower of  Yeshua for over 40 years before anyone pointed out this strange quote from the Jewish book of Job. I wonder why? I may be wrong but one possible reason may be its suggestion that Divine communication isn’t dependent on a sermon or homily from a professional preacher. It may be too dangerous for people to begin to hear God’s voice for themselves!

Dreams in ancient societies were always understood to be a means of communication from the gods – today many such native Peoples still hold to that premise. We in the West after the arrival of the 20th century god ‘psychology’ and its cohort neuro- sciencehave concluded that the ancient practice of  interpreting dreams as Divine messages was no more than superstition. Yet the facts are that scientists still can’t fully explain the dream phenomenon – we just believe they can.

As with visions most Western religious adherents are deeply suspicious of anything outside an intellectual framework of faith. Letting go of the conscious mind’s control is seen as a no-no! You never know what could happen? We all hear horror stories of folk who think they’re Napoleon,Joan of Arc or even more terrible, Jesus Christ Himself.We shy away from our subconscious minds believing that if we stuff our heads full of lots of good Bible teaching then God should be able to get through to us if He wants.

Before we progress let me say that I believe the Divine can communicate through the Bible or a sermon based on the Bible if He so chooses.So again, my Evangelical friends can sleep easily in their beds! Sorry, maybe that’s the wrong thing to say as we’re about to tackle dreams as Divine communication.

Let’s do a question and answer thing again and see if it proves beneficial.

Can dreams be a Scriptural form of Divine communication?

Yes. See the above quote from poor old Job and the numerous dreams within both Jewish and Christian Scriptures. You’ll be surprised at how many dreams are hidden in there that we just overlook or spiritualize away, Jacob’s angelic ladder being one of the most famous. Young Joseph rose to political power due to his God-given ability to interpret Pharoah’s nightmares.So too with Daniel etc.

But surely the New Testament is different?

No. Many of the leading characters had dreams, interpreting them as Divine communication. Mary’s future husband Joseph, Pilate’s wife and the mystically inclined  Saint Paul. There are others.

Are all dreams Divine messages?

Personally I don’t think so. Scientists claim that dreams are just the brain’s activity of  safely filing away the days new information. I can live with that for some dreams, especially after I’ve eaten a late night cheesy pizza!

What sets apart a dream with a message?

In my experience I often wake up from these ones with a start.They are easy to recall and seem to have made their way into the conscious mind.

What is the source of such messages?

I believe there are two sources – our Higher Self/ ‘I’  and Divine Spirit.

Can you clarify these two sources?

Often we believe that we consist only of our conscious self. In my experience this conscious self can suppress information coming from the subconscious whether Higher or Lower.A dream soured here is trying to get an important message across to me that will adjust my inner life. It may be a warning that my health is suffering due to suppressed emotion or memories. My primal wounding as a response to trauma is setting this dream warning system off so I can take action. I view these dreams as a kind of internal sprinkler system trying to put out the hidden fires that lie deep within.Nightmares tend to originate in the Lower subconscious whereas more positive and life enhancing dreams tend to come from the Higher Subconscious.This area may be close to the religious terms soul or spirit – the area of Self that borders with the Divine.

Other dreams definitely seem to come from the Divine Spirit, flowing through our Higher subconscious but originating from an outside Intelligence that we call God or Holy Spirit.

How can one tell that it’s a Divine message rather than an internal psyche message?

Both are important to respond to but the Divine message will usually have a future ‘vision’ element to it Divinely sourced dreams are usually life enhancing without any hint of fear. Strangely they also tend to be in colour. It’s like God can’t work with the shadowy world of our  internal grey dreams and turns up the coloured pixels to make the dream particularly alive and memorable. Each person may be different but those dreams I’ve interpreted for others that seem to be Divine in origin usually are in glorious Technicolor!

Why does God have to send me a dream?

The Divine loves to communicate with us, not just on Sundays but at all times. What stops this flow of communication is the blockage mechanism of the conscious mind. It has an important role to play in helping us live in the ‘real’ world but tries to dominate our Being by shutting out messages sent via our Higher consciousness. Mystics, I believe, are those who’ve been able to place the conscious mind in its proper place and let other forms of communication flow.

If the Spirit can’t get through to us by more conscious means then out of love will visit us when the defensive shield of our conscious mind is in neutral i.e. when we’re asleep. His goal as is suggested by Job is to open our ears, in other words to listen. If we don’t listen to the Voice in our waking hours then He will communicate visually and audibly in a dream clip.

What should I do with a dream upon waking?

If you can recall anything from the dream then write it down in a dream journal. More of the dream may reveal itself to the conscious mind later in the day if you use your waking memories as a ‘handle’ on the dream. Ponder over it and don’t be embarrassed or ashamed to do so. You’re not being weird but trying to ‘get the message’ that your psyche or the Spirit is trying to deliver to you. It will enrich your life and maybe even change it.

How do I interpret my dream? Do I need to buy a dream interpretation book? Do I need someone else to interpret it for me?

Dreams are deeply personal things but like all pictorial revelation will usually be symbolic in nature. I find the dream interpretation books a big turn off – symbols appear to mean different things to different authors? How confusing is that! If you are just beginning to interpret your dreams, as with visions, ask the Spirit for the interpretation. Be patient and the meaning of the main players/events within the dream will pop into your conscious mind.

Another tip is to steep yourself in the imagery of the Jewish and Christian Scriptures. If you’ve a dream in which you’re riding a horse can Scripture imagery help you out? Yes! Being on horseback is symbolic of holding authority. The Horsemen in the Revelation of John for example were sent out with God’s authority to release certain events on Earth. God may be encouraging you to take authority indeed to let Him supply you with a Divine authority in a situation. Kings rode horses, foot-soldiers had to walk!

If you don’t feel comfortable interpreting your own dreams, try to find a spiritual friend who has some experience of revelatory gifts. He or she may be able to point you in the right direction but remember the dream is yours and you don’t require a guru to reveal the Divine mind. Perhaps talk the dream over with a soul mate – if they think your interpretation is way out then just be cautious. They may be correct.

What will be the outcome of the interpretation?

Like visions dreams are sent for a reason.

They may point out present or approaching danger. By the way if you die in a dream don’t panic  – it usually represents the death of a phase in you life or a relationship that will end.

They may be sent for encouragement to show you that you are on the right track. To empower you and see yourself in a new way. If you see yourself flying in a dream it may mean that you have spiritual perception and can hear the Divine voice, perhaps even have revelatory gifting for the service of others.

Job suggests that dreams can give sealed up instruction. Such sealed instructions may suggest a future purpose when the dream will be applicable. The unsealing may refer to the interpretation process that may take a little time, become clearer at future date.

What about repetitive dreams?

These would appear to be dreams of great depth that reveal a lesson that we find it difficult to learn or absorb into our daily lives. I tend to think that they originate in our own subconsciousness whether Higher or Lower, and deal with strong Primal Wounding issues. That’s just my subjective hunch. The repetition is a means of progressively healing us from such wounds or a sign that we may need further help by a trained therapist that one can trust.

Can you relate a dream?

In my book The Prodigal Prophet I relate the following dream that proved extremely powerful in a time of confusion and turmoil. It seems to be coming to fruition even as I blog and write!

In it I was sitting in my parked car in Priory Lane, a street near my childhood home. As I sat there with the window rolled down a substitute history teacher from my old school approached me. He politely asked what I was going to do, now that I’d retired from the teaching profession.

I confidently replied, “I’m going to speak to people about the Lord.” I was as surprised by my reply in the dream as my ex- colleague. Being the disillusioned son of a retired clergyman he was a card-carrying atheist and a very cynical one at that.

At that point in the dream a police patrol car pulled up behind me and parked. I was sure they were coming to speak to me but instead the two officers crossed the street and entered a house.

I suddenly looked down at my car clock and noticed it was 9.10 a.m. I apologized to my teacher friend saying I’d have to leave as I was late. Starting the car I quickly drove off.

As I lay in the stillness of the night the interpretation slowly came to me point by point. The car was my life’s purpose. At present I seemed to be going nowhere. I was resting close by, but not in, the religious world as represented by the close vicinity of Ballybrigg Priory.

My verbal response to the teacher’s question was my prophetic call to speak God’s words into people’s lives. I was replying to a history teacher’s question so my future purpose would be bound up with my own personal history.

The policemen represented two of the authority figures that I’d experienced as model obstacles; they would no longer bother me and be the focus of my life.

The clock reading was highly significant. 9.10 a.m. was the end time each morning of the pastoral period in school. During this fifteen minute period I’d be bombarded with the pastoral problems of both pupils and staff. This problem solving pastoral life within both the educational and religious worlds was now over.

Starting the car and heading off represented a new direction and purpose in my life that would become clearer in time.

My dream touched me deeply. Was Divine Love so detailed? Was it trying to reach others through dreams as they slept? Could the Divine encourage, strengthen and sometimes warn us through dreams?

http://www.amazon.com/author/dylanmorrison

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Recent tragic events that are crashing around us like battered waves on a rocky shoreline, are causing us to wonder where God is to be found. Has he dozed off and let the world system go its merry but paradoxically angst filled way? Religious folk did deeper into their ‘certainty of belief’ bomb shelters, believing the end is nigh and suspecting that the Mayans may have been right after all.

Many are just confused with a deep sense of unease that something is shifting in the affairs of man – a shaking that’s reducing our modern Babel Towers to rubble.

Does the God of Yeshua care and if so why can’t He come to us in our darkness? Serious questions for serious times.

In light of such confusion I’ve decided to repost my article ~ The Inner Void hoping that it can help and encourage us in our search for the Divine dwelling place. May it bless and enlighten you on the Journey.

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One of the strangest rooms in the history of religious experience was the Jewish ‘Holy of Holies’. At first a portable enclosed cube of space, 30 feet by 30 feet by 30 feet, within the skin tented Tabernacle, it was later incorporated as the focal point of  Solomon’s First Temple in Jerusalem.

What was this room all about and has it anything to teach us in our 21st century search for the Divine?

The surprising fact about the holy cube is that it was sparsely furnished. In the Solomon Temple it housed the famous Ark of the Covenant, a gold lined box containing the Torah tablets as received by the Jewish leader Moses. The golden top of the Ark was known as the mercy-seat where the Divine Presence  took up residence whenever He wished. The furnishings were completed with Aaron’s miraculously flowering rod and a jar of manna, representing the Jewish deliverance from Egyptian slavery and the ‘Bread of Life’ that had kept them alive in their nomadic wanderings.

Significantly in the later Second Temple the Holy of Holies was just an empty room, following the disappearance of The Ark and other religious artifacts during the Babylonian siege of Jerusalem.

It was also fairly small and, perhaps most significantly, dark. And yet this was where the Jewish High Priest entered only once a year, on the Day of Atonement, to meet their God YAHWEH; a meeting with the Divine in a darkened space, lit only by the Shekhinah manifestation of Presence.

May we, in our own emptiness and inner darkness be likened to such a holy room? I believe so. When our lives have emptied of all superficiality through a descent into confusion and despair, when we are alone in the seeming singularity of our inner humanity, when love seems far away and human or religious trust completely non-existent, what is left? Nothing or Ultimate Reality?

In this void within the human heart is their not a space for Divine Love to meet us on our own Day of Atonement, our appointed Day of Sacred Oneness? Does not a Shekhinah Presence come and surprise us in our isolation, causing us, like the High Priest to fall on our faces in awe? So transforming a Presence that our faces shine with Spirit, like that of Moses, after our encounter in desert solitude.

Where do we encounter such Divinity if it can be experienced at all? It’s certainly not experienced in the mind where conceptual truth is mistakenly worshipped as Ultimate Reality. Many followers of Yeshua fall short of their birthright by settling for doctrinal knowledge, a pale shadow of  Divine Presence. Theologians and philosophers frantically search through the conceptual maze hoping to nail such a Presence down, straightjacketing  it in their chains of religious theory.

Fortunately Divine Spirit easily avoids the vain clutches of  such academics to meet the common man in his inner chamber, the ‘I’ room designed for such an encounter. As our false survival selves crumble, their social and material supports tumbling into extinction, a door opens into the darkness of our confusion, where we stand stripped naked of self-assurance and ego.

Here we wait, often in despair for the Divine Light, the comfort of our Creator Parent, our Source, the very stuff from whence we have come. Thankfully such a Light will appear as surely as day follows night but only when darkness has carried out its liberating execution of our enslaving ego. Only then will all make sense; when spirit embraces Spirit and we are One.

So, on our journey into the unknown, let’s not be afraid of our inner world, our Divine meeting place, for to such a place we will return on our parting breath. Better to get familiar with it now I reckon.

Dylan’s author page: http://www.amazon.com/author/dylanmorrison

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Dysfunctional Religious Attachments ~ Revisited

The comings and goings of leadership within religious groups is happening all the time. It’s like a sacred form of musical chairs with the Divine being held responsible for each appointment or dispatch from the prestigious seat of power and influence. Sometimes the ‘leader’, or more likely their family, has wisely ‘had enough’; on other occasions the departure is an expulsion for some perceived ‘sin’ on their part.

Loyalty to one’s ‘faith group’ is often dressed in the guise of a loyalty to God. If I love God, I will love the group and particularly His appointed leader(s). If I have issues with the leader(s) I have issues with his/her boss viz God. A few proof texts are thrown into the mix and the believer is locked into a form of social control that they don’t perceive until a personal crisis unexpectedly comes to rescue them.

My friends at Wartburg Watch are presently writing about developments in such a tight-knit religious group in the USA. I’m not surprised by these events having lived through similar ones in the 1980s.

So for any of you who suspect that all is not well in your present ‘faith group’ here is a little blog I posted sometime ago. I trust that it might empower and encourage you to step out from under control and walk in the freedom that Yeshua demonstrated during His time with His beloved mankind.

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Recovering from abuse experienced within a spiritual or religious setting is a long and painful process.While the level of abuse can vary along a given spectrum there are some characteristics common to all cases.

In the same way that an alcoholic denies that he/she has a drink problem or a battered wife’s denies that her husband is an abuser, so too with victims of religious or spiritual abuse. Deep within the abused will be a feeling that something isn’t quite right and yet a strong emotional attachment still locks the victim, for that’s what they are, into a mind-control matrix. The first step to freedom is to admit that one may be imprisoned in such a complex system.

There are a number of phenomena linked to subliminal abuse and control that might suggest you’re suffering a level of abuse.

1) The elevation of the abusive group above all other faith groups.

A clear danger sign is the exclusive nature of such a religious group. The ‘God has chosen us to be special syndrome’ is a symptom of a control mentality.

2) Broken or distrustful relationships with previous friends, family or outsiders.

‘Us and them’ mental strongholds lead to emotional fractures with those previously close to the victim.

When my wife and I left our Shepherding group, an elder’s wife publicly asked the pastor if she could discuss ‘family business’ with us if she met us on the high street. Thankfully and to my great surprise she was told to be as open as she wanted. Yet the question revealed a deep seated ‘us and them’ mentality that was prevalent in the group mindset.

3) A level of ‘committment’ to the group that eats up time, money and emotional energy that’s often to the detriment of normal family life.

Often commitment to God is interpreted as commitment to the group. In my experience this is a real sign of near cultic tendencies within faith groups.

4) A strong charismatic leader with an elevated view of his own position and service.

In my own experience I was drawn to the charisma of my leader through mimetic or imitative desire – I wanted to be as close to God as he appeared to be. Like me, such ‘followers’  can greatly inflate a leaders view of his own importance leading to religious delusions and tight control.

5) A one-man-band leader who insists on doing all the public service of the church.

Variety is a strong characteristic of creation and should be reflected in the life of a faith community. It’s not just the ‘Rev/Pastor/Father Blogg’s Show’

6) A dismissal of genuine concerns by the leader or leadership.

If the leadership of your faith group are constantly ignoring or belittling your and others feelings of unease then it usually suggests a superiority attitude within the group’s leadership team.

7) ‘God has appointed us as leaders and we always will be  – we see any disagreement without us as a lack of  ‘faith’ on your part‘.

In my own experience my ‘Shepherd’ had a great technique whereby I left private meetings with him with the impression that the ‘problem’ only lay within me. It was a brilliant psychological trick skillfully played on all dissenters!

8) A secrecy regarding the financial expenditure of the group, especially regarding the leader’s salary.

We had a great technique in our fellowship for hiding details of expenditure. The salaries of all our workers were grouped together at the AGM giving the impression of an equality within the salary structure. The opposite was the case – if your group is secretive about detailed expenditure beware. You are under a form of financial control that is contrary to basic integrity.

9) A regular feeling of guilt regarding your ‘service’ to God via the group.

Guilt has nothing to do with being a follower of Yeshua. If this guilt lands on you after attending a faith group then you are being abused.

10) A special ‘in’ language that outsiders can’t understand.

A new language that innocently conveys the ‘hidden agenda’ of  the abusers. In my own case such phrases as ‘being under authority’ and ‘ having covering’ were falsely revered as spiritual correctness.

11) A lack of vulnerability on behalf of the leader or teacher.

Most abusive leaders are locked into a denial of their own flaws and weaknesses, appearing strong to their followers.At the same time a level of vulnerability and openness is often required from followers by such a leader. Such a degree of openness keeps the follower locked into the abusive matrix. Remember knowledge is power and especially in abusive pastoral situations.

In my next blog I’ll suggest some ways that you can free yourself from such subtle and often subliminal control once you’ve been honest with yourself.

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