At our Lantern Group meeting this time, we thought about spiritual cleaning — cleansing and purifying, not housework!
We were looking at three areas:
- Cursing and blessing.
- Severance
- The Ho-oponopono prayer.
Now, this is about the removal from society, or one’s personal life, of toxic input — that might be abuse or bullying, whether directed at you or at someone else; or other toxic behaviours that are spoiling your life or the common life; perhaps people who are greedy or selfish or violent or sexually predatory; that sort of thing. Or it can be about removing any kind of block to progress and development.
Starting, then, with cursing and blessing. There are two key passages about this in the New Testament. Here’s what Jesus had to say about it in the beatitudes (Matthew 5)
43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbour and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.
And here’s what St Paul had to say, in Romans 12:
v. 14: Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse.
17 Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everyone. 18 If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. 19 Do not take revenge, my dear friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written: “It is mine to avenge; I will repay,” says the Lord. 20 On the contrary:
“If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink.
In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.”
21 Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.
These passages make it clear that in our spiritual practice as Christians, we are not in the business of cursing. The key is that last phrase from the Romans 12 passage: “overcome evil with good.” That’s what we have to do.
This doesn’t set us at a disadvantage, because there is no power but God, creation proceeds from God, and God is love, God is good, God “causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous”.
We can infer from this, that goodness will always triumph in the end, because it is inherently more powerful than evil. In the rock-paper-scissors of the spirit realm, goodness will always trump evil, blessing will avert a curse. Love wins.
It’s important to grasp the power of what we say, when it comes to blessing.
You may have heard of Masaru Emoto — his experiments on water in Japan — and Veda Austin doing the same thing in Australia. They photographed the crystalline structure of water molecules captured at the point of freezing. If you look this up online you can find lots of information and photos about their work.
Masaru Emoto would take words and tape them to the side of a bottle of water, with the word facing inward so the water could read it. He demonstrated that the words made a difference to the water’s molecular structure: so something like “peace” or “grace” or “I love you” or “thank you” would bring about beautiful, snowflake-shaped structures captured by freezing. By contrast, such words as “I hate you” or “you make me sick” would result in chaotic and disordered structure.
Our bodies are 60-75% water. What is spoken into us makes a material difference to our wellbeing on a molecular level. Words of blessing make us well.
We are made in the image of God who is I Am that I Am, so our words have power. In order to transform the world and establish the reach of Christ, the kingdom of heaven, it is important that we use words with care and respect, because we are speaking life conditions into being. We are to bless, not curse — we want to create Heaven, not Hell.
It’s also important to understand that we have power, authority and responsibility, through the Name of Jesus, to do this. So when we pray to transform a situation by blessing, we command or announce, rather than petitioning or requesting. Thus we would say “I bless you with the love of the Lord” rather than “Lord, please will you bless this person?”
There are two particular ways of praying into a toxic situation that needs changing — for instance a cruel and oppressive political régime. The first way of praying is to not curse it, but to announce in the power of the Name of Jesus, and with his authority, that it will be transformed or removed, making way for leadership committed to social justice, international peace, the wellbeing of creation and the common good. This is a form of mountain-moving intercession, of clearing the way for the King of Glory to come in and the kingdom of peace to establish.
The second prayer, that I learned from Eileen Wheeler of The Servants With Jesus, is short and simple: “I bless you with the love of the Lord.”
She would use this prayer as a kind of spiritual solvent to dissolve and remove any blockages. For instance, at one time the Servants had a sitting tenant who would not vacate a house that they needed to sell. They didn’t argue or threaten, they just prayed repeatedly and daily, holding that tenant in mind, “I bless you with the love of the Lord.” The tenant left of their own accord.
Something else to bear in mind is that authenticity, honesty and truth are essential to effective prayer. Miracles can occur only in an atmosphere of authenticity and integrity. Because we are made in the image of I Am that I Am, the created order will organise according to our authority — it will believe us and respect what we say. But if there is a dissonance, it won’t know what to follow — we’ll be sending out mixed messages. So if we are tangled in hypocrisy or trying to maintain an image or approval-seeking, we block our own power to bring transformation. How will the universe know what to do if we say one thing but do another, or say what we don’t mean, or profess one thing and secretly think something quite different.
Jesus lived in complete alignment with God, and there is no power but God, so power came thundering through Jesus and made people well, and calmed storms, and raised the dead. He thought and spoke and lived in accordance with the flow of grace.
To re-cap so far — two prayers that are announcing not requesting:
- For a toxic situation or regime to be transformed or removed in the Name of Jesus
- The short blessing to remove blockages, “I bless you with the love of the Lord.”
Moving on now to severance as a method of spiritual cleaning.
To practice compassion with a pure heart, it is necessary to establish and maintain firm boundaries.
If you don’t set and keep clear and firm boundaries, it is overwhelmingly likely you will become some combination of stressed, resentful, depressed, manipulative and ill.
If, in your life, there are individuals who routinely abuse you and treat you without respect, or who are enmeshed in narcissistic behavioural patterns, you would do well to sever yourself from them. Some people are habitually destructive and dangerous, and it is not practical to maintain companionship with them. They will ruin your life. Severance is advisable.
But in order to sever yourself from somebody, to separate yourself from them completely, to release them and let them go so that you are no longer entangled at a spiritual level, it is necessary to both love and forgive them. There is no other way to get rid of them. If you are angry or resentful towards them, if you bear them a grudge, that will bind them closer to you.
Forgiveness and love are not feelings. In this instance, forgiveness and love are the way you let them go. You disconnect by cancelling all the spiritual debt they owe you, leaving that in the hands of Jesus, and then blessing them on their way. You don’t have to say it to them, you don’t have to have anything to do with them at all — this is about the attitude you must bear toward them. Love in this instance is not an embrace but a refraining from blame or retaliation. They are God’s problem now. Live long and prosper. Off you go.
This, too, is a form of spiritual cleaning; removing toxic influence from your life.
Our last area of consideration is the traditional Hawaiian Ho’oponopono Prayer, popularised by Dr Hew Len (you can find him on YouTube if you do a search there). It is simple:
I love you
I’m sorry
Please forgive me
Thank you
Dr Hew Len offers the evaluation that we are responsible for whatever shows up in our lives. By that, he doesn’t mean that whatever happens to us is our fault or we caused it. He means that what comes to meet us gives us the authority to respond. It should keep off our path and out of our way if it doesn’t want what we are.
So whatever shows up in our life — perhaps a harassed parent with a child having a meltdown in the supermarket, or a couple having a row on on the bus — even if we don’t know those people or their situation, we have authority now to the extent that they have appeared in our life. This allows us to pray with power.
Dr Hew Len had a medical colleague vexed by a difficult problem in his psychiatric hospital. Patients were getting worse not better, and staff were leaving. The situation was getting unmanageable. He asked Dr Hew Len if he could help. So that made Dr Hew Len responsible — as in, entitled to respond, even though it was not his problem.
He asked for a room in the hospital and a list of the patients’ names. He didn’t need to meet with them, he just sat down in that room, in their hospital, and prayed the Ho’oponopono prayer into their names “I love you: I’m sorry: Please forgive me: Thank you”— a bit like Masaru Emoto speaking words of power and meaning into the bottles of water. Over and over, Hew Len spoke the Ho’oponopono prayer into the list of names given him. And the patients began to get better and were able to be discharged. The situation eased and resolved.
Wherever you are that a turbulent situation shows up and thereby entitles you to respond, you can, in the quietness of your mind, repeatedly speak the Ho’oponopono prayer into the situation, and you will see the situation be defused, calm down, start to settle. You will alter its molecular structure.
So, to recap:
- We are to bless not curse, and blessing will overcome curse; light is stronger than darkness. Into a toxic or oppressive regime we can command or announce with power that it be transformed or removed.
- We can apply blessing as a solvent to release stuck situations: “I bless you with the love of the Lord”, repeated several times when the situation comes to mind.
- In order to be effective in our spiritual path it is necessary to live with authenticity, integrity and honesty; if we practice with divided intention, with a public self and a different secret self, we muddy the waters and the universe won’t know which set of instructions to follow — what we pretend or what we are.
- In order to sever completely from destructive fellow-travellers, which is advisable, it is essential to love and forgive them.
- We can use the Ho’oponopono prayer to take spiritual responsibility and bring calm into a turbulent and unstable situation.
Our mantra for this time:
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