November 2003
 Your
Spiritual Bank Account
We all know that we have to have money before we
can spend it. And how comfortable it makes us feel to have a good
fat checking account, an account big enough to draw on in emergencies
without impoverishing us when it comes to paying for our ordinary
needs. Let us talk about another kind of checking account which
is equally important. We are calling it your spiritual bank account
because we believe there are great spiritual forces that we can
draw on and deposit in our own minds, and which can be used in
any emergency, in any stress or strain of life. Life has enough of everything to spare.
It contains love and faith and peace of mind and joy. Would it
not be wonderful if we could
build up a spiritual bank account and hold it in reserve—an
account which we knew would be sufficient to meet any emergency
in our lives? For we are always being called on to meet emergencies— times
when we need more love and tolerance, more kindness and understanding,
a deeper faith and a higher hope. These are the real crises in our lives. And at such times, unless
we have a vast amount of good stored up, we not only become impoverished,
but we sometimes become destitute of hope. And then despair takes
the place of hope, and fear takes the place of faith. This is what
we want to avoid. How would it be if we all opened a spiritual
account with the Bank of Life and, realizing that we were drawing
on the Infinite, each day deposited enough hope and happiness and
faith to more than meet any emergency that might possibly arise?
The wonderful part about this is that we know Life contains all
these things and It wants to give them to us. It is intended by
the Divine scheme of things that we should have them. How would we go about it to open up such an account and be sure
that we had enough of these qualities on deposit so that our checks
would be honored whenever any emergency arose? We know that we
have to deposit money in the bank in order to draw checks. We know
that the money is in a safe place and that the checks will be honored
unless we overdraw the account. In our ordinary affairs we have
to earn the money, and in a certain sense this will be true of
our spiritual bank account. But the earning of the supply or the
substance for our spiritual bank account is a little different,
for we earn the ability to draw on the Bank of Life only through
having practiced Love. This is where many of us fall down because we do not quite realize
that Love is the base of everything. We have had so much experience
that seems to contradict this that we become skeptical and cynical
and sometimes wonder if Love, after all, is the greatest reality
in life. And yet we know that we could not live without Love, for
life is absolutely meaningless unless its whole motivation is built
on Love and Givingness. Why can we not think of it this way: God
has already made the initial deposit—and a big one—for everyone who is ever
born into this world, because God has given Himself to us. He has
imparted His own Life and, in a mysterious way which is beyond
our comprehension, has endowed us with the capacity to Love. If
God is Love—and no sane person can doubt this—and if
each one of us has, as we must have, immediate access to the Love
of God, then we earn the ability to draw on the Bank of Life in
such degree as we become loving. We shall earn the ability to draw on this bank through constant
meditation and prayer and communion with the Infinite, using statements
in our meditations similar to the following: God is Love and all the Love there is is mine now. I shall endeavor to see something lovable in everyone I meet,
in every situation in which I find myself, and as I do this I shall
accumulate a great degree of Love to be deposited in my bank. And then when some experience comes along which seems unkind or
unlovable, I shall be able to write a check on my Bank of Life
which will cover every liability of hate or of unkindness. And here is one of the great secrets of
nature—the person
who has taken the time to harmonize himself with Love will find
that, when some incident that seems hateful or discordant arises
in his experience, he can draw on a reserve Force which he now
has. He can actually apply this to the situation when it arises. If you have accumulated a certain amount
of Love and then meet some situation where discord and strife
seem to enter, get quiet
inside yourself and say, “I am bringing Love to bear on this
situation— a Love which comprehends and includes everything,
a Love which has no hurt in it, a Love which is not afraid, a Love
which is calm and confident and sure of Itself.” Right here is where the Law of Mind in Action comes into play.
When you apply your thought of Love directly to discordant situations,
and there is nothing in you which is afraid, your thought of Love
applied to that situation will heal it. If you have deposited enough
Love in your checking account you will find that you can meet the
situation, your check will be honored by the Bank of Life, and
the situation that confronts you will be healed. And because you have deposited a Love which can see around everything
that contradicts It, and because you have ample Love left in your
own thought, you will find that the Love you use, acting as Law,
will definitely overcome the fear and the hate and the sense of
insecurity that come where there is a sense of lack of Love. Perfect Love alone can cast out all fear. Love is always greater
than fear. Fear is not really an enemy of Love. All that fear can
do is cast a shadow across your pathway. But this shadow is dissipated
when you look at it with Love. You are not dealing with two opposing
forces but with only One Force, which is absolute and positive
and conclusive. But first you must have made the deposit with the Bank of Life.
You must have spent much time with yourself straightening out all
the little animosities and resolving them into the one great Love
which is God. God never fails and Love never fails and you will
never fail if you use the Love that God is. Ernest Holmes
|
