Hello Unity Friends and Family,
"A Vow of Prosperity"
Through much of my life I heard about individuals taking a vow of poverty for their religious experience. I didn’t care for the notion. Why? Because I thought it meant a vow of destitution. I looked up what it means to take a “vow of poverty.” It means to give up ownership and live within a community. It means one is not burdened or distracted by possession. That sounds better. Then I came into Unity and I heard all about “Prosperity”. “Everyone should be prosperous and abundant.” It got to the point where I saw that many were ashamed that they didn’t have more money and had no real ideas of how to get more, so they were left thinking they were somehow lacking (which isn’t a prosperous thought at all.)
Then I met Edwene Gaines and it was clear that she had taken a vow of prosperity and was committed that her mission was to open her mind to allow prosperity for all beings. Having her good didn’t interfere with anyone else’s good and visa-versa. As far as I could tell, that while she had possession of many things and she carried the deed of ownership by law to plenty of stuff, her thought was that ultimately they were given by Spirit and therefore were to be paid for by Spirit and therefore ultimately owned by Spirit. Her job was to move her mind and her feet collecting the income so generously spread around by Spirit. Oh, and she had to write the checks to pay for the commitments. Spirit doesn’t write checks. Spirit provides Divine Ideas on how to keep an abundantly active checking account in our favor.
I liked what Edwene said and I began to emulate her in my seeking Divine Ideas and following through on them. I made a vow of prosperity and then I allowed life to open up to show me what prosperity looks like for me when I follow through on my Divine Ideas. I live well in many areas. I’m even beginning to show prosperity in most of my personal relationships. Forgiveness flows more easily than ever before and my confidence that invisible and visible channels are working together in my favor is present within my mind.
Each day, I seek to make my vow of prosperity so that I may easily give and receive without making what is given the object of my value. My value is, I am a beloved child of God. Your value is that you are a beloved child of God. We have so much in common…actually, we have everything in common. While our stuff may look different, the Source of our stuff is the same.
Congratulations to us all,
Rev. Shawn