Sunday, January 3, 2021

2021 Destressing by Spiritual Expansion

Hello! Happy 2021!

Spiritual Work to Destress Yourself is what I'd like to discuss this day.

Spiritual work means the spiritual expansion and connection to God.

Dear reader, how are you doing? 

Practicing faith, patience, and trust

I am, and it's a never-ending enduring to the end. Funny phrase, "enduring to the end," seeing how we are eternal. I guess I'm enduring to the end in spiritual things in this mortal journey.

Have you read the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew chapters 5-7, in the Holy Bible? It is excellent instruction for spiritual work to be done in human existence.

Most Bible readers are very familiar with the Sermon given by Jesus Christ. If you are, or are not, aware, I say give it a gander and see what you think. 

One of my favorite scriptures in the Sermon on the Mount is, "But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you." Matthew 6:33, Sermon on the Mount, New Testament, Holy Bible, KJV.

Seeking the kingdom of God is spiritual work. In my last three posts: Spiritual Advice, Destressing via Spiritual Experiments, and Spiritual Experiments to Destress, I discuss ways to seek the kingdom of God.

When we seek God's kingdom, we are actually seeking God.

When we seek God, we are, in fact, seeking spiritual expansion.

I know that 2021 is the year of spiritual expansion.

Crisis asks, even begs, for focus.

Are you in crisis mode?

Maybe you aren't in crisis mode. Perhaps you are just stressed out.

Seeking God will give you great peace, which is done by inner work. When we want to connect to God, we must use our minds to focus on faith, which is the foundation and key to finding God, and His kingdom.

Concentration, contemplation, and focus on faith are the order of the entire year for spiritual expansion in 2021.

"Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: 

But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal:

For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light. 

But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!" ~ Matthew 6:19-23, Sermon on the Mount, New Testament, Holy Bible, KJV.

The light of Christ is the focus for 2021.

The opposite of light is darkness, and if practiced it gives anger, anxiety, depression, and despair. Therefore, I will be writing about focusing on perfect love, as I do, with spiritual exercises and experiments.

"There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love." ~ John 4:18, New Testament, Holy Bible, KJV

Faith forms the perfect love for God, life, others, and yourself that will bring great light and inner peace to any crisis, darkness, and/or stress you may be experiencing.

I have written some posts about spiritual experiments in the last couple of months. My experiences began with praying for all, then evolved to contemplating and praying for faith, patience, and trust.

The experiment that I will offer today is focused on faith.

This is the beginning of the conditioning and training in spiritual expansion for 2021.

My focus for 2021 is to talk less and listen more. Listen more to others, and listen more to me. Listen to others to learn and understand, and listen to me to notice any insecurity I may have.

Thoughts of feeling unsafe become more apparent when we focus on confidence. This is very good because doubtful thoughts aren't as noticeable when we are just looking for them. When there is a focus on trust, the contrast of mistrust is louder. When thoughts of worry are detected, we can condition and train ourselves to replace them with confidence.

This is where we begin (I say "we" and hope you will do this with me)...

Memorize...

"Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." ~ Hebrews 11:1

This is our intentional contemplation. When we wake in the morning, let us make this our first thought. This is really cool! I've been experimenting with this for the past year. When I have a memorized phrase, scripture, or word that is my focus, I make it my first thought when I wake up. This gives me concentration on spiritual things.

Spiritual things are the solutions to human conditioning.

In addition, the scripture above is our intentional concentration throughout the day and our consideration as we lay our heads on our pillow and retire for the night.

This is the beginning of our focus on faith.

As we do this, I believe fearful thoughts will be more prominent, and when they are, we will ask ourselves, "What do I want?" or, "What do I hope for?" And answer the questions. 

This will make us intentionally change insecurity to confidence as we focus on what we want.

For example, I ask myself, "What do I hope for?" I think about what I hope for in that moment or future. I'd like things to go my way at the moment, and I articulate what that would be. Ultimately, I'd like to just be able to research and write for a living. Although I do research and write much of the time, I'd like to do research and report on spiritual things full-time.

What would you like to be, do, or have?

When you answer that question, you think about things hoped for, as in the scripture we're memorizing on faith.

Seeking the kingdom of Heaven is inner work!

Spiritual expansion is inner work!

Connecting to God is inner work!

The free will that God gives us is choosing what we think.

We live in our power when we control and govern what we think.

Our power is not in controlling how others treat us but in how we govern our own thoughts.

What we think creates our emotions.

Fearful thoughts lead to anger, anxiety, depression, and despair.

Faithful thoughts lead to happiness, joy, and vitality.

Will you walk this journey of destressing by spiritual expansion in 2021 with me?

I hope you will work for you if you feel like you need to.

This is heavenly work on earth, and it is spiritual homework.

Print this post, make notes, highlight what you will do to help you, and refer to it daily as part of your spiritual studies.

Do! Not! Forget! To! Memorize! And! Intentionally! Contemplate! Hebrews! 11! 1!

Ha ha ha...

I'm bossing you around. But honestly, I know these suggestions will help anyone seeking spiritual expansion, and that is precisely what we need to connect to God and discover He is in charge.

God allows all things to work for our good. It is our responsibility to discover that it is all for the working of our faith. 

There is a lesson in everything; the study is faith, patience, and trust. If we haven't been practicing these lessons, we may not be too conditioned in them.

This is spiritual expansion.

This may seem silly to some, but fear is creeping in for many, and faith truly is inner work; it is my prayer that if you have fearful thoughts and focus on faith, things will be more comforting when you intentionally work on it.

God bless you, my dear sweet reader.

Speak soon...

Elizabeth Stanfill 

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