The following points are drawn from comments made in Round 2 sessions across the online LP Life Groups in their work with Genesis 34:25-29 as dealt with in numbers 4494-4512 of the Arcana Coelestia…
Group A
Read More- We need to be rebuilt and this is done through being able to step away from our historical faith, connect with the Lord, see what he is offering us, not what we think it is. When we receive that love we have to give it back, and it is in giving it back that we actually experience the joy and the connection from which we can see the process and the pain and the discomfort as the blessing that it really is.
- Illusions come through our senses and when believed create states of doubt and negativity
- Our reading of the Word, when viewed through the senses, can lead us astray
- Love received needs to be given out again
- We can draw strength from the discomfort that arises from making an effort to do the right thing
- It is often easier to remember a task and see it working in retrospect than in the present moment
- The Word shows us what we don’t know, it shows us what we’ve never seen before
- Each time we come to the Word it feels like a new beginning
- It can be hard to get past the literal meaning of the Text
- We can quickly slide into hellish states
- The task we set will often bring into view its opposite and can manifest in our physical body
- The physical body can give us what needed to give attention to our spiritual life
- When we avoid spiritual work it exhibits in our external sensory life
- Reflection in hindsight allows us to see both the proprium and the Lord at work
- We don’t choose the task or spiritual focus, the Word chooses it for us
- We work not just for ourselves but for others in the group which includes the spiritual communities we are all linked to
- We often pass through the states of morning – noon – evening – night over the two-week cycle and then experience a sense of peace once it’s finished
- A reminder of the importance of body, and mind, and soul in this process, that the three are always working together and that when one is out of balance the rest suffer
- Reminded that we are on a long journey and we are only at the beginning for it continues on for eternity
Group B
Read More- It is noticed that much of what comes up for people to work with isn’t big but is usually quite subtle small nuanced annoyances that cause frustration
- Working to do the right thing despite the resistance, if persevered with, tends to lead to states of calm
- Without the good of application knowing the truth doesn’t have a lot of benefit. When we act then we find the Lord is with us leading and guiding
- It is comforting to hear of other’s experience and to find something common in our experience of the Word working in our lives
- The reading brings up things that challenge us and this is transformed into a gift to share with everyone in the group
- It’s interesting that the Word causes us to experience what it’s describing and to see that over and over whether it’s something actively observed or something that unfolds unconsciously to be observed or seen only in hindsight, it seems as if the Word just does what it needs to do with us.
- Even though there is this united experience of the Word that often occurs there is an appreciation for just how differently everyone experiences the Word. We are like different spokes, each seeing what they are given to see of reality. Yet we are all united to the centre, the Lord, and while there is this difference each view is valid. In addition to the written Word, this is also the Word too, with every person bringing out a facet of what’s there. It’s the uniting of the human mind and body too, with the truth that comes in via the written Word. It’s a living Word, being inside each person and it’s marvellous to see that shining out showing things through others that our own mind cannot see.
- There is a difficulty in taking what the Word says about our lives seriously – the closer the Lord comes the more we experience a judgement – and there is a difficult work in having truths go from something intellectual to affecting the heart. To really take on the tasks we are given is hard work that needs to be honoured, knowing that to do this is going to be troubling. So it’s useful and heartening to see people being troubled or impacted by what they are reading and to remember that for new people coming into this work this is likely to be something they have to deal with.
Group C
Read More- On every front, this work reveals just how ubiquitous the inclination of proprium to claim merit and what is of the Lord’s for one’s self
- There is a pattern that becomes apparent when looking to apply the Word. First, you meet resistance, then there arises a real terror or fear. These numbers state why that is, its a result of the proprium feeling under attack. The hells play on this, at first we don’t want to be aware of the proprium, once we become aware of it then evil spirits want to make us identify with it and make it that that’s all we are about, that that’s all there is, and then there comes that sense of terror and if we can’t be led out of that by the Lord that state is very uncomfortable. This is the Lord’s mercy when it is so hard to bear, for when things reach a certain point, or the limits of what we can endure the Lord then sees to it that there is a change of state so that we are lifted out, regain our sanity, look normal again.
- There is a need to remember that external things can seem very important, so much so that they can tend to override internal things. There is an effort required for internal things to be prioritised over external things.
- The group provides a strong reminder that we can hear the Lord through everybody and if that idea is active it changes how group life is experienced. Each exchange is an opportunity for the Lord to speak into our life something we aren’t given to access other than through the experience of others. It’s a reminder as to how important it is to be in a state of openness and receptivity to what’s presenting.
- Some states we work with tend to be cyclic, returning at different times revealing that there is more work needing to be done
- Sometimes there is doubt about whether turning to the Word is going to be helpful due to the past experience of not always hearing the Lord’s voice speaking through the Word.
- Being reminded that whether or not we get what’s coming through the Text in the immediacy of reading it will offer what we need when we actually need it
- Even when the struggle is such that there is a turning away from the Word something deep, a sense of needing to keep the Lord as a central focus in my life draws me back.
Being a new comer to Logopraxis, I very much appreciate written comments about the LP experience.
Hi Fred. There was an article of a compilation of people’s LP experiences in the last Theta Alpha journal which you might like to read . Let me know if the link does work.
https://newchurch.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/Theta-Alpha-Journal-April-2018.pdf
And also David’s article on the site here on “Awakening to Spiritual Life”. http://logopraxis.online/2016/10/14/1-awakening-to-spiritual-life-introduction/
Thank you Sarah, but I do not see a link. I would like to read the Theta Alpha journal that you refer to.
Its there but the links are written in white here so you just need to hover the mouse over the space!! The website is newchurch.org/resources/publications/theta-alpha-journal. its the April 2018 one. if you google theta alpha journal you’ll find it that way too.
I have tweaked the settings so that hyperlinks are now visible
You may have to refresh the page to see them however…