Heaven is All Around Us

The following guest sermon was submitted by ULC Minister Dr. D.D. Dolezal. All ULC Ministers are invited to contribute their own sermons for consideration/publication. To submit a sermon, please email it to sermons@ulc.org.

Fools seek out happiness, the wise seek heaven. Happiness is a fleeting emotion that comes and goes as quickly as the clouds in the sky above; Heaven is the contentment and lasting peace that results from returning mentally to reflect upon the origins of a desire and the beauty of its completion.

All of your deepest desires begin within you. They come from a place within you that is deeper than thinking. As each desire moves outward; the desire moves from thought, to decision, then to action. Your actions over time then begin to affect and change the perceived physical world that exists all around you until your desire becomes manifest. The perceived physical world is continually being rearranged by you in accordance with your desires. The object of your deepest desire will become what you desired at that specific moment in time and not what you may desire at a different moment in time. This can easily create suffering rather than peace. 

For example, when a girl was young, she desired to be a nurse. Over time she became a great nurse but her career did not bring her contentment or lasting peace. She became unhappy because she could see from this new perspective that being a nurse was nothing like what she thought it would be as a child. Now a young woman, she believed that she could find contentment and lasting peace by achieving more than just being a nurse. So, she desired be a nurse practitioner and over time she became a great nurse practitioner. Yet this career did not bring her contentment or lasting peace either.  She was unhappy because she realized from this new perspective, that being a nurse practitioner was nothing like what she thought it would be as a young woman. Now an older woman, she believed that she could find contentment and lasting peace by achieving more than what she dreamed of as a young woman. So, she desired to be in the position of a Medical Doctor, and so on. Like the woman in this story, this is the suffering that most human beings experience when they look at their blessings from the wrong perspective. 

They suffer because they fail to realize that the perceived physical world has provided them an interactional space that allowed them to manifest all of their desires. They suffer even though the perceived physical world allowed all of their desires to become manifest and will continue to allow all of their desires to become manifest as long as there is no conflict within them that would prevent their desires from coming into being. They are unable to appreciate that they have received everything they have ever truly wanted. 

This is because it takes time to manifest desires, years in fact, and by the time their desires become manifest, instead of being contented, they are looking forward to new desires and have long forgotten the reasons for their earlier desires. Their suffering is the result of them receiving the object of their desires long after the reason for their desires has faded from their memories. 

They are unable to stay in one mental place long enough to marvel at the perceived physical world around them that continually allows their desires to become manifest in due time.  They should stand in amazement and be overcome with joy at this never-ending miracle. They should be able to see that they are living in heaven and yet, they believe they are living in hell.  

They wrongly believe they are living in hell because they have forgotten why they had their desire in the first place. They are looking at what they desired from a new position that they put themselves in, and cannot recall the original context of their prior desire. The nurse could not recall from the context of the young girl, how truly wonderful it would be to become a nurse. She could not remember her desire from the context that she desired it as a young girl. If she could think back in time and take herself to the mindset she had as a young girl when she was dreaming about becoming a nurse, she would see that she was in heaven every day that she was able to be a nurse. 

Most can recall having a dream of becoming something or getting something that they really wanted more than anything else in the world. But not many can remember the joy and contentment they felt in the moment that they actually received it. Getting the new job, big promotion, the big bonus, the new degree, certification or award was heavenly. 

But once the moment was over and done, the realities surrounding their desire soon became apparent and they began to think about how ignorant they were of the realities that would surround their desire. After that big promotion, the challenges of the job became way more stressful, the hours became longer and the load became much heavier.  Instead of enjoying the gift of the new job, most soon become unhappy and begin to convince themselves that they would be much happier if they only had something else.  They forgot how much they dreamed about the big promotion, the extra money, the extra respect and the security of a better retirement. They are living in heaven because all of their desires have become manifest and yet they are frustrated and unhappy because they cannot see it while looking at it from the wrong perspective and in the wrong context. Heaven is all around them and yet they remain blind to its existence. 

If you wish to experience heaven on earth, you only need to return mentally to the moment that any desire arose within in you, and recall the original context of the desire. Connect that moment with the moment that your desire became manifest in the perceived physical world and you will quickly realize that heaven has been all around you and even within you this entire time. 

Amen