We are going
to talk about
hope.
Human hope and divine hope.
And it was good, because
this morning’s event starts like this,
in such a joyful way,
inviting us all to
look at these gifts from life.
And our talk this morning
is based in a few texts by Emmanuel
taken from the book “Living Spring”
and from the book “Vinha de Luz".
But we’ll approach those texts
in a different way,
making up a “pearl necklace”.
Collecting a few sentences
which represent jewels
and putting them together, because when
they are connected and put together,
then they have a different glow.
And the proposal
is that we are able to find
a point of balance.
And when we speak of hope,
we do not wish to be naïve
to the point of destroying
or to not recognize
the role of sadness, for instance.
Valentina’s book talks about that.
We don’t wish to underestimate either
the experience of the storm,
the experience of the night,
the experience of being cold,
the experience of shortage,
of nostalgia, absence, grief and loss.
That’s not it.
To talk of hope
is not simply to disconnect
from all of the difficult moments
and all of the challenges
that spiritual evolution presents
to each one of us.
To talk of hope is to talk of waiting,
of the capacity to wait.
But there are several levels to that
and several stands that may be taken.
There’s the attitude of extreme passiveness,
which borders on irresponsibility.
There are people who wait in a criminal manner,
getting to the verge of the crime of omission.
There are those who wait in a cynical manner.
They are not willing to cooperate,
but they prefer to sit on the sidelines
and watch the valorous hearts
who are willing to build something.
And they start cheering morbidly.
Those people who cheer
for something to go wrong.
They root for someone to give up.
They root for
a project not to become reality.
That’s waiting,
but it’s unfortunate waiting…
There are also those who hope.
They hope on the outside, but
they despair on the inside…
And despair
is perhaps
one of the most terrifying feelings
of the human experience.
Despair… When you despair,
everything is at risk,
from the psychological integrity
to the spiritual projects
that human being took on
before he or she reincarnated.
To despair is to throw the towel.
To refrain from fighting.
To renounce the purpose.
So we will talk
of waiting and hoping
which is like expecting,
being pregnant.
It’s active waiting,
formative waiting.
It’s waiting that brings out the new
in the very guts of the soul.
And nobody is able to generate
if they are not capable of waiting.
Because between the present time
and the time of harvest,
between the present time
and the time of dream come true,
there’s the journey of waiting.
And we begin now
to collect our first pearl
for our necklace.
It’s in the book “Paul and Stephen”.
Every time
that life
proposes that we build something new,
that we follow paths
that are not customary,
to see landscapes
which our eyes are not used to,
every time we have
to wash our eyes
to see new things
in well-known places...
To see the new
which has been by our side for thousands of years
and we were not able to see,
a bit of hope arises.
It’s natural.
Because when facing a challenge,
our first impulse is cowardice.
It’s fear.
Fear of failure,
fear of not being able to handle...
And it was so with Saul
when he turned into Paul...
Saul,
used to winning and raising trophees
in his usual fields.
Because even the most naïve human beings,
even the most puerile spirits,
even the most immature souls
know how to win and triumph.
Winning and triumphing,
any immature soul can
go through that experience.
What’s difficult, and that requires maturity,
is the experience of loss,
of the “supposed” lack of success.
Paul won in the spoken word,
he won in intellectual disputes,
in accumulating material goods,
he won in the social world...
But when he is convoked by Jesus
to an inner victory,
few times visible to the human eye,
he despairs.
He despairs when the struggle was just starting.
And Abigail appears to him in a dream...
And so she guides him:
“Love, work, wait...”
“Love, work, wait and forgive.”
Active hope.
Hope preceded by love and work.
Or pregnant hope.
Formative hope.
Someone who waits while building something
on the inside and on the outside.
That’s the hope we’ll talk about.
Because the other one doesn’t interest us.
We haven’t come here to celebrate
defeats.
We have not come here to celebrate
our limitations.
Today’s not for that.
Today’s a day to celebrate
our capacity of resisting,
our capacity of persevering.
And Emmanuel, on chapter 103
of the book “Living Spring”,
gives us one more... pearl.
The message
from chapter 103 of the book “Living Spring”
talks about hope.
He comments on the Epistle to the Hebrews,
chapter 6, verse 15.
But he gives it a curious title.
And sometimes
Emmanuel’s most profound lessons
are on a title.
Many times
he doesn’t even have to say much.
The title he chooses for the message
is already the pearl.
And the title of this one is: “Waiting and Receiving”.
Waiting and receiving.
And the verse that he comments
is when Paul says:
“And so, after waiting patiently,
he received what was promised.”
After waiting patiently,
he received what was promised.
And I,
after reading a few passages,
I would like to talk
about the word “promise”.
Because every time we idealize something,
every time we dream about
a place to get to,
every dream is a promise.
And many times, a shared promise.
If I make a plan
of building something with someone,
whether it’s an amorous relationship,
a entrepreneurial enterprise,
an enterprise
related to the Spiritist Doctrine,
anything in my life,
everything I wish to do,
which is not real yet,
which cannot be touched yet,
is a promise.
And promises
are based on trust.
Promises are based on relationship.
And we were made a promised
when we were created
God knows when,
in the guts of the Creator...
A promise was made.
The promise:
“You are gods.”
The promise that there is
an indescribable spiritual heritage
waiting on each one of us.
Each one of us
has a spiritual patrimony in store.
A spiritual condition that’s unimaginable
from where we stand spiritually now.
There’s a divine germ inside of us
and spiritual powers breaking out,
in development,
which we totally ignore.
When a human being manifests
a small percentage of those divine powers,
we usually call those human beings
saints, enlightened beings,
as if they no longer belonged
to the human race.
No such thing.
They are only
a partial fulfilling of the promise.
When someone looked for Chico Xavier,
amazed at his mediumship,
at the spiritual faculties
which he manifested, he said:
“My son, if you wish
for a more intense contact
with the spiritual world,
you only need to vibrate an octave higher.”
To those who appreciate music,
those who know a little bit,
that sentence is very subtle,
because he didn’t say:
“Look, you have to change
your note entirely!”
It so happens that I’m Do, Andrei is Mi.
If he needs to turn
into another note...
It’s very difficult.
No. That’s not what he asked.
He said: “Make your note
vibrate an octave higher.”
That’s your essence. It’s you,
but it’s you a little better.
It’s you with a bit more intensity.
It’s you a bit less tied up,
you a bit less enslaved
and maybe you
a little bit less pessimistic.
You a little bit less grumpy.
An octave higher.
Because, when there’s this connection,
the promise begins to be fulfilled.
But God did not promise only that.
He promised he’d be on the journey.
And here we must say something
which the Spiritist Doctrine makes it a point
to state very clearly,
though not all Spiritists
have yet meditated
more deeply on that matter.
When Allan Kardec says,
on the introduction of “The Spirits’ Book”,
about Pantheism...
When the spirits say
that Pantheism is a mistaken idea,
the spirits were trying to say to us
that if Creation were over today,
God would remain,
because God is not Creation...
God is infinitely bigger
than Creation
which is infinite.
The philosophers call that
“divine transcendence”.
Divine transcendence.
So God is not the sum of the little trees,
the little flowers, the daisies,
the oceans…
If we sum up all Creation,
it is infinitely smaller than God.
To a being that is so grandiose,
the question arises,
the big question arises,
the 21st century man’s big question
which to me
was masterfully expressed
in a Tom Cruise movie,
in which he is a contract killer.
I forgot the name of the movie…
A movie buff, please…
“Collateral”, yes.
“Collateral”. That’s it.
And the movie begins with him saying…
He was a killer, so
he came and talked to the person:
“Andrei, I’ve come here to kill you…
But look:
I’ll ask you a question,
if you answer…”
“If you answer the question, I may..
I may not kill you.”
The idea is that
it’s senseless indeed.
What he wanted to convey
is that life doesn’t make any sense,
no sense at all.
I doubt there is any incarnate
who really takes this thought
to the ultimate consequence.
I doubt that anyone is able to live
being coherent to that idea.
So he said that.
He gets to a jazz musician and says:
“I will ask you a question.
You’re going to die.
But if you answer the question
correctly…
Where did Miles Davis learn how to play?”
The guy gave the ordinary answer
and he said: “No. It’s wrong.”
“It’s wrong” and killed the guy.
And then he justifies himself.
He said:
“Listen, look at this grandiose
universe.
Billions and billions of suns,
billions of galaxies,
3 million living species
or more, on Earth,
we are one of them
and unfortunately, from our species,
there are more than 8 billion here.
We are one among those 8 billion,
in a planet that has
3 million living species.
And there are people who think they’re special.”
And then he tells the story of the person
who took the subway in Los Angeles,
died,
nobody saw the guy was dead.
The subway went away, came back.
Back and forth, the whole day long,
with someone sitting there dead.
And at the end of the day, when they stopped there:
“You could have awaken that guy,
he can’t be sleeping.”
And then they realized he was dead.
And the killer used that argument
to say:
“Life makes no sense!
Who says that your problems,
your life, anything that’s yours
matter at all?
They don’t.
You’re one of the 8 billion thrown here,
assembled by chance.
So that was his idea.
Why?
Because one thought was lacking:
divine immanence.
If Creation is over, God remains,
because He is transcendent,
but He is immanent.
So Kardec, in the book “Genesis”,
explores divine immanence
and tries to explain through the cosmic fluid
that God is present in the life
of each one of us.
And He knows what you had for breakfast today.
More than that,
what you were thinking
while you were having breakfast.
Because He hasn’t
simply made a promise,
He also committed himself to accompanying
the journey.
That is the promise.
And that’s what Emmanuel will comment on,
when he says:
“Waiting and receiving.”
“The hope of attaining divine peace
involving unchangeable happiness
vibrates in all individuals.”
Why does it vibrate in all individuals?
Because we carry
that promise in us.
The promise of unalterable happiness
and divine peace.
“The desire of patriarchs of old
is similar to that of modern men and women.”
There’s no difference.
If you were incarnate 10.000 years ago
or if you are incarnate today,
that hope is the same.
What hope?
“A home crowned with blessings.
A job well-done.
An uplifted conscience.
A higher ideal
properly realized.
A triumphant endeavor.
A plentiful harvest.
The soul’s aspirations are always the same
everywhere.
However, waiting means persisting
tirelessly…”
Persisting tirelessly.
“… and receiving means
triumphing decidedly.”
That’s the pearl I wanted to bring:
“Waiting means persisting and receiving.”
Persisting and receiving.
That’s when I told a teacher:
“How long
will I have to study to pass this exam?
And he said: until you pass.”
So we’re gonna have to wait
until when? até quando?
We’ll wait until we receive.
Persistent waiting.
Stubborn waiting.
And he goes on:
“Between the target and the goal,
it is imperative to start making
a constant and unpostponable effort.”
Constant and unpostponable.
“Hope does not mean not doing anything.”
Patience...” Another pearl.
"Patience means peaceable obstination
in doing the work we propose to do.”
Peaceable obstination
in doing the work we propose to do.”
Because there are certain works
which were meant for the obstinate.
The obstinate... Think of a stubborn person.
The obstinate is even more so.
But it’s obstination without violence.
It’s obstination that knows how to respect
a few things I will not mention now.
In a while.
If you intend to materialize
your purposes with Christ,
then keep the formula of patience
as the sole open door to victory.”
Because if you are not patience
you hasten the birth.
I am not a doctor,
but I know that if children come out of the womb
before they are due...
They can come out before they are due,
a little bit before,
but if it’s long before,
the pregnancy is jeopardized.
It’s important to say that.
It’s important to say that
because we live in a culture
that rewards the hasty ones.
If you’re not someone
stupid and ignorant in traffic,
you’re considered retarded.
Our society is the society
that applauds the hasty ones,
because we value speed.
Illusory speed.
Why is it illusory speed?
I get into the supermarket…
Cheese.
It’s here in my hands.
Let me see here… jam.”
Jam. Then I think
that what happened to this jam was:
it sprouted. So did the cheese...
Some children who...
Children who are raised in apartaments
think that from the cow’s breasts
come the cheese already in a package.
And even when
we think we are wise, studious...
A few years ago, I went with my wife,
my kids, my daughter, my son João,
I went to visit my father in Poços de Caldas
and I told him:
“Dad, I want to eat
a pamonha, a Brazilian corn cake.”
But I expected him to say:
“It’s simple.
We’ll go there and we’ll buy a pamonha.”
Right? Right…
And he said: “Let’s go.
Let’s go, my son!
Don’t you want…
I love pamonha too!
I love pamonha. Great!
Get in the car.
“Let’s go!” In 10 minutes
I’ll be eating a pamonha
and drinking coffee.
And suddenly he began
to take a dirt road…
Fantastic! Homemade pamonha.
Because now it’s like this…
You say: “I want to have
a sophisticated dish.” It’s one price.
Homemade rice and beans it’s three times more.
Because it’s handcrafted, it’s homemade…
So I said:
“Wow! Homemade pamonha.
We’ll get in here, in this farm,
a small farm.
And we’ll buy homemade pamonha.”
Then he went: “Hi, José! How’s it going?”
“Hey, Haroldo! Everything’s fine.”
“My father’s also called Haroldo.”
“Hey, Haroldo! How are you doing?”
“Fine. Look, we want
to eat pamonha…”
And I said: “That’s it!”
“Ah, is that so, Haroldo?”
Do you have corn there? Do you have corn?
Corn? And I began to worry.
No. I don’t want corn.
“Yes, Haroldo. This corn is real good!”
They both get out with a knife, a pair of boots,
walking in the middle of the cornfield,
reaping green corn.
I said: “That’s not going to work out.”
That was eight in the morning.
To make a long story short,
because we have to go on here
with our “pearl necklace”…
To make it short, I had that pamonha
at five o’clock in the afternoon.
Because they had to gather the corn,
they had to do everything,
and grate it, and put it there…
And I said: “My God in Heaven”
But I thought that pamonha
was already born in a plastic bag. Hot.”
But there’s no such thing in life.
It’s just that we, human beings,
have picked up bad habits,
because someone makes things for us
and we buy them.
But when that has to do
with spiritual issues,
no money can buy it.
For everything else there is Mastercard,
but for this there's no way.
When it comes to spiritual values,
you have to go there and reap the green corn
and make your pamonha.
There's no way you can come and say:
"Doctor, are you
a renowned OBGY?"
"So they say..."
"Very well, doctor. I wished...
How much do you charge?
Because this is the thing:
I want my pregnancy to last a month and a half.
You do your thing!
I'm 2 weeks pregnant
and I want to schedule the operation
for a month and a half from now.
You go and hurry this pregnancy."
There's no way.
So the natural process of life
is the process of waiting.
The natural process of life
is the process of hope.
The coffee we've been drinking here,
since Friday,
the black coffee that's being served,
is planted here.
They've planted it. They reap the coffee,
they dry it, they toast it...
And this coffee that we're having
is from this place.
So the coffee you had today
results from the hope of he who planted it,
because those who plant are only sure of one thing:
hope.
There’s no guarantee, folks.
There’s no guarantee.
Those who plant have no guarantee,
only hope.
And he goes:
“Is there suffering in your tortured dreams?
Are your wishes
misunderstood by many?
Have ingratitude and pain visited your spirit?
Do not waste time weeping,
nor curse your problems.
Wait for the surprises of time,
acting without hurry.
Wait for the surprises of time.
In another message, another pearl,
Emmanuel will say:
“We are undeniably
connected to the life of God,
who may change everything now,
to our benefit.”
So, for example,
you’re having financial problems,
or emotional problems,
your problem may be solved
a little while from now.
You might discarnate.
No, that’s not perhaps the solution
that you wish for,
but it’s a solution. It’s a solution.
Because the minutes are made of surprises
and I don’t know what surprises,
in a little while,
time will have in store for me.
I don’t know what surprises.
Dearly beloved that leave
for the spiritual world,
loss... gain!
Situations.
So living...
To live is to be immersed
in the atmosphere of waiting.
Because everything in nature is cyclic,
everything demands time,
and things come
when they have to come,
not when we want them to come.
“If each night is new darkness,
each day is new light.
Remember that not all waters
are the same depth,
nor are all trees the same
height, girth or species.
Recall the words
of the Apostle to the Gentiles:
waiting patiently,
we will receive what was promised.
Do not forget...”
And here comes another pearl:
“Do not forget that a sure success...”
The sure success.
“...does not belong to the one who attacks it,
but to the one who knows how to act,
persevere and wait for it.”
That is: true success
does not belong to those who take it,
those who grab it by force.
Because when we take something by force,
the Law of cause and effect
forces us to give it back.
True success
belongs to those who know how to act,
persevere and wait for it.
Hope.
Emmanuel too,
in another passage,
comments on Paul’s letter,
Paul’s 1st letter to the Thessalonians 5:8.
Paul says so much, sometimes,
in a sentence, doesn’t he?
He says:
“Having as a helmet
the hope of salvation.”
Helmet? What kind of talk is that?
Helmet. Why helmet?
Why didn’t he say
“having hope as a hat”?
“As a beret”...
Why helmet?
Because he’s wearing
the attire of the Roman army.
What he’s saying is this:
it’s war.
But not against other people.
It’s war against evil.
Not only the one that’s outside,
but mainly the one that’s inside.
Because the greatest damage
to our evolution
does not come from the outside, but from inside of us.
They who complicate the ways of life the most
are us, our choices.
It’s the evil that still rules and reigns
over our inner world.
It’s a war. It’s a fight.
It’s a fight. And that fight requires weapons,
but different weapons.
Not the sword to wound somebody,
not the helmet to protect oneself, not…
And then he begins to say
that this helmet covers exactly
the brain.
Because despair
is born out of dark thoughts.
I start to feed dark ideas,
ideas that there isn’t really
anyone following us.
The idea that I am alone.
That’s a recurrent thought:
"I am alone.
Because, if someone were with me,
I wouldn’t go through this situation.”
And then he says:
we must wear the helmet of hope.
Emmanuel says more, he goes:
“Rays of anesthetizing negativity are shot
at the enthusiasm of learners
by all forces that oppose
the Gospel of salvation.”
So at every moment
we are being bombarded
by thoughts of pessimism,
defeat and despair.
That’s why we must wear the helmet.
And he concludes:
“Let us keep our minds
on the helmet of faith-filled hope...”
Faith-filled hope.
"...and press on
to the supreme victory of the Good."
Here he explained the word "salvation".
Salvation is the supreme victory of the Good.
But there I need - and here comes the detail -
faith-filled hope,
hope that is faithful
to the promise and to the purpose.
Because that's persevering,
it's keeping faithful to the purpose
until you reach it.
It's not about believing...
This is not a movement of belief.
This has nothing to do
with whether you believe or not.
Every person who perseveres
goes through moments
of belief and disbelief.
The secret of perseverance is not giving up
when you're in the valley of disbelief
nor straying
when you're on the mount of belief.
Because we stop doing things
not just because we're in despair.
We stop because we get too excited
about other things
that have nothing to do with the project.
How many people came
with a certain spiritual programming
to earth and then got distracted here?
They came with the purpose of doing something,
but they got here, got distracted and that was over.
Leave it to the next incarnation.
With great prejudice to themselves
and to the comunity
who waited for the fruit of those labourers,
those people who abandoned
their places of service.
And sometimes they abandon service
not when they are in the valley,
but when they are on the mount.
Like Amyr Klink says:
"The most dangerous moment at sea
is when the sea is calm."
When he arrived
at those Nordic seas, threw his anchor
and the experienced sailor said:
"Watch out when the sea is calm!"
He said:
"That guy drank too much vodka...
I've faced 100-foot waves,
and I'll have to watch out for calm sea?"
And he entered those seas,
then there was nothing, no wave,
there was nothing...
He had lunch, he began to feel sleepy...
He fell asleep.
He was awaken by the horn of a big ship
that was approaching,
and he said he had to make
the most difficult manouevre of his life,
in order to drive his tiny vessel away
from the pulling force of that giant ship.
The ship almost smashed to pieces
his little yacht, his little vessel.
And then he remembered
the experienced sailor:
"Watch out for calm sea!"
That's why the hardest
thing in life
is losing success.
No criticism intended here,
it seems the hard thing is not being a billionaire,
but staying a billionaire.
Well, but that’s another story.
Let’s forget that.
Well, another one...
In the book “Vinha de Luz”.
In the book “Vinha de Luz”,
Emmanuel has a message called
“Hope”.
And he comments the Letter to the Romans,
chapter 15, verse 4.
“Because everything that was writtten before...”
Everything that was written in the past.
“...was written to teach us,
so that through patience
and consolation from the Scriptures...”
So that, through patience
and consolation from the Scriptures.
“... we have hope.”
Look!
Why? Only those who wait patiently
can profit from waiting.
And analysing patience,
when we look,
when I look at myself,
why am I not patient?
It’s not enough to say:
“I’m not patient.”
That everyone knows.
But why am I not patient?
Why am I not patient?
Because I want to control life.
Impatience is our illusion
that we can control life.
You think you can control
that you’ll arrive at 9 o’clock.
You can’t control that.
You can program yourself, that’s different.
And you should program yourselves,
for God’s sake, people!
In my case, for example,
I have auditions,
everything on schedule, oh my!
If I don’t arrive on time,
my mother suffers.
People call me names!
And I need to program myself;
now, if I’ll get there it’s something else.
Programming is one thing,
because sowers program things.
How’s it that they program things?
They plough the land, they spread the seeds,
but they don’t command the field.
They don’t have control over the rain,
they don’t have control over frost,
they don’t have total control over plagues
and they don’t have control over the harvest.
What they can control
is what they should do,
their share of the work.
But the problem with impatient people
is that they are perfectionists.
And controlling.
So they look at the sun and go:
“That’s not possible! But it’s high time
you were in the center.
You should be in the center!”
They look at the weather and go:
“That’s absurd! It should be raining already
in Belo Horizonte."
But they don’t have control.
Who said that we have any control?
That causes impatience.
That’s why Paul will say:
hope has to be grounded
in patience.
Patience and consolation.
In consolation.
Then he says:
“Hope is the light of every Christian.”
It’s the light of every Christian.
And he says: “The night waits for the day.
The flower waits for the fruit.
The worm waits for the future.
Even if men dive
into disbelief or doubt,
tears or laceration,
they will be helped by God
with the indication of future.”
This is amazing, isn’t it?
Because God helps us
through the surprises of the minutes,
that’s why it’s a necklace,
I’m putting this sentence together
with the other one that I...
God does not help by materializing and going:
My son, why are you crying,
are you sad?
I’m God, I’ve come here to talk to you.”
That’s not how it works.
God helps our sadness,
our disbelief,
with the surprises of minutes.
With the surprises of circumstances.
But what’s interesting here is that
the night waits for the day.
You know why?
Because there’s law here.
There’s law in this universe.
After spring comes summer.
And you can decree otherwise,
you can rule otherwise... There’s no way.
Nobody changes that.
After the night comes the day.
And you planted,
after the fruit comes the flower.
Unless you kill the plant.
There’s a law.
There’s a cycle.
There’s an order. Tem uma ordem.
All we need is to become silent,
like the Buddhist monks do,
because the monks,
they teach us meditation
and we need to learn that so badly!
Meditation is the training of silence.
I stop thinking stupid things,
stop feeling useless things,
I become silent in order to observe life.
Then you observe that it was cold this morning,
but now it’s already
warmer.
It might rain in the afternoon.
Tomorrow anything can happen,
even nothing.
Because there’s a cycle in nature
and it is by trusting the unchangeable
and infallible laws of God
that we may hope.
We can only hope
because nature does not fail.
Its processes are cyclic,
perfect, harmonious.
That’s why he says:
Night waits for day, flower waits for fruit.
Jesus, as the Divine Master,
knows that His apprentices
will not always get it completely right,
that mistakes
are a part of the school of evolution
and for that same reason, hope
is one of the most sublime chants
of His Gospel of love.”
And I wanted to wrap up with
this last little pearl
from this small necklace I brought -
there are many others:
the divine hope in us.
Because God knows I’ll make mistakes,
that I’ll fail, that I’ll be unfaithful,
that I won’t fulfill
my promise,
that I will go back to my task,
that sometimes I’ll give up,
that I’ll be sad,
that I’ll be depressed,
that I’ll have to start over...
But God’s hope in me
and in each of us is unchangeable.
And in that sense, God is a pregnant mother.
Because He is expecting
the angel that exists in each one of us.
And the Divine Hope is so powerful,
so powerful,
that when Jesus meets
Publius Lentulus,
He says:
“You find, at this moment,
a definite landmark
for the alteration of all your evolution.
But it is in your wish
to follow me now
or thousands of years from now.”
Publius Lentulus chose thousands of years,
but it’s ok...
The Divine Hope is unchangeable
and Jesus’ hope,
the Divine Hope,
transformed Publius Lentulus
into Emmanuel.
Thank you very much and good day to all of you!