These readings about grace, both from the Bible and from the writings of Gurumayi Chidvilasananda, are included for your study, reflection and enjoyment.

Now this Lord is the Spirit and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And all of us, with our unveiled faces like mirrors reflecting the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the image that we reflect in brighter and brighter glory; this is the working of the Lord who is the Spirit.

-- 2 Corinthians 3:17.

Do you not realize that you are a temple of God with the Spirit of God living in you? If anybody should destroy the temple of God, God will destroy that person, because God's temple is holy. You are that temple.

-- 1 Corinthians 3:16-17.

The Word became flesh,
He lived among us,
and we saw his glory,
the glory that he has from the Father as
the only son of the father,
full of grace and truth.

-- John 1: 14.

I am the true vine,

and my father is the vinedresser.
Every branch in me that bears no fruit

he cuts away,
and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes

to make it bear even more.

-- John 15: 1-2.

It is the spirit that gives life,

the flesh has nothing to offer.
The words I have spoken to you are spirit

and they are life.

-- John 6:63.

My food
is to do the will of the one who sent me,
and to complete his work.

-- John 4:34.

Do not be surprised when I say:
You must be born from above.
The wind blows where it pleases;
You can hear its sound,
But you cannot tell
Where it comes from or where it is going.
So it is with everyone who is born of spirit.

-- John 3:5 ff.

. . . though this outer human nature of ours may be falling into decay; at the same time our inner human nature is renewed day by day. The temporary, light burden of our hardships is earning us utterly incomparable, eternal glory, since what we aim for is not visible but invisible. Visible things are transitory, but invisible things, eternal.

-- 2 Corinthians 16-18.

. . . dying, and yet we are alive; scourged but not executed; in pain yet always full of joy; poor and yet making many people rich; having nothing, and yet owning everything.

-- 2 Corinthians 6: 9-10.

Welcome each other into your houses without grumbling. Each one of you has received special grace, so, like stewards responsible for all these varied graces of God, put it at the service of others. If anyone is a speaker, let it be as the words of God; if anyone serves; let it be as in strength granted by God; so that in everything God may receive the glory, through Jesus Christ, since to him belong all glory and power forever and ever. Amen.

--1 Peter 4: 9-10.

No distinction is made: all have sinned and lack God's glory, and all are justified by the free gift of his grace through being set free in Christ Jesus.

-- Romans 3: 23-25.

The Lord is near. Never worry about anything; but tell God all your desires of every kind in prayer and petition shot through with gratitude, and the peace of God which is beyond our understanding will guard your hearts and thoughts in Christ Jesus.

-- Philippians 4: 4-7.

When you receive something great from inside, gratitude wells up along with it. We lack gratitude in our lives even more than we lack the awakening of our inner energy. We receive so much from God, we receive so much from nature, we receive so much from other people, yet we are ungrateful. Ingratitude causes even more of our misery than does ignorance of the inner Self. We take, take, take, but we rarely appreciate how much we have taken.

When we receive grace, it creates the grace of gratitude within us. This gratitude takes many forms: It takes the form of love and the form of compassion; it takes the form of a way of life. Gratitude gives life to living. Often we are dead while living, but gratitude brings us to life.

-- Gurumayi, I:8.

Once a person asked me, "Are you God, or am I God?"
I said, "God is inside me, and God is inside you."
She asked, "God is inside me also?"
I said, "That has been my experience: God is inside you, too."
Then tears came to her eyes. When you drop the shield of your concepts, there is only one thing left: the presence of God.

-- Gurumayi I: 64.

When the inner awakening takes place there is grace, and when there is grace you can see the Self, the Truth, the love of God in everything and in everyone.

If you put a crystal on fire, it cracks inside. As long as you keep it on the fire, it continues to crack into tinier and tinier parts. The crystal is still whole, but on the inside it becomes fragmented and reflects the light like a diamond with many facets. In the same way, as the inner awakening takes place, the fire of Consciousness burns away all impurities, all negativities. You are still in the body, but inside, everything becomes Consciousness, everything becomes light.

-- Gurumayi I:119-120.

The quality of patience should become very natural, a matter of course for a disciple. You do not consciously say, "This is happening, so I'm going to be patient. I'm going to watch and wait and see what happens." Instead, patience should become the core of your being. Then whenever anything happens, you have the ability to be patient. Patience is not something you command yourself to do; it is a miracle that takes place within, through grace.

Patience brings about serenity and tranquility, and from serenity and tranquility still greater patience arises. All these qualities are interrelated. Each depends upon the other, and all exist together. If you start watching yourself, you will notice how bound or how free you are, and this understanding will enable you to become freer and freer.

-- Gurumayi I: 169.

When we gather together, it seems in the beginning that we are strangers, that we don't know one another, that we have not seen one another before, at least not in this life. Yet there is a feeling of familiarity: "I know this. I have done this many times." This is the Principle within. When it comes in contact with the same Principle in another, there is a revolution.

When this revolution takes place, some of you feel strange, some of you feel confused; others feel elated, and still others, intoxicated. The manifestations of this revolution differ according to different personalities. But what is happening is one and the same: the awakening of grace inside.

-- Gurumayi II: 216.

Grace is the highest element that exists throughout this universe.

Because of grace, the sun and moon shine. Because of grace, the waves leap up and down. Because of grace, volcanoes erupt and mountains are created. The earth itself wants to reveal its joy. Because of grace there is such beauty in Nature, in human beings, and in animals. Because of this grace, compassion pervades all times, places and objects. Because of grace, there is love in everyone.

-- Gurumayi II: 216.

Rabi'a was very compassionate. She said, "Hasan, you don't experience the Truth from sitting on water or from flying through the air. Fish live in water; birds fly through the air. How happy are they, truly? If we can sit in our own heart, then we will know what is true and what is not true."

This is why we need grace. It is only grace that makes it possible to sit in our own heart. Otherwise, we will look at the world only through the mind, the mind which is not yet purified and clear.

-- Gurumayi II: 226.

[W]e are able to experience the vibration of grace all the time. We can experience grace when we chant, when we meditate, and when we are talking to people. Whatever work we are doing, we can experience the vibration of grace in it. Grace is always tingling within us. We become aware of this tingling sensation in our body which makes us laugh with feelings of great joy and love.

-- Gurumayi II: 232-33.

The sages say that Consciousness is always scintillating and shimmering. When we put forth great effort, we are able to see grace vibrating at every point in our life. If we are in touch with this awareness, then even when we are late getting somewhere, we always know there is a reason for it and that nothing has gone wrong. The sense of always being wrong vanishes when we get in touch with the pulsation of grace.

-- Gurumayi II: 233.

A lot of people have the ability to attract grace, and a lot of people have the ability to attract calamities. But when you start experiencing the Truth within yourself, you have that incredible strength to ask for God's help. You don't pray in an obvious way; it all takes place inside, but whether you call it a miracle or God's grace, help comes just when you need it.

-- Gurumayi II: 232.

A lot of us get angry with God, angry with the inner Self, with the higher power, the divine force. We say, "Why aren't You there all the time for me?" Of course grace is always there, but it is when we really need it that we fully understand it. And this can happen if we are in touch with the awareness that is always flowing through the senses of our body and through the veins of the universe.

-- Gurumayi II: 232.

There is a tremendous amount of grace in our lives. Still, we need to acknowledge it. Meditation is a way of showing our gratitude for what God has placed inside us, as well as for what we have received on the outside. If we do not give ourselves this time, we become restless. The soul needs its own time.

-- Gurumayi I: 53.

Remove the veil of your ego,
And then you will find your beloved.

This is so true. When two people meet each other, if there is no veil, they immediately fall in love. However, two minutes later, the veil falls once again and they say, "I never loved you. I always knew it. You were the wrong person for me." Exactly the same thing happens when it comes to loving God. When we let go of the veil, we can easily love God; we can easily experience Him in everyone and everything.

-- Gurumayi I: 104

We all want to be self-made people. "I am a self-made man," a great writer said. "However, if I had to do it again, I would ask someone for help!" Only when we have become free inside can we pray to God, saying, "Your grace is everything for me," not just with our physical tongue, but with the voice of the heart.

-- Gurumayi, I: 105.

One should be possessed so much by this intense longing for God that one shouldn't be able to sleep or to rest without wondering, When will I see God? Who will show God to me?

Such a person receives the Guru's grace quickly, and he also completes his journey and finds the Lord quickly.

-- Muktananda I: 6.

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