THE STILL SMALL VOICE

Church of The Still Small Voice

Meets Every Saturday Morning 10 to 11:30 AM

All are invited to come to a regular weekly meditation on hearing your Still Small Voice within. We gather for one & half hours of silent meditation, reflection, and healing.

ALL WELCOME!

Located At: 2620 Hughes Drive; West Linn, Oregon 97068

Mailing Address: PO Box 597, West Linn, Oregon 97068

Each Saturday the Service Focus’ On

The spirituality of listening to God (and developing a dialogue with God), which can be heard as a “Still Small Voice within”; inviting the Holy Spirit in through a series of guided prayers and mediations; we will learn a method which could develop into a person’s spiritual practice for themselves.

Simple methods for “inner listening” and “centering prayer” so that they might hear their own “Still Small Voice within”.

Please wear loose comfortable clothing

Please bring a notebook and pen to write down what you hear in meditation on your Still Small Voice

Eat Lightly before you meditate

MY RELIGION

My Religion Is Of The Earth

My Religion Is Of The Sky

To Me The Earth Is Holy

It Is My True Mother, The Sustainer Of My Life.

To Me All People On The Planet Are Holy. They Are All Sacred Brothers And Sisters

To Me All The Birds Are Holy

All The Animals Are Holy

All That Swim In The Sea Are Holy

All That Fly In The Air, All That Walk On The Earth.

To Me The Creator Has Given Life

I Am Alive Only At His Pleasure

I Am Here Only To Serve Him

God Is My Master, My Father, My True Father. I Am His Child.

All Creation Has Come From The Holy Father

We Must Respect Creation For God Has Created It All

We Must Respect Each Other For God Has Created Each Of Us.

God Has Placed Within Each Of Us His Divine Love, His Divine Wisdom, His Divine Guidance.

Deep Within All Of Us A Gentle, Loving Voice Speaks. This Still Small Voice Is The Love Of The Creator. This Sacred Voice Is The True Voice. It Is The Voice That Wishes To Guide You Home. This Sacred Voice Is The Voice That Spoke To St. Paul and St. Peter and Yogananda And All The Saints And All The Masters Who Have Opened To God and Allowed Him To Dwell Within Them.

All Is Holy. All Is Of The Lord, All Is From The Lord. All Is Given By The Lord. All Is Taken Away By The Lord.

Our Work Here Is To Love.

Our Work Is To Love All That God Brings Us Each Moment.

God Is The Truth. There Are No Other Truths.

All The Saints, All The Masters, All The Angels, All The People Of Love,

The Great Master Jesus Christ Has Been Sent By God To Lift Us Upward To His Light, His Love, His Peace.

A Great Light Shines Forth Before Each Of Us.

God Asks That Each Of Us Follow Our Own Light For That Light Will Lead Us Home To Him.

God Has Sent A Holy Light To Each Of Us. That Light Will Lead Each Of Us From Our Darkness. God Has Sent A Sacred Voice And A Holy Light.

GARY

The Beauty of God’s Religions

The Jewish religion is so beautiful for it holds and bears the Light of God on Earth;

The Muslim religion is so beautiful for it shows us how to enter into the Heart of God and stay there;

The Christian religion is so beautiful for it shows us how God behaves to God;

The Buddhist religion is so beautiful because it is the Mind of God;

The Native American and Indigenous religions of the world are so beautiful for they show us how God behaves to the Earth Mother.

Daily Prayer & Meditation

Gather once a week.
The location should be free of noise and distractions to begin with.
Use a candle & silence-nothing else.
Start with a guided meditation on our “inner light” and then go to a guided meditation on the “sill small Voice of God” within.
Ask each person to listen to their own “Still Small Voice” within.
Sit in silence as a group for one-half hour.
Don’t share anything you heard within.
Agree on the next meeting time and place.

Community

Through My Meditations the Still Small Voice Has Encouraged Everyone to Build A Community Over Time around the “Still Small Voice” and peace by sharing meals, creating friendship, and sharing love with one another.

There can be no judgment in God’s kingdom.
The candle is a symbol of God’s inner light in you.
Meditation twice a day for one-half hour each time is the fastest way to God.
Children are our teachers, place them in the middle of a circle & let them teach.
Love is the way to God; God is the way to love.
Fasting is important.
Vegetarianism is necessary.
Alcohol must be given up.
Recreational drugs will kill us.
Have compassion for the poor, they are God’s personal messengers to you for your personal salvation.

A Book of Gentleness: Developing A Dialogue With God

This is from "A Book of Gentleness: Developing a Dialogue With God"; is the foreword which came to me in meditation and explains how the Still Small Voice of the Lord first came to me. The Book was published in 1995 and the Still Small Voice first came to me in the desert in 1988. I encourage you to purchase a copy for this is a training manual on how you can hear the Still Small Voice within you.

Sitting here in Tucson, Arizona watching the snow come down outside my window I'm struck with the unlikeliness of this vacation. My vacation started out as two weeks in the sun in Death Valley, California for a little outdoor purification and mental and emotional healing from my life in the Pacific Northwest. As always with trips for those purposes I seek out the desert. A place of great natural beauty, emptiness, and quietness. It is in that place of quietness that I feel I connect into the "I" of myself most deeply. It is always into the desert that I go in order to feel the presence of the Creator. In the desert one can even hear a slight hum from the Earth as it vibrates to the one cosmic tune.

The desert as well as the wilderness and the natural areas of the earth are where I feel closest to God and they are where I go regularly to renew myself and to commune directly with the still small voice within. It is in the earth's natural areas that I feel I connect into our Creator most deeply. It is in these natural earth areas that all can feel the "Presence of God".

Following a deep meditation, within myself the words were spoken, "Go south, go where it is warm, go to Tucson." The next morning, I packed my car up, and sat in the nearby hot springs one more time with some other desert dwellers. As the wind began to pick up and blow the sand, I thought I was just being guided to a place of being more comfortable. My friend Tom, who was with me, felt I was being guided to Tucson to meet a teacher. One thing was sure, as we left Death Valley and listened to the radio, we were just in front of a massive winter storm front.

I dropped Tom off in Beatty to catch a bus back to Reno and headed for Tucson. As I drove I felt in my being a very intense attraction there. I didn't know what would happen, just that I was to be in Tucson for the remainder of my vacation. My inner voice also told me to begin fasting for three days. As I approached the city, my inner guidance directed me to a hotel, which felt good to me. On checking in I did another deep meditation and it became clear that I was to begin writing this book. The beginning of the book was my sole purpose in being in Tucson.

As I meditated my inner voice spoke the twelve chapter titles of this book to me:
In The Beginning: to speak about the separation of humankind from God
For God So Loved, God Created Love For: God's greatest gift to humankind is the gift of love
The Earthly Delight: each of us are stewards of one of God's greatest creations, the earth
World Without End: each of us individually are on a life journey toward wholeness and integration
The Disciples: we all share a deep spiritual brotherhood and sisterhood in this human family we find ourselves in
The Coming Of The Lord: the Creator is speaking to all of us constantly from within and He can be heard as a still small voice
The Dawn Of Tomorrow: God has a glorious vision for humankind and the earth
The Christ Within: God's sacred voice speaking from deep within each of us will lead us to Christ consciousness
The Christ Without: the light of the Christ consciousness dwells within all souls and we must seek that light in all our brothers and sisters
And God Created All People Equal: we are all loved equally by God and we must open to seeing God in all creation
The Future Is Now: it is time to acknowledge our individual journey toward God, whatever it's form, and start our spiritual work
God Is Calling All People To His Ministry: all souls are God's ministers and each of us have a calling

and a role to play

I was told to spend the next three days in my hotel room writing this book. A somewhat unlikely way to spend a vacation.

Namaste

Tucson, Arizona

Author’s book: “A Book of Gentleness; Developing a Dialogue with God” – ISBN 0-9636072-5-1 published in 1995 by John Honea Press; cost is $15 and can be purchased in church or by sending the cost plus an additional $5 for shipping to the mailing address: P.O. Box 597 West Linn, Oregon 97068
Gary Alan Spanovich has taught this form of meditation since 1988 when he first began to hear the “Still Small Voice within” and has meditated every morning for 28 years; he taught about the Still Small Voice at Marylhurst University for many years in the Religion & Philosophy Department as well as conducting numerous retreats over the years in: churches, Colleges, retreat centers, bookstores, as well as outdoor week retreats in the desert and mountains. Gary has been an oblate at Mt Angel Monastery in St. Benedict, Oregon for twenty years.