Waves Fall 2004 Newsletter

...I knew that God had placed them there as warring angels...who believed in God and loved him enough
to give their lives to his service. -- The Awakening Heart by Betty J. Eadie, p. 88

September, 2004

W.A.V.E.S. Newsletter

Fall Edition

Embraced by the Light

Prayers

The Message from Chicago

by Eri "Tamago"

An ideal historian, in my opinion, is one who writes up the facts and figures of history -- the who, what, when, and where -- and leaves the interpretation to later scholars. Well, as historian of the Chicago event, I tried capturing the who, what, when, and where, but sadly I am horrible with matching names to faces, keep lousy time, and cannot even remember the name of the hotel we stayed at unless I check my notes (it was something-something Chicago O'Hare something). I often think I am far more a philosopher/interpreter than a historian, in which case I should perhaps ask Betty to change my title.

But in all seriousness, as I was busy trying to be historian of the Chicago gathering, I did discern one message -- a message so obvious, it was as if God were holding up flash cards to help me memorize it for a quiz. Granted, this was a message that is my personal interpretation, picked piece by piece out of each day -- and each day is a lot bigger than what I could write up here. Someone else may pick out some other message from his or her experiences. But, in any case, I was asked to be historian, and as a sadly opinionated and flawed historian, here is the message -- the golden thread -- that I found woven through the fabric of the Chicago WAVES Convention.

Friday, July 23rd. (Yes, I have to read my notes to remember the date.) This morning, Betty commented that WAVES are constantly going out and coming back. WAVES leave, but they tend to leave to grow, pick up new information, learn something, or just deal with life... and then they return.

Later that evening, during her public address, Betty stressed the need for women - mothers, grandmothers, wise women - to step up and demand an end to the things that are destroying our world. She called also for men to be the protectors, the rock that supports the spiritual message that women need to get out into the world. I saw this as a call for wives and husbands, mothers and fathers to work together, combining their strengths and weaknesses, to help stop negativity and start healing the world.

Then, at the end of Betty's talk, musician WAVE Christian Andréason was asked to come up and speak. Among other things he said something that would echo in my head as the key to all these pieces. He said, "We are family."

Analysis of Friday. "We are family." I started picturing it. A family modeled roughly on the family life in Heaven: angels working together, utilizing their strengths and helping each other with their weaknesses, coming and going from the Heavenly Throne as God's Spirit leads them, striving to do God's will by bringing God's light and peace to places that don't yet know the Kingdom. We are here on Earth, but some things remain the same as in Heaven. Whatever our strengths, whatever our weaknesses, we are here to support each other, to work for God's message of unconditional love to spread across the world, to do whatever we can to stop the hatred and violence, and bring forth love, forgiveness, and peace. We may have no physical house to rest within and to share, but we share a Spiritual Home, where the gateway to entry is love, and as long as we love, we are within.

Saturday, July 24th. Saturday started off with the message "hidden" at the breakfast table in plain sight. This is from my notes that I wrote up that night:

"Sitting at breakfast this morning, we had four WAVES in, or recently in, interracial and/or intercultural marriages (at least three distinct races were represented) as well as people of mixed heritage, an international adoption, and so on."

The only person who was not internationally connected in an obvious way was Rita, who therefore (we joked) needed to adopt an international cat, or something.

Later that day, as we launched into the WAVES-only program, Betty talked a little bit more about WAVES and the desire WAVES feel for unity. But soon after that, something unexpected happened. What I think were meant to be simple, quick introductions of all WAVES in the room turned into something else: a series of moving personal testimonials about how Embraced by the Light and its message changed each WAVE's life. This sharing took up considerable time and also a lot of tissues (I think almost everyone was in tears as it progressed).

At intermission, we bid on various items from the Silent Auction -- which Betty pointed out was in part meant to encourage WAVES to share parts of ourselves with each other.

Then we were back to the moving introductions and personal testimony. Some WAVES even felt they remembered other WAVES from somewhere, sometime before their mortal life on Earth. Sharon Robbins spoke of "reminding each other how to love again"; Rita spoke of "spreading the hope," and Christian said firmly, "We are all attached," and reiterated, "We're family." And then, to round out the day's meeting, we prayed over the prayer requests from WAVES who couldn't attend.

Analysis of Saturday. OK, now let's look at the model of the family that I had started developing from Friday's message. Friday's message reminded me of how our Earthly spiritual family resembles the Heavenly spiritual family. Well, what about Saturday's message? Saturday started off with a multiracial, multicultural, multinational gathering eating together, talking together, and laughing together. So, the obvious message even I could figure out:

"Your Earthly spiritual family transcends all limitations of race, culture, and nation. Your family will continue to grow and expand and include people from all over the world."

Now, I like that message. I hope you do, too! And what else?

"WAVES want to walk in unity."

"WAVES are brought together by Embraced, but specifically the message from Embraced: the idea that God loves us unconditionally, and wants us to love each other unconditionally, too."

"WAVES should share in each others' lives."

"WAVES are family" (reiterated by Christian).

And then:

"WAVES are extending prayer and love to others who, although they may not be able to be present, still are part of the family and need our prayers."

The family is spread out on Earth and is having its ups and downs, but its members are still linked by love!

Sunday, July 25th. Before I talk about Sunday daytime, I'll mention some of the less than pleasant stuff that was going on behind the scenes. Not everything was love and light. My gosh; there was lots of drama. There were WAVES angry and resentful at other WAVES. There were WAVES being insensitive. There were WAVES who hurt each other inadvertently. There were WAVES who perhaps hurt each other deliberately. Even your friendly neighborhood historian was struggling with a great deal of anger and hurt at someone, and had to finally (mentally) get down on her knees, put down a pile of resentment and rage, and turn to God and say, "God, help me to love and forgive ANYWAY, and may Your will, not mine, be done!" And after the rage is let go, there is only great hurt and grief, and those we must turn over to God for healing and miraculous outcomes. For me, this insight came early morning Sunday, so I'll include it with the day's events.

The characteristic "flavor" of Sunday's WAVES gathering with Betty was that of gratitude and thanksgiving. I think I can safely say that the planners had not intended the thank-yous to take up so much of the program, but that's what happened. WAVES thanked Betty through song, Heidi Ann's gift of a beautiful painting, and Jim's presentation of a lovely doll of Native American inspiration. Event coordinator Kristen thanked various WAVES who had helped with the event. Then Betty likewise thanked WAVES who had helped with the event. These thank-yous took a lot longer than expected, but, rather than seeing fault in this, I like to think, "Why?" When things don't go as planned in an event honoring God, it's fairly safe to look at it and say, "Did God have a hand in the unexpected change?"

Betty spoke of the future of the WAVES. She said "growth is good," and she pictures WAVES organizing by state or region, and having periodic meetings. Not just social meetings, but WAVES meetings where WAVES activities can be discussed and organized. And the job of WAVES for the future? "It's no big secret," said Betty (paraphrased). "It's developing and spreading the news about loving unconditionally and supporting each other." Soon after, Kristen brought in copies of Embraced that she had bought long ago at a discounted rate, and she gave them out to WAVES for WAVES to give out in turn, and for their recipients to pass along, and so on in a great chain of giving. Tom Eadie commented that the book has an energy to it, and that it changes lives.

Among Betty's last lessons given to the assembled WAVES was that of praying for others. "When we pray for others, our prayers are answered," she told us. "It is part of the mechanism of [prayer]." In praying for others, "you are so benefited." She reminded us that we must do unto others as we would have them do unto us, that we must pray for others as we would have them pray for us, and that we must forgive others as we would like to be forgiven. And, true to our words, we ended our gathering with a group prayer, where each person added a prayer. If you read this paragraph, you can start seeing that the message is SO simple, just restated over and over in different ways. What you give out is what you receive, and your job as a child of God is to love, love, love - and you will receive love, love, love.

Analysis of Sunday. So, what else did Sunday teach, built upon the previous two days' message of a Heavenly family on Earth? One big lesson was this: "Trials and hurts and injustices will occur among you, but you are to forgive each other, love each other, and help each other ... anyway!" After all, even the most "perfect" family will have squabbles and disagreements and resentments. That's normal! Our job is not to hold resentment and anger -- our job is to let go of our pride, our egos, our anger, and to let God touch the deeper hurt within. (Sounds good, but it's so hard to do when we're actually angry, isn't it? lol) Anyway, that lesson was followed by a big, big lesson in gratitude. Why did gratitude and thanksgiving take up so much time on Sunday (and even on Saturday within the WAVES' self-introductions)? Maybe because we don't thank enough in general. Imagine if we spent far more time thanking God and thanking each other. Maybe that's the lesson of the overextended thank-yous -- a reminder that we're short on gratitude in our daily lives.

After that came Betty's discussion of the future of the WAVES family. We are going to grow (and from Saturday’s discussion topic, we know it is an international growth that transcends barriers). Our job is to spread the good news of God's unconditional love and the need for us to love unconditionally as well. We may need to be organized to do this job, but we'll figure it out as we grow. And finally... at the very end, we have such a beautiful reminder of Jesus' teachings. We are first told that to pray for each other is the way to have our own prayers answered. But this is just a piece of the big, shining truth: what we give out really is what we receive. To love unconditionally, including caring, forgiving, not judging, not condemning, and giving, giving, giving -- this is what it means to be a child of God, to truly belong to God's family. "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength; and your neighbor as yourself." It is so simple.

Summary. WAVES is a family, an international, multicultural, multiracial family, united by its love of the God of unconditional love. It is a family in which people will come, and go, and return again. This family has no specific home on Earth, and its members may be far apart, but the love of God and each other unifies it. Some WAVES may hurt each other on occasion, but this family's job is to live true to the principles of unconditional love, by loving and forgiving -- and in doing so to grow in love and hence grow closer to God. In all things, in both the good times and the tough times, family members are to be thankful to God and gracious to each other. And when the WAVES family lives true to these commandments for a while, it discovers that it is part of God's family. And more, this family discovers that it is -- we are -- helping others to know what it's like to be part of God's family. Not only are we doing so, but also it is part of what we are meant to do and need to do, for the sake of the world, and out of love of God and our neighbors.

In other words, we are all part of God's family, and our job is to bring a little piece of the Kingdom of God to Earth.

"Love one another."

That was the message of Chicago.

Warring Angel Volunteers on Earth, (WAVES) is acknowledged as a trademark of Betty J. Eadie