The Peace That Passeth Understanding – Jonathan Hoffman & The Cityside Practitioners
This video features the Sunday “talk” only. Watch the full service on our Facebook page.
DESCRIPTION
If you’re feeling down, disconnected and disillusioned, it is important to recognize that your body is signaling that something is amiss. But there is something loving and encouraging that resides inside of you that is in opposition to this troubled frequency. Join us this Sunday as we explore how to access your inner source of the Peace that passeth understanding.
SUMMARY
In this transcript, Jonathan Hoffman shares his personal experience of moving to Boston and the feelings of loss, disillusionment, and depression he experienced. He discusses how the principle of oneness with God, a core teaching in the Science of Mind, helped him navigate these emotions. Hoffman explains how recognizing that he is “good, true, and one with God” provided a healing balm for his feelings of judgment and shame. He emphasizes the importance of awareness, acceptance, and self-love in restoring inner peace and balance. Hoffman leads the audience in a meditation practice focused on affirming one’s inherent goodness and connection to the divine, encouraging them to direct love towards themselves and any area of life needing more peace. Highlights of the talk include Hoffman’s personal journey, his teaching on the principle of oneness, and the practical meditation practice he shares with the audience.
TRANSCRIPTION
This transcription was auto-generated, please excuse typos, errors and omissions.
Jonathan Hoffman (00:01):
Thank you, Paige. Thank you, Greg. I’ve got to fan it off on that one. That was great. Thank you. That was one of my favorite songs. It’s one of my theme songs and I will never forget that experience. So thank you.
(00:16):
And hello, good morning Cityside and good morning to the online folks near and dear to my heart. I’ve been there for the past three years, so hello to you. And anyone new that might be joining us, just want to make sure you know you are welcome here. My name is Jonathan Hoffman. I’m one of your licensed spiritual practitioners. My pronouns are he him, and today is practitioner Sunday. Woo-hoo. It’s practitioner Sunday. So that just means there’s five Sundays in this month and this is why I have the incredible opportunity of speaking with you today. So thank you Reverend Amy for asking me.
(00:56):
And I just want to highlight that Cityside now has 17 spiritual practitioners. 17. Yeah. Amazing. Amazing. And that’s really a testament to this community’s consciousness. So thank you to the community.
(01:14):
So to start out, I wanted to just share a little bit about my life for the past three years. Three years ago, my husband and I left Chicago and moved to Boston and we went for my husband’s job, it was a great opportunity. And, you know I was excited and ready to go, and this was going to be new and different. But to be honest, as soon as I got there, it was not that, that was not the case. That was, you know while William loved his job, and at least at first, and everything was great. I felt overwhelmed with loss, the loss of my friends, the loss of my community, the loss of my network here in Chicago, and just the loss of everything comfortable and familiar.
(02:13):
It was … William would be off at work having a great time. And while I’m at home, I was working a hundred percent remote, commuting to the front room. And you know, while he’s off and away, I’m at home crying on the bathroom floor. I really felt with the… I was disillusioned, I was in discomfort, I was depressed, is really what it was. So can anyone relate to that? Great. I’m not alone. So what do you do? Where do you go with that when you’re feeling these things so heavily in your heart? The first and most primary spiritual principle that I found to help was my understanding of oneness. And that helped me understand just my feelings and the quote, “We are one with God, one with all life, one with the infinite mind of the universe. There is no separation between the divine and the individual; all is one.”
(03:31):
So this is a big concept, but in understanding this, I could understand that these undesirable feelings that I had weren’t wrong. That I’m okay to feel this way because I am one with God. So nothing about me is separate, nothing, not even these feelings that I don’t care for. They’re not separate. So this is a foundational teaching to the Science of Mind, that God is all there, is that I am one with God. There is no separation between me and my maker. And there is only loving connection. And this has been super important for me to understand and not only to cognitively understand because it took a bit for my brain to wrap around that concept, but for it to sink into me, to internalize it, to emotionalize it. A friend and I call it to have it sink into God core, that place where you feel connected.
(04:45):
So it was actually this principle that most attracted me to the Science of Mind teachings. And as a gay man growing up in the conservative Christian Church, I was taught that being gay was wrong. It was a sin – that in fact it was an abomination. Which is such an ugly word. And that I should pray to God to change the way I am because that aspect of myself wasn’t acceptable. And I did pray that for years and I wished it into wishing wells and I told myself I just hadn’t met the right girl yet, all the things.
(05:32):
But on the other side of that, of the acceptance, well at first I can see the craziness, but also the perfection of it. So to me, this understanding of oneness, that I’m whole, perfect and complete, that was a game changer, that was in fact a life changer for me. And this oneness, this unity, understanding that it felt like a healing balm, healing balm on the open wounds of my judgment and my shame. And I truly believe this concept of oneness is helpful for everyone dealing with pain and discomfort. I’m okay. You’re okay. And when these feelings of despair arise, it’s important to simply gain awareness and recognize that our bodies are simply signaling to us that something is amiss, something is out of alignment.
(06:36):
And I should add that it can be very difficult to remember this when you’re going through it. Please don’t be afraid to ask for help. I know for me it was Reverend Linda and the practitioners here. They helped remind me of my truth when I forgot, and they encouraged me to simply be with these feelings and not try to push them down or do something to get ’em out of the way. Just be with it. They reminded me that the invitation is one for the heart, when dissolutionment occurs. I have another slide… “So the invitation of the heart is to restore peace and balance. And the best place is to start with ourselves, to daily meditate on the perfect life, to daily embody. The great idea is a royal road to freedom, to that peace, that path, passeth understanding and his happiness to the soul of man, let us seek the good and the true and believe in them with our whole heart. Even though every man we meet is filled with suffering and limitation appears at all sides.”
(07:51):
So the invitation is to practice loving kindness towards ourselves, towards myself. Because feeling down and depressed cannot be defeated. You can’t tackle it with willpower and make it not so. It doesn’t work like that. It can only be transformed through the power of love. So if you want to restore balance and peace, it starts right where you are with awareness, body’s telling you, getting that awareness, and then loving, acceptance, acceptance of what is. And that’s the game, that’s the practice. Awareness and acceptance. I have a very good friend who has reminded me for years of awareness, followed by acceptance and a healthy dose of self-love and self-compassion, ease and grace with yourself along the way.
(08:50):
There is a deeply loving presence that resides within us that is constantly seeking to restore balance and harmony, guiding us back to that peace, that passeth understanding through love.
(09:07):
Because I am good enough and I am true, and I am one with God, just as you are good enough and you are true and you are one with God. See, there is always something very loving that exists inside of us that is in opposition to any disharmony.
(09:32):
In today’s reading, Don read that “the heart is known as the center of love, which is the healing balm for every inharmonious thought. As we recognize oneness with infinite intelligence, we are set free from uncertainty and pain as long as we realize that our heart is a living center through which the love of God flows to bless eternally, not only our own lives, but the lives of all whom we contact. As long as we realize this, our hearts cannot be troubled.
(10:07):
So as the reading says, our hearts are a living center of love, and our hearts are a powerful tool and instrument that we can act, that can act as a healing balm when you’re crying on the bathroom floor. Our hearts are where the love of God blesses us and where we can bless others. And if you start there, if you can find love on the inside, the outside stuff will take care of itself, it will fix itself. And as Whitney Houston sang to us long ago, learning to love yourself, it is the greatest love of all. Now, before I go into a practice, I just want to out myself that there is a strong persona that wants to get it right, that wants to do a good job, that believes my worth is based on my doing, but that’s not the truth. I’m one with God. My worth is just from being, just being here.
(11:19):
And I went through it this week writing this talk. I had to rewrite it a few times… and just focus on going back into my heart space. Letting go of the ego and performance and just sinking into heart, looking into my heart and finding that peace, that passeth understanding. So this next practice I’m going to lead us in is one I had to do for myself this week. When peace was nowhere to be found. And the intention here is to elevate peace instead of staying caught in pain and suffering. We are not wrong to feel distressed and disillusioned. We are highly intuitive beings. We are humans. It’s part of being human.
(12:11):
But the important thing to realize is when these feelings of dread come up, that there is something very loving and very vulnerable that is asking for attention. That these feelings are a call for us to restore peace and balance. And the best place to begin is within. And I want to invite all the practitioners in the room to please stand, just to hold space for the community as we are led in this practice.
(12:45):
Okay? So right here and now, I just invite you to take a moment and to close your eyes if that’s comfortable for you, and to turn within and to find that still small place inside where it’s safe. Where it’s safe for you to simply be yourself. Where every aspect of yourself is accepted and held in arms of love.
(13:15):
I’d like you to bring to mind some area of your life where you could use a little more peace. It could be some aspect of yourself, some aspect of another, some aspect of your life. It could be a relationship or just a confusing situation you find yourself in. But as you find that aspect, I invite you to settle in a bit deeper into your body. Take a few deep breaths to calm your system. The invitation is to step into the softest, most loving aspect of your being, unguarded, ready to give and receive love. I want you to gently place one hand on your heart and repeat the mantra. “I am good, I am true, and I am one with God.” And if the word God is triggering for you, please replace it with another word like universe or spirit, intelligence, whatever is friendly. But I want us to repeat that mantra three times and you can say it out loud or to yourself, although saying out loud holds a vibration, a strong vibration.
(14:38):
So again, we’ll say “I am good, I am true, and I am one.” So together with me, “I am good. I am true. I am one with God. I am good. I am true. I am one with God. I am good, I am true, and I am one with God.”
(15:08):
So just resting here. Resting here. I’d like you to send some loving thoughts to yourself, to your body and to that aspect of yourself. That’s that aspect in your life that’s needing some more peace, behind the pain, behind the fear and the distress is something vulnerable, asking to be loved.
(15:35):
So use the power of your heart, that instrument that beats in your chest and direct love to both yourself and to those aspects in your life needing peace, stepping out from the distressed frequency and shaking your love awake because you are good, you are true, and you are one with God. And thank you. Thank yourself for doing the generous and loving work you’ve just done. Stepping inside of yourself in order to give love to yourself right where you are and to the world around you. This is what we’re capable of and this is what will ultimately give us peace. For it is is finding it within ourselves that we begin to see it everywhere we look. As above, so below, as within so without, as the universe so the soul. Please know I love you and I believe in you, and I believe in your ability to create a better life by focusing on the love within, where the peace that passeth understanding has its way. You have the power to change your life.
(16:55):
And now I’ll speak our closing prayer, just right here, right now, recognizing there is one power, one presence. Recognizing this power and this presence as love, as joy, peace, power, wholeness, abundance, freedom, wisdom, beauty, balance, unity, all of this. And I know that I know, that I am one with this power and this presence, that the truth of my being is rooted and grounded in love, joy, peace, power, wholeness, abundance and freedom. That this is your truth, that beauty, balance, wisdom, unity, wholeness, this is your truth. That we are one. All that God is, we are. So it is from this place of oneness that I just speak a blessing on every heart, every mind, every person that’s within reach of my voice just proclaiming their oneness with source, with love, and just trusting that love is having its way right here and now that spirit is moving and using each and every person in their lives and their specific situations and all of the situations of life, all of the circumstances, that this is all, it’s all good is all for us.
(18:27):
So I just trust that we are blessed in the giving of love. We are blessed in the receiving. And that we are all held in arms of love. That life is for us, love is for us, and that you have all that you need, right where you stand, right here, right now. So I’m just grateful to affirm this prayer of and for each and every person here. I’m so grateful for this community that supports life, that supports love, that supports wisdom and truth. I’m so grateful for everyone here. I’m so grateful for the fulfillment of this prayer, and I just release it. I release it now into the action of the law. The law that only and always says yes, it is done unto you as you believe, and here and now together we believe. And so it is. Amen.
(19:35):
Thank you, Jonathan.