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‘Le Club de l’Esprit’
The Journey or going the full circle
About four and a half years ago, I joined Toastmasters to become a better communicator of the good news of the Paternity of God, the brotherhood of man and the kingdom of heaven within each of us.
On my first visit, I was kind of overwhelmed by the applause and the protocol, but on my second visit, I realise that I could learn a lot in that organisation and I did. I did the whole program and more importantly I decide to serve my fellow Toastmasters in different functions from the club to the district, from VP PR to Division governor.
‘With God the Father, sonship is the great relationship. With God the Supreme, achievement is the prerequisite to status--one must do something as well as be something.’
After a little bit more than a year in Toastmasters, I felt that something was missing: the spiritul element, so essential to growth. Driving on my way back from a meeting, I asked my spiritual partner, my TA why was I doing all these Toastmasters experiences. The answer came right away, it was to start a spiritual Toastmasters club. We were at the beginning of the summer so I waited in the Fall to transform my study group into a talking group. It was fascinating to see how much richer were the meetings by combining the UB study group with the Toastmasters meeting. It was and still is fascinating to observe how much progress each member do rapidly. When you need to clearly organize your thoughts in order to share your spiritual insights and experiences to your fellow members, the growth is pretty powerful.
A few months after, our local Urantia association decided to do a Canadian conference in the summer. All the speakers at that conference were trained at ‘Le Club de l’Esprit’. They were all able to practice, get feedback, improve their basic abilities, their verbal and non-verbal communication and much more. All of them were kind of amazed how well they did. ‘That which the enlightened and reflective human imagination of spiritual teaching and leading wholeheartedly and unselfishly wants to do and be, becomes measurably creative in accordance with the degree of mortal dedication to the divine doing of the Father's will. When man goes in partnership with God, great things may, and do, happen.’.
A few months after the conference, I moved to a new location and I was not able to host ‘Le Club de l’Esprit’ in my appartment anymore. So ‘Le Club de l’Esprit’ was put on hold for almost 2 years until last summer where it was relaunched but this time as an official Toastmasters club. The first version of the club was not an official Toastmasters club and most of the people were Urantia Book readers. Now, 7 of the 24 members are UB readers. What a great way to subtely influence others to a wider understanding of the cosmic realities, a great way...‘ in our endeavor to expand cosmic consciousness and enhance spiritual perception’ as the revelators do.
At the new beginning, we had to be cautious about our way to talk about God. We had to be delicate and respectful of the others, not pushing the UB on others. After only a month, 4 meetings, it was surprising to see how much more people were freely talking about God. Now all of us are doing it in a very normal way. All within six months.
And last week, something very interesting happened. Usually we meet in a bigger room and we are around 15, but for that meeting, we were only 8 in a smaller room. The meeting last for almost 3 hours. This more intimate surrounding create the perfect setting for a tranformation: this meeting was a spiritual meeting with a Toastmasters touch. When we promote ‘Le Club de l’Esprit’ outside, we usually say that it is a Toastmasters club with a spiritual touch.
‘Le Club de l’Esprit’ is now back to its original roots. We started as a spiritual group using the Toastmasters surrounding in order to be able to speak the tongue of the Spirit; then we became an official Toastmasters club with a spiritual touch and now the two have fused very naturally and we are a spiritual club with a Toastmasters touch. We went the full circle, an everlasting ascending circle.
Thank you Father for indwelling each of us and for inspiring us in serving our brothers and sisters in so many different ways.
May the love and peace of our Father be with you and within you always.
Your brother in Spirit and in service
Guy Perron, Montréal, Québec, Canada
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"Service...is productive of the highest satisfaction and is expressive of the divinest dignity. Service--more service, increased service, difficult service, adventurous service, and at last divine and perfect service--is the goal of time..." p.316
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