Divine Order & Predestination

My prayer chaplain at church honored me with a phone call this weekend.  With all of our conversation in class about Divine Order, I thought that to be a wonderful prayer request.  While I truly loved the prayer and inspiration, I really had to remain centered in my own interpretation of Divine Order and not hers.  It sounded like her definition of Divine Order had some aspects of Predestination thrown in.  In Van Harvey's A Handbook of Theological Terms, Harvey defines Predestination as "the idea that before the creation of the world, God determined all that would come to pass in it....God's will...respecting the destiny of intelligent creatures."  I think a great number of people in Unity think that is what Divine Order means.  Well, it doesn't.

Based on the works of Charles and Myrtle Fillmore, the founders of Unity, Divine Order really refers to the the Divine Order of Mind, Idea, and Expression.  Our Mind creates Divine Ideas, and those Ideas, in turn, express in the world as Spirit.  The Divine Idea is Unity's version of Heaven.  From that thought seed of creation, all new things are formed!

So when I was asking for a prayer on Divine Order, I think I was really blessing this creative process within me that brings new God seed ideas to the table of life.  And then, it is up to me to serve them to the world!  While this may seem to be a little variance from Predestination, there really is a huge theological difference here.  With Predestination, the power seems to be coming from another predetermined force outside myself.  From the view point of Unity's Divine Order, the power is current and all within!  Love that!!!