Yes. Abundance is not about what you have or what you don’t have; it’s a state of being; it’s an awareness. And there’s a powerful link between abundance and spiritual awareness. Look at this encounter between Jesus Christ and His disciples; let it serve as some sort of spiritual appetizer for your thoughts for what I’ll be dealing with in this post.

Mark 8

¹⁴ The disciples had forgotten to bring bread, except for one loaf they had with them in the boat. ¹⁵ “Be careful,” Jesus warned them. “Watch out for the yeast of the Pharisees and that of Herod.”
¹⁶ They discussed this with one another and said, “It is because we have no bread.”
¹⁷ Aware of their discussion, Jesus asked them: “Why are you talking about having no bread? Do you still not see or understand? Are your hearts hardened? ¹⁸ Do you have eyes but fail to see, and ears but fail to hear? And don’t you remember? ¹⁹ When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many basketfuls of pieces did you pick up?”
   “Twelve,” they replied.
²⁰ “And when I broke the seven loaves for the four thousand, how many basketfuls of pieces did you pick up?”
   They answered, “Seven.”
²¹ He said to them, “Do you still not understand?”

Let me quickly observe from the above passage that the disciples’ consciousness was dominated by their lack. Their not having bread with them was not pre-planned; it was an accident. They found themselves in a situation – probably due to the carelessness of one of them – where they had no bread. They were obviously worried, and had allowed that lack-consciousness to dominate their minds to the point that they were no longer listening to Jesus Christ. They interpreted His words in the light of their lack.

This is the reality of most people today. They are so dominated by the consciousness of their lack; they are so desperate; and they can no longer observe or gain wisdom from the presence of God around them.

Jesus Christ reminded His disciples of the possibilities He had shown them through His various miracles; and through the years, I have been inspired by His last question to them: Do you still not understand?

Spiritual awareness is a very powerful thing. Sometimes, in fact, most times – or, perhaps, absolutely – what we term faith is just another expression for spiritual awareness, the beholding of realities from a higher plane of consciousness. For instance, listen to this Roman Centurion:

The insight of a Centurion

"…But say the word, and my servant will be healed. ⁸ For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. I tell this one, ‘Go,’ and he goes; and that one, ‘Come,’ and he comes. I say to my servant, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.”  ⁹ When Jesus heard this, he was amazed at him, and turning to the crowd following him, he said, “I tell you, I have not found such great faith even in Israel.”
~Luke 7:7-9

Jesus was amazed at the Centurion’s words; He referred to it as great faith. Yet, take a moment and reflect on this: the Centurion, probably as a result of his military training and position, had a firm grip on the concept of authority, and was able to apply it to Jesus Christ. But if this awareness was strictly due to his military circumstances, why wasn’t it available to other soldiers?

Shaped by awareness

The power of spiritual awareness is clearly expressed in the following verse of scripture regarding Moses:

"By faith he left Egypt, not fearing the king’s anger; he persevered because he saw him who is invisible." ~Hebrews 11:27

Though the overriding theme of the 11th chapter of Hebrews is faith – so much so that it has been hailed as faith’s roll call – notice that Moses faith in the above verse was simply a manifestation of his spiritual awareness. It is almost impossible to not be affected by the higher realities you behold from an elevated plane of being. Even Abraham’s unfaltering climb up the mountain to sacrifice his son, was as much a matter of spiritual awareness, as it was that of trust in God; isn’t the knowledge of God the ultimate spiritual awareness?

An era of spiritual blindness

As I wrote here, we live in an era of numbers, where worth is measured in terms of physical parameters and dimensions. Success is judged in terms of the thickness of paper sheaves piled up in a bank’s vault; or in the area of earth’s borrowed space occupied by stacks of brick and mortar. This is truly an era of poor spiritual development and awareness – perhaps, the lowest in man’s history; and the worst tragedy of it all is that he’s not even aware of it. He claims that this is his finest hour, an era of civilization and advancement. Somewhere along the way, we have mistaken the preponderance of toys – such as the technology I’m using to write these lines – as a mark of advancement. May God have mercy on our souls.

Mammon

The moral depravity of our day comes from man’s entrapment in the material plane. This is a master stroke of satan. More significantly to me, however, is his main tool for such devious accomplishment: Market forces. At least, that is what 21st century human enlightenment calls it. It’s true identity, instead, is identified by Jesus Christ: mammon. As pathetic as it sounds, it’s a fact that mammon has been and remains a parallel god in the universe of men.

"No servant can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon. "
~Luke 16:13

Mammon = material things (both tangible and non-tangible): popularity, material symbols of wealth, visible attainments and achievements, societal status, etc. Mammon is the number one enemy of the knowledge of God. Mammon rules the world through blindness.

"The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God."
~2 Corinthians 4:4

It is impossible to advance in spiritual awareness as long as your soul is dominated by mammon.

The essence of abundance

True liberation for your soul begins when the following words of Jesus Christ penetrates, and dominates your consciousness…

"Then he said to them, "Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions"."
~Luke 12:15

And when it enters you, it awakens you; it drives away your worries. Then it connects you to the source and essence of all supplies; and only then can you experience true abundance; because true abundance is nothing other than the absence of all worries.

Make no mistakes about this; going to church in no way implies that you can see. The disciples of Jesus Christ, while they were in His company, were no more spiritually aware that the heathen in the farthest regions of the Gentile world. They had no clues to what He was saying! Their consciousness was dominated by material concerns – or lack; because, that’s just what it is. It doesn’t matter what you own, if your consciousness is dominated by the things you possess or do not possess, you are living in lack. Lack is the state of being dominated by material possessions or non-possessions.

Abundance, on the other hand, is the state of the absence of worries; the state of being where material possessions mean absolutely nothing. This is true peace. And this state is attained through sight. How? Well, that’s for another day. For now, like Bartimeaus, you can at least say, "Lord, I want to see."