IN THE WORDS OF JESUS–Part 473

Love is the Fulfilling of the Law

ON LOVE; PART LXV

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GoodWill IS Love in Action

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“Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also. And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know. Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest; and how can we know the way? Jesus saith unto him, I am the way , the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. If ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also: and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him. Philip saith unto him, Lord, shew us the Father, and it sufficeth us. Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Shew us the Father? Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works. Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me: or else believe me for the very works’ sake. Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do ; because I go unto my Father” (John 14:3-12).

In the last post we explored the possibilities of Life as we see them from our perspective of an aspirant. While we may not see the reality of it ALL, we do get a glimpse that we can interpret into these words and our interpretation is grounded in our reading of the Masters’s words plus the progressive interpretations of Life from more esoteric sources. Much of what we say may seem far fetched and it will appear to some as babbling but there is a confidence, a sense of faith, in the general principals that we are expounding. We should remember here that the Apostle Paul was called a babbler and while we can in no way equate ourselves with the apostle we can draw upon his life for guidance. Acts Chapter seventeen appears early in the ministry of Paul and is considered by some to have taken place in his 4th year and before any of his epistles to the churches; it is here in Chapter seventeen that we read: “Then certain philosophers of the Epicureans, and of the Stoicks, encountered him. And some said , What will this babbler say ? other some, He seemeth to be a setter forth of strange gods: because he preached unto them Jesus, and the resurrection” (Acts 17:18). We should note here the that the reason that these Greeks think this way is because of the apostles teachings on what they considered “strange gods” and this, in the Apostle Luke’s understanding, is “because he preached unto them Jesus, and the resurrection“. These people had their own understanding of Life and death and this new teaching by Paul did not agree and therefore he is a babbler. Unlike many today who hear something that is contrary to what they believe or think that they KNOW is True, these Epicureans, and Stoicks were not so closed minded and Luke tells us that “they took him, and brought him unto Areopagus, saying , May we know what this new doctrine, where f thou speakest, is?  For thou bringest certain strange things to our ears: we would know therefore what these things mean” (Acts 17:19-20).

Contrast this with what we see around us in our time where men are seemingly so entrenched in their own beliefs that few there are that will even listen to the beliefs of others. This entrenchment is the result of glamour as we have defined it in past posts, as that emotional force that causes one to believe that their perspective is True above ALL others and this affects men around the world. Look at the Muslim perception of the Christian and the Jew; the Jewish perception of the Muslim and their rather mutual view of Christianity seeing that neither believe Jesus to be the Christ or the Messiah but rather as a Holy Man and a Prophet. At the same time the Christian considers the Jew to be blinded by their own sense of righteousness which is as the Master tells us and while they, the Jews, yet wait for their Messiah of whom the Christian believes that He is already come. Toward the Muslim the Christian sees a sense of delusion, that the people who are adherents to the denominations of Islam are deluded by the teachings of a man the they do not even consider Holy. Sprinkled through ALL of these beliefs is a strand of Truth but this Truth has been hijacked by the doctrines of each of these and converted to the dogmas that tend only to separate and that are fed by and also feed the glamour that both causes and allows this ALL to happen. ALL things tend to stop progressing when a new thing comes along and the adherents to the older are hard pressed to accept the newer although there are some that do and it is these some that do that carry the wave of the new idea to new shores and subsequent generations.

This however was not what happens with the Epicureans, and Stoicks and perhaps in this is a lesson for us ALL today; these Greeks want to KNOW and Luke tells us of his opinion saying that: “all the Athenians and strangers which were there spent their time in nothing else, but either to tell , or to hear some new thing” (Acts 17:21). While this is painted by doctrine as a group of philosophers who “spent their time in nothing else, but either to tell , or to hear some new thing“, we should try to see them more clearly as men of that day who went to their day jobs and enjoyed new philosophies in their off time and this is not unlike people throughout history. They are hearing something new and strange and instead of just discounting it, the inquire about it and seek to learn something of it; again, perhaps this THE LESSON for us ALL. So, they ask and Paul is more that happy to oblige; the apostle says: “Ye men of Athens, I perceive that in all things ye are too superstitious. For as I passed by , and beheld your devotions , I found an altar with this inscription , TO THE UNKNOWN GOD. Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship , him declare I unto you” (Acts 17:22-23).

We should see here that Paul is not calling these men ignorant but is telling them that they do not fully understand that what he has been teaching is the same as this “UNKNOWN GOD“. The New International Version of the Bible (NIV) renders this from the Greek: “For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: to an unknown god. Now what you worship as something unknown I am going to proclaim to you” and this translation puts this into a different Light that we get from the ideas of ignorance as portrayed in the King James Version. Paul is trying to establish that this teaching of his IS NOT about “strange gods” but rather the very same ONE GOD in whom they already believe. Paul then goes on to teach them something about the Nature of the ONE GOD saying:

“God that is Lord of heaven and earth, seeing that he is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands; Neither is worshipped with men’s hands, as though he needed any thing, seeing he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things; And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed , and the bounds of their habitation; That they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after him, and find him, though he be not far from every one of us: For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring” (Acts 17:24-28).

This is rather clear to us but still a mystery to millions of Christians who believe that ANY that do not believe in Christ must be heathen because they believe in a different god. Paul tells us with certainty that there is ONLY ONE GOD and understanding his words should give us the impression that it matters not what He may be called because He “is Lord of heaven and earth“, because He “ he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things” and, most importantly, as we have been discussing in the last few posts, “in him we live, and move, and have our being” and this is the biblical definition of our understanding of ‘part and parcel’. In Paul’s words is the certainty of ONE GOD and it is in this certainty that the world MUST come together and in the logic of the day ALL should be able to see this UNITY. However, it is difficult to shed the glamour that makes us believe otherwise and it is the illusion that keeps us from the Truth.

So, closing this for today we note that Paul is not called a babbler because of this teaching of UNITY but before it, when what he spoke of was new and different. Luke tells us that after Paul’s speech on Mars Hill that “when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked: and others said, We will hear thee again of this matter. So Paul departed from among them. Howbeit certain men clave unto him, and believed: among the which was Dionysius the Areopagite, and a woman named Damaris, and others with them” (Acts 17:32-34).

Again, while we do not compare ourselves with the apostle, we note that there are those who can and do accept new and different things and there are those who do not. Our new and different things are much like Paul’s as they concern UNITY and the ONENESS and the Brotherhood of ALL. This is the message of the Master, this is the message of the apostles and this is our message as well. We will continue with our thoughts in the next post.

On the United Nations front we look today at UNICEF through this Wikipedia article.

United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF; /ˈjuːnɨsɛf/ JEW-ni-sef)  is a United Nations Programme headquartered in New York City, that provides long-term humanitarian and developmental assistance to children and mothers in developing countries. It is one of the members of the United Nations Development Group and its Executive Committee.

UNICEF was created by the United Nations General Assembly on December 11, 1946, to provide emergency food and healthcare to children in countries that had been devastated by World War II. In 1954, UNICEF became a permanent part of the United Nations System and its name was shortened from the original United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund but it has continued to be known by the popular acronym based on this old name.

UNICEF relies on contributions from governments and private donors and UNICEF’s total income for 2008 was $3,372,540,239 Governments contribute two thirds of the organization’s resources; private groups and some 6 million individuals contribute the rest through the National Committees. It is estimated that 91.8% of their revenue is distributed to Program Services. UNICEF’s programs emphasize developing community-level services to promote the health and well-being of children. UNICEF was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1965 and the Prince of Asturias Award of Concord in 2006.

Most of UNICEF’s work is in the field, with staff in over 390 countries and territories. More than 200 country offices carry out UNICEF’s mission through a program developed with host governments. Seventeen regional offices provide technical assistance to country offices as needed.

UNICEF has been criticized at times for its focus or for specific policies. In 2004, the editorial in the Lancet argued that UNICEF’s rights-based approach to child welfare, based upon the Convention on the Rights of the Child, whilst in accordance with international development policy, leads to a lower emphasis on child survival and mortality

The Catholic Church has also been critical of UNICEF, with the Vatican at times withdrawing its donations, because of reports by the American Life League and others that UNICEF has used some of those funds to finance sterilizations and abortions. Catholics have also accused UNICEF of supporting abortion through their endorsement of “good quality abortion services” at the International Conference on Better Health for Women and Children in Kenya in 1987.***

We should note here that with the enormous benefit that this program provides to the children of the world that the church is more concerned with doctrine and, in this case, a doctrine that DOES NOT have its foundation in the words of the Master nor or His apostles but rather is doctrine that is devised by man. We will get into these doctrines on abortion and contraception and on the ideas of sex that lead to these issues in some later essay and for now we will just leave this with the understanding that the whole idea of Life, as in the Life of a man, is misplaced in these doctrines.

Note on the Quote of the Day

This daily blog also has a Quote of the Day which may not be in any way related to the essay. Many of these will be from the Bible and some just prayers or meditations that may have an influence on you and are in line with the subject matter of this blog. As the quote will change daily and will not store with the post, it is repeated in this section with the book reference and comment.:

So that we do not forget that the reality of this ALL is still LOVE which is our Truth regardless of whatever other realizations may come to us in Life, we present here again the Apostle Paul’s words followed by our own understanding of this reality:

….but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law. For this, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not kill, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness, Thou shalt not covet; and if there be any other commandment, it is briefly comprehended in this saying, namely, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law (Romans 13:8-10).

The first of all the commandments is, Hear , O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment. And the second is like, namely this , Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these

(Mark 12:29-31)

We should remember always to link to this Greatest Commandment that other saying of the Master that gives to us the practical understanding of how to love one’s self plus the practical instruction on how it is that we CAN Love our neighbour; He tells us:

Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them

(Matthew 7:12)

Unlike so much of the Master’s sayings that come to us in the form of parables and for which we can only surmise that we have the spiritual presence to understand, these sayings are very straightforward and they are the key to many of the promises of spiritual life; they are the very key to the Kingdom of God. To these sayings we add our adopted definition of the Greek word agape (agapao) which is translated into the English words Love and Charity and which is:

‘In a general sense love is benevolence, good will; that disposition of heart which inclines men to think favorably of their fellow men, and to do them good. In a theological sense, it includes supreme love to God, and universal good will to men’

• **     United Nations Website: http://www.undp.org/content/undp/en/home/mdgoverview.html
• ***   Wikipedia contributors. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 7 Oct. 2012.
• *       Cambridge Dictionary of American Idioms Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2003