Love is the Fulfilling of the Law
ON LOVE; PART CLV
ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•Α
GoodWill IS Love in Action
ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•Α•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•ΑΩ•Α
“There was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews: The same came to Jesus by night, and said unto him, Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God: for no man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him. Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother’s womb, and be born? Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit. Nicodemus answered and said unto him, How can these things be? Jesus answered and said unto him, Art thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these things? Verily, verily, I say unto thee, We speak that we do know, and testify that we have seen; and ye receive not our witness. If I have told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe, if I tell you of heavenly things? And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life” (John 3:1-15).
In yesterday’s post we began looking at the relationship between the Master’s words born again as the way to the Kingdom and the other words and phrases he uses to denote this same thing. We offered a logical and mathematical view of these relationships by saying that in math, the only Truly predictable science in our opinion, if A is equal to B and B is equal C then A must be equal to C and this would be True in any direction regarding this type equation. Taking this forward we can see that if being born again gives one the Kingdom and any of our other criteria below gives us the Kingdom then the other criteria and being born again must be equal.This is our premise going forward. We did cover these in the last essay:
- “Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God“.
- “Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God“
- “And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples, and said , Blessed be ye poor: for yours is the kingdom of God” (Luke 6:20) AND “Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:3).
- “But I tell you of a truth, there be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the kingdom of God” (Luke 9:27) AND “Verily I say unto you, There be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom” (Matthew 16:28).
The first one above is our baseline, it is the primary statement against which we will measure and equate the rest. The second one we covered yesterday tells us that this attainment of the Kingdom must be done it this world where we are born of water and, in addition, attaining the Kingdom requires being born of the Spirit as well to become the equivalent to being born again. Being born of the Spirit IS the reality of the Light of the Soul, the Life and consciousness of the Christ Within, becoming one’s expression in the this world. Born of water puts us here as carnal beings; allowing the Spirit, the divine man as the Soul, to become our expression and this IS being born of the Spirit and IS being born again and in this expression is ALL that the Master teaches as we become DOERS of the word. Here we can see that born of the Spirit IS being born again, they are the same thing.
In the next saying from Luke’s Gospel we see the idea of being poor and this is a difficult thing to relate to the Kingdom in normal terms. However as we said in the last essay, there is a reality to this that is tied to the Master’s reality of discipleship and the general theme of His teachings overall. In an early post we looked at this as giving up the things of the world and those things that keep us tied to the world by our consciousness and this is accomplished by letting the Soul control His consciousness which is first of all from the Soul and second has been ‘hijacked’ by the Life in form. We discuss this in some detail in In the Words of Jesus parts 457, 542 and 550 and can say simply here that the consciousness IS the Soul’s awareness and this is lent to the Life in form, a Life that is the Soul’s as well. We use the word ‘hijacked’ here to illustrate that the personality Life has taken over the consciousness and it is the Soul that must take it back but this will not happen until the consciousness that is controlled by the personality is willing to see the reality which is hidden in the illusion and the glamour of the Life in form. In the slow and difficult struggle that ensues when the personality consciousness begins to sense the reality of the Inner Life of the Soul, the Soul can retake possession of the consciousness. It is in this retaking that the man gives up his ties to the world, it is here that we see the idea of being poor and poor in Spirit as the consciousness no longer being attracted to nor bound to the world nor the things of the world. In this is hidden the reality of the Master’s words “take no thought” (Matthew 6:34) and the variety of sayings that instruct us on the benefits of giving up the things of the world for the Kingdom of God. In a previous post we said that we would address the practical ways of forsaking ALL for the Kingdom and we never really did get back to this as the subject is difficult and it requires a certain amount of revelation to properly discern and address these ideas. Here however, from very early on in our series of essays, we find a real hint and a real clue to this dilemma and that is that we give them up as the consciousness is taken over by the Soul, by the Christ Within; as the things that may have been heretofore important lose that importance and we are no longer attracted by them as our focus is moved to the things of God. Overall, when our saying is interpreted as we are seeing it, as the reality that the things of the world no longer are desired and are allowed to fall away in consciousness and thereby in reality as well, the man, from the perspective of other men, can be seen as poor. In this poorness however are the riches of the Kingdom and we can say here that to be poor in this Light is equivalent to being born again and IS the Life and consciousness of the Soul, the Christ Within, being expressed to the world.
As we discussed the last saying above we noted that it likely did not belong in our list of sayings but that our understanding of it would be helpful to our understanding of the next one. This is True because the saying addresses the reality of the Kingdom as being here and now and not some future reality after death. The saying is simple and it is offered to His disciples; not necessarily the twelve only but all who were with Him this day, and it tells them that some in their company WILL accomplish those realizations of the Kingdom and the ability to overcome the things of the world; to become the expression of the Life and the consciousness of the Soul in the world. Other meanings given by commentators and in doctrine offer no real understanding of these words but their reality can be seen in our ideas above and the next saying that is not rightly discerned by most of the church still today.
We continue now with the rest of our sayings:
- “And when he was demanded of the Pharisees, when the kingdom of God should come, he answered them and said, The kingdom of God cometh not with observation: Neither shall they say, Lo here! or, lo there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:21). This is one of our most often used sayings by the Master and one of His more profound teachings. That the churches and doctrine do not recognize the Truth in these words that “the kingdom of God is within you” is one of their greatest shortcomings as this reality IS NOT taught to ALL. Our last saying above leads us to this as well and, as we said, we had never looked at it quite this way. Today we see that as some of these disciples of the Master become firm enough in their ability to keep His words, follow him and do those things necessary to attain True discipleship and the Kingdom, the greater realization of the Presence of the Kingdom and the Christ Within takes over their consciousness. This is True because “the kingdom of God is within you“, there is no place to go nor a death to endure there is only the realization of the Kingdom that comes by these things, by keeping His words, or, as we read below, doing “the will of my Father which is in heaven“. Here we should go a bit further to say that the Kingdom is within, it is a realization and a state of being and it is also where God IS as a realization of that divinity; to this we add also that this is where the Christ is as the Christ and the Father are ONE and, of course, the Christ to the individual man in form IS the Christ Within, his own Soul. In our equation then we can try to see that the Christ, the Father, the Kingdom are ALL the result of a man’s being born again or being born of the Spirit which is done by those things that we cite here; keeping His words, following Him…..doing “the will of my Father which is in heaven“.
We did not plan to spend the additional time restating the ideas from the last post but in our effort to make these things clear we did so. We will pick up here in the next post and in closing today we should point out that there is a great circle of things that ALL mean the same thing as we see in some of the points we make above and this is our greater point here: that ALL these things are resolved into Love which is a theme that we will pick up at the end of our journey through the Master’s references to attaining His Kingdom.
We will continue with our points below in the next post.
- “Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness’ sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:10).
- “For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:20).
- “Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 7:21).
- “And said , Verily I say unto you, Except ye be converted , and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 18:3).
- “But Jesus said , Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me: for of such is the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 19:14).
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Aspect of God |
Potency |
Expressed as Fire |
Aspect of Man |
In Relation to the Christ |
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GOD, The Father |
Will or Power |
Electric Fire |
Spirit or Life |
Life |
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Son, The Christ |
Love and Wisdom |
Solar Fire |
Soul or Christ Within |
Truth |
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Holy Spirit |
Light or Activity |
Fire by Friction |
Life Within the Form |
Way |
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:
Today’s Quote of the day ties into our discussion above from the point of view that these virtues expressed ARE the reality of being born again and that in their expression comes the baptism, the immersion of the consciousness in the things of God.
Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering; Forbearing one another, and forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel against any: even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye. And above all these things put on charity, which is the bond of perfectness. And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to the which also ye are called in one body; and be ye thankful (Colossians 3:12-15).
In this Quote of the Day we find the Apostle Paul speaking to the followers and believers at Colosse and instructing them in how it is that they should act and be. These are the virtues which establish the ways of disciples of the Master. We note here that Paul tells us the importance of Love which is translated here as Charity but which we know from previous posts is from the same Greek word as Love. We should see also that it is the same Love that we defined as a combination of our English definitions of both words, Love and Charity:
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. Plus the ever important High Ideal as taught by the Christ: “Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them” (Matthew 7:12).
Paul ends this with what comes naturally when we are in the Presence of the Master and this is to be in His Peace; as we seek and we strive toward Him we should notice the aura of Peace that overcomes us and in that Peace we find all of the virtues enumerated above.
Let the peace of God rule in your hearts!
- 1 Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, 1828 and 1913
