Monthly Archives: July 2013

ON LOVE; PART CCCXXXVI

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GoodWill IS Love in Action

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For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh: (For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds;) Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ; And having in a readiness to revenge all disobedience, when your obedience is fulfilled. (2 Corinthians 10:3-6).

In the last post we began with the idea of Transformation as the result of Repentance and ended in another dissertation on the requirements for discipleship as the Master gives them to us. We were led here through or idea of the focus of a man who IS transforming being much the same and on parallel track with the growth of the Kingdom Within as the Master teaches us in His parables on the subject, as in His example of this growth as the mustard seed growing into the great tree. As we had already discussed these parables on the growth of the Kingdom, we centered on two other parables that reflect the importance of the Kingdom to the man who has found it or has glimpsed it in the prompting of the Soul as we would paint this. The result is then that the man who finds the treasure in the field, or, the sense of the Kingdom in his consciousness, gives up ALL else and buys the field, or, in our terms, gives up ALL carnal claim to the consciousness and pursues the Kingdom. The consciousness is the True battleground, if we can use that term here, and this idea is found in our Quote of the Day from the last post which we have today at the top of our essay. Remembering that the Master’s words are a parable and, seeing the treasure as the Kingdom and the field as the consciousness, we ended up again relating the ideas of giving up ALL to the story of the rich young man, as we call him, and the Master where we find those infamous words “ it is easier for a camel to go through a needle’s eye, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God” (Luke 18:25). We noted how this saying is treated by the various doctrines of the churches and how many dilute it and change the intent of the Master’s words which are very much similar to His other words on God and mammon and on the cost of discipleship as it is addressed in the Apostle Luke’s Gospel as He tells us clearly that: “whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14:33).

We covered then the same idea of forsaking ALL from a number of different angles as offered by the Master; one in parables where He shows us the importance that the Kingdom has for those who find it, that they will give up ALL, sell ALL, to possess the field of treasure or the pearl of great price:

• “Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto treasure hid in a field; the which when a man hath found, he hideth, and for joy thereof goeth and selleth all that he hath, and buyeth that field” (Matthew 14:44).
• “Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a merchant man, seeking goodly pearls: Who, when he had found one pearl of great price, went and sold all that he had, and bought it” (Matthew 14:45-46).

Second we saw in the Master’s words the need to relinquish ALL attachment to riches to attain the Kingdom as He tells the rich young man and where He comments to His disciples afterward, and us as well, that “How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the kingdom of God!”. Then, after seeing their amazement as the severity of this saying: “But Jesus answereth again, and saith unto them, Children, how hard is it for them that trust in riches to enter into the kingdom of God!” (Mark 10:23-24). Finally we have those sayings that are specific to being His disciple, specific to the criteria, as He tells us that we must forsake ALL for this High Calling. In these three we should be able to get the True intent of His words, that we CAN NOT enter the Kingdom, which IS here and now and not at some future place after death, and which IS as the Master tells us saying “the kingdom of God is within you“(Luke 17:21), while attached to the things of the world and while this is mostly seen here as riches and possessions, we should try to see the greater reality. It IS ALL thoughts, attitudes and actions of the world that may come before one’s thoughts, attitudes and actions of the expression of the Love and Power of the Kingdom of God. And this same is abundantly clear in the attainment of that High Calling of discipleship as He tells us  “whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple“; this again should not be seen as riches and possessions only but ALL as this saying follows upon the first two and the Parable of Counting the Cost which includes ALL things including one’s attachment to loved ones in this world.

In most all of our examples and sayings above and in our previous posts we find that the attitude of the various doctrines is either to ignore the Master’s sayings or to change and dilute them to suit the needs of the man in the world. For us, the better idea is to understand the Master’s sayings as they are intended and understand at the same time that these thoughts, attitudes and actions ARE our goal, that we ARE NOT yet there, and that we will continue to strive. This IS the attitude of the aspirant, this is the attitude of the man who desires to see the Kingdom of God and to answer that High Calling of being a disciple of the Lord and thereby a servant of the Great and Awesome Plan of God. There is no easy way, there are no shortcuts of believing a certain thing or saying some certain affirmation, there IS ONLY the doing and ALL else IS deception and this the Apostle James tells us most clearly and bluntly saying: “But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves” (James 1:22). Perhaps it is the added clarity of vision that enables the aspirant to see the reality in the Master’s words, a reality that is hidden from the man who IS NOT yet striving toward the Kingdom in full acceptance of the severity, from a carnal perspective, of the work to be done. And, perhaps it IS in this severity of work that the man of the world, religious or not, looks to the deception of safe harbor in His words rather than at His words in the broad sense in which He has offered them to us. And, we should never forget that the whole of our journey begins and ends in that Love that He teaches us and which He has made of Supreme importance by His words:

“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).

It IS in accomplishing this as the Master presents it, and in that way that shows the broadest sense of Love to ALL, that we are to be seen as striving and, as we have said in past essays, this idea of Loving God is not the simple way of affection and attachment to the Transcendent God that we can speak of as Him, but it IS Love for the God Within ourselves and the God Within every other man in this Earth regardless of his place, his religion, his creed, his culture or his willingness to accede the same to us. And we should understand here as well that this Love fro ALL IS NOT that affection and attachment of the mortal man but rather that deep seated Love that follows the Golden Rule and understands that as “God is no respecter of persons” (Acts 10:340)  that neither should he be as James tells us clearly saying: “if ye have respect to persons, ye commit sin, and are convinced of the law as transgressors” (James 2:9). And this also, when a man believes that he loves God in any way at ALL, the Apostle John gives direction regarding that Love, that it is not True if there IS NO love for one’s brother as he tells us: “If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen? And this commandment have we from him, That he who loveth God love his brother also” (1 John 4:21:22). And we must not forget that the Golden Rule, named such by men of some vision, is the KEY to most ALL divine awareness and in these few words IS the totality of the right understanding of Love for one’s neighbor, one’s brother and the stranger who qualifies as both.

“Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets” (Matthew 7:12).

“And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise” (Luke 6:31).

In these few words is also the KEY to understanding the reality of our time here in this Earth and our way of deliverance “from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God” (Romans 8:21). In these words of the Golden Rule IS the beginning and the end of our journey from striving to keep His words to DOING, from aspirant to disciple, and from our entry to the Path to our entering at the strait gate which opens into the Kingdom of God. And this is the idea behind the Apostle Paul’s words at the top of our essay as well; that it IS his strongholds that keep a man from understanding and performing the Truth as the Master teaches it and which Truth, if we honestly view it, is most concerned about the relationship of one man with another and the abolition of those self-centered thoughts, attitudes and actions that prevent the free flow of Love to ALL. And only each of us KNOWS his own strongholds, those thoughts, attitudes and actions that keep each individual trapped in the illusion and the glamour of Life in this world, those carnal ideas that keep us from seeing the reality of His words. Paul helps us some with these strongholds as he defines for us what some of them might be; first there is the idea of “Casting down imaginations” which we should see much in the same way that this word is rendered. The Greek word here is logismos and while Vincent does not address it, Vine’s tells us that: “a reasoning, a thought” (akin to logizomai, “to count, reckon”), is translated “thoughts” in Rom. 2:15, suggestive of evil intent, not of mere reasonings; “imaginations” in 2 Cor. 10:5 (RV, marg., “reasonings,” in each place). The word suggests the contemplation of actions as a result of the verdict of conscience ⁶. Understanding that Vine’s generally gives us doctrinal understandings, we should still be able to see the intent of this word as the apostle is referring to thoughts and reasonings insofar as how to act or think about a thing that may be contrary to or “against the knowledge of God“; it IS these imaginations that must be cast down, ignored and not acted upon. The idea of high thing must be seen in a similar fashion as is the idea of imaginations although perhaps on a more spiritual level; the imaginations may be in regard to a man’s thoughts, attitudes and actions regarding the things of the world while these high things are more in regard to a man’s thoughts about himself spiritually, that he thinks that he is acting in righteousness while at the same time NOT keeping His words which would be of course “against the knowledge of God“, IS a good example. Vincent tells us that this Greek word, hupsoma, that is rendered as high things can be seen as it is: used in the Septuagint and Apocrypha of mental elevation, as Job 24:24, where the Septuagint reads “his haughtiness hath harmed many” ⁴.

We should see the word knowledge in our verses above as more than the natural knowledge of things; there are several Greek words which are rendered as KNOWING of some sort and others, like faith, that we understand as KNOWING but which are not reckoned so by scripture. In our terms the idea of “faith as a grain of mustard seed” (Luke 17:6) means for us that KNOWING without a doubt that is required for the outcome in those verses that use this idea. Here the Greek word gnosis is used for knowledge and, according to Vine’s, this means: primarily “a seeking to know, an enquiry, investigation”, denotes, in the NT, “knowledge,” especially of spiritual truth; it is used (a) absolutely, in; (b) with an object: in respect of (1) God, (2) the glory of God, (3) Christ Jesus, (4) salvation, Luke 1:77; (c) subjectively, of God’s “knowledge,”; the word of “knowledge,” 8; “knowledge” falsely so called ⁶; we have left out the many bible references which any who wish can look up easily online at http://www2.mf.no/bibel/vines.html; we should here have the point of this idea of the ” knowledge of God” to which Paul refers. The next phrase is the culmination of ALL that we have above, that we take captive our thoughts, attitudes and actions of ALL kinds and in ALL directions and as we go, we make certain that they ARE according to His words, that they ARE “to the obedience of Christ“.

This IS ALL the policing of our own minds and emotions as they are emitted from the personality, that they ARE NOT of the world but ARE of God, of the God Within. Policing to ensure that they ARE expressing the Love and the Power of the Soul and we should recognize Paul’s words as just another way of saying that we must keep His words and it IS in doing so that we can KNOW that we Love God as is the instruction above and as the Master clearly tells us saying: “He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him” and again saying “If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him” (John 14:21, 23).

We will continue with our thoughts in the next post.

Aspect of God	Potency	Aspect of Man	In Relation to the Great Invocation	In relation to the Christ
GOD, The Father	Will or Power	Spirit or Life	Center where the Will of God IS KNOWN	Life
Son, The Christ	Love and Wisdom	Soul or Christ Within	Heart of God	Truth
Holy Spirit	Light or Activity	Life Within	Mind of God	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.

We repeat here again a saying that is from the Bhagavad Gita, which goes well with our theme of the God Within, the Soul, which we see as the Christ Within and while this is good in the Christian world and is True based upon our understanding of the Christ as the manifestation of God, we should also see in these words below that it does not matter what these divine ideas are called; that it matters not what we call this Inner Man, that he is the same in ALL, he is the Soul.

Thou carriest within thee a sublime Friend whom thou knowest not. For God dwells in the inner part of every man, but few know how to find Him. The man who sacrifices his desires and his works to the Beings from whom the principles of everything stem, and by whom the Universe was formed, through this sacrifice attains perfection. For one who finds his happiness and joy within himself, and also his wisdom within himself is one with God. And, mark well, the soul which has found God is freed from rebirth and death, from old age and pain, and drinks the water of Immortality.—Bhagavad-Gita

It is difficult to tell just what verses of the Bhagavad Gita the above is from; whether it is a paraphrase or a combination. It is from the book “The Great Initiates” by Édouard Schuré which was originally published in French in 1889 and perhaps it is in the translation of the verses that they become hard to recognize. However, the sheer beauty of the presentation caught my attention and so I share it with you. The Path to the Kingdom is the same no matter what religion one professes.

Let the peace of God rule in your hearts!

• ¹ Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, 1828 and 1913
• ⁴ Word Studies in the New Testament; Marvin R Vincent D.D. 2nd edition, 1888
• ⁶ Vine’s Complete Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament Words, 1996