IN THE WORDS OF JESUS–Part 757

ON LOVE; PART CCCXLVI

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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).

Our two thoughts from the last essay which we have been discussing for several day merged in the end into the similar message. On the one is the idea that a man is brought to the threshold of spiritual reality by his disillusionment or dissatisfaction with Life in the world, a dissatisfaction through which he realizes that there must be more, which causes change and, where the man can sense the prompting of his own Soul, can lead to True spiritual pursuits. In the other, the words from the Apostle James, is the message of the fragility of this change to spiritual reality, to becoming the aspirant and the disciple; the message that one IS still in the world and the caution that one should not fall back into the ways of the self and the ways of the self in world which are centered in lust and envy as we read again below and in which words we should clearly see the self-centered and self-absorbed way of the man focused in the world:

“From whence come wars and fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members? Ye lust, and have not: ye kill, and desire to have, and cannot obtain: ye fight and war, yet ye have not, because ye ask not. Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts. Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God. Do ye think that the scripture saith in vain, The spirit that dwelleth in us lusteth to envy? But he giveth more grace. Wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble. Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded” (James 4:1-8).

To the point of our current saying: “Do ye think that the scripture saith in vain, The spirit that dwelleth in us lusteth to envy?” with which we had some trouble discerning the apostle’s meaning, we find James’ cautions on fighting, on conflicts and on quarreling as these flow from the what he calls “your members” and which we would see as one’s mind and emotions. It is apparent that this is intended to be seen among his audience, who are aspirants and disciples who the apostle believes should KNOW better, as a sharp rebuttal hence his abrupt start here as he notes this happening. He goes on to instruct them in the nature and the result of lust and shows them in his language that they “receive not” and not because the ask amiss from the perspective of asking in the wrong way but rather because they are asking for the wrong things; they are asking for things so that they can “consume it upon your lusts” and here we should be able to see our thought of this error. Can we see here James’ message that they stop the lustful desires and that they stop as well their attempts to get what they are lusting after which James sees as even killing, which is perhaps just an example of the lengths to which lust can make one go? Can we see as well that in his message that they “ask amiss” contains a link to his prior sayings to them: “If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed. For let not that man think that he shall receive any thing of the Lord. A double minded man is unstable in all his ways” (James 1:5-8)?

We should be able to understand that within this word called Wisdom come ALL things of God and ALL fruit of the Spirit which ideas we ever marry together because they are the same and because this IS what the man who is reaching toward God, the aspirant and the disciple, are to ask for; they should not be asking for, nor lusting after, those things “that ye may consume it upon your lusts“. This IS the Truth to the apostles message which we were not able to express so clearly in our earlier words on this and this then continues James’ next words which, from a point of view of attacking them with Truth if you will, he calls them “adulterers and adulteresses” which, even if Vincent is right and the first word does not belong, is a strong statement of his displeasure. And displeasure is likely his overall point which he frames in words that are rendered as friend and friendship and as enemy and hate in some translations but which we see as fondness and attraction to the world and the things of the world causing displeasure and a sense of wrong against the Truth and against God; that these ideas ARE contrary; fondness for the things of the world and Love for God. Of course this IS NOT what the apostle says but it IS likely what he means through the harshness of his words that are intended to awaken the aspirant and the disciple who may be falling back into his former worldly ways. And then comes our problem saying which, when we can view it as we did in the last posts, as addressed to the aspirant and the disciple in whom is some degree of the expression of the Light of the Soul but who, still being in the world, is also bound by the spirit of vanity, of illusion and glamour, to which he had been subjected and which, by the Light of the Soul, he is in the process of overcoming. A warning and a caution that this fondness for the things of the world is because of this spirit of vanity, this illusion and glamour, and they they should be wary of this and be able to stand in this understanding.

James’s explanation and rebuttal goes on to show that the resolution to these problems that the aspirant and the disciple encounter is found in the grace that one can receive by right actions; he says: “But he giveth more grace. Wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble“. Now grace is a difficult word to understand away from the doctrinal explanations which have no place here. James IS an apostle and as such he is aware of the finer points of discipleship as is Paul and John and Peter and the others; we must assume that this same understanding that we ourselves are reaching for is already within their ken and that James KNOWS the reality of the Soul, the Christ Within, and that there IS NOT a God looking down upon mankind with rewards and punishments. We can assume this from the very nature of his writings and here there IS no difference; he speaks of God and perhaps much of this is to do with the nature of the man in that day and their ability to understand the realities of Life in the world which are clarified for him only in one’s own revelations and realizations. Understanding that from the last verse the apostle IS speaking to the aspirant and the disciple who has some degree of this realization and revelation and yet has the spirit of vanity and of illusion and glamour which James frames in the ideas of lust and envy, we should be able to see that the apostle’s message here is that in one’s humble attitude, away from pride, lust and envy, all of which are intimately related, that the man will continue in His grace, which we should understand as the Light of the Soul which has no part with the man focused in the world of things or, as this idea is rendered in the New Living Translation (NLT): “if your aim is to enjoy this world, you can’t be a friend of God“.

Our understanding here of this word grace as it is used in relation to God can be seen within the confines of the right definitions of the Greek word charis. Vincent tells us that this means: Grace (χάριν) From the same root as χαίρω ,to rejoice. I. Primarily that which gives joy or pleasure; and hence outward beauty, loveliness, something which delights the beholder ⁴. From the perspective of the aspirant and the disciple, nothing can give more joy nor pleasure nor can anything afford more outward beauty than the Light of the Soul being expressed by the man in the world as this IS, after all, the True goal of the aspirant and the disciple. Then it can follow that in being humble, in eschewing the pride and the lust and the envy, that one will be enabled with the expression of more grace. We should understand here that this saying “God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble” is presumably from Proverbs where it is rendered from the Hebrew as “Surely he scorneth the scorners: but he giveth grace unto the lowly” (Proverbs 3:34) and that this is also a saying used by the Apostle Peter as he says in context: “Yea, all of you be subject one to another, and be clothed with humility: for God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble. Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time: Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you” (1 Peter 5:7). In the words from our subject verse, we should see the idea of resisteth as a word of opposition; Vincent tells us that this Greek word antitassomai IS:  A strong and graphic word. Lit., setteth himself in array against, as one draws out a host for battle. Pride calls out God’s armies. No wonder, therefore, that it “goeth before destruction.” ⁴. We should be able here to see the force of the argument against one’s being proud which is a strong word in its own right; the lexicon tells us that this word rendered from the Greek huperephanos means: showing one’s self above others, overtopping, conspicuous above others, pre-eminent; with an overweening estimate of one’s means or merits, despising others or even treating them with contempt, haughty  and in this we should see much more than today’s common understanding. Vincent refers us to his remarks on the Master’s use of the word pride where he says: From υπέρ, above, and φαίνεσθαι, to show one’s self. The picture in the word is that of a man with his head held high above others. It is the sin of an uplifted heart against God and man  ⁴; this, while a bit milder, still shows the reality of this idea put forth by James and in these we should be able to see the reason for the opposition by God and the God Within who CAN NOT work through a personality so involved. Hence, the grace, the Light, does not come to the man whose thoughts ARE on the self and the self in the world.

By looking at these ideas together, they ALL become a bit clearer as this caution and warning to the aspirant and the disciples is to say that if one finds fondness in the world and the things of the world, if he allows the world to keep alive any tendency to lust and envy and if he allows pride, which we see above as a very selfish attitude toward man and God with a man perhaps lifting himself above ALL as THE authority, that this man will find no grace, no Light to illumine his Way. The apostle completes is dissertation with the admonition to his readers to “Submit yourselves therefore to God” which IS what they should be doing without James’s words but which IS a difficult endeavor for a man in this world. Vincent expands this idea of submit for us by noting that the Revised Version renders this as “be subject” to and then saying that: The verb means to place or arrange under; as resist (James 4:6) is to array against. God sets himself in array against the proud; therefore, array yourselves under God, that ye may withstand the devil ⁴. It is likely that Vincent’s remarks are in part to acknowledge the next verse where James tells us to “Resist the devil” and here again we have the personalization of a force or a Power much like we see in James’ words above and throughout this epistle. These views of God and Satan and the devil as personalities is likely rooted in tradition and are the very nature of the doctrines and, in many cases they are inserted by the translators for both clarification of the thought and doctrinal purposes; from our perspective it is ever the God Within that we must see in these references to God as He and it is the forces of the world itself that we should see as the devil and as Satan, the forces of that vanity into which word we can easily find place for pride, for lust and for envy.

In researching our words here today regarding this tendency to personalize God and the devil in the rendering of these ideas, we come across a translation that does not appear to do so. This is the New Century version and by example let us look here at two sayings from the New Testament comparing them to our King James Version:

• James 4:7 KJV
  • King James Version: “Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.“
  • New Century Version: “So give yourselves completely to God. Stand against the devil, and the devil will run from you.”
• Matthew 6:30
  • King James Version: “Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which to day is , and to morrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith?“
  • New Century Version: “God clothes the grass in the field, which is alive today but tomorrow is thrown into the fire. So you can be even more sure that God will clothe you. Don’t have so little faith!“

While this is also the translation that we cited a few posts back for having a clearer picture of James’ words that we had some difficulty with and which comes across in much the same way that we understand these things, there is no relationship here to our reference above. However, based on these ideas we will work this bible version into our view with some purpose as we go forward in our essays as we can never have too much help in understanding the words of scripture.

These next sayings at the end of this section are as clear for us as they are purposeful. Resist the ways of the world which ways the apostle has cautioned and warned against and draw closer to or, as we would say, focus more intently on God and the things of God; and the benefits of each are cited. As we resist, the pull of the world lessens; and as we focus, the Way and the Path become clearer. Is this not our objective then and can we see that this as James’ audience’ goal as well? The apostle then further clarifies his words and tells us that we should keep our selves clean, from sin which is free from focus upon the world and that we should purify, which perhaps we can understand as make perfect, our hearts, our consciousness, to NO longer be double minded. We should remember and understand that this is the movement of one’s spiritual Life from that sense of duality to the single mindedness of overcoming the world and in this overcoming IS a great part of the perfection that we must seek as we read in the Master’s words saying: “Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect” (Matthew 5:48).

This brings us to the end of our look at these words from James from which we should have a clearer vision of the Way of the disciple and the obstacles that beset him so long as he is yet in this world.

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!

• ² New Testament Greek Lexicon on BibleStudyTools.com
• ⁴ Word Studies in the New Testament; Marvin R Vincent D.D. 2nd edition, 1888