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“My son,you and I are always together, all I have is yours”
Luke 15:31.
Everywhere,individually and collectively, there is a struggle going on, spiritually and materially. There is the struggle for possession, for security which bring sconflict and separation, and there is the struggle for the acquisition of virtues which becomes a vice.
With all this struggle the world becomes the arena for spiritual and material dominance which creates opposition, quarrels and conflict between individuals and groups.
Man has separated the material and spiritual yet the one is but the expression of the other, there is only one Source from which all things come. Therefore division only arises in the mind and this is the cause of struggle.
Some people despise the materialist because they think themselves spiritual, but all come from the same Source. Those who think themselves spiritual are not one bit better than the materialist for all are caught up in the struggle of the mind.All are in conflict, one with the other. Therefore there is no understanding either with the material or the so-called spiritual.
Wherever there is craving there cannot be understanding. Some desire truth for materialends, some think that through the repeating of a ritual they become spiritual.All this comes from ignorance of the false that blinds one to the Truth of the One in All and All in One.
Some look to the future while they are bound by the past, thereby failing to realize the Ever-present Reality, “my son, you and I are always together, all I have is yours.” So man lives in opposites and is in conflict within himself and with others.
Is it not so that we struggle with disease while we hope for health, we struggle with want and hope for plenty. It is only when we realize that all this goes on inthe mind that our ignorance is revealed. If there is conflict within, that conflict will be externalized, even the denial of the external does note liminate the conflict.
Only by understanding does the conflict cease, then Creativeness comes into being. Only when we come to understand that we are the creators of the conflict can we dissolve the cause. While we are imprisoned in our own conflict we cannot be creative. But when we become aware that we ourselves create our own prison canwe break loose from it.
Being prisoners we are perpetually concerned with what is Truth, what is God. In the intensity of our suffering we try to imagine what is Truth, what is God, what is freedom. Still caught-up in the mind with ideas of right and wrong, with allthe various opposites, we are lost in the illusion we ourselves create.
The first thing we must do is to understand the mind with all its opposites so that we no longer struggle with opposites. Then we will live in the present without struggle, without limitation, without fear of the past or the future, “my son,you and I are always together, all I have is yours.”
If we make this merely an idea we will still remain in our ignorance, because Truth is not an idea, Truth is a Living Reality that is Ever-present. The Spirit isalways free. It is when we realize this freedom through understanding our struggle do we free ourselves. This is an experience and not an idea of the experience. If it is an idea of the experience than we will still be in the struggle of opposites.
Our thoughts arise from our fears, from our conditioning, but pure thought is only possible when all illusions have been discerned and understood.
There is no mental effort required when we are free from opposites and in this way only do we realize the resident Cosmic Power with which we are always united. It is when we concentrate on things do we lose this realization.
The Cosmic Presence with which we are always united is the only Reality. “He that cometh to God must know that He is.” This is when we look away from the Living Cosmic Presence and look upon appearances as real do we get lost in the illusions of the mind in which we struggle.
The Presence is all there is, there is no division, no separation in the Presence that is the Reality in everyone of us. Now some try to realize the Presence by meditation while the mind is in conflict, but this means only struggle again.Neither can we realize It by living on carrots or turnips, nor can we realizeit by going round in rags. Nor can we realize it by sitting on the mountain top. Only by true meditation can this realization come, and true meditation is discerning the false. Then the Creativeness comes into being without struggle,without effort. True Creativeness is effortless.
Only in our effortless Creativeness is all fear removed. Craving, fear and limitationare of the mind and you can easily see this when you look into the mind without struggle or fear. There you will see where opposites exist. It is ourstruggling that prevents the expression of the Indescribable Ever-present Reality.
Our true Creativeness can only be expressed when we do not compare, judge or condemn where there is no birth or death or memory of the past to hide It. In our discerning of the mind we will see that there is no distinction, no separation,no cults, no differing creeds, no right or wrong, except in the mind. When this is seen freely then that which prevents the expression of our effortless Creativeness is dissolved.
Is it not so that our minds are saddled with memories, pregnant with scars of experiences of the past which is ever giving continuity to its own scars and conditioning the present? It is this that is binding us, and there can be no true expression until this is discerned. When we live fully, experiences do not leave traces behind, for the present is Eternal and l free from such conditioning.
How can amind that is conditioned with memory, with division, understand a mind that is unconditioned? The Spirit is always free, beyond all value, beyond all comparisons. How can a mind that is divided realize that which is not divided? How can a mind that is caught-up in beliefs understand that which has nobeliels? How can a mind that is caught-up in separation, in tradition, rightand wrong, high or low, understand that in which these things do not exist? Wemust see how false are all these things before we can realize that which istruly Creative.
In Luke14 verse 26 (Eastern text) I will repeat the verse again because it containsone of the most profound sayings of the Master, “he who comes to me and doesnot forsake his father and his mother and his brother and his sister and his wife and his children and even his own life, he cannot be a disciple to me.”
The verse has created a bit of difficulty to many because their minds are caught-up inseparation. But when we see the wonderful truth Jesus was revealing, the light dawns upon us, father, mother, sister, brother and the self is limitation and separation, unless we put aside even this limitation which we cling to wecannot be a disciple of the Christ of God that is in everyone of us.
He also says, “salt is good, but if the salt lose its savour with what can it be salted?” meaning the Spirit is all but if we divide It in our minds It has lostIts value to us, with what then can we restore Its value?
In Luke15: l-3, “then the publicans and sinners drew near to him to hear him. And the scribes and Pharisees murmured, saying, ‘he receives even the sinners and eats with them. ’”
So Jesus told them this parable, the parable of the shepherd and his sheep in Matthew18: l2-14,
“What doyou think? If a man should have a hundred sheep, and one of them is lost, wouldhe not leave the ninety and nine on the mountain, and go in search of the onewhich is lost? And if he should find it, truly I say to you, he rejoices overit more than over the ninety and nine which were not lost. Even so, your Father in heaven does not want one of these little ones to be lost.”
Here again the Master was showing that the fold was one fold and not even one canever be lost, for the Father is the Father of all. Here he shows that there is no separation except in the mind of man which makes up the division. It is this division that is preventing Wholeness from manifesting in us all.
Only in understanding our divisions can we find the great Truth of our unity and it is this that gives rise to the recognition of the interior power which is beyondthe mind, beyond our reason. We try to make intellectual statements about this realization without avail. But this Livingness is not a mere statement, nostatement about a thing is the thing itself, our statements are merelyrelative, but our Livingness is not relative, It is a Reality.
We maysearch all the holy books and there we find statements but what of it, if we donot understand ourselves we will never realize that which is not a statement.Jesus himself says, “ye search the Scriptures for in them ye think ye have Eternal Life, and they are which testily of me. You make a mistake”—meaning in effect, you suppose that reading of the Scriptures can in itself confer Life.What your Scriptures do is to make statements of that which “I am.” Realize what those statements mean and you will see in me the Living example of the Living Truth and this can be found when you have discerned your own falsehoods.“I and the Father are One,” is the Truth of our Being.
Seeing the false in ourselves only will reveal that for which we are seeking. There we will find that the building power of the Universe is the same Spiritual faculty which is reproduced in ourselves and by which all Creation exists.
True discernment and Divine reason remove mental obstacles that hinder true expression of the Real, so that the Supreme Inner most will work in accordance with our conscious realization of the Truth of our Being.
It is the same Living Power that is behind all humanity and Its activity can onlyfunction fully in us from the conscious Realization and intelligent use of theLaw pertaining to It. “Love your neighbour as yourself”
There cognition of the Inner most Creative Power must always be preceded by apurified and enlightened mind which makes you and me the Temple of the Living God.
This can only be done when we see that there is no separation except in man’s mind and this ignorance must be destroyed through a purified and enlightened mind. Then the realization of the Divine Presence will be a reality. Jesus saw that he was the reproduction of all the principles which give rise to the manifested Universe. “I am in the Father and the Father is in me.” So the Temple of the Living God must include all in which there is no division.
Proverbs25: 4, “take dross from silver, and the silver shines out pure; . . .”
BENEDICTION
O Divine Spirit, Thou art ever free.
While I struggled in my mind I did not know Thee.
In my ignorance I divided Thee into so many parts and lost sight of myself in others.
In the self-created prison of my mind I was perpetually concerned with an idea of Thee.
I read all the holy books, the statements there confused me because I was myself confused.
Then I saw. “He that cometh to God must know that He is.” Then I knew that Thou wert beyond my mind.
As I looked into my mind and saw all there in I knew that Thou wert not there, I had merely an idea of Thee.
Only when I gave up all ideas of Thee didst Thou reveal Thyself to me. Thou wert my Life,my substance, my All. Then I knew we were one, O Divine Spirit.
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