May 03, 2015

THE KING His Household and His Ministers

from


 THE  KING


His  Household  and  His  Ministers





Martin Cecil   April 24, 1983

 


The quality and character of the king­dom is the quality and character of the King. This is also the quality and character of His people. Grace and dignity were the two words used to con­vey something of the nature and atmosphere of the King and His kingdom. The kingdom is one way of describing the true state on earth. There would be no kingdom if there was not a King. As I have indicated, the charac­ter of the kingdom is the character of the King and of His people. 


The King governs in His kingdom. It may be said that the govern­ment is one of love and truth and life. It isn't an arbitrary imposition; it is readily and delightedly received by those who are present in the kingdom and by all creatures great and small. There could be no kingdom but for the King. The King carries responsibility for the kingdom; He carries it on behalf of a greater King. But in­sofar as we are concerned this One, whoever He is, is the King. We can trust Him to be the King and to govern in the quality and character of His kingly nature. 


Perhaps His true nature as a King is sufficient to identify Him in our consciousness. Those who are His people love Him and desire nothing more than to serve Him; that is fulfilment enough. If it doesn't seem to be so to anyone it is simply because that per­son does not know the King. There has been very little knowing of the King. Except from the standpoint of claims of the lips on the part of some, the King has remained obscure, without any particular authority in the lives and the experience of human beings. 


The King has been ignored, factually ignored, and His government, whatever that might be, rejected in favor of the ideas and doctrines of men. But there is a King, and while He has been largely excluded in human experience there is a level of being at which He governs. The King is in His heaven, a heaven of which human beings know virtually nothing. But the King governs there; He is loved there. He chooses His household there; He chooses His ministers, and there is government from that level. 


Because there is such government human beings have thus far continued to exist on earth in their rebellious and disobedient state. But the King still rules in heaven—fortunately for the continued existence of human beings on earth. It seems to have been imagined, without any intelligent thought being given to the matter, that it would be possible to ignore the King and steal the earth. Certainly the world is a den of thieves. There is no hope for human beings anywhere until or unless the King is acknowledged. 


If we are aware of the reality of this supreme point of government related to this world, heaven and earth, then we also have begun to experience the fact that He chooses His household and He chooses His ministers. They are chosen in heaven. I'm not, I trust, using the word "heaven" in the sense that would be fantastic in your consciousness. There is a heaven, and you have had some experience of the fact of it. There is a realm out of which one may live on earth, ungoverned by any expectation anymore of being able to steal the world. It doesn't belong to human beings. "The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein." 


As there begins to be a recognition of these things, of course the fact of responsibility comes into the picture. The King appoints His ministers, He chooses His household; and this fact in heaven begins to become known on earth as there are human minds and hearts who exhibit a willingness to let the fact be made known. You have some awareness of the factual nature of this heavenly truth simply because it takes form on earth. You may let it take form in your own experience and you may observe it taking form in the experience of others.



The choice of the King is absolute. His word is law. That's the fact of the matter. The King appoints His ministers. To be His ministers they must minister to Him. Usually ministers are thought of as ministering to their flocks; but the first concern is to minister to Him, because this is necessary if He is to assume His authority in the human consciousness. If a person has an imagination in this regard and then says, "Well I know that the King would require me to minister to His people on earth," then he has turned his back on the King and is trying to do something according to his own views of what should be done or somebody else's views of what should be done. And so people in each generation tend to follow out the same lines, the party line, so to speak. But that isn't ministering; that's theft. It's trying to steal something from the King and saying, "Well now I have stolen it; I know better than you how to apply it to my flock." That's a lie! 


It is necessary to love the King first, above all else, because until that is the experience one's consciousness cannot be filled with an awareness of what it would mean to love His people. If you don't know the King you don't know His people either. We ourselves presumably love the King. To the extent that we do so we will discover what He has chosen. Who are His chosen people? The ones whose minds and hearts are sufficiently willing to allow the truth to become known, the truth that He chooses His household and His ministers. And one must discover the truth for oneself.


The character of the kingdom was described in terms of grace and dignity. I think we could add humility also, for the King Himself is humble; He is humble before His King. Human beings are arrogant. They think they know; they think they are capable of judging; they think by the exercise of their brilliant intellects that they can discern all things. The human mind is stupid.  

          

No, there is a King and there are His ministers, and His ministers rightly take form in the flesh. Presumably from the King's standpoint this would be the first order of business. What else can be done until His ministers put in an appearance? Nothing, nothing at all. So, in whatever measure, this has been occurring. In order for this to be effective, as it naturally will be if it emerges as it should out of heaven, there will always be the necessity of a first minister. There rightly is a first minister who, in revealing the character of the King, evokes love. The love is for the character of the King. One can hardly separate the one who reveals the character of the King from the character of the King. Presumably if it is a true revelation they are one anyway. So love would include the first minister, but only because the first minister reveals the character of the King. And so those who begin to become aware of the fact of being chosen as ministers naturally love the King and His first minister. There begins to be something taking form here which, when fusion occurs, provides the King with the means of His creative action. But there must be fusion. 



The essential ingredients for fusion in what might be called the ministerial body are love for the King and love for His first minister. This engenders easy communion, communion between ministers and an open communion between all with the first minister. While elements of communication may be, and rightly are, involved in this, communion is something deeper, because it is based in love. If there is no love, communion is impossible; and because communion is impossible, communication is im­possible. The means of communication are fine, but there must be those on hand who have something to communicate. In order to have something to communicate, the experience of communion must have been established. Communion is impossible without love, and all this centers in the King who carries the supreme authority. 


This brings obedience into the picture. We have heard tell that man rebelled against God; in other words he became disobedient. The disobe­dience of course led to the theft. 


So, love for the King brings love for the first minister, as he begins to be recognized by those who also are ministers. It has been said that angels know each other. The ministers of the King know each other, and they cannot deny their love for the King, their love for the first minister, and their love for each other. All this follows naturally. Now there are those who are inclined, on the basis of the stupid human mind, to think in terms of some sort of a hierarchy being set up. That's a ridiculous human concept based in the state of separation. There is a design of course; nothing works without a design. 


There is one course of action, one design, one way it works; that's all. It is futile to pay any attention to anything else; nothing else works. All else is subject to fission, disintegration; but there is the opportunity for fusion. Fusion only comes because there is a King. There have been many people who acknowledge there must be a King, and they have their ideas about it, and their doctrines, and so on, but the King has re­mained unknown. He wasn't known when He took form in the flesh on earth. He was denied, betrayed and, apparently, crucified. That's water un­der the bridge now, but it certainly did not get rid of the King; He is still there. His ministers emerge. All concerned who play their part in this are one. They love each other because they love His ministers, because His ministers love His first minister, and His first minister loves the King. Then all share that fire of love, which is the fire of fusion. Without it there is no fusion, just fission: each individual tends to go his separate way, doing his separate thing, imagining that that is what should be done, that others should agree to it. What foolishness! 


There is a design. There is gov­ernment. And there is a sensible way by which government occurs. It has been occurring right along insofar as the universe is concerned but it certainly hasn't been occurring in the affairs of men. But now it may, and it is emerg­ing into the flesh because of obedience to the truth. 


When there is obedience to the truth, so that the truth characterizes the individual nature, love becomes known, not before. Love is well protected from human experience by the truth. When the truth is known there is love. Love makes possible communion and right, fitting com­munication. And all that is included in what I have called fusion. Together, because we love the King in truth—in the de­sign and the government of the King, acknowledging the design with de­light—obedience in this sense is a delight. And acknowledging that, the design and the government are the experience, the dominion is set in one's own living.



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