The Great Lover

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The  Great  Lover

Uranda   March 22, 1952

I think we might well meditate upon the wonder of God's Love. Most essential in this process is a vivid realization of the meaning of God's Love. The central core of the Holy Spirit, the central core of the Spirit of the Living Christ, is God's Love, or the Spirit of Love; and we remember that the first of the two great Commandments emphasizes that we must love the LORD our GOD with all that we are, not just a part, not just seventy-five percent of heart and mind and strength, but with all that we are. So, over and over again, we need to meditate upon the Reality of God's Love, so that there may be a deeper realization, so that there may be a clearer vision, so that there may be an enlarged understanding.

God is eternal, and it will take eternity for us to know the fulness of God's Love. This being true, we cannot hope, in any one moment, or in any one hour, or in any one year, to learn all there is to know about God's Love. Yet, when we begin to meditate upon a subject which we have considered before, there is a tendency in the human mind to translate what is said into old patterns of belief, and we are reminded of the Master's Word, that we should put the new wine of life into the new bottles, into the new patterns of realization, into the new understanding of Spiritual things; for if we put the new wine into old bottles, the bottles will burst and the wine will be lost. The wine of life, as it appears in us in the depths of realization, must be allowed to find a place in the new bottles of understanding.

Now, as we meditate upon this familiar theme, let us not translate what is said into old patterns of concept or belief. Let us so let go in love response to God that through the very Spirit of the Word there may be a deeper realization than we have ever known before; for no matter how much we may know about God's Love it is not enough, and it certainly is not all that there is to be known. The central core of the Spirit of God is Love. It is written: “God is Love.” The more we know about Love, Divine Love, the more we will know about God; and the more we know about God, the more completely are we fitted to let God's Love have meaning in our lives, to let God's Spirit work through our minds, through word and deed, through our hearts, through all that we are, with all of our strength.

In meditation upon God's Love, I would that we draw nearer to God's Heart of Love than ever before, and to this end I should like to share with you a meditation upon a text which I have read many times before, perhaps not in the presence of some of you, but to me this text has exquisite beauty, to me it is the richest poetry. And to my mind it conveys a depth of understanding, a breadth of vision and an opportunity for meditation such as can be found in few places in sacred literature. This text tells something of the way in which God's Love has been wooing the wayward, hardened hearts of men and women down through the centuries.

God is a Great Lover. “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him...”—and the Master said, “He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also.” So if we do not do the works, if we do not let His Spirit move us to the point where we can do the works, we do not believe on Him, no matter what our lips may claim; for the Master said, “He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also.” So it is not the claim of the lips; it is not the declaration of the individual. The proof rests in whether or not we let the Father do the works and speak the words, whether or not we let the Spirit of the Living God have meaning in our daily lives.

God is a Great Lover. We look back through the period of recorded history, and we see that over and over again He sent His prophets into the world to woo the wayward hearts of human beings. Over and over again He sent those Words which should have softened the hardness of human hearts. And, finally, our LORD and KING Himself came on earth and did the works and spoke the Words and revealed Life in a glorious expression of the Essence of Deity—something that surely should have melted the hardened hearts, something that should have drawn the wayward, so that there should be an eagerness in our movement toward the Kingdom. And yet, in the world there are so few who are ready to move eagerly and with enthusiasm toward that Divine Pattern which God has established for the children of men. And even when they are the Responding Ones who let themselves be drawn as far as you have, so that you have come to this time and place, there is sometimes a lack of eagerness, sometimes a lethargy, sometimes a lukewarmness toward God, the Great Lover.

If we would know God's Love we must yield to His wooing, and if we say He has not wooed us tenderly, persistently and everlastingly, then we surely lie and the Truth is not in us; for constantly that wooing Love has been sent forth to all of us and to every man, woman and child on the face of the earth, regardless of race or color or creed. The Great Lover is wooing you tonight. He has been, through the years that have gone. And can you say that your response is such as to satisfy His Love? Have you so yielded to His Love that He knows He is in you, that you are one who abides in His Love and lets His Love abide in you? The LORD of Love said: “Abide in me, and I in you.” Until we abide in His Love and let His Love abide in us, we cannot know oneness with Him, and until there is that oneness we are not ready to do our part toward letting His Kingdom come on earth.

The Great Lover

No matter how many times He has been rebuffed, no matter how many times His Love has been scorned, no matter how many times human beings have, in self-pride, turned their backs on Him, He loves us still, and that Love so overflowing must finally one day overwhelm us and take us to itself. If we are to be His in the true and final sense, that Love must draw us into oneness with Himself, that we may abide and go no more out, that we may be so centered in Him that the Light of His Love shall shine through our eyes, the Spirit of His Love shall appear in our lives, in all of our attitudes and all that we do.

In this poetry which I would read to you there is a beautiful portrayal of God's attitude, the attitude of the Great Lover, and the words are spoken to you tonight. They are not merely words that were recorded some thousands of years ago, to be thought of as a part of a dim and distant past. They are words of beauty, because they are words of Truth. They are words of penetrating meaning, because they are words of Love, and as we yield to Love and let the beauty of Truth have meaning in shaping the patterns of our lives, we find that we begin to Live, that we are lifted up out of the realm of mere existence and brought into the land of the Living, where there is a victory over all the limitations which beset human beings. I thank God for the privilege of sharing with you such Love, such an opportunity of response to the Great Lover of humanity. We turn to the Song of Solomon, second chapter, beginning with the eighth verse, and this is our recognition, to begin with, our acknowledgment, our vision, of the great Lover:

“The voice of my beloved! behold, he cometh leaping upon the mountains, skipping upon the hills.”

“The voice of my beloved!” Before one can reach forth one's hand to touch the Beloved, one can hear the sound of the Voice that thrills, and if there is a depth of Love there is a thrill in the sound of the Voice of the Beloved, and if we love God there is a thrill in the realization that His Word is to us in this hour.

“The voice of my beloved! behold, he cometh leaping upon the mountains, skipping upon the hills.”

What is God's attitude toward the obstacles? Do the mountains hem Him in, and are the hills as barriers? The things of God cannot be contained by the mountains of difficulty and the hills of adversity.

“The voice of my beloved!” And how does God come? How does the Spirit of God come? As something which makes man feel subjection to the worms of the dust? Oh no! How does God come? In the current of victory, in the spirit of vibrancy, in the revelation of power that is beyond the fondest imaginings of man—He cometh. The Master said that there would be those who would say, “My Lord delayeth His coming, and so we can go out and do as we please. We can follow our own fancies.” The voice of disbelief, the voice of the self-active, says, “My Lord delayeth His coming.” But the voice of those who love God, and who recognize the Voice of the Beloved, acknowledges, “Behold, He cometh.” We have the opportunity of receiving Him in this hour. We have the opportunity of knowing that the Great Lover is coming to us as we yield in heart and mind and body and soul. “Behold, He cometh.” And how does He come? “Leaping upon the mountains, skipping upon the hills.”

“My beloved is like a roe or a young hart.” Sometimes when we take a walk in this part of the country we come upon a little herd of deer, and if you have ever seen a deer, a roe or a young hart, in natural habitat, eating in the meadow or having caught a whiff of some scent, heads erect, alert and standing like statues, what impressed you most? There was the vibrancy of life, gracefulness, beauty of form, and something indefinable, something—shall we use the word “wild”? Not in the sense of the wild tempest, but something which knows the freedom of the wilds, something which is not bound, something that spells freedom in the deeper sense, and alertness, and vibrancy. Yes, you come unexpectantly upon the deer in his natural habitat, and there is something of indescribable beauty. “My beloved is like a roe or a young hart.” The roe and the hart are of the deer family. And so, that vibrancy and strength are there. And when the deer begins to move—while standing still there was the graceful poise, but moving, light-footed and fleet, leaping over barriers, going like the wind! To me, that one sentence says so much: “My beloved is like a roe or a young hart.” And when we pause to consider all of the characteristics revealed we see something of God, something of that which should be in us, something that is in us as we allow the patterns to unfold and the Spirit of God an opportunity to express according to God's Will for us.

“My beloved is like a roe or a young hart: behold, he standeth behind our wall.” What a world of meaning in that clause, “He standeth behind our wall.” The Master said, “The Father who dwelleth in me, He doeth the works.” The human being has erected a wall, his front, the wall which is so slow to yield to the Divine Pattern. “He standeth behind our wall,” behind that barrier, behind the wall of human resistance, human self-activity. He is there waiting behind the wall, and, in this connection, we are reminded of something else the Master said: “Behold, I stand at the door and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him,” and share the expression of life with him. The same pattern, the same truth, is revealed here in this bit of poetry: “Behold, he standeth behind our wall.” “Behold, I stand at the door and knock: if any man (anywhere, of any color or creed) hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him,” and share the expression of life with him.

And so we let that barrier down, we let the wall cease to separate us from the Great Lover, the wall which the human being self-actively thinks must be up there if the individual is to be meaningful. The human being thinks the human personality is in jeopardy, but if we will let that wall crumble, let the door open, the Divine Personality will begin to appear. We need not be concerned about what will pass away when we yield to the Great Lover, for we are better off without that which then passes away. Whatever falls away, whatever disappears with the coming of the Great Lover, let it go. We do not need it.

“Behold, he standeth behind our wall, he looketh forth at the windows.” What are the windows? The windows of your eyes. Again it is saying, “The Father who dwelleth in me, he doeth the works.” And when we yield to the Great Lover, what happens? When you meet someone who is in love, in this outer world, is there a love light in the eyes? If there be no love light, there is no love. “He looketh forth at the windows, showing himself through the lattice.” The human being feels that he must maintain that latticework. Instead of letting the Great Lover show Himself through all that we are and all that we do, there is the tendency to keep up the lattice, to let Him show Himself just a little through the lattice. “If we were to let that latticework which we have built with such effort be torn down, there would be nothing left,” the human being says. If, then, there is nothing left, it is better so; for if, then, there is nothing left, there is nothing in any case. Let us let the lattice of human, self-active patterns be torn down, so that the Beloved may show Himself fully, and be revealed in the expression of our lives.

“The voice of my beloved! behold, he cometh leaping upon the mountains, skipping upon the hills.

“My beloved is like a roe or a young hart: behold, he standeth behind our wall, he looketh forth at the windows, showing himself through the lattice.

“My beloved spake, and said unto me, Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away.”

And that is the word for each one. It is the word for you. “Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away.” Away from what? Away geographically? Not necessarily. Sometimes it does mean a geographical change. But that is not the point. Come away from the old patterns of life, let go of the old limitations, the old fears. Come away out of the old sphere of existence and arise, arise up into the new pattern of life. Let yourself be adopted, let yourself be reborn, let yourself share in the Resurrection. “Rise up, my love.” That is the Word of the Beloved. So often human beings seem to think that the Word of God and the Will of God is that they should be crushed down under some heavy burden, and that the difficulties should increase. There may be mountains and hills, but as we yield to the pattern of the Beloved—what does it say of Him?—“Behold, he cometh leaping upon the mountains, skipping upon the hills,” and if we are to come away with Him we will be doing that with Him. The lethargy of human beings! They think that if they are going to walk with God they must confine God to the same dull patterns which they have built for themselves, that they must confine God to the same realm of limitations and imprison Him on earth. But the coming of the things of God down out of Heaven into the earth does not mean that God should be imprisoned, but that man should be set free, free to share the glorious liberty of the Children of God.

The Great Lover—wooing with all the yearning of His great Heart of Love, has been calling to His children down through the ages; and so few have listened, so few have yielded. Human beings have so many things to do, so many things that are so important that they just do not have time to listen to the Voice of the Beloved, or to yield to the yearning, wooing current of His Love. And yet, if we are to know what it means to share with Him the privilege of leaping upon the mountains and skipping upon the hills, we must come to the recognition that we cannot do such things in human strength, of ourselves. It is only as we yield to that Invitation that this can be accomplished. “My beloved spake, and said unto me, Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away”—away from the old patterns. “Rise up and leap upon the mountains with me. Come with me skipping upon the hills. Let the vibrancy of life fill you. Let new meaning penetrate. Let the hardness melt away. Let my Love overwhelm. Yield to my wooing and I shall make you one with me, that you may share that which I AM, right here where we are.”

When two human beings are in love, in any true sense, is there any lethargy in their attitude one toward another? Suppose the loved one has been away for a time and is nearing, what is going to be the attitude? “Oh, let him or her wait. What is the difference? I will go over here and take care of that. I have this to do and I have that to do. Let him wait. It does not make any difference.” Is that the voice of love? No. Even in a human sense, everything is dropped, unless some life depends upon it, and there is interest in seeing, in meeting, the beloved.

So, our attitude toward God must be that of yielding to His wooing, that in heart and mind we may be overwhelmed by His Love, that all hardness may melt away and that, caught up in His arms of Love, we may let His Love find expression through us into the world; and only then can we love our neighbor as ourselves. How do we love ourselves then? There is a selflessness, a state of being yielded to God's Love, and when we truly love God we are not concerned about loving ourselves. We are concerned about loving God and letting His Love express through us. Then, in the human sense, we are not concerned about loving our neighbor to fulfil that Second Commandment. We are concerned about letting God's Love express through ourselves to our neighbor, that even as we have let God's Love express through ourselves, we may let His Love reach someone else. And so do we begin to fulfil the second of the two great Commandments.

“My beloved spake, and said unto me, Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away”—away from the ills of the old life—and live in the Spirit of the Living Christ, share the Victory. “The flowers appear on the earth.” When the Spirit of God's Love appears in one's life, lovely things begin to take form. “The time of the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land.” Why? “For, lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone.” The winter of the coldness of man's heart, the winter of refusing to yield to the warmth of God's Love. “The fig tree putteth forth her green figs, and the vines with the tender grape give a good smell.” To my mind, that is a glorious line. In the springtime, when the earth is bursting forth into resurrection, there is something so Divine in the earthiness of growing things, something Divine made manifest in this realm of form. “And the vines with the tender grape give a good smell.” That is earthy, the things of God made manifest on earth in the realm in which we live. “Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away.”

And so, the Voice of the Great Lover has been sounding down through the centuries and is sounding now for you, and as we yield to the LORD of Love and let that Love hold us centered and true while the patterns of His Truth begin to shape and mold our lives, it will not take so long for that beauty to appear. If human hardness of heart postpones the coming of the spring, we cannot blame God. The Great Lover's wooing is not at fault. So let us yield, let go to Him and let His Love enfold us and fill us, that abiding in His Love, centered, faithful and true, we may let the patterns change from the coldness and the chilliness of winter that is past, that the beauty of the flowers may appear, the beauty of the New Earth state, the vibrancy of life, the Resurrection and the Life, all because we yield to the Wonder and the Glory of God's Love, for this is the Invitation of the Spirit of the Living Christ: “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” Learn of me, not just about me. Yield the load, let go and respond to the Invitation of the Great Lover, the LORD of Love; for as we are centered in Him, all else shall take form according to the patterns of His Everlasting Truth, that we may share the Victory of the Living Christ, and LIVE.

Peace be unto you, in the Name of the Prince of Peace, as you remember to be obedient to His Command

Abide in me, and I in you

© Emissaries of Divine Light