We are able to speak together of earthly things from a heavenly perspective. This is most necessary, that a sharing in the process by which hearts are purified might be known. Only when the heart is purified to a goodly degree can we speak of heavenly things with a heavenly perspective. As we have already understood, the house of the Lord, where we rightly dwell, has both a heavenly and an earthly aspect. A purified heart opens the door into the experience of heaven, dissolving the veil which is the impurity of heart. The earthly aspect of the house of the Lord is hardly present at all in human consciousness now.
We have to see the earthly state as it is, but from a heavenly viewpoint; and we have begun to do this. We have noted the awareness that is now present of the working of the creative cycle and how it is that all that transpires in the world as it now is comes about by reason of the working of the creative process; therefore we do not need to dispute what is going on. We may, and I suppose we do, observe the foolishness which is expressed by people the world around, close in and far out. We understand as to why this is. It is because human beings are foolish. Very simple. They are inevitably foolish in this human state. Therefore if we observe foolishness it is not very surprising. It carries very little weight. What carries weight is the working of the creative process, which certainly emphasizes foolishness when foolishness is present; but it also emphasizes wisdom when wisdom is present. Our concern is with the wisdom, because wisdom is of heaven. We ourselves therefore would surely be wise.
We are able to observe the effects of the creative process in the world of form around us. It is well that this process should be operative and that we should at the same time be aware of the fact that it is operative. This gives us a heavenly perspective of earthly affairs. We see these earthly affairs with a heavenly vision and no longer with the earthly vision which comes because of involvement with the earthly affairs. We are quite aware that the vast majority of the population are involved with the earthly affairs and therefore put great store in the various ways by which these earthly affairs are being handled by human beings in this unfortunate state. We do not put much store in that, even though we observe it. We put great store in the creative process itself.
However we need to see the creative process not merely from its effects in the earthly sense. We need to understand that creative process as it is present in the heaven. We are familiar with the question: "Knowest thou the ordinances of heaven? canst thou set the dominion thereof in the earth?'' One can't know the ordinances of heaven without being in heaven. The ordinances of heaven are in the process of being set in the earth by reason of such awareness as is present in those who know that what is happening in the earth is consequent upon the working of the creative process. It is because of this that the ordinances of heaven are being set more directly in the earth, even though those who carry this responsibility may not be fully aware of what is happening by reason of their acceptance of the responsibility. There is, so far, little conscious awareness of what is happening in heaven from the perspective of heaven. There is an awareness of what is happening in the earth—beginning to dawn—as a result of what is happening in the heaven.
The creative process springs out of heaven, and the effects are recognizable to those who begin to share a heavenly perspective. But there needs to be more than that. We need to be in position to speak of heavenly things. This only becomes possible to the extent that we can speak of earthly things from a heavenly perspective. Then there may be the beginning point for the acceptance of what is present in heaven. This relates to something that we perhaps know of old, pointed to through the word "Shekinah'': the evidence of the presence of the One who dwells in heaven. The first touching into what is present in the heaven relates to the most peripheral aspect of Shekinah. This of course is the cloud of glory. The cloud of glory relates to a more or less undifferentiated awareness of something. This is about as far as anyone has reached from the human standpoint. Nirvana has been considered to be an ocean of bliss; it is another way of speaking of the cloud of glory, the most peripheral aspect of such awareness as may come of the heaven; it isn't really the heaven yet.
This also relates to what we have seen as the necessity of silence, of quietness. In that quietness there has, at the same time, been an awareness of the sounding of a tone and of a brightness. This has been known in some measure to us. We speak of the tone of life. How on earth did we become aware of it? This is present within the scope of the cloud of glory. We had to be quiet enough to begin to hear the tone, a sounding note, which is quite different certainly from the cacophony of noise that is present in the earthly state. We begin to hear the tone when we are quiet enough, and we become aware that there is a brightness, a lightness: The yoke is easy and the burden light. Here is the first dawning awareness of the heaven of the house of the Lord from the heavenly standpoint.
We are to dwell in the house of the Lord. We can't yet dwell in the earthly aspect of the house of the Lord, because it isn't present. But we are in position to begin to dwell in the heavenly aspect of the house of the Lord. It's only when this is done that the earthly aspect can begin to put in an appearance. There have been many sincere and earnest people in the world who have had the romantic idea of somehow building an earthly heaven, but you can't build an earthly heaven without heaven. It is heaven that carries the weight insofar as we are concerned, surely, that we may be so unmoved by the present earthly state that we can share an understanding of the heavenly aspect of the house of the Lord.
I am reminded again of another story from the Bible, relating to the Master's experience shortly after His conversation with Nicodemus. At least that seems to be so in the story that has come down to us. He had another conversation, this time with a woman. Perhaps there is more significance in all of this than meets the eye, relative to the male and female aspects and the particular conversations that occurred. After some talk, during which the Master was feeling out the nature of the state of this lady, the conversation developed and she expressed some rather structured views as to how it might be possible to worship God. Then the Master said something which in fact carries considerable significance.
"Jesus saith unto her, Woman, believe me"—understand me, understand what it is I am saying—"the hour cometh, when ye shall neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem, worship the Father." It wasn't a matter of form. Certainly it wasn't a matter of geographical location. "Ye worship ye know not what.'' And I think that is a statement that could be repeated within the hearing of almost anyone on earth, particularly the religious people. "Ye worship ye know not what: we know what we worship: for salvation is of the Jews."
I suspect that the latter portion of that sentence was inserted somewhere along the way, but it does make a point relative to the creative process as it has been working out and as it had been working out up to that point. The First Sacred School, which was brought to a very specific point by Moses, had failed of its purpose after Moses. However here was the initial opportunity provided, by which the restoration of man might occur. Therefore, in the continuing unfoldment of whatever might happen next after that failure it would necessarily have to emerge out of what was left of that state of failure. This is why Jesus was born into that particular situation as He was, because out of the remains of the previous opportunity the next opportunity could come. We are aware of the fact then of the Second Sacred School. These are ways of describing the sequence in this aspect of the creative cycle.
The Second Sacred School emerged through Jesus. As I said, Moses was primarily responsible for the First Sacred School, which failed after him. Jesus was responsible for the Second Sacred School, which failed after Him. The Second Sacred School therefore necessarily emerged out of the First, and what we know as the Third Sacred School must necessarily arise out of the Second—I suppose you could say out of what remains of the Second. But the remains are rather more massive than they were of the First Sacred School at the time of Jesus. That involved the Jewish pattern of things at a particular point of focus at that time in Jerusalem. The evidence of the failure of the Second Sacred School and the remains of it could be summarized by the word "Christianity.'' So out of Christianity, somehow or other, the Third Sacred School had to take form. It did so through Uranda. He certainly had a very strict, one might say, Christian background—Seventh-Day Adventist, to be exact. I myself had something of the sort too.
So what has arisen in the Third Sacred School emerged out of a Christian condition simply because this had provided at least some recognition of the Master's presence on earth and the importance of what He did. All this got mixed up, but still here was a connecting link with the Second Sacred School. Uranda was responsible for this. And while there had been of course failure previously, both after Moses and after Jesus, if anything was to be salvaged out of all this there had to be some sort of success or victory from the standpoint of the Third Sacred School. Thus far it has been proving itself out. Something remained in clear polarity after Uranda. I necessarily had something to do with that, but there were others who held the point with me, so that there might not be a failure this time.
All this is indicated in that little passage that I read: "For salvation is of the Jews." Salvation emerges out of the creative process, which had two shots, followed by failure and dissipation in each case. I don't think those who are Christians would like to hear this; and I suppose most of us came out of a Christian background, but much more than that is included now. Certainly there is the inclusion both of what came out of the First Sacred School and what came out of the Second Sacred School, as witness the fact that there are those who have thought of themselves in the past as Christians present, maybe in this room now, and also those who have thought of themselves as Jews. So, here we go! We would not exclude anyone, regardless of background, whether from the Orient or from the—what?—Middle East. But here is the way the creative process works. It's interesting, it's quite capable of picking up the chips again. It has been doing that, and we are at least some evidence of the fact that it has been doing that.
"But the hour cometh"—and this is surely the hour; it came anyway—"and now is"—you can say that again!—"when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him." Along the way perhaps some of us may have misinterpreted this matter of seeking, sensing that "the Father seeketh such to worship him.'' We would be good Emissaries and find them! But He seeks how? In the expression of His spirit. Here is what we have described as a magnetic force, and the magnetic force is quite capable of finding those who will yield to that magnetic force. It is, in that sense, a foolproof system. It brings home those who should come home.
Some of those who begin to come home decide against it along the way. Woe unto them, because they had the opportunity. There are vast numbers of people who never had that same opportunity. If there is one thing that I might feel quite strongly about, it is that anyone who has the opportunity should turn their back on it. There certainly have been those who have done that. They turned their back on my King, and that is the unforgivable sin. I suppose, for some, it is possible to turn around again, but it certainly hasn't happened too often. It may happen for those who, as it were, go "by default''—just drift away. And there are some of those who, as it has been put, are re-surfacing; and I rejoice in that. But if there are those who turn their backs on my King they mean absolutely nothing anymore to me. This is an attitude that we need to share. We are not playing children's games. We are not here to fiddle around with human nature. Along the way we have done a great deal of fiddling with human nature, our own in particular—and other people's too, because we were still fiddling with our own, so we felt it necessary to fiddle with other people's.
But, coming to the point of knowing what we know, we realize there is no sense to fiddling around with human nature. We repent of it in ourselves, and so the current of life is offered to others. And we see this is quite effective. People put in an appearance very often that we really don't know where they came from or why. It doesn't matter. They come because the magnetic force is there and it brings them, and we are thankful for that. We can't pat ourselves on the back and say, "I did it.'' We may have participated in extending the magnetic force. We had no idea where it would land up, and we don't need to know—just do it. We do it through our willingness to repent as necessary. We become aware of the elements in ourselves which need to be relinquished, then let the spirit carry them away, and then there is a clear connection for those who are being drawn by this magnetic force. We all share in this. We all have our own fields of responsibility because we are all different. Aren't you glad for that? Would you want any reproductions of yourself? I am quite content to be unique, and so it should be for each one. We are not trying to be anyone or anything. Someone may be accused occasionally of trying to be Jesus, for instance. What blasphemy! That One is who He is. But each one of us is who we are individually.
We discover that our dwelling place is in the house of the Lord; and our first experience of the house of the Lord is necessarily the heavenly aspect of it, because as yet there isn't any earthly aspect to experience. When we know the heavenly aspect then we begin to be in position to dress and to keep the garden, in other words to set the dominion of the ordinances of heaven in the earth. Then the fact of the new heaven and the new earth can come quickly. The new heaven and the new earth simply refer to the house of the Lord. It isn't new; it's just new to us.
So in our time together this evening we have touched into a heavenly awareness of the creative process, which certainly has produced certain effects in the earth. But we begin to see that it is our responsibility to understand this heavenly aspect of our responsibility. We may know that we have repeatedly played a part in this particular creative cycle which I have described from the time of Moses. You can go back farther than that, I suppose, if there is any reason for it, but this is the most recent application of the creative process in a specific sense through human beings. We have a perspective in this regard because we are very much aware that in the heaven the total concern is for the re-creation of man. This much we know of the heaven from the heavenly standpoint. All that happens at the moment is for that purpose. There is a lot more going on in the universe than that, but insofar as our field of responsibility is concerned, that's it! And when we are in the heaven that is known; it's prominent in awareness. We don't find ourselves at any point saying, "Ah, shucks, I forgot!'' No, the dwellers in heaven are trustworthy. They are inseparable from the One whose house it is. We begin to become aware of what the ordinances of heaven really are and how they must be brought into the earth to allow for the restoration of the earthly aspect of the house of the Lord.
We learn once again to dwell in heaven. I don't think that is such a tough proposition. It means that a good deal of our present surroundings must be largely ignored. We don't find it necessary to become involved in them in the sense of reacting to them. We may utilize our external opportunities in the business of repentance—that is required—but we see everything we do in the external sense from the heavenly standpoint and we don't get lost in our consideration of it from the earthly standpoint. What are your favorite things from the earthly standpoint? What do you imagine you were created to do on earth? Human beings translate that invariably in human terms: "I'm a businessman. I'm an artist. I'm a banker. I'm a scientist. I'm a sociologist"—all very important things, meaning absolutely nothing.
I am the angel of the Lord incarnate on earth. All these affairs that human beings put so much store by are not important for that reason at all. They may carry an importance to us because they enable us to bring something out of heaven into the earth in relationship to people, that's all, not to satisfy ourselves. What do you do, day by day, to satisfy yourself? That's something that might be thought about a little, because we are not here to satisfy human beings, ourselves or anyone else, but to bring heaven into the earth; and we use what is at hand to do that. Anything we do day by day is for that purpose only. People get so thoroughly embedded in their external interests, that they forget: "Oh shucks!" again.
Of course one has to have money; one has to live, after all. You do? Why do you have to live? What would the reason be? So that you can do your human thing, whatever it is? That's no reason at all. You might just as well be dead. The only reason that human beings are still alive is to give them an opportunity to find out why they should be here; that's the only reason. If we begin to know that, then let's be true to it. I thank God that there are those who are discovering what it means to be true to that, so that nothing of this earthly state looms so large that it causes amnesia, a lapse in memory, as to why one is here.
So we consider these things together in times like this. But, remember, the spirit of truth brings all things to remembrance constantly, so that you never forget. We are not here to forget why we are here but to do what we are here to do. Remembrance Day is coming up shortly. With respect to it there is something about "lest we forget." Well I think that's a pretty good thought to conclude our time together this evening. We are not here to forget why we are here but to do what we are here to do. Just let it happen. Just let it happen.
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