Glory To God In The Highest
Uranda June 26, 1953 Class
I would like to direct your attention to one of the outstanding keys to a realization of reality that can be found in Holy Writ anywhere, which has from the standpoint of its true purpose and meaning been virtually ignored. As long as we ignore the keys, we cannot use them to unlock the doors and let the things of God come in. You let the Master in, and when He comes in He begins to prepare a place for you—a mansion of soul, in which the things of heaven are present and made manifest. This particular key was given to man at the time our Master's body was born on earth in the form of a babe. There were many remarkable revelations of the reality of Shekinah at the time of the Master's birth, but the central key is the Angels' Song: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.” Let us look at this expression from the standpoint of reality, with the eye of the heart. “Glory to God in the highest.” What is the Glory? The Shekinah Cloud of Glory. Glory to God in the Highest. That carries to the Highest Focalization of Deity, going beyond the range of human consciousness or awareness. Glory to God in the Highest. And the expression was made in relationship to those who dwell on earth.
So if there was a recognition of Glory to God in the Highest, we see with the eye of the heart how there was a Great Cone allowed to settle down over the earth, the base of it enfolding the earth as in a net, and the point of it extending upward to God in the Highest. And what is it that shapes this? What is it that gives it form? Glory—the Shekinah Cloud of Glory. And it was brought to the earth, enfolding man, centered on earth in the babe that was born. Glory to God in the Highest, signifies that the Cloud of Glory, made manifest to man through the form of the babe that was to become a Man, extended to God in the Highest—that there was no break, no point of separation, no veil, except the inability of human beings to see. The Cloud of Glory, the Shekinah, extended to the earth, enfolding the earth and carrying to God in the Highest. Glory all the way. The Shekinah Cloud of Glory here, and all the way to God in the Highest. And then, when that is a reality, what does follow? “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth”—enfolded in the Shekinah Glory something begins to manifest. “Peace on earth, good will toward men.” The coming of the Master was the Supreme Gesture from God, the zenith of God's Gift of love to man—and only in relationship to Love can there be peace—and it is clearly indicated it was on earth, and the Supreme Gesture of goodwill.
We see that at the time of the Master's birth the Divine expression, the Angels' Song, conveyed to man the Supreme gesture of love and goodwill. What is the natural result when human beings allow themselves to be enfolded in the Shekinah Cloud of Glory that extends all the way to Highest God? First there begins to be a sense of peace—peace on earth—the result of the working of God's Love within the Shekinah Cloud of Glory. And then goodwill. Goodwill from God in the Highest, through the Shekinah, to all the children of men. Goodwill—the willingness to let all differences be past, to let all wrongs be as if they had not been. This is the message of a God of love, who does not require any blood sacrifice. This is the message of Highest God to the children of men through the Shekinah Cloud of Glory made manifest on earth and centered on earth in the body of a babe. Peace on earth.
And the Angels sang the Song even though there was no room in the inn for Him, no bed available to Mary; the Angels sang the Song even though they had to move the ox from the stalls and put in a little fresh hay in the manger to make a place for the birth of the babe—the lowliest place. Even though that was all that man could provide for the coming of the LORD of Lords and KING of Kings, there was still the Angels' Song, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.” No judgment, no condemnation, the open invitation to come and let the beauties of the Kingdom of Heaven be revealed in the lives of the children of men. In conjunction with this there were other evidences.
This Song the Angels sang was heard by the shepherds who tended their flocks—and there we have again the pattern of the Shepherd. Human beings, instead of seeing the glorious significance of the Angels' Song, they have continued to weave the patterns of assumption and belief on the basis that prevents God's love from being received, His power from manifesting, His truth from being known. In season there will be those who are willing, of their own volition, to draw near and begin to see the truth as it is. “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.”
We begin to recognize that the Wise Men who followed the Star came to the place where the Master was born directed of the Spirit of God. And what was the Star? First we have the pattern with the shepherds—the Glory, the Shekinah Cloud of Glory. And then come the Wise Men—wisdom, the sense of the fitness of things, a function in relationship to the mind, to the truth. And what do we see? The Wise Men following the Star. And the Star is what? The Light that Glows. The Cloud of Glory, the Light that Glows, and then the Fire of Love. And within the Fire, One like unto the Son of God. The Shekinah Pattern of Being was established in relationship to the Master's birth, and He used it all the way through His ministry. He talked about it. He revealed it over and over again.
And when He came to the point of the conclusion of His work on earth, before the pattern of the atrocity, before the betrayal, He prayed a prayer. And in this prayer we find a glorious portrayal of Shekinah: “These words spake Jesus, and lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, Father, the hour is come.” What hour? The hour is come for what? “Father, the hour is come; glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee.” How is He glorified? The Shekinah Presence of the One Who Dwells has power over all flesh. And entering into the Cloud of Glory is the way by which the Father glorifies the Son. He was talking about the Shekinah Pattern of Being. And then He continued on, “I have glorified thee on the earth.” How? By letting the Shekinah Cloud of Glory have meaning, by letting the Shekinah Power manifest, by letting the Shekinah Light shine. “I have glorified thee, O Father, on earth”—the revelation of the Shekinah on earth.
And then He said, “I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do.” Now, is that a true statement or not? That is where the thing finally hinges. What do we believe? Whom do we believe? He said, “I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do.” He had some other things to face, but they were things that human beings forced upon Him. He had already completed all that God had given Him to do, before the atrocity. Seventeenth Chapter of John, the Fourth Verse, if you want to read it and look at it yourself.
“And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was.” Here we have the description of Shekinah, and it is working in relationship to heaven and earth. “I have manifested thy Shekinah unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world: thine they were, and thou gavest them me; and they have kept thy word. Now they have known that all things whatsoever thou hast given me are of thee.” But those who thought they were following Him and called themselves Christians forgot that. “All things are of thee. For I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me.” Specifically, “I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me … and they have received them, and have known surely that I came out from thee.” And that is all they did know surely. The pathos in this prayer is something that must surely touch the awakened heart. He could not anywhere through it say, “My disciples have reached a point where they can carry on.” If you read it with understanding you will see that the only thing He could say that they knew surely was that He had come from God. But how it worked, what it was, the reality of Shekinah, all the rest, they did not understand. “… and have known surely that I came out from thee, and they have believed that thou didst send me.
“I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me; for they are thine. And all mine are thine, and thine are mine; and I am glorified in them.” How? When the Shekinah Pattern of Reality works through them, the Shekinah Cloud of Glory, the Light that Glows. He said, “Let your light so shine before men”—the Light that Glows. “Love the Lord thy God”—the Shekinah Fire, the Light that Glows, the Shekinah Cloud of Glory—let these things manifest in you. He said it so many times, so many ways. “And all mine are thine, and thine are mine; and I am glorified in them. And now I am no more in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to thee. Holy Father, keep through thine own Shekinah those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are. While I was with them in the world, I kept them in thy Shekinah: those that thou gavest me I have kept, and none of them is lost, but the son of perdition.” What is lost? The son of perdition—the whole devil pattern as it works through man, the whole fallen sphere—the son of perdition in any generation. Every human being who defies God and refuses to let God's will be done is a member of the body of the son of perdition. And the son of perdition is lost. “And now come I to thee; and these things I speak in the world, that they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves.” Here, at the conclusion of the Master's ministry on earth, He was talking about joy: “That they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves.”
“I have given them thy word”—I have given them thy Shekinah—“and the world hath hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world.” Well! The Master in His prayer which concluded His ministry on earth said, “I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil. They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.” Thy Shekinah is truth. “As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world.” Now let us stop and look. You were sent into the world on exactly the same basis, the same laws, the same principles, as the Master was sent into the world.
“And for their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified through the truth”—through Shekinah. “Neither pray I for these alone.” The Master recognized that in all likelihood there would be those who would rise up and say, “Well now, He was just talking about His disciples. He was just talking about His twelve disciples having the power.” What does He say? “Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word.” I do not know how He could have made it any plainer, that everything He was saying in His prayer applied to any man or any woman, in any generation, of any color, regardless of background, socially or by creed or anything else. No limitations. It applies to you. His prayer applies to you just as much as it did to anyone, anywhere, at any time. “Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word; That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me. And the glory”—the Shekinah Glory—“which thou gavest me I have given them.”
Now where are those who have received the Glory? Look in the world. Either God did not give our Master very much Glory or else those who were supposed to receive it have not received it. “And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them.” And it applies to us in this hour. When are we going to receive the Shekinah Glory? When we let it appear. “And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one.” We must accept the fact that we are supposed to have Oneness with the Father on exactly the same basis that He had Oneness with the Father. And how was it? Through the Shekinah. It has been called different names, but human beings have forgotten what it means; they do not know. “That they may be one, even as we are one: I in them, and thou in me.”
“I (Shekinah) in them, and thou (the One Who Dwells) in me (Shekinah), that through Shekinah we may all be one.” Not until you begin to understand the principles of Shekinah can you really understand the Master's use of language here. "And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one: I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me (Shekinah), and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me.” In other words, that the Father loved them, you, in this hour, as, in exactly the same way, He loved our Lord when He was on earth. “As thou hast loved me. Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am.” Not where I am going to be. “Where I am.” He was the manifestation of Deity on earth. He was the focalization of, the revelation of, Shekinah to the children of men, and He said, “I pray that they shall be with me where I am,” not where I am going to be. No. Where I am—the manifestation of the power of God on earth.
“Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am; that they may behold my glory…” What Glory? Do they have to go to some far heaven to behold the Shekinah Glory? Certainly not. “… behold my glory which thou hast given me: for thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world. O righteous Father, the world hath not known thee: but I have known thee, and these have known that thou hast sent me. And I have declared unto them thy name”—I have declared unto them thy Shekinah—“and will declare it: that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them.”
The Shekinah Fire of Love in the manifestation of the Divine Pattern on earth. Here we have the words of the Master Himself, in His concluding prayer. If they be the words of Truth, the words of our Lord in fact, then let us give heed to them and stop being concerned with all the assumptions. Let us “soar to high neglect of what's denied or said, this way or that,” on the basis of assumption, interpretation, belief, and all the rest. The Master said, “And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free”—free to live, to move and to have your being in the Shekinah of our God. And so shall you share the victory and do your part toward finishing the work which you came to do.
© emissaries of divine light
