|
Matthew
5:43 - Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy
neighbour, and hate thine enemy.
Matthew
5:44 - But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that
curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which
despitefully use you, and persecute you.
Matthew
5:46 - For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye?
do not even the publicans the same?
Matthew
10:37 - He that loveth father or mother more than me is not
worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not
worthy of me.
As we can read above from scripture there is a great demand upon
us to love. We must love our neighbors, our enemies, our fathers,
mothers, sons and daughters ........... but, we must never love anyone
or anything ... more than God.
At first glance this seems like a
demand from a jealous and selfish god ... but the statement is from God
as revealed through the Christ in Jesus. In Truth the statement is
a demand on us to love God first because each of us has within us the
same Indwelling Spirit of the Almighty as Jesus .. the Christ.
This Christ within us is our Higher-Self ... our Spirit ... the very
Life of us ... the perfection within each of us that can never be
touched by circumstances or experiences. It is this Indwelling
Christ that Jesus referred to when He stated "if I go not away the
Comforter will not come to you." The Comforter, the Christ,
is that spark of the Divine that can only be touched within our
consciousness. It is the image and likeness of God ... it is the
individualization of the Infinite.
The command to love God first insures that we never
allow ourselves to deny our own Divinity. Who can hate themselves
and love another? No one. To hate ourselves is to hate God
... to despise our very Life. Too many of us have allowed this to
happen to a certain measure. We may not hate ourselves completely
but we hate our life experiences, our jobs, our financial conditions,
our relationships that didn't work out ... and this hate no matter to
what measure it may be ... holds us in bondage to that which we hate.
We have allowed ourselves to feel inferior ... or to feel superior over
others ... both of which take us out of alignment with God or Good.
This hate has denied the Christ within us. If we cannot recognize
the Christ in ourselves ... we deny the Christ in others ... this is the
great message of the Master Mind Jesus. This same message is
echoed throughout the Science of Mind, the textbook of Religious Science
written by Dr. Ernest Holmes.
Once we touch this Christ within we are never the
same again ... we no longer hold on to the dualities in our mind.
We no longer see inferior or superior ... good and bad ... right and
wrong. Yes, these old ideas may still come to mind ... but we will
dismiss them quickly and effortlessly and not be affected by them.
Our passion will be for God or Good ... Good and more Good ... meaning
God and more God in our thoughts and ideas. We will have an even
greater desire to emulate the Infinite ... by seeing past limitations
... transcending limited ideas and beliefs. We will not longer be
manipulated or intimidated by the false ideas of superior and inferior.
We will walk in confidence ... speak with self-assurance. And most
of all, we will realize that as we speak from the Love within us ... all
that we say and all that we do ... no matter how it may be interpreted
... is but an attempt to show others that there is more to Life than
what we see, feel, taste and touch ... our ideas will all be focused on
the Infinite ... never acquiescing to limitation ... to limited ideas
... or to small-ness in any form. We will be so Lifted Up by this
Love that Is God that few will truly understand us ... but we will Love
them anyway.
And
So It Is!
Letting
Love Use Me In Its Own Good Way,
Henry
Lee Bates
|
