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Keep A True Lent
Chapter 5
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[Keep A True Lent]
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The Throne of Love
Chapter 5
DIVINE LOVE is the force that dissolves all the opposers of
true thought and thus smooths out every obstacle that
presents itself. When love ascends the throne and takes
complete possession of our life its rule is just and
righteous. Even destructive faculties, such as resistance,
opposition, obstinacy, anger, jealousy, are harmonized
through love. Perfect love casts out all fear. When love
harmonizes the consciousness we find that our outer affairs
are put in order and that where once there seemed to be
opposition and fear co-operation and trust prevail.
We demonstrate nonresistance by denying all intellectual
opposition or antagonism. When the substance of divine love
is poured out upon all alien thoughts we are not bothered
by them any more. This leads to joy, a positive force that
has not been bearing fruit because of the obstructions
heaped upon it by the failure to fulfill the law of the
All-Good. The wonderful kingdom within man is developed
through keeping the commandments; that is, commanding,
controlling, and directing every thought according to the
harmonious law of love to one another.
The dissolving power of spiritual love is the antidote for
a dictatorial will, but we must deny all
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selfish desires out of our love before we use it in
softening the imperious will. When the consciousness of
love stands in the inner court of our being we cannot help
acceding to its demands. Unselfish love is fearless,
because of its forgetfulness of self. Will divides its
dominion with love when it is approached in the right
attitude; that is, with understanding. Understanding of the
law is necessary in all permanent unions. When we know
Truth we know that we are all one, that there is no
separation whatever. They that love without the
adulteration of selfishness or the lust of sense come into
the very presence of God.
There is a distinction between love of the divine type,
exercised by divine man, and love of the human type,
exercised by the mortal man. It requires discriminating
judgment to distinguish between human and divine love. All
love is divine in its origin, but in passing through the
prism of man's mind it is apparently broken into many
colors. Yet, like the ray of white light, it ever remains
pure. It is within man's province to make its manifestation
in his life just as pure as its origin. This, too, requires
painstaking discrimination and good judgment. We learn by
experience that love must be directed by wisdom. If we give
up blindly to the impulses suggested by human love, we
shall suffer many downfalls.
David represents love passing through some of these
experiences. He let his affections go out to many wives; he
attached himself through the heart
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to the many sources of sensation that the love nature
opens. When one gives up to all the emotions engendered by
love there is a saturnalia of sensation in consciousness.
The first step in all reform is the recognition of the
power of the law. Wisdom shows us what the law is and where
we have fallen short in our use of it. Then we are shown
that there is no anger against us on the part of God.
Transgression of the law brings its own punishment. We are
not punished for our sins but by them. God is kindness, God
is love--loving-kindness is a word of rare compound.
One good definition of love is that it is the feeling that
excites desire for the welfare of its object. If all people
would recognize love as embodying this ideal--recognize
that God loves all men to the degree that He has poured out
His life and substance and intelligence equally with us in
the universal scheme--they would find in it the solution to
every problem of life. Our greatest good comes in the
welfare of all. Jesus recognized divine sonship and
universal brotherhood. We confess Jesus as the Son of God,
and by that confession we acknowledge that all men are sons
of God. All of us want to know Truth and the help that
comes from it, but when it is presented to us we object to
the broad spirit that it proclaims. This is especially the
case if our religious training has been narrow and
pharisaical.
The Jews were taught that they were the chosen people and
that all others were barbarians. Such
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doctrine is the foundation of the caste system. When a man
begins to see himself better than other men, the thought of
superiority extends to his environment, and social
apartness follows. What those in authority have taught and
what the customs and beliefs of the past have been are of
more weight than reason and logic. An innovation on old
methods of thought is resisted. The whole religious nature
is moved; thought runs to meet thought, and a concentration
of resistance is set up in the mind.
Many persons wonder why they do not develop divine love
more quickly. Here is the reason: They make a wall of
separation between the religious and the secular, between
the good and the bad. Divine love sees no distinction among
persons. It is Principle and it feels its own perfection
everywhere. It feels the same in the heart of the sinner as
it does in the heart of the saint. When we let the Truth of
Being into our heart and pull down all walls of separation
we shall feel the flow of infinite love that Jesus felt.
A sense of oneness is a natural product of love, and it is
accompanied by a consciousness of security. Through our
sense of oneness with the All-Good, the greatest possible
sense of security is realized; therefore, all fear is
readily and completely cast out. John emphasizes the fact
that in order to love God we must necessarily love our
fellow men. A love that is adulterated in any degree by
hatred for anything or anybody is not pure enough to discern
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the great love of the Infinite, which unifies all men.
Jesus said that love of God is the greatest commandment.
"Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and
with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the great
and first commandment. And a second like unto it is this,
Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two
commandments the whole law hangeth." Divine love is such a
transcendent thing that words describing it seem flat and
stale. But words used in right understanding quicken the
mind, and we should not despise them. Affirming that we do
love God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all
our mind, and with all our might will cause us to feel a
love we have never felt before. No better treatment for the
realization of divine love can be given than that which
Jesus recommended.
Jerusalem, the Holy City, represents the love center in
consciousness. Physically, it is the cardiac plexus. Its
presiding genius is John the Mystic, who leaned his head on
the Master's bosom. We establish the ruling attitudes of
mind throughout our body by our daily thoughts, and they
may or may not be in harmony with Principle. Our dominant
thoughts about love will show forth in the heart center and
establish there a general character. The loves and hates of
the mind are precipitated to this ganglionic receptacle of
thought and crystallized there. Its substance is sensitive,
tremulous, and volatile. What we love or what we hate
builds cells of joy or pain in the cardiac plexus. In
divine order
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it should be the abode of all that is good and pure.
To be in subjection to the higher Power is the highest goal
of human attainment. The spirit of obedience is the spirit
of love. Love is the most obedient thing in the universe.
It is also the greatest worker and will accomplish more for
our happiness than all other faculties combined. If you
want a servant that will work for you night and day,
cultivate divine love. At times there may be obstacles in
the mind that interfere with this fellowship of love. One
of them is the thought that we owe our neighbor something
besides love. For some wrong, fancied or otherwise, we
think we owe him punishment. The higher Power tells us that
we owe him love only, and by sending him the word of love
the law is fulfilled, and the barrier is burned away. We
must make friends with everybody and everything in order to
have this mighty worker, love, carry out for us the divine
law.
When we even faintly realize the love of God we begin to
love our fellow men. There is a fervent love among
Christians that is not found among any other group. Love is
a divine ordinance, and those who let the love of God pour
itself out in charity do truly cover and forgive a
"multitude of sins," not only in themselves but in others;
love pours its balm over every wound and the substance of
its sympathy infuses hope and faith to the discouraged
heart. Divine love has a balm for every ill.
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