D8. God's Commands Are Man's Demands.

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Life is a science which has no end. There is no stage in existence when we can say: “We are finished.” The thing we imagine we comprehended and understood to‑day may have to the awakened and ever awakening mind a new meaning and interpretation to‑morrow, and will have still newer and newer meanings and interpretations in the future. The thing bringing us evil to‑day may bring good to‑morrow. That depends upon our knowledge of its use. Gunpowder is dangerous in the hands of a boy. It is not so dangerous as used by a skilled blaster. Again, the thing we think to be for good to‑day we may find an evil to‑morrow

 

The word to which we attach a certain meaning to‑day may have an entirely new meaning to‑morrow. Ideas cannot be expressed merely by the sound of certain letters and syllables. As our mental vision grows clearer and clearer every word in the language will have a new meaning for us. These meanings cannot be found in the dictionary. There is a language of idea which words can never fully express, and no dictionary can keep pace with it.

 

It is impossible for man to ask of the Infinite in the tone of an abject beggar or a groveling suppliant when he realizes that he is a part of the Infinite. As a part of the measureless whole he can demand. As a part he cannot command that Power which has no beginning, no ending and is not compassable by any human mind.

 

When a soul is thoroughly awakened and cries out, “What shall I do to be saved?” that question is past the bounds of supplication. It is in the spirit of earnest demand. That is the spirit the Supreme Power requires of us before it can give us what it insists on giving us and what the Supreme Mind knows we most need. When you would do an individual a genuine good you want that person to thoroughly appreciate the value of what you have to give and to be keenly alive to the good it will do him. His is then an earnest demand for such favor. The Infinite requires of us the same mood of earnest demand for the good He will do us.

 

The locomotive of itself does not draw the train. It is only a machine for the power of steam to act on and through. We stand in somewhat similar relation to the Supreme Mind. As we demand power of that mind, power will come to us, and work results through us.

 

A thought has power to work results in proportion to the amount of demand put in to it. The Supreme. Power puts such force of demand into it—not we. The more of truth in the thought, the more is there of the Supreme Power in it, the more is there of the quality of demand and the greater are the results coming of such thought as it acts and works through the individual.

 

The inspiration which invents or accomplishes great things or what is called Genius, comes of the force of demand. It is an imperative thought, or force, acting on the individual and compelling him to write, to invent, to act or do in some way what never was done before.

 

Such thoughts or forces acting on Shakespeare compelled him to write and express ideas in a material form. He, of himself, did not make those thoughts. They came to him ready‑made. Nor could he tell how they were made. They came knocking imperatively at his door demanding admittance and utterance in words. He would have been miserable had he been denied the pleasure of writing them. His works came of the same power which has accomplished all miracles, ancient or modern. That is the power of an idea acting on the individual and demanding expression in some material form. Such thoughts give the individual no rest until he commences working them out. They forced Watts and Fulton to recognize and apply the force of steam. They forced Franklin and Morse and Edison and others to work out the miracles wrought seemingly by electricity. Such thoughts have forced every inventor, every discoverer, every poet, every writer, every artist, to those inspirations and results which are as much miracles as are those told of in the Mosaic and Christ record. They are the commands of the Illimitable Mind in the limited intelligence, and such commands come in response to the demands of the limited or human intelligence.

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A greater force of thought than ever is coming to this planet. It is in its nature demanding and imperative. It will show man a new life, a new meaning in life and a newer and better way to live. It will abolish very much of what we now deem indispensable to our comfort and convenience, for it will show us a better way. When the railway came with its thirty miles per hour, it demanded the abandonment of the stage coach with its ten miles per hour. The railroad is the better way until something superior to it comes.

 

The more we become channels for the Supreme Power to act through, the more will be done through us. We may become more and more such channels by simply keeping in mind the idea that we are such channels and demanding of the Infinite Mind to work more and more through us.

 

In healing ourselves, for instance, we need to demand of the Infinite Mind that a positive, imperative thought of health act on us. But we must not of ourselves try to manufacture such thought, or make it imperative. That is the business of the Supreme.

 

If we make such attempt it is the individual who is vainly trying to usurp the functions of the Infinite. We have nothing to do but keep quiet and receive what God sends us.

 

We say in substance to the Infinite Mind: “I demand that your will be done with me. I demand to be made whole mentally and physically, for wholeness (holiness) is the characteristic of the Infinite, and I, being a part of that vast whole, demand wholeness. But I do not prescribe or direct the Infinite how I shall get perfect health. I will not say I want my limbs, or my stomach, or any special part of me made well immediately, for the wisdom far greater than mine acting on me may, for some purpose I cannot now understand, seem to retard the recovery of parts I deem so essential, knowing that much else must be done before perfect health is realized. I demand of the Infinite to take care of me. I surrender myself up to that care as I would obey the suggestions of a skilled physician in whom I had perfect confidence. I do not demand of the Infinite to be cured by the method I think best. I do demand to he cured in such way as that Higher Wisdom thinks best.”

 

A thought like this is an imperative force for health acting on you. It comes as demanded of the Imperial Power ruling this universe. Can you, the smaller part, make it as imperative and powerful as the measureless power of the Infinite?

 

A demand like this taps the exhaustless source of all thought and wisdom. It puts you in connection with the measureless wisdom. It brings then from time to time other imperative thoughts to act on you for perfect wholeness and a never ending health. And as so brought one after another and they become parts of you and your eyes are opened to see clearer and clearer, you may be amazed to look through those new eyes with your new mind and see what foolish things your self of the past has tried to command God to do for you.

 

A thought and the act accompanying that thought to accomplish results must be positive or imperative. You cannot drive a nail properly in an undecided, halting, hesitating frame of mind. You cannot send the hammer with any force straight to its mark unless your mind goes to that mark first with similar directness of purpose. You must demand that it goes there with such directness. You pray that the hammer should go in such manner. You pray in every positive act of your life, great or small, and when you pray you demand. If you pray like a beggar, fearing that in using the hammer it won’t hit the nail unless the Deity sees fit that it should, the chances are that you miss that nail many times.

 

This co‑operate demand made by hundreds at once did bring to them temporarily a different thought element or atmosphere from that in which they ordinarily lived. It stimulated them. It filled them with excitement. It swept over those assemblies a great spiritual wave. It prostrated men, women and children. It sent some into trances. It filled some with the deepest grief. It filled others with a frantic joy. It was a real thing or force brought to them by means of the power of the demand they put out.

 

The spirit of demand is a Divine law. It acts on all created things, to make them finer and better. It has brought this planet and all things on it from the chaos and crudity of countless ages past up to its present degree of refinement. It cannot be checked. When you would force it back it returns with more power and in a different form.

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This great, silent demand of many thousands is going out night and day. It is a mighty, unseen force, working, acting, and bringing results whether those who make such demand keep it always in mind or not. Forgetfulness for a time of the thing demanded does not lessen the working power of the demand to draw to us the thing demanded.

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This demand is in many who would not dare tell it even to themselves. We often try to beat back thoughts and longings which come to us. But they do come again and again. They will not be beaten back. They are imperative forces knocking and asking for admittance. They may so come for years before they are expressed in words to others. Perhaps our first verbal recognition of them is when we bear them talked out or written out by another and then we say in surprise, “Why, I have been thinking those same thoughts for years.”

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Silent demand works more powerfully than if spoken. The mood or frame of mind which makes it, never ceases, though it may at times be out of the material memory. The individual does not create this imperative thought acting on him, nor does he operate it. It comes to him a creation, a force from the Supreme Power. It works on him and will re‑create him in time. The Infinite is ever sending thoughts to this planet which change it and the people on it into newer and still newer beings and happier beings. They are forces which will not let people fossilize on any tread‑mill of belief. They make people see injustice and absurdity. These imperative thoughts are as rays of clear light darting into dark cellars. Those rays to‑day forbid imperatively that persecution of one sect by another which went on in this country two hundred years ago. They have changed the hard, relentless, avenging Deity of but sixty years ago into a conception more gentle and merciful. They are the commands of the Infinite, saying to us, “You must know more of me. You must cease to worship a sound, a word of three letters, and worship me by a daily increasing admiration and appreciation of the millions and millions of ways in which I express myself through material things. Demand of me the power and I will make newer and ever newer senses which will cause you to see and feel new things and new sensations in leaves and trees, rocks, and stones, the sun, snow and rain. I will so refine you that you shall see and feel powers and forces, and things of beauty all about you, of which you now have no conception. I will give you power over your body so that you cannot lose it, and make you realize that the last great enemy to be overcome is Death.”

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When men and women call themselves “unworthy creatures” and “miserable sinners” they are helping to make themselves so. What we think and call ourselves we make of ourselves.

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That blind, cringing, fearing spirit, which abases itself before the Supreme is not reverence. True reverence is based on the amount of our appreciation and knowledge of the wonderful never ending powers and qualities in the Supreme. The more of this knowledge and appreciation we demand the more must we reverence the Endless Mind, the I Am, and I Am of Infinity.

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Q's note:

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"In the Oceans of me, I define, I design my Recovery!" James Arthur - Recovery - YouTube