THE LORDS PRAYER
Emmet
Fox
The Sermon
On The Mount
Harper-Collins Publishers
1934
The
Lord's Prayer is the most
important of all the Christian
documents. It was carefully constructed
by Jesus with certain very clear ends
in view. That is why, of all his
teachings, it is by far the best known,
and the most often quoted. It is,
indeed, the one common denominator of
all the Christian churches. Every one
of them, without exception, uses the
Lord's Prayer; it is perhaps the only
ground upon which they all meet. Every
Christian child is taught the Lord's
Prayer, and any Christian who prays at
all says it almost every day. Its
actual use probably exceeds that of all
other prayers put together. Undoubtedly
everyone who is seeking to follow along
the Way that Jesus led, should make a
point of using the Lord's Prayer, and
using it intelligently, every
day.
In order to do this, we should
understand that the Prayer is a
carefully constructed organic whole.
Many people rattle through it like
parrots, forgetful of the warning that
Jesus gave us against vain repetitions,
and, of course, no one derives any
profit from that sort of thing.
The Great Prayer is a compact formula
for the development of the soul. It is
designed with the utmost care for the
specific purpose; so that those who use
it regularly, with understanding, will
experience a real change of soul. The
only progress is this change, which is
what the Bible calls being born again.
It is the change of soul that matters.
The mere acquisition of fresh knowledge
received intellectually makes no change
in the soul. The Lord's Prayer is
especially designed to bring this
change about, and when it is regularly
used it invariably does so.
The more one analyzes the Lord's
Prayer, the more wonderful is its
construction seen to be. It meets
everyone's need just at his own level.
It not only provides a rapid spiritual
development for those who are
sufficient advanced to be ready, but in
its superficial meaning it supplies the
more simpleminded and even the more
materially-minded people with just what
they need at the moment, if they use
the Prayer sincerely.
The greatest of all prayers was
designed with still another purpose in
view, quite as important as either of
the others. Jesus foresaw that, as
centuries went by, his simple,
primitive teaching would gradually
become overlain by all sorts of
external things which really have
nothing whatever to do with it. He
foresaw that men who had never known
him, relying, quite sincerely, no
doubt, upon their own limited
intellects, would build up theologies
and doctrinal systems, obscuring the
direct simplicity of the spiritual
message, and actually erecting a wall
between God and man. He designed his
Prayer in such a way that it would pass
safely through those ages without being
tampered with. He arranged it with
consummate skill, so that it could not
be twisted or distorted, or adapted to
any man-made system; so that, in fact,
it would carry the whole Christ Message
within him and yet not have anything on
the surface to attract the attention of
the restless, managing type of person.
So it has turned out that, through all
the changes and chances of Christian
history, this Prayer has come through
to us uncorrupted and unspoiled.
The first thing that we notice is that
the Prayer naturally falls into seven
clauses. This is very characteristic of
the Oriental tradition. Seven
symbolizes individual soul, just as the
number twelve in the same convention
stands for corporate completeness. In
practical use, we often find an eighth
clause added - "Thine is the kingdom,
the power, and the glory" - but this,
though in itself an excellent
affirmation, is not really a part of
the Prayer. The seven clauses are put
together with the utmost care, in
perfect order and sequence, and they
contain everything that is necessary
for the nourishment of the soul. Let us
consider the first clause:
Our
Father
This simple statement in itself
constitutes a definite and complete
system of theology. It fixes clearly
and distinctly the nature and character
of God. It sums up the Truth of Being.
It tells all that man needs to know
about God, and about himself, and about
his neighbor. Anything that is added to
this can only be by way of commentary,
and is more likely than not to
complicate and obscure the true meaning
of the text. Oliver Wendell Holmes
said: "My religion is summed up in the
first two words of the Lord's Prayer,"
and most of us will find ourselves in
full agreement with him.
Notice the simple, clear-cut, definite
statement - "Our Father." In this
clause Jesus lays down once and for all
that the relationship between God and
man is that of father and child. This
cuts out any possibility that the Deity
could be the relentless and cruel
tyrant that is often pictured by
theology. Jesus says definitely that
the relationship is that of parent and
child; not an Oriental despot dealing
with groveling slaves, but parent and
child. Now we all know perfectly well
that men and women, however short they
may fall in other respects, nearly
always do the best they can for their
children. Unfortunately, cruel and
wicked parents are to be found, but
they are so exceptional as to make a
paragraph for the newspapers. The vast
majority of men and women are at their
best in dealing with their children.
Speaking of the same truth elsewhere,
Jesus said: "If you, who are so full of
evil, nevertheless do your best for
your children, how much more so will
God, who is altogether good, do for
you"; and so he begins his Prayer by
establishing the character of God as
that of the perfect Father dealing with
His children.
Note that this clause which fixes the
nature of God at the same time fixes
the nature of man, because if man is
the offspring of God, he must partake
of the nature of God, since the nature
of the offspring is invariably similar
to that of the parent. It is a cosmic
law that like begets like. It is not
possible that a rosebush should produce
lilies, or that a cow should give birth
to a colt. The offspring is and must be
of the same nature as the parent; and
so, since God is Divine Spirit, man
must essentially be Divine Spirit too,
whatever appearances may say to the
contrary.
Let us pause here for a moment and try
to realize what a tremendous step
forward we have taken in appreciating
the teaching of Jesus on this point. Do
you not see that at a single blow it
swept away ninety-nine percent of all
the old theology, with its avenging
God, its chosen and favorite
individuals, its eternal hell fire, and
all the other horrible paraphernalia of
man's diseased and terrified
imagination. God exists - and the
Eternal, All-Powerful, All-Present God
is the loving Father of mankind.
If you would meditate upon this acct,
until you had some degree of
understanding of what it really means,
most of your difficulties and physical
ailments would disappear, for they are
rooted and grounded in fear. The
underlying cause of all trouble is
fear. If only you could realize to some
extent that Omnipotent Wisdom is your
living, loving Father, most of your
fears would go. If you could realize it
completely, every negative thing in
your life would vanish away, and you
would demonstrate perfection in every
phase. Now you see the object that
Jesus had in mind when he placed this
clause first.
Next we see that the Prayer says, not
"My Father," but "Our Father," and this
indicates, beyond the possibility of
mistake, the truth of the brotherhood
of man. It forces upon our attention at
the very beginning the fact that ll men
are indeed brethren, the children of
one Father; and that "there is neither
Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond
nor free, there is neither chose nor
unchosen," because all men are
brethren. Here Jesus in making his
second point, ends all the tiresome
nonsense about a "chosen race,: about
the spiritual superiority of an one
group of human beings over any other
group. He cuts away the illusion that
the members of any nation, or race, or
territory, or group, or class, or
color, are, in the sight of God,
superior to any other group. A belief
in the superiority of one's own
particular group, or "herd," as the
psychologists call it, is an illusion
to which mankind is very prone, but in
the teaching of Jesus it has no place.
He teaches that the thing that places a
man is the spiritual condition of his
own individual soul, and that as long
as he is upon the spiritual path it
makes no difference whatever to what
group he belongs or does not
belong.
The final point is the implied command
that we are to pray not only for
ourselves but for all mankind. Every
student of Truth should hold the
thought of the Truth of Being for the
whole human race for a least a moment
each day, since none of us lives to
himself nor lies to himself; for indeed
we are all truly - an in a much more
literal sense than people are aware -
limbs of on Body.
Now we begin to see how very much more
than appears on the surface is
contained in those simple words "Our
Father." Simple - one might almost say
innocent - as they look, Jesus has
concealed within them a spiritual
explosive that will ultimately destroy
every man-made system that holds the
human race in bondage.
Which
Art In Heaven
Having clearly established the
Fatherhood of God and the brotherhood
of man, Jesus next goes on to enlarge
upon the nature of God, and to describe
the fundamental facts of existence.
Having shown that God and man are
parent and child, he goes on to
delineate the function of each in the
grand scheme of things. He explains
that it is the nature of God to be in
heaven, and of man to be on earth,
because God is Cause, and man is
manifestation. Cause cannot be
expression, and expression cannot be
cause, and we must be careful not to
confuse the two things. Here heaven
stands for God or Cause, because in
religious phraseology heaven is the
term for the Presence of God. In
metaphysics it is called the Absolute,
because it is the realm of Pure
Unconditioned Being, of archetypal
ideas. The word "earth" means
manifestation, and man's function is to
manifest or express God, or Cause. In
other words, God is the Infinite and
Perfect Cause of all things; but Cause
has to be expressed, and God expresses
Himself by means of man. Man's destiny
is to express God in all sorts of
glorious and wonderful ways. Some of
this expression we see as his
surroundings; first his physical body,
which is really only the most intimate
part of his embodiment; then his home;
his work; his recreation; in short, his
whole expression. To express means to
press outwards, or bring into sight
that which already exists implicitly.
Every feature of your life is really a
manifestation or expression of
something in your soul.
Some of these points may seem at first
to be a little abstract; but since it
is misunderstandings about the
relationship of God and man that lead
to all our difficulties, it is worth
any amount of trouble to correctly
understand that relationship. Trying to
have manifestation without Cause is
atheism and materialism, and we know
where they lead. Trying to have Cause
without manifestation leads man to
suppose himself to be a personal God,
and this commonly ends in megalomania
and a kind of paralysis of
expression.
The important thing to realize is that
God is in heaven and man on earth, and
that each has his own role in the
scheme of things. Although they are
One, they are not one-and-the-same.
Jesus establishes this point carefully
when he says, "Our Father which art in
heaven.
Hallowed Be Thy
Name
In the Bible, as elsewhere, the "name"
of anything means the essential nature
or character of that thing, and so,
when we are told what the name of God
is, we are told what His nature is, and
His name or nature, Jesus says, is
"hallowed." Now what does the word
"hallowed" mean? Well, if you trace the
derivation back into Old English, you
will discover a most extraordinarily
interesting and significant fact. The
word "hallowed" has the same meaning as
"holy, ", "whole," "wholesome," and
"heal," or "healed"; so we see that the
nature of God is not merely worthy of
our veneration, but is complete and
perfect - altogether good. Some very
remarkable consequences follow from
this. We have agreed that an effect
must be similar in its nature to its
cause, and so, because the nature of
God is hallowed, everything that
follows from that Cause must be
hallowed or perfect too. Just as a
rosebush cannot produce lilies, so God
cannot cause or send anything but
perfect good. As the Bible says, "The
same fountain cannot send forth both
sweet and bitter water." From this it
follows that God cannot, as people
sometimes think, send sickness or
trouble, or accidents - much less death
- for these things are unlike His
nature. "Hallowed be thy name" means
"Thy nature is altogether good and Thou
art the author only of perfect good."
Of purer eyes than to behold evil, and
canst not look on iniquity.
If you think that God has sent any of
your difficulties to you, for no matter
how good a reason, you are giving power
to your troubles, and this makes it
very difficult to get rid of
them.
Thy
Kingdom Come Thy Will Be Done In Earth
As It Is In Heaven
Man being manifestation or expression
of God has a limitless destiny before
him. His work is to express, in
concrete definite form, the abstract
ideas with which God furnishes him, and
in order to do this, he must have
creative power. If he did not have
creative power, he would be merely a
machine through which God worked - an
automaton. But man is not an automaton;
he is an individualized consciousness.
God individualizes Himself in an
infinite number of distinct focal
points of consciousness, each one quite
different; and therefore each one is a
distinct way of knowing the universe,
each a distinct experience. Notice
carefully that the word "individual"
means undivided. The consciousness of
each one is distinct from God and from
all others, and yet none are separated.
How can this be? How can two things be
one, and yet not one and the same? The
answer is that in matter, which is
finite, they cannot; but in Spirit,
which is infinite, they can. With our
present limited, three-dimensional
consciousness, we cannot see this; but
intuitively we can understand it
through prayer. If God did not
individualize Himself, there would be
only one experience; as it is, there
are as many universes as there are
individuals to form them through
thinking.
"Thy kingdom come" means that it is our
duty to be ever occupied in helping to
establish; the Kingdom of God on earth.
That is to say, our work is to bring
more upon this plane. That is what we
are here for. The old saying, "God has
a plan for every man, and he has on for
you," is quite correct. God has
glorious and wonderful plans for every
one of us; He has planned a splendid
career, full of interest, life, and
joy, for each, and if our lives are
dull, or restricted, or squalid, that
is not his fault, but ours.
If only you will find out the thing God
intends you to do, and will do it, you
will find that all doors will open to
you; all obstacles in your path will
melt away; you will be acclaimed a
brilliant success; you will be most
liberally rewarded from the monetary
point of view; and you will be
gloriously happy.
There is a true place in life for each
one of us, upon the attainment of which
we shall be completely happy, and
perfectly secure. On the other hand,
until we do find our true place we
never shall be either happy or secure,
not matter what other things we may
have. Our true place is the one place
where we can bring the Kingdom of God
into manifestation, and truly say, "Thy
kingdom cometh."
We have seen that man too often chooses
to use his free will in a negative way.
He allows himself to think wrongly,
selfishly, and this wrong thinking
brings upon him all his troubles.
Instead of understanding that it is his
essential nature to express God, to be
ever about his Father's business, he
tries to set up upon his own account.
All our troubles arise from just this
folly. We abuse our free will, trying
to work apart from God; and the very
natural result is all the sickness,
poverty, sin, trouble, and death that
we find on the physical plane. We must
never for a moment try to live for
ourselves, or make plans or
arrangements without reference to God,
or suppose that we can be either happy
or successful if we are seeking any
other end than to do His Will. Whatever
our desire may be, whether it be
something concerning our daily work, or
our duty at home, our relations with
our fellowman, or private plans for the
employment of our own time, if we seek
to serve self instead of God, we are
ordering trouble, disappointment, and
unhappiness, notwithstanding what the
evidence to the contrary may seem to
be. Whereas, if we choose what, through
prayer, we know to be His Will, then we
are insuring for ourselves ultimate
success, freedom, and joy, however much
self-sacrifice and self-discipline it
may involve at the moment.
Our business is to bring our whole
nature as fast as we can into
conformity with the Will of God, by
constant prayer and unceasing, though
unanxious, watching. "Our wills are
ours to make them Thine."
"In His Will is our peace," said Dante,
and the Divine Comedy is really a study
in fundamental states of consciousness,
the Inferno representing the state of
the soul that is endeavoring to live
without God, the Paradise representing
the state of the soul that has achieved
its conscious unity with the Divine
Will, and the Purgatorio the condition
of the soul that is struggling to pass
from the one state to the other. It was
this sublime conflict of the soul which
wrung from the heart of the great
Augustine the cry "Thou hast made us
for Thyself, and our hearts are
restless until they repose in
Thee."
Give
Us This Day Our Daily
Bread
Because we are the children of a loving
Father, we are entitled to expect that
God will provide us fully with
everything we need. Children naturally
and spontaneously look to their human
parents to supply all their wants, and
in the same way we should look to God
to supply ours. If we do so, in faith
and understanding, we shall never look
in vain.
It is the Will of God that we should
all lead healthy, happy lives, full of
joyous experience; that we should
develop freely and steadily, day by day
and week by week, as our pathways
unfold more and more unto the perfect
day. To this end we require such things
as food, clothing, shelter, means of
travel, books, and so on; above all, we
require freedom; and in the Prayer all
these things are included under the
heading of bread. Bread, that is to
say, means not merely food in general,
but all things that man requires for a
healthy, happy, free, and harmonious
life. But in order to obtain these
things, we have to claim them, not
necessarily in detail, but we have to
claim them, and, we have to recognize
God and God alone as the Source and
fountainhead of all our good. Lack of
any kind is always traceable to the
fact that we have been seeking our
supply from some secondary source,
instead of from God Himself, the Author
and Giver of life.
People think of their supply as coming
from certain investments, or from a
business, or from an employer, perhaps;
whereas these are merely the channels
through which it comes, God being the
Source. The number of possible channels
is infinite, the Source is One. The
particular channel through which you
are getting your supply is quite likely
to change, because change is the Cosmic
Law for manifestation. Stagnation is
really death; but as long as you
realize that the Source of your supply
is the one unchangeable Spirit, all is
well. The fading out of one channel
will be but the signal for the opening
of another. If, on the other hand, like
most people, you regard the particular
channel as being the source, then when
that channel fails, as it is very
likely to do, you are left stranded,
because you believe that the source has
dried up - and for practical purposes,
on the physical plane, things are a we
believe them to be.
A man, for instance, thinks of his
employment as the source of his income,
and for some reason he loses it. His
employer goes out of business, or cuts
down the staff, or they have a falling
out. Now, because he believes that his
position is the source of his income,
the loss of the position naturally
means the loss of the income, and so he
has to start looking about for another
job, and perhaps has to look a long
time, meanwhile finding himself without
apparent supply. If such a man had
realized, through regular daily
Treatment, that God was his supply, and
his job only the particular channel
through which it came, then upon the
closing of that channel, he would have
found another, and probably a better
one, opening immediately. If his belief
had been in God as his supply, then
since God cannot change or fail, or
fade out, his supply would have come
from somewhere, and would have formed
its own channel in whatever was the
easiest way.
In precisely the same way the
proprietor of a business may find
himself obliged to close down for some
cause outside of his control; or one
whose income is dependent upon stocks
or bond may suddenly find that source
dried up, owing to unexpected
happenings on the stock market, or to
some catastrophe to a factory or mine.
If he regards the business or the
investment as his source of supply, he
will believe his source to have
collapsed, and will in consequence be
left stranded; whereas, if his reliance
is upon God, he will be comparatively
indifferent to the channel and so that
channel will be easily supplanted by a
new one. In short, we have to train
ourselves to look to God, Cause, for
all that we need, and then the channel,
which is entirely a secondary matter,
will take care of itself.
In its inner and most important
meaning, our daily bread signifies the
realization of the Presence of God - an
actual sense that God exists not merely
in a nominal way, but as the great
reality; the sense that He is present
with us; and the feeing that because He
is God, all-good, all-powerful,
all-wise, and all-loving, we have
nothing to fear; that we can rely upon
Him to take every care of use; that He
will supply all that we need to have;
teach us all that we need to know; and
guide our steps so that we shall not
make mistakes. This is Emanuel, or God
with us; and remember that it
absolutely means some degree of actual
realization, that is to say, some
experience in consciousness, and not
just a theoretical recognition of the
fact; not simply talking about God,
however beautifully one may talk, or
thinking about Him; but some degree of
actual experience. We must begin by
thinking about God, but this should
lead to the realization which is the
daily bread or manna. That is the gist
of the whole matter. Realization, which
is experience, is the thing that
counts. It is realization which marks
the progress of the soul. It is
realization which guarantees the
demonstration. It is realization, as
distinct from mere theorizing and fine
words, which is the substance of things
hoped for, the evidence of things not
seen. This is the Bread of Life, the
hidden manna, and when one has that, he
has all things in deed and in truth.
Jesus several times refers to this
experience as bread because it is the
nourishment of the soul, just as
physical food is the nourishment of the
physical body. Supplied with this food,
the soul grows and waxes strong,
gradually developing to adult stature.
Without it, she, being deprived of her
essential nourishment, is naturally
stunted and crippled.
The common mistake, of course, is to
suppose that a formal recognition of
God is sufficient, or that talking
about Divine things, perhaps talking
very poetically, is the same as
possessing them; but this is exactly on
a par with supposing that looking at a
tray of food, or discussing the
chemical composition of sundry
foodstuffs, is the same things as
actually eating a meal. It is this
mistake which is responsible for the
fact that people sometimes pray for a
thing for years without any tangible
result. If prayer is a force at all, it
cannot be possible to pray without
something happening.
A realization cannot be obtained to
order; it must come spontaneously as
the result of regular daily prayer. To
seek realization by will power is the
surest way to miss it. Pray regularly
and quietly - remember that in all
mental work, effort or strain defeats
itself - then presently, perhaps when
you least expect it, like a thief in
the night, the realization will come.
Meanwhile it is well to know that all
sorts of practical difficulties can be
overcome by sincere prayer, without any
realization at all. Good workers have
said that they have had some of their
best demonstrations without any
realization worth speaking about; but
while it is, of course, a wonderful
boon to surmount such particular
difficulties, we do not achieve the
sense of security and well-being to
which we are entitled until we have
experienced realization.
Another reason why the food or bread
symbol for the experience of the
Presence of God is such a telling one
is that the act of eating food is
essentially a thing that must be done
for oneself. No one can assimilate food
for another. One may hire servants to
do all sorts of other things for him;
but there is on thing that one must
positively do for himself, and that is
to eat his own food. In the same way,
the realization of the Presence of God
is a thing that no one else can have
for us. We can and should help one
another in the overcoming of specific
difficulties - "Bear ye one another's
burdens" - but the realization (or
making real) of the Presence of God,
the "substance" and "evidence," can, in
the nature of things, be had only at
firsthand.
In speaking of the "bread of life,
Emanuel," Jesus call it our daily
bread. The reason for this is very
fundamental - our contact with God must
be a living one. It is our momentary
attitude to God which governs our
being. "Behold now is the accepted
time; behold now is the day of
salvation." The most futile thing in
the world is to seek to live upon a
past realization. The thing that means
spiritual life to you is your
realization of God here and now.
Today's realization, no matter how
feeble and poor it may seem, has a
million times more power to help you
than the most vivid realization of
yesterday. Be thankful for yesterday's
experience, knowing that it is with
your forever in the change of
consciousness which it has brought
about, but do not lean upon it for a
single moment for the need of today.
Divine Spirit is, and changes not with
the ebb and flow of human apprehension.
The manna, in the desert is the Old
Testament prototype of this. The people
wandering in the wilderness were told
that they would be supplied with manna
from heaven every day, each one always
receiving abundant for his needs, but
they were on no account to try to save
it up for the morrow. They were on no
account to endeavor to live upon
yesterday's food, and when,
notwithstanding the rule, some of them
did try to do so, the result was
pestilence or death.
So it is with us. When we seek to live
upon yesterday's realization, we are
actually seeking to live in the past,
and to live in the past is death. The
art of life is to live in the present
moment, and to make that moment as
perfect as we can by the realization
that we are the instruments and
expression of God Himself. the best way
to prepare for tomorrow is to make
today all that it should be.
Forgive Us Our
Trespasses As We Forgive Them That
Trespass Against Us
This clause is the turning point of the
Prayer. It is the strategic key to the
whole Treatment. Let us notice here
that Jesus has so arranged this
marvelous Prayer that it covers the
entire ground of the unfoldment of our
souls completely, and in the most
concise and telling way. It omits
nothing that is essential for our
salvation, and yet, so compact is it
that there is not a thought or a word
too much. Every idea fits into its
place with perfect harmony and in
perfect sequence. Anything more would
be redundancy, anything less would be
incompleteness, and at this point it
takes up the critical factor of
forgiveness.
Having told us what God is, what man
is, how the universe works, how we are
to do our own work - the salvation of
humanity and of our own souls - he then
explains what our true nourishment or
supply is, and the way in which we can
obtain it; and now he comes to the
forgiveness of sins.
The forgiveness of sins is the central
problem of life. Sin is a sense of
separateness from God, and is the major
tragedy of human experience. It is, of
course, rooted in selfishness. It is
essentially an attempt to gain some
supposed good to which we are not
entitled in justice. It is a sense of
isolated, self-regarding, personal
existence, whereas the Truth of Being
is that all is One. Our true selves are
at one with God, undivided from Him,
expressing His ideas, witnessing to His
nature - the dynamic Thinking of that
Mind. Because we are all one with the
great Whole of which we are spiritually
a part, it follows that we are one with
all men. Just because in Him we live
and move and have our being, we are, in
the absolute sense, all essentially
one.
Evil, sin, the fall of man, in fact, is
essentially the attempt to negative
this Truth in our thoughts. We try to
live apart from God. We try to do
without Him. We act as though we had
life of our own; as separate minds; as
though we could have plans and purposes
and interests separate from His. All
this, if it were true, would mean that
existence is not one and harmonious,
but a chaos of competition and strife.
It would mean that we are quite
separate from our fellow man and could
injure him, rob him, or hurt him, or
even destroy him, without any damage to
ourselves, and, in fact, that the more
we took from other people the more we
would have for ourselves. It would mean
that the more we considered our own
interests, and the more indifferent we
were to the welfare of others, the
better off we would be. Of course it
would then follow naturally that it
would pay other to treat us in the same
way, and that accordingly we might
expect many of them to do so. Now it
this were true, it would mean that the
whole universe is only a jungle, and
that sooner or later it must destroy
itself by its own inherent weakness and
anarchy. But, of course, it is not
true, and therein lies the joy of
live.
Undoubtedly, may people do act as
though they believed it to be true, and
a great many more, who would be
dreadfully shocked if brought
face-to-face with that proposition in
cold blood, have, nevertheless, a vague
feeling that such must be very much the
way things are, even though they,
themselves, are personally above
consciously acting in accordance with
such a notion. Now this is the real
basis of sin, of resentment, of
condemnation, of jealousy, of remorse,
and all the evil brood that walk that
path.
This belief in independent and separate
existence is the arch sin, and now,
before we can progress any further, we
have to take the knife to this evil
thing and cut it out once and for all.
Jesus knew this, and with this definite
end in view he inserted at this
critical point a carefully prepared
statement that would compass our end
and his, without the shadow of a
possibility of miscarrying. He inserted
what is nothing less than a trip
clause. He drafted a declaration which
would force us, without any conceivable
possibility of escape, evasion, mental
reservation, or subterfuge of any kind,
to execute the great sacrament of
forgiveness in all its fullness and
far-reaching power.
As we repeat the Great Prayer
intelligently, considering and meaning
what we say, we are suddenly, so to
speak, caught up off our feet and
grasped as though in a vise, so that we
must face this problem - and there is
no escape. We must positively and
definitely extend forgiveness to
everyone to whom it is possible that we
can owe forgiveness, namely, to anyone
who we think can have injured us in any
way. Jesus leaves no room for any
possible glossing of this fundamental
thing. He has constructed his Prayer
with more skill than any lawyer
displayed in the casting of a deed. He
has so contrived it that once our
attention has been drawn to this
matter, we are inevitably obligated
either to forgive our enemies in
sincerity and truth, or never again to
repeat that prayer. It is safe to say
that no one who reads this with
understanding will ever again be able
to use the Lord's Prayer unless and
until he has forgiven. Should you now
attempt to repeat it without forgiving,
it can safely be predicted that you
will not be able to finish it. This
great central clause will stick in your
throat.
Notice that Jesus does not say,
"Forgive me my trespasses and I will
try to forgive others," or "I will see
if it can be done," or "I will forgive
generally, with certain exceptions." He
obliges us to declare that we have
actually forgiven, and forgiven all,
and he makes our claim to our own
forgiveness to depend upon that. Who is
there who has grace enough to say his
prayers at all, who does not long for
the forgiveness or cancellation of his
own mistakes and faults. Who would be
so insane as to endeavor to seek the
Kingdom of God without desiring to be
relieved of his own sense of guilt. No
one, we may believe. And so we see that
we are trapped in the inescapable
position that we cannot demand our own
release before we have released our
brother.
The forgiveness of others is the
vestibule of Heaven, and Jesus knew it,
and has led us to the door. You must
forgive everyone who has ever hurt you
if you want to be forgiven yourself;
that is the long and the short of it.
You have to get rid of all resentment
and condemnation of others, and, not
least, of self-condemnation and
remorse. You have to forgive others,
and having discontinued your own
mistakes, you have to accept the
forgiveness of God for them too, or you
cannot make any progress. You have to
forgive yourself, but you cannot
forgive yourself sincerely until you
have forgiven others first. Having
forgiven others, you must be prepared
to forgive yourself too, for to refuse
to forgive oneself is only spiritual
pride. "And by that sin fell the
angels." We cannot make this point too
clear to ourselves; we have got to
forgive. There are few people in the
world who have not at some time or
other been hurt, really hurt, by
someone else; or been disappointed, or
injured, or deceived, or misled. Such
things sink into the memory where they
usually cause inflamed and festering
wounds, and there is only one remedy -
they are to be plucked out and thrown
away. And the one and only way to do
that is by forgiveness.
Of course, nothing in all the world is
easier than to forgive people who have
not hurt us very much. Nothing is
easier than to rise above the thought
of a trifling loss. Anybody will be
willing to do this, but what the Law of
Being requires of us is that we forgive
not only these trifles, but the very
things that are so hard to forgive that
at first it seems impossible to do it
at all. The despairing heart cries, "It
is too much to ask. That thing meant
too much to me. It is impossible. I
cannot forgive." But the Lord's Prayer
makes our own forgiveness from God,
which means our escape from guilt and
limitation, dependent upon just this
very thing. There is no escape from
this, and so forgiveness there must be,
no matter how deeply we may have been
injured, or how terribly we have
suffered. It must be done.
If your prayers are not being answered,
search your consciousness and see if
there is not someone whom you have yet
to forgive. Find out if there is not
some old thing about which you are very
resentful. Search and see if you are
not really holding a grudge (it may be
camouflaged in some self-righteous way)
against some individual, or some body
of people, a nation, a race, a social
class, some religious movement or which
you disapprove perhaps, a political
party, or whatnot. If you are doing so,
then you have an act of forgiveness to
perform, and when this is done, you
will probably make your demonstration.
If you cannot forgive at present, you
will have to wait for your
demonstration until you can, and you
will have to postpone finishing your
recital of the Lord's Prayer too, or
involve yourself in the position that
you do not desire the forgiveness of
God.
Setting other free means setting
yourself free, because resentment is
really a form of attachment. It is a
Cosmic Truth that it takes two to make
a prisoner; the prisoner - and a
gaoler. There is no such thing as being
a prisoner on one's own account. Every
prisoner must have a gaoler, and the
gaoler is as much a prisoner as his
charge. When you hold resentment
against anyone, you are bound to that
person by a cosmic link, a real, though
mental chain. You are tied by a cosmic
tie to the thing that you hate. The one
person perhaps in the whole world whom
you most dislike is the very one to
whom you are attaching yourself by a
hook that is stronger than steel. Is
this what you wish? Is this the
condition in which you desire to go on
living? Remember, you belong to the
thing with which you are linked in
thought, and at some time or other, if
that tie endures, the object of your
resentment will be drawn again into
your life, perhaps to work further
havoc. Do you think that you can afford
this? Of course, no on can afford such
a thing; and so the way is clear. You
must cut all such ties, by a clear and
spiritual act of forgiveness. You must
loose him and let him go. By
forgiveness you set yourself free; you
save your soul. And because the law of
love works alike for one and all, you
help to save his soul too, making it
just so much easier for him to become
what he ought to be.
But how, in the name of all that is
wise and good, is the magic act of
forgiveness to be accomplished, when we
have been so deeply injured that,
though we have long wished with all our
hearts that we could forgive, we have
nevertheless found it impossible; when
we have tried and tried to forgive, but
have found the task beyond us.
The technique of forgiveness is simple
enough, and not very difficult to
manage when you understand how. The
only thing that is essential is
willingness to forgive. Provided you
desire to forgive the offender, the
greater part of the work is already
done. People have always made such a
bogey of forgiveness because they have
been under the erroneous impression
that to forgive a person means that you
have to compel yourself to like him.
Happily this is by no means the case -
we are not called upon to like anyone
whom we do not find ourselves liking
spontaneously, and, indeed, it is quite
impossible to like people to order. You
can no more like to order than you can
hold the winds in your fist, and if you
endeavor to coerce yourself into doing
so, you will finish by disliking or
hating the offender more than ever.
People use to think that when someone
had hurt them very much, it was their
duty, as good Christians, to pump up,
as it were, a feeling of liking for
him; and since such a thing is utterly
impossible, they suffered a great deal
of distress, and ended, necessarily,
with failure, and a resulting sense of
sinfulness. We are not obliged to like
anyone; but we are under a binding
obligation to love everyone, love, or
charity as the Bible calls it, meaning
a vivid sense of impersonal good will.
This has nothing directly to do with
the feelings though it is always
followed, sooner or later, by a
wonderful feeling of peace and
happiness.
The method of forgiving is this: Get by
yourself and become quiet. Repeat any
prayer or treatment that appeals to
you, or read a chapter of the Bible.
Then quietly say, "I fully and freely
forgive X (mentioning the name of the
offender); I loose him and let him go.
I completely forgive the whole business
in question. As far as I'm concerned,
it is finished forever. I cast the
burden or resentment upon the Christ
within me. He is free now, and I am
free too. I wish him well in every
phase of his life. The incident is
finished. The Christ Truth has set us
both free. I thank God." Then get up
and go about your business. On no
account repeat this act of forgiveness,
because you have done it once and for
all, and to do it a second time would
be tacitly to repudiate your own work.
Afterward, whenever the memory of the
offender of the offense happens to come
into your mind, bless the delinquent
briefly and dismiss the thought. Do
this, however many times the thought
may come back. After a few days it will
return less and less often, until you
forget it altogether. Then perhaps
after an interval, shorter or longer,
the old trouble may come back to memory
once more, but you will find that now
all bitterness and resentment have
disappeared, and you are both free with
the perfect freedom of the children of
God. Your forgiveness is complete. You
will experience a wonderful joy in the
realization of the demonstration.
Everybody should practice general
forgiveness every day as a matter of
course. When you say your daily
prayers, issue a general amnesty,
forgiving everyone who may have injured
you in any way, and on no account
particularize. Simply say, "I freely
forgive everyone." Then in the course
of the day, should the thought or
grievance or resentment come up, bless
the offender briefly and dismiss the
thought.
The result of this policy will be that
very soon you will find yourself
cleared of all resentment and
condemnation, and the effect upon your
happiness, your bodily health, and your
general life will be nothing less than
revolutionary.
Lead
Us Not Into Temptation But Deliver Us
From Evil
This clause has probably caused more
difficulty than any other part of the
Prayer. For many earnest people it has
been a veritable stumbling block. They
feel, and rightly, that God could not
lead anyone into temptation or into
evil in any circumstances, and so these
words do not ring true.
For this reason, a number of attempts
have been made to recast the wording.
People have felt that Jesus could not
have said what he is represented to
have said, and so they look about for
some phrasing which they think would be
more in accordance with the general
tone of his teaching. Heroic efforts
have been made to wrest the Greek
original into something different. All
this, however, is unnecessary. The
Prayer in the form in which we have it
in English gives us a perfectly correct
sense of the true inner meaning.
Remember that the Lord's Prayer covers
the whole of the spiritual life.
Condensed though the form is, it is
nevertheless a complete manual for the
development of the soul, and Jesus knew
only too well the subtle perils and
difficulties that can and do beset the
soul when once the preliminary stages
of spiritual unfoldment have been
passed. Because those who are yet at a
comparatively early stage of
development do not experience such
difficulties, they are apt to jump to
the conclusion that this clause is
unnecessary; but such is not the
case.
The facts are these - the more you
pray, the more time you spend in
meditation and spiritual treatment, the
more sensitive you become. And if you
spend a great deal of time working on
your soul in the right way, you will
become very sensitive. This is
excellent; but like everything in the
universe, it works both ways. The more
sensitive and spiritual you become, the
more powerful and effective are your
prayers, you do better healing, and you
advance rapidly. But, for the same
reason, you also become susceptible to
forms of temptation that simply do not
beset those at an earlier stage. You
will also find that for ordinary
faults, even things that many men and
women in the world would consider to be
trifling, you will be sharply punished,
and this is well, because it keeps you
up to the mark. The seemingly minor
transgressions, the "little foxes that
spoil the vines," would fritter away
our spiritual power if not promptly
dealt with.
No one at this level will be tempted to
pick a pocket, or burgle a house; this
does not by any means imply that one
will not have difficulties, and because
of their subtlety, even greater
difficulties to meet.
As we advance, new and powerful
temptations await us on the path, ever
ready to hurl us down if we are not
watchful - temptations to work for
self-glory, and self-aggrandizement
instead of for God; for personal honors
and distinctions, even for material
gain; temptations to allow personal
preferences to hold sway in our
counsels when it is a sacred duty to
deal with all men in perfect
impartiality. Above and beyond all
other sins the deadly sins of spiritual
pride, truly, "the last infirmity of
noble mind," lurks on this road. Many
fine souls who have triumphantly
surmounted all other testing have
lapsed into a condition of superiority
and self-righteousness that has fallen
like a curtain of steel between them
and God. Great knowledge brings great
responsibility. Great responsibility
betrayed brings terrible punishment in
its train. Noblesse oblige is
preeminently true in spiritual things.
One's knowledge of the Truth, however
little it may be, is a sacred trust for
humanity that must not be violated.
While we should never make the mistake
of casting our pearls before swine, nor
urge the Truth in quarters where it is
not welcome, yet we must do all that we
wisely can to spread the true knowledge
of God among mankind, that not one of
"these little ones" may go hungry
through our selfishness or our neglect.
"Feed my lambs, feed my sheep."
The old occult writers were so vividly
sensible of these dangers that, with
their instinct for dramatization, they
spoke of the soul as being challenged
by various tests as it traversed the
upward road. It was as though the
traveler were halted at various gates
or turnpike bars, and tested by some
ordeal to determine whether he were
ready to advance any further. If he
succeeded in passing the test, they
said, he was allowed to continue upon
his way with the blessing of the
challenger. If, however, he failed to
survive the ordeal, he was forbidden to
proceed.
Now, some less experienced souls, eager
for rapid advancement, have rashly
desired to be subjected immediately to
all kinds of test, and have even looked
about, seeking for difficulties to
overcome; as though one's own
personality did not already present
quite enough material for any one man
or woman to deal with. Forgetting the
lessons of our Lord's own ordeal in the
wilderness, forgetting the injunction
"Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy
God," they have virtually done this
very thing, with sad results. And so
Jesus has inserted this clause, in
which we pray that we may not have to
meet anything that is too much for us
at present level of our understanding.
And, if we are wise, and work daily, as
we should, for wisdom, understanding,
purity, and the guidance of the Holy
Spirit, we never shall find ourselves
in any difficulty for which we have not
the understanding necessary to clear
ourselves. Nothing shall by any means
hurt you. Behold I am with you
always.
Thine
Is The Kingdom And The Power And The
Glory For Ever And Ever
This is a wonderful gnomic saying
summing up the essential truth of the
Omnipresence and the Allness of God. It
means that God is indeed All in All,
the doer, the doing, and the deed, and
one can say also the spectator. The
Kingdom in this sense means all
creation on every plane, for that is
the Presence of God - God as
manifestation or expression.
The Power, of course, is the Power of
God. We know that God is the only
power, and so, when we work, as when we
pray, it is really God doing it by
means of us. Just as the pianist
produces his music by mean of, or
through his fingers, so may mankind be
thought of as the fingers of God. His
is the Power. If, when you are praying,
you hold the though that it is really
God who is working through you, your
prayers will gain immeasurably in
efficiency. Say, "God is inspiring me."
If, when you have any ordinary thing to
do, you hold the thought, "Divine
Intelligence is working through me
now," you will perform the most
difficult tasks with astonishing
success.
The wondrous change that comes over us
as we gradually realize what the
Omnipresence of God really means,
transfigures every phase of our lives,
turning sorrow into joy, age into
youth, and dullness into light and
life. This is the glory - and the glory
which comes to us is, of course, God's
too. And the bliss we know in that
experience is still God Himself, who is
knowing that bliss through us.
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