Chapter 14
GOD'S
ABUNDANCE
Charles Fillmore
Keep a
True Lent
TIMES OF DEPRESSION
bring out the fact that in days of
prosperity man either forgot the
prayers and struggles that brought him
to success and apparent safety, or else
he failed to build his fortune on a
firm financial foundation. If he had
thought more about the source of life
and substance, he would have escaped
the needless grind of the poverty he
has endured right here in the midst of
abundance.
There is both a primary
and a secondary law of increase. Men
pile up possessions by human effort,
interest, and other ways of secondary
increase, and grow into the thought
that these are the real means of
attaining prosperity. But possessions
gained in this way rest on a very
insecure foundation and are often swept
away in a day. Then men are in despair
and often think that their means of
existence is gone forever and life is
not worth living. Such persons are
really never happy in their wealth,
because there is always a lurking fear
that they may lose it. They are
secretly troubled with the thought of
lack, in the presence of worldly
plenty.
We cannot help but think
that a wise and provident Creator must
have planned more permanent possessions
for His offspring. In Truth, He has so
planned. Access to this permanent
source of all man's good lies in his
power to possess and mold in thought
the omnipresent substance of
Spirit.
Apparently we live in
two worlds: an invisible world of
thoughts, and a visible world of
things. The invisible world of thought
substance is the real world, because it
is the source of the world of things,
and man stands between the two, handing
out with his thoughts the unlimited
substance of Spirit. When man gets
understanding of the right relation
between the visible and the invisible
into his mind and active in his
thought, all his needs will be met.
That is what Jesus meant when He said,
"Seek ye first his kingdom, and his
righteousness; and all these things
shall be added unto you."
But the invisible
thought substance provided for man is
very sensitive to man's thought about
it; that is, about the things that
originally came from it and that man
claims as his possessions. If man
hoards the things that he seems to
possess, he clogs the spiritual channel
from which they originally flowed and
so receives sparingly from that
source.
Watch your thoughts when
you are handling your money, because
your money is attached through your
mind to the one source of all substance
and all money. When you think of your
money, which is visible, as something
directly attached to an invisible
source that is giving or withholding
according to your thought, you have the
key to all riches and the reason for
all lack.
Paul had a consciousness
of this law of thought in finances when
he wrote to the Corinthians, "He that
soweth sparingly shall reap also
sparingly; and he that soweth
bountifully shall reap also
bountifully."
This law of the mind
affecting resources applies especially
to those who are responsible for the
temporal needs of the family, because
they are seriously interested and put
actual thought substance into the
monetary income and outgo. Children and
those who have not labored to gain
money put very little thought substance
into it or its spiritual idea. But the
heads of families need thought
discipline in raising the prosperity
consciousness, because the law is no
respecter of persons and millions of
good people, the very salt of the
earth, are in want the world over
because they do not know this law of
sowing and reaping in thought. The
financial field is a large one, and we
are all sowing and reaping in it every
day. The financial genius deals in
large transactions because he has large
ideas of supply.
God, being the giver of
inexhaustible ideas of plenty, loves
those who abandon themselves to a
cheerful state of mind so that He may
pour more abundance into their
thoughts. Then Paul says, "God is able
to make all grace abound unto you; that
ye, having always all sufficiency in
everything, may abound unto every good
work."
The thought behind a
gift is the real measure of its value
and efficiency. Jesus illustrated this
when He called the attention of His
disciples to the poor widow who cast
two mites into the treasury, which was
large in her estimation because it
represented all her living. It is what
we think about our gift that gives it
spiritual value and not the stamp on
the coin. This is illustrated by the
story about the careless Scot who
tossed a crown, thinking it a penny,
into the collection plate, and when he
saw his mistake asked to have it back.
The deacon refused, and the Scot
grunted, "Aweel, aweel, I'll get credit
for it in heaven." "Na, na," responded
the deacon, "ye'll get credit for the
penny."
It is easy to forget
that God is the source of our supply,
so we have our days of thanksgiving and
our grace at table, besides the
discipline of acknowledging the supreme
Giver of all good whenever we receive
or pay out money. The practice of
tithing is undoubtedly the most
expansive practice in this respect, and
thousands of successful businessmen use
it to their continuous financial and
spiritual profit.
Jacob began tithing very
early in his successful career. "Of all
that thou shalt give me," he vowed to
Jehovah, "I will surely give the tenth
unto thee." Tithing for the support of
his religion was incumbent on every
Israelite, and of all the races of the
earth none other has equaled the
Israelites in financial
ability.
Metaphysical insight
reveals why the Jews have always been
noted for their prosperity. By the act
of tithing, men make God their partner
in their financial transactions and
thus keep the channel open from the
source in the ideal to the
manifestation in the realm of things.
Whoever thinks that he is helping to
keep God's work going in the earth
cannot help but believe that God will
help him. This virtually makes God not
only a silent partner but also active
in producing capital from unseen and
unknown sources, in opening up avenues
for commercial gain, and in various
other ways making the individual
prosperous.
That the law works for
those who persist in its application is
beyond question. But nearly all who
practice tithing confess that in
certain stages of their prosperity they
fall into the error set forth in
Deuteronomy: "Beware lest thou forget
Jehovah . . . when . . . thy silver and
thy gold is multiplied, and all that
thou hast is multiplied; then thy heart
be lifted up, and thou forget Jehovah
thy God . . . lest thou say in thy
heart, My power and the might of my
hand hath gotten me this wealth. But
thou shalt remember Jehovah thy God,
for it is he that giveth thee power to
get wealth."
We give money a dignity
that does not belong to it. Money and
those who possess money are looked on
as wielding a certain power, and we
give them deference that in no wise
belongs to them. The foundation of this
is fear; we fear the power of those who
use money to their own ends.
Various plans have been
proposed to rob money of its power--or
the power that men have given it-- the
idea being that money is responsible
for the abuses that have grown up
through its use. But the destruction of
money will not cure the evils that have
come into being in the name of money.
It is not money, but the love of money,
that is the root of all evil. What men
need to know is that money represents a
mind substance of unlimited abundance
and accessibility; that this mind
substance cannot safely be hoarded or
selfishly used by anyone; that it is a
living magnet attracting good of every
kind to those who possess it; that
those who train their thoughts to
depend on this mind substance for
supply of all kinds never lack. When
there is a need, they simply sing and
pray and praise and give thanks that
their need is bountifully supplied. If
the mind is free from attachment to
money or love of it, and lovingly
concentrated on the divine substance,
there is never failure in the
demonstration.
"Because thou servedst
not Jehovah thy God with joyfulness,
and with gladness of heart, by reason
of the abundance of all things;
therefore shalt thou serve thine
enemies that Jehovah shall send against
thee, in hunger, and in thirst, and in
nakedness, and in want of all
things."
This was the admonition
of Moses to the Children of Israel, and
it holds good to this day. Making a
living is a species of slavery to most
persons. To them God is a slave driver,
and they are continually under the lash
of their own thoughts of how hard it is
to make a living. Life to them is just
one task after another without any hope
of finding rest and peace.
This certainly is not
the destiny planned by an all-powerful
and all-loving Father for His children.
When we groan and sweat under the
stress and strain of life, we are
serving Satan instead of God. The
satanic consciousness would make us
believe that there is a limited amount
of the things necessary to life and
that we must labor hard to get our
share. It is true that such conditions
do come upon those who have turned
their faces from God. "In the sweat of
thy face shalt thou eat
bread."
However, those who
follow Jesus in the worship of the
loving Father escape the effects of the
curse of the serpent and are restored
to the liberty of the sons of
God.
All work becomes divine
for man when he affirms that he is
working for God and that God is a
generous paymaster. Then joy and
gladness of heart will automatically
spring up in the soul "by reason of the
abundance of all things." This means
that when we praise God and give thanks
for His supply and support we open our
mind to the inflow of the abundant
spiritual essence of all
things.
Jesus said that before
we can enter the kingdom of the heavens
we must become as little children. Most
children are bubbling over with
happiness. They have not yet been
taught how to take life in the serious,
solemn manner of the average adult.
They hop and they skip and they sing,
and their daily needs are
met.
We all look back on the
joys and freedom of our childhood and
wish that they might have lasted
always. And why not?
We have been taught that
in mature life we have many hard
lessons to learn, that trials and
tribulations are an essential part of
man's life, and that we must experience
them in order to develop our character;
that is, our consciousness. But Jesus
said we must become as little children
before we can enter the kingdom of
heaven and that the kingdom is within
us.
The little child has no
consciousness of the tribulations of
life, and the logical conclusion is
that when we unload false states of
mind and become childlike we shall
begin to realize what heaven is
like.
"'For your Father knows
your necessities before you ask Him.
Consequently, ye must pray in this
way:
"'Our Father in the
Heavens; Your Name must be being
Hallowed;
"'Your Kingdom must be
being restored.
"'Your Will must be
being done both in Heaven and upon the
Earth.
"'Give us to-day our
to-morrow's bread;
"'And forgive us our
faults, as we forgive those offending
us, for You would not lead us into
temptation, but deliver us from its
evil.'"
This translation of the
Lord's Prayer is found in "The Complete
Bible in Modern English," by Ferrar
Fenton.
In a footnote to this
translation Mr. Fenton says:
The above is the
literal translation of the original
Greek, retaining the Greek moods
and tenses by the clearest English
I could. The old versions, having
been made from a Latin translation,
could not reproduce the actual
sense of the Saviour as given by
the Evangelists, for Latin has no
Aorist of the imperative passive
mood used by Matthew and
Luke.
The force of the
imperative first Aorist seems to me
to be that of what is called a
standing order, a thing to be done
absolutely, and
continuously.
Ferrar Fenton
says that the Aorist is a tense
expressing complete action in a
single movement. So we see that
according to the preface of the
Lord's Prayer as originally given
by Jesus, He wants us not to pray
for something to be done in the
future. Instead, since God has
already provided the things we need
before we ask Him, our prayers
should be in the nature of a
command implying our recognition of
the fact that they are now
appearing in our world. As Fenton
says, the prayer is of the nature
of a standing order, "a thing to be
done absolutely, and
continuously."
So we see that we are
not to beg God to provide for us,
implying that He has been like an
improvident parent whom we have to
remind of His remissness. God has
provided absolutely and continuously
for every need of man, individually and
collectively, and everything belongs to
us: "All things whatsoever the Father
hath are mine," said Jesus.
