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Story of
Progress Long
has mankind been content to think of himself as a human being born in
this world to experience the many vicissitudes of life – some
good, and some bad. He has expected to live his life span, then to have
death overtake him. The goal of the majority apparently has been to
provide the necessities for a comfortable physical existence, to enjoy
life, and to submit to old age and inevitable death. Man’s
expectations of a future life are according to his individual beliefs
and religious training or lack of it. Thus he may expect to go out into
oblivion or to live on in a glorious heavenly realm. Now,
new light of understanding is dawning upon man’s
consciousness, and in that light man is beginning to see life as
something much bigger than heretofore conceived. "Now we are the Sons
of God" living this portion of everlasting life, which provides the
opportunity for unfoldment into that sonship day by day. Life goes on
unendingly and each individual will have the opportunity to achieve his
sonship; he will know that he is an individualized center of God-Being,
and that he shares God-Life, God-Mind, God-Power, and God-Love. His
true purpose in life becomes the discovery of himself as he is in God,
and his object is to express that Self in everyday living. He
understands that he is born of God, is brought forth into expression
without ever getting outside of God, and lives forever in the
omnipresence of God. Jesus’
great achievement proves that he realized his true Self, his
potentialities, and his divine heritage. "As he is so are we in this
world." 1 John 4:17 Man needs only to know and obey the law by which
Jesus achieved, to bring about his own achievement as a Son of God. Chapter Eight Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. Eph. 4:13 As
He (Jesus) is, so are we in this world. 1 John 4:17 Let
this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. Phil. 2:5 Unfoldment Watch For
Answers As You Read Give several proofs that man is capable of growth and development.
All of us have
looked at a full-blown flower and marveled that such beauty could
unfold from the tiny, brown seed, or from the lifeless-looking bulb.
But
we have seen this happen so often that we have come to accept the fact
that the complete pattern of the perfected plant and blossom is
implanted within the dormant seed or bulb, and that the impulse for
growth which will bring it to fruition is also involved within its very
nature. We have not
always realized that the same is true in the case of man, that is, that
the pattern of his beautifully perfect Christhood is implanted within
his innermost nature. That the Spirit of Life within him, as within the
see, acts as law to manifest the fullness of its potentialities. Man's
Christ-like characteristics and nature will unfold through the process
of growth and development until the consciousness of the individual
brings forth the outpicturing of the Christ as his own person. Just as
Jesus became the Christ, so this is the latent possibility and destiny
for the individual - each one will become Christed. Divine Science
acknowledges an infinite Presence and Truth ever present with all
creation, but it also acknowledges the process by which the creature
grows, unfolds, and comes into a full-blown, conscious realization of
himself and his place in the cosmic order of life. This process is
called spiritual evolution, unfoldment, increasing awareness of Truth,
or the law of spiritual maturity. To substantiate the process of
unfoldment is the fact that all creation proceeds from the Infinite,
but before visible creation could possibly appear there must have been
first the spiritual pattern for it in God-Mind. Thus we see that
greater by far is the God-Idea or prototypal man implanted within us
than is our present human expression of it. Man is the Son of God, but
as a son of man he has not yet put on that completeness which is
latently his in God-Mind. Within the
thought of evolution is the recognition of a persistent urge in all
living things to move on, to progress to new things and new
experiences. Emerson says, "The creation is on wheels, always passing
into something else, streaming into something higher." There is
something in the very nature of life itself that compels it and its
creatures to move on. There is an innate urge that speaks in every
soul; aspirations in every human heart which indicate the evolutionary
tendency of the universe. The indefinable Spirit which keeps us moving
onward and upward is the great guardian of humanity. It forwards
creation's spiritual evolution for the purpose of ultimately bringing
out all the hidden wonders and beauties of the God-Mind. For God holds
all His ideas within His consciousness and is zealous for the
development and fulfillment of their every potentiality. Divine Science
teaches that this creative drive is the God-idea, an infallible truth
moving throughout all the created realms, and calls it the Christ
principle. The Christ principle is the essential part of human nature.
It is the fundamental God-idea of MAN embedded within the spiritual
constitution of that which appears to us as a human being. Christ is
the truth that reveals and expresses the life, purity, perfection, and
power of the perfect Mind. In the heart of all humanity are stirring
dreams, ambitions, visions which are of a higher order than man's
present material environment. The source of such dreams and visions is
the Christ principle stirring within him to make him aware of his true
Self which is yet to be realized and manifested. This Christ within is
the motive power which constantly pushes man toward higher evolvement. When things
move along very well, objectively speaking, man may deny or even fear
the deeper intuitions of his soul and continue to live by false values.
He may still work for outer goals, but if these goals, when achieved,
turn out to be disappointing, in that they do not give the inner peace
and satisfaction he had anticipated, he is not happy. By this very fact
he should realize that he is being urged to progress: "Be not conformed
to this world, but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind."
Rom. 12:2 He is now ready for a new state of consciousness and will not
be happy until he adjusts himself to becoming more nearly his real Self
in thought and practice. We are to
understand that man is a threefold being with three distinct aspects to
his nature. First, there is the physical aspect in which he seems to be
primarily a body - a body which is "fearfully and wonderfully made."
But man discovers that his body is subject to his mental states, so the
mental is man's second aspect. These two, the physical and the mental,
are referred to as the human personality and many people live a
lifetime and do not realize that there is still a deeper and more
fundamental side to their being, the spiritual aspect, the true Self of
every man - the Christ. The true Self is that part of man which speaks,
unfolds, and expresses, not from a world sense, but from a divine
awareness. It knows beyond logic. It lives not under the confines of
time and space limitations but functions in the freedom of Spirit. In
the early periods of unfoldment this true Self, the Christ, is so
buried beneath mental concepts and sense training that it has to be
literally unearthed or resurrected and brought up to its rightful place
in our lives. As individuals
journeying through life from a purely natural and objective vision of
life to the Christ Consciousness, or purely spiritual viewpoint, we
seem for a long time to be deadened by the material sense of things and
to live mainly at the level of physical sensation. Man begins his path
of individual experience and unfoldment in the material order of life
where self-preservation comes first. Moral, intellectual, and ethical
values come along at higher stages of natural and human development.
Sooner or later the intuitive urge for growth arouses the soul of man
to be aware of a need for something higher than his present material
concept. He begins to realize that he is destined for something more
than the worldly life about him. Eventually the
Christ, the higher than the human or the natural, begins to dawn, and a
spiritual order is perceived, a rebirth occurs and a new set of values
comes to consciousness. As man is able to silence the personal and
material senses, the spiritual aspect of his nature as it comes to
conscious level and makes itself known as an active presence within his
very soul. For a man to accept the spiritual reality of his being
evokes inspiration, mighty strength, and an awareness of his true
talents and abilities which spring out of the Son of God, the Christ,
within him. With growth
comes faith in our God-nature, in the Christ, the potential man within
us. We begin to believe in it, to declare it, and wait. "For ye have
need of patience, that after ye have done the will of God ye might
receive the promise." Heb. 10:36 "First the blade, then the ear, after
that the full corn in the ear." Mark 4:28 So is the order of creation,
or unfoldment; there is first the Universal (Cause), then the
individual (effect). At first we discover "the I Am that I am" and
faintly realize it – "the blace," but as revelation is
received thought expands – "the ear," until we recognize the
All as all – "the full corn in the ear." Babyhood of
understanding first, gradually more and more perception, then finally,
realization or conscious possession of Truth, thus does the individual
evolve. It is
scientifically true to teach that the Infinite expresses what it is and
neither does nor can express that which it is not; that there are no
qualities inherent in man except God qualities, no attributes in
man’s nature that are not attributable to God. The way we
grow and release ourselves from our limited experiences is by the
changing of our thought patterns. Each unfoldment of thought is a
resurrection. Out of some dead concept our mentality rises to a greater
realization of the living Truth. The more conscious we are of the Truth
of Life, the fuller our understanding of the forms of life. It is
man’s thought of life that awakens in consciousness to fuller
comprehension of what is. The revelation of truth by which man sees
more and more clearly is evolution. We ascend to realize our perfect
Self, the Christ. All things await man’s recognition and
acceptance. As students of
Divine Science we have continuously been taught to affirm the reality
of the I Am, the indwelling Christ, the true Self. Now, we can better
understand the reason for this, for since our lives are unfolding
states and stages of our spiritual Selfhood, as we let the Christ
enlighten the conscious levels of our being, we are renewed, inspired,
and prospered by the divinity within us. As we grow in consciousness of
our unity with God and develop power to express the Christ in our daily
living, the blessings of the Most High, which are our inalienable
rights, come into our experience more easily and naturally. In the
cosmic order of the universe it is intended that God should express
through man, or that God’s will be done through the
consciousness of His son, the individual. "To this end was I born, and
for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto
the truth." John 18:37 The wonderful
experience of awakening to the truth that we ourselves incorporate the
God-idea of MAN, Christ the Son, must come to everyone at some time in
his unfoldment. All through life we, as individuals, do the things we
do according to the general tenor of our understanding, our level of
unfoldment, our growth in consciousness. Each individual life is a
journey in consciousness, and many changes and adjustments will be
necessary as we grow. Each adjustment affords new growth and opens new
vistas. Each understanding of God and His overwhelming generosity in
the manifestation of His Spirit in the life of the individual brings
new concepts with lift the soul into higher levels of consciousness. When our life
and behavior rise from a spiritual basis, we see life as something
greater than a birth-and-death arrangement. We begin to think in terms
of a spiritual universe, rather than of a material world; we think in
terms of eternal life and the immortality of the individual soul. We
then understand that since God is infinite perfection and creates
perfection, we are all potentially perfect in Christ, the perfect
pattern of MAN. As the soul’s evolution is realized in daily
living, we begin to take on the likeness of the God-image within us. We
begin to see that even during this period of gradual development, we
are nevertheless innately perfect; our perfection is the spiritual
truth of us, and we look up to this omnipresent and indwelling nature
as
our true being. "We have this treasure in earthen vessels." 2 Cor. 4:7
Strict adherence to principle and faithful practice bring out what is
potential within. We unfold the fullness of what is within us. The law of
growth and unfoldment is the law of Self-expression, or God acting and
revealing Himself; God creating within and unto Himself. The process of
calling forth that which is potential within is true education. The
only true growth is the unfoldment of the powers and possibilities that
we are. All unfoldment is the work of an Unfolder, God. All growth
reveals the effect of the activity of God. Therefore, direct expression
of God in creation by means of divine activity is the law of growth and
unfoldment. We, as individual expressions of this divine activity, are
accountable for our actions as we grow and unfold in consciousness. We
may often "miss the mark" as we feel our way while growing; even so we
always reap as we sow and thus we learn our lessons in life with law as
our schoolmaster until our motives coincide with God’s
purpose of All Good. "Be not deceived; God is no mocked; for whatsoever
a man soweth, that shall he also reap." Gal. 6:7 Human life,
objectively considered, is a growing unfolding, progressive process. It
never remains static. As we grow and unfold our individuality (that
which we innately are) it is a satisfaction to know that only that
which is involved into the Christ pattern of man by the Creator can be
evolved or unfolded into permanent manifestation. Reason tells us that
there must be a basic consciousness, or first mind, out of which this
continuous unfoldment takes rise. As God alone is, it is God who is
manifested in an ever-present creation. The rule of the creative
process is that all proceeds out of the infinite All; visible creation
appears according to the spiritual pattern for it, the image in the
mind of the Infinite. The Bible
presents the history of this gradual unfoldment of the race into more
and more consciousness, from the awakening of its mentality in Adam to
its great perception by Jesus. The Bible is the story of
man’s unfolding consciousness of his God and of his own
innate divinity, his Christhood. As we study the Bible, giving special
attention to the life and teachings of Jesus, we find there the
evidence that he came to a higher understanding of life; that he became
aware of his own divine nature and lived in accordance with its
guidance. His teachings and works show how the love of the Father
causes life to overflow with spiritual blessings; prove the power of
God to lead men into all truth; and demonstrate the power of spirit to
heal dis-ease and to manifest the wholeness of the body. Jesus taught
that Spirit is always affirmative; taught that it is God’s
will that man should be whole and that when he accepts and rejoices in
the Wholeness within him, he allows it to manifest. He showed
man’s ability to use Truth would reveal the light of truth
regarding any circumstance or condition; he showed that God is
all-sufficient in all things as He gives the light needed to illumine
the way. Jesus literally became the Christ made flesh; became the
personification of the Christ. By his resurrection Jesus revealed that
life is greater than death and that death is but life’s
effort to free itself from man’s self-imposed limitations. Jesus’
disciples accepted the fact that Jesus knew that what was true for him
was also true for all mankind, for it was John who said, "As he is, so
are we in this world." 1 John 4:17 The indwelling Christ is the same
creative channel and quality of Spirit working in us which worked in
and through Jesus. The same Christ principle which evolved in Jesus is
in each of us and as wholly capable of guiding our unfoldment to its
destined goal. We now see that Jesus is our wayshower because his clear
realization of the Fatherhood of God and the sonship of man
demonstrated how the Christ manifests in the flesh, when given
opportunity, until the man, the effect, become the true embodiment of
the Christ, the indwelling Cause. In Jesus the inner and outer became
one and indivisible – Jesus Christ! Jesus is the perfect
example of man’s potentiality. Paul assures us that we may
accomplish our Christhood, when he says, "For if the first fruit
(Jesus) be holy, the lump (mankind) is also holy: and if the root be
holy, so are the branches." Rom. 11:16 Our work is to find and prove
our own divinity, to unfold our own latent powers, and to bring forth
our own indwelling Christ as the second coming. Through the
guidance of the Christ Spirit within we are awakened to the spirit of
all Good. This Christ Consciousness is the fullness of the riches of
divine Mind active in our souls. The attainment of Christ Consciousness
is our goal. Christ Consciousness is spiritual perception in contrast
to intellectual analysis; it is awareness of the spiritual nature and
function of the universe. Consciousness is the measuring stick of our
unfoldment. The levels of man’s consciousness may vary from
the lowest and slowest to a cosmic quality. Cosmic Consciousness,
toward which we are unfolding, is the awareness of the cosmos, or the
life, nature, and beauty of the universe. It is supreme intuitive
knowledge of the divine order that transcends the mere intellectual
faculty of comprehension. Cosmic Consciousness gradually dawns; we grow
up into it. In this new consciousness we willingly subscribe to a
wholly spiritual way of thinking, acting and being. Those of us
living in the world order are travelers on the path of unfoldment. Our
perfection is as yet only a spiritual truth and not a complete
manifestation. When the highest that we know seems show in manifesting
perhaps it is because we are still accepting more of the old order than
we realize. Let us be patient if there are seasons when we seem to lack
the power of perfect demonstration in all ways. We are still growing,
but complete education along spiritual lines comes slowly. When we
arrive we shall live in a spiritual order of life here and now. When
man comes to that place in growth where he discovers his real being
and, living from this viewpoint, will use the natural order for greater
accomplishments rather than be used by laws over which he seems to have
no control, he will have come to the place where he knows that there is
nothing to fear. He will have overcome the former bad habits of envy,
jealously, hatred, and revenge with their resulting illness. Then shall
peace come upon the earth, for the true way of life will be known and
proven right here. We shall eventually reach the stage of development
where we demonstrate with the skill of the Christed man. There are many
ways in which we may hasten the process of growth: 1.
We can
regularly be still and know. 2.
We can uphold
that which we know to be within us, for we have a living example of it
in Jesus Christ. 3.
We can expect
a coming forth of this miracle-working power in the wake of affirmation
and realization of its divine nature. 4.
We can act
from the basis of a Son of God within ourselves and release more and
more of it through the conscious and subconscious levels of human
personality until the outer takes on the perfection of the inner.
"Until Christ be formed in you." Gal. 4:19 5.
We can see
that Jesus’ attitude brought him assurance of his good. His
attitudes can be our attitudes: a.
Certainty of
the Father’s care. b.
Nonresistance
to conditions or appearances "Be no overcome of evil, but overcome evil
with good." Rom. 12:21 c.
Dependence
upon the Fathers guidance. "I can of mine own self do nothing." John
5:30 1.
We can
practice seeing the Christ within another. This means to accept the
divinity which is potential within everyone and to uphold the
integrity, wholeness, and latent possibilities that are there though
they are not yet manifested. 2.
We can
practice keeping our thoughts, actions, and reactions positive so that
they heal adverse situations. In negative circumstances, to do as we
have been done by only adds fuel to the fire. 3.
We can
remember that unkind, untrue, childish, petty, angry, and ugly remarks
have no place in our new vision of life. 4.
We can prove
for ourselves, as did Jesus, that when human life is lived in
realization of the omnipresence of God as Life, then spiritual
demonstrations bless our human existence. 5.
We can
practice mentally to come unto the Christ. The Christ within speaks,
saying, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life." John 14:6 6.
We can examine
carefully the undercurrent of our thought. Until false opinions and
beliefs based upon human experiences are uprooted, we are not free.
Every new awakening in thought is a birth on a new plane of
consciousness. This is the way to the Christ Consciousness. "Be ye
transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye many prove what is
that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God." Rom.12:2 7.
WE can
meditate regularly upon the truth which we have already accepted and
more light will dawn upon us. 8.
We can "Be
still and know that I am God" – nothing less than the Christ,
the unlimited Spirit of Truth. Individual
life, like the branching of the tree, has a beginning in consciousness
that is the bud of the coming branch and fruit. Its growth is fuller
unfoldment from within. This is evolution, the becoming conscious of
what is. Each individual begins as "Adam" in understanding; each shall
end as "Jesus" in full consciousness. Paul says that we "may grow up
into him in all things." Eph. 4:15 or into his understanding of
divinity as man; the revelation of truth by which we see more and more
clearly. Again we turn
our thought to the dormant seed or the apparently lifeless brown bulb
and we "consider the lilies how they grow." If we wish a beautiful
lily, how may we obtain it? Shall we being by trying to make the
flower? No, we cannot reproduce the blossom in that way. We must plant
deep in the earth a lily bulb which in due time will unfold its stem,
its buds, and its full bloom. It is a natural process; all growth is
from within outward. All of us have the perfect Christ implanted within
us. Christ in you,
your hope of glory. Living from the basis of our spiritual being, the
true Self, the Christ within, we are no longer prisoners to the senses
but glorious souls of consciousness; each one a Christ mind in a Christ
body achieving the work of the Christ. You are now prepared for the
wonderful experience of awakening to the truth that you, yourself,
incorporate the God-idea, Christ the Son. It will come to you, for it
must come to each one sometime in his unfoldment. Only you can develop
your individual consciousness. No one can do this for another. A study of
Divine Science brings new light, new understanding, new purposes, new
goals, with new and accepting the truth of our oneness with the Christ
within, we shall ascend from joy to joy, from glory to glory until we,
too, have attained conscious Sonship and our Christhood is demonstrated. Statements of
Truth I daily
declare my true nature as that of the Christ within. The Divine
Idea of me (the Christ) is forever held in the Living Consciousness in
which I live and move and have my being. Since God is
infinite perfection and creates in perfection, I am potentially perfect
in Christ. Direct
expression of God in creation by means of divine activity is the law of
growth and unfoldment. I bless and
praise the action of God within me. Man from the
basis of his spiritual evolution has not yet put on the completeness
which is latently his in God-Mind. Our human
existence is our relative degree of unfoldment of the Christ Self
within us. Within the
Christ are all the potentialities of our being which God works to
unfold through spiritual evolution. As I silence
my personal senses and turn to the divinity within me, by Christ Self,
I receive new inspiration, increased health and strength, and my
inheritance in God is made real to me. Question for
Review and Discussion
Divine
Science Its Principle and Practice
Copyright 1957 by Divine Science Church
and College Denver,
Colorado Made available
here by the ministry of Rev. Lawrence C.
Terry, M.Msc., D.Min. P. O. Box 68324 Indianapolis, IN
46268-0324 |
