Learn to distinguish the eternal human that walks about and among these stones of fire, in bliss and woe alternate, from those states or worlds in which the Spirit travels. This is the only means to forgiveness. I must learn to distinguish between the state and the occupant of the state. If I can see the most horrible acts in the world knowing that that is an actor, and the script is written for him. If he is cast in that role he has to play that part. If there's any condemnation it must be to the author who wrote the part and not the actor who is playing the part. So here, if I can distinguish between states and the occupants of states, then I can forgive.
Now, how do I forgive? By identifying the one that I would forgive with the ideal that he has failed to realize. The highest ideal would be to identify him with the divine image itself. When we are told, "Let us make man in our image," well now, that image is the image of God. It's called in scripture Christ. To take a man unknown in the world that is condemned by the world, and still identify him with the image that is Christ that radiates and reflects God, that doesn't make sense. Yet I am called upon to do it. I must actually identify him in my own mind's eye with that divine image. But I could fall a little short of that and take an ideal that he has failed to realize. The ideal, well, in his own world of Caesar it could be that he is affluent or at least he has an income equal to his responsibilities, even though he has nothing, and identify him with that. Until I am strong enough to go beyond the barriers of appearances and see him as really the divine image itself. Well, I am called upon to set this in motion and to practice it, and not only practice it but to talk about it and tell it.
25 апр 2024
