Chapter 8
SPIRITUAL LAW
Charles Fillmore
Dynamics For Living
ALL SANE persons acknowledge the necessity of observing law in their daily living. The great majority have a human standard. Now the whole race is awakening to the knowledge of a higher source of existence. More people every day are giving attention to the law of Spirit in their life.
We find in the Scriptures constant reference, in symbols and also in direct language, to order as a fundamental law of the universe and of man. All peoples have observed this, and especially the people of God. Paul said, “All things should be done decently and in order.”
Remedy
Suggestion is systematically used in the business world, and unless you are strong in your own convictions as to what your needs are, you will be loaded up with many things for which you have no use. The remedy is to establish yourself in the spiritual law. You will come under one or the other of these laws, the manmade or the spiritual, and it is for you to choose which is best.
Whatever there is in mind, body, or affairs that is out of harmony is easily adjusted when you open the way in your mind for the manifestation of divine order.
Jesus’ Birth
The birth of Jesus was foretold and arranged beforehand. It was not left to chance. His mother “magnified” the Lord before He was born. This illustrates the truth that it is necessary to have order from the very beginning. The bringing forth of John the Baptist is an example of the coming of another state of consciousness and of the necessity of law and order in prenatal culture.
The same law holds good in our body and our affairs. The power of the word should be expressed in our homes. We should surround ourselves with words suggestive of spiritual things. If words count, and we know they do, we should be careful of every belief taken into consciousness through the eye as well as through the ear.
Suggestion
From their inception to their expression, words are important. The law is fulfilled not only in mind but in manifestation also. Every suggestion that enters the mind brings forth like expression in act. The time is coming when it will be unlawful to print in the daily papers any record of crime or of anything that will bring discord into the minds of readers.
Once I read of a man who committed a crime, and in his pocket was found a newspaper clipping describing almost identically the same criminal act. His crime was the fruit of suggestion. How many such suggestions does one large daily paper carry to its thousands of readers in its recital of the daily horrors that make up the news?
As the world comes more and more under the spiritual law editors and publishers will not ask their readers what they want, but will give them what they should have for mental food. And as the people are raised to higher planes of consciousness they will demand reading of an uplifting character. They will be just as careful as regards what they read as they are now beginning to be in reference to food. There will be the same demand for pure reading as for pure food. If it is against the law of the land to adulterate food, how much more is it against the law of right thinking to adulterate the truth! We can see the necessity of order and law according to Spirit. If we would demonstrate health, every deleterious thought should be kept out of our mental atmosphere even more carefully than harmful elements are kept out of our material food.
Food and Clothing
This spiritual law is operative in food and clothing. If we think about order and harmony our taste in material things will change. We shall desire the purest foods, and there will be more harmony in the colors we choose to wear. Man stands above all creation. He has power to clothe himself in the richness and glory of Spirit. Out of the air we may manufacture the things we eat and wear. This is not a flight of fancy. It is not an assumption of theoretical metaphysics that we may be able to make our food and clothing from the air, but a logical conclusion that follows the understanding of God as the omnipresent source of all that appears.
If you are disorderly and indefinite along any line, put yourself at once under the order of Divine Mind by affirming daily that the same law that swings the stars is operative in and through your life and your affairs.
One Law
All people who have studied metaphysics and understand somewhat the action of the mind recognize that there is one underlying law and that through this law all things come into expression; also that there is one universal Mind, the source and sole origin of all real intelligence. First is mind, then mind expresses itself in ideas, then the ideas make themselves manifest. This is a metaphysical statement of the divine Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The trinity Mind, the expression of Mind, and the manifestations of Mind are found in simple numbers and complex combinations everywhere.
I Am
In the King James Bible the Hebrew “Jehovah” has been translated “Lord.” Lord means an external ruler. Bible students say that Jehovah means the self-existent One, the I AM. Then instead of reading “Lord” we should read “I AM.” It makes a great difference whether we think of I AM, self-existence within, or “Lord,” master without.
All Scripture shows that Jehovah means just what God told Moses it meant: I AM. So instead of “Lord” say “I AM” whenever you read it and you will get a clearer understanding and realization of what Jehovah is.
God was known to the Israelites as Jehovah-shalom: “I am peace.” You can demonstrate peace of mind by holding the words “I am peace.”
If we start any such demonstration and try to apply the I AM to personality, we fall short. This is frequently the cause of lack of results in carrying out the laws that all metaphysicians recognize as fundamentally true.
The mind does not always comprehend the I AM in its highest, neither does it discern that the all-knowing, omnipotent One is within man. This recognition must be cultivated, and everyone should become conscious of the I AM presence. This consciousness will come through prayer and meditation upon Truth. In Truth there is but one I AM, Jehovah, the omnipotent I AM that is eternally whole and perfect.
If you take Jehovah-shalom into your mind and hold it with the thought of a mighty peace, you will feel a consciousness, a harmonizing stillness, that no man can understand. This consciousness is healing in itself. It must be felt, realized, and acknowledged by your individual I AM before the supreme I AM can pour out its power. Then you will know that you have touched something; but you cannot explain to another just what it is, because you have gone beyond the realm of words and made union with the divine cause. It is the quickening of your divinity through the power of the word. This divine nature is in us all, waiting to be brought into expression through our recognition of the power and might of the I AM; to Jehovah-rapha, which is “I am he that healeth thee.”
Inner and Outer
We should not fail to think always of the spiritual law under which the I AM moves. It is possible for man to take I AM power and apply it in external ways and leave out the true spiritual law. We are proclaiming that man can use I AM power to restore health and bring increased happiness; in fact, that through righteous, lawful use of the I AM he can have everything that he desires. But some people are using this power in a material way, neglecting soul culture, building up the external without taking the intermediate step between the supreme Mind and its manifestation in the outer.
We should remember that the soul must grow as well as the body. For example, a man was overtaken with physical disability and loss of eyesight some years ago. In his extremity he turned to the spiritual law for help and was very faithful in its mental application. Time passed before I saw him again; his physical condition was unchanged, but there was a great change in his mind. He had found the light and he was filled with inward rejoicing. He had become blind that he might see. However his family thought all his dependence upon Truth had been a failure because his physical sight had not been restored. During all these years he managed his business, and it prospered, and his family was well provided for. He was himself for a time disappointed and rebellious because his eyes were not healed. Then he became glad, because through the prayers and meditations he found the inner light. His physical sight will be restored when he has made the complete connection between mind and body.
If you find yourself disappointed because you do not at once demonstrate health or success, be at peace and know that your earnest prayers and meditations are working out in you a soul growth that will yet become manifest beyond your greatest hopes.
It is easier to seek the Truth willingly and be watchful and obedient than it is to be forced by some severe experience. Hard experiences are not necessary if we are obedient to the Truth that saves us from them. Time should be given to prayer and meditation daily. We cannot grow without them, and no man who neglects them will successfully develop his spiritual powers.
Unification
Before you can realize the mighty power of ideas you must unify them. All must pull together. Get your ideas in divine order, and a mighty mind force will begin to work for you right away. This divine order is necessary to the upbuilding of both mind and body. This divine order is the “kingdom of heaven” so often referred to by Jesus. To attain this unity and harmony of mind it is necessary to have perfect statements of Truth and to adhere to them in thought and word.
Ideas change the race thought atmosphere. Jesus had a grasp of divine ideas. If we believe in and follow Him we shall come into the Christ state of mind. We become like-minded by entering into the absolute Mind. In the absolute Mind there is only harmony.
As man unifies his own mind forces in the one Mind his body is lifted up into a new state of harmony. If he is not demonstrating this principle, it is because he is not unified with the one great harmonious Mind. He is not expressing this Mind as he should because he is not realizing his oneness with it.
Resolve to become one with God through Christ. Harmonize yourself with Him and all your world will be in harmony. Be on the alert to see harmony everywhere. Do not magnify seeming differences. Do not keep up any petty divisions but continually declare the one universal harmony. This will insure perfect order and wholeness. The Christ Mind is here as the unifying principle of this race. We must believe in this mind working in us and through us and know that through it we are joined to the Father-Mind. In the consciousness of the Father-Mind the unity of God and man is demonstrated.
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Dynamics For Living by Charles Fillmore
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