Listen/Download Audio of The World You Live In
Remember that you live in two worlds, the world God made and the world you are making.
God made His perfect world by His word, and you are making your world by your words, which are sometimes spoken and sometimes unspoken. As your world grows more like God’s world you reap an increasing measure of the blessings that your Father has prepared for you from the beginning.
Remember that God’s world is good, harmonious, prosperous, and peaceful. It is overflowing with good things. Goodness is its keynote, for God made it and pronounced it very good. But the average man’s world has weak spots in it, for he calls his world both good and evil.
This popular mistake is symbolized by Adam and Eve’s eating of the tree of the knowledge of of good and evil, which caused their exile from the beautiful Garden of Eden. The children of Adam and Eve have continued to make the same mistake, which is keeping most of them out of God’s world. But it is not God’s will that any man should remain outside. God has therefore provided a door in man’s heart through which he may return to his rightful place in God’s perfect world. This door is the Christ, the I AM within every man.
All things in God’s world have been provided for man’s happiness and well-being, but there is one tree the fruit of which man should avoid. It is called the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Among the good things that God has given man is freedom. Freedom is necessary for man’s happiness and development, but in it is the possibility of his going too far and making license out of freedom.
Man was given freedom to choose the good that God has made for him, or to imagine things that God has not made, such as evil, which is not in accord with God’s plan. In order to enjoy God’s world man must look for the good everywhere.
Looking for evil seems to have become a general habit among men. When a person is engrossed in hunting for evil he forgets the good and loses his connection with God’s good world. He sometimes wonders how God can tolerate so much evil in the world, not realizing that God is interested only in good and that it is man who promotes evil by believing in it.
God’s world is here all about us and within us. It is heaven on earth. It will be revealed to anyone who has faith enough to enter into it through the Christ door within him.
Man ignorantly takes the elements of God’s world and uses them in various ways, some of which he calls good and some evil; and whatsoever he calls them, that they are to him. But man cannot change God no matter what he calls the things God has made. God knows that all things He has made are good. Man daily misuses the good things that God has given him, and then classifies them as good or evil.
God gave powers to man and man uses these powers as he wills, sometimes for good, and sometimes for evil. When a man believes in both good and evil he cannot understand how it is possible for all men to be one in Spirit, nor can he see how all can be children of the one Father. When a man tries to use God’s power and substance to harm another man he harms himself, because his own good cannot be separated from the other man’s good. By expressing love and good will toward the other man he benefits himself, because he becomes a co-worker with God in establishing mutual good.
When a person uses God’s forces to promote love and harmony he makes himself and others happy and prosperous by bringing all a little closer to an understanding of the world that God created. By thinking loving thoughts and keeping our Christ self in view we move ever closer to God, because we are trying to conform to God’s plan governing His good world.
Suppose a group of people are trying to work out a plan for the good of their community when suddenly one of them becomes angry because he happens to disagree with something another person says. What happens? He goes off the divine beam that would lead him to success, happiness, and co-operation. But if instead of getting angry he silently calls upon God for more love and wisdom and endeavors in a kindly way to understand the neighbor’s point of view, he leads the way to cooperation and good will, and an ultimate, successful plan for the benefit of all.
There is a signpost at the crossroads where personal opinions diverge, which points clearly in the direction of God’s highway of success leading to heaven on earth. It reads: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. . . . And . . . thy neighbor as thyself.”
A man’s highest possible attainment and the one most satisfying to him is an understanding of his unity with God’s good world and conformity to it in thought, word, and deed. A world of good and evil is a difficult world to live in, but we should not blame our loving Father-God for the things in our world that make us unhappy. When things begin going wrong we should turn within and ask for wisdom and guidance that we may discover the riches that God has prepared for us and that we have been ignorantly seeking for in our own self-made world. God’s riches and good things are actually right at hand. The only obstacle that stands between us and them is our own personal will.
“There is a spirit in man: and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding.”
SUGGESTIONS FOR DAILY MEDITATION
SUNDAY: I dedicate my world each day to God so that it may be in tune with His good world.
MONDAY: I joyously enter into the spirit of God’s good world by going through the door of Christ the I am within me.
TUESDAY: My thoughts, words, and deeds are dedicated to the purpose of establishing God’s good world in my life and affairs.
WEDNESDAY: I am happy because God has placed His mighty power and substance in my hands to use in expressing His glory.
THURSDAY: The Christ in me is saying: "I am the door.” "I am the way, and the truth, and the life: no one cometh unto the Father, but by me.”
FRIDAY: There is a Spirit in me, and the inspiration of the Almighty gives me understanding.
SATURDAY: I love God with all my heart, soul, and strength; and I love my neighbor also.
