The Overcoming Mind
WE begin the new year with our usual inward joy and Christian smile. Regardless of outer circumstances, a real Christian has an inner conviction that all things are working together for good to them that love the Lord.
A Christian is one who has the "mind of Christ," which is the supermind, the mind of the spiritual man. Jesus had the "mind of Christ"; so did Job, who said, "When they cast thee down, thou shalt say, There is lifting up."
The Christ mind is the overcoming mind. No one ever went down to defeat who in his hour of need declared the almightiness of God through Christ. Many Christians theoretically know and proclaim that Christ saves to the uttermost, but when tribulations come, they think it their Christian duty to play the part of the downcast; like the good woman who, when her friends remonstrated with her for making such a fuss over her troubles, wailed, "When the good Lord sends tribulations, I tribulates."
It is no easy matter to appear helpful and happy in the face of adverse conditions, and no one can, in fact, do it without the aid of a power superior to personality. It is here that Christians who know the truth of man's real spiritual being have the advantage over those who trust in the arm of flesh alone.
We often wonder whether our conduct is pleasing to God. We think we have a monitor in that inner guardian, conscience. But conscience may be seared over by being repeatedly disregarded and may no longer function. Again, the poet moans, "Conscience does make cowards of us all." So some of us are conscienceless and others so conscience-minded that we are haunted by the ghosts of crimes we
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never committed. Either state brings us to unhappiness, which is not the standard of life patterned for man by Divine Mind.
All the great prophets, poets, and wise men of every age have discerned that this universe is attuned to law and harmony, which has no other issue than joy.
"In thy presence is fulness of joy;
In thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore,"
sings David (Psalms 16:11). Job says that "the morning stars sang together" (Job 38:7). Jesus promised, "Your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no one taketh away from you" (John 16:22).
No one in mere human consciousness can conceive of the ecstasy that wells up in the heart when the gladness of Spirit floods the soul. It is not like the joy that propitious events produce. There may be no external cause whatever; the situation may even seem to be desperate; as, for instance, that of Paul and Silas, who had been stripped and beaten with rods and cast into a dungeon with their feet made fast in the stocks. Such misery cannot be conceived of in our day; yet, in spite of it, Paul and Silas "were praying and singing hymns unto God, and the prisoners were listening to them; and suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison-house were shaken: and immediately all the doors were opened: and every one's bands were loosed" (Acts 16:25).
No external condition or circumstance can hold the soul of man in bondage when he makes mental contact with God. If you want joy to come into your life, begin to rejoice in the things that you know about the goodness of God. We all have many blessings that we have not valued as we should. Begin to praise God for the abundance of all things: your words will crack the omnipresent ethers, and good will flow to you from every direction.
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It is written in the 28th chapter of Deuteronomy, "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 ... in hunger, and in thirst, and in nakedness, and in want of all things" (Deut. 28:47).
We make ourself servant of the things we build up in our mind. Thinking and talking about lack or ill-health will lay hold of the etheric living substance in which our mind functions and make it manifest. One who knows this law can blame no one but himself for sickness or poverty.
Begin right where you are to rejoice and to be glad in Spirit. Then, according to Job 22:25-28:
The Almighty will be thy treasure,
And precious silver unto thee.
For then shalt thou delight thyself in the Almighty,
And shalt lift up thy face unto God.
Thou shalt make thy prayer unto him, and he will hear thee;
And thou shalt pay thy vows.
Thou shalt also decree a thing, and it shall be established unto thee.
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Preceding Entry: The Household of Faith 231-232: A Sure Remedy
Following Entry: The Household of Faith 236-238: How Should We Pray?
