In a discussion of grace and works, the context is the God-Man relationship and our human thoughts of salvation and atonement (at-one-ment). Many fundamentalist Christians believe that "we are only saved through the grace of God," and this type of thinking creates a false dichotomy of conceptualization between "grace" and "works." I don't see a grace vs. works dichotomy. They are intertwined together, inextricably and unavoidably. One is not enough, nor is the other; one won't work without the other. So let me try and create a different perspective, one that broadens and enriches understanding.

First, the bottom line - what many of us are ultimately considering when we think of such things: salvation. Forget for the moment what Jesus said about the Kingdom of Heaven being within us¹ , right here and right now, as opposed to being some place we ascend to in glory after we're dead. The typical human questions are: How are we "saved"? What shall we endeavor to do to make things right and secure a positive outcome? Let's first look at what Jesus said in the last chapter of the last book of the Bible:

"He that is unjust, let him be unjust still: and he which is filthy, let
him be filthy still: and he that is righteous, let him be righteous
still: and he that is holy, let him be holy still." (Rev 22:11)

For balance, look at a much earlier work in the Old Testament. The two types, or classifications, of souls who will appear for judgment are profiled in Daniel 12:

"And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt. And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever." (Daniel 12:2,3)

According to the choices he has made, man is either unjust and filthy or righteous and holy. And so shall he stand before the Lord God to give accounting for his exercise of free will. Jesus will be at our side in the judgment, and as Jesus said in verses 11-15 of Revelation 22, he will pronounce:

"Behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to give every man according as his work shall be." [emphasis added]

"Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they have the right to the Tree of Life and may enter in through the gates of the city. For without are dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongeres, and murders, and idolaters, and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie."

So if Jesus took the cosmic eraser and erased the record of our sowings, he would also be erasing the consciousness that conceived it and carried it out - that's you or me-- and there would be nothing left to inherit the kingdom. Because the sinner and the sin are one; and the righteous soul and his righteousness are also one. We are the sum total of our words and works, our thoughts and our feelings, our desires.

Matthew 25 also clearly states the criterion for entering into Life eternal -- words and works: sharing the Lord's burden. It is written that "Every man shall bear his own burden." (Gal 6:5) And that means every manifestation of God must work out and carry the weight of his own destiny: "Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling." (Phil 2:12). Thus Paul preached Christ's doctrine to the Lord's followers in Macedonia.

And this leads into the concept of GRACE.

Ever since the 4th century when Augustine invented his concept of Original Sin² , many Christians have been taught to inflate the importance of grace at the exclusion of the other two members of the essential tripod of salvation and atonement -- faith, works, grace. Grace is undoubtedly the foundation stone set by God that enables the rest of our hopes (and His) to be built upon, but it is not the miracle pill conceived of by many Christians.

A careful reading of the Bible teaches us clearly that Grace is the connection with the divine. It is the spiritual awakening made available to us by God that propels us out of the rut of sowing and reaping (remember, the only difference between a rut and a grave is a matter of depth). We need grace to unlock the misdirected actions and momentums/habits we have locked ourselves into which turn into stumbling stones we have tripped over time and time again. Grace is the action of God's Mercy bestowed freely upon us with love. Grace is an opportunity God has given us through the actions, love, and propitiation of Jesus Christ.

But, by relying on an imbalanced interpretation of the Epistles and the doctrine of original sin which removes from us any power or say so in our salvation, throughout history churches have given grace the inflated power of a miracle pill. According to some denominations, grace alone accomplishes our salvation. I believe it is important ingredient: I do not believe it is a panacea.

Grace is God meeting us halfway, not God picking us up and carrying us from here to eternity.

Many first, second, and third century Christians didn't understand grace as the sort of miracle pill it has become today for many. They saw grace is an opportunity to become Sons of God. They saw grace as a boost, a leg up, rather than an elevator ride to the top. For them, the Saviour was a deliverer who came to show them the way to liberation from earthly existence. The Saviour had come to wake them from the sleep that was the death of the soul. For them, grace was a kindling of the spark within their hearts. Just as a person can blow on the ashes of a seemingly dead fire and rekindle a flame, so the Saviour had rekindled the divine spark within their hearts. But this grace did not do it all for them. Once the spark was kindled, it was up to them to expand the spark until it filled their whole being -- and this is essentially what Jesus and Paul continually teach us how to do in the Bible.

As the Hindu saint RamaKrishna said,

"The breeze of divine grace is blowing upon all. But one needs to set the sail to feel this breeze of grace."

But let me backtrack a bit and look at just what the New Testament says about grace and works ....in the context of the belief that many have that "we are saved by grace and not by works."

Let me start with the very last chapter in the Bible, chapter 22 of The Book of Revelations. Verse 12 says:

"And, behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to give every man according as his work shall be." [emphasis added]

But besides Revelations, the importance and necessity of doing "good works" is taught throughout the NT. The writings in Matthew through Jude are also liberally sprinkled with teachings about works, especially the letters of Paul. The following is a partial list to illustrate verses I found thumbing through my bible in a week; they highlight the necessity of works in the process of our salvation and in the process of our lives:

John 3:21; 14:12; 17:41
Acts 26:20
Rom 2:6
1 Cor 3:13; 15:58
2 Cor 9:18; 11:15
Gal 6:2 - 10 (the famous sow and reap passage)
Eph 2:10
Phil 1:6
Col 1:10
1 Thes 5:13
2 Thes 2:17
2 Ti 2:21; 3:17; 4:14
Titus 3:1; 3:5; 3:8; 3:14
Heb 6:10; 10:24; 13:21
James 1:25; 2:14-26
I Pet 1:17
I John 3:18
Jude 1:15

What all these verses teach us is that we are ultimately responsible for all our thoughts, words, and actions; that Jesus will judge us according to how well we bring LOVE to fruition in our lives, and the lives of those we touch. Grace gives us the opportunity to glorify God through our actions; but, as James said, it is our works whereby we show our faith, it is by our works where our faith is made perfect. And as Jesus said in 1 John: " My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue; but in deed and in truth."

I won't go into the historical, theological reasons why Churches have inflated grace at the expense of works (and faith). I will try to explain why some churches and Christians are under the mistaken impression the grace is the miracle pill...that Jesus did it all for us -- the concept that is termed "vicarious atonement" by some theologians.

The verses which lead to the idea of vicarious atonement are to be found primarily in a few of Paul's letters, especially Romans (e.g., Rom 3:20-25). But, as seen in the above list of verses, Paul also is a primary thinker in the bible who stresses the importance and absolute necessity of good works in our strivings toward salvation. It seems that on one hand he says we are saved by grace alone, then on the other he stresses the absolute necessity of good works. Let me attempt to reconcile this seeming inconsistency.

II Paul's Theology and Christology

The authentic Pauline letters were composed in the first century during the decade of the fifties. Therefore, the epistles of Paul contain the oldest teaching in the New Testament, and thus deserve special attention. Unfortunately, because of their sporadic and unorganized compilation within the bible, along with Paul's use of esoteric and archaic terminology, it is very difficult to study them coherently and systematically. Let me first give a summary of Paul's theology, then examine what is behind the apparent dichotomy of grace and works within his letters.

The salient features of the Pauline theology are as follows:

(1) The heavenly Christ (Messiah), a divine Being, descends to earth, assumes a body and is born of woman, under the law of Moses, and is known as Jesus.
(2) Jesus is crucified and dies for the sins of Jews and Gentiles, which he takes upon himself, thus "justifying" them before God, freeing them from imminent judgment and from the bondage of the law of Moses, which is now abrogated.
(3) By his resurrection from the dead, Jesus becomes the Son of God with power appearing in the semblance of divinity (as to Paul at his conversion) and eventually returns to the heavens, resuming his posture as the Spiritual Christ and the head of all sovereignties and powers.
(4) By faith in Jesus' life, death and resurrection, those called to follow Christ must follow him in his death and resurrection, be crucified and rise again in a celestial or pneumatic body at the close of their sojourn on earth.
(5) The faithful and saints who believe in Christ form a close-knit community (Greek: ecclesia) with Christ as its head and themselves as members, forming a mystical body.
(6) The faithful are at war with and must defend themselves against cosmic powers of evil or darkness among whom are the Archon or god of this aeon, the devil and his children of disobedience, and "the lost."
(7) Those who are called "the perfect" are initiated orally into a secret wisdom-teaching. These are the pneumatic (spiritual), while others are called psychic who are babes in Christ and are not spiritual. They receive a beginning or lesser teaching. The carnal or sensuous cannot receive or contain the teaching.
(8) Paul, as Apostle and minister, received his gospel from Jesus Christ through a revelation. Portions of Paul's gospel relating to Jesus' sojourn on earth were received from the apostles.
(9) The faithful and saints were predestined and foreknown by God for this salvation presumably in a preexistent state prior to their descent to earth and are known as the "elect." They are destined to overcome sin, the carnal mind, death and corruption,
and thus achieve immortality.
(10) The central mystery of Paul's doctrine is "Christ in you, the hope of glory," who leads the faithful to "the measure of the stature of the fullness (Pleroma) of Christ and to the Perfect Man."
(11) The "Perfect Man," "inner man," "hidden man of the heart," "Son of Man" (the last is how Jesus designates himself in the gospels) is the Archetypal blueprint we all answer to and strive to be restored to.

The essential element in the (Platonic) teachings of Paul is that the visible universe conforms to a pattern or design, which represents the image of the Invisible God who, himself, has neither form nor substance. Man, the crown of creation, being made in the image of God, answers therefore completely to the original pattern, which thus may be conceived as a manlike figure. Paul sees man, therefore, as wearing physically the likeness of his spiritual Archetype, and that archetype is the expression of the nature of God....But for what purpose was man created? His creation must have had to do with the Messianic Plan, and the soul of Adam must have been knit with the soul of the ultimate Messiah [Christ].

Paul's purposes in his letters are essentially to teach various audiences how to be restored to the original archetype through Christ Jesus, who is the Archetype.

According to Paul, all have transgressed (in past lives and ages) and are "dead in sins," i.e., not quickened to their divine destiny or origin (i.e., archetype) and are under the influence of "children of disobedience," evil powers and rulers. The way to salvation is through Jesus Christ who overcame the evil powers and restored the opportunity (grace) for man to be one with God.

Throughout his various epistles, Paul seems to be saying the entire planet is facing impending judgment for its evil deeds. Compensation must be paid. How is this to be accomplished? Paul answers, "Whatsoever a man sows, that shall he also reap." (Gal. 6:7) The debt or penalty for sin (what man has sown) must be paid (reaped) by every soul, both Israelite and Gentile. Those who incur the penalty must pay the penalty. However, explains Paul, God in his mercy and righteousness desired to bestow opportunity on both Jews and Gentiles and on the world as a whole by freely compensating (justifying) for the penalty or debt due to sin. The law of grace (mercy and opportunity) was made possible by the redemption (deliverance) offered by Jesus. According to the Scofield Reference Bible, redemption means "to deliver by paying a price." What was the price? Jesus' descent to earth, his obeying the Father's will, submitting himself to a voluntary crucifixion, undergoing "death," and triumphantly overcoming "death," thus becoming the mediator between God and man.

"[Christ Jesus] whom God hath sent forth to be a propitiation
through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the
remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God;"
(Rom 3:25)

How, then, should we understand Paul's view of Christ's death? The sacrifice of Christ includes not alone his death, but his voluntary incarnation in the flesh, his crucifixion, and his resurrection. The "death" of Christ Jesus, according to Paul, is Jesus' surrender of his life, soul and body to God's will in fulfillment of that will. The "life" or "blood" of Christ is not the life of a mere mortal, or even of a good man, but of the Son of God. Only the surrender and sacrifice of one who has become Son of God, as Paul teaches, will suffice to compensate or atone for the judgment due to sin, both personal and planetary. Jesus' taking sin into himself, identifying with the effects of sin, and putting sin to death in himself (by his divine life or blood), results in the remission of sin or the "passing over of sins done formerly," as Scofield translates the phrase. Remission or
forgiveness of the penalty due to sin is set aside so as to give opportunity (grace) to those called to accept the gift of Jesus and to "put on the new man," who is, as Paul also said, the "Perfect Man" or Archetypal Man, resident within all humanity.

It is obvious, of course, that even after the death of Jesus on the cross, sin and evil continued in the world. The statement "Christ died for our sins" must not be construed according to Paul's theology to mean the obliterating of sin itself or the propensity to sin within the faithful, but rather, the setting aside of the accumulated penalty/debt due to past sins. The debt which is set aside must one day be paid by every soul, perhaps in a future epoch. Those who attain to the stature of the fullness of Christ whereby they, in effect, will possess the wherewithal (the spirit of Christ) to balance that debt. The ultimate result of the balancing or paying the debt is the "resurrection of the dead," which Paul understood to mean the individual's attainment of immortality, i.e., freedom and release from confinement in the flesh form, and from successive incarnations. The soul then inhabits a "celestial body." All this has been prefigured by Christ in his
incarnation, crucifixion and resurrection. The pattern was set?the faithful must follow. Paul admonishes them to "work out your own salvation with fear and trembling." (Phil. 2:12) This "working out" of salvation would not have been possible if God's righteous judgment due for sin had not been set aside by Christ.

As Jesus' sacrifice and resurrection set aside a planetary judgment/holocaust, so also was the personal judgment due to sins likewise set aside. Those called by Paul to a new life in Christ, both Israelites and Gentiles, have had their personal sins set aside to give them opportunity to progress from "glory unto glory." The initial requirement of those called and chosen is the profession of faith in Jesus as Christ and in his redemption on their behalf. As a corollary to this, those who are Jews need not practice the Mosaic code. They are not justified by works but by faith in Jesus' redemption on their behalf should they choose to accept it. Again, the setting aside of personal sin (forgiveness and justification) enables the believer to "put on" Christ and eventually to balance that personal sin by striving to attain to "the stature of the fullness of Christ." Only the fullness of "Christ in you," leading to the personal resurrection, can atone for personal sin.

Christians today have been taught that mere belief in Jesus is sufficient to blot out their sins forever. They take the well-known verses in Romans 3:20-25 to inflate the power of grace at the expense of good works and faith. Were this true, no sin or propensity to sin could have remained among the faithful the moment that Jesus bowed his head on the cross and "gave up the ghost." Sin would have been forever swept away from the earth and from the souls of humanity. To sin would have been impossible and humanity would have been immediately catapulted into heaven! And this would have negated the nexus of God's will/plan which is for every human being (or rather, human becoming) to choose freely to align himself with God once again....to let God experience Himself through us to the fullest extent possible.

This of course has not been the case on earth. Paul's letters are indeed directed to those redeemed and forgiven by Christ, yet the propensity to sin remains. Why? Paul's teaching is clear: forgiveness (grace) is the setting aside of sins committed in past lives in order to give the believer opportunity to balance that sin both in the present and in the future. We find this teaching to be both implicit and explicit in Paul. His statement, "Whatsoever ye sow that shall ye also reap," corroborates this analysis.

Let me say all this tedious theology in another, easier way:

Some who read Romans 3:20-25 create a whole theology of grace as the miracle pill, the only necessity, and essentially say :"Note, noone saves himself by doing good."

Well, certainly noone in Old Testament times was doing a very good job of it! The old law stated that "The soul that sinneth, it shall die." (Ezekial 18:4, 20)[Note that verse 20 explicitly states that we are all responsible for our own sins] When applied to the human condition, this means that the soul that sinned would die in her sin, pass from the screen of human life and receive the judgment therefore.

But Paul's teachings tell us that the Mediator between Perfect God and imperfect man, the Universal Christ, said ( in effect):

"Not so, Lord. May it be that the soul shall live again, to learn again,
to be tutored of me, that I, the Beloved, might turn that one again to
Thee. Let there be established, Lord, a median ground between eternal
Life and that eternal damnation which is reserved only for the Devil and
his fallen angels. (Matt. 25:41) Let the earth be a place where Thy
souls return to meet Thee again, face to face in one another. Let them
learn to love again and to extend mercy to Life as Thou doest extend
mercy to them."

So, in conclusion, Grace appears to be God's mercy of giving us the opportunity to be restored to the original archetype of soul purity [a soul of LOVE, which is the primary energy of the universe, i.e., God]. This grace was granted to us as a propitiation through the advocacy of Christ on our behalf. Faith is a bridge between the seen and unseen, a bridge created by the very act itself; it is the engine of God's power made available to us if only we will have it. And our work is the work of Jesus: to ennoble our souls, and to enrich all around us by remembering and choosing through our own free will to BE WHO WE REALLY ARE and WHO WE REALLY WANT TO BE. It is following the instructions of Jesus to enrich and restore our souls (and thus God too) by treating others as God would treat them himself. And it is through the process of living this way, by doing the "work" that so many biblical verses make reference to, that we enable, as Paul said, Christ to be formed in us (Gal 4:19). The whole bottom-line thrust of Paul's teachings is seen in a verse in 2 Cor 3:18:

"And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as
though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another."[emphasis added]

"Till we all come in unity of the faith, and of the gnosis of the Son of
God, unto the perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the
fullness of Christ." (Eph. 4:13) "...Put on the new man which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness." (Eph. 4:24)

And this is why, when I hear people say "we are saved by grace alone" I want to add a few words about "work." I have often run across people who believe, essentially (even if they don't realize it consciously), in what I called "vicarious atonement" up above. Because of this, some people have not been trying to form and reform themselves in Christ. They have not even been invoking God to help them put on more Light. St. Paul said that one star differs from another star in glory (1 Cor 15:41). This simply means that some people are more spiritually aware than others - and as spiritual chelas, we know that Jesus wants us all to be spiritually aware, so much so that we can have total faith and assurance in his own words: "The works that I shall do {ye} shall do also; and greater works than these shall [ye] do." (John 14:12) But many people are not even making the effort to become more spiritually aware nowadays because the churches tell people that somebody else has already paid the price for them. And they say, "Now, because he paid the price, it's all done. And it really doesn't matter too much what I do." And of course, in this day of easy lessons and instant life and instant victory and instant achievement, people do not want to expend the effort themselves. They would rather believe that somebody else already did it for them. Maybe this is why often things seem to be getting worse rather than better.

Maybe it's time we realized that we too have the potential that Jesus did (and really take Jesus' words seriously and have true faith. He commanded us in no uncertain terms: "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect." (Matt 5:48) Paul said: "This corruption must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality." I see too many Christians who perceive themselves as something different, who don't understand that they too can spiritually evolve - it's easier to just worship Jesus and count on the so-called miracle pill rather than to emulate him and take his commandments and instructions seriously.

As a matter of fact, what I see is people (including myself!) who stagnate and die long before they are pronounced dead. Because of their failure to perceive Jesus Christ as an example of self-transcendence, they forget that self-transcendence is a Law of Life: that which ceases to grow -- i.e., self-transcend-- ceases to be. Life moves on and so must we. To self-transcend is to create, and that which fails to do so ceases to be. Saul of Taurus transcended himself. Once he saw Jesus he could no longer live as a persecutor of Christians. He said "I die daily."(I Cor. 15:31) With each new perception of Christ, something less Christlike in him died daily. He took on more and more of that Christ Self (that is also in each of us!) and eventually became a mighty apostle. He grew with the spirit; too many today stagnate with the spirit because of the teaching that says Jesus already did it for you. They become smug, both intellectually and spiritually and stink of non-productivity and decay.

III Getting Personal

I take Jesus' words/teachings seriously, as I do Paul's words and teachings. What this means is that I consider it my sole (i.e., soul) mission to put on the new garment of holiness/purity/glory Paul spoke of in order that I too may express and manifest what God wants from us: LOVE. All the time, in all ways. It is the soul work that I want to be actively and productively engaged in. It is this sort of endeavor which I consider to be my "work" in life.

So far in my life, I have frittered away lots of time and opportunity. I have built up momentums (habits of using energy) that do not directly help what I truly want to be my sole (soul) endeavor: the process of soul experience and soul purity. I have crawled around like a snake in a serpentine manner, back and forth, up and down, slithering slowly toward my goals, but moving slowly and sporadically....sometimes hot and sometimes cold.

Our destiny is to find -- or remember (re-member) God. This is the work of the ages

And unless we find God, we will have missed the greatest opportunity of our lives. One of my problems is that HE cannot be intellectualized....as I am wont to do, as I have a momentum of doing. Jesus said: "God is a Spirit and they that worship him must worship in Spirit and in Truth." (John 4:24) I like to think that God is a spirit (here I am intellectualizing again!) -- like a great big ocean. And I like to think of all of us being little drops of water in a vast sea of Light. This is my favorite similitude. When I am at the beach, I like to hold up my finger with one little drop of water glistening on my fingertip. I see that drop of water sparkling jewellike, like my soul, and I know that all of the elements of the whole ocean are to be found in that drop of water. Just like my soul, it lacks only the quantity of God, but none of the quality. (This is a startling concept to those steeped in the "we are just hopeless sinners" mentality.) We all have the shining qualities of God, of the Creator of a living soul which has the real potential -- the realizable potential -- of the Spirit. Jesus told us this, and Paul taught us that it is our job to stop identifying with what is unreal and instead start realizing that divine potential, through Jesus Christ, the Archetype.

And thus, our work, in part, is to stop identifying with what is unreal and focusing more on what is ultimately REAL. And what is ultimately REAL? My soul knows, and I suspect so does yours....although I don't always pay attention to what my soul knows.

IV The UNREAL

In general (and I fit into this category), people are so inclined to think of themselves as the patine. So here we have a bright, golden image of the Son of God, a miniature babe born in the manger of the divine identity. With the passing of years, the real image becomes tarnished and scarcely recognizable. And we identify with the patine that has formed over the image, and even though it may seem to become more beautiful with age (like the green oxide that forms on copper), it's still not the real thing. We identify with that , when we are no part of it! What is Real is the Archetype, the seed of divine within us -- the Christ Self that is the seed of our souls and our connection to the divine.

V The Christ Self

Who is Christ? He is called the Messiah, the Saviour, the Holy One of God. His message has marked the course of western civilization, and yet to some the figure of the Nazarene Master, tall upon the hillsides of the world, serene and unmovable through the centuries, has not appeared translated as the Image, the Person, of the Christ within. That is what is real, and that is what I want.

Many have marveled at his miracles but few have followed his magnificent example. Yet to this present hour his promise is unfailing: "He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father." (John 14:12)

Jesus Christ is the "express image" ( Heb 1:3) of the Person of God, the archetype of man's God identity. Known to his disciples as "The Word" -- Logos 'God in Action' -- he is the infinite love/wisdom/power of the Spirit "made flesh." (John 1:14) John the Evangelist explains that "all things were made by him; and without him was not anything made." (John 1:3) The beloved disciple learned from his Master that God the Father through the Image of the Son had created Christ Selfhood as the Light of every son and daughter, and so he recoreded this truth in the very first chapter of his gospel knowing that only those who are of the Light and born of the Spirit would understand this profound mystery of their joint-heirship with Christ ( Romans 8:17) John the Baptist, sent by God to herald his coming, also proclaimed his portion to be our own saying, "...Of his fullness have we all received, and grace for grace." (John 1:16)

Jesus of Nazareth is the personification of that selfsame Word which put the law of God in the inward parts of his people and wrote it in their hearts (Jer 31:33) Jesus, the son of man, so identified with the perfection of the universal Christ, the Son of God, that in him we behold the fullness of the Godhead dwelling bodily (Col 2:9) We see him in the individualization of the God flame -- the perfection of God made manifest in man. This is the mystery of the Incarnation. This same mystery God would reveal both in us and through us as we confess the Christ in him to be the Christ that is also in us. Indeed, he is the Wayshower of the Christ potential which lives as the embryonic Light within every child of God. "That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world." (John 1:9)

"For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." (John 3:16) Jesus gloriously demonstrated the fullness of the only begotten Son -- the Christ who comes in the Person of the Real Self of every son and daughter of God. The only begotten Son is the Second Person of the Trinity, that portion of the Godhead with which the All Father has endowed each of his servant-sons and daughters. Jesus' sublime demonstration of this truth is the open door for us to receive salvation through his name. And so, beloved, we are also sent into this world to become the Christ.

The kingdom he proclaimed was and is the consciousness of Christ -- the awareness of the Self as Christ -- individualized in you and me. To bear witness unto the truth of this inner Christ, this Real Self, is the end to which Jesus was born and the same cause for which we -- souls born out of the same Christ Image, the same living Spirit -- came into this world. And "As many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God. " (John 1:12)

Jesus is the Great Exemplar who proved that there is a science, a geometry, a mathematics based on LOVE whereby we stand, face, and conquer the impositions of the personal ego and the limitations of the subconscious mind. "Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus." (Phil 2:5) Change the water of the human consciousness into the wine of the Spirit. (John 2:7-11). Cast the moneychangers out of the temple of church and state (Matt 21:12) "Be ye therefore perfect." (Matt 5:48). This is the work we as people who endeavor to be Real are to be involved in.

Remembering my soul, establishing a connection with the undeniable seed of Christ that is within us all, and experiencing Love in all ways at all times is what I set out to do in this life. The re-union of my soul with the individualized Presence of God, the I AM THAT I AM...the return to this Reality, this Essence, is the goal of my life. It is the raison d'être of every son and daughter of God. It is the means whereby we individualize the God flame. "If any man serve me, let him follow me," Jesus said, "and where I am" in the heaven of the universal Christ consciousness, "there shall also my servant be." (John 12:26)

"Behold, I stand at the door, and knock; if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come to him, and will sup with him, and he with me. To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as I also overcame, and am set down with my Father in his throne." (Rev 3:21)

The path of this overcoming is God's gift to us....his grace of opportunity. It is the gift of life itself. And the goal is our soul's reunion with God.

Bottom line is that is that we should not ultimately br interested in the mere pleasures of the mundane. If that were so, I believe I would be bored stiff. On the contrary, I find immense happiness in the words of Jesus. He said: " My Father worketh hitherto and I work." (John 5:17)

Interesting phrase, isn't it? We understand ourselves -- you and me -- as working hand in hand, heart to heart with the Father through the same universal Mind that was in Christ Jesus. He also said, "My meat is to do the will of him that sent me and to finish his Work." (John 4:34)

All of us have our own work to do. But it is God's work on earth that we must truly make our own, as President Kennedy said³ -- that we may one day work His Work in heaven. And nowhere is this work more apparent than in the spiritual field. Truly it is a joyous spiritual labor that engages all our forces as we seek to remove the many veils of self-illusion and confusion behind which we, good people, have cloistered ourselves from Reality. These hang between layers of consciousness as partitions of inner self-division and walls that keep out God and loved ones.

VI Conclusion

I know that within myself the heart and mind can do nothing until energized by the currents of my soul. Something is there that is greater, something that has a reach and stretch beyond physical capacity. For me, it is time for experience, to experience....it's what my soul wants. To experience the simultaneous action of universal spiritual worship -- that is, right action being the culmination of my worship -- and to experience all love all the time in many various ways. I know it is simple folly to worship without the totality of worship involved in doing "the things which I say," as the Master said (Matt 7:24; Luke 6:46) -- to be involved only with the written word, only with the word of devotion, without actually carrying out the Word in some ultimate usefulness in our lives. It's now time for experience, for experience is the arena of the soul, and thus of God. It's time to do the work of the ages...it's our sole (soul) purpose in life.

FOOTNOTES:

(1) Where is Jesus' "Everlasting Kingdom?" I suspect it is right where Jesus told us it was! Jesus did not see the "kingdom" as an apocalyptic future event. Problems were not to be wiped away and the world transformed in an instant when God's messiah arrived. Rather, Jesus saw the kingdom as a state of being, something which we don't have to wait until the end of the world to experience. We can enjoy it today -- if we have the keys. And the fundamental truths expressed within real Christian teachings are lessons about how to access those keys.(Obvious examples are Jesus' Sermon on the Mount and Paul's letters).

Take a look at some sayings of Jesus that represent the bare bones of Jesus' message about the kingdom. Two sayings that appear both in Luke and Thomas are pivotal. He said:

"What is the Kingdom of God like? To what should I compare it? It is like a grain of mustard seed which a man took and sowed in his garden. It grew and became a tree, and the birds in the air made nests in its branches.

"The Kingdom of God is like a yeast which a woman took and hid in three measures of flour until it leavened the whole mass."

What do yeast and a mustard seed have in common? Both have an effect out of proportion to their size. What else has these same properties? The divine spark, the seed of Christ within us all -- what the Hindus call the "Atman". Hidden inside each person, it is so little it cannot be seen. Yet it also contains the allness of God; it is so vast it cannot be comprehended.

When Jesus tells us that the kingdom is like yeast and a mustard seed, he is telling us that the kingdom is realized through the divine spark. As the tiny mustard seed becomes a large plant, so the divine spark can allow us to fully become the great tree of our divinity. As the yeast causes the entire batch of dough to rise, so the divine spark has the power to transform our entire being into God. When we realize the kingdom through the divine spark, we will have achieved divinity. As Paul said, accessing this divine spark -- this seed of Christ within us all, this doorway to the Kingdom-- is a process that will transform us "from one degree of glory to another." (2 Cor 3:18) Jesus' other statements about the kingdom bring to mind another quality of God--his all-pervasiveness, inhabiting every part of life, ensouling the universe. Jesus tells us that the kingdom is present everywhere but not accessed by everyone. In Thomas saying 113, the disciples ask Jesus,

"When will the kingdom come!" He answers, "It will not come by watching for it. It will not be said,'Behold, here' or 'Behold, there.' Rather, the kingdom of the Father is spread out upon the earth, and people do not see it."

"The kingdom of God cometh not with observations: Neither shall they say, Lo here! or lo there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you."

Tally up what Christians know about the kingdom. In the Dead Sea Scrolls and the wisdom tradition, it is a state of being--the power to rule--that is granted to the wise and the righteous, and it leads to immortality. Philo tells us we can achieve it by detaching ourselves from the material world. Luke and Thomas tell us that it is available to us here on earth but that not everyone is able to access it. From Hebrews we learn that it is made up of spiritual things and not created things. Jesus tells us that it is both very small and very big and has a transformative power, thus suggesting a connection with the mystical idea that we can become one with God. The Gospel of Thomas and the other Nag Hammadi texts also point in this direction. Thomas saying 3 tells us that the kingdom is both inside of us (very small) and outside of us (very big). The author of Thomas expands and builds upon the concepts of Philo and Hellenistic Judaism when he tells us that the kingdom is achieved through self-knowledge:

"Jesus said, "If your leaders say to you,'Behold, the kingdom is in heaven,' then the birds of heaven will precede you. If they say to you,'It is in the sea,' then the fish will precede you. Rather, the kingdom is within you and it is outside you.

"When you know yourselves, then you will be known, and you will understand that you are children of the living Father." (saying 3)

The Gnostic text Pistis Sophia repeats this idea. Here, Jesus promises kingship and divine union to those who receive his mysteries. He says, "All men who will receive the mystery of the Ineffable will become fellow-rulers (kings) with me in my kingdom. And I am they and they are I."(Pistis Sophia, 96) In other words, when you become one with the Christ, exemplified by Jesus (the archetype of your immortal divine image), you will have attained the kingdom.

Other sayings in the Gospel of Thomas confirm that "finding the kingdom" is a code phrase for "divine union." First, Jesus compares himself to the kingdom: "Whoever is near me is near the fire, and whoever is far from me is far from the kingdom."(saying 82) If the kingdom is like Jesus, then people wanting to attain the kingdom need to become more like Jesus, as implied in saying 108: "Jesus said, 'Whoever drinks from my mouth will become like me; I myself shall become that person, and the hidden things will be revealed to that one.' "

In Thomas, another synonym for becoming divine is "returning to the beginning," the primordial state of perfection before souls ever descended into mortal form. Scholar Steven Davies concludes that in the Gospel of Thomas "the beginning, the kingdom of God, Jesus, and the light are equivalent terms."

When Jesus' disciples ask him about the "end," he tells them that the way to acheive eternal life is to return to the beginning. "Jesus said, 'Have you found the beginning that you search for the end?" In the place where the beginning is, there the end will be. Blessed is he who will stand at the beginning, and he will know the end and he will not taste death.' "(saying 18) In saying 24, Jesus tells us more about how to attain the "beginning" (or perfected) state, which he has already achieved. His disciples say, "Show us the place where you are, for we must seek it." Jesus replies, "There is light within a person of light, and it shines on the whole world. If it does not shine, it is dark."

Thus, when you discover how to make your light shine, when you become one with the light that is God in your heart, you will stand at the beginning--you will have discovered the kingdom.

(2) http://www.oocities.org/Athens/Styx/8676/files/Augustine.html [An essay of mine on Augustine's theory of Original Sin]

(3) In his inaugural address delivered January 20, 1961, JFK closed with these words:

"With a good conscience our only sure reward, with history the final judge of our deeds, let us go forth to lead the land we love, asking His blessing and His help, but knowing that here on earth God's work must truly be our own."