What Is The True Christian Religion?/Chapter 16
CHAPTER XVI
OVERCOMING BY THE TRUTH
When people read that the angels overcame the Dragon through the blood of the Lamb and through the word of their testimony, it will mean to many that we are saved by the vicarious death of Jesus on the cross and that eternal life is the result of accepting the dogma of Faith Alone, without the need, or possibility, of doing anything of good that will contribute to salvation; but the "blood of the Lamb" means here as elsewhere the Divine love or Divine truth. When one pours out his life's blood, he is pouring out his life and his life involves his love and thought—his conscious life. In the case of Jesus when he poured out his life for us He was giving that which His life represented and involved, His love and His truth.
We are saved as that Divine Love enters into our wills and as His Divine Truth teaches us the way to heaven. Is that not self-evident? We are not saved by His literal blood, as we have seen, for that was small in quantity and disappeared almost immediately.
People who believe in the Vicarious Atonement seem somehow to believe that the literal blood of Jesus cleanses us in some miraculous way. They do not appear to realize that they are thinking of the blood in a mystical way, and that they do not have the literal blood applied. If it is, as it must be, thought of as something of a spiritual nature, what is it? Is it a fanciful something, or is it something practical such as the Divine Love and the Divine Truth which actually constitute the Divine Life? And we see that as the Divine Love enters our will and as the Divine Truth enters our understanding, we become new creatures, and in no other way.
Salvation is always the life of God—His love and His truth— received by man by his free choice and permeating all his thought and life. This is the Lord's blood, and it obviously can be nothing else, since it cannot be His literal blood shed upon the cross. That never washed away sins in a literal way, nor was it offered by one Divine Being to pacify or appease another Divine Being, for there is only one Divine Being, not Two or Three; and thus there was no Divine Being up in heaven demanding the murder—for that is what the crucifixion of Jesus was of His innocent Son in order to be able to forgive mankind. In reading Bible texts, which seem to confirm the teaching of salvation by the "blood," the true sense becomes apparent at once if we use the word "life" instead. Salvation by the blood thus becomes salvation by the life of Jesus in our lives.
The whole trouble is that men do not understand the true nature of God, and seek to be saved for heaven by an easy way. In this New Age the true nature of the Divine Being is revealed. God is as to His inmost substance and being nothing else but Love,—Unselfish Love,— which has nothing whatever of Self-Love in it. His Love,— or His nature,—goes out wisely in order to accomplish the purpose that true and sincere love always has, namely, the lasting welfare and happiness of others.
God's purpose therefore is to bless endlessly and completely, and to do so it goes out into the performance of useful things for the beloved. A mother's love is a picture on the human plane of the love of God. How can a loving Heavenly Father demand the death of His children? Can a mother do so? The Trinity in God is Love, Wisdom and Use. The Father is the Divine Love, or the soul, as it were, of God. The Son is the Divine Wisdom, or the Divine Truth, which goes forth creatively, and is the Logos, the word, the Divine self-expression. The Holy Spirit is the loving activity of the Father manifested in His coming forth to view as the Son. It is the Divine Presence. There are not three, but one, just as the soul, body and outgoing spirit of a man are one.
God had to have a revelation of Himself given to His creatures who otherwise could not know an invisible Being. He gave it in the Old Testament through angels and prophets, but the time came when it became necessary, due to the darkness of men's souls, for Him to reveal Himself directly; and to do this it became necessary for Him to provide a channel, or an external instrumentality in the world of nature. Jesus revealed Himself as God: "He that hath seem me hath the Father," and He also said, "No man cometh unto the Father but by me," just as no one can see or approach our soul except through our body.
In assuming a human nature, with all the weaknesses and tendencies to sin inherited through Mary, it became possible for Him to meet and overcome through temptation-combats the evil, malignant beings of the underworld. This involved His sufferings and His death upon the cross. There was no substitution, but an actual rescue by the Lord as the champion of mankind. His death did not appease the Father's wrath or offended sense of justice for Jesus was the Father, as He said, "I and the Father are one," or identical. Was not this love, true love, overcoming love, and does it not melt our hearts and arouse in us our love to Him?
Let me close this chapter with certain statements about the nature of God taken from the Lord's revelations of Himself to this New Age which are surprisingly beautiful. Contrast them with the idea of God involved in the old cruel statements in the "Plan of Salvation," or the doctrine of Faith Alone, where a curse is placed upon the human race which God is by His sense of justice unable to avert.
Now hear this:
"With the Lord, when He was in the world, there was no other life than the life of love toward the universal human race, which he burned to save eternity. This is the veriest celestial life . . . Jehovah is nothing else than mercy, which is of love to the universal human race— and that life was one of pure love, which is never possible with any man." And now another:
"From these few statements it can be seen how deluded are those who think, and still more those who believe, and still more those who teach, that God can damn anyone, curse anyone, send anyone to hell, predestine any soul to eternal death, avenge wrongs, be angry, or punish. He cannot even turn Himself away from man, nor look upon him with a stern countenance. These and like things are contrary to His essence; and what is contrary to His essence is contrary to His very Self.
"Jehovah God—or the Lord—never curses anyone, never leads anyone into temptation, never punishes anyone, and still less does He curse anyone. All this is done by the infernal crew, for such things can never proceed from the Fountain of mercy, peace and goodness. The reason of its being said in the Word that Jehovah God not only turns away His face, is angry, punishes, tempts, but also kills and even curses, is that men may believe that the Lord governs and disposes all and everything in the universe, even evil itself, punishments, and temptations, and when they have received this most general idea, may afterwards learn how He governs and disposes all things by turning the evil of punishment and of temptation into good. In teaching and learning the Word, the most general truths must come first and therefore the literal sense is full of such things."
We speak of a mother's love, or of the attitude of the father of the Prodigal Son, but here is the Lord's attitude toward us:
"The Lord, from the Divine Love, or mercy, wills to have all near to Himself; so that they do not stand at the doors, that is, in the first heaven; but He wills that they should be in the third and if it were possible, not only with Himself, but in Himself. Such is the Divine Love, or the Lord's Love."
Is it not time that the world should know the truth as to the real nature of God and turn away from false concepts of Him? and thus turn away from a "Plan of Salvation" misrepresenting Him and cunningly worked out to deceive men into believing that they cannot cooperate with Him in overcoming their evils of life? Forever it is to take up the cross of self-denial of hurtful lusts, "Blessed are they that DO His commandments that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city." "He that overcometh shall inherit all things, and I will be His God, and he shall be my son." "Ye shall know them by their fruits." Salvation is the life of God in the soul of man and it is obviously nothing else.