This recording is one of several used as source material for Chapter 1, “The Two Worlds,” in A Parenthesis in Eternity.
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Find the Points for Practice
While listening to the recording or reviewing the transcript of the recording, it is helpful to note the points of practice that Joel gives. These are our “assignments.” He is telling us how to live and practice The Infinite Way message in order to make spiritual progress and experience the fruits of our work. The notes below are not a summary of the whole class but are an example of notes intended to highlight some points of practice. As you study the class yourself, you will find others. Then you can choose to work with the ones that feel right for you.
Why is our spiritual progress slow to show forth the fruits of our work? Joel says that it may be because we still believe that a human being can receive something of God. That is not true.
The Master made it clear that only those who abide in the Word—the indwelling Presence—and let the Word abide in them will bear fruit richly. Paul said that the natural man receiveth not the things of God, is not under the law of God, neither indeed can be. We become children of God and live by grace only when the Spirit of God dwells in us. When we experience sin, disease, death, lack, or limitation, we have stepped outside the government and grace of God.
What makes it difficult for us to attain spiritual consciousness is that we think we can add spirituality to our humanhood, or our “outer self,” and we cannot. We have to die daily to our sense of humanhood in order to reveal and live in our Christhood. It is only as the human sense dies in us that the Christ is born, and that spiritual harmony begins to function in us.
God does not come to the human experience. The individual gives up the human sense of self and exchanges it for the realization of Christhood, or true identity as the son and heir of God. Dying daily to humanhood is the key. Until we become one with our Source, we are like a branch of a tree that is cut off.
How do we make this transformation? First, we must make this clear-cut distinction between the man of earth—the human, the outer self—and the son of God, the indwelling Christ that is under the law of God and lives by grace. Then we must choose the direction of Christhood and make it our first and major concern. Eventually, this choice brings about the inner change that brings us under God’s grace and enables us to live by God’s law, might, wisdom, and love. In some measure we attain the realization of our true identity as one with God, and that inner change affects our outer experience.
The transformation does not depend on whether you are a good or bad person. What counts is what is going on within. What degree of search for God, or truth, or the Christ, is animating you? What is your inner goal? Joel says:
The first step that I urge upon you is not to be concerned with whether or not you ought to be more loving, or more generous, or more benevolent, or more virtuous, or something of this nature. Let those things ride for a while; let them take care of themselves, or be taken care of, and keep as your basic, your foundational point in life, the eternal questions: What is God? How do I come face-to-face with God? How do I become the child of God? What is the nature of God? What does it mean to be consciously one with our Source?
In other words, if it is not already there, develop a curiosity. And above all things, do not go to God seeking that through God you will attain something out here, even health. When you go to God go only seeking God.
Now let us see what this curiosity means, the Master says: “My kingdom is not of this world.” (John 18:36) Do you know that if you were to take that one statement and spend, if necessary, a year or two on it, that that would get you closer to the spiritual kingdom than almost any program you could follow?
Why? What is “My kingdom?” Now, it is not of this world. Therefore, it has nothing to do with abundance; it has nothing to do with a happy home; it has nothing to do with health, because it is not of this world. Then what is it? What is “My kingdom?” That means, “What is the Christ kingdom?”
You see, until you break through, there is going to be no change of heart, no change of being, no change of consciousness. You must break through into an understanding of what “My kingdom” is. What is this mystery kingdom? What is this hidden kingdom? What is this “My kingdom” that has nothing to do with this world? Yet if you enter “My kingdom,” all these things will be added unto you—what you shall eat, what you shall drink, and wherewithal you shall be clothed. All of these will be added to you if you seek and find My kingdom.
Or another equivalent: “My peace give I unto thee, My peace—not as the world giveth.” What is “My peace?” This means “Christ peace.” You can get a lot of peace, you know, from having an abundance of money. You can get a lot of peace from having good health. You can get a lot of peace from having a happy home. And yet the “Christ peace” has no relationship to these. And yet if you attain the “Christ peace,” you will have these. Just remember the whole human race is seeking these. Now what is wrong? The whole human race is seeking health, wealth, happiness, and peace on Earth. And when they find it, they still have not found My peace, My kingdom, My grace. They still have not made their demonstration. In other words, they are seeking the wrong thing, because even if they attain what they are seeking, they will find that that is not it.
The seeking should be: What is My kingdom? What is “My peace? What is “My grace? Because attaining these, all the things that the world is seeking are added unto us. We have them anyhow, but with them we have the greater thing—the Cause or Source of them. The moment we stop this chasing for the baubles and the bangles; the moment we stop chasing things and persons and begin this search for God, search for truth, search for the Holy Grail, search for Christ, whatever term you wish to use—the moment we start this, we are really on the path and ready to enter the kingdom.
It can happen in a blinding flash, or even in a moment of sin as it did with Saul of Tarsus, or the woman taken in adultery, and turned them into a saint. It makes no difference; it can happen at any moment. What counts is what is going on back in consciousness. What is the direction our consciousness is walking in? What is the direction our consciousness is turning to? What is the goal of our life? The moment it is away from baubles and bangles and on to My kingdom, My peace, My grace, the realm of God, the kingdom of God and His righteousness; the moment our thought turns to this, we begin to shed our mortality. It begins to drop off.
When we realize My grace, My peace, and My kingdom, all things are added unto us—or better said, we realize that we already have them within our being.
Contemplate the Scripture Quotes
Finding and contemplating the Scripture quotes in a class is an activity that can bear spiritual fruit. Usually, it is helpful to work with the ones that resonate with you. For example, here are some of the Bible quotes that Joel uses in this class to corroborate the lesson he gives. As you study the class, other quotations may come to you.