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Transcript

January 11, 1970 (Tape 209, CD 21)
Sermon

This morning I’m going to talk to you something about the kingdom of God. A subject which has been very much debated, a subject which is not spoken of very much. And I take my text out of the 12th Chapter of Luke, verse 32. “Fear not little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. 33) Sell your possessions, and give alms; provide yourself with purse that does not grow old, a treasure in the heavens that does not fail, where no thief approacheth, and no moth destroys. 33) For where your treasure is, there will be your heart also.”

The interesting thing of this text is that while it has been considered a mystery for ages, there is no mystery. While there has been great discussion, great controversy about heaven, there is no mystery. Now let us first of all consider the reality, and of course we shall consider the reality all the way through this text which is very much controversial to that of the approach of our more modern theologians.

First of all, where is the kingdom of God , the Father? If we believe and if we know that there is a Father then we know that we live within Him, then we know that He is this System, this Solar System within which we live. It is only a few years ago when there was a great deal of controversy among thousands and thousands of people about flying saucers. And yet I find here that he says in this 12th chapter of Luke: “Fear not little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”

Well now, He’s going to give you the kingdom, His kingdom, the access to His consciousness, the access to His material kingdom, then you’ve got to have some way of getting around, don’t you? He must have provided it on one level or another. You either have to accept it or you have to deny the words of our Lord Jesus Christ.

If there’s anything that I dislike in the world, and anything that comes close to getting under my skin, is a man that tries to stand on two sides of the fence at the same time. Because I’m out looking to see right where he really is; is it him or his shadow that I’m looking at?

And if the Father wishes the good pleasure of giving you the kingdom He must have had some idea that you could get around in it or you wouldn’t have much pleasure in it, would you? Now you go through life and you go through these experiences of trying to attain spirituality, trying to get to the point where you know Jesus Christ, and the Father to a certain extent and you try to approach the level of consciousness that you may understand these great mysteries. And here’s one of them that I’m talking about this morning.

And you go through all kinds of torture with yourself trying to find your way to God, and it’s already been prepared. What are you struggling about? What are you going through all the contortions for? Do you know what it is? It’s that you haven’t learned how to receive. And he specifically tells you here, to sell your possessions and give alms and provide yourself with a purse that does not grow old. Well a purse is something that will contain things, isn’t it? It’s a receiver of things that it holds. It’s very simple. You could ask a child five years old and he could tell you what a pocketbook was. It’s one of the first things he learns to know about. It’s a place where he can put away his pennies and his money and what he mooches off of grandpa and so forth. He knows what it’s worth.

Well he tells you right here – if you give away these things and then you provide yourself with a purse that will not decay with age; it doesn’t grow old. That your treasure in heaven does not fail where no thief approaches and no moth destroys for where your treasure is there will be your heart also.

Now he told you, he just said he prepared it. He didn’t say you’ve got to go and get it. He’s telling you that you have got it. Now if you want to struggle to take it, why that’s all right with him of course – you’ve got the right to. You can struggle. But one of the main things that I want to bring to you this morning is the Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. To His little flock.

Well he’s told us before in another part out of the Testament that many will be called but few will be chosen. And this is what he’s talking about. He’s talking about learning how to have a place where you can store up. And where do you store up? In the soul and in the Self. The Self is in full contact and full knowledge. Within the soul is where you store up this information, this understanding of how to use it. So you can go out in His kingdom; he didn’t say anything about going to heaven at all, did he? Not a thing. He didn’t say a thing about it. He didn’t give you any contortions to go through, He just said His kingdom. He created it, so He’s the Lord and Master of it. He’s the creator of it. He didn’t tell you you were going to go to hell or you were going to go to heaven one or the other. He wants you to be able to have the pleasure of His kingdom.

That’s what you’re striving for only some of you people make it so terribly difficult because you’re trying to find out some 8th or 9th heaven or something or other. Sure he told us in the Testament that ‘in my Father’s house are many mansions’, yes, that’s right. Now how are you going to get to them? Well, if you’d just stop trying to make it tough for yourself you’d know. And you’d prepare this vehicle to be able to get around. And you’d learn that through your understanding and through your wisdom and through your, above all things, control of mind. That you’d be able to tune in and you’d get around.

There are some of you here whom have joined the priesthood and taken eternal vows. You say, ‘Oh my, my, my, isn’t that a long time’. What do you mean, time? What are you talking about? Where do you want to go? You know, so often in this school I hear, ‘Well I don’t want to lost my freedom’. Oh boy, are we concerned about losing our freedom because we’re put under vows. Are we concerned whether we get weekend liberty or not because there’s so much out there that we’ve got to get out there and get. And then we get out there after a while and find out there’s not a darned thing. We’re so worried about our freedom but we’re not worried about our freedom after we leave here. Well there’s the time when we can take our freedom. That’s the place in the Father’s kingdom where we really can be free and get around and go places. There’s lots of room out there – I’ve never felt confined there.

It’s just like the fellow who goes out and steals a loaf of bread and gets put in jail for six months; the other fellow goes out and steals several thousand dollars and he gets put in jail for six months. You know that seems pretty foolish because you can ask somebody for a meal and you’ve got it. Now what you’re doing is settling for (unclear word) when there’s the whole of the Father’s kingdom out there to roam in, you’re worrying about whether you can get out of the house or not. That’s true. You’re worrying what you’re going to do with a few years when you’ve got thousands of years to roam around if you get down to business and learn how to use what you’ve got.

He didn’t say he was going to send you to heaven and he didn’t say he was going to send you to hell and there’s no place, believe me, in this New Testament, no place, you find it and I’ll buy you the best dinner, where it says that Jesus Christ or God sent anybody to hell that had come off the earth. You find it. You find it. And it didn’t say that He sent them to heaven either. Not one of them. But He does say that He wishes to give you the kingdom and it’s a pleasure for Him to do it.

You know, I’ve got a very strange and subtle mind and I’m just wondering if he’s getting us to take over so he can get relieved. (Laughter) You know,I’m always leery about something like that because when somebody starts giving me something, see, I say ‘where’s the strings?’.

Believe me, there’s lots of room out there, so let’s get out of this old one-track mind business that the church has perpetuated in order that you’re going to be afraid all the time of everything so that you’re afraid to do this and afraid to do that, and afraid to do the other thing. And let’s open up and let’s learn to use what God giveth. All of the vehicles, all of the Law, all of the things which He put into our hands and get ready to move out into the wide open spaces. And you can.

They used to say, back in the early 1900’s, ‘Young man, go west’. And I say to you, ‘Young man, go out’ because there’s lots of room out there. And believe me its pretty beautiful. It’s pretty beautiful. And it’s time that we stop worrying about this interim here and start to open up. So that we can, as some of the poets have said, hitch our wagon to a star. And you know, they weren’t so far wrong; they had a lot on the ball when they said that. Because we can, when we get away from this earth-bound idea, do just that. In God’s world, in God’s kingdom, within Him, the Law holds true anywhere. Within Him is the beauty and the glory of creation for us.

I don’t know, maybe after we get through with that we can wander off some other place. But within Him we have this freedom. Now everybody is always worried about ‘because this law says this way’, ‘that’s the way God said it’. You’ll be thankful when you get out there and find out! For ‘fear not my little flock’. He didn’t expect twenty-five million or a hundred and fifty million off of this earth or three hundred million or three billion. How many? He says ‘my little flock’. Fear not my little flock, for it is the Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions, give alms. In other words get this darn cycle of giving and getting. Get it in action.

How do you suppose I’m going to get anything to you if you keep hanging on and keeping me from doing it? It’s plain and simple, it’s so simple. That’s our problem. It’s so simple. Just five minutes out there is worth a whole lifetime. It really is. Because you can’t measure, you can’t understand it now until you have let go, you have sold your wares and given alms and let go of everything. And then you will have and be able to receive the glories of the kingdom.

Let’s put away the false ideas, let’s put away the confinement. You’re so worried about being confined. You’re so worried about not having freedom. Let’s put away those things; and really, I challenge you to take your freedom that God has given us. Really take it. And then you will have the knowledge and the wisdom of the great glories of that kingdom. And the great pleasures, oh, pleasures beyond anything that you can think of. Beyond anything you can think of. Let’s get with it and hit that stardust trail instead of the trail to the west coast. The trail out. And let God break the pattern of confinement and fear that exists, so that we can tell our brothers about it.

That’s what we’re waiting for, that’s what the Master is waiting for. That whomever he may be, whether it’s the Master or somebody else, the Messiah or the great Teachers, whether there’s one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine or ten I’m not going to say. Because you aren’t going to catch me in a false prophesy. Let them come and do the work. Let them come so that more can be taught and learn about this freedom.

Men have fought and died and have given their lives and has gone through all kinds of bloody crucifixions and everything you can think of for freedom. For why? We’ve got it in the palm of our hands. Accept it. Don’t fight it. Accept it. And join the other throng. Not a throng of beings with angel wings and white robes and all the other things. Just you, yourself, your being out there in the immensity and the glory of God’s kingdom.

In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.