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MASTERS
from "The Impersonal Life"
You, who are still holding to the idea, taught in various teachings,
that I will provide a "Master" or Divine Teacher for each aspirant towards
union with Me, hear My Words.
It is true I have permitted you in the past to delve into all kinds
of mystical and occult books and teachings, encouraging your secret
desire to acquire the powers necessary to attain this union extolled
in such teachings, even to the extent of quickening in you some slight
consciousness of the possession of such powers.
I have even permitted the belief that by practicing certain exercises,
breathing in a certain way, and saying certain mantras, you might attract
to you a "Master" from the unseen, who would become your teacher and
help you to prepare for certain initiations that would admit you into
an advanced degree in some secret order in the inner planes of existence,
where much of My Divine Wisdom would be opened up to you.
I have not only permitted these things, but, if you can see it, it was
I who led you to these books, inspired in you such desire, and caused
such belief to find lodgment in your mind;-but not for the purpose you
imagine.
Yes, I have brought you through all these teachings, desires and beliefs,
trying to point out to your human mind the Forces I use to bring into
expression My Divine Idea. I have portrayed these Forces as heavenly
Hierarchies, and that your human intellect might the better comprehend,
I pictured them as Angels or Divine Beings, Impersonal agents or executors
of My Will, engaged in the process of bringing into expression My Idea
that was in the beginning.
But you did not understand.
Your human intellect, enamored of the possibility of meeting and communing
with one of these beings, as claimed in some of the teachings, proceeded
at once to personalize Them, and began to long for Their appearance
in your life, imagining that They are interested in your human affairs,
and that by living in accordance with certain rules set down in certain
teachings, you could propitiate Them so They would help you to gain
Nirvana or Immortality.
Now I have purposely permitted you to indulge yourself with such delusions,
letting you long and pray, and strive earnestly to obey all the instructions
given; even leading you on, sometimes, by giving you glimpses, in self-induced
visions and dreams of ideal beings, which I permitted you to believe
were such "Masters". I may even have caused to open in you
certain faculties, which make it possible for you to sense the presence
of personalities that have passed into the spirit side of life, and
who have been attracted by your desires and seek to fulfill the part
of Master and Guide to you. Now the time has come for you to know that
such beings are not Masters, also that Divine Beings do not call themselves
Masters; that I, and I alone, your own Real Self, AM the only Master
for you now, and until you are able to know Me also in your brother.
That any being, either in human or spirit form, that presents himself
to your consciousness and claims to be a Master, or who permits you
to call him Master, is nothing more nor less a personality, the same
as yours, and therefore is not Divine, as your human mind understands
that term, despite the many wonderful "truths" he may utter, and the
"Marvelous" things he may do. Just so long as your human mind seeks
or worships the idea of a Master in any other being, no matter how lofty
or sacred he may seem to you, just so long will you be fed with such
ideas; until, verily, I may perhaps, permit you to meet and commune
with such a "Master".
If that privilege is vouchsafed you, it will be only in order to hasten
your awakening and your consequent disillusionment, when you will learn
that "Master" is indeed but a personality, even though far more advanced
in awakening than you, but still a personality - and not the Divine
One your innermost Soul is yearning for you to know.
For I feed you with every idea that will operate to teach you the reality
back of the seeming, and if I lead you on to apparent deception and
loss of faith in all human and even Divine perfection, it is only to
enable you the more clearly to distinguish between the substance and
the shadow, and to prepare you for that far higher Ideal I am waiting
to picture to you.
You can rise in your human personality only to the ideal your human
mind is capable of conceiving. Through Desire I cause My will to manifest
in you, and through Desire I perform many wondrous works. If you doubt
this you need only to apply the Key:
To think of a Master is to create one.
This idea of a Master, by your thinking, becomes what you desire and
imagine a master to be.
In other words, by your thinking you build around this idea, all the
qualities you imagine a master possesses. Your human mind, through Desire,
through aspiration, through worship, must needs create these qualities
in some imaginary being, who is still a personality, for you cannot
as yet conceive of an Impersonal being.
Therefore, according to the intensity of your desire and thinking, must
this idea sooner or later come into actual manifestation., either by
attracting to you such a personality in the flesh, or one entitized
in the realm of visions and dreams.
As your human mind is constituted, it at certain times thinks it needs
a Master, one to whom it can turn with its human trials and problems
for explanation and advice, thinking life's problems can be settled
that way. If I draw to you one who fails you or deceives you and throws
you back finally upon Me, your own Self, discouraged, disillusioned
and humiliated, it is only that perhaps then you will be ready to turn
to Me within, and will listen to My Voice, which all these years has
been speaking to you, but to which your proud and egoistic mind has
not deigned to listen. You who have not yet had this experience, who
have not yet met the Master of your aspirations, either in human or
spirit form; you, within whom My Words have failed to awaken a quickening
response to their truth, - for you I have in store certain experiences
which will surely lead you to Me later on, and then you will be brought
to know that I AM the Master, the inspiring Idea back of and within
every thought of and every aspiration towards a Master that enters your
mind, whether coming from within or without.
It is taught, "When the pupil is ready the Master appears." And this
is true in a sense; but not as you have interpreted it.
Your secret desire for a Master will bring him to you, but only when
I have prepared you for such an appearance. But such will be only an
appearance of a Master. The true Master or Teacher, when He appears,
you may never recognize; for He may be hidden in an interesting friend,
a business associate, your next door neighbor, or in your own wife or
husband or child.
You, who have risen above Desire, you who no longer seek a Master or
Teacher, or even Me, but are abiding alone in the faith of My Eternal
Presence and Promise, - for you I have in store a meeting and a communion,
which will bring to your Soul such joy and blessings as your human mind
is incapable of conceiving.
Fear not; this mystery will be revealed unto you - if you truly wish
to know My Meaning.
Until then, why, in your seeking, be satisfied with anything short of
the Highest?
Why seek in human or spirit teacher, guide, master, or angel, for the
necessarily limited manifestation of My Perfection, when you can come
directly to Me, God within you, the Omniscient, Omnipotent, Omnipresent,
the Inspiring Idea back of and within All manifestations?
As I AM in You, even as I AM in any you seek, and as all the Wisdom,
all the Power and all the Love they possess come only from Me, why not
now come to Me, and let Me prepare you also so I can express My All
through You?
You are a human personality, yet You are Divine and therefore Perfect.
The first of these truths you believe, the latter you do not believe.
Yet both are true. - That is the mystery.
You are just what you think You are.
One or the other, which are you? - Or both?
You are One with Me. I AM in You, in Your human personality, in Your
body, mind and intellect. I AM in every cell of Your body, in every
attribute of Your mind, in every faculty of Your intellect. I AM the
Soul, the active Principle of each. You are in Me. You are a Cell of
my Body; You are an Attribute of My Mind; You are a Faculty of My Intellect.
You are a part of Me, yet You are I, My Self. We are One, and always
have been.
This idea of a Master I brought to your mind's attention was only to
lead you to and prepare you for this Idea of Me, your Impersonal Self,
an Angel of Light, a Radiation of My Being, your own Divine Lord and
Master, within.
Yes, I, your Divine Self, AM the Master your Soul has caused you to
seek, and when you do find Me, and know I AM your Self, then will you
in your human consciousness gladly become My Disciple, will lovingly
wait upon Me, and will be concerned only that you faithfully serve Me,
both within yourself and within your fellow men. And then you understand
why only "One is your Master"
For I dwell in all men and AM their One and Only Self. Through all men
I AM ever calling to you and trying to reach and impress your human
consciousness. As I AM continually teaching you, not only through every
avenue needed at the time, I have many ways of reaching your consciousness
and utilize all to bring you to a realization of My Meaning.
I speak with many voices - with the voice of all human emotions, passions
and desires. I speak with Nature's voice, with the voice of Experience,
even with the voice of human knowledge.
Yes, these are all My Voice, which I use Impersonally to express to
you the one fact, that I AM in All and that I AM All. What this voice
says, in Its thousand ways, is that you, too, are part of this All,
and that I AM in you, waiting for your recognition of Me and your conscious
cooperation in the expression of My Idea of Impersonal Perfection on
earth, even as It is expressing in Heaven.
When this recognition comes, and then only, are you ready to meet and
know a real Master. Then and then only will you realize why I, your
own Impersonal Self can be and AM the only possible Master of your human
personality.
Then also will you understand why in your personal, separate consciousness
you could never recognize or know a real Master should you meet Him
in a physical body - that not until you are able to enter into My Consciousness
within you and within Him, He would not exist to you other that perhaps
as a kind and helpful friend or teacher.
When you have attained to that Consciousness, then will you be worthy
and qualified to know and commune with your fellows in the Great Brotherhood
of the Spirit, Those who have mastered self and Who live only to help
their younger brothers also to find the Divine One within. If a being
should come into your life who seemed to you Divine and who let you
think or call him a Master, he is not yet wholly Impersonal. Such a
one might be a master-man, but he could not be the Divine One your Soul
yearns to serve.
Perhaps you should be satisfied to have such a one for a Master, even
if he were not wholly Impersonal. If so, then I would hereafter bring
you to a realization of his personal imperfections by a constant comparison
with My Impersonal Perfection; until you would finally turn and come
to Me in complete abandon, acknowledging Me and My Impersonality as
the only Model and Ideal, and as the true Cause which inspired your
long search without for My Perfection, that could be found only within,
hidden deep within your own soul
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Again, the above is taken from the book, The Impersonal Life (DeVorss
& Co.) by Joseph S. Benner. Just something to think about - Steve
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