On Doing God's Will
-by Ron FaulkHumanity, at least that portion which reflects on God, is inclined to think that, in the next life, the will of God will be clear to see and convenient to do.
What many fail to realize is, first, the way to God is a long one. Jesus said many mansions were in his father's house, and by "many" he meant worlds upon worlds. All these mansions must be experienced on the way to God.
Second, the purpose of these mansions is to prepare the creature to stand in the presence of the omnipotent, infinite and eternal God, the First Source and Center of a virtually infinite universe of universes of things material, mental, spiritual, and other-wise. It requires a certain amount of vanity as well as immaturity to believe that one could leave this world and immediately stand in the presence of God. True, such belief also represents the tremendous force of desire in the human spirit to return to its divine parent. God is our father, and all of his true children yearn with amazing desire to return to his spirit-giving presence.
But if, following death, a typical evolutionary being from the "first abode" could be transported to the immediate presence of God, then, under such hypothetical circumstances, if the person could actually be aware of God, s/he would be consumed by his glory and perfection, spiritually seized to such an extent that his or her individuation would be subsumed.
But such an awareness of God, which would also be an awareness of his perfection, would so bring into blinding revelation each least imperfection, each tendency of thought, each slightest feeling, that the creature would be shamed into ir-reconciliation. When we stand before God, each thought and feeling is broadcast to the corners of the universe. Only a person with perfection in thought and feeling can stand there with relative impunity. It would be a terrible awakening to stand before God and all creatures without reasonable perfection of thought and sense. Therefore God's grace provides much time to achieve the degree of perfection that will indeed allow each person to stand with relative immunity and comfort in the unimaginably powerful and loving and searching presence of God. As long as anything remains that you do not want to be searched, and searched utterly, then you do not want to stand before God.
The purpose of evolution is evolution. Evolution hardly ends on this world. Death is essential to evolution, but death accomplishes nothing miraculous, except, from the creature's perspective, the "miracle" of resurrection. Resurrection does lead to new levels of faith. But that is about all it does. The next life merely provides new opportunities for evolution towards God, albeit, the next and more spiritual world is glorious compared with this one.
Evolution takes time. In death is no miracle that abridges the evolutionary process and suddenly makes anyone perfect. If God wanted to make someone perfect, he would. And he has. But these are not evolutionary beings. Nor are they privileged to adventure with Jesus, the Son of God and Son of Man, and Lord of the universe's evolutionary beings.
When a person enters the portals of death and re-awakens in the next world, the will of God is not, in a personal sense, much more obvious than here. Wo/man largely fails to comprehend that the job of evolution is to learn to do the will of God based on the spirit-voice in his or her heart. No short-cuts to this exist. Our purpose is to know the will of God our self -- not to hear it from another. Only when each person knows and does the will of God as the result of true desire, and based on a successful effort to establish a personal relationship with God through the soul and in spirit, will whole worlds be able to enter into the kingdom of heaven.
Jesus said, "I am the way and the life." Jesus clearly revealed the way to know the will of God and make it ours. Only a certain kind of living, the kind of living that Jesus practiced, leads to the moment-to-moment awareness of the perfect will of God, and, to the certain practice of actually doing that will.
Why do people think, when so few have practiced the One True Way here, that they will automatically know and practice it in the next world? Jesus is the way to the father. Until we walk his way, we cannot find the father. Death will not make it miraculously easy to walk Jesus' way.
It is true that "the yoke is light." It is also true that few have put on the yoke in this life -- but more are succeeding and a new generation of Godly children will arise, indeed is arising. The key is to set aside the egoic self-will. This self-will is difficult to manage because it is largely fear based. It is afraid of "not being." Therefore does it fight tooth and nail and with all the illusions and deceptions at its command to reign supreme. Ironically, this is the very path to insure that the person will not move towards eternity. This same struggle for self-mastery and liberation of the will from the human ego-bridge continues in the next life.
Too few understand the great gift God has given, a gift with eternal and infinite potential. Wo/men can actually hear directly from God. They cannot now stand in his full searching presence, but they can hear his perfect still voice. Each person can actually know God's will by hearing from him directly, if it is truly desired. For along with true desire, God has provided the means whereby each desire can actually be fulfilled. The law of the universe is: to yearn in the spirit, is to begin the fulfillment of desire. The good new is that all true desire will be fulfilled. It is also true we find that many of the things we desired were too small.
Does wo/man think that the worlds of time and space are peopled with beings who hear directly from God? This ability is a great and rare gift and the primary compensation, as it were, for the tribulations of material evolution. The beings of paradise do directly apprehend God's will. But the only person in this teeming, tremendous universe of time and space who knows God's will and does it every time is Jesus. And Jesus has clearly shown that he will not force anyone to his yoke, which in reality is God's yoke. Jesus will not abridge the responsibilities, or the privileges, of time and space, of the long road to paradise, and of the unfathomable opportunities it provides.
When wo/man wakes up in the next life, there are no beings to tell him or her what is God's perfect will. Certainly good advise and profitable choices will be offered. But wo/man should know that the great gift of being able to hear from God is also, and perhaps even primarily, a gift for other beings. Humanity's job, with Jesus' supernal counsel and perfect leadership, is to develop its profound spiritual ability to hear directly from God, and then to learn to put God's will first, so that others may thereby profit.
The lesson in the next life is the same lesson as here. Yes, a much vaster concourse of beings will be visible and available for education and experience. But these beings cannot tell any person what is God's perfect will. They are, rather, enthralled with watching the "lowly" creatures from the "vale of tears" grow and develop their innate abilities to hear directly from the spirit-voice of God within. As Jesus said many times, "the kingdom of heaven is within you."
Humanity "educates" as much as it is educated. The universe is a training ground, a way-faring place, for many beings. And each person born of the world actually can, if s/he only will, do what vast numbers of beings cannot -- hear directly the spirit-voice of God. Consider this well. Consider also the nature of the yoke that is required for this tremendous fruit to develop. Consider Jesus statement that the branch that bears no fruit will be shorn. This universe is not made to let the meager human will run rampant. Wo/man is oh so slow to comprehend that no person is happy when the small, self-centered egoic will rules, for the simple reason that this is not the real self. Imagine the child that wants to stay five years old forever. In the first place it is not possible, in the second it would only lead to unfulfillment.
Take up the yoke. It is indeed light, and with it tribulations will diminish and peace will descend. The yoke is to turn a full heart to God. That desire, if true and sincere and persevered in, will result in loving service to all other beings. Do you not know this is the purpose and privilege of eternity?
September 4, 1998
Note: the first twenty-two essays are available on diskette (format Windows, MS-Word 97). A small donation to cover costs is appreciated but not necessary. Contact me by email <rfaulk@nstar.net>, with a request and your US mail address and I will send it.