PP 297537/00068
PO Box 627
Caringbah NSW 1495
Tel: (02) 9540 2391
Fax: (02) 9524 0025
www.sydneygoodwill.org.au

No 193 / January 2003

Dear Friends,

As we prepare for the Share the Spirit of Peace - Peace Summit we are becoming more and more aware of the working out of our vision and of what we know is coming. The very way in which businesses, groups and individuals are contributing voluntarily and spontaneously of their time, skills and resources wherever need becomes apparent reflects the growing sense of a unified purpose and intention guiding us all depending on what we have to offer. This energy of service to the whole flows from a human heart, which requires no recognition (sponsorship in the usual sense is not promoted) but sees only its participation in the unifying cause and purpose we all serve together. The rewards lie in the further expression of the soul of humanity as it unfolds the future.

A Master writing for his disciples in the 1930's explains: "Happy the disciple who can bring the vision nearer still to humanity, and work it into existence on the physical plane. . . the materialisation of any aspect of the vision on the physical plane is never the work of any one man. Only when it has been sensed by the many, only when they have worked at its material form can their united efforts draw it into outer manifestation."

He then advises them: ". . work not for joy but towards it; not for reward, but from the inner need to help; not for gratitude, but from the urge that comes from having seen the vision and realisation of the part you have to play in bringing that vision down to earth.

"It is helpful to differentiate between happiness, joy and bliss: First, happiness, which has its seat in the emotions, and is a personality reaction. Second, joy, which is a quality of the soul and is realised in the mind, when alignment takes place. Third, bliss, which is the nature of the Spirit and about which speculation is fruitless until the soul realises its oneness with the Father. . . . . Does the aspirant refer to his happiness or his joy? If he refers to the latter it must come as the effect of group consciousness, of group solidarity, of oneness with all beings, and may not be interpreted in terms of happiness after all. Happiness comes when the personality is meeting with those conditions which satisfy it in one part or other of its lower nature; it comes when there is a sense of physical well being, of contentment with one's environment or surrounding personalities, or of satisfaction with one's mental opportunities and contacts. Happiness is the goal of the separated self.

"When however we seek to live as souls, the contentment of the lower man is discounted and we find joy in our group relationships and in bringing about those conditions which lead to the better expression of the souls of those we contact. . . . It is a platitude as well as an occult paradox to say that in the midst of profound personality distress and unhappiness, the joy of the soul may be known and felt. . . . Some people are happy because they shut their eyes to truth, or are self-hypnotised, hiding themselves within a shell of illusion. But the aspirant has frequently reached the stage wherein his eyes are wide open; he has learnt to speak truth to himself, and has built up no separating wall between himself and others. He is awake and alive; he is sensitive and frequently suffering."

So our challenge at this moment as the new era is inaugurating is to live it into existence. How often we find that the theory of something and the living practice of it are very different experiences. And as our modern humanity focuses less on the physical experience and more on the emotional and mental experience, we move into realms that provide subtle hiding places for those of us who are delaying the inevitable meeting with our soul and thence with the Soul as it expresses in all things.

These hiding places are illusory in the light of the soul and irrelevant in the Light of Spirit as it informs through soul and into our world. Yet we cling to their familiarity and our theories can be so beguiling that we remain immersed in them and their promulgation even when the very reality working out before our eyes - and even in which we are engaged - cries out for an application of these theories into living practice. Thus we find that expressions of peace and of our interconnectedness can be delayed while we continue in the old dynamic of conflict and promotion of individual image over others. We theorise but we do not make our theories a living reality. In short we do not practise what we are so fond of preaching!

And yet our theories and our words hold the seeds of our next expression - we have but to apply the discipline of achievement to bring the joy of their realisation. And we cannot hide forever. Our very hiding is an acknowledgement of what we would hide from. This is a habit begun in the Garden of Eden when our capacity for knowledge was first uncovered. We read in Genesis from chapters 2 and 3: "And the Lord God commanded the man . . . of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it. For in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die. . . . And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die: for God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil." So they did eat the forbidden fruit and then felt the need to hide from the consequences of their knowledge: "And they heard the voice of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day: and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God amongst the trees of the garden. And the Lord God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where art thou? And he said, I heard thy voice in the garden. And I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself. And He said, Who told thee that thou wast naked? Hast thou eaten of the tree, whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat?"

It is clear from these first acts of humankind that we took charge of, and gained responsibility for, our own actions and that the pursuit of the knowledge of good and evil was the path we chose. But the prodigal son returns to the Father having used knowledge and experience of good and evil - the pairs of opposites - as a tool for realisation of his eternal oneness with Spirit, with the Father. He learns that he is not knowledge or any of the constructs he makes from it - identities, images, theories - but he is spirit itself using his knowledge of things as a tool for the expression of his true identity as a part of Life itself. Then: ". . he knows . . that he is not this or that, but Life Itself. He is not the physical body or its emotional nature; he is not, in the last analysis . . the mind or that by which he knows. He is learning that that too must be transcended and superseded by intelligent love . . , and he begins to realise himself as the soul. Then, later, comes the awful 'moment in time' when, pendant in space, he discovers that he is not the soul. What then is he? A point of divine dynamic will, focussed in the soul and arriving at awareness of Being through the use of form. He is Will, the ruler of time and the organiser, in time, of space. This he does, but ever with the reservation that time and space are the 'divine playthings' and can be used or not at will."

The inner reality is always in process of externalising into mental, emotional and physical living in the world. Yet there are moments of critical penetration into the future when human public awareness reaches a peak or summit of realisation, the response to which can only be a quantum shift in our way of living in the world. We are now in the midst of just such a defining moment when we can live into existence that which we KNOW must come - a dynamic culture of peace and of recognised interdependence between all dimensions, all kingdoms in nature, all nations and peoples - or we can continue to hide and turn our increasing knowledge into the downward spiral of destruction. The need and urgency of the moment is clear!