1952 New Washington Series

Joel S. Goldsmith

7C-A – A New Meditation 3/4

In this meditation it came to me that, The law came by Moses, grace and truth by Jesus Christ, and my thought went back immediately to…Well, of course, first to the Ten Commandments, which you remember were given to the Hebrews as a code of conduct while they were in that desert experience with Moses; when they were just leaving ignorance and superstition on their way to enlightenment and illumination, when they were leaving poverty for abundance. And in making that transition it was necessary for them to discipline themselves or to be disciplined and to be made to live by a code of conduct called The Law, or The Laws of Moses.

These laws you notice are imposed on people whether or not they like them, whether or not they enjoy living under them, but they aren’t imposed upon them for the good of the general public. They are imposed upon them for the good of all, but you’ll note this: The law is imposed upon us from without.

Now, my thought jumps immediately to Christ Jesus and his teaching of living by grace, by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God, and of course, God, as our poet has told us, is Closer than breathing, nearer than hands and feet, and Jesus told us that the kingdom of God was within us.

Now we see that this rule or reign of grace or living by grace is something that comes from within our own being. Oh! Do you see this: The law is imposed upon us from without. Life by grace flows out from within our own being. Right here, I’m flooded with the remembrance that material sense always lives in the outer realm and by and through material objects. Whereas, spiritual consciousness always lives from the hidden manna or the meat that the world knows not of or the water that I can give you. That water which is not drawn up from a well in a bucket.

In this meditation, you see, I’m being reminded again that only in my unillumined, ignorant state, only in my materialistic state am I governed from without by imposition, by imposed laws.  Oh, this comes to me too. Where do these medical beliefs come from and theological beliefs that bind men? They come from without also. They are imposed upon us by authorities, theological authority and medical authority.

And, of course, you know the nature of this medical authority, don’t you? It gives you a law today and ten years from now laughs at it itself, ridicules it, and says, “Oh, that was alright ten years ago. It’s no good now.” In other words, the very laws that it imposes upon you today as being laws of life and death itself, it will itself laugh at ten years from now.

So you see that as long as we are to live under the beliefs and so-called laws that are imposed upon us, we are not really living under intelligence and love. Only when we begin to live by grace, that is, by the Spirit as it flows out from within our own being, only then are we governed by God. Only then do we receive a government that is without change, and in Its permanence is permanently good.

In this meditation I am constantly being shown that whenever I am in obedience or even loyalty to that which is imposed upon me from without, I am under that which is changeable and changing, therefore temporal. Whereas, if I listen to the still small voice, and let the government be upon His shoulder, that is, let this Infinite Invisible express Itself through my being, then am I under the law of eternal love, eternal justice, eternal mercy, in fact, the Truth itself.

As I consciously realize that these impositions, these beliefs and laws imposed upon me from without, cannot be binding upon spiritual being or the child of God, which in truth I am, I begin to understand more clearly that I can trust, that I can completely depend upon the government of grace, that is, that I can learn an obedience to an inner voice, an inner counsel, an inner guide or guidance, and in this find my peace, my perfection. Perhaps it would be better to say I would find God’s peace and God’s perfection coming into my daily experience.

You will notice now that this meditation which began with just a thought of law and grace now is beginning to take a definite form and leading me up to a conclusion that when it reaches its ultimate will really set me free. It will fulfill the promise that if I know the truth, the truth will set me free.

And do you notice in this meditation I have been knowing the truth, that is, receiving the truth from within upon this subject of law and grace, and gradually leading up to what I’m going to tell you now, and that is this: As humans do you not see that we are all living under the laws, under beliefs and theories? It doesn’t make any difference whether it is a theological law that if the father’s sin the penalty will be visited upon the children unto the third and forth generation, and then learn that that isn’t the law at all, that no more shall this be said in Israel, because every man has to pay the penalty for his own sins or his own misconceptions, or whether it is a medical law that is life or death today and is ridiculed tomorrow, or whether it is an economic law. I don’t have to remind you of how many economic laws have been upset in the last quarter of a century: theories, dogma, laws, all of men’s opinions thrust upon us.