1961 Hawaiian Village Open Class                             Photo: Inez Marques
Joel S. Goldsmith
438B – Freedom Spiritually Discerned 2/4

This is not a wild theory. This is spiritual law that has already been demonstrated by some of our great industrialists who, themselves, have been freed and who have freed their employees. And their institutions prove what can be done when one individual in a company, one in sufficient authority, realizes the nature of man and sets him free and is thereby set free. There is no greater spiritual law than this—that we only attain the freedom we give.

There is really only one God, and God is universal being. God is the God of you and the God of me. God is the life of you and the life of me. And when the Master reveals that inasmuch as ye have done it unto the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me; or inasmuch as ye have not done it unto the least of these my brethren, ye have not done it unto me he is revealing this spiritual law. That since there is only one self, one being, one life, the freedom that I give to another is being given unto me. And the freedom that I do not give another is being withheld from me. Freedom, then, is a quality of your own consciousness and you must “open out a way for that imprisoned splendor to escape.”

It is exactly like the subject of love or the subject of friendship or the subject of companionship. You have read in the writings that there are many people seeking metaphysically to demonstrate companionship, so they believe, and it isn’t true. They aren’t seeking that at all; they are merely seeking companions or a companion. That’s far different from seeking companionship. To seek companionship means to express it, not to look for it to come from outer space or from someone else. We are not responsible for someone else’s life or demonstration, but for our own. And if we were seeking companionship, the only way to attain it would be to give it—to seek some way of expressing companionship.

There is no way to find love in this world. The only way to experience love is to express it. There is no way to find philanthropy in the world unless we call these miserable handouts philanthropy. Benevolence is something that must be expressed from within our own being.

It is for this reason that these subjects, like the subject of freedom, can never be understood until we understand the nature of our own being and of our own identity. And then give up this searching for freedom, searching for companionship, searching for love and begin to realize that, as an heir of God, all that the Father hath is mine and now how can I ‘open out a way for this imprisoned splendor to escape?’ What am I holding in bondage or who am I holding in bondage, and to what extent or how? And to what extent and in what way can I give freedom, can I release?

The Master voiced it in forgiving seventy times seven; he voiced it in praying for our enemies. In other words, release, release this world! Coming into the higher consciousness of the mystical kingdom where you find the Master saying, “My kingdom is not of this world; my way is not your way,” you begin to realize that the first freedom that has to be given by us is a freedom to God. We have to free God. We have all been holding God in bondage. We have all been holding God tightly within our grasp so that He doesn’t get away from us and doesn’t forget His duty to us and His obligation to us. We are always holding tightly. Loose Him and let Him go. God does not have to be reminded of His function in life. God does not have to be held down and watched.

When we release God, and no longer hold God in that bondage to ourselves, no longer expect God to be taking us as favored individuals or a favored nation into freedom, harmony, abundance. When we release God to be the law of freedom unto this entire universe, we have started to come out of slavery, out of bondage. We have started to come into freedom because now at least we are free of the nonsensical belief that we have to be running around holding on to God in order to bring some benefits into our experience. Oh you would be surprised what a release and relief, and freedom and joy will come into your life when you release God and really trust God to be God without our supervision.

Oh yes, we supervise God every single day of the week. Indeed we do…Try to guide Him and lead Him into the paths in which we would go, if not instructing Him how best to bring it about. But probably that is too much to expect of us at one jump.

We can start closer at hand within our family circle and try to review within our own thoughts to what extent we are acting as limitation to members of our family, to what extent we are holding them in bondage to our beliefs of what a husband or a wife or child or aunt or uncle or cousin should be. The freedom isn’t from our relatives; the freedom is a freedom that’s attained within ourselves. And this gives them their freedom and the freedom that we give to them returns unto us.

In the world today this whole idea of freedom fills the pages of every paper and magazine that’s printed. Freedom. Probably at first hearing you won’t believe this. But do you know that the world is seeking freedom from a country with which it is allied, and recently fought a war to get freedom from someone else? Do you not realize that it is only a short time ago that we were allies of the great democratic Christian nation of Russia in seeking to overthrow the undemocratic and unchristian nation of Germany?

Do you feel a little bit ridiculous when you stop to think that in some ways even now we are allied with Russia, while at the same time, seeking freedom from them? Do you believe we are in bondage to them? Do you believe that we ever could be? Do you believe really and truly that anyone can ever enslave us except insofar as we permit it? Are we not masters of our fate? Are we not heirs of God? Do we not have jurisdiction over our lives by the grace of God? Are we not servants of God? And if we are, how could we ever become servants of man, or slaves of man, or slaves of a system?

These things can only creep up upon us by our own consent. And the only way we give our consent is by ignoring our relationship with God. Our freedom must be spiritually attained, spiritually realized, spiritually maintained, and then nothing can enter that defileth or maketh a lie. Nothing can enter from without. No powers external to us can operate in our consciousness or upon our lives except by our ignorance of spiritual truth, spiritual identity, and the fact that freedom isn’t a physical thing; it’s a spiritual entity.

Now be assured of this if you hold freedom to be something of a physical nature that can be given to you or taken from you, so will it be unto you in accordance with your faith. But in that moment when you realize only by the grace of God do we have freedom. Only by the grace of God do we have God’s government, and that this is not at the mercy of man whose breath is in his nostril. That this cannot be given to us by princes nor taken from us by kings or potentates. Only by the realization of the spiritual nature of freedom can we attain it and maintain it.

Freedom isn’t something you go out and fight for. The nations of the world have been going out and fighting for it since time began. And now 7,000 years later they are fighting for it on a wider scale than ever before, and there are fewer free places on earth than probably ever in history.