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As men seek to expel from their worlds the shadowed substance woven there by the misuse of power, as men seek to refine their inner natures and purify their souls, they renew their attunement with the Holy Spirit, which beareth much fruit. Jesus said, "They that be whole need not a physician but they that are sick"; hence, self-righteousness, which is a shadowed weight of both subtlety and deceit, must be laid aside as the first veil that covered the Reality of the Holy Spirit.
I know of many wonderful God-loving individuals who are detoured from time to time from the Path of Holiness simply because of their own erroneous thought about their spiritual positions. Conversely, I know of Ascended Masters who actually bow to the Holy Christ Self of embodied individuals even when the latter are deeply steeped in error. I have seen the gamut of Man's expression of so-called humility and so-called spirituality and I think that I also can discern the difference between the genuine and the counterfeit.
Just as I do not approve of self-depreciation whereby individuals, according to your own vernacular, "sell themselves short" in the cosmic marts and assume themselves to be nothing in the Eyes of God, so I cannot approve of those who esteem themselves to be something extraordinary whereas in reality they are manifesting but a little of Heaven's Perfection in comparison to that which they could be. Now, it is strange but true that oftentimes the most magnificent individuals who have externalized great momentums of service approach the Throne of Grace with the utmost humility; whereas those who have so little to offer approach the Throne with great brashness and braggadocio.
May I introduce, then, here and now a plea for balance in all that man does? The seeker on the Path of Godliness ought not to be an extremist. Yet, we condone extreme measures of godly Devotion! I do not say that individuals cannot most diligently seek the Kingdom of God, for this is most desirable, but I do say, let them exercise balance with regard to their associations with other people. Let them take into account the status and stature of others, the opportunities for learning that others have had, and the total state of each one's present consciousness.
The borders of God's Kingdom ought not to be enlarged with force but by the Power of the Infinite One. The statement, "And I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto me," refers to the Christ Consciousness. It ought to be apparent, then, that as men lift up the Spirit of God in the eternal verities, that the Spirit of God in all Its tangibility will increase Its action within a given set of squares; applying this in a more simple manner, let Me say that if the circle or sphere that exists nine feet or ninety feet from around the Heart Chalice of an individual could be divided up into cubes one foot square, each containing a certain intensity of the Holy Spirit, that intensity could vary from a very minute quantity to a very tremendous radiance. Now, the greater the radiance, the greater the power of the magnet within the forcefield of an individual to draw men toward God.
One of the errors which men are sometimes prone to make - and this is indeed a razor's edge of understanding - is for individuals to utilize the great drawing power which comes to them as the result of the action of the Holy Spirit to attract people to their own personality or their own opinions about Life. It is ever a wise "cosmic scientist," then, who seeks to point out to the individual who is drawn by the Light into his orbit the Divine Unity in the Radiance of the Holy Spirit and to encourage that one to expand the Light of his own Heart.
At first this may seem somewhat difficult for there is ever the propensity on the part of the student - as soon as he feels a touch of the Paraclete and the beginning of his own expansion - to rush forward too rapidly into the teaching field. Many who have studied a few short years begin to fancy themselves as worthy of being gurus. They seek to draw to themselves a circle of chelas, not realizing that unless they are wholly prepared by the Holy Spirit for this purpose, they may unduly take unto themselves many karmic conditions without necessarily improving the lot of those they instruct.
I want to develop, then, a most wholesome attitude in all of the chelas. One of the best ways that I know of doing this is to develop a sense of God awareness. Therefore, in drawing the Holy Spirit to you, I shall urge upon you that whether you contemplate Man, Nature, or God, you have an abiding sense within your mental body as well as in your feeling body of being held in the very hollow of God's Hand. The disquieting factors of life may come; old momentums may seek to take their toll, but you must stand completely oblivious of this in the eternal bastion of God's Own Imminence.
All around you, vibrating in space, is Light. This Light that many have not recognized from day to day - or have recognized for a time and then forgotten again - must be persistently, tenaciously invoked, adored, loved, and basked in, until It is tangibly felt at first and then even made tangibly visible. To do this does not mean that men must become impractical, shirking the necessary responsibilities of Life; but neither must men become spiritually impractical, seeking to pour out their life's energies upon the material earth. Room must be found in the inn of Man's Being for the Divine Plan. Allegiance must be paid to eternal verities, and Faith must mount up as on eagle's wings from the base of the landed present.
Men must not fear to study the sacred writings of the past nor to accept the great progressive elements the Ascended Masters release from time to time in this day and age through their accredited Messengers. Pure gold can be tried in the fire, its purposes analyzed, its objectives brought before the eyes of the soul; and the disclosure of its Source made to the sincere. Those who would pursue the Holy Spirit, then, must give themselves without reserve to the purposes of God.
As long as any price is too great to pay; as long as any measure of the sense of possession is retained in the clutch of human consciousness, individuals have still not let go of the finite self. Man must come to the great threshingfloor of God and place himself there, subject to the eternal flail of right knowledge. "For whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth and scourgeth every son whom He receiveth." Therefore, all who would enter into the Kingdom must be willing to accept the Fires of Purification, the necessary trials and examinations and even the necessary risks involved. God will never ask aught that is evil of Man, nor will He misdirect man to do harm to any other part of Life. The science of harmlessness, then, must also be understood and, in complete surrender to God's Holy Will, men must become open, receptive channels through which the purifying Fires of the Holy Spirit may flow.
These Fires are both tangible and symbolic. Therefore, let none think they abide entirely in the realm of the symbol; for there is an actual tangible emanation of Fire from the octaves of Purity ministered to by the Purifying Angels. When these brush the physical octaves of earth and come into contact with the Fire Elementals, there is sometimes released an uncomfortable sensation in which the flesh itself seems to melt with a fervent heat. This shall pass as will all tests till Man becomes cooled to the restless passions of the flesh and awaits a release of more spiritual Grace and a fitting for higher dimensions of service.
The foundations of Life must not be ignored, for the Temple which is the body of Man's whole Substance must be prepared for the infusion and descent of the Holy Spirit. Man's Body of purified Energy must be a tabernacle builded without hands, the hallowed, eternal, abiding place of God. Whether in the Child-Man, renewed in the manger of life, or in the magnificent towering service of the Wise Masterbuilder, let it be said of all in consecrated rhythm, "Come see the place where the Lord lay!"