Keep a True Lent, by Charles Fillmore, [1953], at sacred-texts.com
Keep a True Lent, by Charles Fillmore, [1953], at sacred-texts.com
WE, AS METAPHYSICIANS, take special care that we are logical in our reasoning. We hold that all Truth has its origin in Divine Mind. Whatever we can conceive as being true must manifest itself in creation, and if the creation seems to fall short of the divine perfection in any way, it is a fault on our part--either we are not seeing the whole of it, or we are lacking in understanding. And if we hold to our logic that the good can create nothing but good, it will bring us to the right conclusion. Holding to this logic, we find that there are two steps in creation--mind ideates that which it later brings forth in the outer, just as a man works out in his mind his invention before he makes the model. God is the all-potential mind. God creates first in thought, and His idea of creation is perfect, and that idea exists as a perfect model upon which all manifestation rests. The body of man must rest upon a divine body idea in Divine Mind, and it logically follows that the inner life substance and intelligence of all flesh is perfect.
But you say, "I do not have a perfect body; my body is not perfect, I can see that it is material." It may be that you do not understand; that you fail to discern the "Lord's body," which failure, Paul said, is the cause of weakness and sickness and death.
We have a perfect body in mind, and this perfect mind-body expresses itself through our I AM, or the Christ in us; it brings itself into manifestation just as fast as we let it, just as fast as we perceive God in the flesh.
The real source of life is within you. Go within and close the door of materiality. Talk to God about your life problem; begin to release your hidden energies. Make it a daily process and talk little about what you are doing. The incorporation of divine life in the millions of cells composing your body was accomplished in conjunction with Spirit, and the release should be under the same law. If you want to see the real expression of Divine Mind in your body, all you have to do is mentally to image it. Put your I AM identity into it and affirm that the perfect body as idealized in God-Mind is now made manifest in your hands, in your feet, in your heart, and in every part of your organism.
Is this good logic? Will it work? Of course, it will. This is the real secret of metaphysical healing. In the beginning the Word was God, but the Word became flesh and dwelt among men, and they saw Jesus' body, His glory and His perfection. Jesus Christ was the Word of God made manifest. Jesus saved His body from dissolution and raised it up to the heavenly estate, which is substance so pure that no disintegrating force can be found in it. This gives an importance to the body beyond the usual estimate. People think that soul salvation is the object of
the Christian life, but Jesus and Paul laid great stress on the ability of man to "lay it down, and . . . take it again," even this "temple of the living God."
Can we save our body from death? Yes--by seeing it as the very temple of God; and this means more than looking at it as if we were looking through a telescope. We must see our body with our mind. We must see it with something more than the intellectual mind. We must see it with Jehovah, the Christ within us.
When the perfect man is conceived in pure reason, the reason of Spirit, and man sees himself as he is in God-Mind, the Lord's body begins at once to appear. We can all see our body with the "single" eye that Jesus spoke of, and through faith in the reality of the invisible body regenerate the flesh. The body is wonderfully obedient to the I AM. It hastens to do its bidding and is renewed and transformed by thought. But so many of us see our body as it appears to mortal sense, unaware that the real continues, while the seeming passes away. We know that we are healed by right thinking, that we can and do raise sick bodies and restore them to health. Where is the limit to healing? There is no limit. Why can we not go right on and perfect the body idea as conceived in Divine Mind? This is where pure reason and logic sustain us. It makes no difference how many people die, or are going to die; the logic is good if it proves the healing of a single illness. It is indeed uplifting to know that
there is a divine power behind this universe, that there is a true God; that life has more meaning than the mere piling up of material things; that we can become the real man, and all the pure ideals can be fulfilled here and now.
The real body of God is a living body. Above all, it is a beautiful body, a temple. And God Himself is in that temple, and it is not necessary to have any light but His light, the light of life and health. It is wonderful how quickly our body responds to a thought of life and health, how we can feel a flow of health instantly if we hold the right thought. Just closing our mind to outer things and holding the thought that we are the perfect manifestations of Divine Mind will often heal our body of its illnesses. Disease is not natural. We must let it go, relax, and let Spirit carry on its perfect work in us; and all at once evil or sick conditions disappear, and we are whole. Those who have had divine healings tell us that their best work was done by simply letting go and realizing that there is but one universal Mind and that this Mind makes a perfect body for every man.
We see this proved again and again in the healing power of nature. All doctors admit that the body is restored to health naturally, that neither they nor drugs do the actual healing. What causes the body to be restored? The divine idea of perfection. Our body really is the temple of the living God. The so-called material body has within it and about
it the divine perfection. We should not make any separation. We should hold that our body is spiritual and hold nothing else. We must carry out that living true Word which every one of us knows to be the offspring of Divine Mind. "And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us."