Unity of LO Lesson
The Prayer Way To Health, Wealth, and Happiness
By Lowell Fillmore
The Garden-of-Eden consciousness is very much like the kingdom-of-heaven consciousness, which Jesus has instructed us to pray for in the Lord's Prayer. In this prayer we pray that the kingdom-of-heaven consciousness may come into the world and be in it as it is in heaven. This means that the kingdom will come into the world of any individual who complies with its principles, even though his neighbors are not aware of the kingdom. It can become a reality to any man if he will comply with its principles.
Jesus has taught us to pray not only for the kingdom of heaven to come, but also for our daily bread* and for the forgiveness of our debts, which according to the divine law, requires that we forgive others their debts before we can be forgiven ours. The teachings of Jesus in regard to applying the divine principles is that we must comply with these principles by using them. We must do to others as we would have them do to us. We must be peaceful if we expect to find peace. We must be loving if we would receive love. We must forgive if we expect to be forgiven. We must give if we would receive.
We must overcome evil with good. We must be generous. We must be meek, yet firm in faith and steadfast in purpose. When we stand firm in the Christ consciousness of forgiveness and understanding we do not condemn those who disagree with us. All these musts can be summed up in these words: "We must keep our eye single to the good and not experiment with good and evil."
It is said that it takes two to make a quarrel. If this be true there can be no quarrel when one of the two maintains his spiritual poise. The other fellow may lose his poise, but since he is only one of a necessary two, there can be no quarrel when the first one refuses to quarrel.
Sometimes it may seem to us that if we do not fight we may lose our shirt, but we should remember that the Lord has plenty of shirts to give us when we work in harmony with His laws. Jesus said: "If any man would.... take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also." A coat or a cloak or a shirt is too unimportant a thing to provoke us and cause us to be cast out of the Garden of Eden.
When we co-operate with God in spirit and in truth our actions also become harmonious with our thoughts. Adam did not eat of the forbidden fruit until he had first decided to do so in his mind. We do the wrong things first in our mind before we do them with our hands. Therefore the Christ teachings must first be accepted and followed in our thoughts, and then our deeds will fall in line with our good thoughts.
When we follow the Shepherd He shows us the easy way, and He protects us. He leads us beside the still waters and over smooth paths. He keeps us from harm. He is ever with us, but if we do not follow Him but choose our own way, we may find ourselves in the byways, which are filled with thistles, rocks, and difficulties; also there may be wolves waiting to devour us.
When we follow Him we tread the smooth path, where our tasks are easy and our bread is waiting for us each day. When we follow the divine Shepherd as He guides us, all our ways are ways of pleasantness and all our paths are paths of peace.
*Bread
"Our daily bread is the sustenance for spirit, mind and body."