Infinite Way Study Practice
April-June 2004



The following study practice is designed for those students who already have at least some background with Joel Goldsmith's Infinite Way teaching. My first recommendation would be that you go to the source text or tape where these messages are presented and listen to the original instruction.

Adapted From Joel Goldsmith's
"Man Was Not Born to Cry" -
Chapter 10 - The Meaning of Prayer

Joel Goldsmith often used the phrase "Santa Claus God" to describe the God that is worshiped by most people on the face of the earth. By this he meant that the majority of people who say they believe in God actually are believing in a concept of God that was taught to them at an early age and which they have accepted to this very day. This God may possess numerous qualities and characteristics in their mind, and for most people that is where their God stays their entire life -- in their mind.

One of the most dramatic and self defeating of these beliefs is that God is "out there" in the world or in the heavens and we must continue to seek God until we get It to start working on our behalf. For the majority of people, God is a mental image in their mind not much different from any other object that they might think about such as a cloud, a president, or a tree. The very state of consciousness beholding this God produces a separation from that which they are seeking, and as long as the state of consciousness stays at that same level the realization of God can never truly be attained.

In Chapter 10 of "Man Was Not Born to Cry," Joel tells us that this way of thinking about God is a conditioned state of mind brought about through an acceptance of a belief in a selfhood apart from God. In other words, when we were children we agreed with the state of consciousness that was projected on to us which told us that we are isolated human beings living a temporary existence which must eventually have a finite ending.

Joel goes on to say, "Actually, this is not true. 'I and my Father are one' is an eternal relationship, but if we have forgotten it, if the mesmerism of world beliefs has taken it away from us, then we have to go back within ourselves, where eventually we shall find the kingdom of God, and there, pray, ask, and knock:

"Father, reveal Thyself. Break this mesmeric sense that I may pierce the veil of separation. Open my eyes that I may see; open my ears that I may hear. Glorify Thou me with the glory that I had with Thee in the beginning.

"Then we are not asking God for anything. What we are trying to do through this prayer is to break that mesmeric sense within ourselves until the glory of God, which is already established within us, can once more be evident in manifestation. Truth, light, love, happiness, joy, peace, dominion, companionship, home -- all these are established within us. Our only task is to let them flow out from us."

For this study practice let us try to go about our prayer in a way that recognizes first our true identity as Children of God made in the image and likeness of God. We do not need to ask ourselves to live beyond our current state of consciousness for even if we may not have fully realized our true nature we can acknowledge that there is something operating within us that has led us this far. There is something in you which has agreed with the Infinite Way teaching or you would not even be here reading these words at this moment. We ARE coming into the realization of this new state of consciousness! And we ARE coming into IT NOW!

The only requirement is that we make the acknowledgement within and let that in and of itself go before us to make the crooked places straight. This is not our work. This is God's work. We are merely the transparencies through which God may live our lives.

NOW ... let it be.

Peace be still.



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