Spiritually we are equally heirs of God, children of God -- heirs, joint heirs. Humanly God doesn't even know us. We aren't even known to God humanly. If God knew humans all humans would be perfect. If God knew humans every human would be healthy, wealthy, and wise. If God knew humans no human would ever die. God doesn't know humans -- not any humans because all humans have gone the way of flesh. To be known of God we must be children of God, heirs of God and to be children of God or heirs of God necessitates our doing something. Since, having accepted this dual creation, this belief of good and evil, this selfhood apart from God, this mental image of ourselves which is not ourselves -- having, however, accepted this now we must do something, and the entire mission of Christ Jesus -- the entire mission -- was to show us what to do to become children of God again -- to be reinstated in the kingdom of God.

He told us what we must do and what we must not do. He pointed out to us that we must not seek an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. We must not return evil for evil. A great many other things you'll find we must not do but primarily he pointed out what we must do. Love thy neighbor as thyself. Ah, of course, everybody under the canopy of heaven knows the statement, "Love thy neighbor as thyself." It has become a world cliché. Speak to most people honestly, man to man or woman to woman and you'll find that they'll say, "Yes, but it isn't practical. It was all right for Jesus but not for us." They couldn't be further from the truth. They haven't experimented to find out how very practical it is. Not only practical but to be honest it's the only way in which we can be reestablished in the kingdom of God.

The Sermon on the Mount must become to us a set of living principles. It must become the pattern of our existence if we are to work our way back from mortality to immortality. From being that man of earth, the natural man, to once more being that man who has his being in Christ. There are certain things that must be done. We must not take thought for our life. That wipes out about all the praying for ourselves doesn't it? Take no thought for your life. Try to work that out in practical application and you'll find out how mad you can get at both Jesus and me. Jesus for saying it first and me for reminding you of it. Try to see how difficult it is to stop praying for yourself, for your life, for what you shall eat or what you shall drink, or where-with-all you shall be clothed, or what transportation you shall have or what home you shall have, or what companionship you shall have. Think of wiping all of those things from your thought in order that you may be children of God. In order that you might seek the realm of God, the kingdom of God -- my kingdom which is not of this world. You cannot apply my kingdom, my grace, my power, my peace to this world.

Therefore, we must be healed of this world as the Master was. "I have overcome this world." I haven't improved it. I haven't enriched it. I haven't made it free. I haven't rid it of war. I have overcome it. I have wiped out of consciousness both the good and the evil. The evil and the good. Why? Because in seeking the kingdom of God, I am not seeking the kingdom of good humanhood. I am not seeking the realm of better human experience. In seeking the kingdom of God, I am seeking the kingdom of God. What is the kingdom of God? You do not know. And you never will know until you get there.

If you haven't seen Victoria Falls in South Africa you don't know what it's like. And you may have seen lots of pictures of it and lots of movies of it, but if you haven't been there you do not know what it is like. And you never will until you get there because it is beyond your expectation, it is beyond your imagination, it is beyond anything that you could possibly embrace in your thought until you see it and then there it is, now you have experienced it. And so it is, it is folly to say, "What am I going to find when I get to the kingdom of God?" If you could be shown pictures of it, it would not tell you what it's like. If you could meet a dozen people who've been there they couldn't tell you what it's like because it is an experience and it is an experience which touches each one at their own level of consciousness. Therefore, it cannot be described.

The question is, "Why should we seek it?" And indeed it's a good question. And as long as that question is in our thought we shouldn't seek it. We wouldn't find it anyhow. So we might as well save ourselves the effort. The only reason for seeking the kingdom of God is when the first glimpse of the kingdom of God has touched our consciousness and we have a taste of it, and then we say, "Ah, ha! That's what I'm after and I will not rest until I attain it. Even if in attaining it I lose my mother and father and sister and brother. If I have to sell all that I have and give it to the poor, I will not rest." But who could make such a declaration except one who has at least had a foretaste -- a glimpse -- and knows that life can never be worthwhile until the kingdom of God has been attained. And that is why many of the really great masters of the world have done a great deal to discourage people from seeking it, because it isn't to be found in spare time. Few there be that enter.

It involves a life of dedication. And there we again come up against the practical ones. "I don't have that much time." "I'm not free enough." As long as those excuses are in the thought it is better to follow them. It is folly to try to succeed while making excuses. If there is anything present in your thought greater than the attainment of the kingdom of God, the kingdom of God will not be attained. It is the pearl of great price. It is that for which you exchange everything -- all of your time, all of your energy, all of your effort. And yet no one has ever been called upon to neglect the duty to their family, to their nation, to their community. Strange but it is so.

Now see, if, and my eyes are closed, I'm looking into the dark. And if I see anything there that looks good, it only looks good or desirable because it is a mental image in my own thought, and its goodness is based on my concept of good. You may look at that very same thing and find it valueless because nothing is good or bad but thinking makes it so. There is no object in your thought that is either good or bad. It is the concept of it that you entertain that makes it good or bad to you. This object in thought actually is an illusion. That is why it has been said that, "If you attain the thing that you spend your life seeking, you'll usually find it turn to dust in your hand." It only looks glamourous afar off. The other fellow's grass always looks greener. Fame unattained looks desirable. Wealth looks as if it were the solution to every problem. It is only after you have gained them that you find that they aren't what they appear to be. They aren't as desirable as they appear to be. Why? Because none of these things contain either good or evil. Many people seriously believe that money is evil, and it isn't. It isn't evil. It isn't good. Money is something that is dead. It reflects the value that you place upon it but in and of itself it has no quality of either good or of evil.

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