God's Love Gave to the World His Only Begotten Son - Part 4

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God's Love Gave to the World His Only Begotten Son - Part 4

(Dialogue With Nicodemus, Part III (Conclusion))

 

Salvation comes not

through blind belief,

but through direct

experience of God

 

(p.278) " He that believeth on him is not condemned; but he that believeth not is

condemned already. " This highlights also the role of " belief " in the

condemnation or noncondemnation of man. Persons who do not understand the

immanence of the Absolute in the relative world tend to become either skeptical

or dogmatic, because in both cases religion is a matter of blind beliefs. Unable

to reconcile the idea of a good God with the seeming evils in creation, the

skeptic rejects religious belief as stubbornly as the dogmatist clings to it.

 

The truths taught by Jesus went far beyond blind belief, which waxes and wanes

under the influence of the paradoxical pronouncements of priests and cynic.

Belief is an initial stage of spiritual progress necessary to receive the

concept of God. But that concept has to be transposed into conviction, into

experience. Belief is the precursor of conviction; one has to believe a thing in

order to investigate equitably about it. (p.279) But if one is satisfied only

with belief, it becomes dogma--narrow-mindedness, a preclusion of truth and

spiritual progress. What is necessary is to grow, in the soil of belief, the

harvest of direct experience and contact of God. That indisputable realization,

not mere belief, is what saves people.

 

If someone says to me, " I believe in God, " I will ask him, " Why do you believe?

How do you know there is a God? " If the reply is based on supposition or

secondhand knowledge, I will say that he does not truly believe. To hold a

conviction one must have some data to support it; otherwise it is mere dogma,

and is easy prey for skepticism. If I were to point to a piano and proclaim that

it is an elephant, the reason of an intelligent person would revolt against this

absurdity. Likewise when dogmas about God are propagated without the validation

of experience or realization, sooner or later when tested with a contrary

experience reason will assail with speculation the truth about those ideas. As

the scorching rays of the sun of analytical inquiry get hotter and hotter, frail

unsubstantiated beliefs wilt and wither away, leaving a wasteland of doubt,

agnosticism, or atheism. Transcending mere philosophy, scientific meditation

attunes the consciousness to the highest mighty truth; with every step the

devotee moves toward actual realization and avoids bewildered wandering. To

persevere in efforts to verify and experience beliefs through intuitional

realization, which can be attained by yoga methods, is to build a real spiritual

life that is proof against doubt.

 

Belief is a powerful force if it leads to the desire and determination to

experience Christ. This is what Jesus meant when he urged people to " believe in

the name of the only begotten Son of God " : Through meditation, withdraw the

consciousness and life energy from the senses and matter to intuit the 'Aum',

the Word or all-pervading Cosmic Vibratory Energy that is the " name " or active

manifestation of the immanent Christ Consciousness. [1] One can assert

incessantly an intellectual belief in Jesus Christ; but if he never actually

experiences the Cosmic Christ, as both omnipresent and incarnate in Jesus, the

spiritual practicality of his belief is insufficient to save him.

 

No one can be saved just by repeatedly uttering the Lord's name or praising Him

in crescendos of hallelujahs. Not in blind belief in the name of Jesus or the

adoration of his personality can the liberating power of his teachings be

received. (p.280) The real worship of Christ is the divine communion of

Christ-perception in the wall-less temple of expanded consciousness.

 

God would not reflect His " only begotten Son " in the world to act like an

implacable detective to track down unbelievers for punishment. The redeeming

Christ Intelligence, abiding in the bosom of every soul regardless of its bodily

accumulation of sins or virtues, waits with infinite patience for each one to

awaken in meditation from delusion-drugged sleep to receive the grace of

salvation. The person who believes in this Christ Intelligence, and who

cultivates with spiritual action the desire to seek salvation through ascension

in this reflected consciousness of God, no longer has to wander blindly along

the delusive path of error. By measured steps he moves surely toward the

redeeming Infinite Grace. But the unbeliever who scorns the thought of this

Savior, the only way of salvation, condemns himself to body-bound ignorance and

its consequences, until he awakens spiritually.

 

The Second Coming of Christ (The Resurrection of the Christ Within

You) Volume 1, Discourse 15, pg. 278-280

Paramahansa Yogananda

Printed in the United States of America 1434-J881

ISBN-13:978-0-87612-557-1

ISBN-10:0-87612-557-7

 

Notes:

 

[1] See Discourse 1, commentary on John 1:12: " As many as received him, to them

gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name. "