The Greatest Works of Joseph Benner. Joseph Benner
of it to you personally, unless you use and apply these harmonies of sound in your every spoken word, so that to all hearers they will seem as the sweet music of heaven; and unless your sense of color and proportion so manifests in your life that only kind, uplifting, helpful thoughts flow from you, proving that the only true art is that of seeing clearly My Perfection in all My human expressions, and of allowing the quickening power of My Love to pour through you into their heart, picturing to their inner vision My Image hidden therein.
Likewise no credit attaches to you, no matter what wonderful Truths I speak or works I perform through you, unless you, yourself, live these Truths, daily, hourly; and make these works serve as a constant reminder of Me and My Power, which I ever pour out freely for you, My Beloved, and for all, to use in My Service.
You, to whom I have apparently given none of such gifts and who deem yourself unworthy and not yet advanced enough to serve Me in such ways, to you I would say:
Just to the extent that you truly recognize Me within and seek in real earnestness to serve Me, just to that extent will I use you no matter what your personality, no matter what its faults, tendencies and weaknesses.
Yes, I will cause even you who thus seek to serve Me to do many wondrous things towards the quickening and awakening of your brothers to a like acknowledgment of Me. I will cause even you to influence and affect the lives of many of those whom you contact, inspiring and uplifting them to higher ideals, changing their way of thinking and their attitude towards their fellows and therefore towards Me.
Yes, all you who seek to serve Me, no matter what your gifts, will I make to be a vital force for good in the community, altering the mode of life of many, inspiring and molding their ambitions and aspirations, and altogether becoming a leavening influence in the midst of the worldly activities in which I will place you.
You at the time will probably know nothing of this. You may even be still longing to serve Me, and hungering for a more intimate consciousness of Me, thinking you are doing nothing, are still making many mistakes and failing to live up to your highest ideals of Me; not realizing that this longing and hungering is the avenue through which I pour forth My Spiritual Power, which being wholly Impersonal, is used by you, unconscious of its being I within you using it, to bring about My Purpose in your heart and life and in the hearts and lives of My and Your other Selves.
So, as you finally grow into the realization of all this, as you surely will, and prove it by the practical use of all you have in My service, will I gradually give you the strength and ability to consciously to use Impersonally My Power, My Wisdom, and My Love, in the expression of My Divine Idea, which is eternally striving to manifest through You Its Perfection.
Therefore will you soon see that your human personality, with all its faculties, powers and possessions, which are in reality Mine operating and manifesting through you, is likewise for My use wholly, and that true success and satisfaction can never be found except in such use.
For such use develops, as the planted seed develops the harvest, the ability consciously to use all My Spiritual faculties in the final perfect expression of My Idea, which can be expressed only through your human personality.
Chapter 12
Soul Mates
Let us now examine into some of the things I have given you, those especially of which you cannot yet acknowledge Me as the Giver. Perhaps the particular position in life you now occupy you do not think the best adapted for the expression of My Idea surging within you. If so, then why not step out of that position into the one of your choice?
The mere fact that you cannot or do not do this proves that at this time such position is the one best suited to awaken in you certain qualities necessary for My perfect expression, and that I, your own Self, AM permitting you to remain therein, until you can recognize my Purpose and Meaning hidden within the power such position has to disturb your peace of mind and keep you thus dissatisfied.
When you recognize My Meaning and determine to make My Purpose your purpose, then and then only will I give you the strength to step out of that position into a higher I have provided for you.
Perhaps the husband or the wife you have, you think is far from being suited to you or capable of helping along your "spiritual" awakening, being only a hindrance and detriment, instead. You may even be secretly contemplating leaving or wishing you could leave that one for another who sympathizes and joins with you in your aspirations and seeking, and therefore seems more nearly your ideal.
You may run away if you will, but know that you cannot run away from your own personality; that, in selfish craving for a "spiritual" mate you may attract only one who will force you to a tenfold longer and harder search among the illusions of the mind, before you can again awaken to the consciousness of My Voice speaking within.
For a sympathetic and appreciative mate would only feed the personal pride and selfish desire for "spiritual" power in you, and develop further the egotistic side of your nature. Likewise, a loving, trusting, yielding mate might encourage only selfishness and conceit, when you are not yet abiding in the consciousness of My Impersonal Love; while a tyrannical, suspicious, nagging mate may provide the soul discipline you still need.
Did you but know it, the one who is your true Soul mate is in reality an Angel from Heaven, even as are You, one of the Attributes of My Divine Self, come to you to teach you that only when you have purged your own personality so that My Holy Love can express, can you be freed from any conditions which may now be causing you so much disturbance of mind and unhappiness of Soul.
For not until this Soul, this Angel from Heaven, this other part of My and Your Self, who has come to you and is yearning and striving to call into expression through you the Impersonal Love, the tender, thoughtful care for others, the poise of mind and peace of heart, the quiet, firm mastery of self, which and which alone can open the doors, so It can step forth into the freedom of Its own glorious Being and be to You Its own true Self, not until you can see this Soul in all Its Divine beauty, free of this earthly bondage, will it ever be possible for you to find and recognize that Ideal you seek.
For that Ideal exists, not without - in some other personality, - but only within, in your Divine Counterpart, which is I, your Higher, Immortal Self. It is only My Idea of this, your Perfect Self, striving to express and become manifest through your personality, that causes you to see seeming imperfections in the mate I have given you.
The time will come, however, when you cease to look without for love and sympathy, appreciation and spiritual help, and turn wholly to Me within, that these seeming imperfections will disappear; and you will see in this mate only the reflection of qualities of unselfish love, gentleness, trust, a constant endeavor to make the other happy, that will then be shining brightly and continuously from out your own heart.
Perhaps you cannot yet wholly believe all this, and you still question that I, your own Self, am responsible for your present position in life, or that I chose for you your present mate?
If so, it is well for you thus to question until all is made plain.
But remember, I will speak much more clearly direct from within, if you but turn trustingly to Me for help. For I ever preserve My Holiest secrets for those who turn to Me in deep, abiding Faith that I can and will supply their every need. To you, however, who cannot yet do this, I say, if your own Self did not place you here or provide this mate, Why then are you here? And Why have you this mate?
Think!
I, the ALL, the Perfect One, make no mistake. Yes, but the personality does, you say. And the personality chose this mate, and perhaps has earned no better position.
What, who, caused the personality to choose this particular one and earn this particular position in life? Who picked out and placed this one where you could thus choose, and who caused you to be born in this country of all countries and in this town of all towns in the world at this particular time? Why not some other town and a hundred years later? Did your personality