Bible Review V15: October 1916 - March 1918 - Iapsop.com

1917 STRENGTH 179
the method. No knowledge of any spirit realm can be
gained without attention. It is written, "Be still and
know that I am God." But we understand that the true
rendering should be, "Be still and know God." That is,
still the consciousness that arises from the senses that
the knowledge possest by the soul may reach the externality.
It is written that to the carnal mind, the things of the
Spirit are foolishness. Before one can know Gcd, that is
become conscious of the spirit of God and of those that
dwell therein, it is necessary that the body be prepared,
and that preparation is a life of rigid chastity. By chastity
is not meant celibacy only, but to keep the body clean
and undefiled by refusing to permit the forces of generation
to cause the body to lose the substance of reproduction,
thus becining unclean.
The more one loses of the substance of reproduction,
the more obtuse becomes the mind to all things spiritual.
For it is the conserved reproductive element in the body
that enables one_ to sense and to know the Spirit of God.
Tnis is because that substance conserved in the body
awakens the faculties of the soul, and so enables one to
know things that are otherwise unknowable and are even
accounted foolishness by the natural mind. By the
natural _mind we mean the condition of the consciousness
of one who follows the natural impulses, the strongest
being usually the impulse to generation, thereby losing
that precious water of life that is generated in the body
by the altar-fires therein. The retaining in the body of
the substance of reproduction is the first step, making it
possible to know God.
The next step is to spend much time with the mind, or
the attention if you will, fixt upon God with the earnest
desire to know him.
This is termed by occultists generally
"concentration"
and in the Bible it is called waiting