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

1916 WISDOM 87
When the Christ sent his disciples out to teach the
truths that they had learned, he told them that if they
entered a city and were not received that they should
come out and shake the dust off their feet.
But what does the average young neophyte do when
he gets on the path?
He feels that he has got something
good, something that everyone does not have-which is a
truth-and he immediately tries to force it upon all his
friends. He forgets that the other soul is in a very different
place in the path from what he is, and if his friend
undertakes to walk in the same steps, in the same way
that he is walking, his friend may be an utter failure.
If the neophyte will fix this principle firmly in mind,
he will save himself and others much trouble; viz., Our
heavenly Father never forces any of his children into the
right path, he shows them the way and then lets them
alone to follow or not as they choose. And he often lets
his children fall into the pit that he has warned them
against; for that is the only way that some
learn.
will ever
But what does the young neophyte do when he sees his
brother going into the pitfall? Does he use the same wisdom
that his heavenly Father does? No, he usually uses
all kinds of persuasion and coercion to try to keep his
brother from a great evil; which if he had wisdom, he
would have known that it was his brother's greatest good.
The untimely coercion of a would-be- friend usually results
in both tumbling into the ditch. Wisdom is utterly lost,
and goes mourning when one in the higher life interferes
in the slightest degree with another's freedom.
one who does
And the
it can not afford to do it, for thereby he
takes on the karma of the other soul. And who has not
enough of his own?
It is only the beginner who stumbles here, for those
who are well on the path have learned this hard lesson,