Discovering the Secret Within
Rev. Joseph R. Reid
I heard that in one church the minister was praising the Kingdom of God and he said, “There are streets of gold and fields of emeralds!” And he praised as much as he could and then he asked, “Who would like to go there?” All the hands were raised except one old man’s. The minister couldn’t believe it. Why has this old man not raised his hand? He should be the first, because he is just nearing death. Then he condemned and painted a picture of hell, with all its ugliness, torture, pain, suffering, fire. Again he challenged, “Now, who would like to go to the Kingdom of God, to Heaven?” All hands were raised – but that old man was still sitting without raising his hand. The minister was puzzled. He asked that old man, “Don’t you hear me? Are you deaf? Would you not like to go to the Kingdom of God, to Heaven?” The man said, “Eventually, yes. But the way you are carrying on, it seems you want to carry a load off right now. Eventually yes, but right now, no!”
If you are told, “The Kingdom of God is here and now,” you are not ready. Many are the desires to be fulfilled before you can leave; many, many things have to be done before you would think of entering the Kingdom of God. Here is the problem. Many of us believe we are on our way to Heaven but are not willing to take the simple yet hard steps of giving up the desires of this world. Like the man who said, I am not ready, right now, we keep putting off making a total commitment to God in Jesus Christ. We keep postponing this undertaking because we believe we have time to seek the Kingdom of Heaven. Much of this has to do with what we have been told. We have been told that the Kingdom of God or Heaven is somewhere else: in time, in space, not here and now. Why has this happened? Why is the Kingdom of God not here and now? Why in the future, or why somewhere else? It is because of our mind. It is very hard to live in the here and now. Our mind disappears in the present. It lives in the future, in the hope, in the promise of the future; it moves through desire. Desire needs time; desire cannot exist if there is no time. If we suddenly come to a moment where we realize that time has disappeared, that now there is no time, no tomorrow, desire disappears. We come face to face with our fate here and now. It is at this moment that the mysteries of the Kingdom can be revealed. The Kingdom of Heaven is not somewhere else, sometime else or someplace else, the Heaven is always here and now. It is available today. Since none of us want to die and miss Heaven, I want to share two ways of discovering the secret of Heaven that lies within.
First, in order to discover the secret of Heaven within we must be committed to prayer within as well as without. What do I mean? Most of our prayers are directed to a God as He exists outside of us. The words we use are directed at an external God who we hope will save us from the calamities of life. There is no scientific proof of an external God. God is Spirit revealed in the flesh. Many of us use prayer as a magic wand to make our troubles go away. But deep prayer connects us to God on a regular basis as the Creator and maker of the world, giving us free will to serve Him or not. When we pray to that power that created the universe in the name of His Son, we connect with an awesome power that does do for us what we cannot do for ourselves. But it is a mistake to assume that God will take care of us when we can take care of ourselves. So our prayer should not be used for the desires of this world which we are capable of achieving but for those things that only God can do. Prayer is the key that unlocks the door from without to within.
Second, discovering the secret within requires daily meditation. What is meditation? Meditation is a technique of quieting the mind. Why quiet the mind? Because the turbulent sea of desire that dominates our conscious state can never be fulfilled. Meditation is a way of getting to know who we are in God and who God is in us beyond our desires. Meditation is the key that unlocks the door to Heaven within and without.
