In the book of Saint Matthew, chapter seven and verse fourteen, is given the following: "Enter ye in at the Straight Gate: for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat.
"Because straight is the gate and narrow is the way which leadeth unto life and few there be that find it!" This road which leads to LIFE is the road of OVERCOMING, in which a man need never die.
Such is a portion of Christ's precious teachings. And every waring organization in Christendom is positive that it alone is traveling that sacred Narrow Path that leads to life eternal. Yet they all follow the beaten path of earth into the grave as Isaiah proclaimed in his fifty-third chapter and sixth verse, as follows: "All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way." Or as Paul declared in Romans 3:23. "For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God."
Or as given in Psalms, chapter forty-nine, verses nine to fourteen: "That he (man believed that he) should still live forever and not see corruption.
"For he seeth that wise men die, likewise the fool and the brutish person perish, and leave their wealth to others.
"Their inward thought is that their houses shall continue forever, and their dwelling place to all generations, that they call their lands after their own names.
"Nevertheless, man being in honor abideth not; he is like the beasts that perish.
"THIS, THEIR WAY IS THEIR FOLLY: yet their posterity approve their sayings.
"LIKE SHEEP THEY ARE LAID IN THE GRAVE; death shall feed on them: and the upright shall have dominion over them in the morning; and their beauty shall consume in the grave - - -"
That men have followed like sheep to the grave is indeed their folly, especially since Christ came that men "might have LIFE and have it MORE ABUNDANTLY, EVEN LIFE ETERNAL, that they need never die!"
Christ's whole message is of life -- not death. And then, that none might be mistaken, he proclaimed, "I am the Way, the TRUTH and the LIFE!"
"For the law made nothing perfect BUT THE BRINGING OF A BETTER HOPE DID: by which we draw near to God." (Heb. 7:19)
Then comes the marvelous revelation given in II Peter chapter one, verses three and four: "According as his (Christ's) divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto LIFE and Godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue.
"WHEREBY ARE GIVEN UNTO US EXCEEDING GREAT AND PRECIOUS PROMISES; that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, HAVING ESCAPED CORRUPTION that is in the world through lust." Here indeed is the definite promise that man could partake of the divine nature and escape corruption, which comes through lust.
Remember always is given this information: "The wages of sin is death!" But because we have gone on down the centuries satisfied with our mortal inclination, we truly have "All fallen short of the glory of God," though His promises of Life eternal have been there all the time for us to only open our eyes to see.
The above promise that we might be partakers of the divine nature and escape from corruption is verified in the ancient information that "Man can evolve from the man kingdom into the God Kingdom." If he partakes of the divine nature and escapes corruption then he would have to evolve beyond mortality. Man has, through love and devotion, the power to become a partaker of the divine nature and to escape the grave and death -- that he need not follow the beaten path of mankind into the grave like sheep.
At first doubting man may hesitate to enter this Straight and Narrow Path, which so few find, because he has never beheld with his physical eyes, anyone who has attained unto these PROMISED POWERS. Yes, who has beheld anyone in this day and age who has been born of the Spirit, as Christ explained to Nicodemus -- one who could come and go as the wind and no one would know from where he came, or where he went. These who are born of the Spirit are truly wrapped in the power and glory of their Maker and are sent forth to do the GREATER WORKS. But because individual, mortal man has not yet beheld such glorious manifestation of God's Almighty POWER, in fulfillment, many hesitate to make the slightest effort to travel the Highway of the Gods. They cling to the ugly, mortal way of corruption and death, thinking that is all there is.
But now let us examine II Cor. 4:18, which is as follows: "While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal (earthly, grubby, mortal); but the things which are not seen are eternal." These, as yet, unseen things are spiritual, indestructible and are the most real of all to those who follow that Straight Path into the Higher Way of perfection -- where FAITH IS FINALLY MADE PERFECT and the existence of the spiritual is brought into tangible reality or manifestation.
This Straight and Narrow Way, which so few find, because it is not seen, and because it is entered into by the joy of FAITH. It is traveled in love and divine hope, which lights the Way of glory. This sacred Path is an unfolding of exquisite beauty as one's understanding opens to encompass the dynamic truths which it involves. It is a Pathway which is intangible to the mortal, physical sense and experiences, at first, but as one enters it his faith expands into knowledge as his spiritual attributes are quickened and developed.
This glorious Path is not an outside Path at all. It is an inner path in which one learns to PROVE the glorious PROMISES of Jesus Christ, by LIVING THEM. It is an inner exploring in which one takes hold of the PROMISES and begins to put them to the tests of PROVING. It is not a Path of narrowed, bigoted "dos" and "don'ts" or of restrictions and self-righteousness. It is not a road of darkness or bleak ugliness or skimped conformities. It is a road of Lighted glory and of increasing joyous ecstasy.
It is a road of PROMISES! The great and mighty Promises of God, the Eternal Father. It is traveled by FAITH, as one lays hold of the best gifts, casting out his own doubts. As one begins to look at the PROMISES and desires to PROVE them, which is actually to prove God and His power to fulfill, he must exercise Faith. No doubting man can travel this sacred road of fulfillment. Only by FAITH can it be traversed, this glorified, "Road to Zion, in which a fool need not err, but over which the wicked cannot pass." To travel this sacred road of glory one must cast out his fears and his failures and his great wickedness of unbelief.
These books, which God has commanded me to write, contain the complete map to this exalting Pathway -- and to the great glory to which the Pathway leads.
It is a road of Praise and of Love and of Singing Gratitude! There is no darkness nor sorrow nor evil for Christ IS THE WAY. He is the Light of it. He is the unfolding Revealer of It. He is the joy of it! And as one accepts the invitation to travel this sacred Road he soon learns that these great PROMISES have become a very part of his life without his striving or straining by any agonizing, self-denying misery or anguish.
As one begins to love God with all his heart, soul, mind and strength he enters the true Pathway of OVERCOMING. And he passes beyond the laws of mortal bondage. As he continues his love increases until he actually becomes the divine love of God. And he who is perfected in love is born of God. "Whosoever is born of God doth not sin, for his seed remaineth in him: and he cannot sin, because he is born of God." (I John 3:9) "He reaches the point where he overcomes the evils of his life and loses every desire for sin."
Or, as follows: "Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and everyone that loveth is born of God, and KNOWETH GOD!" ("And this is Life Eternal!") (I John 4:7).
"For whatsoever is born of God, OVERCOMETH THE WORLD: and this is the victory that OVERCOMETH THE WORLD, even our FAITH." (I John 5:4). Or as Christ Himself declared at his trial, "I have OVERCOME THE WORLD!" (John 16:33).
Thus it is fully revealed that FAITH contains the knowledge and the power by which one learns to cast out or OVERCOME the doubts and fears and travels in a full HOPE of all the holy PROMISES which God has given unto the children of men.
"We know that whosoever is born of God sinneth not; but he that is begotten of God keepeth himself, and that wicked one touch him not." (I John 5:18). In other words he enters upon this Straight and Narrow Way of PROMISE and glory in which the darkness of evil and doubting and of self is OVERCOME and left behind.
This divine Pathway is the Pathway of love being perfected until it casts out all fear and all doubting! It is the Path of FAITH made perfect! This glorious Path is not a long, difficult road, but one of prayer and hope and rejoicing as FAITH reveals each day its increasing glory and unfolds its TRUTHS in the power of the divine PROMISES of Almighty God.
As one continues along this road or Pathway of increasing Light and rejoicing he comprehends that his eyes have truly become "Single to the glory of God!"
And the PROMISE is: "And if your eyes become single to my glory you shall be filled with Light and comprehend all things. And there shall be no darkness in you. And I will unveil my Face unto you” etc. As one holds his eyes single to the glory of God he begins to absorb that Light or to bring it forth. How else could he "be filled with Light?"
And it is most assuredly true that as one travels this glorious, Straight and Narrow Path it becomes increasingly more beautiful and joyous and desirable, for "The nearer man approaches perfection the clearer are his views and the greater are his enjoyments, until he overcomes the evils of his life and loses every desire for sin, and like the ancients, arrives at the point of FAITH where he is wrapped in the power and glory of his Maker and is caught up to dwell with Him!" This glorious condition is accomplished not through dying, but through LIVING and OVERCOMING. (Later on in this record the full wonder of this promise will be revealed).
This is a Pathway of almost unspeakable joy and glory as the weaknesses of the flesh are automatically OVERCOME and left behind like ugly, discarded, moth-eaten rags. Yet this is not a road of dark, dismal, ugly taboos and narrow-minded restrictions. It is not a Road of commands and obligations at all. It is a Pathway of choosing and willing and of glorifying God in a joy of exquisite gladness.
This Straight and Narrow Way is the Path of PROMISE as one travels it in an expectancy of joy and ecstasy as he perfects the love of God within himself until it becomes a fountain of "Living Water, springing up into everlasting LIFE!" This love becomes a fountain so life-giving, so real and so desirable one who partakes of it need never die. And Christ invited all to "Come and partake of the Waters of Life freely!" He invites all mankind to drink of these living waters, for they are offered without price.
These glorious, almost incomprehensible PROMISES have been waiting down the centuries for men to begin to open up their minds that they might BELIEVE. And in BELIEVING begin to travel this road of glory, by FAITH.
This Straight and Narrow Way is the Path of God! It is the Straight and Narrow Way which leads to Life Eternal!
It is the Road of unutterable glory -- "Which so few find” because they are seeking with their mortal sense and their personal unenlightened understandings. They are not seeking with Souls alerted and with a humility that is enfolded in praise and love and gratitude and increasingly exalted through joy.
This is the Road which the wicked can never cross over, though a fool need not err therein. It can never be traveled by the self-righteous. Each church believes it alone has the keys of this sacred way of life. Yet each in turn has helped to fill the cemeteries with their dead. "Thus saith the Lord God; WOE unto the foolish prophets that FOLLOW THEIR OWN SPIRITS and have seen nothing!" (Ezek. 13:3) for they are only false prophets bearing witness of themselves, with eyes single to their own glory and not to the glory of God. These cannot travel this sacred Pathway of God.
As one travels this Straight and Narrow Way it becomes increasingly glorious. It is a Path of such praise and joy and ecstatic glory the darkness is overcome and forever left behind. But this great ecstatic joy is held and maintained in a majesty of divine power, not in outward manifestation.
Those who travel this Pathway in loving humility and increasing joy reach the point of Faith where all PROMISES ARE FULFILLED. It is the point of FAITH in which all doubts and fears have been OVERCOME and eliminated. It is the point of supreme, everlasting POWER. It is where FAITH itself is transformed into KNOWING. It is the point where one truly comprehends all things. And KNOWLEDGE IS POWER! It is the point of unutterable glory. It is the unveiling of man's soul as he stands face to face with God, purified even as He is pure, glorified as He is glorious for he will be a co-heir with Jesus Christ -- a joint-heir with the Son of God.
"As one reaches this point of Faith where he is wrapped in the power and glory of his Maker and is caught up to dwell with Him, he can either choose to remain in that Celestial realm, or return to earth to "DO THE GREATER WORKS," which Christ promised. Christ explained that those who truly believed would not only be able to do all the works which He did but go on to do the greater works, because he was going to His Father. But it was not explained at that time that those who fulfilled the works of OVERCOMING, even as He OVERCAME, would be privileged to return to earth if they so chose, and only by this method could they possibly do the GREATER WORKS. And His word cannot return to him unfulfilled and void! Therefore, you who choose to lend your strength to the complete fulfilling of His Word and to fulfill all the promises, the very heavens are awaiting you -- and the earth and all that in them is.
So marvelous is this promise to do even greater works than Christ did, it has been veiled down the centuries in a mist of unbelief. In two thousand years none have opened up their eyes to either see or comprehend how literal these words are, or exercised the FAITH TO EVEN TRY TO PROVE THEM. No one, in two thousands years of preaching and listening has ever done any of the works which Christ did, let alone go on to do the GREATER WORKS which He PROMISED!
Try to imagine what the greater works would be! Then know this, They are still incomprehensible to mortal minds. Yet how could anyone hope to become a joint-heir with Jesus Christ, or a co-heir with him, which means coequal, unless he did do the very works which Christ did -- and then went on to do EVEN GREATER WORKS? How blind the world has been, and how steeped in the dark lethargy of mortality and unbelief. Rend the veil of unbelief and you will KNOW and be able TO DO the greater works, as PROMISED.
Man, when he has traveled that Straight and Narrow Path, of which Christ is the pattern, the Light and the glory, truly reaches the point of FAITH, where he is wrapped in the Power and glory of his Maker and is caught up to dwell with Him.
And only those who walk that Straight and Narrow Path of praise and love and glorious gratitude, as their joy and ecstasy increases, can possibly reach the point of FAITH where they can be made perfect as they are ordained of God and sent forth to do the GREATER WORKS. These PROMISES of Jesus Christ have been waiting down the centuries for those with enough humility to travel so glorious a Path of loving and praising and joyous Thanksgiving and believing in order that they might complete the journey of glory and OVERCOME the world! Even as He overcame!
Only in the OVERCOMING OF THE WORLD, OR THE LITTLE MORTAL SELF with its demanding claim for superiority and attention, can this Straight and Narrow Path possibly be traveled. That is why so few have found it. But "Wide is the gate and broad is the Path that leadeth to destruction (or the grave) and many there be who go in thereat."
Yes, the whole wide world and all the creed-bound, self-righteous demonstrators of Christendom and of the heathen world and of the barbarians are traveling the broad Way of self, which leads to destruction and to death. No professing can fulfill the greatness of the PROMISES. Only the LIVING OF HIS WORDS can give one the POWER OF FULFILLING.
Glorious, Wonderful God! How great Thou art!
Those who have eyes single to the glory of God instead of to their own importance will eventually be filled with Light and complete KNOWLEDGE as the darkness of mortality is OVERCOME IN THEM. Then it is that "God will unveil His face unto them. This is the great and last PROMISE! "It is the very fulfilling of ALL PROMISES! This is the point of perfect Faith in which one actually KNOWS GOD! And "This is Life Eternal, to KNOW THEE, the only True and Living God and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent!"
Then only, as this supreme point of FAITH IS reached can one hope to DO THE GREATER WORKS, WHICH are so needed and so necessary at the present time!
This Straight and Narrow Way -- this Pathway of the Lord -- is the glorified Highway to Zion, THE PURE IN HEART, of which Isaiah spoke as follows: "And an highway shall be there and a way, and it shall be called the Way of Holiness; the unclean shall not pass over it; but it shall be for those: the wayfaring men (Those who are traveling the Straight and Narrow Path of complete purification of the heart), though fools, shall not err therein." (Isa. 35:8)
This Straight and Narrow Road is the PROMISED road to Zion, which means literally THE PURE IN HEART. It is the road of holiness over which the wicked cannot pass. It is the road of complete purification as one leaves his weakness automatically behind and travels with his eyes single to the glory of God, and not single or centered upon himself or his own self-importance. "And he, whose eyes are single to the glory of God shall be filled with Light and shall comprehend all things!"
And it is only as one's heart is purified that he can behold the Face of God -- which enfolds the gift of LIFE ETERNAL!
This glorified road of perfection and power cannot be traveled by the proud or the haughty; the greedy or the selfish or the lustful or by those who loveth and maketh a lie. Neither can it be traveled by the unbelievers nor the fearful nor the whoremongers nor by any whose devotion and love have not become purified as they developed and took on the virtues of perfection. There can remain no self-righteousness or self-acclaim to mar the lives of those seeking to behold the face of God.
Neither can this sacred road be traveled by those who cling to the old, backward methods of mortal concepts and injunctions. These methods were used down the ages to restrain mankind from searching to KNOW for himself and to prevent him from fulfilling any of the dynamic PROMISES OF ALMIGHTY GOD! Man has been held, and to a certain degree bound, as he has been restrained in the small crib that is too short! It is so short he cannot stretch himself in it to think, to observe or to either grow or progress in. And he has been furnished a covering so narrow it has brought neither comfort nor proved sufficient to cover his nakedness. And for centuries mankind has been satisfied with the outward show of things, the vain demonstrations of clattering cymbals and rattling, childish toys which has been the unprogressiveness of immaturity and make-believe.
This childish entertainment of the past is now outgrown and must be left behind. This is the day in which there are many who have been drawn from the breasts and weaned from the milk and who refuse to remain in their stupid, outgrown cribs, lulled into a semi-stupor of empty demonstrations or chanted lullabies and soothing syrups. And their restrainers have been blind men and wicked leaders who have followed the leading of the darkness.
Anyone who awakens enough to climb out of his outgrown crib as he refuses to longer partake of milk, will be answered by his Father and will begin to be fed upon the meat that will develop him and make a man of him. Only the meat, or food of the father will longer satisfy one's hungering and thirsting after righteousness. And only as one's soul awakens and as he demands stronger food, even the food of the Father, can he possibly mature into the perfect stature of a man. It is of the meat that Paul spoke in Hebrews, chapter five. It is of this food of the Father, that leads one on to perfection as he leaves the creed-bound doctrines of the "law" behind. Study very carefully the 28th and 29th chapters of Isaiah and the record of Hebrews, chapter six, verses one and two.
"Blessed is he who hungers and thirsts after righteousness for he shall be filled WITH THE FULLNESS OF GOD,” according to the original and complete record.
And so I have been called to bear witness of this Straight and Narrow Way, which can only be traveled by those who leave their infant cribs and their rattles and childish toys of immaturity behind and begin to hunger and thirst after righteousness, that they might not only be filled, but that they might mature into the very fulness of divinity.
Oh, Glorious, Wonderful God! How great Thou art! Oh, Glorious Path! Oh, fulness of Joy!