Chapter six begins with a vivid testimony regarding Annalee and her daughter. The mother and daughter each had a heavenly vision on the same climactic day. Annalee’s vision is recorded here in exquisite detail for the edification of all who understand the sad tale of precious pearls underfoot. Oh that the thoughts of our hearts would be guarded and grown as priceless pearls so that we would begin to harness the power of thinking and understand the connection between our physical beings and our souls. Oh that we would understand the law of production in connection to our most valuable seeds – our seeds of thought! Oh that we would begin to desire with vision the greatest gifts in existence – godly gifts, celestial blessings and understanding that reaches into heaven.
In this chapter, Annalee pleads with the reader to catch the vision of faith. To cast away idle thinking habits and stop sowing our thought-seeds with the wind only to reap the effects of a whirlwind. The beginning of faith is thinking, then planting, cultivating and finally achieving. This is the secret the author tries so ardently to reveal. Faith starts with our thoughts. Thoughts are things. They are seeds. They are substance – though they cannot be seen they are very real and very potent. In the near future it will be the true thinkers who will stand in holy places. First, we must learn to rule over our own souls.
My daughter, as a little child, had a strange disease which would recur every few weeks. It was an illness that would leave her unconscious, a lifeless little throbbing bit of humanity, burning with fever. To keep her from going into convulsions it was necessary to keep ice-packs adjusted to her head and hot-water bottles at her feet. No physician or specialist was able to help her. The over-confidence of each would, before long, turn into a hopeless admission of defeat and I would be informed that eventually the illness would prove fatal.
Then one day, a man who knew of my search for faith, and my earnest belief in its power and the right of any man to use it, said, "If you have so much faith and believe in it why do you not heal your child?"
It was a challenge such as I had never received. I lifted my head and looking into his mocking eyes, answered with a complete confidence, "Alright! I will! You hold a high position of authority in your church, I hold none -- but God will hear and answer my prayers."
From then on there was a constant prayer in my heart that my child would recover -- if she were meant to live. It seemed such a tragic thing to have a life to live that would be so marred with suffering that it would not be worth the living, that I could only pray that if she were meant to live she would be given perfect health and strength -- if she were meant to die, she would be taken without any unnecessary suffering. For over two years this prayer was constantly in my heart. And I knew it would be answered.
Then one night after an unusually long siege I realized she was dying. I dropped on my knees beside her bed and felt that my heart would break. I had asked the Lord to take her if it was His will, but in that moment the great tragedy of losing her blotted out everything else. In facing that great tragic moment so many have faced since the world began, I failed for an instant, and in wild, heart-broken panic I clung to her. I felt that I could never go on living without this little one with her wee, dim freckles, her tiny, turned-up nose, her reddish, golden hair tossed at random over her pillow.
A long shudder shook her tiny frame. She stiffened -- then grew limp. I clasped her in my arms, holding her close against my heart. Tears streamed from my eyes and splattered upon her tiny face. The agony of my soul was too deep to express as I felt that I could not possibly let her go.
Then vaguely I sensed that I was thinking of myself, not of the little child in my arms -- and a wider vision came. It was then I truly prayed, and the words washed in fire and tears ascended, "Dear God, this child is Yours first -- and then she is mine. If you want her -- take her -- I love her so! But all that I have is Thine." I meant it. Regardless of the cost. If I died of grief then I would have to die.
I looked down for the last time, as I thought, upon that tiny, upturned face -- I wanted to be alone with my child, to gaze in undisturbed solitude before I called anyone to mar our last silent communion together. It was a desperate struggle to clear the tears from my eyes enough to see through them, but when I finally did, I was speechless with gratitude and awe. My child slept in peace, all fever gone. Such a thing had never happened before, and when she began to recover it was always so slow and gradual that the days almost ran into weeks, and by that time the illness would be on its way back again.
When I fully realized that she had been restored to perfect health, I felt as Abraham must have felt when Isaac was restored to his bosom. My tears of sorrow were turned to tears of gratitude as I placed her gently in her crib. The room seemed filled with a warmer glow than shone from my dim, muffled light. And looking up in wonder, I seemed to see no ceiling to the room -- the open dome of heaven shone above. And then, so near that I was startled, I saw the veil of heaven drawn back as the curtains of a stage -- and He stood there -- with all the glory, majesty and power of eternity stamped upon His brow -- the Savior of the World.
He smiled a smile that must have warmed the universe -- a smile which is impossible to describe. It was so filled with love I wondered why the hard stones did not melt before it -- love that drifted into the darkest corners of the earth -- lighting the World -- bringing peace, and calm and rest.
As my soul worshiped, He spoke. Love and tenderness dripped from lips majestic and divine -- and yet it was His eyes I watched -- eyes that knew all things, that penetrated into the very marrow of one's soul and left it throbbing with a devotion that seemed to melt the very bones.
"I am so eager, and so anxious to pour out my choice gifts upon my children here, as they are prepared to receive them." He said it with such longing earnestness.
For a moment I caught a glimpse of those choice gifts, health, strength, vitality, wisdom, understanding, majesty, eternal life, power to rule not only this earth, but power to reach out into eternity. These things, yea, greater, He holds within His hands, and with infinite patience and love waits to grant them unto us. There need be no poverty, no pain, no tears.
I could not fully grasp the magnitude of what I saw -- I, who through the years of heartache, had believed that mankind was meant to suffer and endure -- that misery was the heritage of man within "this vale of tears."
"We are not meant to suffer?" The question rushed from my lips in wonderment and unbelieving awe.
He smiled gently and as He drew back, these words reached me as the curtain closed, "Even I learned obedience by the things that I suffered -- after one has learned obedience there is no need for suffering."
I sat trying to comprehend the full meaning of blessings so great, and happiness and power so complete, but my mind was unable to fully understand -- then before me stood a little child to whom was handed a string of priceless pearls -- so priceless they seemed like glorified dew that would vanish at the touch. The child grasped these precious gems in a grimy, dirty little hand, and dangling them unheeding by his side, dragged them through the dust. I watched in horror and dismay -- and then I groaned, for there he stood before a bead-counter of ten-cent, shoddy trash and, casting the pearls beneath his feet, cried for red glass beads.
Then only did I faintly grasp the magnitude of what I'd seen. Joy, peace, glory could be ours, wisdom and knowledge, majesty and might -- these things like priceless pearls were ours for the asking and appreciation of such gifts -- but we cast them aside in search of red glass beads; or in search of the meaningless empty things of the world. We chose the grime of earth in preference to the light of God with all its unspeakable glory.
My child was healed permanently and completely. About two weeks later she came in radiantly happy and said, "Remember that night those beautiful women came to take me to the heavenly Father . . ."
I turned to her in startled surprise as I realized how very earnest she was, and knew that she expected me to understand.
All I could say was, "What women?"
Impatiently she answered, "Those women who came that night I was so sick."
"But -- what were they like?" I persisted.
"Oh, they were so beautiful!"
"But what were they dressed like?" I asked.
For a moment a puzzled look spread over her face, then she answered slowly, "I guess they had on white nightgowns." She had never seen a nightgown, so was not too sure.
"What happened then?" I probed, holding my breath as I looked into her earnest little face that was a trifle impatient with me because she felt I already knew all about it.
"They started to take me up into the light. It was so bright -- and they were going to take me to the heavenly Father -- then you started to pray -- and they brought me back."
Always that is the first thing we talk about after we have been separated for a long while, my daughter and I. I never saw what she saw. She never beheld what I was shown, but to both of us those experiences are more real than anything else in our lives.
My daughter is married now, and has two children. They were born almost without pain. Last year she took a thorough physical examination. The doctors asked her about the T. B. she had had. Very much surprised she answered, "Why, I've never had T. B." Then she did remember that as a child she did cough lots, that at night she had to be rubbed with hot-camphorated oil in order to sleep. But the X-rays showed her lungs to be filled with scars, showing the disease had had a real hold, though there had been no more cough after that memorable night, and there is no living trace of the disease at the present time. It was a strange thing that none of the experts or specialists had ever suspected that she had T. B. too, along with whatever other strange illness it was that nearly took her life.
Today, and from that night years ago her health has been perfect. She is a living testimony to the power of God, and of His great love and goodness and willingness to answer the petitions of His children. And I know that nothing is impossible, and that God lives -- that "He is a God of miracles," if we will only permit Him to be. It is mankind who restricts His power.
The power to reach for higher things than just ordinary living calls for, is within each man. His thoughts are the seeds he plants. His thoughts and desires will be the crop he reaps. There is truly nothing that is impossible to those who will develop vision and live by that vision, without wavering. Back of every achievement, every act, every accomplishment is desire -- or thought that has reached the point of its fertility, or unfoldment -- and thoughts are seeds.
The greatest gift God has given to man -- the law of production, has been the one most trampled and abused -- pearls trampled ignorantly, sometimes defiantly, underfoot, while cheapness has been desired. What law has been more defiled than the glorious law of planting human seeds -- the gift of co-creation with God -- that God-given heritage to produce after our own kind, or the humble, glorious gift of being parents to sons and daughters of Almighty God?
This perfect and heavenly law in the power of evil souls has brought the greatest crimes, misery and destruction to the human race, and the greatest suffering. For destruction always comes to nations when they have become morally impossible. Just as this great and holy responsibility has not been understood, so the planting of pure and perfect seeds within our own hearts and minds has been trampled and ignored. We have failed to see that we are the sons and daughters of God, with all the attributes of God, and that we have to cultivate and develop these glorious qualities by planting the seeds of glory and success within our fertile souls.
Visualize the thing you desire to become, hold it in your mind continually. Never let doubts and fears come like vile, noxious weeds to crowd out and kill your crop. Cultivate it. Believe it, and you shall receive it. This is THE LAW -- the unchanging, eternal law of God. There are not many laws -- just the one -- the law that everything shall produce after its kind. The fulfilling of the law is the planting -- the cultivating -- the waiting -- and the harvest. It is the same whether it be grain, stock, or thoughts sowed within one's soul. It is the one eternal law.
Knowing this, we realize that it is not only weak to permit doubts and fears to take possession of us -- it is wicked. Understanding this, and knowing the law is eternal and cannot err, we plant with our crop, whatever it be, that glorious seed of faith, and we know that it, too, will produce -- yea, an hundred-fold. New glories will appear and heaven draw near.
Man creates according to the power of his visualization. The higher the civilization the more developed is the power to visualize. The imagination is a God-given gift. It is the power of the mind to "image in" to the spiritual realm the seeds of desire. Modern man has visualized great things -- he has brought them forth into reality. While the African of the jungle has not developed his power of visualization, consequently he is an unprogressive being. And, indeed, an African from his primitive hut would be more astonished and overwhelmed at the wonders and magnificence of one of the great cities of Europe or America than we will be at the glories of worlds farther advanced than our own -- and yet, the difference may still be as extreme. Only our power to visualize can possibly prepare us even for heaven.
"Heaven," the word, is from the Greek "Oranus," which means, "expansion." "The kingdom of heaven is within you," means that the power to reach up, to expand or to develop and grow is within us.
When man begins to visualize the immensity and grandeur of the things in store for him, in this life, and the law of production, nothing will be impossible. When he fully realizes that he is, indeed, a son of God -- a literal son -- when he holds to the vision without doubt, or fear, he will become like God. The words of the Saviour will be fulfilled in all their majesty and power: "Verily, verily, I say unto you. He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father. And whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do." (John 14:12-13). All things will be subdued unto him -- he will come into his kingdom, his heritage. Power and dominion will be given to such a one. But it will be a dominion of love and not of hate, or greed, or destruction.
Get the vision of the thing you desire to be, hold it in your mind and in your heart -- cultivate it -- work for it -- for that is the law upon which all things are produced. If you desire any blessing you will have to fulfill that law. "Unto him that hath shall be given, and unto him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath."1 Naturally! One planted and produced -- the other held what little he had to him, afraid to plant lest he lose it, and it perished in his grasp.
Picture yourself perfect in body, in mind, and in soul. Pray the Father to help in the growth of your perfect crop. Then wait -- or believe -- and holding to it, keeping out the weeds, will give it the power to come forth. It is the law, and it is irrevocable. Even God himself cannot revoke it for it was made before the foundation of the earth, by a God who cannot lie, and the promise was given that it would be the law upon which all things should be produced.
"Without vision the people perish."2 Could anything be more true? A nation will perish if its leaders have not foresight or vision. A church will become a thing of dead and lifeless dogmas if the leaders or head has not vision or continued revelation or direct contact with God. But it means even more. Any individual without vision will perish. Weeds will automatically grow from his useless, idle thoughts and the strength of the soil will gradually weaken and eventually fail to produce in feeble, old age -- and man becomes senile, and finally dies.
We may fool our friends, we may almost fool ourselves about our secret, hidden, undesirable thoughts -- but the crop will come forth as sure as God lives, for within us is planted the seeds of our thoughts, and within us is written the record -- we, ourselves, are the book of life -- our life -- and in time that record will be read.
"Without vision the people perish" -- vision of higher things.
Even sickness in time will prove to be only a crop of weeds planted in the mind -- sickness, poverty, sorrow, yea, even death. When we have learned the law and work with it, growing daily more like God, it will be like the flower growing in the green bud that suddenly bursts the sepal and the perfect flower is revealed. Man will then live in harmony with his own soul -- sorrow and sickness will be no more, and when he has lived to be the age of a tree, the great perfection will come upon him in all its resurrected glory -- and "He will be changed in the twinkling of an eye, from mortality to immortality."
Marden, in "Every Man a King," says: "The coming man will be so much master of his thoughts that he will make himself one great magnet for attracting only those things which will add to his prosperity and enhance his happiness. He will be able to keep his body in perfect harmony by harboring only the health thought, and knowing how to exclude the disease thought, the sickly thought. The coming man will always be cheerful, because he will entertain only the thoughts which produce happiness; he will not allow clouds of worry or anxiety, or the darkness of melancholy, the blackness of jealousy and envy to enter his mind. He will never mourn but will always rejoice."
"We have all sinned, and come short of the glory of God."3 None of us have seen the reality of the law and we have fallen short. Nevertheless, mankind has been told, oh, many times, to be perfect even as the Father in Heaven is perfect; and God never gave His children a commandment that was impossible to keep, if one but desires to keep it. "I will go and do the things which the Lord hath commanded, for I know that he giveth no commandment unto the children of men, save he shall prepare the way for them that they may accomplish the things which he commanded them."4 No commandment, however, looks easy. In fact, they are all impossible until we are willing to live by them, then, putting our hand to the plow, we will find that he will prepare a way for us to accomplish anything which He has commanded or requested of us. The desire or vision must first come to us, and as we follow it with all the power we possess our ability to complete the task will be perfected by the help of the Almighty.
We have all failed to catch the vision. We have even cultivated our little weeds and humored them. We have not only tolerated our weaknesses but at times have even tried to glorify them. The first criminal tendency is always, "self-justification." Every criminal in prison can justify himself in his own mind for his crimes. He is always in the right. It is the world that is in the wrong. It takes strong men to live this higher law -- men who are willing to face the contemptible qualities within themselves and then begin to eliminate them.
We should endeavor to catch the glorious vision of perfection and nothing less would ever satisfy us -- only perfection. Seek the vision. Hold it in mind. Have faith in it and it will come forth because that is the law irrevocable, for He said, "If you do what I say, then am I bound; but if ye do not what I say then ye have no promise."5
No person would think of letting his hand reach out and slap the other pedestrians as he walked along the street, or permit his feet to strike out viciously, kicking those with whom he came in contact, then try to justify it by this weak "lame-brained" remark, "I just cannot control my hand" or, "I'm sorry, but my feet just won't behave." Such a man would be a complete imbecile. Yet we make no pretense of controlling our minds. We let them drift hither and yon with every fluttering fancy. They are just as much ours to control as our hands or our feet.
Have you ever found yourself sitting, lost in abstract meditation, and had someone break in with: "A penny for your thought?" And you rather foolishly answered, "Why . . . I wasn't thinking of anything." Which, of course, is a speech to cover up, for it is impossible to hold the mind blank for more than a moment or two at a time; and the truth of the matter is that if you gave them your line of thought, you would probably be locked up for a lunatic. Next time this happens to you, follow your thoughts back through the maze of bewildering links and you will know exactly what I mean. Your train of thought may have started by observing a bird light on the shrub by your window, and you will recall a bird you followed as a child, trying to throw salt on its tail. That will bring to your mind that you finally fell down in your disappointing attempt and soiled your clothes. Your mother scolded you right in front of a neighbor, who was an old "meanie" anyway who wouldn't let you play in his grove of trees. The trees remind you of a vacation in the mountains, years later -- that vacation may lead your thought to the President's most recent vacation -- and from there your mind may go wool-gathering in modern politics. So from the bird in the shrub by your window, your thoughts have wandered to either the good or bad of the political situation of the moment. But could you tell your friend, who had offered you a penny for your thoughts, the weird road your mind had been drifting along? After all the tiny threads that connected one thought with the next were so finely spun, it would be ridiculous to try to put them together again for anyone else -- but do it for yourself. Do it every time you find yourself day dreaming. Before long you will admit that your thoughts were wasted and rambling, and surely not worth even a penny. When you can do that, then you will begin to realize that you are wasting the energies of the mind and soul.
Such mind relaxation may not be altogether a crime occasionally, but those who never hold their thoughts in control, who never think constructively, who never plant, consequently never harvest beyond the weeds that grow automatically from their useless, idle thought, are being cheated. Unless life pays us back in richness and value for every day spent we are permitting the golden coins of time, allotted to us, to be squandered -- and at the end our lives will be spent, and there will be nothing to show for it.
Thinking is planting, cultivating, achieving. We will have to work diligently, and how long it will take for the perfect thing to mature will, perhaps, depend on the condition of the soil, and the care we give, but the controlling factor will be the intensity of the desire to achieve. This also must always be understood, no crop will ever come forth until the seed has been planted, cultivated, followed by the waiting in patience. But as we work with understanding, wait in faith, our powers will be increased an hundred-fold, the elements will obey our voice -- the sick be made well -- the blind see -- the lame walk -- the poisonous reptiles and the wild beasts will lose their enmity. All things have been given into man's hands -- man, who can rise to Godhood or sink below the level of the beasts.
In the first chapter of James, we find that ancient apostle was trying to teach this marvelous law:
"James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad, greetings.
"My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into diverse temptations; knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing." (Surely then after we have planted the seeds of righteousness and perfection, if we wait in patience, or let patience have her perfect work, our harvest shall produce and we shall want for nothing.)
"If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not, and it shall be given him. But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering (no changing). For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven by the wind and tossed. Let not that man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord." (Naturally, for he has broken the law rather than fulfilled it, and has planted so many things that none of them can come forth, and he will receive nothing).
And again, starting with the thirteenth verse:
"Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God; for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man; But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lusts (or thoughts), and enticed. Then when lust hath CONCEIVED, It bringeth forth sin, and sin, when it is finished (or produced) bringeth forth death."
The following quotations are from James Allen's little book, As A Man Thinketh:
"He who has conquered doubt and fear has conquered failure. His every thought is allied with power, and all difficulties are bravely met and wisely overcome. His purposes are seasonably planted, and they bloom and bring forth fruit which does not fall prematurely to the ground."
"To put away aimlessness and weakness, and to begin to think with purpose, is to enter the ranks of those strong ones who only recognize failure as one of the pathways to attainment; who make all conditions serve them and who think strongly, attempt fearlessly and accomplish masterfully."
"Man is buffeted by circumstances so long as he believes himself to be the creature of outside conditions, but when he realizes that he is a creative power, and that he may command the hidden soil and seed of his being out of which circumstances grow, he then becomes the rightful master of himself."
The great failure of mankind at the present time is its failure to think. The human race has ceased to think. Two or three minds are doing all the thinking for all mankind. The greatest bondage in the world is mental bondage. It is better to be a beaten slave, and serve with bloody stripes than to become a mental slave, without power to think beyond the loud shouting of one's associates, or leaders.
Oh, men of earth, lift your minds to think, for your minds are the connection between your physical beings and your souls -- it is the connection between your life and God -- it is the power that can glorify you. It is the power of creation -- the power of Godhood.
Each individual holds his destiny within his own hands. He plants his seeds, and harvests the crop. His life is joy and happiness, progress and satisfaction, purpose and plenty, or it is a lack of the worthwhile things, according to the thoughts he holds. "Figs do not grow on thistles." "By their fruits shall ye know them."6 No wonder! Everything produces after its kind, and their fruits are the harvest they have planted. One man will be a fertile garden of glory, another an unclean stench of filth and barrenness. Each man has been his own builder, for destiny has no favorites, for any man who cometh to God shall be strengthened and acknowledged no matter how humble he is, or how meager his abilities, for God is no respecter of persons. One's parentage may be the lowliest of the earth, one's opportunities as bleak and few as were Abraham Lincoln's, but with the power of thinking comes the power to think oneself out of any condition in life. Some may be even deficient in vision and wisdom, but that too, will be bestowed on any child who will only ask and believe.
Sometimes people try to lie themselves out of a difficult situation, but lies will produce their own harvest and the refuge they have built of lies will destroy them.
Some children are so immersed with negatives and fear thoughts by their parents that their lives and minds hold nothing but the seeds of failure from infancy. For them the task is more difficult -- but not impossible. If they will only open their hearts and minds to understand, then follow the vision as it unfolds, their lives will become a glory of divine achievement. The broad glorious path of light is wide open for every child of life to plant their feet upon if they will only "see".
No speck of man's thinking power should be blurred or befuddled by dissipation. One's brain should grow sharper and keener with use, therefore anything that would tend to rob one of his greatest gift, the power to think clearly, should be shunned above all things.
The noxious weeds which were to grow henceforth upon the earth, through Adam's transgression, were also the weeds of doubts and fears within man's mind. These are the most noxious of all weeds. They were to grow until the earth was redeemed -- that redemption is near at hand -- and as the noxious weeds in our minds are rooted out and overcome, so shall the earth yield in her abundance.
Tomorrow there will be a race of thinkers on the earth -- men who know and understand the power of thought and use it constructively and gloriously. Those who refuse to make the effort to develop and control their minds will be left behind -- or like those of the present day, will be destroyed and annihilated because they refuse to use the great powers God gave them.
The power to control one's mind is within each individual who has a mind. Those who let others' ideas and thoughts fill their minds may be progressing, but the greatest work of all is to harness one's own mind. Original thinking alone reaps the full harvest or reward. Those who use their minds to control for greedy purposes shall perish with their gains, for their very greed and selfishness shall grow as a jungle and they will become lost in it and perish without vision.
This world in the near future is to be trod by holy men and wise -- you of the present day, who can grasp the glory of your possibilities, will be among the leaders of a new dispensation on the earth. You will know that the power of love is greater than the power of hate and that glory and achievement is meant for every human soul. You will become great in power and majesty, helping to redeem a broken-down world of fearful men who have groveled in blindness and despair. You great ones of the future, power and dominion and glory will be yours forever and ever. You will first learn to rule yourselves, then by the power of God, you will be able to go forth in wisdom and love to counsel cities and nations and men. You will walk as no others have walked on this humble, tear-stained earth, except The One, for you will become like Him, Sons of God.
1. Matthew 13:10-11 IVB: For whosoever receiveth, to him shall be given, and he shall have more abundance; But whosoever continueth not to receive, from him shall be taken away even that he hath. return to paragraph →
2. Proverbs 29:18 IVB: Where there is no vision, the people perish; but he that keepeth the law, happy is he. return to paragraph →
3. Romans 3:23 IVB: For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; return to paragraph →
4. 1 Nephi 1:65 Book of Mormon 1908 version: And it came to pass that I, Nephi, said unto my father, I will go and do the things which the Lord hath commanded, for I know that the Lord giveth no commandments unto the children of men, save he shall prepare a way for them that they may accomplish the thing which he commandeth them. return to paragraph →
5. RLDS D&C 81:3b: I, the Lord, am bound when ye do what I say, but when ye do not what I say, ye have no promise. return to paragraph →
6. Matthew 7:25 IVB: Ye shall know them by their fruits; for do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? return to paragraph →