GIRD yourselves, Oh Brethren, for dark are the clouds approaching. Sinister shadows hover over the haunts of man, imparting a restless foreboding to the hearts of all.

Fear, unnamed, terrifying, fills those who know not of the forces gathering. Fear, known and recognized fills those who know them.

Turn your thoughts toward God Love, my Brethren; gather that Love into yourselves, as a plant gathers and stores sunrays, and then, as does the plant or the wood when ignited, throw out those rays into the darkness surrounding you.

As every tree is a storage plant of unreleased sunrays, so is each man a storage plant of unreleased God rays. As trees are dwarfed or misshapen by buffeting storms, so are men. As Trees twist themselves into gnarled caricatures, or thrust themselves up into the dome of Heaven and fling wide their branches to receive life-giving sunlight, so do men connive with thoughts and ways of darkness, becoming warped and deformed in mind and body; or they lift themselves and receive God light and power to store within themselves against the onslaught of darkness.

And on goes the parallel of men and trees: As one tree fired throws its light into the darkness dispelling the shadows and gloom, giving out healing warmth and protection against cold, how much farther a forest conflagration flings its stored up sunrays into the blackness of night.

Thus it is with the human soul. As one soul stored with God Light repels the darkness of evil forces, so much more do concerted groups repel them.

Faster move the messengers of evil, Oh Brethren. Closer gather the foul furies bent on destruction, but know you, that Light travels faster than darkness; a shaft of darkness is only a shadow upon the brilliance of midday, but a shaft of sunlight dispels the gloom of the blackest night.

Dark clouds are weaving a pall to cast over all living things. So it remains for you who are the awakened ones to work fast and unselfishly for the salvation of Good.

Do not mistake or underate the power of these dark ones. They are conjured from all the misery and sin and sorrow the earth has produced. They revel in their slimy solitudes and gather recruits from those places of sin and abasement which scar the beauty of a once clean universe.

Conscious of their ignominy these forces seek to draw all things to their own level, to desecrate and destroy every vestige of that which is not polluted with the virus of their ineffable evil.

These forces have been active, virulent while the rest of the world has been in a moral coma, heeding naught of anything save its own immediate needs.

That time is past. The expediency of the moment must awaken all to the fast moving Danger that is upon us.

Therefore be you like the trees, Oh Brethren, like those forest monarchs that have flung out their branches gathering and storing sunrays for centuries that one day their warmth and brightness might live again.

Put aside all that is selfishness and work for the cause of humanity, for the cause of a higher, more purified humanity. Work for the protection of ideals and live for the preserving of God Life and Christ Principle upon the Earth. (At this juncture directions were given to read Mark 13)

Go not about shouting of thy knowledge, for it will fall upon deaf ears and be held up for ridicule. Join you those who have followed the word of God, and pray for the deliverance of all people. Give succor to those who seek thee, and give knowledge of God’s word to them who ask. Send forth word to all groups to pour forth the Light from within them, for thus it is that all who dwell upon the earth will not be destroyed.

Hell is given all men that they may transmute it into holiness. And as we are burned by hell-fire, so we are transformed into that which is higher and purer in form.

Give yourselves to any and all tasks for the purification and betterment of Earth, and fear not for your bodies, minds or souls, for you will be transfigured and uplifted and not destroyed.

Wickedness is born in the hearts of men, there festering in its own pustule until at last it is ejected like a flaming comet, zooming away on its orbit, gathering strength and force on its way.

Righteousness is also born in the hearts of men, growing there and blooming, and ripening, sending its fragrance afar, gaining cosmic rays until it gleams, then glows and shines forth like a million suns, outshining and overpowering the forces of wickedness.

Be ever alert to crush the ugly heads of evil thoughts as they arise within your hearts, Oh Brethren, for thus can you live to crush all evil around you; for evil grows in darkness, and as sunlight purifies and sterilizes pest-holes, so does the light of true righteousness purify evil.

The pilgrim must learn to detect and know true righteousness, true Christ love, and not confuse them with sanctimonious cant.

The Inner Man who knows recognizes the divinity of all things, and shines forth in a glory that needs no advertising by grandiose words from the outer shell of him.

Evil is only good gone astray, an overflowing of the ego, which is attacked by powers of purification, as are all waste materials, and we find always that putrification ultimately becomes purification,—a transformation into a higher state.

The God fires within man, if kept aflame, eventually burn the evil thoughts and deeds that might take root and overflow; thus men must be ever aware of this fire, keeping it replenished by God force or soul force, that they may be true instruments of the Divine Plan.

Remember also, that these powers of evil can be averted and diverted into channels where their energy can be put to use. Everything that is, is of some use, put here for the benefit and glorification of man and God’s word within him. —Through Mary and Marta—Oregon.

—o—

THE AWAKENING of Faith is bound to come. On the un- impeachable authority of Holy Scripture, we are told that no word of God shall return unto Him void, but that it shall ac- complish that for which He sent it forth. The greatest word of God is the Logos, even Jesus Christ. What God has spoken through Jesus must be fulfilled before it returns to Him.

—John Maitland.

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