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Excerpt about Faith from
Lessons In Truth
,
by H. Emilie Cady:
There is a blind faith, to be sure.
(Someone has truthfully said that blind faith is better than none at
all ...) But there is also an understanding faith. Blind faith is an
instinctive trust in a power higher than ourselves. Understanding
faith is based on immutable principle.
Faith does not depend on physical facts,
or on the evidence of the senses, because it is born of intuition, or
the Spirit of Truth ever living at the center of our being. Its action
is infinitely higher than that of intellectual conclusions; it is
founded on Truth ...
Blind faith is based on Truth, but a
Truth of which everyone is not at the time conscious. Even this kind of
faith will, if persisted in, bring results.
What is
Understanding Faith? There are some things that God has so
indissolubly joined together that it is impossible for even Him to put
them asunder. They are bound together by fixed, immutable laws; if we
have one of them, we must have the other.
This is illustrated by the laws of
geometry... Our knowing it or not knowing it does not change the truth.
Only in proportion as we come to know it as an eternal truth,
can we be benefited by it.
It is also a simple truth that one plus
one equals two; it is an eternal truth. You cannot put one and one
together without two resulting. You may believe it or not; that does not
alter the truth. But unless you do put the one and one together you do
not produce the two, for each is eternally dependent on the other.
The mental and spiritual world or realms
are governed by laws that are just as real and unfailing as the laws
that govern the natural world. Certain conditions of mind are so
connected with certain results that the two are inseparable. If we have
the one, we must have the other, as surely as the night follows the
day--not because we believe some wise person's testimony that such is
the case, not even because the voice of intuition tells us that it is
so, but because the whole matter is based on laws that can neither fail
nor be broken.
When we know something of these laws, we
can know positively beforehand just what results will follow certain
mental states.
God, the one creative cause of all
things, is Spirit, and visible to spiritual consciousness ... There is
no good that you can desire in your life which, at its center, is not
God. God is the substance of all things--the real thing within every
visible form of good.
God, the invisible substance out of which
all visible things are formed, is all around us, waiting to come forth
into manifestation.
This good substance all about us is
unlimited, and is itself the supply of every demand that can be made; of
every need that exists in the visible or natural world.
One of the unerring truths in the
universe (by "universe" I mean the spiritual and natural worlds
combined) is that there is already provided a lavish abundance
for every human want. In other words, the supply of every good always
awaits the demand. Another truth is that the demand must be made before
the supply can come forth to fill it. To recognize these two statements
of Truth and to affirm them are the whole secret of understanding
faith--faith based on principle...
"Faith is the substance of things hoped
for, the evidence of things not seen" (Heb. 11:1). Faith takes hold of
the substance of the thing hoped for, and brings into evidence, or
visibility, the things not seen ...
The Nazarene recognized the
unchangeable truth that, in the unseen, the supply of every want awaits
demand. When he said, "Ask, and ye shall receive" He was simply stating
an unalterable truth. He knew that the instant we ask or desire (for
asking is desire expressed) we touch a secret spring which starts on its
way toward us the good we want. He knew that there need not be any
coaxing or pleading about it; that our asking is simply our complying
with an unfailing law which is bound to work; there is no escape from
it. Asking and receiving are the two ends of the same thing. There is a
very close connection between them.
Asking springs from desire to possess
some good. What is desire? Desire in the heart is always God tapping at
the door of your consciousness with His infinite supply--a supply that
is forever useless unless there be demand for it. "Before they call, I
will answer" (Isa. 65:24). Before ever you are conscious of any lack, of
any desire for more happiness ... the great Father-Mother heart has
desired them for you. It is He in you desiring them that you feel...
With God the desire to give, and the giving, are one and the same thing.
Someone has said, "Desire for anything is
the thing itself in incipiency"; ...it has already been started toward
you out of the heart of God; and it is the first approach of the thing
itself striking you that makes you desire it, or even think of it at
all ... He wants you to be a strong, self-efficient man or woman ... so He
quietly and silently pushes a little more of Himself, His desire, into
the center of your being. He enlarges, so to speak, your Real Self, and
at once you become conscious of a new desire to be bigger, grander,
stronger.
You think that you want better health,
more love, a brighter more cheerful home all your very own; in short,
you want less evil (or no evil) and more good in your life. This is only
God pushing at the inner door of your being, as if He were saying: "My
child, let Me in; I want to give you all good, that you may be more
comfortable and happy." "Behold, my servants shall eat ... behold, my
servants shall drink ... behold my servants shall rejoice ... behold, my
servants shall sing for joy of heart... And they shall build houses, and
inhabit them" (Isa. 65:13, 14, 21).
Remember this: Desire in the heart for
anything is God's sure promise sent beforehand to indicate that it is
yours already in the limitless realm of supply, and whatever you want
you can have for the taking.
Taking is simply recognizing the law of
supply and demand (even if you cannot see a sign of the supply any more
than Elijah did when he had affirmed for rain, and not a cloud even so
big as a man's hand was for a long time to be seen). Affirm your
possession of the good that you desire; have faith in it, because you
are working with divine law and cannot fail; do not be argued off your
basic principle by anyone...
"All things whatsoever ye pray and ask
for, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them" (Mark 11:24)
...
Take right hold of God with an unwavering
faith. Begin and continue to rejoice, and thank God that you have (not
will have) the desires of your heart, never losing sight of the fact
that the desire is the thing itself in incipiency. If the good were not
already yours in the invisible realm of supply, you could not, by any
possibility, desire it ... You do not and cannot, by any possibility
desire that which belongs to another...you may desire what is
represented by them ... If you desire something to fill your heart's
craving for love, Affirm that there is for you a rightful and an
overflowing supply, and claim its manifestation. It will surely come...
You do not in reality desire anything
that belongs to another. You want the equivalent of that for which his
possessions stand. You want your own. There is today an unlimited supply
of all good provided in the unseen for every human being. No man must
needs have less that another may have more. Your very own awaits you.
Your understanding faith, or trust, is the power that will bring it
to you.
Knowing divine law and obeying it, we can
forever rest from all anxiety and fear, for "Thou openest they hand, And
satisfiest the desire of every living thing" (Psalms 145:15).
The preceding excerpt is from
Lessons In Truth,
by H. Emilie Cady
