Stewardship in the House of the King

5 days ago

10 min read

Come just another inch on the way of that long journey of experience which the soul has set out so valiantly to cover for the love of God. Lift your mind not only above the world but above the self, which is a hard task indeed.

Think of your near ones, those dear ones who have gone on before. Although your thoughts bring them instantly to your side, they cannot get the same power they could possess if you were to try to disentangle yourself from self and fix your heart's desire on finding God.

If only humanity could realise for one instant the possession, the power, and the sacred opportunities held out by trying to find God. If you focus your attention on the one Great Light, which is Love, all else is included! In your daily life, with its many distractions, again and again your thoughts seek to free themselves and contact with that which is of the Spirit. You do so more effectively than you can grasp! But still more desperate is the need for humankind as a whole to lay self at the Feet of the Saviour and to give itself wholly into His sacred care.

It is not impossible, but hard to accomplish while still in the physical body. Only the courageous, the determined, and the pure can reach this high ideal and hold it in spite of the opposing forces. Yet you must take a definite step, you must make a stand for the God that is within you. Not only for your sake now, but far more for those eras of time which lie in front. Get free from the bonds of the material world, free from its thought, because how seldom does God come into that thought. Get free from its distractions; those most destructive distractions which are forever telling you, or if not you then the vast majority, that there is not time; that business presses and the duties of the day, even the duties to "the dead", come first. There are those who are ready to respond to the Call but are confused by the signpost of duty. Sometimes it seems to them that one hand points to God and the other, by the fraction of an inch, points to duty only. You know the spiritual ruling on this. You know if you follow the hand which points to God alone you will find before you have gone very far that duty walked beside you all the way.

Draw back the curtain of the future just for one second and see for yourself what effort, what dedication, and what concentration can bring into being. It would show you for your comfort that stress, strain, overwork, and the disappointing thoughts that follow are as the bricks in that wonderful foundation on which you shall call to the world.

Take in something of the responsibility and something of the sacredness of the Call that has come to you. Argue it out in your mind and be certain that the Father's promises never fail!

On the one side are those multitude of obstacles in the form of distractions; the little unforeseen calls upon time, upon your attention, and upon that active side of your thinking mind. That is the one side and to the majority it seems as though duty and a thousand things of spiritual character lie on that side of physical life. What is on the other side? The quiet call of the Spirit and nothing more. That is how humankind gets so confused. The weight is so much greater on the earth's side than on the spiritual. In comparison of importance, of construction, and of all that creation of beauty and of power, the quiet call of the Spirit is away and beyond all the world's side.

It is a single golden coin against a mass of coppers. To those who did not know, on seeing the two they would instantly think that by taking the pile they were enriching themselves far more than by possessing the tiny coin. It is but a crude illustration. It is difficult to talk in the earth language of that which means so much and so search your own mind and find other similes which will fit in. There on the earth side you get the bulk, you get what seems to your physical mind overwhelmingly important and tangible and real. On the other just faith; faith in yourself that you have heard the Voice of God.

Shorten the road of material experience and enter into the shining path of spiritual experience. Then when looking back, if you ever have an inclination to look back, you will smile at the gifts of the world, those treasures of the earth, and you will see that moth and rust had corrupted them. Those who have heard the Call of the Spirit, their treasure is in Heaven and Heaven in this case means in the Heart of the Father! Their treasure is there and that is why until the unity is complete on your side peace evades you and unrest follows you everywhere. Unrest which frets the nerves and builds up imaginary horrors or ugliness of other kinds in your mind. That unrest will torture you because you belong to God!

You have heard a lot about stewardship and the duties that go with that trusted position in the King's household. Think for just a minute or two on your stewardship in the house of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

Perhaps you have not looked at it in this way. It has seemed to you that you are not of sufficient importance; that rather the Father's Love is extended to you as if you were a child who doesn't yet know very much of the Father's will. Those in prominent positions, who are the avowed servants of God, are the stewards in the household of the king, so you would think. But enlarge your mind on this as on many other subjects. Whether you recognise it or not, whether you seek that position of honour or not, you are a steward in the household of the King!

God has put you in the position in which you find yourself today. You know that there are some who love God dearly who have an idea that by devoting themselves entirely to the contemplation of His Love and the study of the Sacred Word that they are following as closely as possible the rules laid down for stewards. Sometimes it so happens that that is part of their little bit of the pattern. But what of those in the busy world? Those who have work and provide a livelihood for others. The toilers; those who think that they are bound hand and foot to the work of the world. Each one in their separate place, whether they think it fits them or not, are at one and the same time stewards in the household of the King!

Then regard the people at home, those who it seems to them are just the "hacks" of daily life; doing the jobs which the luckier ones have escaped. There are countless thousands who mourn their lack of opportunity, who feel their talents are wasted or that they have never had a chance of developing them. God feels very kindly towards these because in the home there does not seem much chance of proving that within them is that creative force that can build something which will last forever. They would tell you at once that the work produces nothing but irritation; it is the same thing day in and day out! They, as are the outstanding figures in the world, are stewards in the household of the King.

If you could see the working of the spiritual life underneath the physical you would know that not one of the simplest tasks done well does not produce beauty of a permanent kind. Because the task was not exactly a pleasant one, if it is done willingly and to the best of their ability the beauty is greater and grander still.

Get down from the heights of physical thinking and start to climb the ladder of spiritual thought. See in your daily life all the opportunities. Not of startling the world, for the world forgets you tomorrow, but of creating something which will stand for all time; something which will make others say: "There goes a good steward!"

Comprehensive as the spheres may be, stupendous as the marvels unrolled before your wondering eyes may seem, these things are only there by the quietly sustained effort of those doing their daily tasks. The monotony of life is transformed into the radiance of the Sprit by God!

You see now that life, the trivial round, is a bigger thing than you thought. Always bear in mind that by doing your task as well as you can you are also seeking God, seeking God and finding Him too if the heart is kept right with Him.

So focus your attention on the greater Spiritual side of life. In your domestic life or in the slightly wider area of the office, focus your mind on God because if you do that you are bound to work well. The Soul within knows no second best. It only knows that which represents completeness; the finished task done to the best of your ability. That which in the end seems faulty to you, your Father finishes if only you had the power to do so yourself.

Work, effort, and strain are the bricks of that foundation on which you can stand and call to the world. See to it that your bricks are in their right place. See to it that in placing your own you do not disturb those of another. Ensure that the harmony between you and everyone else is complete in the wish to build for God. If only the wish is there you shall find, in such a wonderful way, that you have built better than you knew. But watch the outposts of your life. Watch and be on your guard against those most subtle forces out to hinder the Soul; sadness and depression. These are very often the last of that great army you have fought and conquered. They come when you are feeling over weary with the strain. They come at the end of a long day. They come when the body is weakest and frailest. They are indeed to many the hardest of all to overcome and banish. So be on your guard and watchful of the outposts, and when the first sign or first hint of their presence is felt remember that you belong to joy, the joy which is of God!

Sadness is hallowed in one sense because of what it has produced and what it has worked out in the physical mind of mankind. But once its work is done you belong to it no more. It was only a test sent to prove whether you were strong enough to emerge from it into joy. You belong to that perfect happiness, that perfect harmony which is yours on this side. It is also in the possession of those you love, those who have stepped out of the physical body in order to come into their own place in the Kingdom of the Lord. They too are wedded to joy, and their work now is to link you to joy as well. Therefore, sadness and depression and loneliness are not of them. They are only of the shadows, from which your loved ones call to you to step forward into the light of understanding and into the revelation of the Love of God.

See to it then that you put on your strongest armour to fight the enemies that would approach. If you call upon the Saviour and upon those you love, who are also of joy itself, you shall find that happiness in its most beautiful form. Contentment shall enter and remain a guest until that contentment is turned into something stronger still, when between you and your loved ones the unity will be complete.

Remember that when you think a sad thought you are adding to the sorrow of the world. When you think a glad thought then instantly you are giving extra power to the world. When you think a brave thought the weak ones unconsciously square their shoulders. When you think a holy thought the Spirit of God within humanity rises and dominates that which is of the earth. It is cause and effect. You can build or you destroy. You can add a link or you can break one that already has been put together by much effort. You can lift another up or you can push them one pace further down. You can be an instrument of God or you can, though unwillingly, be used by the shadows to strike that which is Love Itself.

Joy hides its head until you recognise that you belong to light and not to darkness; to freedom and not to captivity, to peace and not to strife, to gladness and not to sorrow!

The question of "stewardship" will come again and again. Everyone has their own particular work to do. For your own sake see that each life is kept as intact as possible. It is like a big school. There is always the lazy child and there is always the one who will work, the one who can be very busy when the mood takes them, and the one who thinks tomorrow will do just as well. You sometimes wonder why an extra burden seems to be put on one who doesn't appear to have sufficient strength to carry it. Those who suffer shall find the strength of the Spirit to carry them through. In God's Name they will find the strength.

But remember that you are a chosen steward in the household of the King. Because that post of honour is yours, the king will not only see to it that you have the tools with which to work but also that the strength will be forthcoming to make that which appears so difficult possible to accomplish.

Remember that in work of this kind, especially in regard to the spreading of a new truth that has got to be hammered in, the power which is of God is given into your possession in a way so stupendously greater than would be possible for you to imagine.

In God's Name continue in faith and be steadfast in hope. In reviewing what has happened day by day and what has been done be certain that it has gathered in grain to be used as food later on. You cannot grasp these subtler truths. You cannot realise that the tasks of today are just those which are needed to produce the power of tomorrow. But distract yourself sufficiently from the personal to know within that, from the spiritual point of view, you are producing by your daily effort, by the wish to be steady and to be true, that spiritual food which in time to come shall be used to feed the multitude so that they may not go hungry.

Go forward in hope, in hope and joyful anticipation that the grey days indeed will be turned to those of sunshiny blue. In that time you will look back and marvel what you did in ignorance, and how God has turned that ignorance into illumination and understanding of the things which are of Him.

The Christ in your heart will lead you on with faith as the strong staff and love as the motive power. These things are yours and one day you will be able to use them as they were meant to be used, without any restrictions at all. God will keep you in the brightness of His Face and give you your soul's desire; which is unity with Him forever and ever.

This message was first given in 1924 through Winifred Moyes.

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