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| Open Theism Discussion Board > Public Forums > General Chat > God as the Ultimate "Treasure" | Forum Quick Jump
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One Love
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Date Joined Jan 2003
Total Posts : 13888
| Posted 9/19/2011 12:23 PM (GMT -6) |   | | I'm thinking that treasure seeking (and finding) is a great analogy for the spiritual life.
The Kingdom of God within us (and everything else) is the "Treasure" that we seek...and eventually, find.
We are most blessed and secure when God Himself is our heart's only Treasure; the only "Pearl of Great Price" worth so much painful effort and self-denial.
We are most self-emperiled when anything other than God takes God's place as our Treasure.
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"Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the Kingdom. Sell your possessions, and give to the needy. Provide yourselves with moneybags that do not grow old, with a treasure in the heavens that does not fail, where no thief approaches and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also."
Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. Post Edited (One Love) : 9/19/2011 12:26:37 PM (GMT-5) | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
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Total Posts : 13888
| Posted 9/20/2011 8:33 AM (GMT -6) | | | | |
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One Love
Registered Member
Date Joined Jan 2003
Total Posts : 13888
| Posted 9/20/2011 2:32 PM (GMT -6) | | Spugeon:
."..the man who possesses "the joy of the Lord," finds it his strength in another respect, that it fortifies him against temptation. What is there that he can be tempted with? He has more already than the world can offer him as a reward for treachery. He is already rich; who shall ensnare him with the wages of unrighteousness? He is already satisfied; who is he that can seduce him with pleasing baits? "Shall such a man as I flee?" The rejoicing Christian is equally proof against persecution. They may well afford to be laughed at who win at such a rate as he does. "You may scoff," saith he, "but I know what true religion is within my soul, and your scoffing will not make me relinquish the pearl of great price." Such a man is, moreover, made strong to bear affliction; for all the sufferings put upon him are but a few drops of bitterness cast into his cup of bliss, to give a deeper tone to the sweetness which absorbs them."
Amen.
You make known to me the path of life; in your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.
Continual Spirit-empowered enjoyment of/rejoicing in God is the human experience of divine "apatheia".
Theoria-unto-Theosis...Mundane Ecstasy (Loder)
"Fullness of joy" in communion with God is always "right here, right now."
The Ultimate Treasure...right under our noses.
Yep.
Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. Post Edited (One Love) : 9/20/2011 2:55:17 PM (GMT-5) | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
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Total Posts : 13888
| Posted 9/21/2011 2:54 PM (GMT -6) | | I want you to notice, dear friends, that this rejoicing is commanded. It is not a matter that is left to your option; it is not set before you as a desirable thing which you can do without, but it is a positive precept of the Holy Spirit to all who are in the Lord: "Rejoice in the Lord alway." We ought to obey this precept because joy in the Lord makes us like God. He is the happy God; ineffable bliss is the atmosphere in which he lives, and he would have his people to be happy.
--Charles Spurgeon, "Joy, A Duty"
Makarios, right, Tom? 
Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. Post Edited (One Love) : 9/21/2011 2:58:50 PM (GMT-5) | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
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Total Posts : 13888
| Posted 9/22/2011 5:24 PM (GMT -6) | | "Our salvation depends upon our knowing and recognizing the Chief Good which is God Himself. I have a capacity in my soul for taking in God entirely. I am as sure as I live that nothing is so near to me as God. God is nearer to me than I am to myself... Thus must the soul, which would know God, be rooted and grounded in Him so steadfastly, as to suffer no perturbation of fear or hope, or joy or sorrow, or love or hate, or anything which may disturb its peace... the soul should be remote from all earthly things alike so as not to be nearer to one than another. It should keep the same attitude of aloofness in love and hate, in possession and renouncement, that is, it should be simultaneously dead, resigned and lifted up."
Meister Eckhart
Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
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Date Joined Jan 2003
Total Posts : 13888
| Posted 9/22/2011 6:53 PM (GMT -6) | | Practical...
In 1953, soon after his appointment as United Nations secretary general, Dag Hammarskjöld was interviewed on radio by Edward R. Murrow. In this talk he declared: "But the explanation of how man should live a life of active social service in full harmony with himself as a member of the community of spirit, I found in the writings of those great medieval mystics [Meister Eckhart and Jan van Ruysbroek] for whom 'self-surrender' had been the way to self-realization, and who in 'singleness of mind' and 'inwardness' had found strength to say yes to every demand which the needs of their neighbours made them face, and to say yes also to every fate life had in store for them when they followed the call of duty as they understood it."
His only book, Vägmärken (Markings), was published in 1963. A collection of his diary reflections, the book starts in 1925, when he was 20 years old, and ends at his death in 1961.[34] This diary was found in his New York house, after his death, along with an undated letter addressed to then Swedish Permanent Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs, Leif Belfrage. In this letter, Dag writes, "These entries provide the only true 'profile' that can be drawn ... If you find them worth publishing, you have my permission to do so". The foreword is written by W.H. Auden, a friend of Dag's. Markings was described by a theologian, the late Henry P. Van Dusen, as "the noblest self-disclosure of spiritual struggle and triumph, perhaps the greatest testament of personal faith written ... in the heat of professional life and amidst the most exacting responsibilities for world peace and order." Hammarskjöld writes, for example, "We are not permitted to choose the frame of our destiny. But what we put into it is ours. He who wills adventure will experience it — according to the measure of his courage. He who wills sacrifice will be sacrificed — according to the measure of his purity of heart."
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“Understand through the stillness,
Act out of the stillness,
Conquer in the stillness”
Dag Hammarskjöld, "Markings"
Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. Post Edited (One Love) : 9/22/2011 6:56:46 PM (GMT-5) | | Back to Top | | |
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