Lessons in Truth

development original: "ment"; completing the word "development" from the previous page., but each moment throughout its existence, he lives within every created thing as the life, the ever-renewing, recreating, and upbuilding cause of it. He never is and never can be for a moment separated from his creations. Therefore, how can even a sparrow fall to the ground without his knowledge? "And you are of more value than many sparrows."

God is. Man exists (from the Latin ex, meaning "out of," and sistere, meaning "to stand" original: "ex, out of, and sistare, to stand forth." The Latin verb is sistere.). Man stands forth out of God.

Man is a threefold being, made up of Spirit, soul, and body. Spirit is our innermost, real being—the absolute part of us, the "I" of our identity. You and I know this part has never changed, even though our thoughts and circumstances may have changed hundreds of times. This part of us is a "standing forth" of God into visibility. It is the Father within us. At this central part of their being, every person can say, "I and the Father are one," and speak only the absolute truth.

Mortal mind In New Thought theology, this refers to the limited, human intellect that is focused on the physical world and prone to error.—that which the Apostle Paul calls the "carnal mind"—is the consciousness of error.

The great whole of as-yet-unmanifested Good, or God, from whom we are projected or "offspring," and "in whom we live, move, and have our being" continually, is to me the Father—Our Father. "And all of you are brothers and sisters," because all are manifestations of one and the same Spirit. Jesus,

recognizing this, said, "Call no man upon the earth your father, for one is your Father which is in heaven." As soon as any of us recognize our true relationship to all people, we at once move beyond our narrow, personal loves—our "me and mine"—and into the universal love that embraces all the world. We then joyfully exclaim, "Who is my mother? Who are my brothers? Behold, these are my mother and my brothers!"

Childlike, untrained minds often say God is a personal being. The statement that God is Principle Here, "Principle" refers to God as an unchanging, universal law or source, similar to how the principles of mathematics are constant and everywhere. chills them, and in terror they cry out, "They have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid him!"

Broader and more learned minds are always cramped by the thought of God as a person, for "personality" suggests limits to a specific place and time.

God is both Principle and Person. As the creative, underlying cause of all things, he is Principle—impersonal. As he is expressed in each individual, he becomes personal to that person—a personal, loving, all-giving Father-Mother. All that any human soul can ever need or desire is the infinite Father-principle, the great reservoir of unexpressed good. There is no limit to the Source of our being, nor to his willingness to manifest more of himself through us, when we are willing to do his will.