God's Truth, Continually Unfolding

In the teachings of the Savior and his followers, uttered on various occasions, we have many important truths, not fully understood at the time when uttered, and perhaps not fully understood now, but which will be comprehended when lighted up by Providence, and when seen in the renewed and adequate preparation of the human mind. One of the great announcements to which we refer, is the truth of universal brotherhood, involving the cessation of war, and the restoration of universal peace.  This is a truth which may be said to be written in  letters of light on the pages of the Gospel; but the human mind, being thrown out of its true position by sin, has not been able to receive it until very lately.  A century or more since, the doctrines of universal peace were proposed and illustrated in Europe, by Castel de St. Pierre, a learned French ecclesiastic; but were received with incredulity, and very much as if he were preaching a dream. They have been propounded again within a few years, and after the experience of an additional century of fighting and destruction. They now everywhere meet with a respectful hearing. It is the same in other instances. There are other practical truths, — truths originating in the divine mind, and flowing from God to man through the mind of Christ, which have received a new development, and which the providence of God is holding up for a new and general reception in the present age; — the religion of Christ in its simplicity, the reign of the Holy Ghost, the relation of temperance to happiness, the universality of civil freedom, the rights of moral and religious belief, universal education, and in every heart a living and triumphant holiness, modeled on that of the Savior.

God is moving on the troubled waters. It was thus in the beginning. There was a time when the beauty of nature was an idea, undeveloped and unrealized. Light existed in God, " but darkness was on the face of the deep." No sun was then, no star, no swelling and teeming earth. "The earth was without form and void;" but when the time came for the realization of the truth and beauty of the divine idea in material forms: then "the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters." The confusion of chaos stood rebuked; the light shone; the waters subsided to their place; the blooming earth appeared.

At this moment, at this eventful hour in the history of  eternal wisdom, the Spirit of the same creating God is secretly, but powerfully, moving on the troubled and chaotic ocean of humanity. The chaos, which is presented before us on every side, is wider, and deeper, and darker, than  that  of primitive nature, because it is the terrible chaos of moral rebellion. But here, too, the Spirit of God will be conqueror. He, who separated the contending elements of nature, and recombined them into forms of wisdom and loveliness, will not be baffled in his great  attempt to erect and consolidate "the  kingdom of God," out of the confusions of a fallen nature.

— A Treatise on Divine Union (1851) Part 3, Chapter 4.

God's Knowledge is Revealed to us Moment by Moment

The creatures of God, however exalted they may be, are unable, from a want of mental capacity, to receive all the knowledge which God has. They can be the recipients of the divine knowledge only in part; and such is the constitution of created minds, that they receive the knowledge which they have, not simultaneously, but in successive periods of time, and generally in small portions. And thus every moment, always commissioned with its appropriate message, reveals something new; furnishing, as it passes by, a new channel of communication, a new opening between the divine mind and created minds. And in this way God is revealed to us, if we are in a situation to understand and receive him, moment by moment. He refreshes us with the daily and continual bread of knowledge.

Ordinarily this knowledge is particular, and has relation to our own persons, and our own affairs; but it always comes to us with the freshness of a new communication, because it is always modified by the circumstances of the existing moment. The bright or clouded sky of to-day is not the sky of yesterday. The man of to-day is not the same man, nor surrounded by the same influences, nor the subject of the same providences, as the man of yesterday. There are forms or modifications of knowledge, appropriate to the conditions of youth and age, of poverty and riches, of subjection and government, and of other conditions, which are modified by the changes of each passing hour. The knowledge, therefore, which is appropriate and necessary now, could not have been equally appropriate and necessary in any antecedent period. It comes, therefore, with the attribute of novelty; and as it is necessary in order to the fulfillment of duty, it is always acceptable and refreshing to the consecrated and pious soul.

— A Treatise on Divine Union (1851) Part 3, Chapter 4.

The Inward Before the Outward

It  is a most dangerous mistake to suppose that we can compensate, by exterior acts, however important they may be, for a want of interior devotion.  Men may even minister at the altar, with all the outward eloquence of a Massillon, and yet with hearts full of unbelief. A want of a right or perfect state of the outward action may expose us to the condemnation of men; but an imperfection of the inward or spiritual action exposes us to the condemnation of God. If we can please both God and men, it is well; but above all things, let us not fail to please God, who, in opposition to the course which men usually take, regards the inward principle much more than the mere outward development of it.

— Religious Maxims (1846) LXVI.

Faithfulness in the Common Things

If we would walk perfectly before God, we must endeavor to do common things, such as are of every day's occurrence, and of but small account in the eyes of the world, in a perfect manner. Some persons are so mentally constituted, that they could more easily undergo the sufferings of martyrdom, than properly regulate and control their feelings in their families during twenty-four hours. How dreadful is that delusion, which excuses itself in its imperfections, because in the providence of God,  it  is not permitted to do or suffer some great thing. Happy is he, who can do God's will in the solitary place, and who can win the crown without going to the stake.

— Religious Maxims (1846) LXV.

The Savior Wounded in the House of His Friends

Many profess religion; many, we may charitably hope, possess religion; but few, very few, if we may judge from appearances, are aiming with all their powers at perfection in religion. Nevertheless, it is only upon this last class, that the Savior looks with unmingled approbation. In regard to all those, who aim at any thing short of bearing his full image, it may be said with truth, that he is wounded in the house of his friends.

— Religious Maxims (1846) LXIV.

A Christian is a Citizen of the World

A Christian is prospectively a citizen of heaven; but actually, and at the present time, he is a citizen of the world. Remember this, and do not think so much of what is to be as to forget what is.  We  have a great work in the present life, and in the precise situation where God has placed us. Angels glorify God in heaven; men must glorify him on the earth.

— Religious Maxims (1846) LXII.

Can We Ask God's Blessing?

We may lay it down as a principle in the religious life, that every thing is wrong, in regard to which we cannot ask the divine direction and blessing. When we sin, we wish, like our first parents, to hide ourselves from Him whom we have offended. But it is the nature of a pure heart, always to seek God. Its language is, in all the occurrences and duties of life, "My Father, what wilt thou have me to do?"

— Religious Maxims (1846) LXII.