At The Mount of the House of the Lord
FATHER DIVINE speaks as follows:
"But just as a Co-worker and a Co-operator, as a Verifier and as an Endorser of the truth, I rose to say, the Sermon on the Mount is stressed vividly in our consideration, and I sincerely believe that the Sermon on the Mount is the Foundation of all of our Christian religion. Now, it is a Sermon that was given by Jesus, but if you stop and read it and consider, it is written: `Blessed are ye when men shall persecute you and say all manner of evil against you falsely for My name's sake: rejoice and be exceedingly glad...'
"Now we should do that. Can you not see the mystery? And all of these
requests made by Jesus, as the Ten Commandments in the old Bible were given
by Moses, even so the Sermon on the Mount was given by Jesus for all Christendom.
Why is it they cannot live it and be as devout to our religion even as Judaism
was supposed to be devout to theirs? Can you not see the mystery? Yet the old
Bible is in consideration. Jesus is the fulfiller, and when we live the Sermon
on the Mount in its entirety, we are living both the Old and the New Testaments.
Can you not see the mystery? Now, our Christian religion is founded upon the
Sermon on the Mount. If we would just take it and read it from a literary point
of view without comment, and take it as Jesus said it and endeavor to live
it and express it, we will be new creatures automatically. We will change almost
over night. Our disposition will change, for when we would `fly off the handle,'
as the old saying is, we would not `fly off the handle' so quickly. We learn
to love our enemies and to do good for them that despitefully use us; pray
for them that curse us and persecute us, and bless those that curse us, and
all of those things. Can you not
see what it really means?"