REJOICE IN PERSECUTION

REJOICE IN PERSECUTION Around the Year with Emmet Fox April 5 Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are ye when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. Rejoice, and be exceeding glad for great is your reward in heaven for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you. Matthew 5:10-12 In view of what we know about the teaching of Jesus, that the will of God for us is harmony, peace, and joy, and that these things are to be attained by cultivating right thoughts, or "righteousness," this is a very startling statement Jesus tells us again and again that it is our Father's good pleasure to give us the Kingdom, and that the way in which we are to receive it is by cultivating serenity, or peace of soul. He says that the peacemakers who do this, praying in "meekness" shall inherit the earth, have their mourning turned into joy, and that, in fact, whatever they shall ask the Father in the manner of this teaching, that will He do. Yet here we are told that it is blessed to be persecuted as the result of our "righteousness" for by this means we shall triumph, that it is cause for rejoicing and gladness to be reviled and accused, and that the prophets and Illumined Ones suffered these things too. All this is indeed very startling, and it is perfectly correct. However, persecution only becomes an occasion for rejoicing when we are deeply aware of our real nature, our true immortality, and know that the suffering of our bodies can be transcended and even transmuted by our state of consciousness. Persecution can be for us a blessed condition when we realize that in such moments we are really advancing. Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life (Revelation 2:10) is a promise that may become a reality right here on this earth.