The Secret Door to Success: Chapter 3 - And Five of Them Were Wise
by Florence Scovel Shinn
“And five of them were wise, and five were foolish. They that were foolish took their lamps, and took no oil with them.” –Matt. 25:2-3
My subject is the parable of the Wise and Foolish Virgins. “And five of them were wise, and five were foolish. They that were foolish took their lamps, and took no oil with them. But the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps.” The parable teaches that true prayer means preparation.
Jesus Christ said, “And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive” (Math. 21:22). “Therefore I say unto you, what things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them” (Mark 11:24). In this parable he shows that only those who have prepared for their good (thereby showing active faith) will bring the manifestation to pass.
We might paraphrase the scriptures and say: When ye pray believe ye have it. When ye pray ACT as if you have already received.
Armchair faith or rocking chair faith, will never move mountains. In the armchair, in the silence, or meditation, you are filled with the wonder of this Truth, and feel that your faith will never waver. You know that The Lord is your Shepherd, you shall never want.
You feel that your God of Plenty will wipe out all burdens of debt or limitations. Then you leave your armchair and step out into the arena of Life. It is only what you do in the arena that counts.
I will you give you an illustration showing how the law works; for faith without action is dead.
A man, one of my students, had a great desire to go abroad. He took the statement: I give thanks for my divinely designed trip, divinely financed, under grace, in a perfect way. He had very little money, but knowing the law of preparation, he bought a trunk. It was a very gay and happy trunk with a big red band around its waist. Whenever he looked at it it gave him a realization of a trip.
One day he seemed to feel his room moving. He felt the motion of a ship. He went to the window to breathe the fresh air, and it smelt like the aroma of the docks. With his inner ear he heard the shriek of a sea-gull and the creaking of the gangplank. The trunk had commenced to work. It had put him in the vibration of his trip. Soon after that, a large sum of money came to him and he took the trip. He said afterwards that it was perfect in every detail.
In the arena of Life we must keep ourselves tuned-up to concert pitch.
Are we acting from motives of fear or faith? Watch your motives with all diligence, for out of them are the issues of life.
If your problem is a financial one (and it usually is) you must know how to wind yourself up financially, and keep wound up by always acting your faith. The material attitude towards money is to trust in your salary, your income and investments, which can shrink over night.
The spiritual attitude toward money is to trust in God for your supply. To keep your possessions, always realize that they are God in manifestation. “What Allah has given cannot be diminished,” then if one door shuts another door, immediately opens.
Never voice lack or limitation for “by your words your are condemned.” You combine with what you notice, and if you are always noticing failure and hard times, you will combine with failure and hard times.
You must form the habit of living in the fourth dimension, “The World of the Wondrous.” It is the world where you do not judge by appearances.
You have trained your inner eye to see through failure into success, to see through sickness into health to see through limitation into plenty. I will give you the land which you though seeth.”
The man who achieves success has the fixed idea of success. If it is founded on a rock of truth and rightness it will stand. If not, it is built upon sand and washed into the sea, returning to its native nothingness.
Only divine ideas can endure. Evil destroys itself, for it is a cross current against universal order, and the way of the transgressor is hard.
“They that were foolish took their lamps, and took no oil with them. But the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps.”
The lamp symbolizes man’s consciousness. The oil is what brings Light or understanding.
“While the bridegroom tarried, they all slumbered and slept. And at midnight there was a cry made. Behold, the bridegroom cometh; go ye out to meet him. Then all those virgins arose, and trimmed their lamps. And the foolish said unto the wise, Give us your oil; for our lamps are gone out.”
The foolish virgins were without wisdom or understanding, which is oil for the consciousness, and when they were confronted with a serious situation, they had no way of handling it.
And when they said to the wise “give us of your oil,” the wise answered saying, “Not so; lest there be not enough for us and you: but go ye rather to them that sell, and buy for yourselves.”
That means that the foolish virgins could not receive more than was in their consciousness, or what they were vibrating to.
The man received the trip because it was in his consciousness, as a reality. He believed that he had already received. As he prepared for the trip he was taking oil for his lamps. With realization comes manifestation.
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