| Answer
from Jesus:
As I explain throughout this
website, the real problem on planet Earth is that people have descended
into a lower state of consciousness in which everything seems relative.
The effect of this relativity is that people tend to be polarized towards
one of two extremes. When a spiritual teacher, such as myself, makes
a statement, it is inevitable that some people will take that statement
to the extremes. So when I said that it is easier for a camel to go
through the eye of the needle than for a rich man to enter Heaven, it
was inevitable that some people would interpret it to mean that in order
to enter Heaven one should be poor.
This misinterpretation has haunted Christianity for many centuries and
caused unnecessary suffering for many people. It has also been misused
to justify keeping a majority of the population in poverty.
The reality behind my statement was that it is not the riches themselves
that keep you from entering Heaven. It is your attachment to riches
that keeps you from entering Heaven. Everything in this world is subject
to the free will of the individual. If you are to be saved, if you are
to enter Heaven, you must do so of your own choosing. In order to enter
Heaven, you must leave the things of this world behind, and you must
do so voluntarily. If you have an emotional attachment to anything in
this world, your soul is not ready to permanently ascend to Heaven.
Your soul will have to come back to this planet to experience a certain
aspect of life until it has fulfilled its desire for that aspect and
is now ready to leave it behind.
That being said, it should be obvious that people have a tendency to
develop attachments to their material possessions. The more possessions
people have, the stronger the attachments tend to be, and this binds
people more firmly to the things of this world. So if you can have riches
without becoming attached to them, you can still make tremendous spiritual
progress. If you cannot have riches without the attachment, then it
is better to be poor. After all, what does it profit a person to gain
the whole world yet lose the soul.
I said that I have come so that all might have life and that they may
have it more abundantly. It is truly not my desire to see people live
in poverty. My true desire is to see every human being experience the
abundant life. When I say the abundant life, I first of all mean spiritual
abundance.
However, I would like to see all human beings on Earth have a material
abundance which sets them free to focus most of their attention and
energy on pursuing spiritual growth. In other words, it is not to my
liking that so many people on Earth live a life in poverty, which makes
it necessary for them to focus most of their energy and attention on
mere physical survival or making a living.
I would like to see a redistribution of wealth on this planet so that
instead of having a few people, or a few nations, where people live
in unnecessary material affluence, we could see every human being have
the material necessities of life, such as abundant food, clothing and
shelter. Every human being deserves to have enough material possessions
so that the person has the option of focusing most of his or her attention
on spiritual growth.
I can tell you that it is not to my liking that there are so many people
in today's world who have more material abundance than they could possibly
need. It is especially not to my liking that so many of the people who
have material abundance spend their lives on an unnecessary and never-ending
pursuit of satisfying the desires of the senses and the ego. So many
people are letting their lives be consumed by material, bodily or carnal
desires. Such people are truly acting with the consciousness of animals,
who are consumed by the desires of the flesh. Some of them are very
rich animals, but all the riches in the world cannot raise your level
of consciousness.
It is your level of consciousness that determines where your soul goes
after the death of the physical shell. You know the saying that "You
can't take it with you" and it applies to your material possessions.
Well, you can take your state of consciousness with you, and
it will follow you until you decide to change it!
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© 2003 by Kim Michaels |
