Where Art Thou oh Great Kingdom

The Kingdom of Heaven is here and now on Planet Earth as one person among six and one-half billion now living. As Jesus always proclaimed the Kingdom is near at hand, and not coming soon to a theater near you. The Kingdom lived in the person of Jesus, as it lives in me. If only because we know in our hearts that we belong to it, and it belongs to us. We take our place among Kings and Lords, of which there have been many before us. We possess a small piece of the world in this flesh and bone that we wear like a garment. That is enough of a territory within the realm of manifestation for a fair kingdom, it doesn't really depend upon greater authority than any man may have.

I am a nation of the world unto myself, although I reside within the national borders of these United States of America. I am not an American, I am an Earthling without respect for the world's political boundaries. I am not a patriot and citizen of the USA, although by birth I may make that claim; instead I am a citizen of the whole world and Humanity. Every man i call brother, and every woman i call sister, and every child i call my child. But in truth even the adults are my children because I claim them, I claim responsibility for them. For the 14 billion citizens of Humanity, of those now living and all those who have already lived and passed away, I claim responsibility. And what does this responsibility demand from me? I should do whatever can be done to promote the welfare of all people, because I am one of the people and I have a special interest in the people. But I get to decide for myself what it is that the people deserve from me, and how it will be delivered. And of course I am subject to certain limitations; I certainly do not have the means, independently, to feed the hungry. My authority goes as far as it does, and I have done nothing to gather supporters from the world. I have no need to command the labors of men, they have already organized themselves to pursue their own goals in the world. And it pleases me that roads have been built, and bridges, and cities.

The challenge for me now is to win the world as a personal property, not that I need so much for myself. But with property comes property rights and the right to make demands. Such authority as I require for my work could never be granted by a national government or a king of the Earth. No power on Earth can guarantee my rights, especially If I believe it is the right to govern all the people. I want to take my turn at making all the rules, I have waited for the opportunity very patiently. But clearly I do not have an army of the world's young men and women standing behind my great cause, who would be willing to fight and to kill for me. Evidently I can not muster the force required to beat the people into submission. They will never allow me to exercise my property rights, no amount of argument would ever suffice to convince the people the whole world belongs to one man. But there must be a Landlord you see, its a role required by historical precedents, an no one man has ever been able to fill that role. Its a job or career much like any other job or career, and clearly a position of great authority, just waiting for the man who can fill the requirements. No-one can really say what qualifications will be needed to govern the world, we are not choosing our candidates, no-one is voting on the matter.

You really only need to win one vote to win the job, you only need one supporter. If that person is the Lord of Angels and Demons alike, Father to the stars and planets of Heaven, and a force unto itself. The highest possible authority has never resided here on planet Earth. And as a child growing up in America, I believe we were all taught to believe in this Higher-Authority as we pledged allegiance to the American Flag and said the words, "One Nation under God." If higher-powers had the will to intervene in our human affairs, every patriotic American should bow to it. Even Jesus himself who many have believed to be a Lord and King, has a Lord and King above him and he admits as much. If the spirit of Christ is an eternal principle of God as exemplified by the ideal first-born son, then there must also be an eternal principle for the great sire and progenitor. The Heavenly Father himself, a mortal man and not a God descending from Heaven. Its hard to reconcile the idea of a Heavenly Father with a man who has a beginning and a natural birth. If such a person could appear in our world in modern times, then who was it that formed Adam and Eve? Who is this person who wrestled with Jacob and gave him the name Israel? And who's voice was it that spoke to Moses from the burning bush? We have always believed these persons are God, and that God has appeared in our world as a man in the past. Heavenly Father has been considered a God by Christians, and every bit as eternal as a God should be, ever-present in the long-distant past. To allow for the possibility of a mere mortal man to rise into that position in these latter-days breaks the continuity of our story.

But that is exactly the way things work in the Kingdom of Heaven. For every living species there must be a Sire to sponsor them before the agencies of Heaven. In a small way Moses himself played that role but only for the people of Israel. Moses did not say to himself, "I am an Egyptian, I am everyman and love all men equally." Moses showed preference, and that the true King of Kings among men can not do. The true King and Sire must be the Good Father to all people, he can not even prefer the good and honorable over the wicked. He must say to himself, "Every last man is worth fighting for, and deserves good, and deserves salvation." He must believe that no man deserves punishment, he must see the criminal as a victim. Time alone makes all men wise and redeemable, and everyone deserves more time. To learn and to grow and become mature, that is the one great goal of life and God's plan.

Homosexuality and the Kingdom of Heaven

Technically sex is all about making babies and not about our personal pleasure; however it is this mutual pleasure which often binds us together in partnership. If we can manage to make a lasting commitment to another person, it's always a good thing. Of course we may have feelings of love for another person without sex ever coming into the relationship, and its hardly wrong to have feelings of love for a person of the same sex. But when we do have feelings of physical attraction towards person's of the same sex; I don't think its as simple as making a choice to feel that way. Indeed some people seem to have been made homosexual, by whatever agency of creation, and we really have no explanation for why this is so. Like it or not, homosexuality is a part of Life, and we shouldn't have a problem with that so long we enjoy some personal freedom. No-one should be forced into sex or molested in any other way, if we did not have to fear this, then we should have no fear of homosexuality.

If there are two consenting adults, bound together by emotional commitments they should be allowed to sanctify that union as they see fit. Whether you want to call it a marriage or a civil union, a little ceremony is good and far better than a written contract. And all the trouble with it begins and ends with legal entitlements that should be due to a spouse and family members of someone who is gainfully employed. It should be enough to prove our commitment to another human-being just to live together in one household, it shouldn't require a legal document as proof. But most people fail to make the lasting commitment, and we need a way to settle disputes when partners separate. Unfortunately such matters often require a court of law if our partners can not separate amicably. We really have to wonder how Love fails us so often, or ask if there was truly Love in the first place.

More often than not, we expect a little fealty from our sex partners; we demand exclusivity. Of course this makes perfectly good sense whenever offspring may be involved because you have to resolve the matter of who will do the parenting. If we allowed for a larger household and more partners, the issue of parenting could benefit. But most of us feel that we would have to sacrifice to much of our rights and privileges to an expanded partnership. As much as some people would like to dominate the lives of their children, we share the burden of parenting with the greater community. In a perfect world we would share the financial obligations as well, among every adult citizen of the community. For the most part our children will get to choose their own hero's in life, mom and dad often provide the best examples of what not to be. I think its fair to say that homosexual couples could do the parenting job as well as anyone else, and if they desire to have children should be allowed to adopt.

So is there a place for Homosexuals within the Kingdom of Heaven? If that Kingdom may be extended to Planet Earth there should be. As the Earth is one planet in the vast expanse of Heaven, I've repeatedly tried to make the point that it's already a part of that Kingdom. But many of God's faithful and true believers will tell you that the Kingdom of Heaven is something else, something separate from this Universe even something unmanifest. Our spirits are caught up to this Heavenly Kingdom only when we die and leave this manifestation behind. But in my opinion these 3-dimensions of physical existence of which we are most familiar is not the full story. Manifestation is key to existence, no thing may exist in an unmanifest condition. And every manifest thing exists within God's presence, separation from God's presence is not a possibility. Many scriptural and inspired writings talk about separation as either a fact or a promise, some of Heaven's personalities will be cast out to another realm forever separated from God's presence because they are enemies to God. But in my estimation most people are confused about who God is and what it is exactly that he does for us. Some people feel that there can be more than one God, and perhaps even a man can become Godlike. There may be many Lords within the Kingdom of Heaven, each with his own authority and capacity to accomplish work. Some of these Lords may have followers and some may have no followers, and every Lord pays homage to a higher Lord. Until you come to the Lord of Lords and yet still beyond him lies the One-True-And-Most-High-God. The Kingdom of Heaven may yet be one Kingdom among many, even our creator may have his peers. But until a man grows so much that he can become a Heaven unto himself, we are bound to this Heaven as children of a Higher-Power.

We are creators and progenitors here on planet Earth, but we are not THE CREATOR, we are not THE PROGENITOR of the species. And no matter what happens to us we can never be elevated to these roles. A man can never become A God, a person can not become like God, there can never be more than ONE God. But a man can become something more than his beginnings. And you'll just have to trust that there is a beginning to all good things under Heaven, no human-being is or has ever been eternal. But we are part of eternity now so we have not failed, and I pray thee God that we can become a more durable part of eternity and endure forever. If you can see the great multitude as personalities we can take a broader view on this Kingdom, clearly it is not limited to just human-beings. But every personality is dependent on this flow from God as the one and continuous source of consciousness, consciousness is our best evidence for God's presence within the Universe.