Time to Stand Apart

 The time has arrived when the full meaning of the saying that "He who is not with me is against me" (Matthew 12:30) has become apparent. There is no more fence sitting. You can no longer simply be a good person or even a spiritual or religious person in a generalised sense for if you are you are likely to be caught up and absorbed by the universal inversion of true spiritual values that is well underway. If you don't consciously see this for what it is and actively stand out against it you will become part of it. Remember that this inversion of values is always presented as a good thing and the acceptance of it the mark of a good person so you do have to make an active stand against the good opinion of the world though without lapsing into egotistic defiance or rebellion for the sake of it. What it does is reverse the hierarchical relationship between spirit and matter, putting the spiritual in a distorted form as existing only insofar as it reflects the requirements and priorities of the material. Good becomes this worldly good only.

We are living at a time when the human sense of individuality has reached a peak. This is at once an opportunity, a test and a real danger. It is a danger in the sense that the consequences of a developed free will mean our choices matter. In the past it may have been spiritually acceptable for our choices to be wrong if the culture in which we lived bent them that way. We were not regarded as so personally responsible because our individual sense of self had not been built up so much. Now we are responsible. The influences of the tribe, the culture, the society are no longer acceptable as extenuating circumstances. This also means that even believing the right thing is insufficient if that belief comes from outside. It must be personal, something we have reached through inner awareness.

I have speculated before that the vastly increased population of the world at the present time may be because many souls are returning to make a definitive choice at a time when that choice will be theirs and not just their culture's. Human evolution has reached the point at which our inner mettle can be tested. The test is made both harder and easier in that religion for most people in the West is no longer the default option. If we are going to believe we must actively develop that belief without the coercion of the past. But then things are also made easier because the results of atheism and materialism are more and more apparent to the unprejudiced mind. God is asking us, "Is this what you want? There is an alternative but you have to seek it out. It won't be given to you ready wrapped as before. If you want it you must look for it but if you do look for it, seriously and sincerely, you will find it."