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"The Endowment"
by Earl R. Curry
Characteristic No. 2: There shall be an endowment of shared spiritual
experiences.
Now, notwithstanding the widening horizons of knowledge,
the intellectual stimulation
and the keys to power that shall arise from your efforts and experience
in the Lord's House of Research,
there are yet higher associations and experiences and enlarging comprehensions,
born of the Spirit,
that will come to those who enter into the great day of endowment.
Always, as the Lord begins a great movement of Himself among the ways and affairs
of men,
He prepares the way before Himself.
He spoke to Enoch, as he journeyed in the land, and rallied to Him
many others who joined with Him to create the city of Zion,
that city taken to Heaven because of its perfection of
beauty.
Centuries before Jesus came into the world, the way was prepared
before Him by the prophets of Israel.
In these last days, as the set time of the Restoration neared, good and
noble and deeply spiritual men were prepared beforehand.
Even now, as the day of endowment nears,
the Lord is opening the minds of many of His servants and
guiding them into enlarging understanding of the deep things of
the Spirit.
He is broadening their areas of comprehension, and
is showing them things to come.
It is after the manner of the Lord thus to move among men,
showing a little here and a little there.
To very few has He ever opened His mind in its entirety.
He thus moves with a profound purpose in view.
Even now a ground-swell is forming.
Even now are some of His ministry beginning to have richer and finer
experiences with the Lord who called them.
Verily, you who come to this day of endowment will be amazed as these His servants,
who are called to that day,
come together
and place that which the Lord has shown them before all--
you will be truly amazed how your all-wise Father in Heaven will thus
have thrown light on difficult problems and situations beforehand and
has made clear the pattern of things to come,
and how wonderfully His servants shall be lifted up as they thus share.
Can you not see that in this moving
the minds of many will be enlarged,
their consecration will be increased,
their faith made much stronger, and
their dedication to the high purposes of the Eternal Father
shall be made deep and urgent
because He has thus lovingly, intelligently, and farsightedly
taken them into His confidence,
that He might prepare a wide brotherhood of prophetic,
noble-minded men to labor with Him?
With whom among you shall He thus move?
He is most anxious to reach out and guide you in the deep things of the Spirit.
If in line with the holiness of the Lord,
if enthralled with the grandeur of His purpose,
if in ever greater withdrawal from the evil ways of your times, and
if in ever deepening love of your most loving Father--
if you will become deeply concerned and
ask His guidance and help,
He will prepare you as chosen instruments in His hands, and
you shall be a part of that sharing.
In what ways will you be prepared for this sharing?
There are particular gifts and ministries of the Spirit that shall bring to you
part of the mind of the Lord.
There is the gift of inspiration in the
acquiring and
perception and
imparting of knowledge.
There is the gift of heaven-blessed wisdom,
the evaluation of knowledge;
how, and where to use knowledge, and
an exalted common sense as a possessor of knowledge.
There are the gifts of vision and dreams,
on instruction which comes from the Lord.
There are the gifts of inspired study and inspired preaching
in which illumination comes from outside yourself.
There are the gifts of prophetic insight and foresight.
There is the ministry of angels.
There are many gifts and ways, even beyond these,
by which a gracious, and anxious, and pleading Heavenly Father can
manifest Himself to you.
Try Him and
see if He will not, bit by bit, open the windows of Heaven unto you!
Ask for His special enlightenment, and
see if He will not pour you out more than you can contain!
Hear once again the words of the Son of God--"Seek and you shall find,
ask and you shall receive,
knock and it shall be opened unto you."
How shall you seek, ask, and knock?
God can only open up unto you that which you prepare yourselves to receive.
How can He open up immense vistas of heavenly enlightenment
if you concern yourselves only with the low or ordinary
or that which only originates in the minds of men?
How can He open to you the deep insights that are born of the Spirit
if you climb not, as it were, the mountains?
How can He disclose broad and sweeping and highly important
generalizations and truths which are His, because His glory is
intelligence,
if you have not started step by step to consider such concepts?
What your marvelous heavenly Father can show you must inevitably hinge upon
your interests,
your efforts,
your concerns,
your ideals,
your outreach toward envisionment,
your outreach of love toward Him and mankind,
your growing faith and experience.
Therefore,
let the problems of life wherein God may help--
let the needs of the church and of Zion
be upon your minds;
increasingly seek to understand all that concerns God's great coming Kingdom;
more and more plead, and
try to perceive and understand the deep things
that are your Great Father's interests,
such as have been called the mysteries of the Kingdom--
do these things and
the promises of the scriptures will be wonderfully fulfilled to you and
in you.
Your marvelous Father, whom one of old called the "Father of Light,"
was not speaking idly when He caused His servant and prophet to write
that the Aaronic priesthood holds the keys to the ministering of angels, and
that the Melchisedec priesthood "have the privilege of receiving the mysteries
of the kingdom of heaven:
to have the heavens opened unto them;
to commune with the general assembly and church of the First
born; and
to enjoy the communion and presence of God the Father,
and Jesus the Mediator of the New Covenant."
How can the Lord say more than this?
He invites you to share the immense treasures of His intelligence, His wisdom,
His truth, His enlightenment.
Some have already enjoyed these things in part.
Others have very much need to receive them.
You shall yet be lifted up wondrously in these things, and
as you do you may be
permitted and
chosen to have part in that endowment that shall come
from shared, profound spiritual experiences.
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