There is an old, old story about a great spiritual teacher who knocked at the gates of heaven for admission into paradise. After some time, God came to the door and inquired, “Who is there? Who knocks?”
To this query, came the confident response, “It is I.”
“Sorry, very sorry. There is no room in heaven. Go away. You will have to come back some other time.” The good man, surprised at the rebuff, went away puzzled. After several years, spent in meditating and pondering over this strange reception, he returned and knocked again at the gate. He was met with the same question and gave a similar response. Once again he was told that there was no room in heaven; it was completely filled at that time.
In the years that passed, the teacher went deeper and deeper within himself, meditating and pondering. After a long period of time had elapsed, he knocked at the gates of heaven for the third time. Again God asked, “Who is there?”
This time his answer was, “Thou art.”
And the gates opened wide as God said, “Come in. There never was room for Me and thee.”
There is not God AND you or I, there is only God expressed, manifested as individual being. There is only one life – the Father’s. We are outside of heaven with no hope of ever gaining entrance to it as long as we believe that we have a selfhood apart from God, a being separate and independent of God.
“All through the ages duality has separated us from our good, but it is a sense of duality, not duality, because there is no duality. The secret of life is oneness and oneness is not something that we bring about. Oneness is a state of being.”
–Joel Goldsmith
Rev. Jeff Radcliff 