Jesus said, Many are standing at the door, but it is the solitary who will enter the bridal chamber. (75)
What is known as “bridal mysticism” is found in most spiritual traditions. The groom is the infinite Spirit and the bride is a finite spirit. Each one of us is to be wedded to God, but we must be faithful to our divine Bridegroom and be joined to none other. Ever. That is why Jesus (Matthew 19:4-5) taught that the prospective spouse must leave father, mother and all others behind and cling to their chosen one alone. “The solitary” Jesus refers to are those in whose hearts God alone can be found. They not only want no other, they refuse all others. Anyone not so dedicated is an adulterer in spirit.
Many are those who think they desire union with God. But only those who turn from everything else but God will find God. That is why Jesus said: “Many, I say unto you, will seek to enter in, and shall not be able” (Luke 13:24). Why? Because “the Lord looketh on the heart” (I Samuel 16:7) and sees that he is not the sole possessor. God neither gives nor receives that which is not all.
“And Jesus sat over against the treasury, and beheld how the people cast money into the treasury: and many that were rich cast in much. And there came a certain poor widow, and she threw in two mites, which make a farthing. And he called unto him his disciples, and saith unto them, Verily I say unto you, That this poor widow hath cast more in, than all they which have cast into the treasury: for all they did cast in of their abundance; but she of her want did cast in all that she had, even all her living” (Mark 12:41-44).
The foregoing is not just a pretty story. I knew a woman who told me virtually the same thing. Her father was dead and her mother made a living as a washerwoman. (This was in the early part of the twentieth century.) One Sunday when they went to church she and her sister knew that the three of them had nothing in the world but two quarters to live on for that week. When the collection was taken up, to their amazement their mother opened her purse. What was she going to do–actually give one of those quarters? No. She took both quarters and put them in the collection plate. The two girls were in shock. “But,” Nellie told me, “the very next day some money came to us–more than fifty cents. And the two of us had learned a lesson we never forgot: God deserves everything we have.”
As Sister Gyanamata, Yogananda’s greatest disciple, said: God First. God Alone.
Read the next article in the Gospel of Thomas for Yogis: Unfailing Treasure