the heaven of your mind, clear images of these perfect states. Not only hold such images before them, but demand that they express those images perfectly. And do not forget to conserve your bodily energies by pure, careful thinking and living, in order that you may have the transparent substance in which your true thought images may be planted and, in their course, brought to fruitage.
42. Many who are faithful in holding right mental images do not get results, because they lack a receptacle; they let the lusts of the flesh dissipate all the clear water of life, and their good thoughts and their good words are returned to them void. Guard all the powers of your being if you would resurrect them from the dead. They do not stand alone, but are dependent on one another, and must all be brought into subjection to the Christ of God. Paul said, "Every man that striveth in the games exerciseth self-control in all things."
43. The resurrection of the dead is the sure and certain work of the true Christian. We know that Jesus is the example that we are to follow, and we say with Paul:
If the dead are not raised, neither hath Christ been
raised: and if Christ hath not been raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins. Then they also that are fallen asleep in Christ have perished. . . .
But now hath Christ been raised from the dead, the
first fruits of them that are asleep. For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made Alive. . . . The last enemy that shall be abolished is Death.
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