1. The Holy Spirit can use all that you give to Him for your salvation. 2But He cannot use what you withhold, for He cannot take it from you without your willingness. 3For if He did, you would believe He wrested it from you against your will. 4And so you would not learn it is your will to be without it. 5You need not give it to Him wholly willingly, for if you could you had no need of Him. 6But this He needs; that you prefer He take it than that you keep it for yourself alone, and recognize that what brings loss to no one you would not know. 7This much is necessary to add to the idea no one can lose for you to gain. 8And nothing more.
2. Here is the only principle salvation needs. 2Nor is it necessary that your faith in it be strong, unswerving, and without attack from all beliefs opposed to it. 3You have no fixed allegiance. 4But remember salvation is not needed by the saved. 5You are not called upon to do what one divided still against himself would find impossible. 6Have little faith that wisdom could be found in such a state of mind. 7But be you thankful that only little faith is asked of you. 8What but a little faith remains to those who still believe in sin? 9What could they know of Heaven and the justice of the saved?
3. There is a kind of justice in salvation of which the world knows nothing. 2To the world, justice and vengeance are the same, for sinners see justice only as their punishment, perhaps sustained by someone else, but not escaped. 3The laws of sin demand a victim. 4Who it may be makes little difference. 5But death must be the cost and must be paid. 6This is not justice, but insanity. 7Yet how could justice be defined without insanity where love means hate, and death is seen as victory and triumph over eternity and timelessness and life?
4. You who know not of justice still can ask, and learn the answer. 2Justice looks on all in the same way. 3It is not just that one should lack for what another has. 4For that is vengeance in whatever form it takes. 5Justice demands no sacrifice, for any sacrifice is made that sin may be preserved and kept. 6It is a payment offered for the cost of sin, but not the total cost. 7The rest is taken from another, to be laid beside your little payment, to “atone” for all that you would keep, and not give up. 8So is the victim seen as partly you, with someone else by far the greater part. 9And in the total cost, the greater his the less is yours. 10And justice, being blind, is satisfied by being paid, it matters not by whom.
5. Can this be justice? 2God knows not of this. 3But justice does He know, and knows it well. 4For He is wholly fair to everyone. 5Vengeance is alien to God’s Mind because He knows of justice. 6To be just is to be fair, and not be vengeful. 7Fairness and vengeance are impossible, for each one contradicts the other and denies that it is real. 8It is impossible for you to share the Holy Spirit’s justice with a mind that can conceive of specialness at all. 9Yet how could He be just if He condemns a sinner for the crimes he did not do, but thinks he did? 10And where would justice be if He demanded of the ones obsessed with the idea of punishment that they lay it aside, unaided, and perceive it is not true?
6. It is extremely hard for those who still believe sin meaningful to understand the Holy Spirit’s justice. 2They must believe He shares their own confusion, and cannot avoid the vengeance that their own belief in justice must entail. 3And so they fear the Holy Spirit, and perceive the “wrath” of God in Him. 4Nor can they trust Him not to strike them dead with lightning bolts torn from the “fires” of Heaven by God’s Own angry Hand. 5They do believe that Heaven is hell, and are afraid of love. 6And deep suspicion and the chill of fear comes over them when they are told that they have never sinned. 7Their world depends on sin’s stability. 8And they perceive the “threat” of what God knows as justice to be more destructive to themselves and to their world than vengeance, which they understand and love.
7. So do they think the loss of sin a curse. 2And flee the Holy Spirit as if He were a messenger from hell, sent from above, in treachery and guile, to work God’s vengeance on them in the guise of a deliverer and friend. 3What could He be to them except a devil, dressed to deceive within an angel’s cloak? 4And what escape has He for them except a door to hell that seems to look like Heaven’s gate?
8. Yet justice cannot punish those who ask for punishment, but have a Judge Who knows that they are wholly innocent in truth. 2In justice He is bound to set them free, and give them all the honor they deserve and have denied themselves because they are not fair, and cannot understand that they are innocent. 3Love is not understandable to sinners because they think that justice is split off from love, and stands for something else. 4And thus is love perceived as weak, and vengeance strong. 5For love has lost when judgment left its side, and is too weak to save from punishment. 6But vengeance without love has gained in strength by being separate and apart from love. 7And what but vengeance now can help and save, while love stands feebly by with helpless hands, bereft of justice and vitality, and powerless to save?
9. What can Love ask of you who think that all of this is true? 2Could He, in justice and in love, believe in your confusion you have much to give? 3You are not asked to trust Him far. 4No more than what you see He offers you, and what you recognize you could not give yourself. 5In God’s Own justice does He recognize all you deserve, but understands as well that you cannot accept it for yourself. 6It is His special function to hold out to you the gifts the innocent deserve. 7And every one that you accept brings joy to Him as well as you. 8He knows that Heaven is richer made by each one you accept. 9And God rejoices as His Son receives what loving justice knows to be his due. 10For love and justice are not different. 11Because they are the same does mercy stand at God’s right Hand, and gives the Son of God the power to forgive himself of sin.
10. To him who merits everything, how can it be that anything be kept from him? 2For that would be injustice, and unfair indeed to all the holiness that is in him, however much he recognize it not. 3God knows of no injustice. 4He would not allow His Son be judged by those who seek his death, and could not see his worth at all. 5What honest witnesses could they call forth to speak on his behalf? 6And who would come to plead for him, and not against his life? 7No justice would be given him by you. 8Yet God ensured that justice would be done unto the Son He loves, and would protect from all unfairness you might seek to offer, believing vengeance is his proper due.
11. As specialness cares not who pays the cost of sin, so it be paid, the Holy Spirit heeds not who looks on innocence at last, provided it is seen and recognized. 2For just one witness is enough, if he sees truly. 3Simple justice asks no more. 4Of each one does the Holy Spirit ask if he will be that one, so justice may return to love and there be satisfied. 5Each special function He allots is but for this; that each one learn that love and justice are not separate. 6And both are strengthened by their union with each other. 7Without love is justice prejudiced and weak. 8And love without justice is impossible. 9For love is fair, and cannot chasten without cause. 10What cause can be to warrant an attack upon the innocent? 11In justice, then, does love correct mistakes, but not in vengeance. 12For that would be unjust to innocence.
12. You can be perfect witness to the power of love and justice, if you understand it is impossible the Son of God could merit vengeance. 2You need not perceive, in every circumstance, that this is true. 3Nor need you look to your experience within the world, which is but shadows of all that is really happening within yourself. 4The understanding that you need comes not of you, but from a larger Self, so great and holy that He could not doubt His innocence. 5Your special function is a call to Him, that He may smile on you whose sinlessness He shares. 6His understanding will be yours. 7And so the Holy Spirit’s special function has been fulfilled. 8God’s Son has found a witness unto his sinlessness and not his sins. 9How little need you give the Holy Spirit that simple justice may be given you.
13. Without impartiality there is no justice. 2How can specialness be just? 3Judge not because you cannot, not because you are a miserable sinner too. 4How can the special really understand that justice is the same for everyone? 5To take from one to give another must be an injustice to them both, since they are equal in the Holy Spirit’s sight. 6Their Father gave the same inheritance to both. 7Who would have more or less is not aware that he has everything. 8He is no judge of what must be another’s due, because he thinks he is deprived. 9And so must he be envious, and try to take away from whom he judges. 10He is not impartial, and cannot fairly see another’s rights because his own have been obscured to him.
14. You have the right to all the universe; to perfect peace, complete deliverance from all effects of sin, and to the life eternal, joyous and complete in every way, as God appointed for His holy Son. 2This is the only justice Heaven knows, and all the Holy Spirit brings to earth. 3Your special function shows you nothing else but perfect justice can prevail for you. 4And you are safe from vengeance in all forms. 5The world deceives, but it cannot replace God’s justice with a version of its own. 6For only love is just, and can perceive what justice must accord the Son of God. 7Let love decide, and never fear that you, in your unfairness, will deprive yourself of what God’s justice has allotted you.