John 1:12 Meaning But as Many as Received Him

To receive love is simply to stop refusing it, and in that small willingness the mind discovers a power it thought it had lost. It does not become a child of God by earning the title; it remembers that it always was one and had only dreamed otherwise. The power given is not new strength added from outside but the return of what the mind is, uncovered the instant it consents to look with love.

Belief here is not agreement with an idea. It is the mind's quiet trust that its true nature is real and its fearful self was the illusion. Whoever is willing to accept this is restored to it at once, for the sonship was never really gone, only denied.

Power here is not handed to the deserving; it is handed to those who receive. The offer waits at the door of every mind, and the mind that takes it in is changed by the taking. Believing on the name works like accepting a new report of who a person is.

A man may be told a thousand times that he amounts to little, and the picture holds until a better one is received and kept. Receiving comes first. The new standing follows. When a person lets himself belong to something larger than his old opinion of himself, the machinery inside begins working toward that station instead of against it. A man grows into the standing he first agreed to hold, and the growing starts the moment the better picture is let in.