Walter C Lanyon Compilation 2

 

27 Various Chapters From Walter C. Lanyon Books

CONDITIONED

Conquest of Fear

THE COSMIC PUNCH

COURAGEDEEP, DEEP IN THE HEART SOMETHING STIRRED

Devitalizing Evil

THE DIMENSION OF INFINITY

THE DIVINE LUNATIC

DIVINE OBSTACLES ALIAS GUARDIAN ANGELS

THE DREAM

THE ELIXIR of LIFE

ENTER

THE EVIDENCE

Except..

FATHER DIVINE

FIRST PERSON, PRESENT TENSE

FLYING

FOR GOD SO LOVED THE WORLD

THE FOUNTAIN

FREEDOM

FROM WALKING UP and DOWN and TO and FRO

GENIUS

The Gesture

GLEANINGS

GLORIFY THOU ME

THE GLORY of GOD

God in Action

 

CONDITIONED

Transformation takes place when the Mental is released into the Spiritual. You become conditioned to reality. That which emanates from the mind of God is designated as LIGHT, GRACE, GLORY.

What comes out of the brain machine is constructed of all the limitations of judging from appearances, ancestor teachings, and superstitions.

The only possible way to escape the dire effects of thought is to pick up the force in apparent evil, merging it in the one source God, thereby depriving the manifestation of its power, hence it falls into the dust for it has nothing to support it. The thought machine stops functioning and the manifestation of evil disappears.

“Return ye even unto ME with all your hearts and ye shall find rest for your souls” – when you return to the one, you leave false mis-action of thought. “Once I was blind NOW I can see” for the moment the distorted sense of LIGHT, which is causing the blindness through taking thought is released, and the whole picture becomes NOW – the only so-called time there is. Human thought stretches in both directions from NOW – but produces nothing but so-called Maya – illusion.

When thought is resolved into LIGHT, the so-called miracle takes place; – which is only a miracle to the human limited thought, – but a natural functioning of GOD LAW.

Intuition does not stem from thought, but from God. What man makes of it or does with it in his Adam belief is different with every individual.

If the Mind is “Stayed” on HIM then the whole body is filled with LIGHT, and in some subtle manner the operation of the body becomes harmonious and perfect.

From mental action to the Spiritual BEING, from the movement of thought back to the motionless BEING is what takes place when Jesus “Goes unto the Father” – when the thought force is cast again into the Sea of Mind and has lost all its distortions, beliefs, and limitations.

Thought like the waves of the sea beats itself out on the shores – but the deeps are Still – “Be still and know that I AM GOD” – enter into the One. Pick up the loose ends of thought and return them unto the LIGHT and see the manifestation change from evil to harmony.

“Ye shall KNOW the truth,” and that is something else again from “knowing the truth.” You are commanded to KNOW the truth, but the human thought-taking mind wants to do something in an already created world and instead of recognizing the finished Kingdom – regardless of what he sees with the human eyes – he begins “knowing” the truth which carries with it the hope that it will happen instead of following the command, “Ye shall. KNOW the truth”: that “I am the Truth.” You cannot know a thing that does not already exist and the Truth IS and is to be KNOWN – recognized, instead of being put through the human thought of “knowing” or attempting to create it.

The mental action of knowing the truth is filled with effort and the overcoming of obstacles. Results are uncertain and unpredictable for it has an avalanche of beliefs to combat. To KNOW the truth is to be able to make the Gesture – “Stretch forth your hand.” To KNOW the truth is to experience the instant manifestation or revelation of that which IS. Healing is in reality, – revelation.

When the mortal body shall put on immortality, the fusing as it were takes place and man is just where: he started – “The Spiritual being created in the image and likeness of God” – and he will “Call no man his father.”

“We speak wisdom among them that are perfect; yet not the wisdom of this world, nor of the princes of this world, that come to naught.” The permanent identity – the ego remains forever intact as it was created in the beginning. “I go to prepare a place for you … that where I AM there ye may be also.” There is no ambiguity about this permanent identity – “where I am” – at the same level and height of power and fullness – “there ye may be also.” It very clearly states that “Where I AM” – not in any sense inferring a time element – about where I will be or where I was at some past date – but where I AM. That is the secret WORD – the thing hidden from the wise and prudent, with its double meaning – its quality of BEING, and its location WHERE I am, The moment we enter into this I AM – the little I AM functioning as Jesus or John Smith suddenly is enveloped by the One – the thought limitations of Jesus are swallowed in the LIGHT of the I AM. That which speaks of itself and says “I can of mine own self do nothing” suddenly is doing all things and not by the thought that said “It is four months” – but by the NOW or revelation, the place of the I AM, the action of the I AM, which is always in the dimension of LIGHT. The dateless quality of the I AM throws much light on the question of Immortality. “Before Abraham was I AM” and if you blend into the I AM, you begin to discover the LIFE quality suddenly absorbing the limited idea of health and supposed power shut up in a body or a brain. I AM that I AM. I AM he that should come to this apparent situation. When I know this, the limitations of the problem break up to make way for the I AM. I AM he that should come. So when the mental is released into the Spiritual, transformation takes place. You become conditioned to reality.

Conquest of Fear

Fear can manifest only because of a belief in separation. As long as you are something apart from God you will experience, in one form or another, fear. It is subtle and hidden like a poisonous serpent coiled in the grass, liable to strike at any time–at the most unguarded moment, when least expected.

Its only power is given to it by thought, and it can be swollen by thought from a serpent into a dragon. All thoughts of evil are like toy balloons in that they are enlarged until finally the capacity is overtaxed and they burst. Sooner or later a fear will explode itself, however much or little damage it has done.

The panacea for all fear is your union with God. This is not a mystical thing as believed in former times. We are now in the New Day where the things of Spirit are realities, and the things of matter immaterial and transient.

The moment you are separated from ME and wander into the thought world (the vacuum of separation), you are subject to the laws of fear. Fear of life, of disease, of debt, of people. And all these fears are backed up by plenty of evidence and tangible proof. The one who is filled with fear sees the “ten thousand fall at your right hand,” and is so convinced of the reality and power of evil that he fails to notice the one who passes through unscathed. Like a bird charmed by a serpent he is so magnetized by the evil that he cannot escape, yet if he were to break the spell (thought) for a moment, he would find that he had within himself a way of escape—he could fly, he had wings. But the little bird (or you) sits and looks at the terrible specter, thus giving it power—in fact all the power it has. It (and you) become so terrified at what you see that, unable to use your only means of escape, you are destroyed. The moment the thought about a fear is broken, the means of escape is apparent. Taking flight sounds like a simple little means of escape from something so terrible, but it stands. Jesus knew how to do this very thing. He immediately “went unto the Father” and became ONE with Him, and then the belief in a separate power disintegrated, and the manifestation of evil vanished.

The enemy comes at you in one way—and is delighted to get away from you in ten ways if it can. It has been so sure of itself because of your acceptance of it, but when the brightness of this union of you with God takes place, the blinding disintegrating light causes evil to flee.

“Stand and see the salvation of the Lord” has a definite, positive value to you NOW. For you are beginning to sense-see the power of being one instead of two. You are beginning to appropriate the instantaneous relief felt from this ONENESS.

This sudden appropriation of ONENESS is accompanied by the consciousness of how to eliminate the object of, or the belief in, fear. There are different “cities” of refuge into which you may run for every differing degree of fear; yet all are the same God. This “running” into God is not as symbolical as it appears. It is an actual fusing of you with the Father within you, and from that moment you are a majority, and you will know the NOTHINGNESS of the fear belief.

It is wonderful, yes, awesome what can take place the moment this union is made. The former things and their powers are as nothing; all are dissipated and destroyed. Whatever manifestation persists in standing in the way of your ongoing must and will be destroyed. It makes no difference how much the human mind is inconvenienced, Oneness will permit nothing that “maketh a lie” to remain.

So “put up your sword”; the currents of Life, the ONE Life, are flowing through you and finding expression through the newly extended senses; and that is sufficient to illuminate any darkened condition.

The Philistines (state of consciousness) built up a great ogre—even as you and I have done—and finally gave him so much power that the entire city was to be destroyed—but there was a way of escape. David and his five pebbles brought the ogre down. You, with your five senses extended into their spiritual capacity, are more than a perfect match for any giant of fear that can confront you. At the “glory of His coming” all the earth trembled.

The glory of the Lord is being revealed.

The thing that you fear is sure to come upon you, one way or another. It may never have an embodiment in the flesh, may be a rankling, devastating, unseen fear which never comes to actual manifestation, but it is just as powerful and has “come upon you” just as definitely as if it had a body and menaced your ongoing. The thing that you fear you hate, and the thing that you hate you fear, and so the cleansing of the mind from hate takes away much of the value of fear.

As you intensify your fear by terrified thought and continued contemplation it grows larger and more all-conquering, until you “remember your Father” and run unto HIM quickly—and then you see the sudden deflation of the balloon of appearance. It is as if the great swollen thing were run through with a rapier. It has not time to escape; it is destroyed.

No more are you trying to match God’s power against the power of human thought. You come with the Power, and every other pseudo-power is overthrown–devitalized and made nothing. If it will not let go easily, it is taken out of the way, together with its manifestation. It makes no difference into what confusion the false belief is thrown, or to what chaotic state of mind it is reduced–the thing that it has tried to bring into manifestation now becomes its own undoing, and your enemy is left to handle and come out of his own beliefs. The blessing of the Lord takes from him once and for all time any power over you, and is the cleansing agency that enters into the cesspool of his mind and starts a cleaning that is not perhaps as happy as it might be. You see again that you are not matching God against the tough and violent power of man. It is as nothing. He blows His breath upon the appearance and it is consumed as a feather in a blast furnace. It is nothing.

Fear is engendered in the human situation by the recognition of a power opposed to God, which is able to bring down on you things which you cannot avoid, perhaps that nothing can avoid. When you view the power of God it is ruthless and terrible and awful to contemplate, in one sense of the word. So the “fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom,” for it is the beginning of the end of human fear. And it is instantly productive of the fruits of peace and quiet.

The nervous, excited mind which is beside itself, like a storm-tossed ship at sea, suddenly experiences a “great calm” as the Master speaks to it—“Peace, be still.” This is Power; and the illustration of the fear at sea (the man in his own consciousness), being tossed about like a frail craft in a storm, is perfect. The illustration is given to show you how instantly all the human laws are reversed or made naught. With the Power to speak, “Peace, be still, “comes the instant manifestation. Do you recall how Jesus did this and how He said, ” The works that I do, ye shall do also and even greater?” Do you dare to “come to Me” on the waters of disbelief? Can you accept this glorious gift of God?

“Fear thou not, for I am with thee, be not dismayed for I am thy God, I will strengthen thee, I will help thee, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness.”

Is it any wonder that the “Sons of God shout” for joy? Is it any wonder that within you goes up such a paean of praise and thanksgiving that you suddenly precipitate a rain of blessings, so many that you cannot “receive” them? Is it any wonder that you are glorifying and magnifying the “Lord in the midst of thee?” No. You can no longer keep from this joy of the Presence, the moment you turn unto ME.

Turn unto ME!

Call upon ME!

Come unto ME!

Every one of these is an invitation to escape instantly the dire evil of human fear. You can and will learn to run into your city of refuge, and the fury of the human thought will spend itself like a flock of evil night birds that dash themselves against the Light that is shining in darkness. Suddenly you are that Light; and the evil manifestation, which had been urged forward by the impetus of its hate and your human-thought support, destroys itself and falls into the ocean of oblivion.

This is the truth—it could happen literally if it were necessary. Or the thing could cast itself into the swine form and rush on to its own destruction. You see we are entering into the NEW DAY—the day of revelation and manifestation, the day when we can say naturally “I believe,” because, having experienced the instantaneous transmutation of things when we “run unto Me,” we become the “majority” which this Oneness gives.

“It is I, be not afraid,” Do you hear? You have nothing to lose and everything to gain, for the most you could lose would be some negligible matter formations; and what they represent can be brought out again and again and more perfectly, if the consciousness of them remains with you.

“It is I, be not afraid.” You begin to see this “I” standing in the midst of the evil situation, and this very recognition disintegrates the thought-form or mask which has been hiding it from your view.

We arrive finally at the point, which is so full of the acceptance of God that it can and does say, “Even if You slay me, yet I will say You are God”—and the last stand is taken. Even if You slay me—yet will I acknowledge this One and Only Power. It is wonderful to know that we are beginning to sense the Power of it (the instantaneous ability to accept and make manifest the words of Jesus). At first this may seem a little confused, and you will go back to the things you have given up. But you will find nothing there. You have “come out from among them.” You are free and shall walk fearlessly into the New Day, pushing out the “borders of your tent” farther and farther— daring to take more and more of the Consciousness, and accepting it as natural and real and true.

“Praise the Lord, O my soul and forget not all His benefits.” All the benefits of this Lord, this Father, this Oneness—they are as the sands of the sea—to try to count them is hopeless, impossible.

God is even in the midst of hell, for “if you make your bed in hell there am I.” If I am not recognized as there, you will burn to death—but if you recognize ME, I will manifest to you Heaven. Sounds foolish?—but there it is and it can be and has been proven. So this recognition of the Presence here, there and everywhere, causes one to see the sudden change that comes when he is able to “look again, and see the fields white with harvest.”

God “in the midst of” the dead Lazarus was what enabled Jesus to bring him forth—the Father, the Permanent Identity of Lazarus was able to pick up his body from death and putrefaction and bring it forth perfect, for he had life everlasting and spirit was present in every cell and fiber of his consciousness. This had to be recognized before it could take place. The sudden union of Lazarus with God—Life Eternal—was made, and the army of beliefs, however time-honored, put to flight.

Do you begin to understand what it means to see God in evil, in hell, in the Devil, in sickness and in fear? It gives you the power of Oneness—for if there is any place God is not, then your God is not Omnipresent—there is a vacuum and another power must fill it. These vacuums are like pockets of evil, which must be cleansed by the daring recognition that God is in the Devil. “The wrath of man shall bless thee”—do you hear? Your very enemy is to bless you. Why? Because you have called out the God in that bewildered maze of human beliefs, and He has come forth.

You do not need to fight—put up your sword! Set yourself and see the salvation of the Lord. Can you do it? You can, when the Love of God has entered into your heart and your recognition of Him as here—there—everywhere has been made.

Separated from God you are naked and afraid, and you try to hide from Me but can find no place where I am not. If you go to the uttermost part of the earth, there My right hand shall lead you. If you take the wings of the morning, if you do anything the human mind suggests, you cannot escape Me. And this Recognition of Me as HERE and now present is enough to untie the knottiest human law that was ever conceived. All this by “a way ye know not of,” and can never find out, for, in every instance, it comes by way of a different manifestation. You will cease to speculate or wonder how it can take place—that is no concern of yours. Suffice it to say it will take place in one of those natural ways which are so mystifying to the human thought, that it flees in abject terror from the “brightness of His coming.”

When you are One with Him, you are a majority and you are One with the Brightness of His coming. “Who did hinder you that you should not obey the truth?” At long last you will answer, “I hindered myself,” because I believed I was something separate from God, that I had a life which was disconnected, but which could be momentarily joined with Him through affirmations or prayers.

It is like magic—the quick and sudden change of everything—when the Lord is recognized as being in the terrifying situation that confronts you. If this be an incurable disease, He is there, awaiting recognition. True, He may apparently be covered over with an avalanche of human beliefs. But all this covering is nothing but so much mist to the brightness of His coming. And at this “coming” the mist is absorbed like water poured on a burning desert.

“I am with you” all ways as well as always—you have this instant panacea with you. It is there, awaiting recognition. Nothing is too small, nothing too great to put through the fire of His brightness. Nothing can stand in the way of His coming, and His coming takes place whenever you can recognize this Presence as everywhere, instead of in an imaginary heaven.

Finally you will understand the Love divine that is a part of you—the Love of this God who is everything to you and who is instantly available and ready to neutralize all your ills. The deep love and sacred acceptance of this wonderful Power finally becomes an actuality. You will not love Him emotionally, but with a deep spiritual fervor that lifts you above mortal FEAR. This is the perfect “Love that casteth out fear,” and is recognized NOW as impersonal and automatic. It is this love that you can bring to another in the throes of some terrible panic or fear. This love covers him like the soft feathers of protecting wings. Within the folds of this Love there is NO fear. And there is no hate or misunderstanding. For the brightness of His coming into being has destroyed all untoward conditions, together with their manifestations.

“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.” “Perfect Love casteth out Fear.” What have you to FEAR after you know ME? I am with you NOW. I am with you always—and the laws of sin, sickness and death, fear and evil are no longer potent. They have collapsed and are no more. “Fear ye not for I AM with you.”

THE COSMIC PUNCH

THE COSMIC PUNCH which landed straight in the middle of the solar plexus of human beliefs and findings was the Immaculate Conception, – the ONE thing which turned upside-down and inside-out all the laws of Adam and his kin. It set aside any and all reasoning of cause and effect. It is the only reason why so-called prayer is answered, or things miraculous take place, -because all miracles are immaculately conceived.

Strange that many religionists deny the possibilities of the Immaculate Conception in one breath, and in the next say “All things are possible with God”, – and still stranger that after denying this archetypal event, they pray or beseech an unknown power to do something which they have found utterly impossible of attainment through human thought and effort.

Without the radical reliance and acceptance of the Immaculate Conception, there is no basis for prayer.

“Behold! a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call His name Immanuel, being interpreted GOD WITH US.”

COURAGE

He that hath the true fear of God in his heart hath no room therein for any other fear. -CROMWELL.

As every positive word has a negative counterpart and interpretation, so the word “fear,” which is the ghastly hydra­-headed monster that besets the footsteps of man from cradle to grave. It has a thou­sand different titles and names—is personal and impersonal. One person might quake with it, another thrill with joy. It is easy for a trained pilot to soar about the heavens like a glorious bird, but the same movements may cause the untutored to be thrown into paroxysms of terror and dismay.

So likewise the expression “Fear of God” brings to the minds of many the fear of a most terrible tribal God who takes keen pleasure in bouncing upon them at unexpected moments and bringing the most fiendish devices to pass, while to another it means a reverence and security with all attending benefits.

A savage, after seeing some of the terrible things that can be done with electricity, might fear it, and even obey its injunctions as in­terpreted by a savage medicine-man. He might prefer to stay by his rushlight rather than have anything to do with this fearful thing. But an enlightened man will not de­prive himself of the glorious benefits and help derived from the proper understanding and use of the power.

There are many people who profess to be civilized—-and smile with derision at the so ­called savage—-who worship in ignorance a God as replete with whims, moods, and fearful power as any heathen God dared to be. While professing to worship a Father­ God who is mindful of his own, they are filled with superstitious beliefs concerning him.

I heard a man—-with great emotion in his voice, talking to this God regarding the need of money—finally conclude his high-flown statements of an impersonal God with, “Now, Father-God, you know if it is best for me to have this money it will be forthcoming.” He was the spirit of humility and contriteness, and was as near a pagan praying to a glorified figure of clay as he could possibly be. Imagine praying for the invisible current of electricity to let you have light if it thought it was well for you to have light. If you are in total darkness and have to read, it is an obvious fact that you need light. Yet thousands are thinking to wheedle some special favor from this God while afraid, and filled with super­stitious fears regarding Him, so that their humility is nothing but a robe of hypocrisy.

“The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom.”

The wisdom spoken of is the understand­ing of God, and the fear that is mentioned is the reverence that one naturally has for fundamental laws. A musician, the more he awakens to the glorious realm of harmony, the more he reverences (fears) the laws of harmony; he does not see in them anything that will destroy him, or from which he can curry personal favors. No matter how con­trite he has been, no matter how many times he has told the principle that he is a miser­able artist, full of terrible discords, and un­worthy of the power to express harmony. As an artist he knows that, the moment he falls away from the laws of harmony, chaos is produced in his playing, and he will even­tually completely destroy himself as a musician if he continues to disregard these laws for long.

“The wrath of God,” or electricity, or dis­cord, then, must be in the keeping of man, no matter what may be said to the contrary.

“The wrath of God” is man’s own wrath, or his ignorance or “fear” of God in the negative sense of the word. Many people have interpreted the fear of God as meaning a power that constantly requires sacrifice of everything but the most ordinary things of life. Others have a tribal God who is a be­stower of personal favors. Still others imagine they are one of the few chosen to express this power-that they are especially consecrated, and that all others must look up to them. Jesus, the great Way-Shower, see­ing this tendency in man, made it clear that the power he was employing was impersonal, and as available to the man in the street as it was to him. “Call not me good.” Well might he have said, “Do not worship me.”

“I AM wonderfully and fearfully made.” Do you begin to understand the FEAR of God, and how it operates successfully over the “fearfully” made body? Do you begin to see what is hidden in the word “fear”? Do you understand how the currents of electricity run freely over a perfectly equipped house? Wherever there is wiring and equipment there it appears in whatever form it is needed, and that form is to neutralize a belief in a lack of some kind. So also the “fear” of God operates over the body, which is “wonderfully and fearfully” made. Many an electric­ally equipped establishment has a system of wiring and switchboards wonderfully and fearfully made. The most ordinary man in the street would not find it anything unusual if told that the same power could freeze and burn at the same time, in the same room; he would not find it strange that this power could connect him instantly with the other end of the earth. No, he has recognized this fact, and accepted it.

That the power we call God operates in the same manner is un-understandable to many people. They want to know what “method” or what power you use to neutralize disease as differentiated from poverty; what affirma­tions you say to bring about happiness as differentiated from those used to produce prosperity-as if there were a different set of currents in an electrical wave to produce different manifestations. God is impersonal, omnipotent, and omniscient, as well as omni­present. He is everything at the same time. The moment you recognize the Presence of God in any place, the situation or condition of human ignorance becomes nil.

When you begin to recognize the impersonal nature of God, great areas of fear leave you. You realize then that it is not a matter of the power working or not; it is a question: Are you willing to let it into manifestation? “When you are ready, I will do the work.” When you are ready to stop this ridiculous praying to a man-god and come before The Presence with the glorious readiness to let The Power into expression, then will you see and know ” The words I [the I AM] speak are not of myself, but him that sent me.” The “words” are the manifestations that you give forth as the Son o/ the Living God.

Do you begin to see why it is, “if you make your bed in [the] hell [of belief] I AM there”? To recognize this is to see the darkness of hell dissipated in the light of Spirit. To the human sense, flames may have light and a burning heat, but this is nothing as compared with the light of Spirit. Hell is always per­sonal, and limited to the belief of a person; heaven is universal and everywhere present, and is available to everyone.

That this power has always been, goes without saying, just as we know the principle of the automobile always existed. Jesus might have ridden into Jerusalem in an auto­mobile as on an ass, as far as the existence of the principle is concerned. No one recognized the principle; hence it did not seem to exist. In the same way you, in your human dark­ness, do not recognize the presence of heaven here and now, and so it does not exist to you.

Because of the limitations of human lan­guage, terms of symbology and parables are used to bring out the hidden meaning of the visible-invisible; yet it is ridiculous to com­pare the power of God with the power of electricity.

The Power is so much beyond the limited illustrations man can give, that words utterly fail to convey the idea, and the best illustra­tions only raise many queries in the mind of the reader. Who can define the Infinite?

The first fear, then, to be eradicated is the false interpretation of the “fear of God,” not the belief in a power opposed to God. When you are unafraid of God because you are beginning to understand the ALL-Now of the All-Presence, and are ceasing the terrible struggle to make this Power work according to human standards; when you cease to fear him as a terrible tyrant, meting out horrible punishments to helpless victims of his caprice —then will you begin to know “the peace that passeth all understanding, “for” in the twinkling of an eye “you will see that all fears are induced merely by the lack of under­standing of God-“the fear of God “-the understanding of this great Power so com­pletely fills you that there is no room for any other ” fear.”

“The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom.” The reverence for, and aligning of oneself with, this glorious Power, is the beginning of wisdom. You will see the human fears for what they are-the product of a double mind. A man I met, working in the service of God, was afraid lest he could not get sufficient money to keep his church in operation. What about it? Do you suppose that this great Power, desiring to express it­self, fails to supply everything necessary to make this possible, without the aid or assist­ance of man? Who is this man who thinks he has to strain every nerve to bring in the Christ Kingdom? Who is this poor benighted soul who imagines that if he does not make a place for God to express, God will not be expressed? Where is that one who is seek­ing no favors, nor any permission to express that which God hath given him to express? Where is the one that needs no recommenda­tion, but finds the temple doors flung wide open to him? Is it that one who, as Crom­well says, “hath the true fear of God in his heart” to such an extent that “there is no room for any other fear”?

You who read this page, what is the nature of your fear? First, what of the fear of God? What do you actually feel in your heart regarding this God? Are you afraid of him? Do you fear him in the old sense of the word, or do you “fear” (reverence) him as the great Impersonal Power? If you but learn to be unafraid of this Power, you will be like the learned electrician. Your fear and super­stition regarding the truth will melt away along with the other fears of evil, poverty, and disease.

“The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom.” Do you hear, you who read this line? The door is opening to you-the door into the glorious land of understanding, through which you may enter and be free. They (your fears) may seem terrible and imminent. They may seem sere to annihilate you until you learn that through the unafraid state of mind they will flee. You cannot fear anything when your heart is full of the fear of the Lord, remembering that you are won­derfully and “fearfully” made, and that the power which is to activate this mechanism is now in full manifestation.

“Come, ye children, hearken unto Me; and I will teach you the fear of the Lord.” The I AM will reveal to the unafraid soul all the wonders that are hidden beneath the “fear.” The eyes of the blind will be opened. You will begin to see that although some may say “Peace, peace, and there is no peace,” and some may retain the “the fear of the Lord” in their hearts and suffer the pangs of the damned, yet others may be so filled with the “fear of the Lord “that no other fear can enter. Do you see? Do you hear—you who read this line? Does not your heart suddenly burn with a glorious joy? Are you not aflame with the glory of the new revela­tion-you who read this line? You have nothing to fear because you have the “fear of God.”

You will begin to read the secret doctrine and see the things that are hidden away from the wise and prudent. You will begin to see how the letter often contradicts itself as well as confuses. Witness this for prosperity;

“By humility and fear of the Lord are riches and honor and life.”

Interpret this from the negative meaning of the word “fear” and you have a contrary argument to the non-fear state that appears to be necessary for the relative world of finance to-day. Fear is to be ejected at all costs, and as fear so it is, but consider this with its true meaning, with your heart full of it, and you will see that prosperity is not a matter of demonstration, but a matter of recognition. You cannot help but manifest prosperity, any more than an electric bulb could refuse to illuminate when the power is turned on.

“Search the Scriptures.” You will learn to search the deep hidden meaning of the Word. “I will reveal myself to you.”

It is only when your heart is full of the Dear of the Lord that you can truly say, “I shall fear no evil,” concluding with the glorious reason, “For thou [the understand­ing] art with me.”

“He that hath the true fear of God in his heart hath no room for any other fear.”

It is wonderful.

DEEP, DEEP IN THE HEART SOMETHING STIRRED

DEEP in the heart of the forest – snugly buried beneath the warm earth and leaves – lay an hyacinth bulb. In the heart of it, it dreamed of a beautiful pink flower – so full of perfume that it filled the whole woods. It dreamed of a very blue sky and tall, black trunks of trees with their great swaying branches – but still it dreamed on – because this was not possible to My Lady Hyacinth – since she lay buried deep in the earth which was covered with a heavy layer of leaves and snow – but, anyway, she dreamed it – it was her secret. She did not tell anybody else, because it was too sacred – and because she had no words to express that secret, had she wanted to talk about it – but one thing she knew, and that was that it was there.

Deep in the heart of man lies buried the same secret – he feels a Godlike something imaging itself in his thought – he thinks also of lofty hills and blue skies, and he dreams of untrammeled walks, through green pastures and besides still waters – but it, too, is buried deep in an earth of material reasoning and thinking, and over this is a thousand and one mortal laws and human opinions which even freeze the ground tighter about him. And he, too, tells his secret to no one – because it is so sacred – and also because he has no words to express it – and then, too, because no one would understand it. But within, his heart sings to him, and sometimes it almost pleads openly to be expressed.

And in the heart of the pale blue egg that lay in the robin’s nest a whole world was mirrored – but it was bound by an ugly hard shell that it could never break – its thrilling dream of flight through the air with its throat swelling with glorious music was also the secret that it kept – the secret of expressing itself.

But anon – deep in the heart of the hyacinth something stirred – it was a queer sort of feeling – half disturbing, half joyous – almost as if something was pushing it out of its warm white bed. Yes, that was what was happening, and the hyacinth thrilled with joy – but presently it was confronted by the dark earth which said to it, “You can never force your way through all this – you will die in the struggle; and, besides, when you do peep through, the frost will freeze you, and you’ll wish you had stayed where you belonged.” But something had stirred in the hyacinth – and just as she was about ready to turn back and give up, this something said, “Keep going – the way will open.” And so the hyacinth abandoned herself to this inner voice, and her dream came true.

And so with the little blue egg – something stirred – but the shell said, “You cannot get out of this condition; I have bound you fast – you cannot break through this wall of prejudice and heredity.” But something had stirred, and the little bird kept growing until he had almost filled the shell, and then he thought – and feared and wondered. “To-morrow I shall completely fill the shell – then what will happen? I cannot get out; to-morrow will be the end of it all.” To-morrow was a black and awful affair to the little bird who had almost used up his supply – who had come to the limits of his present condition. He could not see any further than the narrow boundary of his shell, and he had completely forgotten to look within, and by looking within see the way out of the whole situation; so he settled down to worry, often looking at the tiny mite of room he had left to grow in – and which he was constantly using up. He wished he could stop growing; he wanted to save the room. He could not see that by using up all he had he would burst its narrow limitations and have all the room that there was in the world. But presently in his dire distress he turned to the “still, small voice” within and heard the words, “Take no thought for the morrow. Now is the time. Live to the fullest extent now, if it be to the last sou you posses, use all that you have which you find necessary to use – and see what happens.” So the little bird also with an abandon grew to the limit of the shells’ capacity, and then the narrow walls began to crack and give way. A powerful light began to penetrate the shell – and again a wild fear took possession of him. He was loosing his protection – his present home was being broken up – he was being cast into a strange world; and another panic ensued. Fearful images of what might happen if he dared to leave his present hedged-in thinking. He kept his eyes closed fixed on the outer condition, and they certainly looked as nothing other than chaos and decay. But the happy inner voice said to him, “Judge not from appearances – get a look at the power back of all this change; keep praising its wonderfulness, because all power is good, and only good can result from any change when you declare that the power of good is at work accomplishing whereunto it was sent.” So the little bird felt a happy, contented feeling that the whole matter was in the hands of this power, and that, whatever came, it must be good for him, because there was but one power, and that one Good. And at last the shell gave way, and his dream was realized. Had he one regret that he had declared the truth about there being but one Power, and that one Good? Had he one faint longing to return to the narrow confines of his former abode? Had he one fear that he could not meet the issues as they came to him if he listened to the “still, small voice” within? No; not one. He lay there snuggled up under the wings of Love – oh, so happy, so warm; and as he lay there he listened to the singing of the heart of Love. It was a silent song, not herd with ears, but infinitely sweeter. It was the great heart of Love that sing s a constant symphony of harmony and love to the listening ear. It was the great unselfish and impartial parent love which breathed forth in holiness, “Our Father which art in heaven.” It was the joy of being in His presence and feeling his tender care and relationship that wove itself into the song which the little bird heard, but which the noisy world missed.

And so within the heart of man – something stirred, but he, too, was afraid to listen. His family said it was imagination; his friends laughed at it; material laws held up its hands and said, “Impossible – idealistic and absurd.” And the poor fluttering hopes of man fell into despair and bondage. But the heart of him sung on, “You are free born – you are the son of a king.” “Speak as one having authority.” “Ask and ye shall receive” – and little by little the man began to listen to this inner voice. He used the “manna” of that day without fear that the inexhaustible source would be cut off, without trying to hoard up enough for to-morrow; and presently the shackles dropped from him and he walked Free – a son of the King.

So, dear one who has heard this story, if a condition presents itself to you that you do not understand – and which seems like chaos or fear – just turn within and declare that the power operating within you can only be good, since all power is good; and judge not from appearances, no matter how contrary to good they seem. The very worst condition that may present itself to you may only be the power of good pushing you from the shell of limited thinking, and preparing you to enter a greater sense of Heaven.

And if in your sickness you stop but a moment and realize that the only power operative, not only in you, but in the whole universe, is good, and that power is always present, you will quickly see that what seems to be sickness is merely an evil thought being destroyed or pushed out of your consciousness by this ever operative power of good, and you will rejoice in the midst of the lion’s den, because you will realize that the night is far spent, and already you will begin to see the rosy tint of dawn – if you but turn to the East. So, no matter what the condition seems to be, just declare the allness of this one power good – let go and let it have full sway in you, glory in it in spite of all material conditions, and soon you will preen you wings and fly off to higher fields of joy.

Devitalizing Evil

“I CAME to fulfill, not to destroy” – there is nothing to be destroyed in all the Holy Mountain. Not even the devil; nor even the sickness, poverty, and hateful bondage of human life. Nothing is to be destroyed. It is to be fulfilled.

The egg is not destroyed when it becomes a bird, the caterpillar when it becomes a butterfly, and yet in a sense they are destroyed. The thing which is left when the egg becomes a bird is a thin shell it crumbles and drops into the dust, and even the place thereof is no more.

Jesus counseled the taking away of the attention from appearances and centering it upon this Power which fulfills — by this very process of taking away the attention from the appearances we devitalize the problems of life, which are entirely dependent upon the thought-substance to keep them alive.

The reason your problems have not been met is due to the fact you have been trying to overcome them – you have been fighting against something and at the same time exclaiming there is nothing but God in the universe. When you awaken to the Presence you will see the process, “Ye must decrease — I must increase,” take place before your very eyes as the power is withdrawn from the problem and merged into the Presence for reshaping and re-embodiment. In other words, the devitalization of the manifestation of evil will take place.

It is very much like letting the air out of a balloon — the moment you take your attention from the appearances and judge righteous judgment then the manifestation begins to fade out, just as a parasite begins to wither when the sap of the plant or tree is taken from it.

Once you see this simple method you will understand why it is that the Kingdom of Heaven is given to the child — the attention can be taken from the appearances, the snapping of the thought which is feeding the evil manifestation takes place and the manifestation falls into the dust, not being able to support itself.

“Magnify the Lord within” and disregard the appearance of the problem and you will begin to experience the consciousness of it cracking up — falling away for the new embodiment to take place; just as the egg cracks before the new embodiment of the eagle, which is leaving nothing behind it but the thing which formerly made it egg, but which is now only a broken shell falling into the dust of oblivion. So will you stop the effort to catch fish in the sea which is filled with fish and you will begin to “let down your nets.” The moment the thought is taken away from the problem, at that instant the life-stream is cut from the manifestation and it begins to perish.

The old idea of fighting- against evil and calling on God to destroy something, which in the next breath you admit does not exist, is the densest kind of “metaphysics.” The manifestation of disease, though it may have a history years long, is only as old as the last thought about it. Out of consciousness — out of manifestation – the Walls of Jericho must and will crumble when you have taken your attention from them. At the precise instant the word shall be spoken and a crumbling of appearances will take place — a strong breath of life will dispel the crumbling mass of manifestation into nothingness. It is wonderful – the power which is inherent in the Risen Lord.

“Working” against the condition — or “working” to know there is no condition opposite a state of self hypnosis — you are caught in the language of metaphysics. Dead words — “Awake, thou that sleepest”; are you still under the hateful law, “Earn your living by the sweat of your brow”? Are you WORKING in this human sense of the word when you pray?

“Behold! I come not to destroy” — do you hear? – I said, “I come not to destroy.” Then what are you trying to destroy? An appearance” A belief? What for?

If God comes not to destroy, who are you to destroy? “I come to fulfill”; and, when the thing is fulfilled with the Spirit, when you recognize the Presence, you will burst the thin and narrow confines of the manifestation which is so ugly and untoward. Behold I make all things new. We are not seeking to recover something lost, something once used. “Behold I make all thing new,” and when this idea comes to you, you Will perceive that immediately the new creation is a new consciousness with a new embodiment. So the egg becomes the bird — so you are embodied in a consciousness which is more sensitive to the PRESENCE than you were formerly, and hence are capable of accomplishing things that were utterly impossible before.

“Behold, I make all things new.” The moment you begin the devitalizing process of evil, even the devil and hell are made lifeless and must fall into nothingness — the life is taken from them.

It is as a man who owned a magnificent library of rare first editions. When he died, the library immediately began to disintegrate and was eventually scattered to the four winds. Why? Because it had nothing to hold it up. The moment your attention is taken from the appearances, the appearances fall to pieces. That is why Jesus kept saying, “What is that to thee? Follow thou Me” – the moment you do this the new embodiment is taking place. “Whatsoever you ask in My nature” — whatsoever you can conceive as possible to this nature — that will be made manifest through the Law of Christ Jesus.

In a moment of forgetfulness, many an invalid has done things which were seemingly impossible to do. “At a moment ye think not, I come” – you will see what a little is accomplished by taking thought. “Who, by taking thought, can add one cubit?” Are you ready to hear this? – or would you like to debate the issue, simply because the density of your mind does not apprehend the height, breadth, length of the Presence?

It is glorious when you glimpse the simplicity of this Christ message. It is up and away from the old thinking process — it is pure revelation, past the understanding of man. It is in the realm of the “peace” which passeth all understanding.” I said all — that includes your own and that of the greatest spiritual leader or teacher in the universe — it simply is something which transcends the thing called human understanding.

“Leave all” — do you hear? “Follow Me” does not mean that you let go of a thing, or that you go to any place. But you leave it all, as far as thought is concerned, and that is the quickest way to get rid of the manifestation.

As the wisdom of man is foolishness in the eyes of God, so is the Wisdom of God foolishness in the eyes of man. To the human unenlightened man he is sure that if he thinks hard enough or prays hard enough he will accomplish the destruction of the appearances — if he thinks money hard enough he will create it. He reckons with a human law which might, through some queer whim of fate, temporarily make a change. He cannot think it possible to attain these things and also to entertain the Presence the moment he stops the thought taking process and enters into the recognition of it all and begins to experience the deep and marvelous changes of the new embodiment being born.

“In all thy ways acknowledge him and he shall bring it to pass.” Do YOU hear? Answer me. Well, then, what is keeping “it” from coming to pass in your life? Is it the thought taking, the judging from appearances, the trying to adjust, straighten, or arrange things or thoughts?

Perhaps it is — and perhaps you will “leave all” — I said all and follow Me, and begin to experience the deep delight of the rest that comes to one when he senses that God knows more than any combination of manifestation ever can hope to glimpse. “I have a way ye know not of,” slams the door shut tight in the face of the “man whose breath is in his nostrils” and who is trying to square the teaching of Christ by the yardstick of human intelligence.

“In all thy wars acknowledge him, and he shall give thee the desires of your heart.” Can it be possible? Can you begin to see how you are gradually coming out of the desert of working into a place of service and expression — into a place where man becomes a part of the gorgeous pattern of life, and can no more be kept from his expression than he can be sent into his expression by thought? There is a sudden doing away with the paraphernalia of the human thought.

Who told you to make the effort to express – who told you that a man held the power to keep you out of your place or to let you in? Who told you that you must get a man-made authority to express the substance of your mind? The world has told you, and it is true, as long as you are trying to sell yourself to the world — but when you merge into Spirit, when you are one Nature, there will be no need of entering into the limitations of man. He has his success and his failure; both are but human degrees. They have nothing whatsoever to do with the Power. God is not successful — that is a man-made limitation and is usually pictured out by dollars and cents.

God is not limited to the narrow confines of “success.” That is the measure man holds to the universe, hoping to get it full, but when he “proves Me” he will begin to see that his measure is far too small.

God does not ask permission to perform. You are the word of God made flesh — what about you? Why do you not accept My invitation, “Lean on Me”? — literally, lean upon the consciousness of this Presence. If you have the human decency and honesty to fulfill that which you claim you have, you will see definitely, “I will sustain you” – not after the limited manner of your thinking — “I have ways ye know not of.” Do you believe it?

When is the fire of the burning bush going to burn out all the dead manifestations which you have been holding to yourself so long? When will you flame with the joy of sensing, “Heaven and earth are full of Thee” — and mean it, and cast your burdens on the Lord and feel the Presence emanating through you? The hills shall be made low and the rough places smooth and the crooked places straight — all this symbology to make you see how the problem is devitalized when you take your thought away from it.

“Judge not from appearances, but judge righteous judgment.” The desire of your soul, which is the thing in its incipiency urging upon you for fulfillment, is possible of fulfillment, though it must have a new embodiment — not necessarily a new shape, but a new height of consciousness which can accept the new revelation as natural instead of the old idea that it is something that must be demonstrated.

The literal interpretation of the Scriptures begins to take place the moment you have found the soul of it all. Without an embodiment the unseen is unexpressed and is worthless — it must be embodied; and this power of embodiment in the face of such binding limitations as a shell, a prison wall, a fearful disease or reputation, can only take place when you turn your attention to me and magnify me within.

“What is that to thee?” is the password thereafter — the attention has been taken away from the appearances. This does not necessarily mean that you are closing your eyes to it; just suddenly you have taken the thought from it, and the “What is that to thee?” stays with you as a guardian angel until the moment comes for you to blow the breath and see the walls crumble.

All the while, from the moment the attention is taken away from the appearances, the leaven of the Presence has been devitalizing, undermining the solid appearances of belief, so that when the breath of Life is blown upon the thing, it goes up in a cloud of smoke and you enter in. The Jericho of your desire, walled away by impossibilities, becomes yours. You do not climb over, fight against, tear down, or in any way attack the walls — you devitalize them by taking your thought away from the appearances.

It is wonderful what a little contemplation on this thing will do for you. Suddenly you will see why Jacob struggled all night with the Angel, and how finally he loosed it and let it go. So you will take the very light out of hell or the devil by this same process. When you stop regarding the flames of hell and recognize Me, you devitalize hell, and it becomes heaven. Even while you are momentarily in the flames you experience the holy command, “The flames shall not burn thee.” It is glorious, this one Nature of the Jesus Christ consciousness.

The appearances may be solid and filled with terror, the roadway filled with armed charioteers and horsemen; destruction is near; but “look again” – and the devitalization takes place. We are not going to fight. “Put up your sword” is just as true today as it was two thousand years ago.

“Awake, thou that sleepest, and Christ shall give thee light.” Where is the Christ? When Jesus raised his eyes to Heaven, did he look up? And if so, where are you going to look? When he performed the gesture in his Consciousness he must have stayed on the Power and magnified that, if the embodiment necessary was to take place, and eventually before his eyes the spectre of appearances which manifested hunger and lack, fell to pieces, and the embodiment of plenty took place.

“Believest thou this?” Can you believe in the Divine nature to the point that the embodiment necessary to put the child on earth will take place, by a way ye know not of? Outside of the laws of mankind? If so , you can rejoice, for all flesh shall see it together.

In every instance of so-called miracle cited in the bible, we see Jesus practicing this devitalizing process. The attention is taken from the appearance, and the manifestation has the life-flow snapped instantly. It may wag about until sundown, but the “What is that to thee?” keeps you in perfect peace — the walls crumble as you enter in. You enter in through the door which no man can shut — I said no man, organization, person, place, or thing. By your yea, yea, “Believest thou this?”

“Search the Scriptures, for in them ye think ye have life eternal.” You see yourself moving through every character and every situation of the Bible, and yet you suddenly realize that you see yourself, and it is the you which is seeing yourself that has the power to accomplish that which changes the face of all nature.

“At his coming” — what is this his? At his coming the earth melted. (Is your problem harder than the solid earth?) At his coming the hills skipped for joy and the trees sang, and so is the glorious pastoral poem of the symbolizing of the Presence.

So will the manifestations of evil suddenly lose their shape and form at his coming just as hell melts into heaven at his coming into manifestation, and the devil fades into oblivion. The running from appearances ceases; he can go or stay when you have taken the life out of him. He will be powerless, and will prove it over a thousand times.

Can you begin to see why you are sent into all the world? Naked, yet unafraid — alive, awakened to your true nature. Shed with the preparation of the gospel, wearing the breast-plate of righteousness, etc., is but the symbology of becoming conscious of your nature. It is not a preparation for combating evil. No, not even by the old-fashioned method of begging, beseeching, and praying to a tribal Jehovah.

“In all thy ways acknowledge him and he shall bring it to pass.” Do you hear? What, then, is going to hinder the manifestation of it here and now?

THE DIMENSION OF INFINITY

The Truth as revealed by Jesus Christ (the Word made flesh); the nature of God incarnate; the automatic power of the universe is a new dimension – the dimension of Infinity, if we could understand such a paradoxical expression. What the fourth dimension is to mathematics, the Revelation of Jesus Christ is to the mechanics of the human mind.

Every statement of this new dimension is outside of the law of matter. It is completely in the realm of the impossible, improbable and impractical. Viewed through the “glass darkly” of human intellect, it is almost pure fantasy, or, at best, imagination. Handled by the “thought” of man, it is dissected and found to have no life or existence.

The question “who by taking thought” is an insult to the wisdom of man. His whole wisdom and intellect are gathered by an elaborate thought process, and though it may, for a moment, seemed to be anchored to evidence as solid and unshakable as the Rock of Gibraltar, yet at some future date the impregnable fortress of wisdom is shaken to its base by being approached from a higher level of thought. The ground fortifications, though they be impenetrable from that level, are completely disregarded by the fast moving planes.

So, the best arguments and defenses of the human thought are not considered by this fast-moving “Jesus-Christ Principle.” of which Jesus the carpenter, became aware and gave to the universe.

We speak of Jesus Christ, not as a man, not as the son of the carpenter, but as a Principle embodying all the concepts and etherial ideas of the Whole Universe, and being the type or matrix of every man.

At the moment of awareness of this Presence (the Word made flesh), Jesus (the symbol) is changed into the incarnate Power. Heaven and earth meet – the Word is made Flesh; matter and spirit mingle in a third substance which we call Jesus-Christ. The moment Jesus becomes aware of this Presence he is no more Jesus the carpenter, but he is everything, at the same time he is nothing.

Loosing or letting go of the Jesus who admitted “I can of myself do nothing,” he finds his Life and exclaims “I can do all things.” The narrow confines of the human consciousness can no more hold this Principle than can the four walls of the most glorious cathedral hold God – and yet that is precisely what it does. Man cannot experience it within himself until he can find it everywhere, and then it is everywhere, even within himself, and the trying to make it so drops entirely out of the plan of things.

“You shall find your life when you lose it” becomes a glorious letting go of the personal and a living in the impersonal which personalizes itself again, minus all the limitations of the former self.

As electricity remains unknown until it is given a body – it is everywhere, but it is nothing as far as the senses of man are concerned – the moment the contact is made it becomes something definitely pointed into expression; the Word has become flesh and all flesh shall see it together.

The man Jesus, discovering this strange and wonderful Principle common to all men, possible to anyone who would recognize its Presence and let go of the narrow limits of the human thinking process, also knew that because of its simplicity it would be met, measured, and found wanting by the human intellect. Hence the sweeping statement “The wisdom of man is foolishness in the eyes of God.” The measuring and dissecting of Spirit is foolishness in the eyes of this Power which works entirely outside of the narrow confines of matter in order that it may work through this same substance, transmuting it and changing the meal into leaven.

The great failure of the Truth movement is that it is approached through the “thought-taking” method – yet it is definitely stated that nothing can be accomplished by “taking thought.” Thought emanate from a state of consciousness, and consciousness cannot be changed from without. The moment anything new is perceived, a wholly new aura, or plethora, of thought starts to emanate through the mists of the former beliefs, and finally clears the ground, as it were.

To think a truth may have a certain virtue over evil thinking, but the sum total of the result may be negligible. Thinking over and over a law of mathematics or music does not produce anything in the manifest world. “Go thou and do likewise” is a requisite, no matter what may be said to the contrary.

The beggar at the temple gate would still be there if he had not suddenly (outside of the thought process) made the gesture and had done likewise. One moment of thought on the command “rise and walk” would have produced what forty years of this thinking had produced – his inability to move from where he lay.

Until one sees that it is impossible to manifest this power through the channels of the human thought, he will still try to guide, direct, or make the power work. Until he moves into the dimension of the Presence he cannot see it in the flesh. Jesus constantly asking, “Believest thou this?” is talking outside of the thought process.

What man, blind from birth, can believe from the human standpoint that he can see? What man crippled from birth, can believe that he can walk? The more he thinks of it the more impossible it becomes. Dissect it and you find such an elaborate movement necessary as to stun the human thinking.

Have you ever thought what would have to take place before a man born blind could see? Well, think it over, and then in your imagination try to construct the eye, threading the intricate nerves and muscles into their proper relation with the rest of the body, and then answer this question, “Believest that I am able to do this for thee?”

If the “wisdom of man is foolishness in the eyes of God,” than nothing he can offer on the subject of the how and why or the when of this invisible power could possibly have any bearing whatsoever on the subject.

“Leave all, follow Me,” is a big command. It causes you to “judge not from appearances, but to judge righteous judgment.” To many this has been a sermon on charity, but it is anything but this. It is moving into this new dimension and disregarding the laws of the lower dimension and the results accruing there from.

The story of the shadow kingdom or the realm of the two dimensional plane, where a chalk line constituted a prison, beautifully illustrates this point. The story continues that a three-dimensional being one day entered this kingdom and found a man in a prison made of a single chalk line circle. Getting into communication with this shadow being, he was finally persuaded to stand up. To his amazement, when he was standing up, he no longer knew anything about prison. He could completely disregard the appearances, for in the three-dimensional world a chalk line does not constitute a prison. No time is spent in “overcoming,” “setting aside,” or “getting rid ” of the prison as long as the man is standing up, for he is in the next dimension.

Jesus, coming to a world imprisoned in a network of ugly Conscious-Thinking, so crystallized and solidified by centuries of beliefs and findings, spent no time in fighting the appearances (“put up your sword; ye do not need to fight”), because in the dimension of Jesus Christ, that which constituted a prison on the former dimension was nothing but a symbolic “chalk line” to the present elevation of consciousness.

This chalk line of belief may be anything from an actual prison to an imaginary network of repressions of inhibitions. It might be anything from the most loathsome case of leprosy to the faintest headache – yea, it might be the putrefying flesh soiling its winding-sheet with corruption of death, or the dead, futile shroud of life’s Te Deum. They are all “chalk lines” to the new dimension.

Gradually, man begins to see that at no time was Jesus Christ fighting the so-called problems of the human mind. He did not inquire into the history of the case, was not concerned as to the length of time the “chalk line of belief” had been there, knowing that to do this was only to intensify the belief. Yet most people of the Truth movement today are busy with the idea that the reason for Jesus’ advent in the flesh was to overcome something that was wholly a matter of relativity, and which might pass away of its own volition in many instances. He was only concerned with getting the man in the chalk line prison of belief to “stand up.” “If I be lifted up” – “Come unto Me.”

Jacob struggled all night with his problem, but in the morning he loosed it and let it go. The man at the temple gate suddenly jumped into the new dimension, so to speak, and found full use of his body in an instant, just as the blind man suddenly opened his eye and the beliefs of the former dimension were not considered.

“work out your own (not somebody else’s) salvation with fear and trembling.” The wonder and the glory of this new dimension, when it begins to even faintly dawn on you, is “fearful” or awe-ful in its terrible and wonderful possibilities. The reverence or fear brings with it a sacred recognition of this principle “which to know aright is life eternal.” Even as we faultily know this God do we begin to experience Life, and presently, when we “know aright,” it will mean Life Eternal, and the casting off and taking on of belief bodies will have given place to the resurrected Temple of the “Risen Lord.”

“Arise and shine for thy light is come and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee” takes on a new meaning when you begin to recognize the Revelation of Jesus-Christ (the Divine Nature – your true Nature). You arise in the new dimension, you are absent from the body and present with the Power, and suddenly, when you look out again, the place thereof is no more, the former things have passed away – the chalk line is no more a prison, and so the earth is filled with the Light of the new revelation.

Fighting with the problem, trying to bring God down to the level of the human consciousness, is impossible. Invitation is constantly given you “Arise,” “Come unto Me,” “Open your eyes,” “Look again”; and all these gestures are made outside of the dimension of conscious thinking. The Prodigal suddenly coming upon this Jesus-Christ nature said, “I will arise and go unto my Father.” It is wonderful what can be accomplished in you when you work by the way of Jesus’ revelation. “Go thou and do likewise” is not so in-understandable when you see the possibilities of your “Jesus-Christ” nature taking command.

“Let that mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus” – let the Divine Nature come forth which “has a way ye know not of” and the “ways” of which are past finding out. It need only be recognized, “Behold I stand at the door and knock, and if any (that includes you) man hear My voice and will open unto Me, I will come in to him and sup with him and he with Me.” It is wonderful when you begin to see even faintly the way of the Jesus-Christ nature – your True Self. It is wonderful to sense the facts of existence outside of the laws of the human consciousness.

No more does the human thought wear itself out trying to do things which it knows are impossible. In the resurrected state of the “Jesus-Christ” consciousness it is not trying to do the impossible; on this level it is the possible and natural which is eternally taking place. The Jesus-Christ consciousness is not concerned in setting aside human laws – it is concerned with its own expression of harmony and joy; and this pattern of infinity coming into being apparently sets aside or destroys the laws of the dimension of human thought. Hence, a man sick, incurable or dead in one dimension, is well and alive in the other, and the prison house of thought caves in or falls apart at the moment of recognition of this Jesus-Christ consciousness.

When Jesus walked upon the water, it was because of the fact that the consciousness of Jesus-Christ was not under the law of gravity, cohesion, adhesion, attraction, etc. When Jesus brought forth the bread and fishes, the wine and gold, he was not setting aside a law, but showing forth a new dimension, and the moment the “Jesus-Christ” consciousness comes into the picture the shadows of the former things give way. They can do nothing else. “I come not to destroy but to fulfill,” but in the fulfilling the shadow limitations of conscious thinking may be broken to bits.

At the sound of his Voice (the voice of this Jesus-Christ Nature) the earth melted. Every law of the conscious thinking was disregarded – the hills danced and the way became smooth.

When this is faintly conceived you will understand why we are not concerned with argument on the Truth. The revelation of the Presence is far beyond argument, and so sudden in its effects. Arguments belong to the man “whose breath is in his nostrils”; he sees two powers, and is attempting, no matter how sincerely, to overcome one with the other. He is doomed to failure, for on this plane of duality, evil is stronger than good.

Living under the conscious thinking, evil comes into manifestation uninvited and apparently unthought of. The best living ones are not immune from the most terrible disease, thieves, and fearsome accidents. There is no insurance against the onslaught of the devil, call him what you will. The adamant walls of Jericho shut him away from his kingdom, and try as he will, he cannot scale them or destroy them, but when he “leaves all and follows Me” – then the story is different, and these very walls, so terrible and impenetrable, crumble into dust or are blown into oblivion by the Voice of Jesus-Christ.

Jesus-Christ, the Word made Flesh, the flesh made Spirit, is the Nature of every man, the expression of which brings into view harmony, happiness, substance, and all things that the conscious thinking has tried to gain by the “sweat of his brow.”

“Fear not – ye shall reap if ye faint not.” The command, “Thrust in the sickle,” is a big order for one who has not even planted, and, wavering between the “Yea, yea, lord” and the avalanche of human thought and the fearful appearances, it is small wonder that the little encouragement and reassurance is given and needed.

“Be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.” The Jesus-Christ shall “overcome” (come over) the whole belief of the world which is your own objectified consciousness. As you come to “feel” the naturalness of Life in Jesus-Christ the old habit of fighting against things will give place to the recognition of God as here, there, and everywhere.

Jesus, coming through the streets of a veritable hell of human belief joyously proclaiming the Kingdom of Heaven as being at hand, was so misunderstood that they wanted to destroy him for the good of the people at large. Yet did he proclaim it from the heights of the Jesus-Christ Nature, at which point it was and is eternally true and present.

To be hidden with Christ in God is to dwell in the “secret place” above the beliefs of human consciousness. Yet with all this glorious ethereal idea its intense practicality makes it possible to live in the world. The world, to the Jesus-Christ Nature, is Heaven, and, if anything in the world touches even the hem of his robe, virtue proceeds out into expression and, to the human sense, healing takes place.

“I come not to destroy but to fulfill” – the Jesus-Christ Nature in the midst of you comes to reveal the presence of the next dimension which is out from under the curse of the law of duality. When you begin to see God, here, there, and everywhere, your whole body is filled with Light, and everything you look upon is touched with this Divine revelation. Even the fields so barren and brown are suddenly white with harvest.

Within the Temple of your consciousness all these lovely rites are performed. Gradually man goes within to the Father and there finds something which transcends the human thinking and brings him to the point of “Behold.” When man is “Beholding,” he is praising the Presence, and glorifying the Power, and giving thanks to the Power, and these offices cause endless manifestation to become visible – “the glory of the Lord fills the House,” the consciousness, and it reaches to the uttermost part of the earth.

The prison of consciousness thinking becomes a chalk line which can go or stay as far as its influence on you is concerned. “Be absent from the body and present with the Lord” – present with the Jesus-Christ consciousness within you. It is wonderful – and so it is.

THE DIVINE LUNATIC

ALEXANDER THE GREAT, magnificent in body and accomplishments, was dubbed “the Divine Lunatic” because his entire life was fraught with a succession of events beyond human comprehension. Because of the lavishness of his expression, he was also dubbed “the Golden Lunatic”.

His mother, Olympias, impressed upon him that he was not the child of a human father, Philip of Macedonia, but that in reality she had been overshadowed by Zeus, – therefore his nature and capacities were Divine and not constrained within the narrow confines of human limitations.

Alexander believed this and acted accordingly. His appearance did not belie his Divine birth and he was constantly doing the unpredictable and the impossible. His gentleness made him beloved in spite of the fact that he was a valiant and relentless warrior. His life was full of this Divine quality, stemming from the fact that his mother had told him he was Divine.

At one time by his gentleness he conquered the magnificent, mettled black charger, Bucephalus, after his father Philip had eschewed the opportunity to show his prowess and the groom had declined to touch him. It is recorded Alexander put his arm around the charger’s neck, patted him, jumped onto his unsaddled back and rode away as though he were the gentlest of animals.

And then comes Jesus! His mother was actually over-shadowed by the Spirit, – and while we have no record of her telling Him this, we see from the beginning of His career a succession of events which come under the category of Divine.

Since the “Wisdom of GOD is foolishness in the eyes of man”, I presume Jesus, too, might have been called a “Divine Lunatic” because of His works. And strangely, one of the chiefest “planks” of His teaching was “Call no man your father, but ONE which is in Heaven” We find Him saying to the world, – You are not born of man, but you are born of God, – You are Divine, – You have the capacities to do God-like things, such as healing the sick, raising the dead, opening the eyes of the blind .. . All of which apparently invoke a power beyond the physical capacities.

Alexander believed, – and reproduced a Divine quality in body and works. This very capacity to BELIEVE is the key-note of the teaching of Jesus. “Believest thou this?” A thousand other times this insistent word is brought for consideration as an absolutely necessary thing.

With this belief comes the capacity to do what the human woman-born man calls miracles. When this is once accepted, the laws of God become the natural laws of man, and the man-made laws of time-space become naught. There is, therefore, a”Divine Lunacy” in the whole picture as far as the human mind is concerned. “How does this man speak, seeing he has no learning.” How did He do the things He did without any technical knowledge of them? How did Alexander subdue the stallion without doing anything?

The “call no man your father” principle establishes once and for always your Divinity, – and the BELIEF in this truth clears away the veils of human belief which says “born-of-woman, few-of-days and filled-with-trouble”. It sets aside the time-space element of life and brings into being an indefinable substance called “NOW”.

Jesus dwelt much on this substance called “NOW”. Everything of which He spoke took place in this “NOW” – and always takes place in the “NOW”. No matter what the slow human mind thinks about the time element, it does not exist to the consciousness of God, – and hence finds no place in the mind of His off-spring. The illusion of human thought, with its measures and its laws of physics, evaporates, as it were, without explanation or apparent reason, – and the harvest appears without all the motions of man, – the sick man is instantly well without the convalescing of human thought.

There is so much startling information given as to upset the entire human thought world, – telling every man that he IS the Son of God, – that he IS endowed with the capacities of God, which can and do set aside anything and everything man-born-of woman has learned through thousands of years of experience and study, – notwithstanding what is said to the contrary. This God-given heritage finds the “wisdom of man is foolishness in the eyes of God”, and quite naturally, the God-wisdom is “foolishness” in the eyes of man.

It is not a belief in a Power called God as something separated from man, – not a use of it as something apart from him, – but a belief in his Divine Nature, – that he, too, is the Product of God, the expression of His Love, and that he, too, can, in the language of Jesus, “do the works that I do, and even greater”, when he accepts his birthright.

In spite of the records which state clearly that we were created in the image and likeness of God, a little lower than the angels, given dominion over all things, and so on, – man still harks back to the fact that he was “born”. Man was never born, – he was created, complete and perfect. This trite and hackneyed saying suddenly bursts into flame when we actually believe, instead of trying to believe.

How can you believe when you look to appearances? Alexander’s father, Philip of Macedonia, was a great king and warrior, and he claimed him as his son, – but Alexander had already accepted his Divinity and showed forth his BELIEF, – even as did Jesus in a much truer and greater way. So will you when you discontinue the “study” of Truth and enter into it and be saved from your human beliefs of time-space and the “born-of-woman” state of affairs. You will then be “born again” – “a new creature in Christ Jesus” – in the sense that you must re-appear in the freshness and newness of the created, changeless ONE which you are.

A moment’s contemplation of this TRUTH and many old pictures of diseases will pass into oblivion and the barren fields will be ripe with harvest. “Believe, and ye shall be saved” from your human thought-belief of good and evil.

On and on the WORD continues, offering this salvation from humanology for as small an amount of faith as a grain of mustard. All things will be changed in the twinkling when you claim your birthright, – not as something you have to claim, BUT AS SOMETHING YOU HAVE TO CLAIM. You do not do anything by force or effort when you discover you are the Child of God. You inherit a Divine Right which you employ and the groundlings of human belief flee before the brightness of HIS coming.

The effortlessness of healing by Jesus Christ is as one removing dust from a highly polished surface, – a casual wiping away of nothing. Age has nothing to do with it, for in the God-head there is no age, – it is a never-born, never-dying Spirit.

And then comes Paul, – seeing the Athenians, mistaken in the Power which he showed to them, fall down and worship him, he exclaimed, – “Ye men of Athens – know ye not that ye are gods?” What a revolutionary statement! To tell the Greeks that they were actually the Gods they had been worshiping, – that they were Love, Power, Beauty… The Greeks had divided their god into twelve phases, giving one deity many forms and virtues. They prayed to Aphrodite for Beauty because she symbolized that phase of the Great One.

And today we have as many names for God as the Greeks had, – or for that matter, more. We pray to a God of Strength as surely as the Greek prayed to Mars, – and to a God of Love and of Harvest.

And so we see how the generations of the worlds have been reaching for the supreme knowledge of this One God, – which only Jesus Christ gave and which we have so miserably failed to grasp, for we are still casting lots for His Robe of Understanding, peddling it in the markets of the world.

Always there is a “secret” to be sold or a special way to follow. And yet there is no secret which the very Soul of you, when awakened to its Divinity, does not perfectly comprehend. There is always the “teaching” that it is “difficult” to understand God and more “difficult” to “use” Him, – which is quite right. You have only to pause for a moment and think of the thousands of people who believe God is something to be prayed “at”, – some power which is to grant special dispensations. There are no special dispensations for those who are in Christ Jesus for the special dispensation which the human mind seeks indicates a belief in two powers.

“If any man lack wisdom, let him ask of God”, not John Smith. We have heard this a thousand times, – -yet we continue to ask the “man whose breath is in his nostrils” to make something happen.

If the ways of God are NOT the ways of man, as it is written, then why do we attempt to change the ways of God to conform to those of man? “My ways are not your ways … For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways.” And still man beats against the door of heaven with human ideas, thinking to gain the ear of God by many words as do the heathen.

We have tried our way, – the way of the man-born-of-woman, “of few days and full of trouble” How about launching out into the deeper waters of the “created-in-the-beginning” man, the image and likeness, endowed with such magnificent powers and given dominion over everything that now has dominion over man.

Transformation too, – and in the twinkling of an eye, when this perfectly Created Being sees through the age-old beliefs of time and change, ugliness and age.

And so the next time you read and HEAR Jesus speaking to you through the sacred pages, telling you that you are to “call no man your Father”, BELIEVE and experience the glorious plus values of Heaven-on-earth.

You ARE the Son of God! It may all seem foolishness to the man-born-of-woman, – but do not tell him. Let him discover it, and perhaps he will consider you a “Divine Lunatic” also, – and perhaps you will be just that, because everything that God knows is insanity to the human mind.

We have a better and surer proof of being “sired” by God than did Alexander. We have our Precious One, who ran through every picture of the human thought and proved them all to be the insane hypnotism of the human mind. So you can fold your tent and steal silently away into the new level of revelation in which ALL things are possible because you are Divine. Yes, we hear Jesus calling our attention to, – “Know ye not that ye are Gods”.

The hour is late, – the Kingdom has already been ushered in, – and the awakened Sons of God are shouting for joy! That joyous shout within your soul will tear down the walls of your Jericho.

ARISE and SHINE for thy LIGHT is come, and the Glory of the Lord thy Father is risen upon thee, – and Radiant Splendor which has hitherto seemed so abstract, is now found to be real.

DIVINE OBSTACLES ALIAS GUARDIAN ANGELS

SHE WAS a Truth student, – and a good one, too. She was on her way to the airport to catch a plane for the West Coast, to the fulfillment of a cherished dream. Life was as rosy as dawn, – a song was in her heart. Visions of a contract, signed, sealed and delivered, clustered about her like a flock of cherubs around a Murillo Madonna. Things were practically perfect until that sickening noise of a punctured tire made her heart sink. The car stopped, the driver got out and looked at the deflated tire. “Sorry, lady, but I have no spare, and the nearest station is a mile away.”

From under the car a flock of inky imps rushed out shrieking with laughter, pulling at her. “Why did this happen to me?” “And why did it happen today?” “Why, – after all of my praying?” “Of what avail is the Truth if such things can take place?” and a thousand and one other thoughts flooded her mind like a dark, swift current of water in a subterranean passage. It all spelled defeat.

Back to the hotel and utter desolation, – and to bed with seven devils of torment. Finally morning, – and with it the daily paper carrying dead-black headlines telling of the crash of the very plane she was to have taken.

Nothing had happened to her, – but suddenly she was thrilling with joy and thanksgiving for the very thing she had cursed the night before.

“God works in mysterious ways His wonders to perform”. Sometimes when we are too dense to understand the inner voice, we are saved from our own undoing by the presence of what appears to be an obstacle, – an apparent defeat of plans, – a sudden stoppage of the way.

Yoked with the illusory fate is your Divine Destiny, – like two horses pulling side by side. One (fate) is so vicious and unpredictable it is apt to throw you without warning into some ugly and unexpected condition for apparently no purpose whatsoever, – which you are supposed to bear with fortitude and courage as part of your lesson, or charge off to a karmic debt of which you know nothing.

You continue riding this night-mare (fate) until you discover the perfect Destiny running so beautifully beside you, – and make a change. Whenever this Divine Destiny is acknowledged, the hateful pictures of human thought are neutralized. You are impressed with a desire, which is evidence of an already established thing, – but from the standpoint of fate, would have to be “worked out.”

In the Divine Destiny are the things that “eyes have not seen, ears have not heard, nor has it entered into the heart of man the things that are prepared for those who love the Lord.”

Jesus came to the earth to set aside fate, which is the heritage of the Adam man. Until man sees and accepts the fact that he is not born of the Adam father, but born of God, he will experience the hateful fate of “few days and filled with trouble.” So apparently new is this absolute and radical reliance on the Truth of Jesus Christ that many times we fail to hear-see the VOICE of guidance given us, – and so the Love of God saves us with His Divine obstacle, – a Guardian Angel.

The more we believe and rely on this Inner Light, the more we will see and experience the VOICE or warning that comes before every evil fate-picture.

This interpretation does not mean that we are to accept every evil pattern that comes to us as a warning from God. Many times we rise in “righteous indignation” and put to flight the thought-congested pictures. But it does bring to us the truth that there is no “insistence” in God, and the memory of “not my way, but Thine: be done.” Having your way is not conducive to bringing about the will of God. “My ways are not your ways … ”

We are told to “resist not evil” and it will flee from us, – and in this sense we do not resist it because we have come to the recognition that it has no reality, – and hence has nothing within itself to be resisted. The evil may be the ugly pattern of disease which appears very real. Resisting it will only intensify it if we are making something out of it other than human thought. At the same time we are told to “RESIST EVIL”. There is nothing contradictory in these commands, – they are both the same thing. Resist the evil temptation to believe in the reality of evil, and see it flee from you.

When we resist a thing in the generally accepted sense of the word, we create something to resist, – or at least give the picture confronting us the ugly power it seems to present. When the ways of God become our ways, we stop resisting the apparent condition which seems to block the intense desire.

Relax that conscious thinking for a moment and see through the mirage of beliefs. In that very obstacle is the blessing you have been seeking. Why do you insist on having YOUR way? It is written, “Your ways are not My ways”.

It is also written, “In all thy ways, acknowledge HIM and He shall bring it to pass”: not maybe nor perhaps. If the acknowledgment Is made, He will bring it to pass without question and “by a way ye know not of”.

“Wait patiently on HIM”, – and “Stand and see”. Give thanks for the only way there is. If it be through the crowded streets of confusion, or through the solid wall of fear, or through the scorching fires of evil, and it is HIS way, all the evils of these appearances will be destroyed. “If ye drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt you.”

“Peace be unto you!” Stop kicking against the pricks. Why will you “persecute ME”?

“This is the Lord’s doings, and it is wonderful to our eyes” pronounced over the greatest disappointment or failure will cause it to yield its blessing, as the prickly chestnut burr placed on a hot stove opens and yields its Sift.

Matthew Arnold said: “To understand that the language of the Bible is fluid, passing and literary, not rigid, fixed and scientific, – is a first step toward the right understanding of the Bible”.

A glimpse of this causes us to know how it is that there are no contradictions in the Bible. It is fluidic, – covering a thousand and one interpretations, – – one of which will answer the WHY in your life. The Ten Commandments were graven in stone and are hard and fixed, – until the fluid quality of them is understood, – and then they become as warm oil on a frozen body.

Enter this fluidic stream of consciousness and you will experience untold Light and Illumination. A single word or phrase will burst open in a flood of pure golden revelation.

Yes, it is recorded, “If any man lack wisdom, let him ask of God”, – not John Smith. The more you rely on this Inner Light, the more you will hear-see the WORD so essential to your on-going.

Water runs down hill naturally, eternally seeking the sea. And so the Soul of you feels that urge of returning unto ME, – seeking that place where it is lost in God. If you lose your narrow human concept of life, you shall find it, – -but if you save it, you shall lose it, – it is isolated from the Great Source.

If the water, on its eternal trek to the sea, be stopped by a dam, the Sun can and will pick it up and cast it onto the bosom of the Father Waters. In like manner, there is no obstruction or obstacle in your human fate over which God cannot bear you up. There is always a way when there is God’s way.

No WORD of Truth that you have actually freed in the spirit of recognition, but what must and will come into manifestation.

In the quiet of a cool oasis you have spoken many lovely words, – have freed them. Then do not faint with fear at the first ugly mirage that might show itself when you again mount your camel and go into the desert. The Words and Understanding that have gone before you have already devitalized it, – and you pass through.

You cannot miss anything that belongs to you and your kingdom. “Nothing happens but My LOVE allows.” It says NOTHING. Do you believe?

That the Bible is “not scientific”, as Mr. Arnold states, is proven in a thousand ways by Jesus. A Hindu fakir may be able to make a quick passage over burning coals, – but this is only a “stunt” and is not the manner in which Jesus did things. The human mind is ingenious and can simulate the Divine in an amazing degree, so that “even the elect are deceived”. You see the necessity, then, of watching and entering the fluidic state of mind.

“None of these things move me”, said Jesus. He knew what was behind every obstacle, even the crucifixion. “Nevertheless, – not my will be done.” According to the revelation of our Precious One, we are not here to experience a series of trials as something insurmountable, – but as a proof of the ONE Power. He went through the entire category of human evils so that we would not have to do the same. We are only now faintly beginning to understand this as something other than mere words.

And so the Prophet and his servant (your soul and you) are traveling along, – and the servant is afrighted by what he sees. “Look, – the way is blocked by a thousand warriors and chariots, – we are lost”. What could he do against such a picture of destruction? But the Prophet, that Soul of you which is always with you, has something to say. “Look again”, – and then the mountains are filled with Angels and the Power of the Lord.

“Those that are for us are more than they that be against us”. It is always that way. The recognition of the Presence always brings proof in a tangible and real form. You have only to “call upon ME”, and “I will save you”. But of course you have to believe before you can “call”.

Faith induced by fear is not very reliable, – but is better than none. Faith that is the result of the acceptance of God in your heart as real is a sure fool-proof way of being saved from the evils.

On the surface of the clear pool, Narcissus saw his own beautiful face and fell in love with it, thinking perhaps it was a beautiful water-nymph. But he died awaiting her materialization. All he would have had to do to have discovered the truth would have been to adjust his position.

You can look through fate and see your Divine destiny, if you make the adjustment. Where does the reflected picture go, – and what was it in the first place?

And so the obstacle or the ugly picture of disease that seems so real needs only a slight adjustment to cause it to vanish. The leprous flesh becomes clean and white. You need not go anywhere to make the adjustment, – nor do you need outside help.

“Man born of woman is of few days and full of trouble”, – and he functions through one evil picture of fate after another until he makes the discovery, “Call no man your Father, – for ONE, God, is your Father”. This recognition disintegrates the “fate” and “karma” pictures inherited from the “Adam” father, – and frees you into the “Divine Destiny” inheritance of “God, the Father”.

And so, every time the distressing “just missing the plane” takes place, and you have blessed the situation, and likewise taken your blessing from it, you will join with Keats in the soul song,” Then felt I like some watcher of the skies When a new planet swims into his ken.” Rejoice and be glad! “I have overcome the world” of belief, – overcome it by resisting not, but at the same time resisting the temptation to accept it as something real. Everything is working together for the good of those who love the Lord.

THE DREAM

I dreamed I was standing on a street corner, and saw a man struck down by a passing motor-car. I ran to him, and began wondering how I could best help him. For some time I went through the motions of ordinary emergency thinking. I called “Help,” and began lifting him up and examining the nature of his injury. All this time it seemed very real to me. I think I even suffered a little to see the pained expression on his face. People began to run towards us, and one of them said, “It is no use; he is past help.” Something in that phrase awakened me, so to speak – I remembered that I had the power to call upon the Lord, and have Him answer. “Call upon ME in the day of trouble, and I will answer you.”

I immediately “spoke the word,” but, instead of helping the man, I awakened myself. It had all been a dream, and of course there was no accident, nor injured man to assist, or to heal. All that was necessary was for me to awaken, and find that the whole picture had been a miasma of the human mind. I could not have done anything for the man I saw run down in my dream. There was no possibility of my helping him. It all seemed rather ridiculous, when I thought of it, that I should have tried to help a dream man who had been hit by a dream car, and who had sustained a dream accident – and yet, while I was gazing upon it all, it seemed real enough.

The interesting point to be considered was the fact that the moment I “REMEMBERED” my Father, at that instant, the manifestation of evil was revealed as non-existent. It had never existed anywhere but in my human thought. It called to mind the fact that the Prodigal, sitting in his filth, had only to remember his father to instantly make the dream, which had become so real to him, disappear.

When I thought over the dream and the awakening, I seemed to recall to mind that every time I had dreamed of trying to help anyone with the Truth, it had immediately awakened me. I presume we could say quite definitely that the application of the Truth had been eminently successful; that the spoken word had been fulfilled, since that which had seemed to be had been wiped out of the picture.

This process of AWAKENING to the REALITY of Being when we pray is what is promised by Jesus Christ. “Awake, thou that sleepest.” We are asleep when we accept the human dream as real, and we immediately “run to help,” and proceed, along material lines, to do what we can. True Prayer would simply awaken us to the true state of Life, wherein evil does not exist. That is precisely what happened with the cripple at the Temple gate. A moment before, he was held fast by the dream of the human belief, and then he was awakened. This awakening we may chose to call healing; or we may like better to say it is “The Revelation,” since nothing happens, because that which is shown forth is too quick to happen. The human mind has not sufficient power or speed to function so rapidly. It appears suddenly, and the body that has been bound by the dream of years, instantly is freed into glorious power and health. The dream of forty years is no stronger than the dream of five moments. Because you had been caught in the web of human dream, and seemed to intensify it by trying to rid yourself of it, or by gazing upon it, does not argue one iota for its obstinacy, or its reality. “Call upon me, and I WILL answer.” I will without doubt.

Do you begin to see something? Do you begin to see that the man in the dream is not healed, but that the whole dream is wiped out of your mind by an actual awakening? Do you begin to see that we are not in the business of healing a reality called sickness, sin, or lack, but that we are in the process of REMEMBERING to CALL upon ME, and that this very remembrance does not change the dream, but actually eliminates it by revealing the reality of life? That is why it can happen in the “twinkling of an eye.” That is why it can come through into expression “by a way ye know not of.” Imagine a man crippled for forty years; imagine what a physical change would have to take place to be able to see him, instantly in perfect, radiant health, running, leaping and praising God.

The moment we take our attention away from the appearance we place it on the Father, upon whom we are invited to CALL, with sure and certain success. The moment you call you will be awakened to the fact that there was nothing to be healed and you will perceive the Son of the Living God revealed in all His perfection. It is Wonderful! Wonderful! Wonderful! Heaven and earth are full of the Lord. “Awake, thou that sleepest,” awake to the glorious truth that you are seeing the evil in a dream, and that you can best help the situation by calling upon this POWER and turning your attention away from the appearance.

Of course, many will say that this is just an illustration, but many will also arise and testify to the fact that they have actually had awakening from a consciousness dream, just as suddenly and as perfectly as the awakening from the dream of sleep. It is Wonderful!

Whatever of evil you are experiencing is the hypnosis of the dream, or belief, in a power apart from God, and it is the return to ONENESS which awakens you from your belief. A belief is all you could possibly get rid of. You surely cannot get rid of anything that is real, since the real is eternal and fadeth not away.

“Heaven and earth shall pass away, but My WORD shall remain for ever.” The heaven and earth that the human thought may have created out of its limited beliefs may pass away (in fact, you have a different idea of heaven now than you had as a child), but the glorious POWER of the WORD shall not pass away. It is eternally being fulfilled.

“God spake and it was done.” There is an air of finality about this. No question about the results. No one imagines that after God spake, some human belief spake, or put in an argument against the “God spake.” There is a consciousness that comes with it that is final, and makes you know that, no matter what man says, or argues, or tries to prove, when “God spake” it was done, and there is no further question about it. It is just this God spake idea that functions through us when we begin to accept the Power of God. “I will walk in you and talk in you.” What is meant by that? Does it mean that this “God spake” power is going to talk in you and not be all-powerful? Is your peevish little personality, with its negative beliefs about itself, going to interpose a word which will off-set the “God spake”? You answer that. What do you think? “God spake and it was done,” and there is no “maybe” about it. “Let there be light, and there was light.” This was before the appearance of sun or moon. All this beautiful symbology is given for the purpose of recognizing “that something” which goes beyond the human teaching and reasoning and causes you to experience the Power of this “God spake.” The Voice of God, ringing through the Universe, does not take dictation from man, whose findings are all wrong, and without foundation. No matter if these findings have functioned for a thousand years in a given way. Either God IS stronger than your belief about Him, or else He is nothing. “Awake, thou that sleepest, and Christ shall give thee light”; and that is exactly what you do when you pray. You awake from the dismal belief in evil, either in yourself or another.

“My word shall not return unto Me void, but shall accomplish whereunto it is sent.” Do you hear the finality if this statement? It does not say perhaps or maybe, it distinctly states, “My WORD shall NOT return unto ME void, but SHALL accomplish whereunto it is sent.” And this is the Word of God, not the word of some teacher, lecturer, book, or organization. It is the “God spake” word, which is the light of Revelation, which reveals that the perfect creation of God is for ever intact. “Before ye call, I will answer.” It is all Wonderful! “Be still, and know that I AM God”; and then LET that mind be in you which functioned in the man Jesus, and the “God spake” will happen, in and through you. This word of God will awaken you from the dream of evil in your conscious world, just as, when you pray in your dream, it immediately awakens you to the truth about the situation.

It is glorious to know that the days of the hard taskmaster are over – that “NOW” [at this instant of recognition] are we the sons of God.” The hard taskmaster is the personality, with its beliefs in birth, family, nationality, education, breeding, etc. As long as you are identified with these limiting beliefs, you must take on the nature of them, and go down under them. “Call no man your father” does not make you an orphan, but it gives you freedom to recognize your true Parent, God. All the limitations you took on in the dream – that you were “born in sin and conceived in iniquity”; that you were a creation of the dust, and must return to it; and that you must gain your living by the sweat of your brow – give way before the Revelation of your true heritage as the Son of the Living God, Joint-heir with Jesus. It is Wonderful! Do you begin to see and feel the glorious awakening that is even now taking place within you?

“Awake, thou that sleepest and Christ shall give thee light.” Awake from the dead beliefs that have hypnotized you so long. Turn your attention away from the man in the dream and his supposed injuries, and “call upon ME and I will answer you.” It is glorious. “God spake” – and surely the Voice speaking through you, when you pray in this fashion, is the Voice of God.

Jesus recognized the dream state, and in one instance, when told of death, said, “The maid is not dead, but sleepeth. I go to awaken her” (awaken her to the reality of Life, awaken her from the deaths of beliefs). “The dead shall hear My voice and arise.”

The God spake is the WORD which awakens man from the hypnosis of human beliefs, and brings him back into alignment with Life Eternal. “This IS life eternal, to know ME.” The Voice of God speaking through you will make the un-manifest manifest. “I AM the resurrection and the LIFE; though a man were dead, yet shall he live.” If a man were actually dead, in the sense that the human mind interprets the word (the end of all things), then could he be made alive?

The Voice of God, the (God spake and it was done) WORD, is spoken through the temple of your body. It brings the floods of light, and makes as naught the dreams of fear disease and death. It searches the joints and marrow, and goes into the hidden places. It is wonderful, the God spake WORD, speaking itself into expression by the power of awakening the sleeping senses. “Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee.” The Glory of this “God spake” Word is risen upon you and has awakened you from the dream of human belief. In a twinkling the picture of evil disappears, disintegrates, and goes into nothingness.

“He watching over Israel neither slumbers nor sleeps.” The God spake” Voice in the midst of thee is never off duty, and is instantly available. “Cal upon Me in the day of trouble and I WILL answer.”

THE ELIXIR of LIFE

OLD MADAME GAUNEE was in a pensive mood. We sat in her clean little peasant hut before a blazing fire. It was cold outside but there was plenty of cheer within as the light from the great open fireplace made huge black shadows do fantastic dances on the white walls. She stirred, from time to time, the ragout that was boiling in the iron pot hanging over the flames. When she raised the lid of the pot, the place was flooded with a savory odor as sweet to the nose as music is to the ear. It filled the mind with all sorts of joyous anticipations and made for contentment.

The husky, deep voice of Madame Gaunee startled me. When Madame talked at all -which was rare- she had something to say. She had a peculiar habit of appearing to talk to herself when addressing anyone. She was a woman of the soil, bent with labor and weather-beaten with the sun and wind. Life had taken on a simplicity with her which was disarming to most people. Madame Gaunee dealt in facts. Her daughter, Eloise, had just left us -distressed because her young husband had displeased her. Madame sat silent during her entire visit, and now that she was gone, she spoke -half musing- half as if addressing herself: “Yonder in the Auvergnes lived, years ago, Old Pere La Pre. He had all the secrets of nature and some of the wisdom of God stored away in his old wrinkled head. He knew herbs and how to compound elixirs and philosophy. How long he had lived in the deep ravine of the foot-hills, no one seemed to know, nor where he came from. He seemed to be a part of the whole thing. Young and old alike came to him with their problems, and he usually sent them away healed and helped.

“One day a young wife, sorely troubled, approached his hut and spoke to him. ‘Good-morrow, Pere La Pre. I am wretched. My husband makes life so difficult for me. He is so quarrelsome and argues from the moment he arrives here at night until he leaves for work in the morning. Life has become unbearable with his scolding. Can you give me a charm to cure him?’

“The old Father La Pre smiled at her. ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘I have the very thing – an Elixir which will so transform your husband you will hardly know him, and the beautiful part of it all is that he will not know it is being used on him’. He went into his little workshop and amid bottles and tubes, – he fumbled about and finally came forth with a vial of clear fluid. He shook it well and looked at it through the light.’ Yes, that will do’, he said, handing the woman the bottle. ‘Shake this bottle well to-night and when you see your husband coming home from work, take a tablespoonful of the liquid and hold it in your mouth for twenty minutes-then swallow. Do this every night until the bottle is empty.

“Months passed, and one day the young wife appeared at the door of his hut again. She was radiant and said ‘Good-morrow, good Father. The battle is empty and I have come to tell you how it has changed my husband from a devil into a saint. It has worked a wonderful charm on him. Now then, tell me what the wonderful Elixir contains, so that I may never be without it’.

“‘My daughter,’ said the old Father, ‘the Elixir which cured your quarrelsome husband was just ordinary water’. He smiled at her. ‘It takes two to make a quarrel – it takes two to make in harmony of any kind’.

“There must have been a twinkle in his eye, waiting to see perhaps if the idea had sunk into her consciousness. ‘Yes, it takes two to make trouble. Remember, daughter, there is plenty of water in the world and it is a sure cure for quarreling husbands’.”

ENTER

“Enter into thy closet, and …. shut thy door.” Michelangelo sometimes sat before a canvas days before he made a stroke upon it, and then it happened. The picture virtually painted itself, using his hands as a means of expression. Jesus said: “It is done” before it was started. This recognition took care of it all. We have endowed the body with intelligence so that it can destroy itself, while protesting violently about its suffering.

In all expressions of life, we find success at the place of complete relaxation. When the body is stilled and Mind is allowed to come through without taking thought, the perfect combination takes place. Marriage–that which God has joined together takes place and nothing can or will separate it. You do not need to think what you shall say – open your mouth and I will speak the words – “Take no thought how or what ye shall speak: for it shall be given you in that same hour”-and so it is, when the complete surrender of the body, temple, is made to the Christ mind within. It is then that Jesus appears to be performing miracles, yet all that is happening is taking place through HIM, and not because of him. “I can of mine own self do nothing” – that is precisely the level man must enter when he makes the appropriation of the Christ Mind. The automatic action of the Christ will cause the Jesus to apparently perform miracles. He will set aside the laws of his world with impunity, without struggle or fight. He will walk through stone walls, and know why water cannot quench him nor flames bum; for the consciousness of that which is before both flame and water takes from the manifestation the supposed power. “I say to this man, Go, and he goeth: and to another, Come, and he cometh.” It is Authority of the ONE that accomplishes without effort.

Rousseau, the French philosopher, maintained that thinking is a disease – and intellect is a treacherous thing to be avoided. It all seems mere words until we see into what paths we have been lead by thinking. What, then, is it that functions over the mechanism of the body and produces such wonders? It is the Mind of God – which has picked up the power operating in human thinking and turned it free into revelation and majesty. What we call LIFE is actually God – the Presence functioning within us–and if we make the recognition of this Presence we see why he advised not to count the soldiers – and not to look to appearances for anything other than illusion. Matter becomes inert to the degree it lacks the infusion of Light. It thereby obstructs the free flow of the Light. Matter is perpetually dying – disintegrating and falling into its native dust to be reshapen – and unless it is held in place by consciousness, it disappears entirely. To be absent from the body and present with the Lord – is to become more and more unconscious of manifestation, and more conscious of Life which completely dominates and operates it.

Michelangelo said: “One paints not with the hands but with the mind.” This could be carried on farther until you can understand the action of the power of God through the temple to any degree necessary to complete the reign of harmony. To take from matter the intelligence is being absent from it – and it is then that the complete change takes place – the revelation is made of Life – and the Lazarus comes forth in all his perfection and beauty. Gradually, we leave the answer – we begin to see with GRACE that history as expressed by Rousseau, is “the art of choosing from among many lies, that one which most resembles the truth.” We try to find in the bushels of chaff some grain of truth – failing in this we reshapen the old worn-out material to suit the present concept of truth.

All the evils of life come from a belief in two – a consciousness of duality. The moment the stagnant air of a cave contacts the outside air, it is purified of all its extraneous matter. When man returns to the Father, he blends into LIFE and all the limitations of health disappear automatically. Any time you touch the ONE, you lose the duality that is causing all the trouble. No matter what its name, symptoms, or race consciousness belief-it is dissolved and that which caused it is reduced to nothingness. Do you see then what might have happened if Jesus had chosen to call forth the twelve legions of angels? He who persists in recognizing evil will do one of two things: he will go with it, or be destroyed by it.

“I can do all things through Christ.” Can you?

THE EVIDENCE

Nothing is lost because it disappears any more than anything is lost when the reflection in a mirror is no more. Nothing was given by the reflector, regardless of the number of reflections cast by it. The minute the reflector is taken away, all the images pass from view, because they have nothing upon which to sustain themselves. No invisible means of support in themselves.

So with money. The moment the consciousness of substance is taken away, money disappears or becomes worthless – yet if all the money in the world were destroyed, not one jot or tittle of SUBSTANCE would be lost. Immediately a new symbol would appear – the value of which would be affixed by the human mind. Again, consciousness and manifestation are one.

We glimpse the infinitude of God, and how it is that the things prepared for us are but states of consciousness into which we enter and find them functioning automatically. The moment this takes place, we discover it has always been – and automatically all that belongs on that level of light is ours for the accepting. Not the grabbing or the demonstration, but the accepting. To whatever level we are lifted in consciousness, we experience every bit of manifestation on that level. “Not by might, nor by power – but by MY SPIRIT.”

You enter consciousness at the same time it enters you and automatically you become it. Having absorbed the substance of consciousness, it is incorporated within you as surely as a chick consumes the last vestige of the egg from which it is hatched and breaks the shell. From one “mansion” to another – finally you approximate the inner seeing of which Jesus made such good use. The gaze ceases to be outward and turns within to the eternal realities of your being. These are the pictures that are projected on the screen.

Mr. Kellogg, the famous Bird Man, had the power gained through his early association with the American Indians to make an inaudible sound seven octaves higher than any man is capable of hearing. This was not in the form of exhalation of the breath – but rather a sudden and short intake of air. He then performed this intake, and instantly a row of candles at the end of the hall, a distance of fifty feet, snuffed out. He could not explain the “breath” as he called it – but had so many uses of it that were strange to man. Turning on the ignition in my car, he made the inaudible sound and turned the motor over without stepping on the starter. His reputation has been so well established in America, it needs no argument to substantiate it. You are inbreathed by the Breath of Life, or are you?

The wonder of the intake is it links itself into the “breathing into” instead of out of. “The Lord God breathed into his nostrils the breath of Life: and man became a living soul.” The breath entering from the God Consciousness is what made the soul ALIVE. A word so inbreathed with the inaudible sound becomes the “still small voice” of POWER which accomplished where the shouting voice of so-called “Truth” is naught but sounding brass and tinkling cymbals.

Suddenly, you appropriate this capacity and see the wonders it performs when you accept a state of consciousness instead of trying to create it, by taking thought.

Can you then “BE STILL” and let go of the thrashing about with words, systems, affirmations – and recognize that henceforth YOU, yes, you ARE THE TRUTH? Everything that emanates from this recognition is sure of fulfillment. The WORD OF GOD, being Spirit, cannot return unto you void – it SHALL accomplish. It is wonderful! John saw a NEW HEAVEN descending out of the clouds of human thought, appearing before him with all its beauty – and so will you.

All the wonderful laws given by Jesus came to life when inbreathed with pure recognition and have a body through which to function. In the twinkling of an eye all shall be changed, because the new vision sees through the mystification of human thought, however time honored and established. You have the inaudible breath of God and utter the unutterable word (for those who have ears). “Heretofore ye have asked for nothing” because you asked for everything. You thought asking was a form of begging or trying to influence God to do your bidding. Remember you are inbreathed; – you are a LIVING SOUL. The paralyzed hand can neither take nor give, as far as physical action is concerned – neither can the human consciousness of evil and good take anything of God.

Touching the CONSCIOUSNESS causes the symbolical world in which you have been day-dreaming all these years to take on reality – and you, with John, see A NEW HEAVEN, and hence a NEW EARTH appears. You are through with repetitious words with “aphorisms uncoiling like serpents,” getting nowhere.

EXCEPT..

“EXCEPT ye become as a little child ye shall in no wise enter the Kingdom of Heaven.” The statement is exact, uninvolved, and leaves no loophole of personal interpretation through which you could edge your way. Except ye become as a little child — and by no other means — can you enter.

Adulterers are barred from the Kingdom — only the adult can commit adultery. Throwing up a camouflage of misinterpretation, man tries to believe that the word adultery has solely to do with sex, but in reality this is the least adultery he can commit. His constant adulterating. the word of life, and placing before others a thousand and one fears, lies, and beliefs founded on the false senses, is the wholesale adultery which keeps him out, and which made Jesus sweep the whole thing into the hell of purification to be burned up.

The old adulterous intellect raises its great, erudite, many-headed mind and explains that it cannot become a child; it is physically and mentally impossible. Yet, at another moment, this same one is quoting glibly, “Nothing is impossible to God.”

“Which things are an allegory,” put near the close of the Bible, speaks volumes for those who have ears and eyes to hear and see what the Scriptures have to say unto the temple – the Churches – your bodies.

When you are “clean” you have become as a child, as far as the illustration has any benefit to you. Becoming as a child and becoming a child are two different things. Becoming as a child is to suddenly possess yourself of the most powerful weapons against the relative world. Weapons — invisible, inaudible, having capacities undreamed or unmeasured by the adulterous world of fear, limitation, greed, and evil.

The adulterous breath of the “man whose breath is in his nostrils” breathes his fear, disease, and belief in evil over the whole of creation. “Too good to be true” “as for man, his days are full of trouble” “when I would do good I do evil” — “something might happen,” and in a thousand other ways he adulterates life. He has been wandering up and down in the universe of belief and founded all his false teaching upon these false premises, which have now become such a giant of strength that he is threatened and finally overcome by this terrible self-created thing. No wonder he cannot inherit the Kingdom of Heaven.

When he becomes as a child, he is unconsciously working from the basis of Christ mind. He does not have to see to believe. He can accept his good without question. He will stretch forth his hand and make the gesture when the opportunity is presented to him. He will not try to figure it out by the limitations of the sense mind. “Nothing is too good to happen or to be true.” “Yesterday is done with at sundown” – a new day, full of joys and possibilities, is ever with him.

Jesus, trying every way to make a complete differentiation between the adulterous thinking of the conscious mind and the pure Christ mind as represented by the child, used these simple illustrations for those who had eyes. The child having the capacity to accept its good, does not find it necessary to construct out of thinking, its good. The Father Christmas idea is accepted, and is, as far as the conscious thinking is concerned, suspended in mid-air on a thread of imagination, but it works for the child up to the moment that reason enters.

The old adulterous mind immediately marshals its intellect and comes forward with the trite words, “Who wants to believe in such tosh? And who wants to be a child?”

There is nothing said about your becoming a child — it says as a child. This becoming as a child is leagues away from the coy, Pollyanna sense of sweetness that many people associate with it. “He that hath eyes, let him see” — let him take from the plethora of words and symbols the grain of Truth which will help him enter into his own, which will help him to go in and possess the land (state of consciousness).

“Awake, thou that sleepest, and Christ shall give thee light.” It is wonderful how the simple things of Jesus are shedding the light on the new cycle of spirituality, which is even now descending upon the earth and is showing, by its radiance, the nothingness of the adultery of he intellect and reason.

“Except ye become as a little child ye shall in nowise enter the Kingdom of Heaven” is stated again in the simple words of Jesus when he asked, each time before he rent the veils of human belief, “Believest thou this?” — “Believest thou that I am able to do this?” And if you cannot answer yea to this, you can no more see the power of the Presence communicating its manifestation to you and through you than the child can materialize his Father Christmas. It is one and the same thing. It is no more fantastic for prayer to produce a well body, than it is for the child to produce a rotund man whose chief role in life is to supply the wants of childhood freely. Both of them have to emanate from the same source — they must be “believed in.” Note that the “belief” required is not credulity, it is not faith, in the generally accepted sense of the word; it is a pure acceptance of the whole finished thing and a permitting the manifestation or embodiment to take place in its own good time.

The Power does not come forth at a moment you are thinking about it; on the contrary, “I come at a moment you think not”; “I come as a thief in the night,” etc. He who has ears, let him hear. Let him awake to the simplicity of the Christ teaching so uninvolved by the trappings of man. Throw all the interpretations of the word of God to the wind and go again to the fountain of Life and drink of the living waters and it will water you with revelation undreamed of.

“If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God.” Do you hear? Do you believe? Can you stand on the instructions of Jesus Christ instead of the words of a man who has followed” “Wilt thou be made clean” from the adulterous thought which causes you to follow a man, or organized collection of by-laws trying to see what you should do or not do in regard to your approach to God? “Come out from among them and be ye separate.” Running to a little person, no matter however swollen with human success, to find out what God can and will do for you is the committing of the adultery which makes it impossible for you to enter.

“Ye shall in no wise” is a pretty hard law — there is no leniency in it; it requires just that and it must be fulfilled. Why wait longer on the leprous thought which tries to make you pay tribute to a person? If Jesus could not be called “good,” why will you rush about calling another good? Awake and arise from the dead thoughts, and Christ shall give thee light – illumination and the child-like qualities which will cause Heaven to appear here and now.

It is wonderful the many new and marvelous laws that come into play when you become as a little child. There is the law of trust — such a dangerous thing to the adult, having proven such a broken reed. There is the law of confidence, even in the face of no prospects. There is superhuman action of the Automatic Power which the child can accept. He can believe that “a day will come” or a thing will or can happen in some perfectly mysterious way, and then let it rest without trying to destroy it by dissecting it with the human doubt and curiosity.

This is a stubborn problem. This is a hard thing to meet. This has never been met before, etc. The adultery of conscious thinking denying the Christ constantly and then complaining when its prayers are not answered.

“Come unto me, all ye ends of the earth, and be ye saved.” Do you hear” That means you, even though you are so holy now that you just glisten with your knowledge of truth and truth movements, and though you are recommended, and all that. You have a chance to be saved from the awful adultery of your spiritual pride, just the same as the thing lying in the gutter all covered with the mud of mistakes and the flowers, ineffective mantle of your holiness. You have a chance, no matter where you stand – the invitation is for you if you have come to that child-like quality that can take that which is offered it. Remember that a thousand years is as yesterday in My sight. “Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow.” You have a good Chance to “come unto Me.”

Yes, beloved! A thousand years is as yesterday, so, in reality, it is just two days ago that Jesus spoke in Jerusalem. Pretty close, isn’t it? Yes, it is even closer than that. That which spoke through Jesus is even at this instant speaking through you. Yes, aren’t you glad it is speaking through you in the inner recesses of your being? Telling you things – live things, pulsating things, with the spirit intact, instead of dead, tired repetitions of another. “Come unto Me, all ye ends of the earth, and be ye saved.”

“What ! Know ye not that ye are the Temple of the Living God?” The surprise in that one word “What!” is enough to make the whole temple quake with the coming of the Lord. The sudden recognition of this fact does away, once and for always, with the stupid notion that you are a reflection which has nothing in itself but shadow and light. You are the Temple of the living God. Do you note the word living? What do you suppose it means — living? Think about it for the moment and then will you understand what it means to “search the joints and marrow,” and all the “quickening” power of the Spirit within which is so sharp and quick and so able to divide asunder.

“What!” Haven’t you found it out yet that your body is the Temple of the living God, and that He is in the midst of you and is strong and mighty” “What?” Are you going to let some adulterer take the possibility of this Presence away from you to put it through a lot of human teaching and learning?

“What!” Know ye not? You do not know that the Temple of God is with man? It already is with man, and that is the reason for man. Man-I-festation is the body of God. Without this manifestation He would be unexpressed, unknown, unusable, unreal just as electricity remained an unknown quantity until it was embodied. But it had to be recognized as existing first before it could be brought forth.

Do you begin to understand, then, why such a command, “Go into a certain city and a man will show YOU to an upper chamber” is possible? The Temple is all over the universe, and when you begin to understand the “Body” of God is not a fleeting reflection, but a reality which instantly responds when you call upon the Power within, you can see how it is possible to “go into all the world,” for you will find the Temple, and when you call upon the Power within, you will suddenly see its darkness flash forth the light and show you the way. It is wonderful how the dark crannies and hidden passages flood a light abroad and reveal hidden talents and possibilities.

Every man is the Temple of the Living God — and when you begin to sense this you will see how God can speak to you through anything. It is only when you break down the silly personal idea that just “some” men are the temple and that just “some” men have the word that you begin to find out that the “earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof.” And also the glorious statement, “Heaven and earth are full of thee,” comes to life. What does it matter what the opinion of this or that “wise head” may be? You are hidden with Christ, in God — where that teaching, with its noisy words and systems of ideas, fades out into nothingness.

No wonder, then, that you can go — you will find the embodiment everywhere, even in the bush by the wayside, and so the fear of life flees away and you are wayfaring into Heaven here and now.

“Even if you slay me, yet will I say that you are God” is an intense dramatic moment in the life of one who is finding God to be something that was not invented in the last hundred years, with all the nineteenth-century wrappings of personal teachings.

“What!” Know ye not that your body is the Temple of the Living God?

You are not a hard, cold channel or avenue for the Truth — you are permeated by the word of God, and it can no more be separated from you than the yeast can be taken out of bread. The two have become one. “I and my father are one.” Not maybe nor perhaps or because you have prayed, but because that is the nature of God and His manifestation.

“Now ye are the Body of Christ”; “For we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones.” What plainer statement do you want? “Destroy this body — temple — and in three days I will raise it up.” Gradually we are beginning to understand the word and the surprise in the statement, “What! Know ye not that ye are the Temple of the Living God?” – and by the child-like understanding of the Wisdom of God do you enter in and possess the land — consciousness — which is sworn unto you as your birthright.

FATHER DIVINE

“What Went Ye Out for to See – A Man ?”

Can you imagine the excitement that reigned in the little town of Samaria when the woman returned from the well and said:

“Come and see a man, which told me all things that ever I did; is not this the Christ ?”

“Come ! see a man who is doing the works of the Master; is healing the sick, opening the eyes of the blind, supplying food, shelter and raiment freely; has no new creed, no new system, or church to found. Yes, all this right here in our present day; in this materialistic age; right on the very doorstep of the hub of the universe – New York.”

And so they came in great waves; came to see, to hear and to partake. A thousand gradations of human thought rushed in to “have a look.” A thousand gradations of human thought rushed away to place its interpretation on what it had experienced.

Hundreds daily sat down to a banquet that would have caused the average Continental chef endless planning and trouble. Banquets followed one after the other without the slightest stir or confusion. The only confusion that existed in the household was that which was brought there by the onlookers. Miracle followed miracle, and all wondered.

“Everyman” had on a thousand robes – he was playing every part. There was the little “Everyman” who at once understood everything that Father said, and spent the time setting everybody right. There was the cunning “Everyman” who lay low and watched, and checked against everything to see if she could explain that it would have happened anyway. She was protecting the weak sisters and brothers, who might be misled. There must have been some such a person at the arm of Jesus when he was feeding the multitudes, peeping down his sleeves to see if there were not flour and water, hidden there out of which he made the bread he was giving the hungry.

There was “Everyman” who had proved the power for herself, and knew Whereof she spoke, who went out to see what it was all about; hadn’t she been able to demonstrate the power …. hadn’t she been able to always make the “street-car” be at the corner the moment she arrived ?

Aren’t we funny ? Surely you are going to say yes ! to that ? We are eternally looking for the way out of the human dilemma, and the moment anything comes along that looks as though it were a possible way of escape, we immediately want to make it conform to the laws of the human mind. We are all the same in this respect. We are “Everyman,” and it is not with any malice or criticism that I list the various specimens that followed the exciting invitation, “Come and see a man.” Most of us go out with exactly that idea in mind – we “Come to see the MAN.”

How very disappointing. The man may look like anything. He may belong to any race – he may not conform to any of the idea., you have had in mind. I suppose a Chinaman would like to see a Confucius, and Hindu would be looking for a Buddha, and so on. When we go out to see a MAN We usually see a MAN, and we disobey the teaching of the Master “What went ye out for to see? A man?”

The looms of human conversation, imagination, exaggeration, ran back and forth – words, words, words – repeated, enlarged, stretched beyond all recognition, flew back and forth, weaving a flimsy fabric of fantasy, as a great army of talkers started in the age-old habit of building the Tower of Babel. All talking the same language at first, but presently no two of them speaking in the same tongue. And the only note of harmony that kept breaking through the whole mass of human talk was the startling and glorious word of the Father,” It is WONDERFUL.”

And so the Tower fell, and great was the fall thereof.

“I AM the voice of one crying in the wilderness prepare ye the way of the Lord.”

But it seemed at first as though “The zeal of thine house has eaten me up.” The confusion and excitement of having seen a sign or having heard of someone who had seen sign, ate up the “omer of Manna”, and one was left alone in the desert of confusion; alone in a wilderness of opinions and beliefs.

And only the glorious word remained, “It is WONDERFUL.”

The first great wave broke on the sands , and left behind it a rare collection of things from the deep.

“There is therefore no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walketh not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.”

And the first and glorious word Sounded a hundred per cent like Jesus’ words: “Blessings, blessings, blessings, so many you cannot count them, to you, to me, to everybody ; To all those who have misunderstood and misinterpreted the Words Spoken here. It is wonderful . Nothing has happened but my Love has allowed.”

Day after day the Father sat and dispensed the glorious knowledge of the Kingdom as Here and Now, and spoke of the power of the I AM, and time after time he explained that the I AM was Universal and Infinite, and that all had the right to enjoy it.

“It is not necessary that you see Me personally, for I AM here, I AM there, I AM everywhere. I AM a present help. I do not give absent treatments, for I A M everywhere.

You do not need to follow Me personally, but if you are going to go away from here, claiming that God is everywhere, and then follow after another Man or teaching, I say it is better for you to follow Me.”

Regardless of how many times Father made it plain that the I AM was Universal – here, there and everywhere, it seemed to be necessary to make this explanation every time the I AM was mentioned, or else “Everyman” took offense and reiterated the age-old saying, “He made himself as God.”

Why should He not make himself as God, if He were made by God and moulded out of the substance of God, in the image and likeness of God ? Is there anything strange in that? Yes, there is the strange hypnotism of the human thought that is struggling to free itself, and at the same time trying to lug into the new heaven all its former baggage.

“Only believe and thou shalt be saved” is entirely too simple. The wise “Everyman” cannot bow to such simplicity.

And so the tales of “Everyman” ran wild.

When Father therefore said : ” I will keep your souls, and even if your bodies leave Me I shall hold your souls and you will have to return to Me, “Everyman” got afraid – he heard something personal and imagined that he was being held against his will. He did not stop for a moment to realize that the Voice through the Ages had spoken the same words. Your Soul has always been with God, and your body has been wandering through the desert of human thinking. What is so strange about the fact that that which is born of Spirit is Spirit, and dwells eternally with the Spirit, and what is so strange in the statement, and the promise that the Prodigal Everyman” shall return to his Father’s house?

The great power of keeping the personal separate from the Impersonal was not used, and “Everyman” actually imagined that Father wanted to hold them against their will. Had they stopped for one moment to ask themselves WHY ? they would have seen how ridiculous this piece of imagination was. Father Divine, who asked nothing of any man, and gave all, could fill any place he entered with people who were willing and ready to follow after the glorious Impersonal teaching of the Christ. He had no need to hold on to a few souls. Isn’t it wonderful when you think of it. He asked nothing of anybody and gave all. Doesn’t it sound like the wonderful way of Jesus. He asked nothing and offered all.

“Everyman” came with the story that all their life they had wanted to have the time to learn of this glorious truth, but the question of earning a daily living was always in the way, and Father so graciously and beautifully said to these, “Come, eat and drink without price.” Just what they had they wanted? But was this what they had wanted? Yes, with reservations. No sooner had they entered into this new order of things than the discipline and order that was necessary began to bother them. “I think it should be done this way or that way or some other way from what it is being done.” Aren’t we funny? You and I ? Did we ever hear the word “Patience must have her perfect work ” – yes, we have heard it, but before it has time to work we are going to help it along with a few personal ideas. And so “Everyman” began to find all sorts of faults and conditions that he would change.

One little “Everyman,” who had no-one or nothing to be separated from, complained that Father was separating people ! that he advocated leaving all relations, etc. “Let the dead bury their dead, follow thou Me,” is but the slightest request of the Master, whom this little “Everyman” believed in emphatically. It was but a reiteration of the teaching of Jesus, when he said that a man having seen the Light would leave, family, houses, lands, all and follow after that Light. Yet somehow that did not count – Jesus was after all an historical character, and his teaching was to be taken with reservations.

Yes, ‘”Everyman” is in reality afraid of the very thing he is seeking, because it begins to set aside all the cherished beliefs of his existence. Yet why is it we reiterate the words of Jesus over and over: “‘ The works that I do ye shall do also and even greater.” Do you begin to see that he who travels alone travels far ? Isn’t it wonderful ?

People who went to Father’s and enjoyed free board and room for months, came away saying that he had placed a curse upon them, and that he was breaking up homes and families, and this was especially strange since these very persons had neither home nor family to be broken up. When the human mind cannot have its way, it will try anything to get into the limelight again. But all the time Father smiled pleasantly and said, “Bless them.” What a blessing it must have been!

Hundreds of people partook of the wonderful banquets at Father’s freely, partook of the instructions freely, partook of lodging freely, and then imagined that they were being coerced into following after Father. And all the time Father gave freely, and showed them that which he said he would show, “the miracle of the loaves and the fishes.” And those that had eyes saw and understood, and knew that at last the Truth had come within the vision of our day.

The very people who glory in the stories of Daniel in the Lion’s Den, and the disciples in prison, were the first to broadcast, with “childlike” simplicity and hidden wiseness, Father Divine is in jail, I can not understand it.” Yet these very souls imagine that they would have been the faithful attendants, waiting outside the prison-house to serve the disciples. Do you suppose there was any more worldly honour attached to going to jail then, than now?

“Nothing has happened but my love allows,” said Father, as he submitted to the human law, in order that he could give a further concrete proof of the power to those who needed a further sign.

The proof was given, and in spite of all the efforts of the human mind, the doors sprang open and another legend had become a fact. Isn’t it wonderful.

“Awake thou that sleepest and Christ shall give thee Light.”

A little”Everyman, who was especially fond of saying “All things are possible to God,” came to me saying”Yes, but how could Father produce money – it would not be lawful.” And then with the wisdom of human ages twinkling in his eye, he added: “You see, there would be the serial number of the notes to be taken care of.” You see there would always be serial numbers to be taken care of for that human state of consciousness, and yet he kept on repeating, “Yes, all things are possible to God ” – but evidently there were some things that were not possible. Do you hear, do you see ? You who READ this line? “I have a way you know not of.” Has man, then, found something that God cannot do ? You answer for yourself.

When the old King in the Bible was told that he must be born again, he answered the same thing: “Yes, but what about the serial number” only he said, “Impossible, I cannot go through that re-borning process.” And so we find something else that God cannot do – and if we do not watch out, we will find that God cannot do anything, except what we can conceive of as possible for him to do. Isn’t it wonderful ?

The very idea of being born again would upset all the human laws about birth. Yea, that is just what the coming into contact with the Divine Law does, it upsets the human law and its way of thinking. Aren’t you glad ? “I shall overturn and overturn and overturn until He comes whose place it is to rule.” What are you going to do about it ? I think you had better be glad that there is something that can upset the old false standards and beliefs.

And so a lot of funny little souls who are like chameleons, in that they take on others thoughts, imagined they had been hurt by Father Divine, and people who had not been invited, or asked to come to his home, seemed to think they had missed the chance of going, and should accordingly be recompensed for having decided to go. And a great law was shown forth, and many were caught in the trap of not only accepting evil as real, but also assisting in passing on that which had been merely hear-say. It must have been difficult, after trying with such faithfulness to make evil real, to say in prayer “there is no evil.” Watch – Watch – Watch”

“Untouched in any way by all the talk,” Father’s work grew by leaps and bounds. New impetus having been given to it by the glorious proof of the Power. The weak sisters had fallen by the way, and made the ground ready for the souls that were prepared for the meat. Many a babe on a milk diet found the meat too strong, and retired to cut his teeth on something less solid. Isn’t it wonderful ?

“They laid every charge against him,” sounds like Scriptural language, but it is twentieth century journalism. “Everyman” came after a lifetime of mis-thinking – stumbling and falling on the way, seeking only the loaves and fishes, and when he found none, went stumbling away again, charging his broken-down condition to the teachings of Father.

One little “Everyman” told me she had established a Retreat, where the broken-down souls that had been hurt and torn by Father could find refuge and peace – yes, a place where the driftwood that had been broken on the sea of life might float in. I wonder what will be done with some of the funny little shells and bits that float on the tide from One beach to another ?

I suppose Jesus was blamed for the murder of all the babies that Herod caused to be destroyed, since the announcement of his birth was the cause of their death ? Isn’t it wonderful. You and “Everyman ” – are beginning to see a little, to recognize the falseness of the character with which we have been associated. We profess the Christ and go into ecstasies over His miracles, and yet we are so often caught trying to “slip up on Him,” as it were.

Beloved ! you can “slip up on Him” any time, and you will not find Him wanting – the glorious Impersonal Power that has come to us again has come through the avenue that was most fit and ready to express it. It is wonderful ?

The sport of the human mind is to make a Jesus and then crucify him. And the strange part about those who partake in the crucifixion is that they always come away from their ignoble work exclaiming that they are the ones that have been hurt.

One “Everyman,” who ran about saying that she “had given up everything to go to Father’s, and now she had nothing,” had asked me to pray for her, three months before, in order that she would not be dispossessed of her apartment.

Another “Everyman,” who ran about exploiting Father at one time, later ran about saying in her most sanctimonious tones: “I hope no one is going to ask me about Father Divine ” – letting those who heard draw their own conclusions.

The Romans had finally had their holiday, and after the noise and smoke of human opinion had cleared away, they found that the “sacrifice” had escaped them, and that the glorious echo of the Voice was still in evidence, and the undying word, “It is WONDERFUL,” still echoing in the land.

And so the command, “What went ye out for to see, a man or a principle ?” was again asked and the answer of the masses was “A principle.” And those who have been looking for a principle, have found a principle that is again showing forth the works that it came to show forth, and making it gloriously possible for us to enter into the New Day of realization. Kipling has said it was the, disciples and followers of Jesus that crucified him, and not the mad mob as was supposed And so it is – but what must be the feeling of those who imagined they were destroying a Messiah, to find that He had moved “untouched” through their hands ? And what must have been the amazement to find that He was still blessing them and breaking the bread for them. It is wonderful !

“What went ye out to see, a man or principle ?”

The glorious revelations of Father that have attracted even greater and greater masses of people than before, are put in the simple impersonal language that a child could understand, but the “Everyman” who wishes to distort their meaning will find the same old human equation in evidence.

Father is teaching the Here and Now of the Spiritual Universe. He is teaching the possibility of instantaneously entering into the Heritage of the Son of the Living God. He is teaching the blessings unlimited. He is teaching the one-ness of Jesus-Christ, the word made flesh. He is teaching the abundance and fullness of all that is needful – without price. He is teaching. It Is Wonderful.

“The abundance of the fullness of the consciousness of Good – no space is vacant of the fullness thereof.”

“You must live in accordance with the teachings of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.”

“You must call no man your Father.”

“You must be willing to accept your good here and now, as a reality and as a natural part of your universe.”

“You must enter into the joys of the Sons of God.”

“You must claim your right and press your claim as the Son of the Living God.”

“You must be glad, for you are in a NEW DAY.”

“Must accept the Presence of the Living God, and know that He lives, breathes, moves and has His being in you.”

It is wonderful ! wonderful ! wonderful ! And so are the glorious possibilities of your contacting Him, Here, There, Everywhere; at every place and every time. “Ask and ye shall receive” has again been made true – you will learn the glorious “open sesame” of “Thank you, Father,” because you are arriving at the point where you are transcending the human argument and reason, and are able to accept the inspired word of God as True. All you can do, then, is to say” Thank you, Father,” because before you even voice the idea, the answer is – and by the glorious revelation that we are now receiving we can prove this for ourselves. It is wonderful that “Everyman” is beginning to go out to see the Principle, and he is coming home filled and thrilled with the fulfillment of the Promises. It is wonderful ! wonderful ! wonderful !

The new way is opening before you – you are beginning to accept the words of the Master as True and without reservations. You are beginning to step out on the Promises of God. It is wonderful. “Be still and know” sets aside the human thinking, and makes you free to receive the laws which no human mind has yet stated – the laws of attainment and accomplishment which are unconditioned and free. Such is the gift that Father Divine has brought to us in the only Impersonal way since Jesus brought it. It is wonderful ! wonderful ! wonderful !

One “Everyman” asked another, “Well, if He does not want money, nor followers, and is not seeking to build a new movement, nor a church, what does He want ?” And the other answered: “He wants you to know your God-given heritage and He wants you to accept His glorious offer of Freedom, for He has said “You are not another but the same one – What I AM you are.” Could anything be more glorious, more free or more Wonderful?

(The quoted Italics are the words of Father Divine, in whom I recognize a Door of Revelation. When he said to me : “No man should call me Father who sees me as a man” I knew that I had found a thoroughfare which would lead somewhere other than to unfulfilled Promises.–W.C.L.)

FIRST PERSON, PRESENT TENSE

TALKING of and about truth, and speaking the TRUTH are radically different things. The first is merely rehearsing the letter which is dead and not effective. The latter is the “spake and it was done” state of consciousness. Jesus spoke the truth in the present tense and first person, and results or manifestation immediately followed. “He made himself as God”—in other words He spoke as one having authority, because He spoke from the place of authority. In spite of the fact that you profess to be a follower of Jesus Christ, you are afraid to make any direct statement of good without first “knocking on wood.” Why is this?

On the other hand, it is quite common for people who even profess a KNOWLEDGE of TRUTH to exclaim over evil, “Just my luck”—“It always happens to me”—“I never knew it to fail,” etc., etc. In other words, you are unable to say anything good that is positive. For instance you dare not say “I shall be perfectly well this time next year”—“I shall be abundantly supplied this tine next year,” etc., etc., because you are speaking always from the consciousness of John Smith which knows “When I would do good, I do evil”–“As for man, his days are few and full of trouble”—etc.

This is all due to the fact that you are talking “of and about” Truth instead of speaking the Truth. When you speak the Truth because of your liaison with the Christ within, you can say definitely, “I will come and heal him,” without any reservations, without any treatments, without any series of mental mechanics, because you speak with authority. There is no doubt about the results—you speak the word, and it is done, as far as you are concerned. If the other person cannot accept the truth, that is his loss. In order to practice the revelation as given to us by Jesus Christ, you must act from the standpoint of absolute authority. Very often you hear people “trying” to make a healing, using such terms as “we” meaning of course “God and I,” or “I and God,” according to the importance of the individual.

The most one in this state of mind can get out of talking of and about the truth is personal adulation, or an emotional thrill which soon disappears. Taking Jesus as an example, we see in every instance of healing that He made an assumption of His Fatherhood degree of understanding. Hence He could make a clear statement of facts without equivocation, without fear of contradiction, a straightforward speaking of the Word—“I will come and heal him.” It would be sheer folly or conceit in Jesus or any other man to say He could heal anything. Jesus knew .this when He said “I can of myself do nothing”—“BUT”—and then the thrilling thing happens, when He merges this helplessness of human thought with the Divine and can explain “But with God all things are possible.” It fairly makes you thrill with joy just to sense such a thing–even to read the Word. If you see, you are suddenly filled with inspiration.

Think of it! “BUT” —Jesus saying He could do nothing—-helpless—-hopeless-anti then suddenly “BUT”–“‘With God all things are possible.” are you beginning to hear, to sense—to sense “All things”—not some things, not a few things, but ALL THINGS. Do you hear? All things. Is that enough? Now do you begin to see the necessity of being still and knowing that I am God, rather than trying to make God demonstrate a new car or a red hat? If you are consciously with the Presence, then ALL things are possible and the Voice which speaks through you is One in Authority, and He is always speaking in the present tense and the first person. “For I also am a man in authority.” This wonderful self-recognition of the Centurion is exactly what is necessary for you to accomplish the works set for you to do, and to hear the wonderful recognition “I have not seen so great a thing—no, not in all Israel.”

What authority could possibly be in a mind which was filled with quandary as to whether the Power would heal or would not. “I will come and heal him” leaves no, not any, doubt. Do you begin to see? Who are you, anyway? “This is life eternal to know ME.” Do you want to know ME, and experience life eternal? When you know life, you suddenly forget the ideas of “health and sickness,” and “strength and weakness.” These, together with all the other pairs of opposites, are merely parentheses on the circle of life—a segment of the whole. These pairs of opposites are merely the limitations placed on life by personality. They differ in every instance. What is strength to one roan is positively weakness to another—what is abundance to one man is limitation to another. Yet God is all —“Whole—ONE. A personality such as your John Smith has a limitation as to the placement of these parentheses, beyond which he cannot go. Jesus also had His great limitations, and to such an extent that He explained, “I can of Mine own self do nothing.”

As long as you are working with a consciousness which believes in health and sickness, your range of activity and expression is only between the parentheses, or your concept of life, which you place on the whole. You begin to see therefore why it is necessary to “Go unto the Father.” “When you lose your life you shall find it.” When you lose your parentheses you will find the universal LIFE and, inversely speaking, when you hold on to your life (parentheses) you will lose it. It can run only the length of your human belief. The same thing is true regarding substance—until you lose your personal limitation you can have only that limited substance included in your “parenthesis.” A chicken that is not released from its shell dies the moment it has come to the limitation of the shell. So do you die when you come to the limits of your parentheses. Do you begin to understand why the apparently inane command is given to you,

“Enlarge the borders of your tent”–“Launch out into deeper waters”—in other words, break through these parentheses of human limitations which you have imposed upon your life. “Come out from among them, and be ye free.” There must be a casting away of all bondage of former thought and a stepping into the revelation where the pairs of opposites exist no more. “When you lose your life you shall find it”—as a bucketful of dirty water thrown into the sea is instantly made clean—so your dirty life filled with the history of every filthy thing, is suddenly made clean, by breaking down the parentheses of limitation you have held about you. Jesus did this immediately when He went unto His Father.” “Life is NOW.” In reality it exists only in the eternal Present, and so if your manifestations are to be alive, they must be animated and sustained by life NOW. The mental plane talks about tomorrow and yesterday—things that have happened, or things that might happen, but it never actually speaks of things taking place. All future, of course, is fraught with fear—fear of the deadly possibility of unpredictable evil.

The slimy fear that “crawls on its belly,” is always hiding in the grass to strike suddenly in this thought-taking state. You are not giving up- anything when you release your life into the God Life. “As for man his days are few and full of trouble” —If you believed this, as true, and didn’t sense the possibility of something higher, why would you dare or wish to bring another being into existence? But then in reality, you have never brought one into existence of your own volition or will, no matter how much praying or cursing you have done—you have neither created life nor kept it from manifestation. Eventually we begin to understand that life expresses whenever it has the least opportunity to do so, and not at the bidding of man. There cannot be therefore such a thing as an illegitimate manifestation. It could be illegitimate only when it came under the hypocritical parenthesis of man’s thought. “He made Himself as God” was one of the causes for which they crucified Jesus.

Too late we found we had nailed nothing real to the “tree,” for we discovered “He” was suddenly on the other side of the lake, that He had “suddenly passed through the crowds,” etc. We discovered that He had power to call upon His Father and instantly be surrounded by “twelve legions of angels”—why, that is one legion for every month in the year, and we are talking about “Angels,” which are more powerful in their invisible state than a whole army of tanks and bomber planes, and—and you have the same power. “Believest thou this?” Answer me. Yes, you, this funny little thing that has tried so hard to crucify life, suddenly discovers it also has power at any time or place to call upon the Father, and literally, factually, bring forth and surround itself with twelve legions of angels. Do you hear?

Do you believe? “Awake thou that steepest and Christ shall give thee life.” That Father within you—Permanent Identity—will give your poor little John Smith life, and cause you to rise from a tomb of your own creation into the very Presence of Life filled with the very joys of Heaven here and now. No one may recognize you as a great soul—that is not important; but you may do most glorious things and have most thrilling manifestations. What do you care what the man “whose breath is in his nostrils” thinks, believes or says about anything? “What is that to thee? Follow thou Me.”

If he says the moon is made of green cheese, or that sickness is real, that poverty is true, etc., what is that to dice? Answer me. When will you learn to put the coal of fire on your lips and “let the filthy be filthy still.” If you believe in death, war, pestilence and destruction as realities, you may get a chance to prove this, though you are ten thousand miles from any battlefield—the fury of a war could happen in a small room as far as you are concerned, as well as it could on a battlefront. Do you begin to see? Do you begin to hear? You may be one of the “ten thousand—at your right hand” or you may be the one—that depends. “Eyes have not seen”—no eyes, not yours, nor the eyes of your teacher or your Holy One, nor have their ears heard—nor has it yet entered into their hearts the things that are (right now) prepared—I said prepared—already prepared—right now.

So you begin to see that we are talking about a new state of consciousness. New capacities are released in you. New ways and means to bring out manifestations which are not listed and never have been listed in any book or course of instruction. Jesus merely glanced at the lepers and they were clean. Can you understand this? It can’t be explained in three-dimensional words and yet it is so. When are you going to “Leave off (all your filthy human thinking) and follow me?” A glass of water can be transmuted into the elixir of life when offered to a sick man—that is, if it can be, and of course it cannot possibly be unless it can—and then it can. Do you understand what I am saying to you? It is all rather ridiculous, utter insanity in the eyes of man, since any chemist could grab the glass of water from your hand and find it was still water. The moment the human thought tries to put the God Power under the microscope of human belief, it finds nothing.

Again this beautiful revelation of Jesus Christ is not brought into manifestation to satisfy the idle curiosity of disbelieves, it is a perfectly natural function of your Christ consciousness, and you have full and absolute right to it, but quite naturally you are beginning to see the need of secrecy and silence. Do not TELL—SHOW. Aren’t you thrilled with this revelation of your Divinity? Do you begin to see how the speaking of the Word from this present-tense, first-person state of consciousness brings about or reveals what before has been concealed? What a lovely sense of authority and power! ‘You pass along life’s highway and answer the call of the Divinity in another. Whoever touches you or calls upon you will receive automatically the agreement—virtue will proceed out of you—the healing will take place, the beggar at the temple gates will arise, leap into the air and go on his way shouting for joy. It is amazing! Though ten lepers are healed, only one returns to give thanks, or to make complete recognition, and to establish the manifestation as a reality.

The other nine have gone on their way. Undoubtedly, they will in their excitement “salute every man” they pass on the highway, who will begin to tell them of the “facts” of leprosy as proven by ten million wise heads, and at the end of the day the nine will have leprosy again, and will charge it all off to a beautiful day dream. Do you begin to see the necessity of recognition? “I was hungry and you fed me. I was cold and you clothed me.” What for? What else could I do, in the consciousness of ALL? When you enter a warm room you take on automatically the temperature of that room. When you enter any degree of consciousness of God you take on everything that is in that degree, and it is automatically embodied. “God spake and it was done.”

We are only begin nine to understand that in the God consciousness when a thing is done, it is done. Do you understand? There is no maybe or perhaps-it is done. Do you get the connection between this and the words of Jesus Christ, “it is done”? “I say go, and he goeth, and come and lie cometh” —why? Is there any reason why a particle of steel in the proximity of a magnet instantly comes by the shortest possible way to the magnet? Do not imagine we can speak a word, or a stream of words and accomplish anything. There is “Peace, Peace—and Lord, Lord,” and yet nothing happens—still you are told to “Only speak the Word.” “Only”—it seems as if someone were making light of the situation. You have tried so hard, yet it says to you “Only speak the Word.” Do you hear?-Next time why don’t you speak the word, without knocking on wood?

Are you afraid? Jesus made himself as God—can You? He went through all the necessary steps to show the nothingness in all human belief, and to relieve you from it all, but if you wish to go through the passions of Jesus, and emotionally suffer all that He proved to be unnecessary, you may do so—you may even bring about a crucifixion. I shouldn’t be surprised that you have said many times that you have been crucified—I know I have. “Only speak the word and my servant shall be made alive.” All right then—“I will”—and the servant is healed the selfsame hour—at a distance physically, but in the Presence all the while. No time to give a treatment or argument or affirmation; no time to become spiritual or emotional or to reel off a lot of mantras, but speak the Word—not the words.

Words are merely a human effort to express a state of consciousness which already is. Signs follow. They do not precede. Do you understand? Or do you? Who are you anyway, hiding behind a Mask of Personality? What do you want? “As He is, so are we in this present world.” Present World—mean anything to you? I said Present World—not world to come. Do you believe it? “He made himself as God”—a terrible thing to do. Better make yourself after some human God who is fast going into the dust. Copy some other human manifestation.

Get one that is rich, famous, grand, a success man, a hero—make yourself, but don’t, for heaven’s sake, make yourself as God. Just as long as you will stay down on the human plane with misery and suffering it is all right. “Let me go on with my silly beliefs in truth.” As the lady who “successfully” prayed for her little ailing chickens not to die, was proud to say three months later, “Now they are big enough to eat.” A lovely understanding of spiritual law has been invoked to avert the death of her chickens at one time, in order that she might inflict it at her pleasure later on. This story was told me in perfect sincerity as a proof of spiritual understanding’ It made me ask myself, “What kind of praying are you doing anyway?”—and so I in turn ask you, what kind of praying are you doing? Is it begging, beseeching, is it an emotional outburst, is it telling God how wonderful He is—something He probably already knows—or is it in accordance with the law of Jesus Christ,

“Be still and know that I am nigh.” Signs follow—Do you hear? It says very definitely they follow—they do not precede. Surely then a sign must follow every prayer, and possibly so quickly that it is manifested before it is yet spoken. “Before they call I will answer, and while they are yet speaking I will give it unto them.” This is what is known as direct action, and it is in the present tense, and it is the I, the first person, who is doing it. When your Eye or “I” becomes single, then your whole embodiment and universe are filled with light. This all seems to make one appear rather useless and dumb—as “Dumb as an ox for the slaughter.” You begin to know nothing. You listen and listen, until the time comes to speak and the Word is to be made manifest and then—why then, all is changed in the twinkling of an eye.

Yes, even the glance can do it, and the touch can do it, and the physical absence can do it, because it is already done. It all happens automatically. No one is blamed or praised for the healing, and no system of metaphysics or teacher or organization is lauded to the sky. “But this isn’t fair, he was my patient, I belong to a certain group, they must have the credit—I worked for hint for 3o days.” Imagine praying or speaking the Word and then telling the poor, benighted patient, “Come back tomorrow, and I will pray again.” What a wretched state in which to send anyone away—what little faith in the powers of your words. Imagine Jesus taking patients by the week or month. Funny, isn’t it? Present Tense and First Person: “Behold I come quickly and my reward is with Me.” It is not with somebody else, and it is not with tomorrow or the next day, it is with Me. You understand? My body accompanies Me. Can you take it? Yes, I know, BUT… When are you going to smash that prison door?

That strange state of human thought which will go to the heights of revelation in words at least, and in arguments for spirituality, then will suddenly do a nose-dive into the valley of despair with these words, “Yes I know, BUT.” It would even go on recounting all sorts of things, acknowledging truth on the one hand, but always finishing up with “yes, BUT.” The signs follow. Naturally, normally, or else they upset your whole life with excitement. Many times people have told so often of the terrible things they overcame with their understanding that those things returned to them with accelerated force, because whatever you magnify in your heart is going to come into manifestation, and if you magnify a past evil, it finally becomes stronger than your belief in God —hence it apparently overcomes God, and you are back where you started. Have you ever imagined Jesus giving a Testimonial Meeting, which for the most part is planned after the testimonial addenda in the back of a medicine almanac—“After taking 3 bottles, etc”—“After taking 3 treatments from Mrs. Blank, etc.”?

Jesus had plenty to tell, but it was all so natural to Him that He never thought of explaining it into a “box-office” value. “The works that I do you shall do also, and even greater.” Well! There you are, why don’t you try it? Because you have tried and have failed ignominiously. You even felt a little hurt about it because God didn’t hear, and so you tried again, and again, and again, and then perhaps you said, “Well, it’s too hard for me to understand.” But a child can do it, because he does it, instead of trying to do it, and therein lies the secret. A recognition of this simple thing will bring about a housecleaning—all condemnation will be thrown out, all wondering about the past defeats and successes—the past is suddenly closed. You are entering into tile dimension of “Thank you Father” where the Cosmic Power urges a manifestation into being: It is this consciousness of the finished thing which causes you to say “Thank you Father,” and is the power which steps down the unseen into visibility-as steam condensing into water and freezing into ice, so will your Word be made manifest. Everything—happens in the Now. “Now is the day of salvation.” Now—now—now.

FLYING

Every flyer learns early in his career that his plane must lift against weight and thrust against drift. Lifting against the established laws of the earth plane, in one movement setting aside the old time-honored and unbeatable law of gravity. And then thrusting against the terrible “Drift” of the atmosphere – the onslaught of a hundred and one currents, fogs, pockets and strange unchartered conditions of the upper sphere.

He lifts because he has a perfectly equipped machine with which to lift – and he thrusts into the unknown and untested atmosphere of a new level by the same power that gave the lift.

There is something remarkably similar between the lifting and thrusting of the plane and the “Arising” from the “pig sty” or the “Stretching forth” of the hand or the “opening of the eyes.”

There comes a split second after the contact is made when the take-off is necessary – it must be made. The sudden LIFT is possible because of an even more fast moving recognition of the possibility of it all taking place. The moment he hesitates and begins examining equipment he may find it inadequate to perform the Lift and the Thrust – so he either “Rises” or he waits and thinks. The more a man thinks of the weight of the machine and the law of gravity and the terrible onrush of the vicious and violent currents of air, the more he is convinced that flying is not for him. And so with you – the more you think of your heavy, matter body and mind, the more you find it utterly impossible to lift against the old established laws of sin, sickness and death. When you think of going head-on into the force of human thought with its almost immovable laws, you lose heart – and freeze into a mass of human thinking.

There is that instant in Prayer – the click – the movement when elan vital is struck. In a plane it is the movement of ignition when the spark touches the gas and the thing is set in motion. When the WORD – quick and instant and “sharper than a two edged sword turning in all directions” cuts through the human law of sickness and poverty and sets the marching in motion, it causes it to mount to a new level and make its thrust against all the beliefs of the mortal mind.

That wonderful instant when you “hear” and obey – and rise and go. When Peter asked to come to Jesus the answer was in the affirmative. Have you noticed that the answers of Jesus were always in the affirmative? He always said – “yes – whatsoever you will.” Having asked for it you must handle it. So in the case of Peter. He makes his lift above established beliefs, and is then above the law of gravity of mortal thinking. He then starts the “thrust” and continues beautifully until he starts thinking. The moment he starts thinking the “engine” is killed and the machine goes down to the level of what would happen on the thought plane.

Having made your lift and started your thrust do not look down, but keep flying right into the Power of God and see the mists of belief disappear and presently you arrive at the “boat.”

You make your lift by the Recognition of the Presence and your Divinity within. Once you have made the recognition – something is going to happen – something must happen. “Go not back” –

“Thrust in the sickle” – do you see the thrust against the human law which says there is no grain to harvest? Reap where you have not sown.” All this wonderful revelation of why the man at the Temple (beautiful – body) Gate suddenly leaped into the air and praised God and made his thrust into the full activity of the body. You have the equipment within you ready to lift and to thrust, and so to fly over human beliefs.

FOR GOD SO LOVED THE WORLD

‘When you are ready–I will do the works through you.’ ‘For GOD so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.’ Suddenly, like a burst of light that pierces the dark clouds of night, comes the revelation that God so LOVED the world–yes, this very world that you have been calling hell; that you have found so full of everything evil; that you have been trying to die out of, or trying to escape. Yes, this very world God has LOVED. It must be that we have hypnotized ourselves into something that is unlovely. Yet we find that God so LOVED the world. If God had found it one-tenth as evil as we have been taught to believe it is, He would certainly not have loved it; He would have destroyed it. Can it be that we, you and I, are mistaken regarding the world–have we been seeing through a glass darkly and mistaking the shadows of the human belief for the reality, to such an extent that we have come to hate that which God loved? ‘

Awake, thou that sleepest, and Christ shall give thee Light’–the Light which will enable you to start the Love Process and set yourself free from the prison house of your own making. ‘When you are ready’ … ‘If you cannot love those whom you see, how can you love God whom you do not see?’ A question asked and passed over too lightly. The same thing might be asked: ‘If you cannot love the world which you can see, how can you love the Kingdom which you cannot see?’ It is time that we awakened from the mesmeric sleep that we have cast over ourselves. We have been stupefied by the heavy drug called procrastination. Half the people are ‘knowing the Truth’ are merely waiting for something in the future to happen and are at the same time despising the present manifestation. There be those who will say, ‘Love not the world,’ and by the word ‘world’ they mean just the antithesis of what is meant when it is stated that ‘God so loved the world.’ It is made quite clear that if we cannot love our fellow-creatures we cannot love God.

And eventually we begin to see that we glorify that which we love. The power of love that is within every man is the power to transform appearances. ‘Love never faileth’ would indicate that all else can fail. Also, ‘Perfect love casteth out fear.’ We are beginning to see the power of Love. When we Love our fellow-beings, they become God-like, and display God-like qualities. And when we love the earth as God loved it, then we transform it into heaven. Self-examination shows, however, that to most of us this world is just a battle-ground. Each morning we rise and set forth to battle evil, always looking for way and means of overcoming the almost insurmountable obstacles that arise before us like a Goliath. This fighting spirit stays with us, in spite of the command, ‘Ye do not need to fight–set yourself and see the salvation of the Lord.’ In the beautiful God-loved world there is nothing to fight, but in the world of man’s creating he finds evil everywhere. It is for man to choose in which of these habitats he will live. Surely, as soon as he sees God in man, man becomes God-like, and just so surely as he sees Heaven here and now the world becomes again the Garden of Eden–the very Garden that God loved. And for this purpose He gave His Son–the Christ–and said that whosoever believed upon Him should have everlasting life.

The Son is given to each of us when we are ready to accept the priceless gift within ourselves. ‘I came not to destroy, but to fulfill’–that is the message of the I am coming into expression in your life. I the Christ, the You of You, came not to destroy, but to fulfill the law of God, and to fulfill and bring out the reason why ‘God so loved the world.’ We are missing it all as long as we keep on the hunt after evil. We are missing the great and grand issue of life when we keep pounding away at imaginary beliefs and thinking that our business In the world is to fight evil. ‘Put up your sword’–‘When you are ready…’ ‘God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.’

The idea of a perishing body or kingdom, then, is lost in the consciousness of the everlasting life. Do you think for a moment you can continue everlastingly in the same personality? Do you see this would be quite as impossible, as it would be for you to continue a baby forever? The constant revelation that is coming with this imperishable Life is such that it drops off one belief after another and lets the perfect manifestation come into being. Revelations, one after another, break over the universe of the newly found soul. The former things are remembered no more; they cannot come into mind; for the mind has been made new, and it naturally has nothing in it that answers to the former limitations and beliefs. ‘The prince of this world (the ugly, hated world that you have been living in) cometh, and findeth nothing in you,’ because you have renewed your mind and there is nothing in this new state that responds to the former evils and limitations. Do you begin to see the new day that is dawning?

Small wonder, then, that the command came, ‘Go forth, heal the sick, open the prisons,’ etc. How can this be done except the power is given with the command?–the power of revelation. ‘Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.’ and the Spirit is everywhere, and when it is recognized in that place the limitations of the human belief are suddenly burst asunder and the manifestation is set free. A shell does not hold a chick one moment after it has grown to the limitations of the shell. When you recognize the presence of God, the limitations that bound you are broken asunder by the sudden expansion of this new knowledge. Be still–do not talk–it is well with thee. ‘I AM HE that should come’–and you will begin to understand the difference between overcoming and realization or revelation.

Be still, be still, be still. Remember in your quiet that GOD SO LOVED this world that you are finding so hateful and ugly. Be still; you will see and understand. The presence of the very God that LOVED this world is in everything and through everything–even in your hell, in your prison, in your problem–and contains everything for the complete satisfaction of every human desire interpreted in its truest form. Be still–be still. It is well. Right in the midst of it all, there am I; and I am everything that you can possibly ask or think. For God so LOVED the world (note from A.P. Adams: world, i.e. Kosmos, which is interpreted as, “the order of things’)–what are you doing with it? Why did God so LOVE the place (or the ‘order of things’) that you hate and find so filled with all undesirable things? Be still–be still–and see if the Son which was given does not come to abide with you and make all the desires of your heart possible by the process of revelation. And GOD so LOVED the world–LOVED the world. Are you ready? Answer ME–I AM.”

THE FOUNTAIN

The Fountain at the end of the garden walk retains its shape and form – though the water is constantly changing as you walk toward it. As long as the power is on, the shape remains intact; – the moment the power is turned off, water becomes a shapeless mass ready to take any form introduced into it. So it is with the substance of consciousness – until there is a shape and form, it is void – nothingness, and remains that way until it is shapened again by the matrix.

Electricity flows endlessly through wires into manifestation of a thousand denominations, yet remains always electricity – and man watches over the powerhouse while the manifestation flows endlessly into expression. All illustrations are worthless – meaningless when it comes to actually moving into the consciousness known as the “mind which was also in Christ Jesus.” When one begins to perceive this, he will also begin to arrive at the point of manifestation. But the human thought, hypnotized by thousands of aeons of belief in ancestor teaching and ideas, has the cart before the horse, and spends all its effort and time trying to “demonstrate Truth” – instead of recognizing consciousness. When you have the consciousness of a given thing, the manifestation will take place endlessly; – no matter how often it is wiped out – the consciousness will replace it with the ease that you “replace” the reflection in a mirror. You can break a mirror, but that does not destroy anything but the reflection, and never that which causes the reflection; likewise it is with consciousness – the moment you discover this, the manifestation will FOLLOW.

It is stated in the Law the “signs follow, they do not precede” – yet the Adam man, having imagined he could create, proceeds to work from the without in. He studies and works with man-made ideas or systems; all of which are founded on the teaching of Jesus Christ – but putting them through a human concept of it, he gets everything backward, so he naturally spends his time trying to make manifestations which he calls demonstrations or answers to treatments or prayers. Once he is concerned with consciousness, the signs will follow, and in my (name) NATURE shall he cast out the devils of limited human belief. By doing this, the hard, fast condensation of thought will be wiped out of the Temple – BODY and it shall be filled with LIGHT which will operate perfectly the body-temple and cause a man to KNOW LIFE, and eventually LIFE eternal – as he KNOWS ME. “This is life eternal that they might know thee the only true God.” – and only as man stops trying to “demonstrate God” will he be able to see Him in the Flesh. “YET in my flesh shall I See God” – for I shall recognize Him as the natural and real instead of the demonstrated power of human thought.

Gradually, the ease with which it is accomplished will put to flight all the intellectual hunting in the archives of human wisdom – and he, too, will BELIEVE. You do not think it strange that a child – knowing nothing about life – accepts what it is told by the parent, and by doing just this without question, produces a Santa Claus; – the illustration is again absurd, but the ease with which it is done was what Jesus was referring to when He said: “Whosoever shall not receive the Kingdom of God as a little child, he shall not enter therein.” Ignorant, as far as human intellection is concerned, unable to carry on an elaborate reasoning system, but able to accept without question. If you must become as a little child, why bother further with what a man has to say on how to demonstrate?

All illustrations in the Bible are of the most drastic design. Nothing can be more devastating to cloth than the burning sun and sands of the desert, and this was the test that was made. As long as anything is submerged in the ocean, it partakes of the quality of the ocean – and in like manner as long as you are “submerged” in God and are conscious of it, you partake of the quality of Spirit which is neither young nor old, but it is the glorious freshness and aliveness of God.

When Croesus, the richest of men, grew weary for other worlds to conquer, even as Alexander did, he looked toward Cyprus and Persia. Being a superstitious man, he consulted the oracle of Apollo at Delphi and was told: If he crossed the Halys Mountains, he would destroy a great empire – which he did – never dreaming it would be his Empire.

He had heard what he wanted to hear – not what was said; and so is it with the words of Jesus Christ – they are twisted to suit the desire of man. Definitely it says: “and whatsoever ye shall ask in my name that will I do “but nothing happens until it is heard; that complete assumption of the Mind of Christ Jesus is made. Until this mind is operative in man, he will do nothing other than that he finds in the limitations of his personality. The attempt to demonstrate things without consciousness is like trying to produce electricity without the knowledge of it. No wonder the instructions of prayer are so brief and have nothing to do with thinking. “When ye pray, believe” – you can get no farther than this, and until it is done, no answer will be revealed because what you have in consciousness you have in manifestation. It falls out automatically and without effort – even as the reflection appears on any surface, without effort.

Pindar, the Creek poet of 400 B.C., is asked if Excellence could be learned, to which he replied it was impossible; that it was discovered as an inborn glory, a state of consciousness, and that he who tried to learn it was a “twilight man wavering in spirit.”

We see the attempts to pattern after Jesus – in spite of the fact he warns against it by saying: “Why callest thou me good?” He wished no imitators, knowing the infinite variety of God and His manifestation, and He likewise knew that all of this could and would stem from the consciousness of the Christ within. First, then, it is necessary that this Christ mind which we are told is within us, must be recognized instead of being a strange, foreign thing resident only in Jesus. As this is recognized, we begin to hear through the words – and finally we hear the WORD which is the substance of all words, no matter in what language and eternally changeless in meaning and action.

“For whosoever hath, to him shall be given,” is only a natural automatic action of consciousness and not a demonstration, and to him who hath not consciousness – or recognition of his own Christ Self – it shall be taken away, for he has nothing with which to retain it. Therefore, leave the old, dead teaching of the ancestors who believed they could implore and beg God to change his mind. Nothing changes but the degree of your acceptance of that which you are saying with your lips.

The inheritance incorruptible is the Christ within you awaiting recognition. You might just as well try to be unbaptized, as one of Voltaire’s characters threatens to do, as to imagine you can deny the Christ actually.

Do you like the idea of “inborn glory”?

FREEDOM

By your conscious realization and recognition of God’s Presence you will be delivered and freed from Every adverse and undesirable condition. It will not be anything that any man must necessarily do, from a personal point of view, which will free you. The Spirit of the Consciousness of the Presence of God Is the source of all supply, and will satisfy every good desire. It will reach every condition. It will abolish every undesirable condition and circumstance, and deliver you from every undesirable expression of life. It will give you joy beyond degree, and when you realize and accept the Truth, that the same Christ is within you which was within Jesus, that will set you free. Free from every untoward condition. ‘Tis the saving Power of God manifested in the name of Christ. And when you Recognize this, He will set you free from all undesirable conditions.”

“If the Son, therefore, shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed.” The Recognition of this PRESENCE is not the old idea of a Power which was invoked to act by prayer. It is a sensing Consciousness of the Presence, which, when recognized, turns hell into Heaven, debt into plenty, sickness into health, fear into love, and unhappiness into joy. How does it make these sudden changes? “By a way that ye know not of.” There is no human reasoning that can scale the lofty peaks of the Absolute God and tell what is the working of His Mind. ” His ways are past finding out”; then why waste any more time trying to “find out” how the Power can neutralize evil? The Power of the next dimension always sets aside all the hard and fast laws of the dimension preceding it. Hence what is a hard and fast law in the two-dimensional world is non-existent in the three-dimensional world, and so on.

When Jesus came showing this NEW way, which was past finding out, but which was the heritage of every man who would actually Recognize the Presence, the old human reasoning again said; “This cannot be.” How can poverty be turned into riches? Who can answer that question, “Canst thou by searching find out God?” and, “Who hath known the mind of the Lord?” It is wonderful that we are recognizing this, and letting go of the old mental ideas that we could assist God, or make Him do something, of that we had the power to make God operative. The old idea, so firmly fixed in the minds of many, is actually a belief that God is only working when they are “knowing the Truth,” and that at all other times He apparently is absent and inactive.

“Awake thou that sleepest, and Christ shall give thee light.” “He watching over Israel neither slumbers nor sleeps.” The Power of God is always active, and when you align yourself with this Power you set aside the so-called laws of the three-dimensional universe in which you have lived. Hence when a man Accepts the Presence of God as HERE and NOW, if he has been under the bondage of sickness, he finds himself suddenly well. That which he called a “healing” has been the action of the Revelation of his True Self–the coming out of the mists of human belief and the Real MAN. It is Wonderful! Awake, arise, and shine, for the light has come.

The PRESENCE even now, as you are reading, is all about you, within and without, awaiting Recognition; and the moment of Recognition is the moment of the downpour of blessings. “The blessing of the Lord, it maketh rich.” Do you begin to see that you–yes, you–as you are sitting reading this very line, are, at this instant, able to function this glorious manifestation of Light, Life, and Love into expression? It is Wonderful! You are thrilled and filled with the Presence of the Holy Ghost, and the three-dimensional fears are gone.

\ The Recognition of the PRESENCE is what raised Lazarus and Jesus from the dead. The Presence sets aside every human belief, no matter how time-honored or old. So the recognition of the Presence will set aside, suddenly, every adverse condition or undesirable expression. Do you begin of FEEL the Presence, the sense of protection and immunity, that He gives you? “He giveth His beloved sleep.” There is sense of relaxation, a letting go as it were, when one cognizes the Facts of Being Everything is in the hands of God, and it is well.

As you are reading, the Voice within is saying, “Fear not, it is I—Fear ye not, be not afraid, “I am with you alway.” It is so glorious. I am here NOW, and I will show you a way out that ye knew not of, and that no person knew anything about. “I am the Way”–do you hear? It is glorious, this Recognition of the Presence. BE still; I have much to say to you in the secret place. I have much Revelation to make to you when you are ready, and when you cease going without, and trying to solve the mysteries of evil. They shall all vanish away at the coming of the Lord. Blessings! Blessings! Blessings! “Every tongue that shall rise against thee in judgement, thou shalt condemn.” Every obstacle which impedes the outflowing of Truth shall be moved away. See that you do not make yourself an “obstacle” to the Truth in another. “Be not wise in your own conceits”–you do not have to set the world right by pointing out all the people who are wrong in it. Every criticism that you utter comes home for fulfillment one day–“watch, watch, watch.” Ye shall eat your own words.” It is Wonderful! “Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, and are dead.” See that you feed upon the manna that they knew not of. This is the Manna of the Presence. The manna that your fathers did eat was the human beliefs about life and God It is Wonderful.

The Recognition of the Presence can be made by a child; we are told that the Kingdom can only be entered by the Child, so you see it is quite simple. Can you accept the Presence of God, and once and for always acknowledge that He is stronger than any human belief, and He does not fight against Evil? “Thou art of purer eyes that to behold evil.” At the coming of God into manifestation, the creation of man fades out like a dream. His hard and fast beliefs melt like wax in a blast furnace. The evil problem which has hovered about you for so long, and which seemed to have the support of so many believing people, will melt as a snowball cast into a white-hot fire; and all they that battled against thee and laid snares to catch thee, shall fall into the ditch of their own making. It is Wonderful!

The Doors of the Hidden Treasures shall suddenly be flung wide open unto you. The things that have been told in secret shall be proclaimed from the house-tops of Recognition, and the Heaven on Earth shall be made manifest, HERE and NOW. It is wonderful! No man knows, or thinks of, or even senses, the glorious riches that are to be poured out on you when you make this Recognition. “Awake, thou that sleepest, and Christ shall give thee light.” Christ is the Power within you which makes your Oneness with the Father possible.

The Recognition of the PRESENCE of God causes the descent and the ascent of the Blessings of God!

“The blessing of the Lord, it maketh rich, and He addeth no sorrow with its” “When He giveth quietness, who then can make trouble? And when He hideth His face, who then can behold Him?”

So in quietness and peace the strength of the Presence is Recognized, and the “quietness” is past all description. No matter in what a turmoil you may have been, the “quietness” given by God cannot be troubled by any man, belief, or power. The Presence goes before thee always, and makes the way smooth.

“A knowledge of the Spiritual realities of life prohibits asceticism and repression, the same as it prohibits license and perverted use. To err on the one side is just as contrary to the ideal of life as to err on the other.”

The immunity with which the Presence wraps you about is not that of overcoming’ it simply brings you to the dimension where the things that were formerly true are no more so. A man may desire protection and immunity from accidents so ardently that he permits himself to be locked in a cell. He has gained his object, certainly, but he has lost his freedom in so doing. So with man, who insists on getting his immunity from evil from the outside. The immunity which comes through the recognition of the Presence enables you to walk through what the human mind calls evil, without experiencing any of the effects. Hence the H Hebrew children in the fiery furnace–the same furnace which, to human belief even destroyed the man who built the fire. It is wonderful! We do not have to run away from evil” the Presence will take care of all of that. When you begin the process of Recognizing God in everything, then the appearances of evil will diminish, until they fade entirely out of the picture.

FROM WALKING UP and DOWN and TO and FRO

BUT where did evil come from in a perfect world? And how did it all happen-the leaving of the Garden of Eden, and all these false ideas that man has accepted and under which he has functioned? A thousand questions of this kind surge through the mind of the Seeker of Truth. He has a right to ask such intelligent questions. He also has a right to the use of his own Free Will. If man were merely an automaton, and had no will of his own, no power to choose (were nothing but a machine, such as the typewriter I am using), then there would be no possible reason or excuse for the appearances of evil in his life. But man born of God is given the happy faculty of Free Will, and allowed to develop the gifts with which he is endowed according to the light of his own choice.

“Choose you this day whom ye will serve” shows the wonderful freedom of the Sons of God. This liberty is your heritage, and most of you have used it to a point of prodigality. We know what a dismal thing life becomes when it is completely legislated by another. When life is completely legislated by another we have prison. Your free will and choice are taken away. You must obey the law of another. You do not relish the idea, nor would you appreciate the universe of God run on the same lines, even though it had saved you from many of the problems through which you have gone. It is true that if a man has himself locked up in a cell he is not going to be injured by an automobile. In fact he will entirely escape all traffic problems and dangers ensuing there-from. But he will also have lost all his freedom. Jesus counseled,

“Be in the world, but not of it”—knowing that when man is properly aligned with the Father within, he finds everything verging to a point of harmony. When his choice is right, the results follow with mathematical accuracy. People who are crying for a cut-and-dried Heaven which will cause everybody to conform to the laws of what they call goodness would only find themselves in such a hopeless state of monotony that they would do anything to break the tedious spell of it all. The glorious freedom of the Sons of God allows you to choose the way of Life. “If ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law,” and so you move in a world and are not of it. You give to every man that which he asketh, but in having discharged this blessing you do not wait to see-this doubt foretells the failure of your gift. “Go not back to your former bondage”-do not become entangled again by the mistaken choice you have made. You may have chosen wrongly, and arrived at conclusions which make for inharmony for you.

There is no condemnation in this, however, and the moment you discover it and make your right choice, as did the Prodigal, your Father, seeing you a long way off, comes towards you with the robe and the ring. It is marvelous, the statement that the “former things shall pass away and shall not be remembered nor come into mind any more.” A thousand and one instances of the creation of evil out of belief have been cited. A woman covered with diamonds created a thief for herself out of a suspicious looking man, and as she neared her destination—a dark railway station in the country—she saw him rising to leave the train. At this juncture she remembered something. Turning to the man she said, ” I live some distance from here. Would you mind acting as my escort and protector? I will gladly pay you for it.” The man assented. At the door of her home she offered him money, which he refused. He paused a moment.

“Say, lady, I was going to rob you when I saw you on the train, but your making me your protector made it impossible.” Where was the robber, where the protector? Where did disease come from in a perfect world? From the same freedom of choice and the mistaken sense of accepting the appearances. To the sight two lines running away converge and seem to touch, and at first a good many mistaken conclusions might be drawn from such a premise, but later you can say with assurance, “the appearances do not move me. I know the lines do not touch.” When you know the Truth and understand it, then the appearances do not deceive you, any more than the converging lines make you accept what your sight tells you is true. It is marvellous what the Lord has revealed unto us. It is unnecessary to cite the many specific instances where disease has been caused by a mistaken belief and resulted in death.

A person suffering from hay fever has been known to manifest all the symptoms, in the dead of winter, on seeing a harvesting scene on the screen. A thousand and one instances of this kind may easily be found. If, then, disease can be caused entirely from a mental state, resulting in physical manifestation, it is plain to be seen that the point of attack is not in the physical. It is also plain that the conscious-thinking part of the individual is entirely responsible for the ills or the disease he experiences in life. “As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he,” shows the unstable nature of the conscious mind. The Mind of the Christ changes not. God is a Changeless Being, and hence we find Jesus fleeing from the personal or conscious-thinking, wherein lay all limitations.

If the wisdom of man is foolishness in the eyes of God, because of its shifting, changing basis, then how much more is the wisdom of God foolishness in the eyes of man? Who can believe that good, and more good, and more good, can and will continuously flow into manifestation through a mere alliance with the Power of Christ within? A thousand questions raise themselves in the minds of the people. None of them can be answered to their satisfaction, for they are working from the wavering basis of the conscious-thinking which says, “When I would do good I do evil.” So uncertain is the conscious mind of its point of direction that it hurts that which it would help, and vice versa. What a curious hodge-podge of coming and going the conscious-thinking offers man. Sickness—health; poverty—riches; happiness—unhappiness; an internal swinging back and forth between limitations on the pendulum of conscious-thinking. What a serene sense of Peace comes from the God Mind—a changeless consciousness of the Presence—an awareness.

“God is mindful of His own” begins to mean something. The following letter was recently received “I am in town lecturing every afternoon. It is wonderful the revelation that has come through, but this afternoon I felt a very strong opposing factor-a terrible antagonism. The audience simply would not let me use the Word of God. I could have toppled off the platform and wept.” So it would seem that all the glorious Power, which swung the universe into space, and caused the seasons to come and go, is powerless before a little despotic mind thinking against it. What a puny little God it is which cannot use His Temple to express Himself, because some pygmy intellect has a personal grudge. What a fiasco the whole idea of God becomes when reduced to such measures.

Do you see what it means to enter into the cesspool of Conscious-Thinking wherein lies all the evil that man can experience? You cannot feel anything that you do not recognize, that is sure. Just the moment you drop down to the Conscious-Thinking you see all sorts of evil things through your “glass darkly,” and many of these are pure imagination. Allowing that someone in the audience is antagonistic, and wants you to fail, it is too stupid for words to imagine that this little gnat of human intellect is going to obscure the light of the Sun. Let him fly against it. If your light is burning and you are looking straight into the face of God, you have no further disposition to make of the gnat. Many an evil thought has singed its wings and fallen into the pit. “Fear not; I Am with you. Hundreds of people are running about today with all sorts of Conscious-thinking ideas. Recently one came to me and said that the members of a certain Church were “treating against her.”

She had spent restless nights, and terrible things had happened because this sect had such power. Where is God and what is God? And then, a little bit later, the same person came to me and said that the members of her own Church were practicing the same thing on her and had threatened her with all sorts of evil if she failed to do as they said. Do you not think it is about time for you to awake, and arise from the pigsty of Conscious-Thinking and go unto your Father? Going prodigal means a lot more things than just eating and drinking and riotous living. It means going into the filthy Conscious-Thinking created by persons and peddled about in the name of the Christ. Teaching filled with fear, cursing, and hatred. Do you not think it is about time for you to “Arise and go unto your Father” and leave all these husks to those who trade in such theories? Certainly they get results from it, just as the jungle witchdoctor gets results from his voodoo practices.

But both they and he must be sure of one thing, and that is that the “patient” knows he is being worked upon. And this very necessary step uncovers the whole thing as a process of Conscious-Thinking. You are your own devil and your own evil power. Whenever you recognize evil you embody it, and it takes up active warfare against you. Jacob struggling all night with the angel found out that he was doing the whole thing himself. So he loosed it and let it go. How wonderful when you loose the fear that the issues of life and death are in the keeping of a person, and know that the issues of life are in God, and that as long as you are knowing God you are verging into Life Eternal. “Stand and see the salvation of the Lord”-no wonder the Sons of God shout for joy; they are being freed, not from a god of evil, but from their own Conscious-Thinking.

“Who did hinder ye?” What are you going to answer to this when you are confronted with it? One woman came to me and said that she had been told if she read certain books or went to certain places she would be cursed. Cursing does not proceed from God-we are in the new day, when the God of Love has come, and in this recognition lies your sudden and complete escape from the beliefs of witchcraft, modern or ancient. Dressed in a new garment, evil may be presented to you as Truth, but if you are staying by the teachings of Jesus Christ you will not be deceived. God is Love. Is it Love? Answer me. “Awake, thou that sleepest, and Christ shall give thee light.” “Awake, and arise from the dead.” There is no mediator between God and man except Jesus Christ.

Why will you look to another and get yourself involved with the ideas of a man? “Little children, let no man deceive you.” If you are not following after a man, there is no danger of your being deceived. If you are following after a God of Love you will hear nothing, see nothing, and allow nothing but Love to enter your mind, and you will not be troubled by the “cursing” or the “treating” against you. You will be so busy contemplating the Power that you will have no time to set others right. “Vengeance is mine”-it is not in the keeping of any man. “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” Do you believe it? Or do you have to run to a person to see whether you are right or wrong, or if someone is working against you or can work against you?

When you “stand and see the salvation of the Lord,” you see something which makes you know that “Those that are for thee are more than those that are against thee.” “Be still.” “Be still”-it is well. Do you understand the message I have written to you between the lines of this book? “God is not mocked”-and so you do not need to fear that any can use this glorious Power in the name of evil. Put the “coal of fire upon your lips”—know nothing, say nothing, and I will show you something not written in books or spoken by man. “Yet a little while”—do you hear? Christ Jesus came to fulfill, not to destroy. Do you hear? “Call upon Me and I will answer you.” Do not work against those who are “working against you.” You are too busy with the Word of God to be bothered with such futile activity which only beats itself against imaginary principalities. “Nothing shall separate you from the Love of God.” Do you hear? Then of what are you afraid? If nothing can separate you from the Love of God, the hate of man is consumed like a feather in a blast furnace.

Stay a little on this Love, “wait patiently on Him and He shall bring it to pass.” It doesn’t say maybe, or perhaps, or if, or but it says “He shall bring it to pass,” and if He brings His Love to pass in your life you have little or no concern about the hatred, which you have imagined being directed toward you, having any results. When He brings it to pass, you will not be able to find the “place thereof” of hatred any more. “Follow Me”—come out of the bog of imagination which is filled with all evil and uncleanness and which is the hell of the Conscious-Thinking. It is in Conscious-Thinking that you create the hellish manifestations from which you suffer. “Follow Me”—your attention is taken away from the mirage of the double vision and is seeing the Love of God from which nothing can separate you. “What is that to thee? Follow thou Me” carries such a nobility of the Spirit with it that it dwarfs the mountains of Conscious-Thinking.

The Divine indifference to the appearances accompanied by the integrity of soul lifts you above the whole mirage, and when you look again the place thereof is no more. “What is that to thee? Follow thou Me.” Do you hear? If you will do this, you will find that your accusers or your “cursers” are no more. They have fled into the shadows of their own wilderness and hell of Conscious-Thinking. All that they offered you in the way of fear is an actual reality to them. “The Lord is in His Holy Temple—let all the earth rejoice.” The Lord—in His Holy Temple—your embodiment. Does it not thrill you that this glorious Power is in the midst of you, and through you, and round about you, and that nothing can separate you from the Love of God? Nothing—not anything—person, place, organization, nor condition-can keep you from the Love of God. Only your Conscious-Thinking can so obscure the view as to make it appear all distorted by judging from appearances. “Believest thou this?”

Believest thou that I Am able to do this unto you? Do you believe in the Love of God as transcending all the hate of the Conscious-Thinking, or do you believe a pygmy intellect, swelling itself with all sorts of imaginative power, can control, destroy, harm, or direct your path? “In all thy ways acknowledge Him and He shall direct thy paths” is just as true today as when it was first said. What do you care about the opinions and beliefs of another if your path is being directed by Him? Be still! Be very still! You have something to hear that does not come through the noisy voice of man. It is wonderful-and so it is.

GENIUS

Genius stems from “will free knowledge.” The human will which has tried so hard to manipulate God discovers in the final analysis it has accomplished nothing but frustration. Genius – (that strange thing which is so completely beyond human understanding) is the result of being “will free” that is being absent from the human thought-taking processes and present with the Lord, Law.

What is it that transforms a carpenter into a genius – a financial genius – a healing genius? “I can of mine own self do nothing, but.” Then he went into what He designated as “Father” thereby losing the limitations of Jesus.

When we let the Christ Mind be in us, then human intellect – which judges from appearances and is perpetually under the hypnosis of ancestor teaching – evaporates. The Genius of the Christ; the doer of the impossible, the power which knows fully and without effort that prayer is answered before it is uttered. When the Will of God becomes apparent, man becomes a genius with power outside his mental limitations. Only a Genius would know how. No human thought could in any way make that happen which could not happen. Human thought could not perform the revelation of the perfected creation.

“Genius is the highest form of will-less knowledge”- nothing can be accomplished by “taking thought.” The explosive question is asked, “Who by taking thought?” Genius can neither be learned, nor demonstrated. Genius is the uninhibited movement of God, and manifests in the dimension of the impossible.

While the human mind is stumbling through a labyrinth of figures, genius arrives at the answer without effort and without strain, arrives at the answer which has always existed. How does he do it?

He does it by taking “no thought.” This is meaningless confusion. When man returns to the one substance, he is released from the limitations of human thinking. “Who by taking thought?” – The answer “No one.”

“Genius is the highest form of will-less knowledge. The lowest forms of life are entirely made up of will, without knowledge.”

When Jesus discovered “I can of mine own self do nothing” he became aware he “could do all things” through blending with the ONE. At that instant of blending, he became a genius – a worker of miracles – one who transmuted the law of the human will and mind. The human mind is willful – full of will, or personal power.

If Jesus could do nothing – what are you, with the will of the human thought, going to demonstrate? Did you ever run into 5,000 problems at once? Jesus did; he instantly merged the limited power of Jesus into the ONE.

“Ye shall decree a thing, and it shall come to pass” – is about as stupid advice as was that of Marie Antoinette – when she suggested the starving people of France eat cake if they had no bread. True Genius then is the ability to look straight into the face of God, and see from whence the reflection “you” comes, and to be willing to merge with this lovely new discovery.

“If then I be lifted up” to this consciousness of ONE – shall “draw all men” (manifestation) unto me” – even as the magnet automatically pulls the steel filings unto itself. So will you draw everything in that level of consciousness unto yourself without effort, and will show forth the “genius” which is not operated by will and force, but by God.

The Scriptures take on a new and wonderful meaning when we “Leave all.” When we leave the mental bondage and hypnotism in things past, present, or future, and feel the deep undertow of power – endless wonders come from the depths. You are told to launch out. Big fish swim in deep waters; little ones splash about making a great noise in shallow waters.

The discovery of “Genius” is the discovering of your true self. Now that egotism is gone; you are a point in universal consciousness where God is free to express. Genius is self discovery, it frees you from the “self” born of woman – filled with trouble, etc., into the Son of God. This Son of God is not a glorified human being, but a lump of Luminous Substance.

“Thy will be done” is not submission, it is freedom; it is entering into the place where the Divine purpose of you has a chance to come into being. Through endless aeons of ancestor teaching of reincarnation and disease, man can do nothing but commit folly. What chance has man with all his “will” power, if he be under a hard fast law “When I would do good evil is present with me”?

SO HE MADE IT AGAIN

“The word which came to Jeremiah from the Lord, saying,

Arise, and go down to the potter’s house and there I will cause thee to hear my words.

Then I went down to the potter’s house, and behold, he wrought a work on the wheels.

And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter:

SO HE MADE IT AGAIN, another vessel.”

The story goes on to tell that the malformed manifestation is remade. The substance of it is not destroyed but reduced to its primal essence and brought forth again a thing of beauty.

The analogy of the potter is common enough and the lesson back of it is deep. The great point, however, is usually overlooked, the vessel is not cast aside as worthless, and so left to harden into an ugly misshapen manifestation which is finally trampled into dust. The clay of our bodies given us so freely becomes diseased, worn-out and distorted and we are wont to carry on with the misshapened vessel until we return the clay to its source and refashion it. Yet HE MADE IT AGAIN and when you can cast the mistaken, misshapen clay back into the “no form” place of God, you will fashion it again into the lovely pattern shown to you in the beginning, and the reshaping of it will be finer.

So cast it back into its original substance and MAKE it again in the silence of your heart. Presently, the ugliness will have disappeared from sight and from memory, and the thing of beauty will come forth.

All ugliness is only congested human thought which interferes with the ongoing of the WORD in you. Do not let the misshapened thing with its accumulation of disease, hatred and revenge represent YOU. Rise in the strength which is yours. Take it all back into the ONE and fashion it again and when it comes forth, it will have dropped all the disease and ugliness and a NEW PURIFIED MANIFESTATION WILL come to thee.

MAKE IT AGAIN! MAKE IT AGAIN – MAKE IT AGAIN. He who promised is faithful – so make it again.

“Hath not the potter power over the clay?” Matter is only congealed energy after all. Return to the ONE SUBSTANCE, SPIRIT, and make it again. There is transformation, transfiguration and translation – so why not make it again?

THE GESTURE

“RISE up and walk.” It is related that a helpless mass of flesh and bones, having lain at the temple gates for almost half a century, suddenly arose, sprang into the air, and ran off, praising God and leaping for joy as he sped on his way.

“Rise up and walk” has been said many times since that memorable occasion, sometimes with instant results, but many times with nothing taking place but a volley of questions, “But how can I rise up and walk?”

The moment the thought enters in upon the occasion it is impossible for the one addressed to escape from the weights of his belief. Pause for a moment and check what the beggar at the temple gate had in his thought. Not only was his body a wreck, but think for a moment of the general physical condition of the blood-stream, the tissues, the muscles and nerves after sitting hunched over in the dirt and filth for years. Imagine the condition of his mind, filled with resentment and envy of the rich lords and merchants who passed daily into the temple, many of whom, no doubt, drew their robes aside, lest they should come in contact with the filth of the beggar, and then try to escape from under that mountain of belief. Yet in spite of all this we see in the narrative that he “arose,” and we have seen many times since that memorable occasion that other beggars In differing degrees of filth and sickness have “heard” the Voice and have risen and found themselves possessed of a glorious sense of Life.

What, then, takes place?

“Open your eyes,” was said to a man born blind, and he opened his eyes and beheld. A man born blind in reality has such imperfectly formed eyeballs that they are hardly entitled to the name eyes. You are asking a lot when you ask such a one to “Open your eyes.” In the common sense of man “it cannot be done.” There is no sight in the unformed eyes even if he could open his eyelids. An intricate set of muscles and nerves are necessary to sight, and these have to be trained and educated through years of careful attention. No, it is no use to ask a man to “open his eyes” when he has no eyes to open.

What, then, takes place? Because, in spite of all your findings, all of which are relatively true, the man, who could not possibly open his eyes (because he had no eyes), not only complies with the command, but also sees.

What, then, takes place?

“Come to Me?” What, across the waters? A heavy material body which weighs fourteen stone asked to step out on that which will not bear the weight of his hand? Well, it cannot be done. I would like to try it, but what do I do first, and how is it done, and what thought, if any, do I hold, or what affirmation, do I make? Of course, I know it is done in the realm of imagination, but actually the physical body is left behind and so the human reasoning arrives at its usual conclusion that it cannot be done. And yet it is done.

What, then, takes place anyway?

What takes place the moment Peter begins the thinking process while he is actually walking on the water? He goes down. Why?

What takes place in the case of the beggar at the temple gate when he rises and walks? He obeys the command, and then he must make the gesture. The gesture is the part of the miracle which the recipient must perform. When the Voice said, “I will come,” it is up to Peter to make the gesture – a gesture which is as unconscious of the thought-taking process as the instant return of a rubber ball thrown with violence against a stone wall. It reacts instantly, and without consideration of the laws back of the reaction. The moment thought enters in, the testimony of the human mind makes it impossible for the laws and limitations which it has imposed upon itself to be broken.

“Arise and shine, for thy light is come,” is something that must be done. When one begins to consider the best way to “arise” and the best way to “shine,” he finds that he is not equal to either. Perhaps he is too filled with sin, or sickness, or evil of some sort or another. Years of self-immolation are necessary. Perhaps the hypocrisy of false modesty holds him back. But, while he is debating the best way to arise and shine, Mary Magdalene arises and drops the dirty garments of her own making into the oblivion of yesterday. “Where are thy accusers'” Mary cannot find any outside of herself and suddenly she cannot find anything within to accuse her, for in the new state of consciousness at which she has arrived there is nothing there of the former thing. She has, however, to arise. She has to make the gesture.

“Stretch forth thy hand” – yes, I know that it is withered and old and incapacitated and crippled through an accident, etc., etc.; but I said, “Stretch forth thy hand,” and the hand is either stretched forth or you are going to tell me why you cannot do it, or ask me how it is done. You will have to make the gesture, the instant response to the Voice of the Power which is within you, waiting and ready to fulfill all your desires as soon as you come to the place of accepting the Power as here and now operative.

“Cast your burden on me and I will sustain you.” Do you hear? Are you going to reason it out? I did not say perhaps, or maybe, or if Mr. and Mrs. Blank thought or did not think it would be done. I said, “Cast your burden on me and I will sustain you.” Do you hear? Can you make the gesture, or is your burden too big for me? But yet you are able to sustain it yourself, however wretchedly. What kind of a god are you praying to, and where is he? “Am I a God afar off?” Answer me. Can I sustain you or are you able to do that which I am incapable of doing? Answer me. “I am the Voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord.” I am the Voice in the midst of thee constantly saying “I will; come to me,” but you must make the gesture. “Arise and shine, for thy Light is come” – yes, this great spiritual light which you have been expecting to come slowly and by degrees, or which you hoped to some day get from a Master or a strange teacher, is come – now. Do you hear? Do you feel the thrill of the secret doctrine which is even now speaking to you between the lines of this book, conveying to you the inspirational interpretation of the gesture, which it is necessary to make in order to receive the manifestation?

The ways of Spirit are not the ways of man; why check them against the findings of man? There is no law of man which can explain in any way the manifestation of Spirit. In the truest sense of the word healing is merely revelation of that which eternally is.

The making of the gesture in response to the Voice of Spirit is the purest unconscious-conscious recognition of the Presence.

“You say it is four months until the harvest?” Why, it is a long story and a true one, isn’t it? The seed must be planted after the ground is ready to receive it, and then watered, cultivated, garnered, harvested, etc., etc. That is why it takes four months; anyone can figure it out. But I say unto you “look again; the fields are white.” You have evidently been looking and seeing through the eyes of relativity, human thought-taking, knowing, reasoning, and then suddenly you hear, and, standing in the same place, you make the gesture, and this time the “Look again” reveals to you that which does not have to come by the way of man. “Look again!” Why don’t you begin to look again and see that the heavy bondage of the human mind does not have to be set aside?

The thrilling revelation of Spirit comes to you as a flood of light in the darkness of night. The Voice crying in the wilderness is making itself heard through the tangled mass of thinking, and making the way for the expression of the Lord here and now. But not by slow degrees does the harvest become visible before the eyes, but as if a veil were torn asunder and the finished thing appears. The revelation of the Presence does not “grow”: it reveals the finished mystery. From the extreme of the human limitations to the fullness of the Christ in the twinkling of an eye, or at the instant man is able to make the gesture. The moment he is able to look again. The moment he makes the gesture which in one fell swoop disregards the teachings of centuries of evolution.

On and on the glorious revelation sweeps; it does not stop with the fertile fields which have been for years cultivated and planted with grain – no, it rushes you into a still greater proof of the Power when it says: “The desert shall blossom as a rose.”

Yes, the desert whereon nothing has ever grown, where the lizard scurries about amid the dry sage brush and sun-soaked sand, and over which the brazen dome of heaven looks down daily – this very impossible place shall blossom as a rose. The contrast is too great and it comes definitely under the heading of the impossible.

But there in the great Book of Life which is opening before you, you are beginning to see why Jesus said, “Having eyes, ye see not, and ears, ye hear not,” for when you realize for a moment the capacity back of the sight and the hearing you will obey the command and “Look again,” and your eyes will behold the glory of the Lord in this very hell of evil and despair. “Awake, thou that sleepest, and Christ shall give thee light.” Awake, awake and arise from the dead thoughts.

The ears hear the words “Arise and walk.” It would be wonderful if I could do it; but how is it done? There is no way for it to be done because you are an incurable; you have something that cannot be eliminated or destroyed; you have something that is stronger than God – or so you say. Perhaps not in those words, but you definitely say it is hopeless, which is virtually the same thing. You only hear the sound, “Arise and walk,” and it has no more power to heal or help than any other three words would have, until you hear, and, when you HEAR, you make the gesture and find the action of God is a perfect stream of manifestation. You find that the dumb speak – yea, sing and shout for the joy. They do not lisp for a season of convalescence. What though the muscles and structure of the throat and mouth be absolutely impossible of producing speech, they not only speak, ‘but they shout and sing for the joy of the new day revealed to them through making the gesture.

What is back of all this gesture idea? Why is it that the making of the gesture is necessary? Why shouldn’t the Power come into full manifestation without a single movement on your part? Perhaps it does. Making a gesture is not confined to the physical movement. It goes so far beyond that that perhaps you remain in a perfect ecstasy of stillness – the deepest emotion is stillness, both physically and mentally, because it comes under the command, “Be still and know that I AM GOD.” The deep emotion of the gesture of stillness causes you to hear the inaudible-audible Voice which is described as “still and small.” The voice commanding you to “rise and walk” in stentorian tones or in velvety resonance is not the voice which brings about the change or the revelation. It is the still small voice, wrapped in the word, hidden under the command, which carries the authority with it, and when heard and understood, causes man to make the gesture, because it immediately frees him from a lifetime of thinking, wondering, guessing, or trying to reason how it is done.

“I come as a thief in the night,” at a moment ye think not; when you are not trying to make the Power work; when you are not trying to heal yourself; when you are not trying to prosper yourself or make your organization a paying proposition. “I come as a thief in the night.” I come with the revelation of the deep hidden meaning which causes you, in an unthinking moment, to “rise and walk” – which causes you to make the gesture.

“Come eat and drink without price.” You will have to come; no one can come for you. Either you “come” or you sit and try to reason it all out. Many have “come” to the feast and spent their time trying to see if they could find out how the law worked, trying to pry into the “birthing out” process of nature – peeping under the veil that hides the Ark of the Covenant to see if they might learn the law of increase, so that they may go their way and “show” to a crowd of personal followers how the trick is done. But when they “come” in this manner to the feast, they see nothing but a very ordinary banquet taking place, and as they watch they begin to see more and more discrepancies about it all, and go away “telling” the world there is nothing to it. Having dismissed the whole glorious revelation with such ease, they return and try to find therein some affirmation which can ‘be polished up again and set into action.

“Come, eat and drink without price.” Either you can COME or you cannot come. Either you have too many dead fathers to bury or too many weddings to attend to “come, eat and drink” of the living Waters of Life which bring eternity to you. But one day you will “leave all – follow me,” and this gesture will have to be made by the individual. I said, “Leave all.” All what? All of the human thinking and reasoning, all of the limitations interposed by the false education of the Presence and the Power. “Leave all; follow me.” I am taking you by a way ye know not. If you already knew the way you would not need me, but, since you have found the way so difficult and hard, and have admitted your defeat, why not “leave all – follow me”?

With your human reasoning you will attempt to tear the delicate membranes away from the gestation of the egg in order that the curious unbelieving eyes can “peep” upon the processes of birth. So will you make a sharp incision with the all-knowing human mind into what you suppose to be the veil of Life, hoping to find out how to make money out of the ethers or increase out of the nothing. But all that you shall find is the nothingness which you knew was there all the time.

“Arise and shine, for thy light is come.” You hear it over and over. Again you wait for the light to come. One day you hear it for the first time, and find the place flooded with the light of revelation. You remember that which you had forgotten – that “your Father hath enough and to spare” – not that He will have nor that He should have, but that He has. Nothing you can do will make this so nor help to make it so. It is already so or else it was never so. Nothing you can do can ever make any Truth so. It is already so, or else it would never be so. What you can do is make the gesture and let the great Power find its own glorious expression here and now.

You can arise and walk into the new day of expression now. You can open the eyes born blind. You can raise the dead when you begin to make the gesture following the command of Jesus, “Go thou and do likewise” – exactly the same as he did.

You are, with Jesus, not ashamed to assume this glorious Power. Your God-given heritage awaits you, because you have long since realized that you as a personality are helpless and can do nothing. It is nothing to be ashamed of. Jesus knew that he could do nothing, and suddenly you come to the same honest place of expression.

It is hard for the old man, the old personality swollen with pride at what it has thought it has accomplished, to give up and admit that it can do nothing. Why, didn’t I build a church, no matter how small, and didn’t I heal a certain person, or give generously of my money, and have I not been recognized as a great healer and helper and a doer of good deeds? As long as all this remains it is impossible for you to follow the Christ teaching. If Jesus found he could do nothing, and asked his followers not to call him good, let the brazen personality who can stand in this revealing light come forth, and claim his or her temporal power, and glorify his temple filled with the dead men’s bones of little things that have happened in the past. But if you find with the Master the deep secret thing which we are designating as making the gesture, you will leave all and follow me. You will automatically rise when the Voice speaks, and will carry on from the heights of the Secret Place.

The Secret Place is not visible to those seeking place and power, neither is the place of the Host. “Choose ye this day whom ye will serve.” What do you feel? Can you come? Can you rise? Can you open your eyes? And can you “Go thou and do likewise”? ;Can you? Can you make the gesture?

GLEANINGS

‘Let there he Light, and there was Light.” This was before the creation of the material symbol of light – the sun. It is just this Light that man is today seeking again, having caught glimpses of it in the instantaneous manifestation of Power, which is termed by many, the supernatural power, but which is in reality the Only Power. Just as the light which preceded the sun is the only Light, the coming of this Light makes the light of high noon as twilight.

In this closing chapter I have massed together the words of Father. The leaven, which, if buried In the meal of your human consciousness, will make the whole mass leaven:

One of Father’s songs:

BEHOLD I STAND AT THE DOOR OF YOUR HEART AND KNOCK. I AM THE FOUNT OF EVERY JOY.

I AM ALL INTELLECT; YOU DON’T HAVE TO GROPE. I AM ALL SUCCESS. I AM ALL HEALTH. I AM ALL WEALTH. I AM ALL STRENGTH. I AM ALL INTELLIGENCE. I AM ALL WISDOM. I AM ALL KNOWLEDGE. I AM ALL LOVE.

I AM ALL THAT YOU CAN DESIRE; AND I AM KNOCKING AT THE DOOR OF YOUR HEART. EVERY TIME A MAN SEEKS JOY,

IT IS I KNOCKING AT THE DOOR OF HIS HEART. OPEN UNTO ME. OPEN WIDE. LET ME IN.

SPEAK LORD, AND THY SERVANT HEARETH.

I SPEAK, AND MY SERVANTS WILL HEAR, WHEREVER THEY ARE. I DO NOT ASK THEM TO HEAR OR DEMAND THEM TO HEAR. I SPEAK THE WORD AND THEY HEAR. I BID THEM SEE AND THEY SEE. I BID THEM WALK AND THEY WALK;

I BID THEM BE PROSPEROUS AND THEY ARE PROSPEROUS.

In speaking of human relationship, Father Divine said:

“You cannot have mothers and fathers, sisters and brothers, relatives and family, etc., and have ME too. You cannot rob God. Someone is nearer and dearer to you than I Am, then you wonder why I do not claim you. That is why you cannot get to ME. That is why you are subject to sickness and trouble, because mortals are subject to those things and you are living in mortal consciousness. God declared, ‘Let there be no division among you.’ Every distinction and every division is a curse to the nation. Jesus, in the seventh chapter of St. John, prayed to make them One even as we are One. Some of you claim to have been in the Truth for years, and yet you have sisters and brothers, and others and fathers, husbands and wives, etc.. Such of you are separating yourselves from the Infinite Whole and joining yourselves to the individual world. The Son ship degree of spirit prayed the Father to make them One as we are One, and that is what I have done. I have put you all in a melting-pot and have made you One. Now that is the way back home, where the Christ is. It is the only way back home – denouncing these mortal things and then REnouncinig them for Christ.

In speaking about the new life, the new idea, in relation to its former bondage, ‘That which is born of flesh is flesh, and that which is born of spirit is spirit.’ The new creature, then, does not go back and have converse with old relative conditions, if he expects to take on his new heritage.

“I have come to take you OUT of the grave, out of mothers and fathers, sisters and brothers, husbands and wives, children and parents, races and creeds, out of mortality into immortality. I have said nothing of how long you have been dead or how long you have been in this state. Lazarus had been in the tomb four days, typifying a time equal to the four thousand years since Adam; and people thought he was dead, saying, ‘he stinketh.’ People have thought the seed of Christ in man is dead, it has lain so long, but it is not dead, and I have proved it is not dead, and I have come to awaken you. You are going back to the Garden of Eden as you were before the fall. If you will live in accordance with My Will, this automatic machine within – the Christ – will begin to work in you, if you abide in this consciousness.

When the new idea is born, it must of necessity have a new abode:

“I’m taking your mind out of the imaginary heaven, for, as John saw, in Revelation, twenty-first chapter, the first heaven and the first earth have passed away. I’m canceling the imaginary heaven and earth out of your consciousness. That’s what I came for, to erase that imaginary heaven and earth from your mind, and prove to you that the Kingdom has come and the Will is being done. You have prayed that the Kingdom should come; how can it come when you have the imaginary heaven in the way? Get it out of the way and then the new Heaven and the new Earth can come in. The first heaven and the First earth shall not be called to mind anymore, and I am getting it out of the way so that the new Heaven and the new Earth can come in. We have Heaven here because we are making Earth a paradise. The old seed idea was alright, but this is the harvest now. The old idea that was planted in your consciousness for years, is bearing fruit now. The prayers of your dear mother, the prayers of your dear father, have been answered, and the new Heaven and the new Earth have come down from God out of heaven.

In speaking of the reason for so much sickness and failure among those in metaphysics, Father says:

“I was just considering how slight a thing it takes to recognize the body, the actual body, of Christ. It is wonderful! Truly wonderful that it is that way. I repeat again that quotation I so often use: ‘For this cause many are sickly among you, because they do not discern the body of Christ.’ It is truly necessary to discern the actual materialization of the Christ in order to be freed from mortal limitations and be saved. The Truth teaches and the Truth students particularly have discerned the Spiritual Christ, but they have denied the materialized Christ. Consequently they are subject to all kinds of sickness and trouble in their physical bodies, because they have not included them in the Christ. They say the spiritualized Christ is perfect in them, and is not dependent upon a physical body. Then why bother with the physical body? Let it go down into the grave. But Jesus came to save physical bodies, and I Am here, the materialized Christ, to save your physical bodies. By gazing upon this perfect manifestation of the materialized Christ you will reproduce the same in your own bodies in every joint, every sinew, and every bone. You will see good in your hands and fingers, in the fine skin, etc.. You will feel this boundless joy coursing through you. Limitless blessings! He who is an anti-christ must be half brother to the atheist. The anti-christ does not believe in the materialized Christ of nineteen hundred years ago, or of today. The atheist does not believe in God. Take these things in, dear ones, for your consideration.

Speaking of the impersonal nature of the Christ:

“Though I should not be visible to you, I Am always with you. I have established this Truth, and, with or without a body, it is operative. It is even more operative when you do not see ME. Nothing can stop the operation of this Truth, for I have established It. If America should sink and every visible expression were to sink in an earthquake, it could not stop It. If you are sick, all you need to do is call on My name and you do not have to see anybody or anything.

Explaining the manner in which manifestations were concreted, or brought into visibility, Father said:

“That which you think is spirit, that which you think is only mental, can be materialized by the power of Christ Itself. ‘As any as received Him, to them gave He power to become the Sons of God,’ etc.. When you believe in the materialization of Christ, that gives you the power to materialize things, but the average person, who believes only in the spiritualization of the Christ, cannot materialize things. I might say here, if I can coin a word out of nothing, they can only imaginationize things. When you realize that ‘the Word was made flesh,’ then you materialize and bring out the activity of Christ in you. When you come to this relation things are actually materialized. Humanity has lost sight of the great importance of the materialized Christ. For your highest good it is necessary to realize that Christ has been made flesh and dwells among us. Dear ones, I am sure that those that are in Truth have been taught that God is a Spirit; they have misconceived the idea that the Word has been made flesh. Many make shipwreck of good faith, and cause themselves to be atheistically inclined, and have caused many more to be atheists than deists.

Every Spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ is of God is of My Kingdom, but every Spirit that denies that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is an anti-christ. He is separating his body from the spirit. God declared ‘What I have joined together let no man put asunder.’ How dare you separate Jesus from Christ, or Christ from Jesus. If you do you are separating your body from the Spirit, and ‘whatever you measure shall he measured to you again, and it shall be full, pressed down, shaken together and running over.” Again I say, ‘your ways are not my ways,’ saith the Lord, for as the heavens are above the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways. Now realize, dear ones, that it is for your good to see the materialization of the Christ. Until the Word was made flesh we could not behold his glory, as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.

But not until It was made flesh could man behold all the glory of God. Since you beheld His glory, therefore, have all we received of His fullness, grace for grace. Do you not see that step by step it came into actuality, as we grew in the knowledge of the Truth? Then of ALL of His FULLNESS have we received, grace for grace. The you, as well as I, will be the identical duplication of the Christ that was manifested nineteen hundred years ago. ”

I give absent treatments? No, because God is present everywhere.

In response to the question “How to go into the silence?” Father answered that it was unnecessary to sit and go into the silence if you lived in the silence. By silence he meant silence of mortal opinions and beliefs.

“Beloved, now we are the Sons of God – God in any individual expressions of himself. ‘The manifested Christ reveals what the unmanifested Christ conceals.

‘He will come as thief in the night – that is, unknown to you, and asked or disguised.”

‘Since Christ came, you have had the same right to the Tree of Life that Adam had before he sinned.”

Father refers to the Lord’s prayer as having already been answered. We need a fuller recognition of this fact, to consider it under the light, “Before they ask I will answer.” The important part of the prayer is: “For thine is the Kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever.

Paul said: “For of the fullness of his glory have we received, grace for grace’ – all of his glory, every bit of it. We have received ALL – so claim your right and press your claim.

“He re-storeth my soul. Your soul was once stored up in God before Adam, and protected by him, but it has become scattered, and is now being gathered up into him. ‘He RE-STORETH my soul, my cup runneth over. Surely goodness and mercy shall ABIDE with me all the days of my life and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.’ I KNOW the Christ in Me can save you. I KNOW it – if you will LET the Christ in you, save you.’

‘The Spirit of the Consciousness of the Presence of God is the source of all supply, and will satisfy every good desire. That is the way I get my money, and in no other way. The abundance of the fullness of the Consciousness of Good – no place is vacant from the FULLNESS thereof. NO space is vacant. No space in you is vacant. It is in every joint, every sinew, every vein, every bone, and every fibre and cell of your body -the ABUNDANCE of the fullness of the Consciousness of Good – I am speaking to every cell in your body, and the Christ in every cell is responding and coming forth to the Christ.

‘And it is done here and now If you will abide in Me, and let My word abide in you, you will, through constant praise and thanksgiving, create such an atmosphere about you that your message, silent or spoken, will continue to bless and heal and draw all joy and health, and love and life unto you.’

It is not necessary that one come to ME as a person to be abundantly blessed, but that they form a mental and spiritual contact, raising their consciousness to contact the Christ-consciousness, if they would be even as I AM, free from all bonds and limitations. The Spirit of the Consciousness of the Presence of God is the source of all supply, and will satisfy every good desire.”

One of the angels at Father’s asked this terse question: “Would a chick hatched in an incubator call the incubator its mother, and look to it for its inheritance?” The answer is obvious.

‘It is essential that all moral intellect be stilled that the voice of God may be heard. A complete relaxation of the conscious mentality is absolutely necessary, being still and knowing the ‘I AM’ God within, speaking, sacrificing, and laying down every prop that tends to hurt or bind, and depending solely on God alone. Then running with patience the race, for it is not unto the swift and the mighty, but unto him that endureth unto the end.’

POSTSCRIPT

Beloved – at this instant, as you read, we are in the glorious silence of the Presence. The Father within and the Father without is present. We are pausing in the flooding light of Truth, which is permeating the entire universe. The heart fills full and runs over with the joy of this Presence. The former things have passed away – you are entering the new Kingdom. In this hushed and lovely moment of silence we give thanks to the rather. Son of the Living God, arise and shine, for thy light has come. The new day has dawned, and the shadows of the day of relativity are fleeing before this Light.

Michael Pupin once said:

“These big stars are only the beginning of God’s creative energy. The human soul, in so far as science can penetrate, is the last chapter of cosmic history as far as it has hen written. It is in the soul that Divinity resides. When we think of that, we are not so small. Science has found nothing in the universe which even compares in importance with the life of man.”

It is, then, to Father Divine that I give thanks and praise for having shown me something of this wondrous Life which looks out from the stars instead of up to them.

‘Blessings, blessings, blessings so many you cannot count them. ‘

Praise God, from whom all blessings flow. You are laved in the glorious flood of Life –

it is well, and so it is. Selah.

GLORIFY THOU ME

“Father, glorify Thou Me with Thine own Self with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was,” is the prayer for the final manifestation in the flesh, of the WORD. It is a wonderful revelation, to note that Jesus is not asking for something new and strange to happen to Him. He is merely asking for a return to visibility of the Glory that He already had experienced, and had already manifested, before He came into the “world” known to him as the world of Jesus the Nazarene. It is the same “glory” that we are all seeking, vaguely and through divers manners and methods. Many believe that something has to be created or changed, instead of something being “restored.” “He restoreth my Soul,” is the same idea. Something is restored that man has lost sight of, and in this thought comes the happiness that it is possible of manifestation because it has already been. Glorify Me with the SAME glory I had with Thee before the beginning of the world of belief – the world that I have drawn to me, by accepting the idea that I was separated from the Father consciousness, and therefore was independent, and had to function through a world of problems and difficulties before I could attain to the PERFECTION and GLORY that we find out later on was always an integral part of our Divine heritage.

It is the awakening to the fact that the Man, made in the image and likeness of God, has always been perfect, and that nothing can, or does, change this eternal fact. The Human sense, having blinded eyes, must again become cognizant of the Facts of BEING, and align itself again with the Truth of Life – and this is all that takes place.

The wearisome idea of working to change things by “taking thought” about them – especially when we are told that it will do no good – has to be uprooted. It is a plant that our Heavenly Father has not planted, and therefore it must go.

The endless dreams of perfection, joy, glory, and expression that have passed over you are but the faint remembrance of the “Glory I had with Thee before the world was.” And it is just this realization which causes us to be “quickened” into a newness.

“Awake thou that sleepest,” Takes on an ever-increasing meaning and life. Awake to the fact that we are not trying to change anything, or that we have anything to build or make, but something definitely to claim, by true prayer – the prayer to the Father. A prayer to the Power within to restore that which has eternally been our heritage. A perfection and glory which transcends any of the human limitations which we have added to ourselves through identifying ourselves with a personality. It is Wonderful!

“He restoreth My soul” – my sense of things. The He mentioned herein is the FATHER within – the Father, to whom this prayer of restoration is addressed. “Father, Glorify Me.” The ME that is here expressing in a body which has come under all the beliefs of the human race is to be resurrected and lifted up out of the tomb of human beliefs. The “dead” are to raised up in glory. We are DEAD to LIFE eternal as long as we are identified with a body which is separated from God.

“As HE is, so are we in this present world.” Do you begin to see that we are approaching something different in the revelation of Truth? It is all so wonderful, and is all there, awaiting the coming of the Master. All the good and all the joy that we ever dreamed of demonstrating are THERE in the realm of Reality, awaiting the appropriation of it: awaiting the coming of one with Recognition. It is Wonderful! Father, glorify ME with the same glory I had with Thee before the beginning of the world.

“As HE IS, so are we in this world.” What do you mean by HE, and where do you place HIM? Jesus distinctly told us that the “Father within, He doeth the works.” We have heard this over and over, and still there is a tendency to pray “up”, or “out”, or somewhere other than contacting this glorious Power in the only place possible to contact it – the WITHIN. Within the consciousness of man is the only possible place to know God. Not a separate little God shut up in a body, as if it were a mummy in a sarcophagus, but a point of contact where the personal touches the impersonal, where the point dissolves into the circle. It is Wonderful!

Over and over again we hear the various things that are to be derived from contact with the FATHER, and presently we will GO within, in the true sense of the word, and commune with the FATHER in secret, and the Father which SEETH in Secret will reward thee openly. That is, the Word shall become flesh and dwell among us. We shall see it with our eyes, and handle it with our hands, and the Glory of the Lord shall have been made manifest to the WORLD. What world? Your world – the world that revolves about you.

As HE is, so are we in this PRESENT world. Actually we are at this instant in the state of perfection in which we were created, or else the whole idea of God creating Man in HIS image and likeness is a myth. Because we do not perceive, it does not argue anything in favor of its not being true. There are many things you did not see or hear that were there all the time, but which you see and hear now. Your eyes are “holden,” because the scales of believing in human appearances have so distorted the normal and true vision that you cannot see this perfection. It is wonderful, however, to know that we are beginning to discover that we have this Divine Heritage, and that we are entitled to it, and that only ourselves can keep it longer away from us.

“Who did hinder you that ye should not obey the truth?” We have been hindering ourselves by the acceptance of appearances as real – and by the looking to man for our Wisdom, instead of turning to God. It is Wonderful! Wonderful! Wonderful!

When we begin to examine just HOW “HE IS” – just WHAT “HE IS” – we begin to see that all the dreams of a lifetime have emanated from the memory of this “Altogether Lovely” creation of God which is our True Self. In spite of all the arguments, beliefs, and proofs of the human world, this “Altogether Lovely” manifestation will come into being when we begin to “return” to the Father’s House – when we begin to return to the Father’s consciousness, and find there the unchanged perfect creation as it was in the beginning before the world was.

It not only speeds the journey, but adds joy to it, to know that we are not going to fight for what we think is ours; we are not going to try to establish our claim to an inheritance; we are merely going to ASK the Father for this inheritance with positive assurance, and then “let” the same GLORY come through into expression in us. “Yet [yes, even after all this false manifestation and belief] in my flesh shall I see God.” Yes; after it has passed through a thousand and one beliefs, which have seemed absolutely hopeless and impossible, YET, even after all this shall “I” (You) see GOD in the flesh. Why will you SEE HIM? Because HE will come forth in all the GLORY which was, and IS, yours always.

Be still. Come before HIS Presence with joy and praise. JOY and PRAISE for the TRUTH of being. The stillness of the human mind, which is always seeking things that it may consume upon its lusts, opens the way for the rebirth, or reappearance, of the GLORY which has been eternally yours before the beginning of the world. It is Wonderful!

“It [the human sense of life] is sown in dishonor; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power:

“It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body….”

And as we have borne the image of the earthly, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly.

“Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed.”

“In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.”

“For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.”

It is so glorious to realize that this identical mortal, the you that has seemed so full of beliefs of sin, sickness, and death – this identical MORTAL must and will put on IMMORTALITY. So long we have thought, we must shuffle off this mortal garment in order that we could inherit the Spiritual Robes of Immortality; we are beginning to see that we are awakened from the “dead” beliefs of sin and mortality into the glorious reality of the Sons of the Living God, clothed upon in garments of Light. It is Wonderful! Wonderful! Wonderful! Clothed with light and thanksgiving. Filled with the Holy Ghost, and raised up into Immortality. Again we are brought back to the GLORY which was ours before the beginning of the world. It is Wonderful! And all this takes place in the twinkling of an eye, when the last trump shall sound, when we shall have come to a full and absolute agreement with the Father within, and accepted this Immortality and Glory.

“The Heavens declare the GLORY of God; and the Firmament sheweth His Handiwork.” Everything is full of the Glory of the Lord, when once we are filled with it. It is the LIGHT which dissolves the darkness of human thinking and reveals the true state, and which is able to say quite definitely, “Arise and walk.” It sees through the shadows of belief back to the GLORY which is the Divine Right of the individual, and calls that GLORY into manifestation. Revelation and Realization follow along in natural sequence. We are coming into the Kingdom as something more than a place of imagination. The former things have passed away. The former beliefs of attaining Heaven and harmony have passed away, and the NEW DAY, the NEW HEAVEN, the NEW Earth are revealed HERE and NOW. It is Wonderful!

“Father, glorify Thou ME with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was.”

The Father within, He knows it all – the how, the why, and the wherefore: whereas the little human Prodigal tries in his limited way to tell God what to do, and just what to bring out. He holds his measure and outline up to God, and says, “Please make it appear after this fashion.” It is like asking the sun only to shine in your garden. The GLORY that is yours is so much greater and more wonderful in its manifestation than anything you can think, or than anything that has ever entered into you heart to conceive, that comparisons are odious and futile. “The GLORY” that you are beginning to experience is something beyond what the human mind has outlined as “just about perfect.” It is the flowing revelation that will come with healing in its wings, and will come showing new and wonderful capacities and ideas to mankind. New expressions and new means of appreciating the perfection of this GLORY will be borne in upon you. Be still – you are in a new day – the old order changeth. Do you hear?

The Old order includes all the limitations and all the hard and set rules of the human mind, with its elegant learning and wisdom, which are to be cast aside as nothing but so much useless baggage.

Ideas, capacities, and abilities that have existed since before the world was are to be revealed to you – be still. You do not have to talk it over with anyone. You just have to be STILL, and ASK the FATHER to “Glorify you with the glory that was yours before the world was, and that glory will be sufficient to bring out of the darkness of human belief all the wonders of HIS LOVE. Some glorious things await YOU. Be still. It is Wonderful! Wonderful! Wonderful! Heaven and earth are full of THEE.

“I Am here, I Am there, I Am everywhere.”

We are in the PRESENCE HERE and NOW, and in this Presence we find the fullness of Joy:

“In the Silence of the Presence of your Father indeed is the full consciousness, the realization of perfection; the ultimate blessing, the dissolution of all worldly beliefs, for your Father and you are One. For heaven is here and Now. You are washed clean indeed. Personality has returned to the things earthly, and the Higher self reveals the Inner Brightness, that Incandescent White Christ Light, which goes ever and Now before you, leading you to greater paths of truth and understanding, on towards the Limitless expansions, the higher heights and deeper depths. You have It. You are Free. I Am with you and within you. You are caught up in the Rapture of your Father, in the glorious White Christ Light – that effulgent radiance, free from all bounds and limitations. It is so, and so it is. According to your faith be it unto you, Now and all through eternity. So rejoice always in the Lord.”

“But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.”

The direct application of the illustration – “as in a glass.” We know how perfect and correct the image in the glass is, when we step before the mirror; and so, when we step before this GLORY, with an open-free consciousness, to “let” the light come into expression, in and through us, just so shall the same image be produced in us – the image of perfection and beauty; the image of success and happiness and expression. It is Wonderful! And it is written: “from glory to glory.” On and on into more and more wonderful experiences of the Presence: things we have not thought of, or dreamed of as possible, come to us as the Revelation breaks over us with its flood of Light and Power. “As in a glass.” Do you hear? Do you see the difference in this Prayer to the Father to “Glorify ME,” and the prayer which is constantly trying to get some little gift away from God? Taking the little gift is merely holding, for a short space, the shadow of substance, when all the while “Glory after glory” awaits you. It is Wonderful!

As you have borne the image of the earthly with all its limitations, so shall ye bear the image of the Heavenly. Something definite and real about this statement. An assurance that this will and must take place. It is Wonderful! Wonderful! Wonderful! “Heaven and earth are full of the Lord.”

The child that was born within, whose name is WONDERFUL, came to lead you into all things. The recognition of the Christ within is the open door through which this new and mighty Revelation is taking place.

Aren’t you glad there is a counselor, somewhere, and somehow, here and NOW, willing and ready to free you from all sin, and from all condemnation? He that the Son sets free, is free indeed.

The awakening to the GLORY which was ours before the world was, begins to put to flight the condemnation we have held over ourselves and others, and, with the coming of this GLORY, the cause of all condemnation also moves out of the picture. It is Wonderful! “Neither do I condemn you,” is as applicable to you as it is to anyone else. The “I” within will speak this freeing word to you, when you are ready to forsake that for which you have been condemned, and it shall pass out of sight and out of memory. It is Wonderful!

The first heaven and first earth have passed away, and the new Heaven, the new “Word made flesh,” is appearing out of the clouds of belief.

The glorious part of this NEW Heaven and Earth is the same glorious thing we find in the resurrected Jesus. He presents a Body which is not a “spirit,” but which has flesh and bones, and which partakes of food and drink; in other words, He presents the “Word made flesh” without all the so-called fleshy limitations. He presents the body which was raised to the point of incorruptibility.

“In the beginning the Word was with God and the Word was God and was invisible. When you began to realize this, you came a little nearer to God: or the Word, the invisible word, came a little nearer to your conscious realization. It began to materialize itself – the word became flesh. The kingdom of God is not visible until it has been made visible by Him that livith for ever and for ever. It is Wonderful! But ‘I’ came to materialize the things that the human mind thought not to be. Once upon a time you were invisible, but today you are visible, and the kingdom of heaven shall also in like manner be made visible. It is written, ‘As He is, so are we in this world.’ and we are Now materializing the things that we realize and we are bringing into conscious realization the materialization of things that have been hidden from generations. That is where we are Now – we are at the point of materializing those things which have heretofore been purely mental and invisible.”

This materialization is brought about by the Recognition of the “Glory” that is ours, and the Glory is revealed by the Father within.

“Father, glorify Thou Me with Thine own Self with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was.”

It is Wonderful, because it transcends any earthly concept of Glory, or Heaven, and at the same time it reveals to us this practical, livable state of existence; reveals to us that consciousness of Life which transcends the laws of the human mind, and finds it natural that the Child of the Living God should be in a state of joy, and peace and plenty.

Finally man comes to realize that the Natural state of man is one of health, happiness, and success, and the old belief that all these things are unusual, and can only be induced if the right word or treatment be said, is passing away. Demonstrations are not given us to be wondered at, but as a natural functioning of the God Power; as a natural emanation of the GLORY which was, and is, ours, before the beginning of the world of belief in which we became lost. It is Wonderful!

“Arise, and shine; for thy light is come, and the GLORY of the Lord is risen upon thee,” – this is so, WHEN it is SO to YOU. Do you hear?

THE GLORY of GOD

“AND THE Glory of THE LORD filled the House.” (Consciousness) And the Glory of the Lord filled the earth -the heavens declare it and the earth showeth forth HIS Handiwork.

What is this strange, apparently evanescent quality of God called “GLORY”? It has become so involved with theological interpretations as to mean nothing more than an abstract sense of Light.

Glory is a fourth dimensional word. It cannot be defined any more than ”Lo” or “Behold”. Therefore it cannot be understood by the human mind.

“The Earth is the Lord’s and the FULLness thereof”. The earth (all manifestation) is the actual body of God, through which He makes Himself manifest and felt.

We are told that everything shall praise His Holy Name (nature), – and that “all flesh shall see it together”. How can man see God, since he is also told “No man shall see God and live”? The man referred to is the Adam creation hypnotized to a belief in separation.

When once he discovers the revelation of Jesus Christ, that he came for but ONE purpose, – and that, to “GLORIFY GOD” (not himself), he will understand his mission in Life. He will experience a strange, subtle change coming into his life, – one so filled with new dimensions, so filled with wonder as to open a thousand, thousand doors before him into places which “his eyes have not seen, nor his ears heard”, and show to him things that have already been prepared, which have never entered his heart.

“For men to seek their own glory, is not GLORY”.

We have all been attempting to seek our Glory through the “demonstration” of health, wealth, success, – but if we have succeeded to any degree, these have eventually turned to “dust” because they had no base upon which to rest and because we knew not that all manifestation begins to disappear the moment it appears, in order that it can be kept fresh and new by the constant stream of GLORY which is passing through the Temple Body, – when once recognized.

What a wonderful relaxation and peace comes with the recognition of the Truth that your body is only for the purpose of expressing the Glory of the Lord. It is the condenser, as it were, through which the unseen Power of God naturally flows into expression, without mental or physical effort. This recognition vitiates and nullifies all human law, science and belief. There is no battle, no struggle, – only immediate, automatic Victory.

GLORY is a power which has no comparison, cannot be pitted- against, – nor can it be used to combat human thinking. It in no wise overcomes difficulties through struggle, effort or super-mental strength any more than the Sun uses force in its evaporation of dew. Nothing is lost, – but all is changed, transmuted, transformed. The violent onslaught of your “evil” is transmuted into avenues of accomplishment, without struggle, without loss. The determined thought pattern of failure which has been so successful in bringing out failure, is turned into success, – -and the success it had in failure, it now has in success or accomplishment.

Many truth seekers have repeated the success formulae in reverse, after this fashion: “I try, – -I read, – I pray, – I meditate, – and yet nothing happens.” The amazing part of it is how successful the power they accept is in bringing about “nothing happens”. It comes without effort and apparently against the strongest fight which may be put up against it. It is effortless in manifestation. It is “successful failure”

What is wrong, when we want so much the things promised and remain without them? The Law does not work two ways. In fact, it does not WORK, – it does not toil any more than do the lilies of the field. All this and more is revealed to you when you glimpse that JESUS and YOU came to express the GLORY of the LORD, – not the glorification or the glamorization of John Smith. The Glory of the Lord does glorify you in a way far surpassing the glory of man, – because it is not transient and fading, but ETERNAL, – and because it has ways and means “ye know not of” in human thought.

“The people of God are a peculiar people”. The people of the Adam creation and belief are more or less a string of paper dolls, all torn out of one newspaper, – and it might depend upon what part of the paper you were torn from.

One thing we have discovered is that we cannot stand against the vengeance of the Lord. Yet the vengeance of the Lord is only terrible to the evil human thought pattern. In reality, it is the LOVE of God moving out of your world that which is false. The Spirit that goes down into the subconscious pool of human thinking, stirs it and causes the accumulated filth to pass off so that the fresh water from hidden springs can clarify the well of Salvation.

Many times you have earnestly called for this Love of God, but when it comes with “sword in hand”, you hug the tatters of personal beliefs about you and have a problem which cannot be accounted for.

“Despise not the chastenings of the Lord”. You asked for it when you asked for LIGHT, – only now that it is attempting to come in, you are afrighted and want to return unto Egypt. You cannot take it, because no one is going to “save your darling from the flames”.

The Legend of the Phoenix Bird plunging into the Holy Fires and burning his accumulated beliefs of age, decrepitude, fear and all else, arising from the ashes anew and afresh, may be painful to contemplate, – BUT he comes out transformed and “without the Smell of Fire on his garments”.

This may sound as though you were to go through some ugly trial. However, the only trial is the letting go of your Soddom and Gomorrah. But, – don’t look back, – or else !

There stands in Southern France a lovely Roman Temple. The day was when it was used for worship, – a place of Light and Beauty. Years of belief passed over it and finally it came out labeled a “Feed Store”. Bales of hay rested against its Corinthian pillars and buckets of grain cluttered the erstwhile altar. Gaudy signs defaced the purity of its walls and the heckling of money-changing went on within. John Smith and Jane Jones had scratched their initials on its steps, hoping for some degree of immortality. And then, – one day renaissance came, – a recognition of its beauty. It was reclaimed and restored to the fair proportions of its true self. Today no vandal would dare desecrate its sacred beauty. “Glorify thou me with the Glory I had with thee before the beginning of the world”, – whether it be John Smith or the Feed Store.

Yes, you were created that the GLORY of the Lord might be revealed, – so that the LIFE of God might be established in a never-ending stream of glorious manifestation through YOU. The recognition of God as LIFE manifests as health and life more abundant, – not as some niggling demonstration of a healed body, – but GLORIOUS WELL-BEING. And so, too, with wealth and success.

Away then with all the buzzing chatter about demonstrations and ideas that you can direct this glorious Power to make it do your personal bidding. You were SENT-and for a definite purpose, – a purpose so much greater than the dreams of the human mind.

Your body is the Temple of the LIVING God -and GLORY pulsates through it, carrying away all the mist-I-fications of human thought. Your body, the TEMPLE of the Living God, – the point where the invisible Glory becomes the VISIBLE Glory.

“Therefore, whatsoever ye do, do all to the GLORY of God”. Let us be finished with the idea that we can of ourselves heal or help or save. When we do ALL to the GLORY of God, we will heal because we cannot do anything else, – and not because we want to. Anything that touches this consciousness, whether he be sinner or saint, will automatically be healed, in spite of the human mind. Then who are you, to imagine that you can of your own self do anything?

The Glory of the Lord is upon you, – and in you, – and through you, – and you SPEAK the WORD that accomplishes, – and you are not burdened with a long list of healings “you” have made.

Beloved, it is all so wonderful when you sense this fact that you came as Jesus came, – “that the GLORY of the Lord should be revealed”. Then what do you care about ephemeral fame, the fleeting egotism that goes with the making of yourself into a demi-god with strange powers. “Of mine own self I can do nothing”. But ah! What a wonderful truth bursts upon you, – “I can do all things through Christ Jesus”. Is ALL enough?

Are you afraid to come to ME? You have asked for so much you did not get because you wanted to consume it on the self-glorification of your little personality. But NOW, yes now, you are going to ASK that your JOY might be FULL, pressed down and running over.

Touching this truth that your body is the condenser of this unseen Glory, the old criticism, envy, hatred is released. “What is that to thee?” will do it. Just this glory pouring through you, – healing the sick, raising the dead, without human effort. You cannot help it, – nor can you hinder it. It is beautiful, – sacred, – holy, and… !

“The glory of man is as the flower of the field”. The GLORY of God is ETERNAL ! Then “Choose ye this day”

GOD IN ACTION

God in action is a never-ending stream of manifestation: In the world of “taking thought” against which Jesus warned man, it is possible to conceive of the action of Spirit without manifestation, just as it is possible to conceive of the technique, rhythm, tempo, melody, and notation of a concerto and experience nothing audible. “Clouds without rain” is the scriptural language for the thinking of and about God and not bringing Him into manifestation. Thinking of and about a thing immediately hedges it in with the limitations of thought. One of the first barriers which seems impossible to pass is making the unseen seen, the intangible tangible – except, of course, through the accepted processes of matter. Hence the miracle of the Loaves and the Fishes cannot be thought out. It is impossible to approach it with thought, because there is no dimension in the thought world which will permit producing substances where there is no substance visible. No amount of study or research into the ways of thought will make this possible. In fact, the more thought that is given to it, the less possible it is of attainment.

“But I say unto you, Take no thought for the scrip, the robe, the purse, the journey.” No matter how man tries to side-step this and use his so-called “common sense,” the injunction stands.

Thought-taking must have its foundation in the wisdom of man, the very wisdom which has been called foolishness in the eyes of God. Pause a moment and clear up the injunction – remembering that God is not a glorified human being, with great eyes, which are looking down upon man’s wisdom. The Eyes of Spirit (the perception of Power) find the puny reasoning of man unable to express or understand the wisdom of God.

The moment we begin to think of doing a thing, or having a thing, or going some place, a host of limitations present themselves. Fears of what might happen – the conjuring of possible evils, the inadvisability of the undertaking, so weigh the project down that nothing can happen. All this is intensified by “taking thought” about it.

There is no freedom to be derived, then, from “taking thought,” according to the Master. “If ye cannot do that which is least, why take thought of that which is greatest?” Answer that.

There is apparently no escape from the present limitations offered through thought. It is foolish to go against the findings of your own mind, just because you have read in a book, or heard someone say, “You can have anything you want, or do anything you like, if you think right.” Either the person making such a statement is speaking of thought from an entirely different angle than that which was specified as so useless by Jesus, or else he is playing about with words.

Definitely it is bad policy, and entirely erroneous, to go against your own findings. If you have accepted the wisdom of man as the highest and are just dabbling, as it were, in what you call the teachings of Jesus, then you will meet with one hundred per cent defeat in going against the findings of your mind. If you find that a man has more power to heal you than God, then you would be foolish to turn to God, and forsake the place of your confidence. If you know or find that a financier has more power to prosper you than God, then you are wasting precious time in turning to God for your substance. In other words, if you are coming by the mental, thought-taking way, you are wasting time to enter the place of inspiration.

Jesus, recognizing the limitations of the human mind, and how the thought works out everything by relativity, and the law of opposites, knew that there was little chance to transcend the limitations incumbent upon his birth and station in life. What could the thought of a carpenter boy do to open the doors of the temples, and to feed the multitudes, let alone to resurrect the body, and open the eyes of the blind? Hence the words, “I can of my own self do nothing.”

Thought in action lives, moves, and has its being in the plane of imagination. It is so often defeated in bringing anything to pass that the minds of most men are secret gardens replete with the flowers of unfulfilled dreams.

There are repeated attempts to explain and exploit that power which is the spiritual counterpart of thought. Due to the limitation of the language, writers have been obliged to use the words “thought” and “thinking,” and we have “As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he” (as a man “finds” himself or accepts himself, or perceives himself in consciousness, so is he).

Thought does not create anything, much less consciousness. Yet we have been led to believe that if we think hard enough something is sure to happen. How many thousands have trudged down this road of disappointment no one will ever know. Presently man is beginning to perceive that the “thought,” which is productive of results, emanates from an accepted state of consciousness, instead of being the modus operandi that created that state of consciousness. “Before you ask” “Before the thought even shapes itself – the answer has been given. When you ask in the ordinary sense of the word, you formulate a thought regarding the whole process. The law states that before you ask it is done, which shows that it was not the direct creation of your thought-taking, nor your asking. Thousands have asked and asked, again and again, for something which never came into being. Something must be out of alignment, or else that which is spoken of as appearing “before you ask” would appear. If must be the something that has to do with the thought of which Jesus warned men. Certainly the “thought of the heart” – if we wish to designate it that way – resolves itself into pure recognition.

“My Father worketh hitherto, and I work,” is closely allied with the processes of manifestation. Now it is true that the Father working in the way of Spirit (which is above the way of man and his thinking) accomplishes, by a way we know not of, whatsoever it will. Think, then, what it must be to start with a basis of this kind. “My Father worketh hitherto, and I work” – in other words, the creation is already finished, and is merely awaiting recognition. If you start with this basic, then what could it avail you to introduce an avalanche of human thinking founded on the limitations of mankind? “Who by taking thought?” You answer that for yourself, remembering all the while that it is not what Mr. or Mrs. Blank said was true, but what the Master said. Can anyone in your day refute the teachings of Jesus successfully? Has anyone been able to bring out any more of the definite proof than Jesus? So you will answer for yourself this question: “Who by taking thought?” If you can find a “who,” then it would be well for you to follow him and not God. If, however, you find in the long list of the possible “whos” no one who can qualify for this place, then turn unto the Godhead and begin to see that “the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom.”

Is human intellect of no avail? Should we all entirely drop away from the standards set for us by civilization? Human intellect is the technique which must be baptized by inspiration. The cold, hard, limiting technique of human intellect must blossom into wisdom and inspiration before anything more than a mathematical hypothesis is apparent.

Remember all the while that we are not coming by the way of man, but by the way of the consciousness which has arrived, partially if not wholly, to the place of “Take no thought.”

The moment the carpenter set aside the thought process with the subsequent limitations, he “lifted up his eyes.” The perception went from the level of the appearances to the source of the all present, and what the “lifted-up eyes” perceived suddenly came into being. Believing that you could see the whole world through a knot-hole would not in any way change the true nature of the universe.

Because you and your teacher and a host of followers cannot see the Presence of the Power, beyond the narrow confines of your teacher’s mind, does not mean anything. It only shows your limitation. Because you have not experienced the things of Spirit does not mean that they are not true. Because you cannot make them fit in with your concept of how it ought to be does not argue for anything but your own ignorance. Hence from now on you are merely stating the limitation of your own thinking. When you say a thing is impossible, you merely are saying it is impossible to you; beyond that you cannot go. In your conceit you may try to fit the strait-jacket of your limited consciousness over the whole of creation.

The person who is speaking to you never says what you hear him say. You have only a certain capacity for hearing an admixture of matter and Spirit, and you hear what you hear – nothing more or less. So is it with the Scriptures; you read what you can read. Not many people would think of literally cutting off the right hand if it offended them, and yet it has been done by people who have read the law that way. The Scriptures are full of the command, “Awake, thou that sleepest, and Christ (not some person) shall give thee light”; “Awake, and arise from the dead.” All the taking thought in the world will not permit you to walk upon water – nor do any of the things which the human mind calls miracles. There must have been something instant in the gesture of Peter which transcended the thought when he obeyed the command, “Come to me.” Try to reason this out, and you have such a mass of testimony against it that it simply cannot take place. It is wonderful what the revelation of the Spirit will bring to you once you begin to see the difference between the old thought processes and the new revelation of the Master.

God in action is a never-ending stream of manifestation. No man can by taking thought put God into action. This you will probably admit is true, and, since it is necessary for God to be in action before anything can take place in your life, you are confronted with the necessity of approaching something higher than the thought-taking process. “Before you ask” is quicker than any human or mental measurement of velocity. “God does not bring to birth and not bring forth”; only man does this. He germinates a perfectly wonderful project in his thought-taking mind, and has it almost ready to function into perfection, but he cannot bring it forth because of the limitation of thought.

“Take no thought for the body what ye shall eat” does not mean that man must run about eating anything and everything, but it does mean that he is freeing himself from the power which has been assigned to foods. It means that he is beginning to escape from the ridiculous law of “One man’s meat is another man’s poison.” Can meat be poison and nutriment at the same time? It frees him gradually from powers many, and causes him to return unto Jehovah – the One Power.

“Be absent from the body and present with the Lord” – absent from the embodiment which is the result of human thinking, and present with the Action of God. You will see how Job, after being deprived of everything, had “twice as much as he had before.” A pretty piece of mathematics that: a man having spent all his life accumulating a fortune, and then, without apparently doing anything, having “twice as much as he had before.” So is it with the Spirit of the Presence.

“Awake, thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead” thinking, and Christ shall give thee light, which will cause the manifestation to take place here and now.

“I was glad when he said unto me, Let us go into the House of the Lord.” Let us go into the consciousness of the Lord, which is not hedged about with the human thinking, but is the recognition of the Presence.

Suppose for a moment that Jesus had been obliged to think out a plan for feeding five thousand hungry men. They would all have starved to death. The things that Jesus brought forth were not accomplished because of anything he thought. They were brought forth by a “way ye know not of” in the human thinking process.

Moving in this consciousness of the House of the Lord, we find in these dwellings the lovely things and ideas for which we have longed. Within this House (consciousness) of the Lord are ways of pleasantness and peace, and the song of the soul is, “The lines are fall unto me in pleasant places”; “I shall go in and come out and find pastures.”

Yes, “I was glad when he [the Christ within] said unto me, “Let us” (you and me) “go into the House of the Lord.” Let us step into this consciousness and perceive that the Father hath worked hitherto and that we are merely going through the mechanics of bringing it forth. We are merely being the stewards for the Father within to work His holy plan into materialization. “Whatsoever ye ask in My name.” that is an almost overpowering promise, without qualifications, limitations, impartial and impersonal, made to all mankind. “Whatsoever” – the word includes all the little and all the great things which you have desired so long, and which failed to appear. All your desires shall be given you in their truest and highest interpretation, if you can come to this “no thought” place of Recognition. “Whatsoever” – the great sweeping wings of its allness seem to encircle the globe and leave nothing out.

But “who by taking thought? – who by taking thought” -can come even within the vision of the heavenly consciousness indicated by the “whatsoever”? Isn’t it a glorious revelation to know that the “whatsoever” is not prefaced by “If Mr. or Mrs. Blank approves.” We know that when you have approached the place of even contemplating the “whatsoever” you will have long ago passed beyond the place of license into the freedom of the Sons of God.

Yes, beloved! The action of God is a never-ending stream of manifestation. To be absent from the thought and present with the Lord is to perceive that the Father hath already worked, and that you are merely going through the mechanics – just as I am now going through the mechanics of bringing into manifestation the book that you now hold in your hand. The Father hath already worked – hath already conceived the whole and completed book. It is all in the House of the Lord. Do you see, beloved, why we are so glad when He says unto us (no matter where we are, nor how far we have strayed, nor into what confusion or limitation we have gone), “Let us” (you and me) “go into the House of the Lord?” – the House of the Lord, where all the former things pass away, and are not remembered any more.

“My Father” (do you sense the My – how close it is to you?) “worketh hitherto, and I work.” The idea has already been conceived in the mind of God, fashioned and completed, and is awaiting your recognition.

God in action is a never-ending stream of manifestation.

 

 

The End