ASK
A Quintology: "Ask, and ye shall receive."
by Walter C. Lanyon
FOREWORD
These are books of inspiration, decoding of the WORDS of Jesus Christ. They are recorded as they came into being - with little or no change. They are for contemplation.
When a man hears, he will go within - shut out all the nonsense of human thought and when he comes forth, he will be divinely indifferent for he will know.
When these manuscripts were ready for the publisher, the urge came so strongly to lecture on them - and a series of lectures was given and recorded. It was most interesting to discover that the spoken word the lectures - seemed to have caught a certain clarity or revelation which was thought to be worthy of retention and accordingly they have been included - though they cover much of the material in the written word. The emphasis lay on repetition.
Copyright ©1970 by E. H. Dickey
All Rights Reserved
CONTENTS
Foreword
Credo
"Thou Hast Conquered
Galilean"
The Space Between
He Openeth His Hand
Conditioned
Who By Taking Thought?
About Translation
Manifestation
When A Man
In Him
The Fountain
Let Him Hear
This Babbler
Allegory, "The Golden Gate"
The Word
The Pool of Resources
There is a Lad Here
Concerning Immortality
The Pool of Bethesda
He Breathed
The Golden Instant
The Touch
Notes
The Evidence
Genius
So He Made It Again
Enter
Awake
He Made Darkness
His Secret Place
Operation
Spiritual Ancestry
God Requires the Past
Absorption
Self Affirmation
Launch Out
Beyond the Square of Reason
Recognition
The Odor of Sanctity
Ten Thousand Instructors
"How Like the Ugly Toad"
Butter
Searching
The Other Disciple
Darkness-Oneness
Be Still
Notes
O Morning Glory.
The Intelligence
A Tight Place
Questions and Answers
The Law of Probability
The Greatest Distance
Self
The Now Man
LECTURES
You Are Quickened
The Silent Monologue
You Are Not Afraid
Manifest Substance
CREDO
To sing, to laugh, to dream,
To walk in my own way and be alone,
Free, with an eye to see things as they are,
To fight - or write. To travel any road
Under the sun, under the stars, nor doubt
If fame or fortune lie beyond the bourne -
Never to make a line I have not heard
In my own heart; yet, with all modesty
To say: "My soul, be satisfied with flowers,
With fruit, with weeds even; but gather them
In the one garden you may call
your own."
From Cyrano de Bergerac
by Edmond Rostand
Translated by Brian C. Hooker
"THOU HAST CONQUERED GALILEAN"
If the thing called AGE had any REALITY, God would be hoary with years. Age is the illusion that is accrued by memory. The Countess of Patoka died at eighty. An autopsy reported her body to be eighteen. She became mentally stationery at THAT AGE, due to a great shock. This is only an incident, - and is tossed aside as a "once in a while." Yet do we see that if Age were a reality then God would be the first to record it, and all emanation from God would be decrepit and ancient. Yet is the day perpetually new, the tree, the bird, the flower. Memory then is, as the old song says, "The only thing that grief can call its own" - and it might be added that Age can call its own. The human mind is invincibly maladroit. Anything can happen if it has an excuse.
That which kept the garments new in the desert for forty years - and which RESTORES Thy Youth like the eagle's, and causes transformation and transfiguration to take place is not THOUGHT OUT, or made to appear by thinking.
It MAY be satisfying to know how to work out a GIVEN problem. A child could memorize the formulae for a problem in Euclid, - set it down and show the results - but that is the end of his manifestation. The slightest SHADE of difference in the problem leaves him helpless. Did the people who wore the garments and shoes that waxed not old, age? If so, why?
If he understood the PRINCIPLE of the law, - he could work out endless combinations called problems. All problems are only mental equations. They have no actuality. They all start with the acceptance of a false equation. Even the problems in arithmetic have to be made up, in order that you may return to the place from which you started, - the NO PROBLEM place, the One. Everything in human thought must eventually return to the ONE. Life in the raw - the undesignated substance which is everywhere present and appears when recognition takes place. Hence a man can and does produce in the desert that which cannot be produced according to the appearances of things. Clouds of words have obscured the Laws given by Jesus Christ.
How hardly then shall a rich man enter the kingdom of heaven. He is rich and loaded with beliefs and records established on the flimsy basis of that which his ancestors have accepted as Truth. When he awakens, he HEARS - "Come out from among them and be ye separate." Come out from among what? and why? and Where? It is all so much talk and meaningless until you begin to sense-feel the difference between Spirit and thought. The Place of suspended animation - the place of "Beholding" something too big for thought and utterly impossible of definition. It is the discovery of God - the universal - the ONE - the LIFE.
LIFE is that immaterial substance everywhere present; - ready to come into manifestation at the moment of recognition. It is that IMPELLING force back of you which from the moment of your creation has been with YOU, and is instantly available. Now you are becoming conscious of your immortality, and when you begin to sense this, you will see what Jesus meant when' he implied that you had never been born and consequently have never been unconscious. The eternal creation of God in all its glory and perfection has never gone through the processes of birth and death. It is eternally what it is - a creation of the Living God. As we sense this ETERNALITY of the LIFE CREATION, we begin to see how it might be likened unto a bolt of Lightning which passes through a hundred incarnations of human belief.
"Who are your father, mother, etc?" Who are you? What are you doing? Where have you been? In the land of NOD- belief in an existence apart from God, hypnotized by the Adam mesmerism, - dazed and bemused into believing that you were a matter body, a creation of man and woman, that your days were naturally filled with fear, sickness and trouble, quibbling about going to heaven even as you profess belief in Jesus Christ, who explained the Kingdom as here.
Could anything be more magnificent than the prayer "Now O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was"? What world? The world called John Smith? The world of hypnotism and belief which you have taken upon yourself, over and over, as you went wandering through the thing called reincarnation. There is the sudden remembrance, and the SUDDEN arising and the sudden going to the Father state of Life; the re-discovery that you were Created by God; - created perfect. As you sense this, perfection begins to appear; when the body is absent from the mind, the bondage of fear and disease are relaxed. The temple is cleansed and comes again to its fair proportions. It is wonderful - it is filled with wonder and Light - revelation - recognition and secrecy. It is as morning radiance filled with splendor. You will say with the Emperor Julian, after he had seen all the hellish devices to destroy the Christ Revelation fail - "Thou hast conquered, Galilean." As the Lord said to Moses - "See, I have made thee a God," so has He said to thee; - thou Golden One, made in the image and likeness - given power over all the things on the earth, under the earth, and above the earth; - created a little lower than the Angels - (the great centers of power and force emanating from the Center of Centers) - the heart of God - that which operates the universe and all its wonders from the tiniest manifestation unto the greatest.
This deeper abiding consciousness causes you to KNOW all the things that are to be added.
"The believers in ONE God change not, age not, die not; everything else: earth, men, their beliefs and opinions is subject to decay and change."
Sophocles.
"Thou hast conquered Galilean."
That is what his crucifiers had to say. What else could they say? The Galilean is still conquering.
THE SPACE BETWEEN
The space between the cruse of oil and the manifestation of abundance stems from
the belief there are vacuities in God. The space between is like the apparent
space between electricity and equipment ... nothing can take place until a tiny
fuse is inserted and the "space between" is filled. The omnipresence of God
needs only this fuse (you) of complete recognition or belief to cause the oil to
start flowing and from three drops come barrels of oil. It will not stop flowing
as long as there is an empty measure.
All this lovely symbology is nil until man discovers that he is the fuse: - the thing which fills the space between something and nothing, and causes manifestation to take place. No wonder Jesus stressed the importance of being silent. No wonder He asked you to be absent from the body, and to come out into the ONENESS of spirit wherein you would find FREE ONENESS. Free Oneness is an Oriental expression of oneness with God. Man is then freed from all beliefs of degrees of life. It is wonderful.
So you enter into the Space Between. You are now at the place where the invisible becomes visible. No one believes this. That is why you are told to place the coal of fire on your Lips, and to go within and shut the door. This law is much disobeyed by earnest seekers of the Light who cannot understand why there are no results, and why the oil does not pour. Yes, you are to borrow vessels not a few. And it means just that. You have been living in a world of limitation.
When you enter or become the "Space between" the flow fills everything around you, - and neutralizes the belief so completely that the problem of lack and limitation does not exist in your universe.
Enter into the Place between and let the flow of light come through you and fill all measures not for the sake of self aggrandizement, but for the free oneness of you and God.
Yes, you are the space between ... Enter in and let the flow of LIFE begin to take place. You, yourself, are the answer to prayer. Free ONENESS:
Take it into the sanctuary. Take that word and return unto Jehovah, - the point of power and creation, and see what takes place in the movement of ONENESS when it is freed from the involvement of your human belief, teaching, and thought. You are suddenly a new creature in this light and understand how it is that FREE ONENESS moves by its own power, and has nothing to overcome. It suddenly arrives and IS, and so do you go within and shut the door and stop telling of and about, and begin to experience the action of FREE ONENESS in your own life. Yes, it is like the man who found the pearl of Great Price and bought a field and buried it, after he had let go of all the old worn out cliches and ideas he had picked up from the man whose breath was, and is, in his nostrils. And that buried pearl will illumine the whole earth. Go in - shut the door - put the coal of fire on the lips. IT IS WONDERFUL.
HE OPENETH HIS HAND
"Thou openest thine hand, and satisfiest the desire of every living thing."
With this overshadowing comes the peace that passeth ALL. An osmosis - absorption - a blending; into the ONE takes place and there is no longer question and answer, problem and solution.
"Thou openest thine hand, and satisfiest the desire of every living thing" becomes a reality. There is no limitation - no questioning whether the desire is good, bad, or indifferent - for from this elevation the desire is the shape of the idea sent straight from the heart of God, and is made alive by the pulsating heartbeat of the universe.
"Thou openest thine hand, and satisfiest the desire of every living thing" yet are you desireless, free from wanting and ready to move into a place of substance, out of the place of things and yet in the midst of them all. You are suddenly One. There is no more you and your problem, there is only you. You pass easily through the crowd of beliefs.
The Light universal keeps shining. As it intensifies, it absorbs the shadows of human belief; nothing matters, yet, everything does. It transform the Temple-body into a tenuous substance, through which it can shine forth, - assuming any attribute of God at will. Healing is not, then, some wonder projected through human thought, but rather the enveloping of the Golden Shadow. It is a natural blending with LIFE which rules out the narrow confines of health and strength in humankind. I AM suddenly submerged in a sea of LIFE - eternal, golden, and all redolent with the LOVE of God.
For the first time, the mystical becomes the intensely practical - the only real thing you have ever known. Sight becomes a capacity to peer through the dense midnight of thought, by means of the Light which projects its Golden Shadow from the "Mind which was also in Christ Jesus" and which you realize is the mind that is also in you.
No longer will you compromise with this power and put it through a thousand and one beliefs concocted by the mind of man. Instead, you permit it to take shape and form, even as the air takes the shape automatically of any vessel, yet never congeals or becomes set in that form, but lasts only for the moment of the duration of the desire.
"Thou openest thine hand, and satisfiest the desire of every living thing" - it is a carte blanche releasement of HIS Love, and it has to be received naturally and not as some special dispensation. It is as though the Golden Shadow has cleared away all obstruction between you and His Love, and you can hear, and really HEAR what is being communicated to the earth plane; now you can really know the full dimensions of His Love, and that all manifestation will take place, independent of your thought and without any effort.
As a sudden heavy rain falls upon a parched desert and is instantly absorbed, so does this descent of spirit come upon you. It instantly changes the nature of the desert and the very seeds already there begin to stir. Something is to take place - "the desert is to blossom as a rose" - because of the downpour of His Love, and because of the Recognition. You are being conditioned to a new dimension.
The Golden Shadow is the Golden Fleece which you have sought for so long and which has been guarded by the Gorgon, with her snaky locks of human devices, ways and means. Upon whomsoever this Golden Shadow rests, something - a quickening, takes place - without effort, and without any of the old ideas of healing and helping. It is entirely impersonal and natural and has nothing at all to do with human thought. Nothing can stay it, nothing can project it; it is a natural movement or urge in the mind of God passing through the temple-body (man) casting the Golden Shadow of Love and doing the things called "miraculous" by its revealing Light.
"Thou openest thine hand, and satisfiest the desire of every living thing." Heaven and earth are full of thee - full, pressed down, and running over - there is not one empty vessel left, - even the borrowed ones are full. The Love of God keeps flowing until everything is satisfied. And all the while the Golden Shadow keeps revealing the intensely practical angle of it. It is not a mystical intangible thing, but something to be experienced and something to be handled with the hands and something that causes the wine of inspiration to flow through the body-temple with the rush of a pure mountain torrent. Health is absorbed into the LIFE of GOD, which knows no limitations.
"Thou openest thine hand, and satisfiest the desire of every living thing." You must be ALIVE to participate in this benefit. You have to come out of the tomb of human thinking into the clean, fresh and almost fierce tides of LIFE. You have to be ALIVE in the recognition and the instant response to HIS Voice.
To human thought His word is almost unbearably stimulating, breaking its limitations. The Spirit refuses to be longer held in the narrow confines of the letter. The grandeur, the magnificence of pure Spirit leaves you speechless and bereft of all thought. "Let the earth keep silent before me and renew her strength" - the body, the temple, the earth of you is experiencing the renewing of self-revelation.
You have entered a new mansion where there are "singing masons building roofs of gold."* "Beauty, then is the destiny" ** which begins to shape itself and put to flight the FATE of human thought.
Yes, "thou openest thine hand, and satisfiest the desires of every living thing." Right now - stay there a moment.
"Not to desire is to have." Can you hear?
_________
* Shakespeare. ** Plato.
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.
WHO BY TAKING THOUGHT
You are asked a very pertinent and definite question. "Who by taking thought can
...?"
Thought is like a rope tied to a captive balloon. An Idea is borne in upon you. You either accept it, or take thought about it. If you take thought about it - nothing but frustration happens. The energy that is used in taking thought is that which would have sustained the idea into manifestation.
All this seems vague and hypothetical until you become silent and see how true it is. "Take no thought" about the idea, and you will have manifestation in due season. You are told to "go" without thought, "carry neither purse, nor scrip, nor shoes," what you shall eat, etc. The moment the idea is accepted and forgotten, then all the energy which would have gone into thought hastens the manifestation of the IDEA.
I stood once in a London Pea Soup Fog. Had I not been told that yonder in the fog lay London, Westminster Abbey, Trafalgar Square, and a thousand and one other well known places, but as far as I was concerned there was nothing but obscurity. Yet, there it lay, and as I stood there I remembered the account of the Mist that went up and watered the face of the whole earth and that the perfect creation lay there in all its beauty. Yet through looking at the mist, I had spent many life times trying to re-create a new universe which would have to be super-imposed upon the perfect creation, and this Adam creation would be constructed on a basis of judging from appearances, and finding everything in the last analysis wrong. Even man had finally invented an instrument which would take him and his kind out of the picture, and so he hurried to try to make an agreement not to use it.
Gradually, we begin to see that the LAWS as Spoken into being by Jesus Christ are actually the laws which operate one hundred percent, and when recognized produce the manifestation out of the invisible substance.
The Mist that went up covered the whole face of the earth and hid - not destroyed - everything. What a revelation to know this, for it again substantiates the law that Creation is finished and done and called very good and this also applies to you - created in the image and likeness of God.
Now a new dimension comes into view which we are beginning to discover, not create or demonstrate, and as the mystification in your mind gets thinner, then, the IDEAS begin to show through, and if we can accept them, we will be able to see them and experience them.
The perfect creation begins to project itself through the mist of belief and the balloon is free to ascend to the higher heavens of inventions.
Who by taking thought? You answer it, and begin to see how much energy and power is expended in thinking of and about, instead of being used to substantiate the IDEA.
ABOUT TRANSLATION
Enoch was translated.
We are prone to make supernatural the idea of "Translation." We are always looking for something unnatural to happen when God comes into expression. The most unpredictable things can take place and do take place all the time, - and we accept them without question. Witness the "transformation" that took place at Hiroshima at the introduction of the atomic bomb, an invention of man. Who wonders at that? A complete change of land and life taking place in a split second. Man can apparently do his "miracles" then - but with God, it is something else.
Jesus did not have any special gifts, - until He was translated by becoming aware of the Presence. He entered into a new degree of consciousness, and discovered certain capacities not known to the former state. Of Jesus He said, "I can of mine own self do nothing."
It has been whispered about that "you" are to be "transformed by the renewing of your mind." That is a form of "translation." It is a literal thing, as all the laws given by Jesus Christ are literal when understood. They are not to be demonstrated as something peculiar to a few people - but as natural laws coming into being when recognized. The action of God is in sharp focus - not in the soft focus of imagination.
Intellectual vanity is neither power nor understanding. The most wonderful thing about Jesus Christ is the fact that He materialized everything He talked about. His word was so replete with recognition it literally leaped into manifestation before the astonished eyes of His disciples. The yearning expressed in His words is moving. He wanted so to make man see the new dimension as natural and real - something that actually took place literally instead of hypothetically.
I wish He might have said of me, "I have not found so great faith - no, not in Israel" - I am wondering if some time or other the Christ is not going to say it to me and you? We are going to measure up surely to the place of absolute Faith and hear not only the, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant," - the glorious statement "I have not found so great faith - no, not in Israel." It will be thrilling. It's coming. It will happen when we are translated from the present degree of "knowing the truth" into the place of "I AM the Truth." Some wonderful things are going to happen to you, - that much I can write unto you.
Every one in the Bible who "pleased God" experienced some sort of up-lilt of expression, - and so we see Elijah taking off in a fiery chariot. And all those who did these things took their bodies with them. Jesus did the same thing - He took His body with Him. What good is it to be just consciousness without a temple of expression? The question then is, "For why will ye die?" I know all the answers from the human standpoint, - but none of them good enough. The answer is, you won't when you are translated.
When you are translated "out" of the human intelligence into the Wisdom of God, you will speak with new tongues - and what you speak will take body and form.
You "please God" when you acknowledge HIM. You do not have to keep asking for things if you will let Him give you the desires of your heart. If you can do this naturally and without the foolishness of demonstrating Him, it will all take place "in the twinkling of an eye."
"In all thy ways acknowledge Him And He shall direct thy paths."
Do you begin to hear? - the perpetual acknowledgment of Him in everything: - devil, enemy, hell and disease, as well as friends, health and substance.
MANIFESTATION
The moment a thing is manifested it is on its way out. Draw a hundred dollars from the bank and it is gone. Before you draw it out, it is there - yet it is not there - not the actual hundred dollar bill. You do it all in "your name" - and the moment it comes into manifestation it begins to disappear. It is so with all manifestation. God is the great Unmanifest - the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen. The actual SUBSTANCE; the moment it is stepped down to the point of manifestation it begins to disintegrate and to return to the original substance, unless stayed by recognition.
Unless man discovers that he Lives and moves and has his being in the ONE substance at the same moment it lives and breathes and has its being in him, he is only a temporary thing which is quickly passing into oblivion by all the evil means at the disposal of the mind which believes in separation. There is no separation between me and thee - there is One - yet I am the expression (the pressed out idea) of GOD, sent for a purpose - to bring, to release the LIGHT.
How can a man "renew his youth" if he does not know that he lives in the immaterial substance, which to know aright is LIFE eternal? It is wonderful when you glimpse it, - you begin to see you are actually LIVING in the invisible and immaterial substance of God and that this knowledge is what sustains the eternal freshness and newness of manifestation. Even as their garments waxed not old. How was it - unless the immaterial substance was always present, and as long as it is recognized, so long does the manifestation stay in place. It is wonderful.
"Heaven and earth are full of thee" and this alone will disintegrate the old beliefs and the "flesh shall become new like a child" because the immaterial substance is constantly flowing into manifestation and sustaining and refreshing the form and shape Spirit has given it.
Can we take it? Not as long as we argue about it. Not as long as we do not believe - believing is not a mental effort - it is a discovery. When the discovery is made, the manifestation takes place.
If you were before Abraham even as Jesus said He was - what about it? Whence came this manifestation of three score and ten, filled with evil, and that man must work out his living by the sweat of his brow? That is the chimera of belief: the mist that went up; - the hypnotism that came upon man when he descended to the level of freewill, and decided he would create again that which had been created and called very good.
Why did Jesus always return to the Matrix" Why does the sculptor return to his idea? The more he contemplates, the more accurately he is able to bring it forth and give it a body and form. "I go unto the Father" - I in the father and the father in me - all sounds like so much talk, until the sudden, quick, almost terrible recognition of the Presence is made.
"I go unto the Father" not to the idea of some man or the desires of some man, - but to the Matrix, the Father, and in that place of unmanifest substance I am completely renewed; - that is: I lose the accumulation of beliefs that have crystalized upon me like barnacles on a ship. It is said that a ship covered with barnacles if run into sweet waters will automatically lose the barnacles, and so is it with man - the moment he runs into God, he loses the evil he has accumulated for years through the ancestor teaching and belief.
WHEN A MAN
When a man is not guilty of that which he is accused - all that is necessary is to drop any effort in connection with it, and instead of taking further thought go to the Place of LIGHT. The place of LIGHT is the point of recognition. When recognition is made of the Presence then all other "presences" are as naught. The thing that comes at you in ONE way of concentrated force of human belief will flee in ten, when it comes into contact with this recognition. The heart that knows it is not guilty and has merged into the LIGHT - suddenly experiences a surge of power. He hears singing within the temple of his being "YOU are NOT afraid" of what man can do unto you. He can do nothing the moment you are at the point of SELF recognition. You put up your sword; the battle is not yours but God's. That's good enough for any warrior - and should instantly allay any belief in two powers. The more imminent evil becomes and the greater the ramifications - the nearer it is to destruction - it is Wonderful. Then can you "Praise God from whom ALL (not some) blessings flow." There is a mental and physical relaxation in this contemplation. To be "Still" is to be STILL - and not a condition produced by taking thought - but suddenly to BE STILL. No noise that man can make with whatever instrument he may have, can compare with the "NOISE OF MANY WATERS."
The Power of the Presence of purity, the roaring of the waters through the beliefs of human thought, silence forever the NOISE of man. So do you stand in the LIGHT -"though ten thousand shall rise against thee" - yet shall your heart be not afraid, for it is only ten thousand thought formations which have nothing to sustain them but your acceptance of them as real. The moment you rise to the ONE - the LIGHT will absorb, dissipate and utterly put to flight all that which is against thee.
"I will fear NO (not any) evil for thou art with me." Appearances are for the moment; - the dust storm that obscures the sun is but a brief encounter with materialized thought which is soon blown away.
Recently a man shot at another, but the bullet hit a steel post ricocheted and finally passed through his own heart. When evil runs into Light, it has a Strange habit of returning to the point of its origin.
IN HIM
Man lives in God yet he does not see God - for it is written that "no man shall
see God and Live." The moment he SEES the degree of God in which he lives, he
discovers the nothingness of things and "dies" to them, only to arise to a
higher degree of consciousness, and make new and more wonderful discoveries
about the power called God. A fish does not see the water he swims in, and man
does not see the air in which he lives - and he does not see God, but he sees
the infinite manifestations of HIS Presence, and it is only when he comes to the
NATURAL knowledge of ONENESS that he begins to assign to things their proper
place. They become something to be USED and not possessed. The moment he begins
to possess things, he transfers power into the manifestation which is only an
illusion, and the illusion possesses him.
Heraclitus, the Greek Philosopher, believed all things were in a constant state of flow - and knew that man could not step in the same river twice. All things are in a constant state of change. The permanency of Spirit (the unseen) gives a solid basis for LIFE. Manifestation automatically takes care of itself. Every plant of the field was beheld in the mind of God before it appeared, revealing the fundamental truth that both seed and flower are at once in the mind of God. Manifestation is the shadow. All vegetation appeared before there was any rain, and before any man had time or idea of tilling the soil. So the tiller of the soil pauses, and as he pauses a moment, for a brief encounter with REALITY, he discovers a thanksgiving welling up in him.
He begins to see the "why" of "before you ask." He begins to know the "substance" and the "evidence" of the unseen must be recognized if the reflection is to be cast into the manifest world.
When are YOU going to stop TRYING to demonstrate God, and let Him have His way instead of your mistaken concept?
Your part is the being Still - with your mind stayed on reality - not on manifestation.
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"?
LET HIM HEAR
Passing a light through a prism causes it to become manifest in many colors, which in turn break up into hundreds of shades and nuances. The same thing is true when the LIGHT of Spirit, which is invisible to the naked eye, is passed through the Temple of your body. It breaks up into all sorts of manifestations and is slowed down to a point of visibility in the thing named "matter" by man. Your body has no more intelligence than your refrigerator. When the electric current is passed through it, it produces ice cubes.
We have become so conscious of the body as a power it has taken over. The tail is wagging the dog. Presently, he begins to understand that none of the senses can be extended on the outside any more than the refrigerator can make ice cubes unless the power is flowing through it. We do not see with the human eye, literally, for the eye of a so-called dead man cognizes nothing, is not afraid, nor does it draw back from outward conditions. When we recognize that God, Spirit, is seeing through our eyes, we will begin to look beyond the surface and will also become aware of the capacity to look forward and backward at the same time, and see the whole manifestation in the present, as Jesus did, and as He stated.
"He that hath ears, let him hear" - a silly statement of itself. Nearly every creature has ears, but few can hear because they think they hear with their ears instead of with their consciousness. No wonder it is stepped down to such a slow pace.
Beyond the narrow confines of so-called ear-hearing are infinite reaches of sound - inaudible to matter, but not to Spirit.
Suddenly, when you know that it is God walking on the waves of your troubled human thought, you will begin to decode the message that is given to you in the hurricane - at any time and under any circumstances. There is no time nor place where God cannot speak to you with the "still small voice," and give you the express instructions for a free passage through the crowd of human beliefs.
"This is the way, walk ye in it" - and "turn to the right - turn to the left" - likewise, "Go into all the world." As long as you are running about trying to make demonstrations, you will never hear - the sense of hearing will have its limit of expression at the surface of things.
"My sheep HEAR my voice." The instinct of the spiritual you will hear. Even as a dog will hear his master's voice and not be fooled by a good imitation. So will you HEAR, because it is God hearing through you. You become clair-audient. The same thing is true of the vision, when you begin to see with the Power of God, then you become clairvoyant. All this is not for the purpose of telling fortunes and making yourself mysterious - but for the GLORY OF GOD.
And so the asking becomes father to the fact that the creation of that for which you have asked has already taken place.
"And now, O Father glorify thou me With Thine own self with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was."
Before the beginning of the "John Smith" world. Note the word NOW - and how it is at the point of "always" on the Cosmic Clock. "NOW is the time" - "NOW are we ..."-"NOW be glorified" - and so on. Everything becomes NOW when the discovery of the new "timeless-time system" is put into action by the awareness of the PRESENCE - this ONENESS.
"Who did hinder you That ye should not obey the truth?"
Go ahead and answer it - you will blame everything and everybody for your failure to LIVE fully - until one day you discover where the hindrance is. Then will you reply, "I hindered myself." Then you have it located in such a place that it can be eliminated. The dam, or obstruction is moved away - and the River of Life flows freely and joyously to the sea. It is wonderful !
Come, for all things are now ready.
If you can accept GOD - you will experience GOD. This is not "an affirmation." This is nothing to THINK about. This is not a catch phrase of modern psychology. This is revelation. If you can accept GOD, you at that instant EXPERIENCE HIM. What is it to experience GOD? It is to find a thousand and one impossible equations solved, dissipated, absorbed. It is to see the congealed energy of thought which you call matter, resolving itself into new and correct patterns.
If you become emotional and excited every time you see the power of God active in your life, you will not see it often, for to you it is not natural. There is no emotion in God, only in the mind of man, and it has nothing to do with spiritual manifestation.
When you stop making God so unnatural, you will discover the Power emerging through the congealed energy of thought and in a subtle way changing appearances.
THIS BABBLER
It is reported that the audience was made up of the intelligentsia of Greece (minds of the Golden Age) who had set up a government and such perfect living conditions that it is almost impossible to imagine. And so they stood waiting for the "Babbler" to tell them something.
Paul was the "Babbler" and he straightway addressed them in no uncertain terms. There must have been a tense silence when he uttered his famous words:
"Ye men of Athens, I perceive that in all things ye are too superstitious"
and then continued - you are worshiping at the Altar of the Unknown God: "Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, him declare I unto you." Imagine what a statement like that would do today if some voice would tell all the space hunters and men of like ilk that it was all going to be revealed to them - that the principle they worshiped and worked so hard to discover and develop was at last going to be explained and shown to them, and that the end of speculation and guessing was at hand.
I can well imagine the Athenians were all ears and filled with surprise when he told them that the GOD of which he spoke was not worshiped in temples made by hands - "as though He needed any thing, seeing he Giveth to all LIFE, and breath, and all things."
With one powerful stroke of oratory, he neatly gathered the rapt attention of the whole crowd with his "Him declare I unto you." Can you imagine what the truth of his statement "as though he (this God you ignorantly worship) needed any thing" - seeing he is the giver of all, and is not worshiped in temples made by hands. What a statement and interesting, too, that he was standing in the midst of Mars' hill in front of a group of buildings and temples that have not yet been surpassed in their purity of design and beauty. This very statement might do something today if it were heard again. Worship, in the minds of many has much to do with buildings and pageantry and men.
If he had said nothing further about this Unknown God than "seeing he giveth to all LIFE, and breath, and all things," he would have overturned a world of superstition and beliefs and opened doors to the literal and actual Kingdom of Heaven here and now.
The temple not made with hands is the temple of the body - is that upon which has been hung all the evil history and belief of the old Adam man with his distorted idea that he could create in a universe already created and done, and you and I come under the stupid superstition and hypnotism that he was right. But a Babbler has to set right, and, of course, we have to hear the Babbler, and having heard we obey and begin to experience some of the new dimensions of LIFE. It is wonderful !
The Babbler is here again, for you are beginning to hear and he may meet you almost anywhere but in the temple made by hands, though he is there too. He is the unannounced Voice of one crying in the wilderness of belief, and he passes you on the highways of Life and speaks to you "Come out from among them, and be ye separate."
Yes, the Babbler is here again - listen and you will hear him, and put the coal of fire on your lips. It is wonderful - filled with wonder.
Is it any wonder then that the Athenians suddenly declared with one accord: "The gods are come dawn to us" from Mount Olympus.
But the Babbler was not through with his revelation; he had something greater to tell them. This time it was a question which you, too, have to answer. Know ye not that, "ye are gods"? What an explosive statement made at any time, nothing but dead letters until it is heard, and it is not heard by the one who imagines that he is "God" or that swells his ego into personal power. He may flourish as a green bay tree, or like a toy balloon that gets larger and larger until it bursts of its own accord, or runs into the sharp point of the sword.
And so the voice is speaking again and saying:
"Ye men of Athens," you are worshiping an Unknown God, a man-God. You are worshiping him in temples made with hands, and are offering him all sorts of things if in turn he will prosper you - but he is worshiped in temples not made by hands eternal in the heavens - Temples not made by hands. Temples wherein there are no arguing voices professing a dozen different kinds of theology. When you enter the first law is "Lay your gift on the altar" - and that gift is the surrender of all desire and preconceived notions. The sudden silence will eventually become filled with the VOICE of Spirit, and you will hear the inaudible definition of the words you have tried for so long to demonstrate. "Be still."
AN ALLEGORY
THE GOLDEN GATE
At the first flush of dawn the pilgrims began arriving. Like so many bits of
colored glass in a toy kaleidoscope, they kept making an ever-changing pattern;
a riot of color, as if an artist had fallen asleep and the paint on his palette
had run wild. Tension, excitement - breathless anticipation - vibrant
expectancy.
It was Passion Week in the Holy City. They were again to watch for the miracle - the second coming.
"Why seek ye the living among the dead?" still went unanswered. The crowd increased and jostled one another in the narrow way. They entered through the Jaffa Gate into the teeming streets of the city. A camel train laden with merchandise and hung with rich stuffs and silks rubbed against the passers-by as they pushed up the hill. The call of the donkey boy was heard as he tried to direct his completely indifferent beasts. The hypnotic beat of the tom-toms and soothing insistent notes of the pipes made a strange eerie decor. Every eye searched each passer-by. Perhaps that might be He - who knows? He will rise again - He will come again.
Over by the Jaffa Gate sat the Arab, enfolded in his soft camel's hair burnoose - near him a pile of golden oranges. He was unconscious of the picture he was making as he sat motionless, oblivious to the excitement of the passers-by. He neither called his wares nor offered them for sale. Above his head the budding branch of a slender tree was making a network of shadow mosaic on the wall; growing darker the while as the sun rose higher in the cloudless heavens. He, too, seemed to be waiting. He seemed to have been waiting there for aeons - waiting, waiting, waiting.
One unhurried golden moment after another slipped noiselessly by like streams of wax that ran down from lighted candles in the temple - incense - the throb of distant chanting; mute - hypnotic - then disturbing-hateful. The wax from the candles kept flowing - the moments kept slipping soundlessly by into a dulcet oblivion - silently they passed like bare, perfumed dancing feet over the silken pile of a prayer rug. Time did not matter. That (time) was the illusion, the pilgrims had so little of. They were in such a vapid hurry to get out of it all they could.
When the Arab opened his eyes and let his gaze travel in a circle upon the people about him, it was like the opening of a fan. Those upon whom it rested felt the gaze, as they might have felt soft feather tips brush them ever so lightly. The gaze came from hidden places, fathomless depths, luminous darkness, accompanied by mute throbbing tones.
There was an infinite wonder and pathos in his gaze almost a pity - and the eternal question, "Why seek ye the living among the dead?" He is risen! He is coming at the precise moment you are willing to receive Him.
It was all so confusing in a way - "If I go ... I will come again" and, "I will never leave thee" - as if some hidden password or secret was given for those who had ears. How could it all be that way? Going - and yet not going - and yet coming again in the flesh.
If you followed the gaze of the Arab, it led to blinding heights of Light. There was hidden in it a wisdom which somehow might change the whole pattern of man. It was that very wisdom which made the other Arab fold his tent "and as silently steal away." It was that something akin to discovery and appropriation at the same instant.
Conception is ever silent - deep, fathomless stillness, where Stygian darkness shuts out curious human thought and reasoning, and the fearful working out of Salvation takes place. The least flutter of human thought would drive it into oblivion leaving a great void. An exquisite sensibility enfolded everything - swept it all upward as if born by angel wings into a breathless second of eternity.
And then as a crystal being shattered into a thousand pieces, the jangling noise of the Pilgrims broke the golden silence. They were fighting among themselves, trying to get into a place where they could better see Him, who would say unto them "love one another." They would not see Him even if He appeared, for they had already gone down the wrong road again. They would miss Him for they would be looking for a miracle worker. They would be looking for a man in purple and fine linen, surely not for one washing the feet of the weary. They would only know Him by His robes glistening with jewels and power - by His authority and glamour.
If I do not get in, I may miss Him. "The race is not to the swift" meant nothing, the more physical effort they put forth the nearer the possibility of personal gains. If they could get near the man who increased the leaves and fishes, this time they would find out how it was done. When HE was here a single word would do it, a single touch of His robe would accomplish what the wise physicians could not do nor understand.
Ever and anon an excited word would go forth that He had come and was giving the Secret of His Power again, but presently the excitement died down, and the whining voices of the deceived went up with a wail.
The Arab was not concerned as he heard the exciting news again and again of His coming. He was resting leisurely at the elevation of "No chance." He did not have to pursue anything; he did not have to win anything. Having to WIN was the out picturing of a consciousness which believed in limitation and in a God who was a respecter of persons. The very thought of this law of no-chance to many stimulated the greedy human thought to a point of frenzy. "Stillness" was impossible in such a seething cauldron of excitement and greed. A million sensuous dreams passed through the mind as a whirlwind on the desert flings waves of sand at the Sun.
It all seemed foolishness. If He was "coming again" why did He not come? and if He was a God of love, why would He permit war? Why would He permit the evil to have riches and the good to have nothing? Why? and why? and why? - until the whirlwind again enveloped him. And presently through the terrific noise, the machinery of desire blacked out everything.
The Arab arose, shook out the folds of his burnoose and passed through the gate leaving no one in charge of his stock in trade. His gaze had taken care of everything, just as the gaze of Jesus took care of everything upon which it rested and revealed all sorts of laws which were self-operative without the aid of human thought. As he went up the hill, he passed through the crowd with little difficulty. Something seemed to be making a way for him, though he was silent and asked for nothing. It was just that they automatically moved aside.
He went over to the Mosque of Omar - the Dome of the Rock (that beautiful jewel dropped down in the center of the Compound) - and disappeared through the door. It was dark inside except for the halo of varicolored lights cast by the band of heavily jeweled glass in the cupola, which kept changing the while as it lay upon the rock, a thing alive. No word was spoken - only silence throbbing, soft, enfolding. His white robe was smudged out by the velvety darkness. Only his eyes could be seen. He knelt and touched his forehead to the floor. Now the silence seemed strong enough to break the thin walls of the ear a tremendous and awful sound of the Presence - as if an infinite number of angels attended him.
The whir of the wings of the Heavenly Host as they dosed in near formation sounded: this was the elevation of miracle - pure revelation! This was the place of breathless adoration, wherein the silence became real - and the "BE STILL AND KNOW THAT I AM GOD" was effortless, an INFLOW OF POWER, an ENTERING LIGHT. This was the restoration of the soul - like the perfect reassembling of quicksilver that had been scattered. There was no seam or jointure - there was only ONE. The soul was not joined, mended or corrected - it was ONE again as it always had been; it was restored, with all faculties alerted for the Second Coming.
And then after what seemed many aeons of time, which was only a moment, he left the soft incense-laden darkness and went to the far side of the Compound and stood near a walled-up gate. Presently you were at the gate too - still, silent, waiting - waiting for the eyes to touch you again with revelation, if you could stand it - if you could stand it.
And finally the eyes opened, the flood of LIGHT came, "This is the Golden Gate. It is walled up and will not be opened until He comes again. At His coming, the stones will crumble and He will pass through." As he said the unspoken words, the stones began to fall away and the Golden Gate was filled with Light and Fire - and HE came through the Golden Gate of your consciousness. He came again in the flesh - Your flesh - and now you SAW HIM and experienced the stones of human belief and limitations fall away - and the GLORY OF GOD revealed.
As you stood trembling in the ecstasy of it all, the Arab had disappeared as a purple shadow at sunset. Over in the valley of the Mount of Olives, a saffron mist swung like a veil in the evening sun.
THE WORD
What do you mean when you repeat the LAW - "Take words and return unto Jehovah." What word? Where do you take it? Until we see that the WORD exists before it is uttered, we cannot see that the fulfillment of the WORD also exists before it appears - and that takes care of the strange statement "Before you ask, I will answer." But how can a person think a thing like that through to a satisfactory conclusion? He is defeated before he starts, for all thinking proceeds from the three dimensional basis of life, and is finished before it starts - there is no permanency in it.
When the "thought word" is launched, it accomplishes nothing; when PEACE is called from the housetops with the thunder of the ages, nothing happens but confusion, wars, and rumors of wars. As far as the thinking man is concerned - because it is nothing but an inflated idea of the human mind which tries to do something by taking thought - even after he is told "take no thought," yet there is the WORD.
What, then, is the WORD that you take to Jehovah? It is the recognition of the PRESENCE which discovers that within every word is the full energy to cause it to function. The moment that recognition is made, it is exactly like the air in a small balloon expanding until it bursts the shape of the balloon and takes on the shape and form of the atmosphere. It is wonderful when you begin to see this mergence - when you begin to understand how Jesus when He went to the Father simply melted or merged into the One, and then, nothing - it says nothing - was denied.
This is not some mystical performance - not something that happens when you have studied endless courses of how and why - not something that takes place when, like the heathen, you have used many words to gain the ear of the DIVINE. It is pure recognition first of your own helplessness "I can of mine own self do nothing," and then the full recognition of the ONE who can do all things; you are through with ah the preconceived notions and ideas of any personal effort and you are at the point of action in in-action. You are ready to LET something happen. Your only part in this is complete obedience to the urge and the integrity that will not question and so the "before you ask" merely comes into manifestation automatically, and in the twinkling of an eye all is changed, or rather revealed. It is wonderful! Be still. The Energy of the word - the imprisoned splendor of it all - is a sort of pent-up energy that is in everything God urged, whether it be man, or the arts of man. It is the soul that, when recognized, will come forth. What makes a masterpiece as compared with the daubings of a rank amateur? What is this very pent-up energy that literally speaks to you?
"A work can have in it a pent-up energy, an intense life of its own, independent of the object it represents." (H. Moore). That is as a modern statement of prayer, the prayer that Jesus advocated - the prayer which is before it is mentioned and is freighted with the necessary energy to come into being and take on a body and form. "Speak the word" is something more than a collection of dead letters. When the WORD is spoken, the dead letters which are holding the imprisoned splendor of it away from manifestation, break up and release the manifestation. All this which is mystical in statement is a literal, actual thing finally to be handled with your hands and experienced, so that you will know that the "eating of food" which Jesus did was only to make you see we are not talking about imagination or metaphysics in the ordinary sense of the word, but about the tangibility of spirit, which is unseen until recognized, and then becomes concrete by pure recognition. It is wonderful.
The same WORD which cannot return unto you void, once recognized and spoken is the word which you have with you always for recognition when the greed and egotism are drained from you. Why should you be greedy for possessions when you have all? You have all the air there is. What are you going to do with it? Try to hoard it? The Word takes all forms and shapes at the instant recognized, and it is "closer ... than breathing - nearer than hands and feet." It IS, and gradually this recognition will cause the false ancestor-thinking pictures to fall away - they will flee in ten ways. The moment you discover the pent-up energy in the word, and by recognizing the power, it bursts the limitations. You will see the Serpent, the wisdom of the LORD, eat up the wisdom of a thousand and one mystics and teachers of personal ideas. "Awake, thou that sleepest and CHRIST (within you) shall give thee light." It is wonderful!
The picture you are to paint is already painted, and that sounds like so much nonsense to the intellectual fool who knows better by a thousand and one tests and proofs - but nevertheless it is so. The Masterpiece that is to take shape and form is already there and waiting to be thrown onto the canvas of life: whether this be LIFE, or wealth, or joy, or whatsoever. But you will not try to superimpose the masterpiece upon a filthy piece of newsprint, which has the record of your own hopeless and vicious attempts to make God do your bidding. You will make the assumption of the virginal mind, and let the perfection of the picture fall upon the clean sheet of your mind. It is wonderful! No one believes it - so tell no one - but later on let them look at the Masterpiece and draw their own conclusions. You do not care what they think, you have gone on to another, and still another. For the substance is everywhere present in every form and you are "about your Father's business" which is the business of letting and not "trying" to let or make. Do you hear now? a little? - well then go in and shut the door. "This is the way, walk ye in it." This is the LAW - abide in quiet and peace.
Like the vortex that draws everything to it - like a mighty vacuum surrounded with the Terrific pressure of the outside atmosphere - suddenly it happens, and man begins operating from a new level of recognition, and the former things are passed away.
All the evil buds that were beginning to shoot out their ugly branches of belief are crushed and dead. NOW. So is the fate pattern suddenly destroyed before it has time to take form and shape, because you have discovered the pent-up energy of the word and have, by recognition, caused it to break the thin walls of belief which held it away from the ONE. It is wonderful. So why not take words and return unto JEHOVAH? - by yourself - alone - and see what happens.
THE POOL OF RESOURCES
According to Sophocles, man is a pool of resources. Sounds very much as if he might have been right, when THE Law giver, Jesus Christ comes along and makes it clear that anything could be done through that very dimension of consciousness, "I can do all things through Christ Jesus." All is enough. The language of cultured Greece puts the idea so beautifully: that within man when awakened is a pool - an inexhaustible pool - of resources, from which he could draw whatsoever he would. "Whatsoever" - that is a very comprehensive word "You ask in my name" whatsoever you find in the pool of resources within you, you can have, and not maybe nor perhaps, but Yes - that is what it says. Can you take it?
So did Sophocles along with the other magnificent Greek writers and sculptors hit upon the law. Yet were the streets full of ignorant intellectuals who denied it then, and would do the same thing today. They all want proof first before they can believe. I know it is insulting to the great, ponderous intellect - but it is so.
Digging a little more in the remains of Greece, we discover he spoke of "wind swift thought" - thought of and about, and which accomplishes nothing until it is merged into the Christ consciousness, and then like a swift flying javelin hits its mark.
Yes, there is something rather startling about the command
"AWAKE"
Give it a little contemplation - something might happen. You might suddenly awaken from the "waking" dream that goes on around you - and see through the film of ancestor lore that obscures the vision. And again you might hear something beyond the narrow confines of man. I think, quoting - Sophocles more accurately, "man was a Miracle of Resources." Take it along with you. Do not ask any man not even your greatest Master - but ask ME and keep still and listen, and then at a moment you think not, it will come through and take form and shape. It is wonderful!
One of the common questions today emanating from the greatest intellect to the lowest is "How did this ever happen to me?" and a lot of other questions about the WHY of life and existence. So we find the Epicurians explaining it all very neatly by saying that life had no rules or system of ideas but was an "accident." You may smile, but it is as good an answer as the ones I got from fifty people of normal and supernormal intelligence, to whom I asked the same question. Most of them did not have any answer except "You've got me." And from the standpoint of the Ancestor teaching, life is nothing but a series of accidents. People have been killed while on errands of mercy. I presume it was something like an atom making a fortuitous and violent encounter with another atom - and that which happened is called man. Well - anyway the Epicurians who rejected the revelation of Sophocles had their own thought out ideas.
What rejoicing should take place within the temple of your being when you recognize the Truth as given by the Beloved Jesus Christ. No more chance, no more wonder or guessing, but an ability to plunge into the Pool of Resources and come up with the right solution and answer to the question. Yes - It says:
"Awake thou that sleepest" - that is what it says.
Tone and echo; consciousness and manifestation.
THERE IS A LAD HERE
The disciples were faced with five thousand problems all at once - and did not know what to do. The situation looked hopeless enough and the way out remote. It was exactly as the man who must "raise" a certain number of dollars in a given space of time - and has apparently nowhere to get them. Words, ideas, beliefs were but sterile agitations of thought. They would get nowhere.
Already the hungry men, who had followed Jesus into the desert pass for three days, were murmuring and complaining. It never occurred to them that perhaps they had something to do within themselves. They were following a "miracle worker" and expecting His miracles to go on forever. He was attempting at least to stir them to the elevation of doing the miracles.
The disciples talked among themselves as the situation grew more acute. But Jesus went away without moving physically from the whole thing. He went into the Consciousness of the Christ, which is the prerogative of every man - and presently one of the disciples came to him with the announcement:
"There is a lad here ..."
And this lad had five loaves and two fishes. There is always a lad in the offing. He is right in the midst of the problem which seems so overwhelming, but he is so little and so insignificant he is usually brushed aside in the fury of trying to get something or making something happen on a big scale.
Jesus always went away from the picture, no matter what it represented. It is of little use to superimpose a new idea on a mind already filled with evil, any more than it is to take a picture on an already used or exposed plate. When Jesus went away to the place He called "I go unto my Father," He went to the place of consciousness, the Virginal Mind of God, where upon was cast the new picture. When this was done, there was the subtle contact between the seen and the unseen - there was the "lad" with the five loaves and two fishes which turned the whole picture into harmony.
There is always the handful of meal, the three drops of oil, the dregs of wine: - there is always the point from which the new picture can take on form and shape. There is always the LIFE of GOD in the midst of thee - no matter how low the flame seems to have burned. "A mountain cannot stop the progress of a cloud." In our excitement, we fail to see the "lad." He is too insignificant - but he is the "grain of mustard" that does the work. Once this is recognized, the power of the pure consciousness of Christ - which has been entered into will take care of the manifestation. No one knows the manner of the miracle or the expression, for "I have a way ye know not of" - a way that is "past finding out." The only thing you can do is to leave the picture of confusion or lack as quickly as possible, taking nothing of it with you, and enter into the Christ Consciousness; the Virginal unsullied Mind of God. Once having seen-felt this new picture or recognition, the manifestation will come through. The "lad" will always be there with his five loaves and two fishes.
This "lad" has appeared many times. We see the same thing taking place in the case of Naaman the Leper. There is "a little maid" here - and she had the password unto the so-called miracle. Interesting that both of these keystones to the miracle should have been children. Again we see the need of the unsullied innocence; - instead of trying to operate from conclusions derived from the mind which is filled with adultery and uncleanness. The adult makes foul and then tries to cleanse. The moment you really "go unto the Father" your mind is cleansed - and the five thousand hungry men are fed.
There is "a little maid" here. She had the WORD of revelation which was mightier than all the power of Naaman, in spite of his great military prowess.
When you awaken to your true heritage, you will see there is always "a lad here" - there is always "a little maid" here. There is always that point of manifestation - no matter what the problem may present on the outside. Do you hear? There is a lad or a little maid right here NOW.
CONCERNING IMMORTALITY
There is so much talk of and about immortality in the Bible. Jesus emphasized the idea by repetition: "This is life eternal that they might know thee, the only true God" - and "If a man keep my saying, he shall never see death." Yet all religions seem to end at the crucifixion. The space between immortality and the thing called life on this planet is called death. In other words, while we are repeating the words of Jesus Christ and professing to follow him, we only go as far as the crucifixion.
A man may insist that he is living only with the idea of going to heaven, and that only when he arrives there will be happy ... yet, point a loaded gun at that man which if fired would cause him to enter the Kingdom of Heaven, and he will scream for help and protection. Would Jesus have been speaking the truth when he said, "For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God"? - just as man says that the wisdom of God is foolishness.
Why do we stop at the crucifixion if we believe in Jesus and his revelation? He was and is the way-shower, and said very definitely, "... the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works ... " Do we believe, or are we just saying words?
And then the host of questions:
Have you ever seen an immortal?
Answer: "No" - the reason is because you do not believe. You cannot see anything you do not believe, regardless. A thousand angels and immortals could stand in your presence and you would see nothing, because you have nothing with which to see. You do not see with thought and argument; you see by recognition, and without that, nothing happens but a repetition of the ancestor teaching.
Nothing is gained by human reason, for the minute it touches inspiration, inspiration disappears. The disciples could not sustain the visible Presence of Jesus Christ because they could not believe. They wanted to make him a "spirit" or apparition concocted by human thought. So he disappeared from their sight without going anywhere; it being beyond their capacity to grasp the reality of LIFE eternal.
No one can prove it as long as he is trying to show it to another. If you are doing it to see whether it is true or not, it will not happen for it is not something that results from taking thought, but something that already is; a merging into the one thing called LIFE - which is indivisible and eternal. Nothing really happens but SELF discovery as the mystification of the "self" fades away. Self-discovery is fraught with light and with the ability to understand some of the things called miracles - such as the telescoping of time, "you say it is four months until the harvest..." There is no explaining it, and no way to prove it to satisfy the curiosity of unbelieving man. There are many other dimensions that will be revealed when the pure BELIEF is established.
The man "whose breath is in his nostrils" is behind the iron curtain of ancestor teaching - he runs through the gamut of birth, growth, maturity, and decay. There is nothing else for him, so he concocts a sort of golden-streeted heaven to which he is going and where he will have his food and lodging without working, and imagines he will be divinely happy with nothing to do all day; he fights off disease and accident, both of which would make a quick end of his misery here on earth.
This can only take place as you BELIEVE - not believe in the human sense of the word, but a pure unconscious acceptance of the Presence. I say unconscious advisedly, because until you actually become unconscious of a thing you are not fully aware of it. When you are unconscious of the air you breathe you pay no attention to it - the moment you become conscious of it, you begin to have difficulties with it - and so is it with anything. To be absent from the body and present with the LAW, or the Lord, is exactly this thing.
The discovery of LIFE is not something to be talked about. It is something to experience. Interesting about Lazarus; I think often of him. He was Jesus' best friend. He was not a disciple - yet it is recorded that Jesus spent most of his leisure time with the Lazarus family. Why? Then came the news that Lazarus was sick. Jesus tarried two days. Why? When the Centurion asked for help for his servant, whom Jesus did not know, he said, "I will" and healed the servant lying ill at a great distance in the self-same hour.
Why did he not say: "I will" in the case of Lazarus? - but he tarried. Why? Could it have been that some experiment was going on? And then two more days and the word came that "Lazarus is dead," but even that did not disturb him. Why? And then he raised him up. The moment the WORD of LIFE touched the decaying flesh, it was instantly back to life.
What became of Lazarus? Where did he go? Why did not Lazarus stay at the time of the crucifixion? He disappeared. Why? Because he was functioning on a level of immortality that men do not believe in. They know they must die or break life in order to gain immortality - and so Lazarus did the same thing as Jesus did when he resurrected himself; he almost instantly disappe