Neville 10-09-1967
We are told in the 1st Epistle of John, the 1st
chapter: “This is the message we have received from him and
proclaim to you, that God is light and in him there is no darkness at
all.” Is this a figure of speech or a literal fact? I am
telling you from experience: it is a literal fact, for God is
light!
There are three very firm statements made in scripture
defining God. God is light. God is love, and God is spirit. John
tells us here that God is light, a light in which there is no
darkness.
Now try to follow me closely. The final gift
to man is God himself and God is a revealer. Man’s knowledge of
himself is based on his knowledge of the revealer. Scripture records
what is said of the revealer. As he awakens in you, read scripture
carefully and you will discover to what extent God has revealed
himself to you.
Jesus makes this statement: “I am the
light of the world; he who follows me will not walk in darkness, but
will have the light of life.” He is the light that lightens
every man as he enters the world. Is this really true? Back in 1926
when I was twenty-one, I was visiting a friend in Larchmont, N.Y. He
was the manager of a private club where several hundred boys and
girls were gathered to dance. I did not join the group but retired
early, turned on the nightlight, and began to read a book. The next
thing I knew the sun was up, the light was still burning, and the
opened book was lying on my chest. I knew from the page number that I
had not read more than a page or two before I fell into a deep, deep
trance, because the book had not been disturbed during that long
period of maybe ten or twelve hours. I awoke to find myself
cataleptic. My body seemed frozen, yet I was conscious of having
returned from knowing myself to be an infinite sea of vibrant,
liquid, living light. There was nothing but myself. I was the light
of the universe and nothing, not one being, existed outside of me. No
planet, no sun, no moon - only an infinite sea of light and I the
light of the world. So I can say from experience: I am the light of
the world!
When God awakens within you (and he will) you too
will know you are He who is the light of the world, and if God is
light then you must be God! After this revelation happens in you,
every claim made in scripture concerning God will begin to unfold
from within, just like a tree in blossom. You will know that God is
love, for you will stand in the presence of infinite love, embrace
and become one with that body.
I am human. I am man, and yet I
know I am infinite love. Since my embrace I have no other feeling but
the body of love that embraced me. While I am here talking with you
now I am wearing but a small portion of myself, just a spark of an
immensity of my own fiery being. I know from experience that I help
and teach more when I am asleep then when I am awake, for now when I
sleep I pass beyond the world of dream into a world of spirit waking.
I know from the thought, the imaginings, the visions I have received
from many of you, that they are fiery darts shot from my own fiery
self. That same being of love is waking within us all and when he
wakes, for an interval you become the new lamp of the world. But your
light is not here. It is beyond the world of dream for here, he who
knows he is the light of the world is always rejected. “He came
to his own and his own received him not.” Even his own brothers
did not believe in him. On this level it is always the same story,
but when God awakens in you, you know who you are; and when the world
calls you asleep, you are beyond the world of dream, having entered
the world of Spirit waking; and from your fiery being you shoot your
darts into the mind of those that you want to stir, to accept your
message of salvation.
Now let me share with you this wonderful
experience which was shared with me. In this lady’s dream I was
standing in the center of a raised platform, surrounded by many rows
of people, all deformed in various ways. As I instructed them, one by
one they were healed, then they rose and departed. Noticing a madonna
made of marble or stone nearby, she saw it become animated and dance
for joy as the words I spoke so thrilled her. Then a few weeks ago
she had this dream. In it I was a doctor in a hospital which had no
surgery or drugs. Everyone simply came to me and was cured. Then she
made this statement: “It is my hope that such a hospital can be
here.”
May I tell her: “No, it is not here on this
level at all.” This is a world of educated darkness where you
and I - infinite beings as we are - entered for a purpose, and only a
very small part of immortal self entered. That’s what we see
here. You are an infinite being, for you are God. Everyone is God,
but here we are just a spark of the immensity of our own fiery being.
And because ultimately we are one, when one awakens and passes beyond
the world of dream, he fires his arrows into the minds of all to stir
them, to set that spark ablaze so that everything said of Jesus
Christ (God personified in scripture) will be experienced. When it
happens in you, you don’t need a new Bible or any credit on
this level at all. You ask for no recognition. It was not granted
then and it is not to be granted now. Even scripture tells us that
even his own brothers did not believe in him. He came to his own
people and they received him not. He was in the world and the world
was made through him and the world knew him not. That is the
story.
So much is said of light in scripture. He lights every
man that comes into the world, because without his spark one could
not breathe or live. God actually became us that we could become God,
who is awakening and unfolding in all. One day you will know that you
are all light, then all love, and finally all spirit. No mortal eye
will ever see you, for although your birth from above does not appear
in this world, the witnesses to the event are mortal. They see the
sign of your birth, but they cannot see you because you are spirit.
Talking about you as though you were not present, they speak of you
in the most incredible terms saying: “How can he have a baby?”
yet you take the sign in your arms and embrace it in the most
endearing manner. That is the sign of your spiritual birth, revealing
yet another definition that God is spirit.
Knowing that God is
love and light, when your spiritual birth appears you will have
experienced the three definitions of God. Then, still finding
yourself confined to this little tiny portion of yourself, you will
teach and help others in this world. Ask for no acclaim, no
recognition, nothing - just simply teach it, and night after night as
you fall asleep you will pass beyond the world of dream, and from the
world of spirit waking you will shoot your fiery arrows into the
minds of those who follow you. You will stir them and they will
awaken as you have been awakened. At some time in your life you heard
the story and, as you slept in the world of dream someone who knew
God from experience shot an arrow into your mind and your spirit
became a flame and God awoke in you. It’s the same being, for
there is no race in God, no sect, no color; it’s just God and
He is light.
We speak of darkness and light, yet is darkness a
thing - or is it the absence of a thing? Is the hole in a sock a
thing or is it the absence of a portion of the sock? I am speaking of
actual light - vibrant, living, pulsing light, which hasn’t a
thing to do with the pigment of skin. I wear all garments - black,
yellow, pink and red. I am not greater in one garment than I am in
another. In Christ there is no Greek, no Jew, no bond, no free, no
male, no female. God is one in all and He awakens in all, and when he
does everything claimed of Jesus Christ is experienced. One day,
having played the central part, you too will close your eyes and
leave this world. Having shot your arrows well, those who heard and
believed you will awaken. They may forget you in time that doesn’t
really matter, for the eternal story is recorded in the gospel. Your
name may not be recorded there but it is recorded in eternity, for
your true identity is God Himself!
On this level you can start
from here, right now, and fulfill any dream. May I tell you: you are
going to live the life that you are imagining, so imagine well!
Imagine the most glorious thing in the world and - no matter how
wonderful it is - may I tell you it is nothing compared to the being
that you really are. Nothing in this world can come close to the
being you really are. This world of Caesar is only a tiny section of
your infinite being, but while you are here, dream nobly. Dream
lovely dreams, for you can realize everything if you are willing to
imagine that you have them now. Begin now to imagine you are the man
(the woman) you would like to be, and regardless of what happens
tomorrow, next week, or next month, if you persist in the assumption
that you already are that which you want to be, you will become it in
this world of flesh and blood. Everything here will vanish, yes - but
why not test your creative power? Then you will begin to taste the
power latent within you, and you will discover that you can conjure
out of your own depth things that are seemingly impossible, conjured
by the mere act of assumption. If you dare to act and persist in
acting as though it were true and it becomes a fact, then you will
know the truth of your creative power.
The promise you will
have to take on faith. I tell you from experience: it is true. I have
experienced the fact that God is love, the fact that God is the
Father. Who would have thought that one born in 1905 (and my friend
who is here tonight - in 1911) with no social, intellectual or
financial background, would experience the fact that we are God the
Father. That God’s Son David - he who decreed: “I will
tell of the decree of the Lord. He said unto me: ‘Thou art my
Son, today I have begotten thee’” - is our Son. Who would
have thought that we, born in the 20th century, are the Father of one
who was supposed to have lived 1000 BC, when we have no memory beyond
that little moment in time. I can return to the age of three in my
memory, yet we both returned to the same memory and remembered one
who supposedly lived 3000 years ago.
We know from experience
that we are the ones who declared: “You are my son, today I
have begotten you.” We know we are the immortal being who took
upon ourselves mortality to test our own infinite power by becoming
just a small part of it. Having played the various parts we agreed to
play, Fatherhood once more has become a part of our consciousness,
and David has stood before us and called us Father. This is the
thrill that is in store for everyone.
So when my friend
saw this healing she saw correctly, for in 1946 I was lifted up, and
as a heavenly chorus sang: “Neville is risen. Neville is
risen,” everyone before me was made perfect in harmony with the
perfection springing from within me. That is in store for everyone in
this world, and in the end we are all gathered into one being, yet
without a loss of identity. There is a friendship and, as with
friends, you accept the existence of others, so God’s name is
plural. It is a unity made up of others.
When you and I
deliberately entered the state called Abraham we were told: “For
a surety, your descendants will be sojourners in a land that is not
theirs and they will be enslaved there for four hundred years. Then
they will come out with great possessions.” Four hundred is the
last letter of the Hebrew alphabet, whose symbol is a cross. Now
crucified on a garment of flesh, you are enslaved by it and must
perform all of its normal, natural functions. Regardless of whether
you are a king or a serf, you must perform all of the functions of
man. Isn’t that a slave? But one day “I” who am God
will bring my identity with me, out of limitation and darkness into
the world of light, for I am bringing out myself. It was God who made
the decision and God who fulfills it in this wonderful world.
We
are told in the 82nd Psalm: “I say, ‘You are gods, sons
of the Most High, all of you, nevertheless you will die like men and
fall as one man, O princes.’” If you are a prince, is
your father not a king? Coming out from the Father into the land of
forgetfulness, memory died as we fell as one man. But when we return
we are the king, for we return as the Father. Now Sons of the Most
High, God’s final gift to us is himself, and God is Love. God
is Spirit and God is Light! And you are destined to experience
everything that is claimed of Jesus Christ in the gospel.
Don’t
try to change the Bible - leave it just as it is. I stand amazed, yet
I cannot be disturbed when I read how the great scholars interpret
it. Today I took the word “light” and was amazed how the
scholars interpreted it as a figure of speech. They could not believe
the word could be taken in a literal sense, so they gave it every
kind of interpretation. These are the great minds of the day, men who
are masters of the ancient tongue, but they know nothing because they
haven’t had the experience. I tell you scripture is literally
true. All the precepts of Jesus Christ must be accepted literally,
for they will be experienced literally, in a region so remote from
that which man knows or can even conceive. You can’t even think
of it here but God does it there, and you will know that you are the
central character of scripture, as the whole thing unfolds within
you.
On this level, you dwell on what I have told you this
night. You will find that it will pay off in tremendous dividends.
You will reach the point when you will know that your wish is already
fulfilled. Then you will sigh and say: “Thank you Father.”
Even though you know you are the Father you can still address him as
another, but an intimate self. “He who sent me is with me, he
has never left me. If you see me you see him who sent me, for we are
one. I and my Father are one.” You can actually have a wish,
thank him, and wait for it to appear in this world - and it
will.
Now, the same lady who wrote the letter concerning
the healing said: “I wanted to see Bergman, so I called the
agencies. I called friends whom I thought had influence; I made every
physical effort to obtain a ticket to no avail. Then, aggravated with
myself, I simply assumed I was in the audience, watching the show and
enjoying it thoroughly. A few days later a friend who lives in New
York City called to ask if I could see him on a certain night, as he
was going to be in town. I agreed and after dinner he took me to see
Bergman.”
This lady made every physical effort to
get a seat, but not one was available. Yet when she assumed she was
there, three thousand miles away a friend decided to come west and
take her. Now, people will tell you that tickets are available out of
town, or that certain seats are kept aside for special people, for
people are forever justifying everything. But my friend didn’t
ask for justification, she simply assumed she was seated in the
theater and a friend three thousand miles away fulfilled her imaginal
act.
You can be anything you want to be, for you are going to
be what you are imagining anyway. As man imagines, he lives! Morning,
noon, and night you can’t stop imagining, because the candle
has been lit. Job tells us that the spirit of the Lord is the candle
on his head. Your candle is now lit and you are moving through a
world of darkness towards the fulfillment of all that you have
imagined; so imagine the best, for everything is yours for the
taking. Fulfill every desire while you are here, and when you come to
the end you will discover that you are God. You began as God and you
end as God, for “I am the beginning, and the end, the first and
the last, the alpha and the omega.” God can’t bring out
another, so out of himself comes all that goes to make God, for he is
the elohim, a compound unity. In the beginning God (elohim) is one
made up of others. You and I came out of the elohim and in the end we
go back as the elohim, but this time we are aware of being the
Father. As common sons (princes) we return as the king. That is the
journey for everyone in this world.
I am telling you from
experience, the story is true. God is light. In the Book of 1 John,
he speaks as though he had only heard and not yet experienced,
saying: “We will tell what we have heard from him and proclaim
to you that God is light and in him there is no darkness at all.”
But in the Gospel of John, he speaks from experience and puts these
words in the mouth of the central character, saying: “I am the
light of the world. He who follows me will not be in darkness, for I
am the light of life.” Here we see light identified with life.
There is something within you which is all light, the light of life
by which you animate and start things moving, just as the lady saw
the statue. It was dead, made of marble; but as everyone was
perfectly formed, the madonna became animated and began to dance. You
animate everything, for you are God, buried in your mortal body,
which is an eternal part of the universe. The bodies you see here are
sepulchers. They appear to be alive while you wear them, but they are
dead. You animate them, for you are the princes who - dwelling as one
man - became fragmented into all these little parts. The one who fell
was the king. Now a prince, you are gathering yourself together into
the one being called the Lord God Jehovah, who is Jesus Christ.
I
know it doesn’t make sense on this level. It is not expected
to, but I tell you it is true. Night after night I go to bed and move
beyond the world of dreams into the world of spirit making, and from
there I shoot my fiery arrows, knowing they never miss. Then someone
will bring me a message, telling me she saw circles after circles
after circles in the air and an arrow penetrate the smallest circle
and swivel. She brought back an image, for that is exactly what
happens. The arrow never misses its target. The message always
penetrates and sets aflame that which is already there. So I tell
you: your imaginings, your dreams, your visions, are fiery arrows
shot by a being who is all light!
Now let us go into the
silence.