Life Is a Race

Tonight’s subject is “Life is a Race.” But this is the most wonderful race, because, really, there’s no competition. The whole drama is taking place within ourselves. If we seem to have competition, it is only within ourselves. We’re not competing with anyone in this world. So in the end, the end of the race is simply self…and so everyone wins the race. No one comes second; there is no second. Only one being plays all the parts, and that being in scripture is called Jesus Christ. The Bible is sacred history; there is no secular history in the Bible. What you and I do here in this world of Caesar, well, it’s entirely up to us to do exactly what we want—make mistakes, achieve ends, do all these things. And in this world of secular history it’s perfectly alright to apply God’s law towards every end in the world.292 ¶1

But God himself came and comes into human history in the person of Jesus Christ. Now that phrase “and comes” is very important. “He comes into human history in the person of Jesus Christ.” The Christ that you and I meet in the pages of the New Testament is the true universal of human nature. Everyone will be not only Christ-like but will be Christ himself, everyone in this world. Christ is profoundly and uniquely related to the “inner being” of every man in every age in this world. So in the end, you are Jesus Christ, who is only the personification of God himself.292 ¶2

So we are told in the story, “The time of my departure is come.” Then he likens it to a fight, “I have fought the good fight.” Now he likens it to a race, “I have finished the race.” And he tells us he has kept the faith, “I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness.” Not a crown; it’s definitive, the crown of righteousness . He goes on to tell us, “Let no one now bother me; for I bear on my body the marks of Jesus” . He bears on his body the marks of Jesus, and yet his name is Paul. So he ceases to be Paul and he bears on his body the marks of Jesus. He’s telling you he is Jesus Christ!292 ¶3

This is the story of every child born of woman. Everyone in this world will one day realize that they are Jesus Christ. He actually came and comes into human history in the person of Jesus Christ. You are born Mary, born John, I was born Neville and I lived the life of Neville; you lived the life of Mary, of John, of all these names. And then suddenly, out of nowhere, right into our life the story of Jesus Christ begins to unfold. Then and only then do you realize who you are. You always thought that you were, well, Mary, John, Bruce, Neville, call it by any name, and suddenly you realize who you are. These names that you bore and this long physical tradition—so proud that you are of a certain family, of a certain this, of a certain that, and its’ all secular history—right down into the center of it comes sacred history. And you realize who you are.292 ¶4

Well, suppose you received a letter this morning and this is how the letter reads, “You have died and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory” . Suppose you received that letter this morning, what would you think of it?292 ¶5

Well, you didn’t [...] if you read it, because the Bible is contemporary. Those who wrote the great script were not recording situations and scenes of the past as historians. What they were doing, they were passing on to the whole vast world the story of salvation as they themselves had experienced it.292 ¶6

So here is that letter to the Colossians, the 3rd chapter, “You have died and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.” Well, who is this Christ? We’re told in scripture by the same author, “Christ is the power and the wisdom and the Spirit of God” . You mean buried in me is the power and the wisdom and the Spirit of God, and God is Spirit? That God himself is buried in me and that I died and my life is hid with God? Yes! That’s exactly what it’s telling you. Now, I think I’m alive, you think you’re alive. So if you read the letter you must be alive for your mind to move from sentence to sentence to sentence, to actually know that you are alive. And I’m told as I read the letter I died. You died and your life is hid with Christ—the power, the wisdom, the Spirit of God—and when Christ who is my life appears, I also will appear with him in glory. While I’m reading this letter, I’m supposed to be dead?292 ¶7

You read it in the Bible, the 3rd chapter of Colossians. Are you really dead? When I walk from here to the corner, walk from here to the car and go home tonight, and do all the normal things that a living man can do—certainly not the dead man—and yet I’m told I’m dead. Now, let me share with you experiences. This whole story is true. If tonight you woke to find yourself in a sepulcher, would you not conclude that somebody believed you dead to have placed you there? Because a man who dies you will say, or anyone, well, he doesn’t know that he died. He died; we know he died, so we will dispose of his body. But the man who died, at the very last moment when he gasped the last and so he died, but he doesn’t know. He just simply expired. He left behind…we buried him. So if I this night woke to find myself buried in a sepulcher, in a tomb, I would conclude that somebody thought me dead and placed me in a tomb.292 ¶8

Then I awake in a tomb. Awaking in a tomb, then I come out to find the entire wonderful symbolism of scripture unfolding before my eye: a new creation, a new birth, a new being, the being that is called Christ Jesus.292 ¶9

Now, I always thought that I was Neville. I never believed for one moment that I was not Neville and yet all that is now taking place in me—and I am the observer, the star in the drama—tells me I am not; that I am Jesus Christ, for there is only Jesus Christ in the story. It is God who became me that I may become God, and in becoming me he so identified himself with me I never thought for a moment I was not Neville, of a certain race, of a certain family, of a certain nationality, and all these things. And then one day, the little cord is broken and I am not that at all; I am the central being of scripture.292 ¶10

It happens to everyone in this world. So in the end, I tell you, the race is won and no one comes in second. It doesn’t matter at what time in the so-called world it happens to you, you are the first. For, he is the first raised from the dead; he is the first fruit of those who slept; the first of those who are raised from the dead. I am the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last. So if I am the very last that actually awoke in this state, I still am the first. For the first is the last and the last is the first, and there is no second.292 ¶11

Everyone awakes and everyone is the same being who is God, and there’s nothing but God. So I’ll tell you exactly how it’s going to happen to you. It could happen tonight, I don’t know. I can’t tell you when it’s going to happen to you, but I tell you it is going to happen to you, for I speak with the assurance of experience. I am not speculating. When I read all these theories coming out of the Vatican today, and all the theories coming out of all the so-called great minds of the world, I stand amazed. And yet I must remind myself they just don’t know; they haven’t experienced it; so forgive them, Father, they do not know!292 ¶12

They haven’t the slightest concept of what this whole wonderful drama is all about. But one day you will see how altogether literally true scripture is. So they buried him on Golgotha; that’s where he was crucified. “So you have died, and your life is hid with Christ in God.” Well, where did they bury him? They buried him on Golgotha. And, “When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory” when he appears . Well, how does he appear? Does he come in from outer space? No, he comes in the peculiar, most wonderful manner, in a series of supernatural experiences that take place in you.292 ¶13

The first great event is his resurrection. Well, if I am hid with him, if he resurrects he resurrects where they have buried him. Where did they bury him? They buried him on Golgotha. Well, Golgotha means skull, that’s all that it means. And one day this is going to happen to you, you’re going to feel the most fantastic wind; the most fantastic vibration possesses you, and you will think, well, I am waking from a deep, deep sleep. You feel yourself waking, just waking, and you wake and wake and wake. It’s such a strange waking. It’s unlike any waking you’ve ever experienced before. But you wake to find yourself in your skull, and the skull is sealed, completely sealed. There is no opening; there is not one little opening in the skull and here you are completely sealed in your skull. You seem to know that at the base of the skull if you but push something would give and you would get out. You know it.292 ¶14

Now the skull, may I tell you, you’re not a little miniature thing, you are just as big as you are now to yourself, all things being relative. If I would draw a line across this just where that being is and right here, that would seem to be the size of the skull, the sepulcher.292 ¶15

And I am standing as I am now, and I am just as big relative to this as I was that night when I rose in my skull. The whole thing…I’m alone, there’s no one at my side. So I pushed and I came out. As I came out I laid on the floor for a little while, two seconds, and then I looked back at that out of which I came, and it was this…the head, ghastly pale and turning this way from side to side. As I looked at it, contemplating this out of which I came, the wind disturbed me, a peculiar wind, which is the Spirit of God. Then I was diverted, because I thought it came in that direction, and as I looked back at this out of which I came, it’s gone, but in its place sat three men. They are, in this dimension of my world, my three older brothers. One sat where the head was and the two sat where the feet were. The one that sat at that end —which would be my left foot, he was as disturbed as I— got off the bed and started towards the corner where he felt the wind originated. As he moved not more than a foot, his attention was arrested by something on the floor, and looking down he said, “Why, it’s Neville’s baby!” Then he lifted this little infant wrapped in swaddling clothes. The other two said, “How can Neville have a baby?” He brought it over and placed it on the bed. Then I lifted this infant wrapped in swaddling clothes, and into its face I looked, and said, “How is my sweetheart?” and this heavenly smile broke upon its face. And then the whole thing dissolved and I woke in a hotel room where I slept that night physically in San Francisco.292 ¶16

That is the beginning of the unfolding of The End, when the drama is coming to its end and the race is over.292 ¶17

That’s the first. The second one is when you discover that you are God the Father. I could tell you this from now to the ends of time…oh yes, I could tell you, write it out for you every day, have you read it, but you would not believe it until you experience it. For, scripture tells us: “No one knows who the Son is except the Father, and no one knows who the Father is except the Son and any one to whom the Son chooses to reveal him” .292 ¶18

So you don’t know who the Son is. The whole vast world speaks of Jesus Christ as the Son of God in spite of scripture. For he said, “When you see me you see the Father; how then can you say to me, ‘Show me the Father’? Have I been so long with you, Philip, and yet you do not know me? He who sees me sees the Father” . Then he asks a very simple question, What do you think…whose son…well, whose son is the Christ? “And they answered, ‘The son of David.’ He said, “Why then did David, in the Spirit, call him Lord? If David in the Spirit calls him my Lord, how can he be David’s son?” .292 ¶19

The word “my lord” is Adonay, which means “my father.” Every son referred to his father as “my Lord,” every son did, and so David refers to him as “my Father.” Then how can I then be his son? So here comes a moment in time when a similar feeling possesses you and you are completely possessed by the Spirit of God. Then something explodes and standing before you is your son, who is the personification of humanity, all the generations of men and all of their accomplishments fused into a single youth. That youth is David and David calls you “Father,” in fulfillment of the scripture: I have found him: “I have found David, and he’s cried unto me, ‘Thou art my father, my God and the Rock of my salvation’” . Here you see David, this eternal, infinite, beautiful being, and you know he is your son, and he knows you are his father. That’s the second sign of the coming of the end of the race.292 ¶20

It’s an awful fight. Read the story of David and you know what you’ve come through…all the horrors of the world you’ve gone through…then comes the personification of all. But it’s so beautiful at the very end; it’s not unlovely at all. You can’t describe the beauty of this son.292 ¶21

Then comes the third sign in the unfolding of The End, when you’re coming to the very end—and you were the one who played all the parts. The third sign is that when the temple is torn from top to bottom. From the very top of your skull to the base of your spine, every segment of that spine is severed, and you look, and at the very base of it is a golden pool. You look at it and you know I am it, that’s my very being. As you look at it, you become what you behold, and you fuse with it, and up you go like a serpent into your skull. Now you know who you really are. You know you’re the Father—you saw David. But you didn’t quite realize until then you are the one called in scripture the Son of man; and as the Son of man is lifted up…yes, just “as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of man be lifted up” …in the same serpentine manner. He asked, “What do men say of the Son of man?” and they answered, “Some say John the Baptist, others say Elijah, and others say Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” Then he said, “But who do you say that I am” ? Now we know exactly what he calls himself; he calls himself the Son of man. Then Peter answered, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.” Calls it the son of the living God; but the Father and the Son now are one.292 ¶22

This creative power that went into this world of death has now been extracted; it’s now alive. He died and returned and became alive—the mystery of life through death. Is it not the 68th Psalm, where we are told that God is our Lord, our Savior, our Salvation; and to him belongs escape from death ? So I saw at the base of my spine which is the temple of the living God…for am I not told, “Are you not the temple of God…and the Spirit of God dwells in you” ?292 ¶23

So he took not the blood of goats and bulls, he took his own blood and took it up for an everlasting sacrifice. You look at it and it is yourself—that pool of golden light. It’s all love but it’s yourself because God is love. You fuse with it and up you go just like a serpent, right up into the skull where the whole drama originated and culminates.292 ¶24

Then comes the final curtain when God himself in the symbol of a dove descends upon you and smothers you with kisses, approving the work that is now accomplished.292 ¶25

So the race is over and you won it. Then you realize who you are. Until then you thought you were John Brown, you thought you belonged to a certain race, a certain nation, a certain family, and now you know there is only Jesus Christ in the world. There is nothing but Jesus Christ, and he became man that man may become God. So in the end there is no competition; competition is only in this fabulous world of ours here, the world of Caesar. And he gave us a law by which we may live while we are in this world of Caesar.292 ¶26

So we have honors bestowed upon us, we have wealth, we have names, we have all these things and we think it’s so great. May I tell you, in the end all things are poured out as though they never existed. Not one thing in this world that man actually has accomplished will be remembered…it will all be poured out…but nothing will be remembered. So you could be the biggest, biggest thing in this world, with all the accomplishments in the world, all the medals of the world, and in the end it’s all poured out as though it never happened.292 ¶27

Yet while I’m with you I must tell you, for your own satisfaction, the principle works beautifully. If you want honors, you can get honors. If you want money, you can get money. If you want anything in this world, you can get it by God’s wonderful principle. It’s a simple principle.292 ¶28

But in the end, it’s all poured out as though it never existed; and the only thing that will really survive are these eternal signs by which you will discover who you really are; and you awaken to discover you are Jesus Christ. You wear the mask of John to the very end, but you will say with one: “Let no one bother me; for I bear on my body the marks of Jesus” . Yes, I am he, he said. I bear on my body these experiences, they happened to me, and so I am he, and don’t bother me. The race is over. The fight was a frightful fight. But now the crown—definitive, not a crown, the crown; there’s only one crown—the crown is now laid up for me and I will wear it. Everyone wears the same crown of righteousness . And you do not lose, may I tell you, your distinctive individuality. You are Jesus Christ without loss of your own distinctive individuality. You pass through the entire drama, you lose nothing, and yet you are Jesus Christ.292 ¶29

Now, let me show you how the principle works, the law works. There is in this room tonight a painting, a portrait. Just a few weeks ago in New York City (I was there for five weeks) and we had dinner with some very dear friends of ours, and my wife who is an artist and loves the artistic world, and trying to encourage our hostess, she said, “You know, Louise, this is the loveliest thing that you’ve done. Everything about it is soft, it moves, the whole thing is alive. And not to criticize your other works but they are frozen, everything is dead.” If she painted water, you could just walk on it like ice. No matter what she did it was simply dead, it was frozen. But this thing was a copy of a Renoir, and my wife loved it…just to express her appreciation of this wonderful painting, to encourage her to use this medium in future work.292 ¶30

She said to my wife, “Well, Bill darling, it’s yours.” Oh, she said, I didn’t say it for that…I don’t want it…no, no, I only tell you that this is the loveliest thing you’ve done. She insisted that my wife take it; my wife said no. They came to my meetings in New York City and every night she would still insist and my wife was equally determined that she wouldn’t take it. So the night before the meeting before I left New York for here, they came to the meeting and she said, “You know, one of my sons will bring it over to the plane tomorrow and you can easily put it on the plane and take it to L.A. with you.” Again my wife said, “No, if you insist I take it, you crate it and ship it, and I will pay all expenses of crating and shipping…but I will not take it.” That was it. We didn’t take it.292 ¶31

A week ago a friend of mine (who is in the audience tonight) said, “After the first meeting I’m leaving for New York, next Monday, and may I call on a couple of your friends? Not to sell them anything, not to do business, just to meet someone in New York socially.” And so I gave him the names of a couple of friends. I could have given, had he desired it and had the time, I could have given him fifteen names. Everyone would have been delighted to entertain him, but he only wanted a couple of names, so I gave him two names.292 ¶32

One was this lady’s name. He called on her husband at business, and the husband said, “Why, we’ll have dinner… come on to dinner tonight.” So he went to dinner.292 ¶33

And they have this perfectly fabulous apartment on the thirty-third floor, looking over the entire city of New York and Jersey and all parts of Brooklyn and Long Island. They only pay $10,000 a year rent for the place and it doesn’t…as far as they’re concerned, they pay that more easily than many of us here pay $200 a month…and they pay $10,000 a year. Been there for three years and renew the lease, undoubtedly, if they feel like it or move elsewhere. Money is no problem.292 ¶34

But during the evening, she said, “Bill wouldn’t take this picture and I gave it to her; and I’m determined not to crate it, and I’ve been seeing myself delivering that in California to Bill without crating.” My friend volunteered, he said, “I’ll take it for you.” Never saw her before. And so, tonight he brings the painting here.292 ¶35

Now, this lady started from scratch in this city of Los Angeles. When I say from scratch, she didn’t have a nickel, not a penny. Today she is a multimillionaire through her husband’s work. But since she married him, he has grown like this.292 ¶36

She does what she calls “homework.” She keeps my book The Law and The Promise at her bedside. The word Promise means nothing to her…it frightens her. What I have told you tonight is the Promise. It’s the law that interests her, and there are forty stories on the law. She reads and rereads…she’s memorized them. She does what she calls her homework, so every night before she sleeps, she takes an objective, for her husband in business, her children in work and school, herself, and she goes over this in her mind’s eye until it becomes objectively real, and then she sleeps. She takes her Imagination and works it to the point of vision and falls asleep.292 ¶37

She took that painting and she saw it in our home in spite of my wife’s refusal to take it… wouldn’t take it. And then a friend of ours going to New York, and whether he’s gone there before I don’t know, but evidently he wanted to meet someone, some friends of ours, just socially. I gave him two names, he called them both, they both entertained him, and this one was a heavenly evening, undoubtedly. They tried to persuade him to remain on last Saturday night, because they were having a bunch of the United Nations delegates in their home to entertain all of them, but he couldn’t postpone his return. But he brought the painting.292 ¶38

So tonight here we have this painting in the…what I’ll do with it, I don’t know. But there it is. It’s Louise. She is the most determined…if anyone can be as determined as Louise everyone would be a millionaire. That’s what she is today. If you had a desire for that to the extent that she has, you would be exactly what she is.292 ¶39

I personally have no desire for any of the things here in this world, but none whatsoever. Friendships yes, all the lovely friendships in the world…that I love! To be with a friend either in their home or they in my home I love that. But to possess things, it doesn’t interest me at all. If it so possessed me that I would make it a daily exercise and do it, well, I would be everything that, well, people admire in this world—like wealth and power and names and all the things that go with it. But it doesn’t interest me.292 ¶40

Let me tell you a little story. The day before I left New York City I went to say goodbye to a friend who’s on the eighth floor of a building between Madison and Park. She runs a metaphysical library and she’s been there for forty years. She doesn’t need the street level, because they all know her and they write from all over the world. Her little store is called The Gateway. They write her for books, and Mary sends off the books, and that’s it. She just does a lovely business, simply on the eighth floor, completely out of sight.292 ¶41

So I went to say goodbye to Mary, and the elevator is a self-run elevator. So I got on the elevator and pushed the street level and it automatically started down, but it stopped on the fourth floor. On the fourth floor this nice looking young man about, I would say, late twenties or thirtyish got on with a lovely display of flowers. It was Bonsai tree and on it there were six beautiful orchids, I would say an oyster shade, with little veins of coral running through the leaves of the orchids. But it was so beautiful I couldn’t restrain myself and I said, “Aren’t they beautiful!” He said, “Aren’t they though!” He said, “Do you see to whom they are going?” I said no. “Well, they’re going to the Duchess of Windsor.”292 ¶42

Well, she had arrived that morning on the Queen Mary and she has a yearly suite at the Waldorf Astoria. So I said, “Do give her my love” He took one look at me and his brain began to ferment…because he knew he should know me. For if I said, “Give her my love,” well then, it implies that I am known and he should know who I am. Therefore…the whole brain…I could see him, tormented…“What am I going to tell the Duchess, I don’t know this gentleman?” And I didn’t ease his pain whatsoever.292 ¶43

We came to the first floor, got off on the street level, I turned towards Madison and he turned towards Park. He was walking in the direction of Park while looking back at me, trying to figure out who is this gentleman…and running into people, almost crushing all these flowers because the crowds are coming towards him. He’s walking towards them but his face is looking at me. And I had the feeling…I said I should really whisper in his ear, “Go tell her the Lord Jesus Christ.” He would have died! But he was scared to death anyway by that time…but I should have told him, “Just tell her the Lord Jesus Christ.” She, too, would have fainted…because she thinks he died 2,000 years ago, and she doesn’t know that God himself came and comes into human history in the person of Jesus Christ…she know nothing of that.292 ¶44

I tell you, here is this one watching a little name, the name called the Duchess of Windsor…he was so taken away…carrying these things over to the Duchess. And he stood in the presence of one who has experienced everything said in scripture concerning the Lord Jesus Christ. But it didn’t have a title in the world of Caesar, and he was completely carried away with a little title “the Duchess” who pays for nothing. She goes into a millinery shop and she thinks she’s doing you a favor…takes all the hats and doesn’t pay for them. She goes to any place and she spends a day, a week or a month; and sometimes she has the audacity not only not to pay, she never pays, but to send you a bill because she graced your home!292 ¶45

So that was what he was completely enamored with, taking this little perfectly beautiful arrangement on a Bonsai. Undoubtedly, it didn’t come out of the Bonsai tree, but they were so arranged and so attached to it you thought they grew from it. But he was completely carried away…he was going to the place to give it to the Duchess of Windsor…and here is someone who lives on the back of society. And anything that lives on the back of another is a leech. A flea does that; a flea lives on the back of a dog. He will fall all over here and all, get off of the dog and fall, and then use the dog as his host for the rest of its earthly days, and the dog feeds the flea.292 ¶46

They do the same thing that the flea does. So Blake painted the “ghost of a flea.” Have you seen it? It’s human…everything is human in this world, because God is man. Here is this monstrous looking face, no neck, a head stuck on shoulders, and the ghost of the flea. He saw it and he painted it. There are fleas, human fleas, all over the world. You employ someone and do not give them their adequate return for their efforts, you are using them as a host and sucking their blood—you are the flea. You may have a million in the bank, but you are that flea that he saw in all this fabulous world of ours.292 ¶47

So I tell you, life is truly a race. But in spite of the horrors of it all when we come to the end of the race we won. For, we had no competition but that which we within ourselves conceived. There was no competition. We think there’s competition and we fight like mad from now to the end and suddenly we reach the end, and the signs of The End begin to appear, and we realize that I am he. How could God have any opponent? There is only God; there’s nothing but God. There was no God before me, I know not any. That’s what we are told: So, “I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior. Besides me there is no savior” . So call him Jesus, why?—because he will save his people from sin. So if you are calling him Jesus, you are calling him Jehovah, and if all of these things happen to Jesus and he’s Jehovah and the same things happen to you that are recorded in scripture as having happened to Jesus, then you are Jesus. “He,” being Jehovah, that’s who you are. And there is nothing but God…nothing in this world but God. And so, if you want to fight, fight. You’re only fighting shadows anyway. There’s nothing but yourself.292 ¶48

So when my wife said to Louise, “No, I will not take it!” and Louise was insistent, well, on this level, well, she knows how to do homework. So my friend Bill goes to New York City and he calls on Louise, she invites him to dinner, they have a lovely evening, and then in the course of the evening the picture is mentioned and he volunteers to bring it. So he brings it…tonight here is the portrait. As I say, I don’t know where my wife is going to put it. I haven’t the slightest concept where she’s going to put it in our house, but she will, she’ll find some place for it. It’s a lovely painting.292 ¶49

But it only demonstrates this persistent use of principle. You can be any being in this world that you want to be if you will take this simple principle and apply it daily. As she calls it, “I do my homework.” You cannot stop practicing even by a day; she does it every day of her life.292 ¶50

She needs an extra million as I need an extra head, but she’ll get the extra million because she works towards it. I was in her home here in Huntington Palisades when she by doing her homework she saw the house, sat in the room which is the dining room, and conducted the dinner party where I sat at her right and her husband at the end of the table, and my wife sat at his right, and then the two boys sat (her two sons). She conducted this dinner party in her Imagination when suddenly they offered her the house. It was offered at $117,500, and she said, “No, I’ll give you $75,000.” Her husband didn’t want it any more than I wanted it, but Louise always gets her way. I was there when he put the $7,500 down to seal the contract. They bought it, lived in it two years. She tires of everything and she goes on elsewhere.292 ¶51

That house has not been empty one day. The German Consul General moved in when they were still living in it, trying to get them out. Paid a frightfully high price for it on a three-year lease, renewed it for another three years…it’s never been empty. And when I left New York City, just the day before I left, he told me they offered him $120,000 for it. I said, “Joseph, sell it! You don’t need it. You paid $75,000 …don’t tell me you didn’t because I was there when you paid for it. So don’t give me any of this silliness about you paid a hundred thousand.” They all pull that line, you know. So I said, “Don’t tell me anything. I was there when you actually bought the house for 75,000. So they offered you 120,000 and in the interval you spent nothing on it and received this huge rental for six years? Sell it!” He said, “I think I will.”292 ¶52

So everything she touches by her homework simply balloons in money. But may I tell you as I’ve told you earlier, everything in this world will vanish as though it never happened, and the only thing that will survive is the history of Israel which is sacred history; there is no secular history in the Bible.292 ¶53

Now let us go into the Silence. * * *292 ¶54

Now are there any questions, please? No questions?292 ¶55

Well, if there aren’t any questions, may I also ask you for your name and address if you haven’t given it to us. We use these names and addresses only to notify you that we are here in the city and just where we are. We never solicit anything and never give the list to others that they may solicit. It is simply our list for one purpose only, to let you know when we are in the city and where we are lecturing.292 ¶56

We will be here in this lovely room to the end, the 17th of December, and we will be here re-opening on the 4th, I think it is, of January. Dr. Smith has been very kind and allowed me to use the place every Tuesday and Friday night. I personally like it, I hope you do. It’s convenient.292 ¶57

But I have been nine years at the Ebell, and, of course, many of us through habit we will find ourselves drifting over there to find I am not there. I know last week many went over and, of course, the boys who are on duty they didn’t know where I am, so they told them that I’m not there. But they couldn’t advise any direction or tell them where I actually went. So if you know of anyone who is not aware that I am here and I will be here every Tuesday and Friday, please tell them. I will take another ad this coming Saturday to let them know of the change of address, and keep on doing it once in a while until they become aware that I am here and not at the Ebell.292 ¶58

Now are there any questions?292 ¶59

Well, this is the evening…the race will be finished and you, regardless of what moment in temporal worlds you come in, you’re first. The only one who is running the race is Jesus Christ, and he is the first who rose from the dead, the first fruits of those that slept. And when you come in, you know by reason of the things that are happening in you that you are Jesus Christ; and because he is the first to rise, you are the first. There is nothing but Jesus Christ. So when the end comes and the little garment is taken off—in my own case, this—when it is taken off, it’s for the last time. No more…the race is over as far as I am concerned, but I want to share with you the joy even though it was a frightful race, fighting with myself. For in the end, I only fought with myself. Didn’t fight with anyone else; there was no one else. And so, as he said, “The time of my departure is come. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. And now there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness. Therefore, let no one bother me, for I bear on my body the marks of Jesus” . These events I have experienced, and so I bear on my body the marks of Jesus. As far as I am concerned, the race is over, and so, the so-called End I have arrived at it. No more births and no more deaths for me. I’ve entered a new creation, a completely new world…and everyone will…and everyone on entering it will be the first. There is only Jesus Christ. Thank you.292 ¶60