Salvation History

This is a question that is often asked. When I make the statement that it is God’s purpose to give himself to us, to all of us, as though there were no other in the world just you—because when God gives himself, it’s not you and God, you are God, well, how is that possible? That is the question that is constantly asked. How could the God who created this vast infinite universe and all within it, and sustains it, give himself to the individual…this little insignificant thing that is born in time and dies in time? How is it possible? Well, tonight I’ll make every effort to explain this mystery.411 ¶1

I will now imagine that I have with me a very devout Christian who knows his Bible, Old and New Testaments, and so I will simply ask him a few questions and imagine his answers if he knows scripture. So I must first say he knows his scripture and then ask him these questions. Do you believe in Jesus Christ? Well, as a devout Christian certainly he believes in Jesus Christ. “Do you speak of him as the Lord?” Yes, he would say, as the Lord. And then, he said, “I and my father are one,” and by father he meant the Creator of the universe. “Do you believe that?” Well, if he is a devout Christian and raised in the tradition, he would have to say yes to that. And “that when you see me, you have seen the Father?” He would have to say yes to that, for all these are parts of scripture and scripture cannot be broken. This is the Word of God and the Word of God is truth. So he would say yes to that.411 ¶2

And then he said that “No one could enter into the kingdom of heaven unless he be born from above.” Would you say that he is in heaven now? And to that, undoubtedly he would say yes. Well then, was he born from above? Well, his Word cannot be broken and if the only entrance into heaven is by birth from above, well then, he would have to be born from above. For in scripture he said he encountered David in the Spirit, and David in the Spirit called him “my Lord.” Do you recall that? If he knows scripture, he would have to say yes to that. Well, is it not said in scripture, and David said, “I will tell of the decree of the Lord: He said to me, ‘You are my son, today I have begotten you.’” And so, he called him “my Lord,” and my Lord called him “my son,” in the 2nd Psalm . Therefore, although he said, “my Lord,” he really said “my Father,” because he said “Thou art my son,” and therefore if David is his son by decree of the 2nd Psalm, and then he called him “my Lord,” he’s calling him “my Father,” is he not? He would have to say yes to that.411 ¶3

Then, if I said to him, is it not said in scripture that unlike all the sacrifices that men make year after year without any changes of consciousness, and they make all the sacrifices but it doesn’t change the conscience of man…but this one makes a supreme sacrifice and his sacrifice, when made, split the entire curtain of the temple, which was his own body, from top to bottom and the took into the Holy of Holies his own blood, would you say yes to that? Well, it’s in scripture in the 10th chapter of Hebrews . You read it in the very end of all the gospels, where from the top to the bottom the curtain was split. But the 10th of Hebrews tells you that curtain was his body…and he took with him into the Holy of Holies his own blood and not the blood of an ox or a lamb or something other than himself. Yes. Now, did not the Holy Spirit—he is the Holy Spirit himself—descend upon him in the form of a dove and remain upon him? Yes. Well, this is all part of the history of Jesus Christ, is it not? A man’s history is made up of the events that he has experienced. That’s a man’s history. If he hasn’t experienced it, it is all hearsay. But all that I have just said to you and asked you and I got your affirmative answers, then this constitutes the history of Jesus Christ, and you say he is the Lord.411 ¶4

Now let me say that only when this history which is salvation history invades time do we really know the meaning of life in time. Here is salvation history and it invades time. It invades you walking in time, and you are born, and you die. You’re restored to life to die, restored to life to die, restored to life to die, and it goes on forever until this divine history of salvation invades time and then this history becomes your history. It’s your autobiography.411 ¶5

Well, if this is the history of the Lord and then it becomes your history, are you not the Lord? So here is an eternal history, the history of salvation. And it’s finished, it’s all over. The only history that’s continuing is human history; and it’s still the same violence in the world of death, for all things in time begin and end. They all die. They appear, they wax, they wane and they disappear. As Hamlet’s mother said to him—you read it in the very first act, I think it’s the second scene—“All that lives must die… passing through nature to eternity.” But she didn’t console him. The father was murdered and he suspected that she was the party and not the only one in the act of murdering his father. But she, to console him, said, “All that lives must die… passing through nature”—this is the world of nature—“to eternity”…but not until the salvation history, the history of salvation invades time and possesses the individual. Not collectively…it doesn’t possess humanity. It comes in and possesses the individual, and the individual experiences these and they are his own experience, and this is salvation history belonging only to eternity. So he is taken up from Time in which it is eternal death into eternity by the experience of the history of salvation. So that’s how God becomes man that man may become God.411 ¶6

So this individual will say to you, “Did you ask me all these questions to test my knowledge of scripture?” No, I trusted you implicitly. I believe that you are a devout Christian and that you actually know your scripture. I didn’t ask these questions of you to test your knowledge of scripture. I was just seeking another witness to two other witnesses. For I have the scripture and the scripture is an external witness; my internal experience is another witness, and now you confirm this history. Well, it happens to be my autobiography, therefore, who am I? I’ve been seeking who I am, and having had the scripture unfold within me and that scripture is salvation history, and it becomes my own personal life, well then, who am I? “And this is life eternal, to know thee the only true God” . So if I have found him in this manner and found him not as another but as myself, though I still walk the earth limited as I must continue to be limited until the very end when it is taken off, I know at the end of taking this off I am my history, and my history is the history of the Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, as told in scripture, “There’s only one body, one Spirit, one Lord, one God and Father of all” . Well, having experienced the only history of salvation, I am that one body, that one Spirit, that one Lord, that one God and Father of all.411 ¶7

But although it’s unique in my case, it’s not exclusive: All will receive this invasion of this history of salvation. So as it comes in and possesses the individual, that individual’s time in the world of death has come to an end. That’s how God gives himself to man that man may become God. Although there are billions of us in the world, what does it matter? Everyone will have this invasion. We will be invaded by a history and it will possess him, and it will become his own personal experience. Well, if I can say I have experienced all these things that are now recorded in scripture as the experiences of the central figure called Jesus Christ, well then, let us go back to see was it believed.411 ¶8

No, it wasn’t believed then because they knew him. Isn’t he the carpenter’s son? Isn’t he Mary’s son? Don’t we know his brothers and his sisters and they are with us today? And how can he come claiming that he came down from heaven? How can he claim that the presence called God is his Father and goes beyond that to claim that I and my Father are one? Because salvation history possessed the individual! So here, he inspired the prophets and came in to fulfill his own prophecy; for the Old Testament is simply a prophetic book of all that must take place in order for man to be redeemed. Then comes the New Testament which is the story of redemption and this is how it takes place in the world.411 ¶9

So here, if someone would say to you, “How on earth could infinite being give itself to a finite man?” By man I mean generic man, male-female. How could he? Well, then you can tell him that there is such a thing as the history of salvation, the history of redemption. It’s spelled out for us in the New Testament in the story of the life of Jesus Christ. He had an unnatural birth…it was a peculiar, unnatural birth, a birth from above. And then, this same one encountered the one of whom the Lord said, “Thou art my son, today I have begotten thee” and established a son. Therefore, by establishing a son, he establishes fatherhood. Without a son there is no father. If there’s a father, there must be a son, so the son is established and it is David. And then you go through the entire series of these major events in the life of the one who personifies the history of salvation. And then, you tell the story…the most incredible story in the world. But I ask you to believe it, for I know from my own personal experience it is true. I’ve experienced it.411 ¶10

Believe it. It will not only become possible and thinkable but really likely in the not distant future. For no one is telling it in this form today, and as scripture tells us, “No one comes unto me save my Father calls him.” So no one gravitates here who is not on the verge of it, no one.411 ¶11

In the 6th chapter of John, those who heard it and could not accept it, they departed never to walk with him again. He said, “Alright, but you can’t follow me if my Father isn’t calling you.” There are things yet to be experienced in the world of time, more horrors, because the world of time is the world of horror, the world of death, the world of disappointment. The most loving couple in the world must, you don’t have to dwell upon it, but if they have a brain in their heads they must know it is inevitable that one will depart and leave the other…unless they go together…that all unions in the world must separate through the gate called death. So the most loving couple or relationship—father to son or mother to son or to daughter—they must come to parting through the gate called death; therefore, no matter how marvelous it is, it dissolves.411 ¶12

We are now watching the complete dissolution of the British Empire. For 300 years it ruled the world. The sun never set on the Empire, never. When it rose here and setting elsewhere, it was always on some part of the British Empire. Now it’s only little tiny England, the size of New York state. We are living in the day of the complete dissolution of the British Empire. It dissolved right before our eyes. They were so proud for 300 years and their contributions in literature and law will still last and last and last. But even it will simply have its day. We today in our might, this enormous power that is America, well now, we feel that because of vastness of the continent it couldn’t happen to us. I’ll prophesy for you: it will happen to us. It will happen to Russia, it will happen to China, it’ll happen to every land in the world. For this is the world of death…not only individuals, but families and traditions and all kinds of things. All things die in this world. And the only solution is God’s plan that was in eternity.411 ¶13

Now let me speak of this eternal state. Don’t think of eternity as duration. It has little to do with duration. It is qualitative rather than quantitative. It is not adding unto…it describes not so much the length of life as the kind of life that it is: It’s a creative life where you are God when you enter eternity. Here all things, no matter how you build it up, it’s going to come to an end. Today there are people in our world, right here in our country, individuals with assets in excess of two billion dollars. I’m not speaking of corporations. I’m speaking of individuals with assets in excess of two billion. And one, at the age of seventy-six, is still trying to increase it. The other at the age of fifty-six or fifty-eight is still trying to increase it. They can’t buy happiness with all the billions that they have. In the not distant future, as things move, they’ll all depart and leave it all behind to be wasted by those who didn’t earn it. It is inevitable…it happens all over the world. They can’t stop it; they can’t take it with them. They’ve been trying that forever…to find some way of taking it with them and so far they haven’t found it out. They can’t do it.411 ¶14

So here, in this world of ours, all things begin and end. But there is no death even though it appears to be death. They are restored instantly just as they were only younger. At death, as we see it, they are not dead to themselves; it’s only to us who see them depart and can’t follow. But to themselves they are not dead; they are restored to life, same body only new, nothing missing, new and young. It’s young and new and not one little part is missing. They go on and they get older where they are, and they depart. To those who are left behind they seem to be dead—again to be restored and again unaccountably new in a world just like this, terrestrial, in a body same as before, and they go on and on and on. That’s not being born again; that’s being restored and restored. But the birth from above is something entirely different and it happens and you cannot deny it when it happens to you. Then comes the sign of the birth, and that sign is the little infant wrapped in swaddling clothes as told in scripture .411 ¶15

So the story of how God this infinite being can give himself to me this tiny little thing…well, he does it by putting into time, where I exist, his story of salvation. The story of salvation invades me and possesses me; then it unfolds itself in me and it becomes my history, my autobiography. So you read it in the Bible of another. It’s no “other”…after that it’s your own story, for this is exactly what happened to me. “But isn’t he the butcher’s son?” for my father had a butcher shop. Isn’t he the butcher’s son? Isn’t he the carpenter’s son? Isn’t he the grocery man’s son?—for my father was a grocer. No matter how he expanded in this world in business, he still began with a meat shop. So, you can tell anyone in the world if they ask that question of you, as this lady asked of me, “How on earth is it possible?” Well, it’s the most incredible story in the world. How could God become man that man may become God? Well, he only becomes man by invading man with his history, for this is the history of God as described in the story and that is God’s personal history. It’s contained in eternity…eternity has neither beginning nor end; therefore it is something that is forever. It is ever taking place. It should be written in the imperative passive mood by saying “Thy will must be being done”—something to be done absolutely and continuously, the imperative passive mood.411 ¶16

So, because it is eternal, it is actually something to be done absolutely and continuously. And who knows who this night will be possessed by this invasion of the history of salvation? It comes like thief in the night, out of the blue, and you’re possessed. You find yourself waking from a long, long sleep and you find yourself being born from above. You find the symbol of your birth in the form of a little child wrapped in swaddling clothes. You find the evidence there and witnesses to it. Even to them it seems incredible. You hold the evidence in your hand which is the child. Well, if the child is placed in the hands of one called Mary, well then, who is Mary? Didn’t you hold it? And if the one that it symbolizes is the Savior and the only Savior in scripture is the Lord God Jehovah, as told us in the 43rd and the 45th chapters of Isaiah: “I am the Lord thy God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior” ; “And beside me there is no Savior” . So the words Jesus and Jehovah are the same in meaning. So who was born? God was born and this is the manner in which he is born and this is his history. So he comes down to earth invading time, for we are in time, and lifts us out of time into eternity, leaving us here for a while where the glory that is ours is hidden by the garments that we wear, to tell it until that moment in time when we depart for the last time and never to return to this.411 ¶17

But, not to gloat! Because there’s only one and so everyone that comes up is the same one: It is only God redeeming himself. So in the end it’s only God. When we are told there’s only one body, one Spirit, one Lord, and one God and Father of all , you are that one body, one Spirit, one Lord, one God and Father of all. The wisdom that possesses you when you completely take off the veil will be the one that created the whole vast universe. And this dream will prove to be really a blessing…the horror of it all. So we came into the world for a purpose, a divine purpose, and all enter this world. As you’re told, if we didn’t enter it willingly at least we enter it. And all will be lifted out of it, redeemed by the history of salvation.411 ¶18

Believe it! It’s the most glorious story! But man couldn’t imagine it. First of all, it’s incredible…to him it doesn’t make sense. So the story is told to the world; they hear it and they’ll go along believing it in a strange way. So when you tell it from this angle, few will listen; and even the few who do listen, from that few many will depart, because they can’t see it. Don’t expect them to, really. Just tell it and leave it. It’s a little seed. They will toy with it, dwell upon it, and maybe they will begin to come closer and closer to it. Because God has put into the heart of man eternity, and then he has put into man a thirst that only eternity can satisfy. So he puts eternity into the heart of man and then a thirst for that eternity, and only eternity can satisfy that thirst. So “God will send a hunger, a famine, upon the world; it will not be a famine for bread, nor a thirst for water, but for the hearing of the word of God” .411 ¶19

So you start to tell the word of God and they aren’t interested. “Turn it off! Let’s get a little jazz music here instead,” and so they turn on a little jazz music and turn off the word of God. You go into a home, try to find a Bible…and if there is a Bible, is it read? If it is read, is it understood? So at confirmation you might give a Bible and there it remains a closed book from then on. It’s not read and if read certainly not with understanding. So there is the closed book. And when you start to discuss the Bible, the first thing they tell you is don’t discuss religion or politics. These things you must not discuss. Even in the barber shop it’s not religion…it may be politics if they know who you are. When he starts cutting your hair and he knows who you are and what side of the street, he will discuss it in your favor. Right behind you he’s going to get on the other fella’s side, and he gets all opinions, but he doesn’t get religion. That’s the one thing he shies from completely. It’s not discussed. But the day will come, he will send upon you…well, when he sends upon the world, the land, you are the land—Adam means “red earth.” He will send upon you a hunger, a thirst, and it will not be a hunger for bread or a thirst for water, but for the hearing of the word of God. Then, not a thing in this world can satisfy that hunger but an experience of God. To have an experience of God, you get an invasion of the history of salvation; it comes in and possesses you.411 ¶20

Then you become the story; everything said in scripture you fulfill. So you’re told in scripture, “I have come to fulfill scripture; and beginning with Moses and the law and the prophets and the psalms, he interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself” . And so, he takes the whole book and only things concerning himself. I receive a letter in the morning…not every word is significant, but throughout the letter there are significant points. I extract that which has meaning. And there are many points that you have to use like a scaffolding to build, but you don’t give significance to that which is the scaffolding. So you write a letter…well, the whole Bible is like that letter…not everything has significance…but there are moments. Here is meaning, there’s meaning here, meaning here…what is he trying to say? So he points out the meaning of scripture, using the law of Moses and the prophets and the psalms, and he interpreted in all the scriptures the things concerning himself: “For in the volume of the book it was all about me,” in the 40th Psalm . The whole book is all about me.411 ¶21

Well, we read it and think it refers to Jesus Christ…and it does…but we do not know who he is. Yet we are told in scripture “Jesus Christ is in you” . Well, one day the contact is made, that invasion is made, and then he rises in us. All that is said of him in scripture is now being experienced in the individual, and he is the book, so he has fulfilled scripture. So the whole vast book comes to an end on what note?—the very end, the 22nd chapter of Revelation, “Come, Lord Jesus” . Of course the last verse is only a benediction, “The grace of the Lord Jesus be with you.” But the actual climax is the 20th verse where it is said, “Come, Lord Jesus”…come, invade me, invade me, possess me and unfold this history of salvation within me, that I and you will not be two any more but one . I’m not watching you on the outside, I’ve become the being. Though I walk the earth with all the weaknesses, all the limitations of the flesh, I nevertheless have fulfilled scripture. So this is the unfolding of scripture in the individual.411 ¶22

You take it to heart. When you go out, you dwell upon it. I tell you it is the only salvation in the world. Tonight, thousands, tens of thousands, will die—either violently if they are in war or in accidents, or naturally—to find themselves instantly restored to life. Haven’t died at all…only to those who saw them go…in a world that is terrestrial just like this. In bodies physical just like this, same body as before only now new and wonderful and nothing missing. They will love each other, and may I tell you, they marry, just like this. It’s the same world. Yes, they marry.411 ¶23

Read it carefully in the Bible: Did not Moses say that if a man marries, leaves no offspring, and then he dies, his brother should take her to wife and raise up a family for his brother. Well, there were seven brothers. The first one married and died…no offspring. The second took her, he died, no offspring. The third took her…they all took her and left no offspring. Now, whose wife is she in the resurrection? And he answered, “You do not know scripture” —“For in this age they marry and they are given in marriage; but those who are accounted worthy to attain that age, the age of the resurrection, they neither marry nor are they given in marriage, for they can die no more, for they are now sons of the resurrection, sons of God” . And the son of God is one with God. Father and Son are one.411 ¶24

So after they are resurrected from this state of death, they die no more; therefore, they marry no more. But until then, they do exactly what they are doing here—they fall in love, and they marry, and they move through the world just like this, and they get old and depart. You have the same phoniness there that we have here. They have cemeteries there making money for people—burying things that do not die—as we do here. If you and I knew and got in on the ground floor of Forest Lawn, we could sit back today and just clip coupons, playing on the gullibility of people, because no one who dies goes there. You might just as well take this suit of clothes that I am wearing now and when it wears out go to Forest Lawn and say, “Give me a plot to bury it”…just the same thing. Because this little garment of flesh and blood is the garment that I wear as I wear this on it. And, why…I’m not going to buy a little plot to put the suit in, so why buy the plot to put the little garment in? But it goes on here and it goes on there, the same phoniness, all making a quick dollar. And they make a quick dollar here, too, and play the same part all over and over.411 ¶25

Well, wouldn’t that be the most horrible thing in the world if it went on forever! No, God in his infinite mercy invades time and redeems man. He steps beyond and redeems man in the one body, the body of the Lord Jesus Christ. So everyone is redeemed in one body and so in the end there is only one body, and that one body is the Lord Jesus Christ, and the Lord Jesus Christ is Jehovah. There is no being other than Jehovah that is the Lord, so all are redeemed eventually.411 ¶26

So believe me, I am speaking from experience; I am not theorizing, I’m not here speculating. Let the whole vast world speculate as to what man is going to be. They’re trying to make him a better man. I tell you, alright be a better man for the little while if it makes you feel better. You find all kinds of things in the world—diets to make you healthier, diets to make you prettier, diets to do this—well, if you really want to be that go on the diets and become as foolish as the others…because they all die anyway.411 ¶27

They were going to bury my father for years and years because he drank heavily. He lived to be eighty-five. He and Churchill were pals. When Churchill came home, the one person he wanted was my father. They both had a good, wonderful thirst. Churchill lived to be ninety, my father lived to be eighty-five, and all the doctors who were going to bury him they died on the way. My father delighted in going to funerals…went to them all…saw them all going into the little ground, while he drank heartily. Wasn’t a very heavy eater but a very virile, vital person…hadn’t a thing to do with his drinking. Now today they have all of these things…you mustn’t do this, you mustn’t do that, mustn’t do the other. I think Churchill was smoking a cigar when he died…just about twenty a day…at the age of ninety. He might have gone a little senile, but time will do that. It wasn’t his cigars and it wasn’t his Scotch…it was simply time. At the age of ninety who shouldn’t be a little bit senile.411 ¶28

And so the memory slips. I’ve seen people in their forties with memory slipping; they hit sixty and all of a sudden they can’t remember. My brother who died at the age of sixty-three was a doctor, and when I went home a couple of years ago just before he made his exit, he said, “Neville, how is your memory?” I said, fine, for the things I want to remember. He said, “Like what?” I said, the Bible, poetry. Poetry is my passion, the Bible is my passion, but the trivia that you see in the papers…I couldn’t tell you what the headline was this morning yet I read this morning’s paper. I couldn’t tell you anything in it. It is simply the same paper reprinted differently over and over and over. So I read it every morning, but I couldn’t tell you anything. But the Bible…I read the Bible this day…I spent five, maybe six hours in the Bible, and a couple of hours in poetry. These things I remember. And he said, “Well, that’s where I’m failing, I’m failing, I can’t remember. Things are slipping from me.” One thing he could remember, he’s a doctor, all things concerning the human body. Ask him anything concerning the body instantly it all came back…the remedy for the thing that he would suggest if you had this or that or the other, instantly. So my brother was, up to the very last, alert concerning what interested him, which was the human body. But he faded and at sixty-two he made his exit from this world.411 ¶29

And yet, his father who drank heavily—and he was the one who warned him he should never drink any more—and Daddy kept on doing it. One day he said to me, “You know, your mother would give anything to see this day. I’ve given up drinking.” I said, “You have, Daddy?” “Yes.” So I told my brother Victor, Daddy has given up drinking. He said, “When, this morning?” And it was…he didn’t have it before breakfast. So he gave it up. Daddy said, “Your Mother would have loved to see this day” when he didn’t start the day with a good, big shot…that’s what he meant…giving up drinking. But he kept on going, this virile, wonderful, strapping man. So it hasn’t a thing to do…as the Bible teaches, if your drinking is going to offend someone, to offend them in their presence, well then, don’t, just stop it, don’t offend them. But don’t because of their offense stop it yourself if you have any pleasure in it. For you’re told in scripture, “I know, and I am persuaded by the Lord Christ Jesus, that there is nothing unclean in itself; but to anyone to whom it is unclean, to him it is unclean.” And so, that is scripture, the 14th chapter, the 14 verse of Romans.411 ¶30

And so I tell you, be as free as the wind, live nobly, live in your Imagination. Dwell only in your Imagination on all the lovely things in the world, for yourself and for others. For you’re going to find, eventually, there is no “other.” There seem to be others now as you look out on the world, there seem to be so many. I will tell you, there is really no other; there is only yourself and that self is God. You’re going to prove it. And yet without loss of identity all will be that one God, the one who created the whole vast world and sustains it.411 ¶31

Therefore, in the end no matter what you’ve done…and may I tell you, without God’s infinite mercy, you couldn’t live with the memory of things you have done. For you didn’t begin a few years ago when you came here; you’ve been traveling for unnumbered, unnumbered years, centuries. You’ve done all the violent, horrible things in the world; and God in his infinite mercy has you lose the memory of your past, or you couldn’t live with yourself. In the end when he invades you with his eternal history of salvation, all your past is completely wiped out as though it never was, completely wiped out. So this is for a purpose and whatever you’ve done is completely gone, and you are completely redeemed with no memory of the horror that is this world of time. This is time, where all things begin and end; and heaven is eternity, it has no beginning or end, it just is. So the history of salvation wasn’t composed by God, it was always so. It was always his plan to insert it into time and redeem humanity.411 ¶32

Now let us go into the silence.411 ¶33

Until Friday…thank you.411 ¶38

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Summary Article Name Neville Goddard Lectures: “Salvation History Invades Time” Description But don’t try to do anything to yourself. Just live the most normal wonderful life. What greater relationship in this world is there than between man and woman! You might find either in the man or the woman hell or you may find heaven. I had the good fortune to find both. Luckily, my second one was heaven and not reversed. So I had the good fortune to find in the second attempt at this greatest relationship in the world, which is man and woman, I found happiness. But in my first, well, she might have found a devil too, I don’t know. But it was certainly everything but heaven. I still would not undo it. It was part of the experience of living in the world of death…and this is it.411 ¶40