Nature God Revealed Us

It is in us as persons that the nature of God is revealed. A scriptural episode is not a record of an historical event but a parabolic revelation of truth. To see Jesus or David as an historical character is to see truth tempered to the weakness of our souls. The minute you see them as characters in history you are not seeing what they represent. We’ll take any episode of scripture, but any, and show you where it unfolds within you. The title of the 54th Psalm is “And David is in hiding within us.” The King James Version translates it “And David is hiding with us”; the Revised Standard Version translates it “And David is in hiding among us.” But the word is within us…that’s where he’s hiding. That is where every character is hiding. So when we say that “All that you behold, though it appears without, it is within, in your Imagination, of which this world of mortality is but a shadow” , I mean that literally, the whole vast drama unfolds within us. So Jesus, David, Abraham, Moses, all are but personifications of these eternal states. We encounter them as we are moving towards the ultimate which is the awakening of God in us.727 ¶1

If the poet Browning had not experienced this, he never could have written the poem Saul, or the one on Paracelus for that matter. But in Saul he tells a story in the 16th chapter of the Book of 1st Samuel that David cured Saul of the evil spirit which had come upon him sent from the Lord. Well, we see right away who Saul is, if we know scripture. Saul represents humanity, the human being as described in the 4th chapter of the Book of Daniel: And the watcher said, “Hew down the tree and cut off the branches, strip its leaves, and scatter its fruit. But leave the stump” . And now it turns from a tree into a person, “Let him be watered with the dew from heaven, and let him move with the beasts of the earth” . Let him now be taken from the human state: “Take from him the mind of man and give him the mind of a beast; and let seven times pass over him until he knows that the Most High rules the kingdom of men, and gives it to whom he will, even to the lowliest among men.” So here we have not the mind of man but the mind of a beast…and that was Saul. Saul went insane…did not remember who he was and was violent. David cured him of his insanity and then David tells him of the coming of Messiah.727 ¶2

David said to Saul, “O Saul, it shall be a face like my face that receives thee, a man like unto me thou shalt love and be loved by forever. A hand like this hand shall open the gates of new life unto thee; see the Christ stand” . He’s standing before him. Now, you think this is an episode in the pages of history. No. This is a drama that takes place in man, this insane being looking for an external savior as man does, and one day this that never walked the face of the earth…but he knows for all revelation has the mood of certainty about it…there is no uncertainty in revelation. Then David stands before you, and you who one moment before were insane in a way…for you didn’t know who you were and that’s certainly a form of insanity, a man who doesn’t know who he is, a form of amnesia any way. So Saul did not know. And suddenly that which had no flesh and blood stands before him as a being of flesh and blood and speaks to him and he to this being. And he now sees the real relationship and the revelation as to who he is. But now, who is he? He is no longer Saul. Saul has been turned into Paul. For the name was changed from Saul into Paul.727 ¶3

Paul now makes the statement, “Henceforth we regard no one from the human point of view; even though we once regarded Christ from a human point of view, we regard him thus no longer” . For, he was trained in the belief of an external historical past of Israel, and to him David was the king of kings. And now, as God reveals his son in him…as he said, “It pleased God to reveal his son in me and now I do not discuss it with flesh and blood.” What man believing as he formerly believed could understand what he is talking about, when he himself knew that he tormented anyone who did not accept the historicity of the revelation of the Old Testament? Now he can no longer believe in any historical character of either Old…and there was no New, the New was not yet written…but they’re discussing a Messiah and now he knows who Messiah really is. Now he knows who the Lord Jesus really is. So now he sees the Lord…that is, not what the world believes to be Jesus…but he sees himself as that Lord and what the world believes to be Jesus. But he sees himself as that Lord…and what the world believes to be a man who was a mighty king is his son, his begotten son . And it wasn’t flesh and blood at all, for this happened in the Spirit. And “When it pleased God to reveal his son in me, I discussed it not with flesh and blood” .727 ¶4

So here, to see Jesus or Abraham or Moses or Jacob or any of the characters as flesh and blood external to yourself in the pages of history is to see truth tempered to the weakness of your soul. Because most of us until the revelation takes place are unable, ordinarily we are, to stand the force of that light of revelation. There is nothing more difficult in the world than to give up a fixed idea, especially concerning religion or politics. You are born into a certain religious group and you do not know why you are born there. You are taught it as your mother taught it, and then you go to a school and they confirm what your mother said, that these are fixed characters who lived in time and space and who left behind them a record of their physical existence…and it isn’t so at all. These are all revelations of an eternal drama that is in man and man’s real being is his own wonderful human Imagination.727 ¶5

So they say, “But don’t you believe, Neville, that there was a man called Jesus?” That’s the one thing I get from my family in Barbados, “But you do believe that, don’t you?” I said, “Are you putting words in my mouth? No. I do not.” I did believe it, may I tell you. I formerly believed it as you now believe it. I can no longer believe in the historicity of any character of scripture, for I encountered them as states, personified yes. But the last one which is Jesus Christ himself, he comes right out of your very being and you are that state. When you are brought to the very end of the road, you yourself are Jesus. Well then, who is the Christ? Surely he is…no, the son is the anointed, the one who was anointed with the oil of gladness above his fellow men. Well, who is he?—that is David. David in the Spirit calls him “my Father.” That is scripture and not in the flesh, for time if you take it chronologically separated these two events by 1,000 years. Yet you find the whole thing is contemporary, it is not something of the past; that God is contemporaneous with us. Now, this very moment he is my very being, my reality, and that is Jesus, that is the Lord. But if he is a father, as we are told in scripture, “Holy Father, keep them in thy name, that thou hast give unto me; that they may be one, even as we are one” , it’s interchangeable, the father-son relationship, they are one. At one moment in scripture as you read it he is speaking as the son; another moment in the same chapter he is speaking as the father. Then he jumps back without giving any warning to that of the son. And man is confused…they think it’s simply one being of flesh and blood. It’s an inter-relationship of father-son, they are one.727 ¶6

A lady who is here tonight wrote me this letter this week. She said, “In my vision I saw a table and at the table sat a man and his son, a young son, and I knew without uncertainty I was that son”—now this is a lady speaking—“that I was that son and I was that father. I also knew that that father and son were one, and I was that one.” Now, the same lady in another vision of the same period said, “A friend of mine” (who is here tonight) “Louise Roach in the vision called to me in a very loud voice and told me that I was pregnant, bringing forth the Son of God.” She said, “At the moment I was embarrassed, because a huge crowd was present and she is proclaiming my pregnancy bringing forth the Son of God.” Well, she is bringing forth the Son of God, and who brings forth the Son of God but God. “Born not of blood nor or the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God” . So she is that being who is the Jesus of scripture bringing forth God.727 ¶7

And because God is a father as we just heard, “Holy Father, keep them in thy name, which thou hast given me” . So the last gift of God to man is himself; and if he’s God the Father and gives himself to me then he gave me his Son. He sent his Son into me calling “Father.” He sent the spirit of his Son into my heart crying “Father” . Well, if he calls me Father, then I am God the Father. And if God the Father is the Lord Jesus, then that Christ is simply the anointed one, and the one he anointed was David: “Thou art my son, today I have begotten thee” .727 ¶8

Now this, I tell you, is a great shock. It’s a frightful shock to those of us who were raised in the Christian faith. It’s also a shock to those who were raised in the Jewish faith, for there’s no more historicity of the characters of the Old Testament than there is of the characters of the New. These are the eternal states through which man passes from darkness to light, and when he comes to the end he is that state personified, and that state is himself, and it’s God the Father. So David is in hiding within us. Now who told him this? We are told it is the Ziphites. Well, the Ziphite in scripture is of the tribe of Judah. If you read the genealogy, the only son of Jacob mentioned in the genealogy is Judah. So this now brings it to David. David now has been notified that Saul has been notified that he is hiding within us. Now the insane man can’t follow this. If he’s hiding within you, where do I look for him? Wait and he’ll come out. At a moment in time there is an explosion, a real explosion; and it is that that releases David who is hiding within you. For, this is told to Saul.727 ¶9

And we are the insane of Daniel. We are the ones…look at the world today…if we aren’t insane when we murder each other. Look at what is taking place in the world. Getting the better of the seeming other and there is no other. For the prayer is that they be one as we are one, and yet we don’t realize that we are one. Not a thing in this world can bring you to that realization but the revelation of the Son to the Father. For when you tell me, as this lady has told me in her adumbration, that she had been seen by one who is here all the time as being pregnant, bringing forth the Son of God, I know she is. I also know you are! You may not be as near to the actual birth, but you are bringing forth the Son of God.727 ¶10

Three other ladies in this audience tonight…and one wrote me this. She is sleeping on a little, I would say, couch in the home of a friend…in other words away from her own home. And there she sees a babe and the babe…there’s a blanket there. At the moment that she’s about to pick the babe up, this little infant and it’s a boy, the door raps…someone is knocking at the door. So she answers the door, holding the new child in her arms to her chest. When the door is opened it’s her daughter who is there, and she’s embarrassed that this little child is in the nude, because she has a friend with her. She says, “Mother, put something on your baby”—she called it “your” baby—“because there is someone here.” Well, it was a friend of the mother’s, too, that she met about a year ago. So the man came in and patted the infant on its back and said, “What a beautiful, wonderful looking babe that you have there.” Then she went back and began to cover the baby with a blanket, with the swaddling cloth, when she woke. That’s a wonderful adumbration, a forecasting of the event. Then she will know what the real event as recorded in scripture truly is concerning the birth of God.727 ¶11

Then another one…it was her sister’s child, and she took the child up, and the child fell for a moment. She picked it up; it wasn’t injured, just a little scratched. But it was this lovely boy. And then she realized her sister said, “Give me back the child” and “the child’s face turned into that of a cherub, from the little infant into the actual face of a cherub and smiled at me. Then I said, ‘I cannot give this back, it is mine’” and with that she held it knowing the child was really hers. Now that is an adumbration…all these are foreshadowings.727 ¶12

Now, these ladies who wrote me these letters are mothers, they have their own children. The last one has five children; one has two. One speaks of a child “her daughter” was at the door. How many others? At least she is a mother…all these are people who have the physical children here. But this is a spiritual child. The whole Bible from beginning to end is a supernatural document where man treats it as an historical fact, and it isn’t. So to see Jesus…and I don’t care who you are, whether you be the highest in the Christian faith today, the head of all the bodies on earth, and you believe that Jesus is an historical character, it’s because you have not yet the strength to see the brilliant light of the revelation of truth, you can’t stand it. I know when it came to me I can’t tell you how the things fell within me.727 ¶13

But we are told, all the buildings will fall in the end, and these structures are the structures of the mind by which we live. The belief in the historicity of Jesus is a structure; the belief in the historicity of the Bible is a structure. You see all these buildings, aren’t they beautiful! You see them externalized as churches, cathedrals of the world. Now they will all fall…in the last days they will all fall, and you will have that experience. You will see all these buildings within you actually fall. Then from the ashes of these buildings will rise that which is permanent, for now you are not living by any external object in the world. It’s all within you and everything has to be unfolded within you.727 ¶14

When you are told that he went into the garden and here he said, “I will give you a sign” and he gave him a sign as to which one is the secret, and he said, “I will kiss him.” So he comes in and goes right up to one and kisses him, and then departs. You are told that in the 14th chapter of the Book of Mark. When you read it you think here is an episode, a record of some historical past. It isn’t, it is actually something you’re going to experience, and you’ll see how this whole drama is now, it’s contemporaneous with us now…for I have had that experience. I am teaching the Word of God and telling them of the experiences that I have had, therefore, I am the Word that went out. I sent it out from myself, clothed myself in flesh, so the Word became flesh and dwelt within me, and all that it implied unfolded within me. As I am telling this now one departs. No sooner had he departed than I knew he is revealing what I am teaching. Then one enters. Well, the one who enters fulfills the 14th of Mark, “This is a sign that I give you…the one I kiss” . Do not hurt him, treat him kindly, but don’t let him go. If this is the truth, don’t let the truth go, for this is the truth I’m going to kiss. So he comes in and kisses me, and then extends his arms in adoration like a cross. Well, the word Judah is simply “to pray with extended arm.” And it was he who kissed me, who then embraced me, severed the sleeve and revealed the arm of the Lord fulfilling scripture. “And who has believed our report and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?” . Well, now it was revealed.727 ¶15

This is simply the symbol of power, the creative power of God, that’s all. But it is so all-together beautiful in imagery, and the image is all perfect because you fulfill it in its perfect symbolism. So here was the man, this beautiful being about forty, gloriously dressed, and he did everything scripture tells you he would do when he comes and kisses the one who has the secret. That’s the one who has the secret…hold him and treat him gently; do not let him go but let everything else go. All that you formerly believed let it go, but don’t let that go. That is the word of truth, and these are the words of scripture. I can’t tell anyone prior to the actual experience what a blow it is to one who has to give up, or at least struggle to give up, his belief in the historicity of scripture.727 ¶16

When I first came here back in 1945, I was invited to come out and tell my story of the Bible. The head of the organization—I won’t mention his name and you know the organization, there are maybe 100 across the country now. They’ve grown quite rapidly and they’re quite successful in their numbers. The very first night that I arrived I’m going to address all of his graduates, and there were about, I dare say, four to five hundred of them. He didn’t give me one minute…I’m taking the platform right away because I’m late, the plane was late. But I was taken to a late dinner party, and so I couldn’t arrive there until about five minutes before eight, and I’m supposed to be on the platform at eight. He takes me aside and in that little short interval of time he tells me I must not speak on the non-historicity of the Bible to his people, because he believes in the historicity and teaches it and I must not in any way disturb his people. I thanked him. I said, I’m your guest tonight so I will abide by your decision, but beginning tomorrow when I’m speaking, don’t tell me what to say. No one can tell me what to say! Again, I’m quoting scripture, “Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you rather than to God, you must judge.” For I cannot but speak of what I have seen and heard, and I know it is not historically true—it is truer than that, it’s eternally true. And these records are forever, and one day you will experience it. Even though you call yourself the dean of this institute, not in my eyes are you any dean concerning the Word of God, because you do not know it. Then I had to take the platform and go on, and naturally change what I had to say, and speak to them on an entirely different level. I couldn’t that night as his guest speak on the truth as I had experienced it. For at least I had experienced it based upon its law, but I was getting glimpses of it, that it was not historically sound, that this episode recorded in scripture was not a record of some historical fact; it was something entirely different. It was simply a revelation of truth, which would stun the man if he had the strength to stand it.727 ¶17

But, may I tell you, when it happens to you, when you actually experience it, it’s perfectly all right and there is no uncertainty, none. There may be a little uncertainty up unto the moment of experiencing the truth, because you will hear it from one you trust and you would like to believe all that he tells you. Certain things seem a little bit too much and you take it under consideration. But when it happens to you everything goes out, because you know now it is the truth. So, you take all the stories, every one, and they are true…but not as they are recorded. They were not writing history as we understand history. It is not secular history; it is divine or sacred history and this is forever. So you can’t speak of it as something in the past or something to come…it is. The climax has been reached and it is always being reached in the moment of time.727 ¶18

So, the Jesus of scripture is seated right here tonight in you. And his Son bearing witness of his fatherhood is seated right here, and hiding in you. Read the 54th Psalm, and they said unto Saul, “David is in hiding within us.” Well, how would the insane man ever know that? How would he find out if he’s hiding within me, where would he look? How do I go about looking for him if he’s hiding within me? Wait! He’ll come out. He will come out one day when some explosion takes place within you, and when he comes out he is standing. That’s why I say Browning must have had the experience, because the symbolism that he uses is actually perfect: “See the Christ stand” and he’s standing. And here, David is standing, so “See the Christ stand.” The word Christ means “Messiah.” He goes to Saul to explain the coming of Messiah and then he tells Saul, “It shall be a face like my face, a man like unto me. This is the one that you’re going to love and he will love you forever.” That relationship between you when he stands before you is one of infinite love and it is forever. A man just like me, he’s telling him. He’s telling you he is Messiah; therefore, he is the Christ, he is the anointed of the Lord. Then he said, “The hand just like this hand will open the door of new life to you.” Now he comes to a point, he said, “See the Christ stand” and he’s standing before him . But that man could not take it. Those who read Browning say isn’t that a lovely thing and pass right on, because it is in conflict with what they have fixed in their mind’s eye concerning the historical Jesus. They think Jesus is the Christ. Jesus is God. Jesus is the Lord, the Creator of it all. But he is a father, and the final revelation of God to man is the fatherhood of God.727 ¶19

The final gift of God to man is the gift of himself. So if he gives me himself, he can’t take back one little bit. He gives me all and in giving me all, he gave me his Son. Is it in scripture? Yes, “And he has sent his Son into my heart crying Father” . He is calling me Father. Well then, when he calls me Father, I will know who I am. As he stands before me and I see him and hear him, I know who I am. Until then I do not know. I’m confused…I’ve heard it this way and I’ve heard it that way. And you have to disturb people. You never go into a place and disturb them, but from a platform like this you ask for it, perfectly all right. But to come to your home and then to volunteer this information would be silly, because you simply are out of order. You are taking your pearls and throwing it before those who are not yet qualified to receive it. So leave them alone and don’t disturb them. But you who know it and you’re called upon to voice what you know then voice it, tell it. You, who are moved to really teach it, go and teach it. Don’t modify it! As Paul said, “Take the words, the true words of the pattern that I have given you. Do not change them.” He tells Timothy, “Hold fast the pattern of the true words which you heard form me” and he calls it “my gospel.” Well, here was one who was very proud of the fact that he was born a Jew. He said, “I was born of the seed of Abraham of the tribe of Benjamin. I am a Pharisee of the Pharisees” . And then the whole thing unfolded within him and he realized the non-historicity of his own great book, and therefore that whatever came out of it would be equally un-historical but equally true. All these are the states through which man passes.727 ¶20

So do not be disturbed when you read in scripture Moses said this and Abraham said that and it’s beautifully painted in words. Take it, accept it. You will one day experience all these states. You’ll experience the state of Abraham and know what faith really is when you see it personified. When you look into his face and see that being leaning against a tree, and wound around that tree is a serpent, the serpent with a human face, the serpent with the wisest of expression on its face. As you’re told in Genesis, he was the wisest of all the creatures that God had made. You see that wisdom personified in the form of a serpent. And you see in Abraham’s eyes looking not into the distance but into time. He is staring into time. As you’re told in Galatians, “And the scriptures, made known unto Abraham before”…he was given a preview of the end of time. Before it actually began to appear in man, Abraham was shown the end. So when you look at him, he’s focused not only in the distance but the distance is the distance of time. The tree under which he stands is just like the human brain, just a wonderful oak, all the knotty, gnarly oak…every little thing is like some part of the human brain. You look at it and you know where you stand in scripture: you are seeing the beginning now of the great journey. Wisdom is present in the form of a serpent; faith is present in the form of Abraham.727 ¶21

Then you see his name was changed from Abram, which is “exalted father” to Abraham, which is “father of the multitudes.” Well, how did they change it? By putting one letter into the name and that’s the fifth letter, which is “grace”. That is the letter He, which is the symbol of grace. So grace is put into the name so that God will now give to his creation the work of his hand; all the gifts, all the things you could ever conceive of he gives them now to his creation; and the final gift is the gift of himself. So he puts the gift of grace into the name of the father of the multitudes and then the journey starts.727 ¶22

So here, when you read it, try to bear in mind, and it may be difficult at first, that you’re dealing with infinite states and they are eternal states. Jesus…it doesn’t take anything from you when you say that Jesus is a state. You are Jesus when you find the Christ. When you find the Christ, which is the anointed of the Lord, you find David; and he’ll call you Father as he called him Father. “In the spirit he called me Lord, how then can I be his son?” . Now these are interchangeable terms, father and son. As you read it, without giving you any notice he becomes the son speaking, then he becomes the father speaking, because they are one: “I and my Father are one” . “He who sees me”—he’s speaking now as son—“when you see me you see the Father”; but one moment before he’s speaking as the son. So keep it in mind as you read scripture.727 ¶23

But I’ll tell you, if you’ll accept what I told you this night, it will make it so much easier for you; so much easier to completely accept the responsibility that should go with every being who knows this truth. You don’t pass the buck. You simply know exactly what as the Lord you can do and imagining does create reality. You can, because that is the real you, and that is Jesus and that is the Lord, you can imagine anything and then sustain it in faith. As you walk in the faith of what you have imagined is so, it will become so. If not this moment, it will become so. Just walk in the assumption that it is done because you have imagined it, and having imagined it, it will become a fact. That I do know. So take anything, take a challenge and then do it.727 ¶24

As I was telling a lady tonight…we were discussing one little venture that she’s started…I reminded her that back in 1943 when I came out of the Army I was looking for an apartment and I found one. I told my wife before what I was going to pay for it, a rental. It was a duplex, a lovely duplex in the heart of Manhattan. When I came home that night I told her I found it, it’s a lovely one, and I committed myself to it. She said, “What are you paying?” Well, I was paying more than I told her I was going to pay. She said to me, “Well that’s not demonstrating this principle, is it? Because you’re paying that much more, a third more than you said that you were going to pay.” Well, I paid the month of September and October. Went downstairs to pay my month of November to the manager and he said to me, “Mr. Goddard, I have an apology to make. An authority from the city came in and looked over my books, and discovered that the apartment that you have I had formerly rented it for less than what you are now paying.” He told me what he had rented it for…and it was to the dollar what I said I was going to pay. He was notified that it’s retroactive and “now you cannot receive this money from Mr. Goddard. Not only you can’t receive it, but it must go back to the first month that he came in.” So he told me, “Take your check upstairs and tear it up and bring me a new check.” So it took me three months of faithfulness to what I said I was going to pay. Even though I was paying more, I didn’t. I got it all back at the beginning of my third month, the whole thing came back. I committed myself in my Imagination as to what I was going to pay, and I went looking.727 ¶25

Because I was going to pay more in his eyes he gave me all kinds of things he would not have given me if I paid him what the former tenant did. First of all, he said, “You pick out the wallpaper”; I picked out the wallpaper. “Pick out all the colors you want.” I said that I have a lot of books, so I want you to build in a lovely bookshelf for me, the whole wall for my books…“All right.” He did everything I wanted because he thought on a long term lease he is going to get a third more than he got from the previous tenant. Then he discovered that he didn’t get one penny more, but he put all these things in and he couldn’t undo them. So had I gone in there and gotten my place for the amount of money I said I was going to pay, he would not have built the bookcase for me, he would not have given me my wallpaper, he would not have painted the entire place. Well, he painted it to specification, exactly what my wife wanted in the colors and the paper, everything just as we wanted it. The bookcase was perfect and took care of all my books. I get it and then the whole thing went back to the first day of September. And we were there almost fourteen years.727 ¶26

So I tell you, it doesn’t fail if you are faithful. So, what can I say when I’m confronted with a negation of it? My wife had every right to say “but you didn’t demonstrate it.” She had every right to say that, because she knew that I was paying more than I told her I would pay. So I paid it willingly, and paid the second month, and went down with my check for the third month to be confronted with this wonderful gift. So I tell you, don’t give up! Set your goal high, set it high. Assume the feeling of the wish fulfilled, and then sleep on it. Persist in it! And if you persist in it, not a thing in this world can rob you of that thing that you’ve assumed that you have.727 ¶27

But the most important thing is what I told you earlier in the meeting, that which is housed within you is God’s plan of redemption, and he only redeems himself. He came down into the world and housed himself in man, and now he’s going to discover who he is in man, for it is in us as persons that the nature of God is revealed. Now let us go into the Silence. * * * Now are there any questions, please?727 ¶28

So all of these births are foreshadowings, but the real birth comes from above. He said, “You must be born from above” . The Greek word is “Anothin” translated “again.” People have misconstrued it to mean “reincarnation.” It doesn’t mean that. For when it appears elsewhere in the Bible…for instance, it appears at the trial. He stands before a man who is now judge of mortal men, and he would not speak to him. He says, “So you will not answer me. Do you not know that I have the power to free you and the power to crucify you?” And now he answers, he said, “You have no power over me were it not given to you from above” . The word “from above” is Anothin. Yet when it appears in the 3rd chapter of John, it’s translated “again.” When it appears in the 1st of Peter, it’s translated “anew”: “We are born anew through the resurrection of Jesus from the grave, from the dead.” But the word is “Anothin” and it means “from God, from above.” So he makes the statement: “I am from above, you are from below; you are of this world, I am not of this world” . He’s a completely supernatural being, for God is and that’s God speaking…but you don’t know it yet. You will one day know that you are the God of scripture, that you are the Jesus of scripture. He is the only reality. So, far from not believing in Jesus, I want to meet the man or woman in this world who believes in Jesus more than I do. But I see no one after the flesh; I do not see him as a character in history 2,000 years ago. To me he is more than contemporary for the simple reason his Son called me Father…and there aren’t two Lords and there aren’t two sons.727 ¶33

Then comes the challenge: Well, if that is so, why don’t you command these stones to be made bread? Why don’t you throw yourself down? Is it not written he gives his angels power to support you? Why don’t you get down and worship me and I’ll give you the world? And to all of these, “Get behind me, doubter” . So everyone will put you to the test. You make a statement that imagining creates reality and one fella on radio one night…he’s a professor of psychology in an eastern college…and he said to me, “Turn that yellow pencil into red.” So I said to him quite innocently, “You are fulfilling scripture.” He said, “In what way?” I said, “There will come in that day, in the last day, scoffers scoffing, saying ‘Where is the promise of his coming?’ and so you are the scoffer.” He turned red. He turned red, not the pencil, because he told all of his students to listen in…he was going to take this man over. We had one of these long marathon nights, six hours on radio without breaks. We ourselves had a break at midnight or about one in the morning, with a few sandwiches and some black coffee. But we went on at midnight and came off at six in the morning. We had one little interval…there was constant talk and the phones ringing, people bringing in all kinds of questions and challenges. So he told his class to listen and he was going to take this thing over. He didn’t want to go back and face them and explain why I called him a scoffer, but he will.727 ¶34

You don’t have a portfolio of $100 billion and tell me you aren’t in business. That’s what our estimate in this country alone is of our churches. I didn’t make it up; I read it in Life magazine and in Time magazine and in the New York Times and the L. A. Times, who quoted the source which was Life who made the survey. The Catholic Church came in with the majority. They had forty-odd billion dollars in America, not the world. The Protestants came behind with a little over thirty billion, and the Jews came with a little over eleven billion, and then other denominations were not considered one or the other. It comes close to 100 billion dollars that is tax-exempt. That’s why I pay…every dollar that I take in here I pay tax on it, as though I’m selling merchandise. I have nothing that I can call or say now this is religion. I’m not a minister, I’m not a priest, I’m not ordained. I’ve been offered all kinds, but I said no, I don’t want to be ordained…I was sent of God…what on earth could you give me? You couldn’t send me, God sent me. So I pay on every nickel that comes in here. My books are so I have no exemptions, and they aren’t exempt, I pay taxes. I don’t care, let them keep it, but don’t tell me that’s religion. They’re in business and what a big business! I don’t care what they do with it. But when they start going into competition with people who are paying taxes—and I don’t mean me, I mean these regular businesses—I think the line should be drawn somewhere. But I’m not here to go into politics. I’m here to tell you what I know from my own experience. So when God has revealed himself in me, what can I tell you but what was revealed. So his Word is there, written down by men from supernatural experiences which they did not understand; then comes the living Word who interprets the written Word. Good night.727 ¶37