You Are God's Temple

In the 119th Psalm: “This is my comfort in my affliction, because thy word hath quickened me.” He said, “I will keep thy word.” “It is good for me that I was afflicted, that I might learn thy statutes.” In the Book of Job, the 36th chapter: “by the bread of adversity” — to what end is he doing this? But let us say this description of the entire Bible — it’s all there, but it is not all put together; they are not altogether conclusive, or immediately evident. And the book begins in this manner: in the beginning there, and when it came, in a coffin — in Egypt. In the beginning that, in a coffin in Egypt — the story is all about God. The president of the world is God. I am living on, we are starting now as I live with you, and the whole thing is done by God to himself.1065 ¶1

I was pronounced before I came down into this world of death. Real divisions that might aid the understanding of this mystery — she’s not here tonight, grandparently — I was innocent of the spirit; as infinite spirit, there was nothing but myself. And I desired to go out into the world, although similarly there was no other place, no good yet, I desired to go out into the world, but I knew I had to have form, to be seen, to communicate. And I made for myself a box — a long, elongated box — of wood. And then, suddenly, there was absolute darkness. You can’t conceive of the blackness and the restriction, a complete restriction, as though you could not concentrate, or bring yourself to a greater point of restriction than that moment, as I found myself in the north, and that was the cause of the blackness and the restriction and the contraction. The problem could see a critical career to do, and then came that moment in time when I desired to leave it, its end, as experience, what it is to see and to think and to hear in this world of death. And then I found myself looking down, and what I sought to be — murdered? I thought a body was on it, but I couldn’t quite see it because of the crowd around the body. I’m at the sides of this, where people, looking on, bending over, and then one says, “he is dead.” And I thought, why, that’s impossible — they cannot die who has never lived. Only while I occupied it, only while I was in it, it seemed to me — but it cannot stop. The body is a box, and the box has never been alive; only as I occupied it, only as I inhabited that box, did it become seemingly alive. And the shock was so great that I awoke, with the marvelous reasons — we are very reverent now.1065 ¶2

The word translated “ark” in Hebrew also means “word,” and it means also a coffin. So, “in the beginning God,” “in a coffin,” “in Egypt,” “the first and the last, the beginning and the end” — so God actually became that for a purpose beyond the wildest dreams. As the rock in which he brought, he now resides. He reached the limit of contraction by becoming man, whether you may expect beyond the wildest dreams, as himself, prior to the contraction, a vaster constant expansion of the one being that is done, and you are that being. We are the One, we are the God that came down and assumed the limitation of man. And it is an affliction on himself, and then the voice, empty, so we’re not — “I am with you always, even unto the end of the age.” “Only believe that I have power to raise from the dead.” By further leaps in power, in universal humanity — but buried, humbled, vulnerable — is God. His name is I AM, forever and forever.1065 ¶3

But how will I know? That I will await. Let us trace the entire return to himself. You prepare the way for himself to return, and that way is described in Scripture. It is spelled beautifully in the Old Testament, but again it’s an adumbration — it’s a rough sketch. The New Testament explains it, but man sees it, he mistakes it, he thinks it’s secular history, and it’s not secular history. The house is divided. You take the story of Jesus Christ — it’s not something taking place here on earth. It didn’t take place there. It took place within man, in an entirely different sense.1065 ¶4

Now let us go back — all right — the story of Job is the story of every man in the world. If you are familiar with the story: he was innocent, he did nothing that really should have called the horrors that descended upon Job — ridiculous. But in the last chapter, Jehovah is made to say: “I have heard of thee with the hearing of the ear, but now mine eye seeth thee.” And then God not only forgave him — he did nothing wrong — that God multiplied his gifts on earth, and all of his brothers and his sisters and all of those who knew him fell came to sympathize with him and ate bread in his house, for all the evil that God had dropped upon him. These are the words of the 42nd chapter of Job. Now the word Job means “where is my father.” Where is the source of the phenomena of life — there is a source of it all. That’s the problem, that’s the search of every person in the world. You may not know it, but he’s looking for God, the source of life. That’s Job. In the end, he sees it.1065 ¶5

Who does he see? There’s only one — you don’t know the father; you’re not in eternity. I could stand here from now to the ends of time and I could not persuade you to the point of conviction until you have the experience. In the old — as scripture puts it — thou art a father, and he singles out one person, because that one is his son. If that one is inside, and that one stands before you at the end of your journey, and then memory returns, for he is only God returning in memory. For we are the God — and it’s in the beginning there was a horror, that is, and the pride of it implies a consciousness somewhere, and there’s that son standing before you, and then suddenly memory returns, and you know he is your son, and he knows you are his father, in the fulfillment of scripture. Then, and only then, do you know who you are. I could tell you from now to the end of time that you are God — you are not going to believe me, because if I am God, why can’t I do this, that, and the other? You do not know the purpose behind the affliction, the contraction that you imposed upon yourself. You did nothing that was wrong to bring about this contraction; it was deliberate, on our own — we agreed in concert to dream the dream of life and become God, come down into the world of death, and experience death, for we could not — in the world of light, and infinite power, we constructed ourselves to experience death, and so we did.1065 ¶6

Humanity, as we see it, is part of the eternal structure of the universe. It is not a thought of destruction; we actually came down into that part of the structure called man, and entered man, and man is dead. And we turned death into sleep, and dream the dream of life. Infinite mercy turns death into sleep, and then, in due course, to work and to be. And here we are, multiplying the form that is man. But you are not the form that you are wearing — do not be disturbed. You are God. Everyone in the world is the immortal God, but this experience is essential for an expansion, and there is no limit to expansion; there is a limit only to contraction. So we took the limit of contraction upon ourselves and became man.1065 ¶7

So, here is the vision first: she saw that ark, an elongated breath. Now let us take the word “temple” in scripture. First of all, the word — or the word, as you saw, this long, elongated thing — falls apart, which is a copy, as early as the Hebrew word for heaven; and where comes the word for “repent” is the word “temple” or “tabernacle” — it also means a grave. So when I read in scripture, “know ye not that ye are the temple of the living God, and the spirit of God dwelleth in you,” I could say, do you not realize you are the grave of God, and the spirit of God dwells in you — the grave. And one day he will awaken in the grave, and one day he will resurrect from that grave, and he will come. I will be sent to you, that he has impounded upon himself, for the word is “grave.” The temple of God is man, as we are told in Paul’s statement to the Corinthians, his third chapter, 16th verse of First Corinthians: “Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and the spirit of God dwelleth in you?” And the spirit of God and the name of God are one, and his name is I AM. Shall you put “I am” aside from yourself? You can’t. Stand the thought, and observe: “I am,” therefore you cannot see that; you cannot see God, as you do all this in space, for you are the reality.1065 ¶8

Hold up — but you can know God when his son stands before you, and you know that you’re looking into the eyes, into the face of your son, and that son is David, our biblical — then you will know the word: “art thou from David?” — “He shall cry unto me, thou art my father, my God, and the rock of my salvation.” Then you know these words, and the words are put into the mouth of David: “And the Lord said unto me, thou art my son, this day have I begotten thee.” So here you have seen the relationship of Father and Son, and only as this is actually experienced by the individual do you really know who he is. Until then, these are false gods — he’s represented as outside of self, and there is no one outside of self to whom you should turn. As Blake said — why, he’s saying, “We here, trembling around, calling on God for help, are not ourselves in whom God will dwell” — enough, as our own wonderful human imagination, that is — they will say there is no God, that God, of human imagination, is all delusion. But, “I know, O Lord, I know the events that arise before my weary eyes, even in this brother, in this strange, mortal form, although I behold thee not, nor can I see how I can be whole.” That reality that I am, as an object other than what I am, I can be wholehearted. From the mouth that I am the reality of being, holding on to how can I behold it, and how do I know who I am? I remain who I am only when my son — I suffered from amnesia when I came down into this world of death, as you are suffering from amnesia totally, and you have forgotten your divine being. You are God. There is nothing in the universe but God; there’s no room for anything but that.1065 ¶9

In 1926, in Larchmont, New York City, I retired early because I was a guest, as a manager — in the club, a private club. It was a Saturday night. In those days there was Prohibition, there was no alcohol, but you would always get it. People did — and this was all given over to the children, that is, the kids, say, 1920 and so on, and they had this wild diet. The manager of the club, I was his guest — he said he didn’t think it would be quite the thing for me, as his guest, to mingle among the members, but I accepted that we would speak, and so I went that day. In 1926 I was only 21 years of age, and I was a professional dancer. I would have loved to have gone on that dance floor and spent the entire evening dancing, but no — the protocol would not allow it.1065 ¶10

Now, let’s see what I read, if I ever did — I took a book, it was a book on the life of Buddha. I turned on the little night-lamp on the base, and I found, to read the book — at what hour I fell asleep, I could not tell, but I must have gone out quickly into a deep, deep trance. When I woke in the morning, and that music had been going on all through the night, until about three in the morning, so I would say, I didn’t hear anything. But when I woke in the morning, the book was on my chest — I hadn’t turned in the interval, and the light was still on, and the sun was up, and it was nine in the morning. I had fallen into a deep, deep trance, and in that trance I was infinite light. There was no universe beyond, no stars, nothing — I was in space, there was no circumference. I was the light of the world, and by will I do not need the world measured by the sun and the planets around it — I mean infinite, healthy, living, liquid life. And when I awoke, and here was this thing on my chest, and I returned to the contraction of the little body called Neville.1065 ¶11

So I know, when he teaches, “I am the light of the world,” it is a true revelation. I also know what he teaches, that God is infinite love, that God is love — that is the true revelation. And in spite of all the afflictions that you and I suffer, and others who suffer and continue to suffer, there is a love behind it all.1065 ¶12

Now listen to these words: “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. Henceforth I call you not servants, for the servant knoweth not what his master is doing, but I have told you everything that I have known from my father.” Now you go to the point where these words are put into the mouth of the one who just made that statement, and he said, “Unless I die, thou canst not live, but if I die, I shall arise again and abide with thee.” The one who never dies today will ever die, for the one who never dies — and if God died not for man, and gave not himself eternally for man, man could not exist. So God died. He died — he actually gave up the being that is, emptied himself, and took upon himself the form of man, the form of that box, and angels that rock — but his name is “I am.” But he doesn’t stop there; in the end, he calls it by a name, and he says, “I am Jim, I am Neville, I am God, I am Aina, I am this” — and so we go beyond his real name, which is I AM. We put a little tag on it. I will become so identified with the little mess that we are wearing, we don’t realize who we are. And in that eating of that fruit, we are suffering from total amnesia. And one day, in the fullness of time, we will awake, as he has plotted the entire thing before he started, yet prepared the way for his sons to return.1065 ¶13

For the father is made up of the son — the word Adam is a plural word, which means God is a plural thing, but put together it is the Lord. It is — but it’s all the name; the word, everyone in the world, puts us all together, and therefore, the one God, the one — so he’s prepared the way for all of his sons to return, but this time, when they return, they are not the son — there’s a complete transformation of the son into the father, and they are new. What is the new adventure? I do not know, I’ve never run that far beyond it. When this comes to a name, and the person comes down upon it, and we all — we are no longer sons of the father, we are the father. That is the goal of sending all of your sons to make himself into the world of death, and then we come out, and we are God the father, because we are the father of the Lord, only begotten son. And humanity was unconcerned — the forms remain the eternal structure of the universe.1065 ¶14

You are not the master over — you are God, to whom God has afflicted, for secret aid he comes, and he heals, and he falls into him. “Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now I keep thy word, and this is my comfort in my affliction, that thy promise gives me life.”1065 ¶15

Well, the fundamental promise in scripture is the promise made to Abraham: “I will give you a son” — it doesn’t say it is God’s son, it implies it is his son. The name is Isaac, meaning laughter — that infant is presented to you, you break into this heavenly smile, our most unusual heavenly smile, as you hold him in your arm, that infant child. And then the next one is the son, and he is the union, and he’s David. So the fundamental problem is the promise made to Abraham, and that was the promise of the son.1065 ¶16

Now, you and I — if you knew how old you are, you would say it’s impossible; the body you wear may still be typical of a tiring or a budding child, but you are not the body that you’re wearing, you are eternal. If you knew your age — and you can’t measure your age, because you had no beginning — and if you could actually know how long you’ve been on the journey, how is it possible to be so old and to have a child? But the child is part of the play, part of the drama, as we call it in scripture. And everything inside of Jesus Christ, you are going to experience in the first person, present experience, and you will know who Jesus Christ is, because everything is going to happen to you, and you will relive the entire story, and then you’ll know who Jesus is. You need not tell it to the world, you need not — you could tell it, but the written form is an attempt to tell it, you’ll get the same response with your prime description: “he came unto his own, and his own received him not.” When he came to his own, this is where the man is married, he has a demon, and he’s mad. Anyone who will tell you what I’ve told you this evening, before a larger crowd, where they’re not geared to this way of thinking, they’re thinking it is entirely mad, to tell you the view, in this century, born in the 20th century, that you are actually the father of God’s only begotten son. And that son is not flesh and blood — but if you read the story, he came in spirit, when he called him “my Lord.” And we say to him, how can I be his son when he is inspirited thought, my Lord, not in the flesh? This is not — it does not take place in the flesh, though you walk the world in a garment of flesh — it takes place in you, but in a region completely remote from this world.1065 ¶17

But I tell you, this very moment you are not all together, sitting in the place where you seem to be, before my eyes — you are infinite. But how do we describe it, how do we tell you this? At this very moment, why you seem to be all put together and collected in thought, and listening to me express — do not fall here, it doesn’t make sense — and I tell you that you are not, you are going to be.1065 ¶18

But I do believe those who come here are not far from that moment in time when the drama completely erupts within, and there they’ll prove that everything I tell you is true, everything that I’ve told — I am not speculating, I’m telling you what I have experienced, and the story of scripture is a true story.1065 ¶19

The Hebrew-Christian faith is the fundamental thing, and all the other little isms that will lead you astray, forget them — this is the fundamental faith. The Old Testament is the seed plot, it is the tree, and we have actually experienced it — we are the fruit of that faith. I could be the tree and not bear the fruit, but I can’t actually bear the fruit and not acknowledge the tree of which I came. And in studying scripture, I find the whole thing — in the Old Testament and the New — is one pattern. Now, every verse is equal in value, not to every chapter, not every book — there is a pattern all through those thirty-nine books, and the pattern unfolds itself in the story of Jesus Christ, as it unfolds itself in the Gospels. If you want to find the word — the Book of Hebrews refers to the Hebrews, so the Old Testament, in every chapter, is probably closely — all the things that occur are related to the pattern man, which we will take up next week, when we come to that title, “The Pattern Man.”1065 ¶20

When you see someone afflicted, don’t think, as the world would say, “he has done this, he’s done that.” Look into the world, and see so many perfectly wealthy people living a wonderful life, a comfortable life, and, you know, many of them, how they got their money — and their faculties, everything is wrong. So don’t judge the one who is afflicted; bear in mind the words I quoted tonight: “and this is my comfort in my affliction, that thy promise gives me life; before I was afflicted, I went astray, but now I keep thy word.” It is good for me to have been afflicted, that I might learn — I accept it. And then he delivers the afflicted by their affliction, and openeth their ear by adversity.1065 ¶21

So when we read, “he was afflicted for me, to support yourself,” in the book, it is all about me, as you are telling it for yourself. “In the volume of the book it is written of me.” And it said, “thou hast drawn me out of the earth” — dropped by adversity, for the one speaking is David, and David is the one who is speaking through the 22nd Psalm, the great Christological psalm. And you read it — the address — but in the end, the words are, see what God has lost, when he looked at what he has done, and promised himself he would do — for his adversaries, he’s saying, into nothing, “I’m wondering, you will awaken from this.”1065 ¶22

All right, I’m not saying that it’s not a difficult time, but this is the hope: if you’re told in scripture that it is worth enduring — very, to the very end — because at the end, something comes out which was before the world — what comes out in you making you God the Father. We’re all brothers, and then he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, and then comes the play, to prove his promise to us is true — he is going to give himself to us. But God promised the man is to give himself to that; and in the end, if God is the father of David, as scripture teaches, and David says, before you, I think, “without giving me,” before he calls you father, you know he’s your son — then you know that God kept his promise; in fact, he gave himself.1065 ¶23

I can tell you tonight, David is your son. I do not care how many children you have in this world, they are not — they’re all brothers, they will be male or female, that’s your brother, and each will be the father of David — so what now is your child will be your brother, and because you are God the Father, one day you will be — one day one will be — God. So in the end there is only one body, one spirit, one hope, one Lord, one thought unfoldable — there’s no room for another.1065 ¶24

So we were chosen in the beginning, before the foundation of the world, to play this part and to be afflicted, but in the end it was seen only as a short sleep. No matter how long it seems to be, now, while we’re in it, when we awake it is though we slept but a short while, in the dream of life. When we awake to eternity, and then leave the world, the world of death is part of the eternal structure of the universe.1065 ¶25

And where was the body? But he was looked at by the crowd, looking at it from three sides, and then came a voice, “she’s dead,” and she replied to herself around, “but that’s impossible, they cannot die who has never lived.” It only seemed to be alive because I was in it — you are making this thing alive. So let it turn to dust into the real one day, but in the end you are the immortal one. That is what I’m talking about now; it does not happen before that moment in time when you decree death again — you will be instantly restored to a body, young, not a babe, young, twenty years old, just like this, nothing missing, perfect eyes, perfect teeth, perfect everything, in a world; the rest is just like this, to continue the journey until what I have shown you takes place.1065 ¶26

The end does not come to pass until what I’ve dealt with — only in the end, when you are born from above, when you ask, hold the child in your own arm, when you see David, when you are split, or you are the temple, and that grave is split into that grave from top to bottom, and you go up into the heavenly sphere within your own tower, and God is within you. As he felt it in the 17th chapter of Luke, the kingdom of God is within.1065 ¶27

The people are looking for it somewhere in space, saying there’s some central star beyond any sun known to man, the Pleiades, some physical, outside, the inspired word brought his spirit — then like God is done, and you’re still looking, boy, in some space, on the outside — you will never know it. Be yourself, until his son stands before you and calls you father.1065 ¶28

Well, I can tell you, and I will tell you, to encourage you night after night, but I can’t swim you into that partial conviction until the experience is your own.1065 ¶29

Right — the man begins to tell anyone how wonderful the Bible is until he has experienced the scripture, and he has nothing to do with what our evangelists are talking about, to see some little tiny Jesus walking around, coming out of a place restricted ahead, and doing all this stuff. Jesus Christ is within you, and when he comes, he comes from within, and when he comes from within, he comes as you, not to you, but as — and David called him my father, so David will call you my father, then you’ll know who Jesus is.1065 ¶30

Now we speak of him as Jesus Christ — that is not a true picture, that you should hope. In the 11th chapter of Revelation, we speak of the Lord, and of Jesus Christ, not “Jesus Christ” — Jesus is the Lord. No one can say Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit, because Jesus is your own wonderful I AM. That’s the name of Jehovah, and Jesus and Jehovah have the same root, beyond a rough translation of the Hebrew, it’s — which is I AM. Now we speak, in the 11th chapter of Revelation, of the Lord and of his Christ. What does it say? “And the kingdoms of this world have become the kingdom of our Lord, and of his Christ” — Christ is the authority, for whom did the Lord anoint? David. Read the 16th chapter of First Samuel — to rise and anoint this, he is; and then he said, “thou art my son, today have I begotten thee,” but where he is the Christ, and the Lord is he, and so David in scripture calls him my Lord.1065 ¶31

Here, rather, make your enemy your question — I know when it happened to me. I can hardly believe this — spirit, I was so stunned, I was so old. I got off that day, and I told it as vivid as I could, and as clearly as I could, and yet my mind was thrown apart, because I had never been told that — I had not yet arrived at that moment in time when I could actually see the parallel in scripture.1065 ¶32

Well, I tell you, if you are afflicted, or those you know are afflicted, don’t blame them, don’t judge — secret aid to come, and he heals, and he calls himself still. Make every effort — to children, make every effort to relieve them, you’re called upon to exercise that challenge. If you are a doctor, any aspect of that profession, doctors, drink this — I don’t care what aspect of it — they all help, they relieve pain and make the body more comfortable. All right, exercise that call and seek the comfort that they offer, seek the help they offer. But don’t condemn the one who is afflicted, let anyone tell you it serves him right, or say it’s right because it is this, that, and the other — they do not know scripture.1065 ¶33

So in the end, these words: “of foolish men, and slow of heart to understand — was it not necessary that Christ should suffer these things, and then enter into his glory?” And then, beginning with Moses and the prophets, he interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself. And then he turned, and actually opened the scriptures to their understanding, beginning with Moses and the law and the prophets, and then their hearts and their minds were opened, and he vanished from their sight. This all took place in a heavenly sphere, not here on earth. We are re-enacting it here while we walk in these garments of flesh.1065 ¶34

Man’s darkest hour — for that hour when God the Father addressed us, even though we never realized it, he addressed that, and tells us his plan. And then God died — he disappeared, he became invisible, he entered these bodies and became invisible to us, because he takes on this vesture of flesh, and now we could not see him as a father — explained to ourselves, because he is enough, and he’s not even there, for nearness he’s inside. Well, in limitation, he became me — that’s why I can’t see him, unless I see him, it is done. And when I see his son, then I know who I am. Man’s darkest night was when God became invisible, and that was God becoming man — that’s terrible — but at daybreak, man becomes God.1065 ¶35