Eighth Of John

A friend of mine wrote me a letter this week and stated something that happened to her. Having read it and reread it, I thought it would be quite a lesson for tonight. She said that having tried to change others and failed, she thought the whole thing over and thought, “Well, after all, I’ll change myself, for the other is only myself pushed out. The whole vast world is myself personified.” So she began to work on freedom, that I am free. And she and a friend of hers who is here tonight too discussed freedom. Then she said a vision developed soon after that which was very disturbing. It came unexpectedly, and here I found myself flat on the ground, stretched out like a cross, face up, and all in chains. And here is my body, my physical body, chained to the ground. It would come without warning. It was not a pleasant vision to see myself there, all chained and anchored to the ground with these iron chains. And one day when it happened, I thought I would look closer, take a closer look, to find that it was not only chains, but there were locks. The whole thing was completely anchored and locked to the ground. Then I felt myself rise out of this body while it began to sink into the ground. And I rose up and up out of the body. I realized then that the body was part of the earth. It belongs to the earth; of the dust it came, and to dust it returned. And I rose up out of it. And from that day on I have never had that vision again. I feel myself free.1073 ¶1

Now she said, I had this on the morning of the 14th of February, this one. Should I return to this world from a profound dream? I knew that it was profound, but I could not move to write it. Here I am, cataleptic. I couldn’t move to write it. I tried to struggle with myself to remember it in detail, and the end began to fade. So I asked myself to reveal to me a vision, some vision that will hold it. And then I saw a serpent emerging out of its skin, and there was its dead skin. And here was a serpent completely out of the skin that it had just shed. Then I saw two serpents, a pure white serpent and a black serpent, and they became one serpent, the white one above and the black below. But it was one serpent, a black bottom and a white top. And then someone spoke to me and said to me, “This is the fulfillment of scripture. You will find it in the eighth of—” and she said, “I thought I heard John, but it could have been Luke, or it could have been some other. I couldn’t quite grasp it, that I thought it was John or Luke.”1073 ¶2

Well, I can assure her it is John. It is not any other chapter. It is John. If you are familiar with scripture, you will find that John the 8th chapter, when you read the sayings of the Lord, they are so condensed. Everything is so condensed that the meaning seems sometimes almost impossible for one to follow, unless of course you have experienced that chapter. If you’ve experienced it, it is easy to follow it. But I have read so many strange, peculiar interpretations by the great scholars concerning that chapter. There are men without vision, brilliant men. They know their Greek backwards. They know their Aramaic. They know all the tongues into which it was translated. But they do not have the vision. They haven’t had the experience. So to them it is something that is like a closed book. So tonight we will take that chapter and show you what is in store for you. She hasn’t experienced it, but she’s on the verge of it. For she was told, “This is the fulfillment of scripture, the whole scripture.” And the fulfillment of scripture is the fulfillment of the Old Testament, for that was the Old Testament at the day that this was written.1073 ¶3

Now, it begins not on the first verse. The earliest manuscripts omit the first eleven verses. Somewhere along the way, some scribe inserted into that chapter eleven verses that you cannot find in the early manuscripts. The last verse of the seventh chapter is omitted, and the first eleven verses are omitted in the Revised Standard Version. They will quote it in a little tiny print and give you the reasons why you cannot find it in the really early manuscripts of the text. But some overly zealous scribe put it into it. If you’re not familiar with it, it is the story of the one taken in adultery — that’s omitted, that was definitely added. So it begins on this note: “I am the light of the world. He who follows me shall walk in light.” Here is one of the great “I am” sayings of this gospel. For the gospel of John is full of “I am.” I am the bread of life. I am the living bread. I am the resurrection. I am the light. I am the way. I am the truth. I am the door. I am the true vine. So these mighty “I am” sayings are all through the gospel of John. It’s the most profound book in scripture.1073 ¶4

So here it begins, “I am the light of the world.” In that statement he is telling us that he is the consciousness of humanity. For we are told in the gospel of John, “In him was life, and the life was the light of men.” Were he not in you as your own wonderful I AM, you would not be animated. You would not be conscious. And I know from my own experience that there is in man that life, and one day he will be in control of it, and he will actually know from experience that the whole vast world is himself pushed out. He will arrest that activity within him and everything that he observes will stand still, proving that he is the light, the consciousness of men. They have no consciousness before your own eyes; they appear as deadly, completely dead, made as though they were made of wax. You release the activity within you that you only a moment before froze, and everything becomes once more reanimated. So you know where the source of all things is — it’s all in you, your own wonderful I AM. That’s God. There is no other gods. So you can change the outer world as you change the inner world. You can freeze it and then stop it. You can freeze it, change the internal you, and then watch it and see the whole vast world execute the change in you. So he said, I am the light of the world. That’s your destiny.1073 ¶5

I know back in 1926 or ’27, in Larchmont, New York, I went to sleep hearing this wonderful orchestra playing below, but I was not allowed to join the crowd. They were all guests and members of the club, and I was only a guest of the manager. So I went to sleep on the early side hearing the orchestra below. And in — well, that year I was only 21, in ’26 I was 21 years old. I’d have loved to have gone downstairs and danced. I was then a professional dancer. I had just returned from London, having danced for four months in London. But he thought it unwise for a guest of his, the manager, to join the members and their guests. So I went to bed, and I did what I rarely do — read in bed. I took a book, and here I’m reading a book. It was the life of Buddha. And then, as I read it, I must have fallen into a deep, deep sleep, a profound trance. Because when I woke, it was about 9 in the morning, the light was still on, and the book was on my chest, proving I had not turned in that sleep — for if I had turned, the book would have fallen to the floor or on the bed. So in that interval, whether it lasted eight hours or more I do not know, but I went into a deep, profound trance, and in that trance I became the light of the world. I could easily have said, I am the light of the world. There was not a thing in the world but myself, and I was light — infinite light without any circumference. There was no boundary to this light. No sun, no stars, no moon, only infinite light, and I was it, a living, pulsing light, the light of the world.1073 ¶6

Then I woke, and here I am once more congested into this tiny little garment that I knew as Neville — a little garment that she saw in her vision, anchored to the earth in chains, iron chains and locks, and it would sink into the earth from which it was taken, while she who was in it would rise above it. For she is the seed of God, as you are. And a seed must fall into the ground and die before it is made alive. If it doesn’t fall into the ground and die, then it remains alone. But if it dies, having fallen into the ground, then it brings forth much fruit. So here she saw it perfectly. And here she is told, this is the fulfillment of scripture.1073 ¶7

Now let us take some of these profound sayings. They’re so completely condensed, unless you’ve experienced it, you wonder what on earth is the recorder who records the words talking about. So we’ll take as many as we can tonight. He discusses the father. They do not know he’s talking about the father. They said, “Who is your father?” He answered, “If you knew me, you would know my father also, but you know neither my father nor me. If you really knew me, in the full sense of that word, you would know God. For he and I are inseparable. If you knew me, you would know God.” That’s what he’s saying in this eighth chapter when he tells them, “You will die in your sins unless you believe that I am he.” Here it is stated the fundamental sin of the world is lack of faith in “I am he.” So we are told in the Psalms, the 46th Psalm, “Be still and know that I am God.” Man finds it difficult to believe that he has a God stuck in the heaven someplace on the outside. He can’t bring himself to believe that his own wonderful human imagination is God. So in spite of the words “be still and know that I am God,” unless you believe that I am he, you will die in your sins.1073 ¶8

Now you tell them. Now we go back to Ezekiel, the third chapter, and we’ll read it in the 17th and 18th verses. “I call you the son of man. The son of man, I have made of you a watchman for the house of Israel. And when you hear anything spoken from my mouth, you tell it to the house of Israel. You tell it to the wicked, to remove them from their wickedness that they may live. If you do not tell it, they will die in their iniquity, which is in their sin, but their blood will be upon your hand. If you tell it and they persist in their iniquity, they will die in their iniquity, but the blood will not be upon your hand.”1073 ¶9

So Paul could say, in the 20th chapter of the book of Acts — he is now addressing the Ephesians, and these are the elders — he said to them, “I am innocent of any blood that is of yours.” Innocent completely of all the blood that is yours. “For I did not shrink from declaring the counsel of God.” He told it just as his vision happened to him. As he said before the king, “O King Agrippa, I am not disobedient to the heavenly vision.” He kept the divine vision in time of trouble. Even though it meant jail, even though it meant persecution, meant beating, he kept the vision and he told it to those who would listen. So that if they would not listen and then abide by what the Lord had said through him, it was not upon his hand that would be their blood when they died in their own iniquities. So here is one who tells the story just as it happened in him. You only tell what you have experienced. I have experienced the entire story, so I tell it whether you believe it or not, knowing that if you do not believe it, then the things that happened to you — it’s not upon my hand anymore. I am faithful to the divine vision. I kept the vision in time of trouble. Though people would leave me and never return again, those who would condemn, those who will criticize — it doesn’t really matter. Once I keep the vision and tell it, so here in the story there is statement after statement, so completely condensed. If you had not experienced it, you would wonder what on earth is it all about.1073 ¶10

Now he makes the statement, “As the son of man is lifted up.” When the son of man is lifted up, you will know that I am he. He tells you earlier, “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up.” If you were not lifted up like that fiery serpent, you would not understand that statement. It’s so completely condensed, the meaning would escape you. But having ascended like a fiery serpent after my body was split in two from top to bottom, and seeing that living, pulsing light, that golden liquid light fusing with it, and then, like a fiery serpent, moving up this staff — for we are told the serpent moved up on a rod. Well, the rod is your own spine, and into your skull you go in violence, you return into the heavenly world, all within you. For the kingdom of heaven is within. And so as the serpent was lifted up on the staff in the wilderness, so must the son of man be lifted up. I have heard these brilliant scholars say it meant when he was lifted up on the cross of wood and crucified. It has nothing to do with that. Has not a thing to do with any wooden cross in the world. The only cross that the Christ of the universe ever bore is your body. This body is the cross he bears. There is no other cross. He is actually nailed on this cross, on your body. These are the crosses the universal Christ bears, and he will wake himself in you and rise in you. And when he rises in you, you will know that I am he. For it’s not another that rises, it’s yourself. You fuse with the light, and fusing with that living, pulsing light, you make one quick circular motion, and up you go on that staff of your spine into your skull, and it vibrates just like thunder. So when the son of man is lifted up, you will know that I am he.1073 ¶11

Bear in mind, this is completely egocentric. He is not talking to people as I am talking to you. He is speaking now to himself. This body is of the earth. So now he makes the statement, “I am from above. You are from below. I am not of this world. You are of this world.” So who is the “you”? It’s the body that you wear that is anchored by these chains that you saw and the very locks that you saw, to this earth, and to earth it will return and must return. But you, occupying these garments, you are not of this world. You are not of this earth. You are from above, but not yet aware of it, not yet awakened within that garment, not yet born from above — but you will.1073 ¶12

Now he makes the statement, and now he’s discussing freedom. Now she in her letter started off by telling me about how she wanted to be free. I will not mention the characters in her life that she felt were holding her back, how she tried to change them without any help. She didn’t see the chains that she thought she would see, and she worked on herself to be free. Then came the vision of the anchored body to the earth and herself rising above it. And then the whole vision faded from then on when she felt free. Now he’s discussing freedom: “If you abide in my word and my word abides in you, you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.” Well, they answered, “Well, we are the children of Abraham, and we have never been in bondage to anyone.” And you say that we must be made free. They did not realize that they were enslaved any more than the whole vast world knows it is enslaved. You are enslaved to the body that you wear. No matter how much money you have in this world, what power you have in this world, you cannot order anyone in this world to perform the natural functions of your body for you. You do it yourself. No matter where you are in the world, you could be sitting on a throne, and you cannot order anyone in your world to perform the normal natural functions of your body for you. You’ve got to go to your own bathroom and perform them yourself. You have to eat your own food and assimilate it, and what you cannot assimilate, you must expel it yourself. And no slave in the world can do it for you. So are you not a slave of the cross that you wear? So here is the world in which we live. They thought they were free, and he tells them you will only be free if the Son sets you free. “If the Son sets you free, you are free indeed.” All these are taken from the eighth chapter of John.1073 ¶13

Now, he’s only fulfilling scripture, and scripture spoken of is the Old Testament. We go back to the 17th chapter of 1 Samuel, and the king has made a promise that the one who brings down the enemy of Israel, “I will set his father’s house free in Israel.” Well, the one who brought them the giant was David. David brought down the giant and severed his head from his body. And when he stood before the king, the king is not inquiring about David — it’s obvious that he brought down the giant, he has the head in his hand — but “whose son are you?” He has to fulfill his promise and set his father free. The father is bound in you, and not until the son appears are you set free. When the son appears, he will call you father, and you will know he is your son, and he will know that you are his father, and that son is Christ, and Christ is David.1073 ¶14

Now I am telling you what the world will throw stones at me, who call themselves Christians or even call themselves Jews. They will think that’s blasphemous. Yet I am telling what Paul said: “I am not unfaithful or disobedient to the heavenly vision.” It happened to me, and I cannot modify it to satisfy the preconceived misconceptions of scripture and tell them of some other being. It was no other being. It was David who set me free. You’re only free when you discover that you are God. For there’s nothing in this world that is free unless it is God. God is the only one that could be free. So I tell you that you are God. His name forever and forever is I AM. That’s God. But you do not know it when you say “I am.” You say, “I am Neville.” You say, “I am Jim. I’m Bill. I’m Peter. I’m Stan. I’m Jan.” That’s not setting you free. When you know “I am God,” you are set free. And you will never know you are God unless his son stands before you and you know he is your son, and that son is David. Then you are set free — free forever.1073 ¶15

The body will return to the dust from whence it was taken, but you who are buried in that earth, you died, and then you were made alive, and then you became free, and you are free as God the Father. So in the end, the Son set man free by revealing to man that he is God. As long as he thought himself Mrs. Brown’s son or Mrs. Jones’s son, and he was back on a physical background, he is not free, because nothing physical can be freed. We are wearing a slave garment and it’s physical, it’s flesh and blood. But when I’m set free, I am freed of that garment. I’m not looking for my genealogy based upon some physical tradition. I am through with that. Whatever happened to the generations numbered centuries ago, it doesn’t really matter — those that I know I love dearly, my father, mother, and my brothers and sister. Beyond that, I do not know them. I do not care what the ancestry was. Makes no difference to me whatsoever. My only real ancestor is God, and I must awaken as God. Everyone must awaken to discover himself the author of it all, and that is God.1073 ¶16

So now he comes down and they say, “You are mad and you have a devil.” He said, “I am not mad.” Said, “You are a Samaritan and you have a demon.” Said, “I am not, I do not have a demon.” Didn’t deny he was a Samaritan. That was the lowest of the caste to be a Samaritan. So they denied he was a Jew when he claimed he was a Jew, but he did not argue the point when he was called a Samaritan, which meant the very lowest of the caste.1073 ¶17

Then he said to them, “If you follow me, you will never die.” Well, he said, “After all, Abraham our father died, and the prophets died, and you are saying that if we follow you, we will never die.” He’s telling them, “I am the resurrection and the life.” If you follow this footstep that I’ve just laid down in these concentrated statements, if you follow them and they awaken within you, you will never die. You will awaken completely. And when you awaken here and people call you dead, you will not return anymore to a little garment that is restored in a world just like this. You will enter the new age, the age of eternity.1073 ¶18

Then he said to them, “But your father Abraham rejoiced that he was to see my day. He saw it and was glad.” They said, “You saw our father Abraham? Why, you’re not yet fifty. Did Abraham see you, or you see Abraham?” And then he answered, he answered now in this manner: “Before Abraham was, I am.” Behold, before the whole vast play was conceived, I am. I am the author of it. And they took up stones to stone him, but he hid, for that is the verdict — if anyone blasphemes the name of God, he must be stoned to death, as told us in the law of Moses. So they only fulfill scriptures.1073 ¶19

He is telling them that he is the being of whom the prophets wrote. He is the being of whom Moses in the law spoke. He is the Lord God Jehovah. That’s what he’s telling them, that there is no other God. But they see a man, not knowing that the man is only the part in which that seed is unfolding. And in this case, it completely unfolded. But they have not yet internal eyes. They do not have the inner eyewitness to see eternity. He opens the eye from within that you may look into the immortal worlds, look into eternity, into the worlds of thought, and see reality. They have not yet had the eye open from within. When the eye is open from within, the man you know as your friend, with whom you dine and wine and have fun — when he has completely awakened from within, if your eye is open, though you knew him and still know him as a friend, or he still wears the garment, you will have moments of experience in that world where you will see him as he really is to be seen. And you’ll see God. You will see that burning one, for he is the burning one. He is radiant light. That’s what he is. And he is not — I wouldn’t say not anything, but he’s not what the world thinks him to be. Human face, yes. A human voice, yes. Human hand, yes. Don’t go beyond that. You’re a fiery being, yet human. The face is human. The voice is human. The hands are human. But don’t go beyond that. That’s the being that you are. The being that you are destined to be.1073 ¶20

The being that’s going to come out of this body that must go back to the dust. That’s why we use the symbol of the butterfly and the caterpillar. The butterfly has wings and takes off into an entirely different element from the caterpillar. So the caterpillar must die, that that which is buried within it, unknown to itself, must come out. And that is God himself. That’s only a symbol of what’s going to take place in everyone in this world. Not one will fail.1073 ¶21

So, “Before Abraham was, I am,” and yet you’re not yet fifty. All right, so you’re judging appearances, and before Abraham was, he saw my day and he rejoiced, and he was glad. What day? The day of eschatology, the end of the journey. We begin with Abraham. Abraham was the man of faith, and biblical faith is faith in God, and God’s only name is I AM. So he had faith in I AM, and a promise was made to him, in spite of your years, “You will be a father of a son and his name will be called Isaac.” And the word Isaac means “he laughs.” You wait, you’re going to have it at the appointed hour, and when you hold him, he’s going to laugh. A little infant just born, and suddenly breaks into the most heavenly smile. He laughs, laughs out completely. And that promise will be held true. It’ll be proven true in time, because every word of God proves true.1073 ¶22

So Abraham saw it, as you’re told in Galatians, that the scripture — and now the scripture becomes a person — the scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the heathen, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham. So if the scripture preached, that the scripture becomes now a person — it becomes, but it is a person because it is the word of God. It is God made manifest in the written form, and it preached the story of the gospel, the good news, beforehand, to whom? To Abraham. So he saw my day and he rejoiced that he was to see my day and he was glad. He actually saw it and walked by faith only. Faith in what? Faith in God. He heard it said that he actually would have that child, and so he walked with faith in God, and that is faith in himself.1073 ¶23

So everyone here should rejoice at one in this audience should have had a vision of that nature. I am telling you, you’re all going to have it. You would not be here as consistent as you are, night after night, month after month, if you were not on the verge of these experiences. Others may say, “So what about the other millions? What does it matter?” Everyone will have it in time. This is the most precious, the most unique thing in the world, and you do not take that which is unique and throw it to the swine. They’re not swine as pigs, but they’re not ready for it. They’re really not ready for it. The day will come they will be. Then they’ll be called one by one into a circle just like this. And maybe you will be the one telling the story from experience.1073 ¶24

When you speak from experience, you speak with authority. You’re not speaking from hearsay. You’re not speaking by speculating as to what it ought to be, as so many brilliant minds do. If I could show you even in what is called the grandfather of all biblical interpretations — and here these scholars, when the son of man is lifted up, they all say it means when he was lifted up on the cross. What about the other two on the cross? They ignore that completely. This is the cross. There never was another cross. When a little child is born, at that moment of birth he is crucified. That is the Lord who became man. Why? That man may become God. And so that was the actual seed of God, that which is imperishable, but it has to fall into this ground, this cross, and die before it is made alive. And when it’s made alive, it bears much fruit.1073 ¶25

Now, you can take what you heard tonight, profound as it is in a spiritual sense, and apply it to the most practical thing in this world, right here, because you’re only dealing with one cause. If you’re going to turn to another cause, you have two gods. There is only one God here. “O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one.” The minute you have a second god, you have a devil. You’re going to blame something outside of yourself for the things that happen in your world. And the minute you blame another, you give him the power to create confusion in your world. And there is no other. This whole thing is egocentric. The whole vast world is God pushed out. Well, do you see a world? Well, it’s God pushed out. Pushed out from where? From wherever you are — that’s where it is, wherever you are.1073 ¶26

So I say to you tonight, if you know what you would like to be, dare to assume that you are it. Don’t wait to become it. Sleep as though you were already the one that you want to be, and in that assumption, fall to sleep. And then have faith in that — that is faith in God. Have faith in no one on the outside. They’re only things bearing witness to you.1073 ¶27

For “in him was life, and the life was the light of men.” So men are made conscious and animated in your world because of the life in you. The day will come that life in you will make itself known. You will feel it, and you will arrest it, and all those who seem so alive and independent of your perception of them will stand still. You will arrest it and they’ll all stand still, as still as things in a museum, all the sculptures in a museum, all stand still — it’s all within you. You release it and they all become reanimated, and they continue to do what they intend to do. But you can change that intention when you still them. And when you release it, they will actually continue, but not to fulfill their former intention — the new intention. And they’ll believe that they initiated the new intention. Therefore, you are solely responsible for the things that happen in your life. The whole vast world stands upon God, and God is his own wonderful human imagination. That is what I’m trying to get over.1073 ¶28

And so I thank her for sharing with me this wonderful experience of hers, and to go back in time to the point where she tried to change a very dear one in her life and felt she had failed, and then turned to self to change, and changing self came a vision which frightened her. It disturbed her. Well, here she is, flat on her back on the ground and stretched out like a cross, and then chained to the ground. And then it would come without warning, and it never once came but it disturbed her. And then one day she thought, I would take a closer look, to find it was not only chained to the ground but locks on it. She was lost in it. And then she rose out of it, and as she rose, it sank down into the earth from whence it was taken. So I’ve told you, as Blake has told you, eternity exists, and all things in eternity, independent of creation, which was an act of mercy. All these things are part of the eternal structure of this world of earth. It’s part of it. You bring them out.1073 ¶29

My wife one night had a vision. It’s so scary, she would not allow it to go beyond the first few paces. Here were doors, but there were not doors, there were panels. She found herself in this wonderful grove. And here the panels became animated, and out of these panels came human forms. There were only panels, and here came the dance of life. And as they came out, they were beautiful. Each figure was so altogether lovely, and each began to dance. And she — this is the dance of life. And then suddenly it changed into the most dramatic, tragic dance. She was so scared that she woke herself. She was beginning to see the mystery. The word “panel” in scripture is the same word translated “rib,” and he took a rib from Adam and out of that he made woman. Well, the word “rib” means “paddle” — it comes out and takes on human form and seems independent of your perception of it, and comes this dramatic thing, and it scared her, and she woke, but recorded what she had seen.1073 ¶30

This whole vast world came out of you. The world is yourself pushed out, because you are the God of scripture. You are the Lord God Jehovah, personified for us in the New Testament as Jesus. The word Jesus is Yeshua, the same root as Jehovah — Yeshua. It means Jehovah, which is translated “the Lord is salvation,” and he is in you. So because he is in you, find out who he is and trust him implicitly, and give all your trust to him.1073 ¶31

So what do you want? He is capable of doing anything in this world. What do you want? Name it. And then, as you name it, assume that you are it. Sleep in that assumption as though it were true. Wake in that assumption tomorrow, though it’s denied you by your senses, as though it’s true, and prepare to receive it in your world. And may I tell you, no power in the world can stop it, because there is no other power but God, and God is your own wonderful human imagination. Now let us go into the silence.1073 ¶32