God Only Acts

Tonight’s subject is “God Only Acts.” You may ask, how could a thoughtful man born as we were born and who will die as we will die know that? Yet I tell you I know it from experience. I told you in the card that I sent you that this is on the Word of God. I have experienced the Word of God, so tonight I will tell you, and I will tell you from my own personal experience how I know that God alone acts.320 ¶1

The name of God is the key to understanding the biblical doctrine of God. In biblical terms, the question is not, “Does God exist?” but, “Who is our God?” What is his name and what is his Son’s name? For Israel, the personal name of God is I AM. You can read that in scripture, as I read it in scripture, but I didn’t know it until I experienced it.320 ¶2

Let us go back tonight to an experience of mine that took place in 1929. It was in the summer of ’29. Before I quote the passage from the 82nd Psalm, let me say that the editor of the most scholarly of all high criticisms of scripture, his name was Thomas K. Cheyne; he was the editor of the Encyclopedia Biblica. You will find this statement concerning the book in both the Americana that is the great dictionary, American dictionary, and great British dictionary, called Britannica, that it is by far the most scholarly of all higher biblical criticisms. This is what he said of the 82nd Psalm. He said, “It makes the strongest demands on the historical Imagination of the interpreter. The ideas may be perennial, but the outer forms are no longer understood.”320 ¶3

Now let me quote the passages in this Psalm that disturbed this great professor. He was the outstanding biblical professor of the day at Oxford University, a master of the Hebrew tongue. He interpreted the entire Old Testament from the original scripture. And here was this master, in his day the giant, and he’s still considered…his book of Psalms as we have in our library is still considered tops in translation. When he said, “It’s the greatest demand of all Psalms on the historic Imagination of the interpreter.” He confesses that the ideas there may be perennial, and still they are, but then he said as far as understanding them they have long been forgotten to man.320 ¶4

Now there are two verses in the very short Psalm that disturbed the great professor, the first and the sixth. The first is this, “God has taken his place in the divine council; in the midst of the gods he holds judgment.” That’s the first verse. In the sixth, “I say you are gods, sons of the Most High, all of you; nevertheless, you shall die like men, and fall as one man, O princes.” You read it in your 82nd Psalm.320 ¶5

Now the crux of the interpretation hangs upon the meaning that the interpreters will give to the word Elohim. And may I tell you, I have read so many commentaries, I have many exegeses at home, and they differ widely. Yet the word Elohim is simply stated in scripture as God. It’s a plural word. It first appears in the very first verse of Genesis. “In the beginning God…” that’s the first time it appears; it’s singular, yet the word is plural. In the 26th verse it reappears, and here we find the word now plural, “And God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.’” Here we find it now in its plural form. In this 82nd Psalm, the word Elohim appears twice, in the first verse and then in the 6th verse. In the 1st verse, “And God has taken his place in the divine council; in the midst of the gods”—that’s plural—“he holds judgment.”320 ¶6

Well, the historic Imagination is concerned only with the facts of secular history. There is no record on earth…even though no history book agrees with another history book on the same event, still they were facts. We know that the Battle of Waterloo was fought, we know the Civil War here was fought, the 1st and 2nd World Wars were fought, and now we’re fighting another one. But no historian in telling the story of these events will tell it in the same manner. They will see it through different eyes, but they were recording facts.320 ¶7

I say, in the midst of changing theories and opinions of men in secular history, stands the unchanging Word of God. Secular history is over; it’s finished. The time is fulfilled now for it to be fulfilled in us. So, secular history is over, secular history a changing thing that will tomorrow fade and vanish like the grass. It will wither like the grass and vanish and fade like the flowers. No matter how big a nation is today it will tomorrow vanish. No matter how big you are you’re going to be rubbed out completely like some footstep on the little sand as the waves come in. But salvation history is forever. So in the midst of these changing theories and opinions of secular history stands the unchanging salvation history of God. This is literally true.320 ¶8

I’ve just quoted you from the 82nd Psalm. I experienced it in the summer of l929. Now here is my experience of this…and I know that God only acts. So when Blake wrote that memorable fancy of his, called The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, he wasn’t exercising his right as the poet when he said, “God only acts and is in existing beings or men.” And when he advanced it into Jerusalem, in his greatest of all poems, and he said, “Let us to him who only is, and who walks among us, give decision.” The only actor is God. God alone acts and there is no other actor.320 ¶9

Now if you remember what I said when I quoted that passage from the 82nd, “I say you are gods, sons of the Most High, all of you; nevertheless, you will die like men and fall as one man, O princes.” Now, “God takes his place in the divine council and in the midst of the gods he holds judgment.” Is this literally true? Well, the great scholars up to this day cannot by their scholars’ Imagination encompass that statement, they can’t. Until it’s revealed, they cannot by all of their knowledge of the tongue, called the Hebrew tongue, or the Greek tongue, or any tongue with which this thing was revealed, they cannot grasp it. It is not part of the facts of secular life.320 ¶10

But here is my experience. I was a dancer in that day. It was just before the great financial crash enveloped our country for almost twelve years. We didn’t come out of it until the 2nd World War and everything collapsed. But I was a successful dancer, successful about making money and pulling my own. I was sound asleep in my hotel room in New York City when I was taken in Spirit into this divine council.320 ¶11

Now the phrase translated “divine council” if you look up the words in the King James Version, they translate that as “the congregation of the mighty, the mighty ones.” You go further and it is called “the synagogue, the church.” He stands in his church, the synagogue; the synagogue being the assembly of the mighty ones, those who are called by name, the called ones by name; and then ordered and commanded by word. It’s the point whence motion proceeds. You are going to be actually sent after you are called. I’m giving you now the definitions of the words as given to us in the biblical concordance, which is Strong’s Concordance.320 ¶12

The mighty ones…when I entered this wonderful assemblage of mighty ones, I saw one, the personification of infinite might. Others were around, all the assemblage of the gods. I was taken to this heavenly woman, and there she was with an enormous ledger open. She was seated. I stood at her left side. She turned and looked me in the eyes. She didn’t say one word; I said nothing. I simply looked and she looked as though she looked for confirmation, for the word is “the called ones by name.” She looked, then she looked back at the ledger, and with a long quill pen there she either entered or checked off, I do not know which. I knew she made a motion on the ledger as she looked at me.320 ¶13

Then I was taken before God, the risen Christ, infinite love. As I stood before him I felt nothing but love. He asked the most simple question in the world, “What is the greatest thing in the world?” and I answered in the words of Paul, “Faith, hope and love, these three, but the greatest of these is love.” With that he embraced me; we fused and became one body, not two, one, infinite love. I wore the human form divine, which is love, fused with God and no one can put us asunder. At that moment I was one with God, and no power in the world can separate me from the love that is God with which I am fused. We’re wearing the same body.320 ¶14

As I was embraced, a voice out of space came and the voice said, “Down with the bluebloods.” I heard the voice but I saw no face. And then I found myself before the embodiment of might…the mighty ones, now gathered as one. When God first reveals himself to man he reveals himself as God Almighty: He said, “I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, as God Almighty, but by my name the Lord (which is I AM) I did not make myself known unto them.” So here, I stood before God in his appearance as Almighty God. He didn’t commune with me as God in the appearance of love did; didn’t ask any questions. Now comes the order, as the word Mighty God is translated in the concordance. He doesn’t ask me anything, he commands it, and the words were “Time to act!” Then I was whisked out of that divine assemblage and found myself back in the secular world of man, where I knew I was born here and I will die here.320 ¶15

I didn’t know then, but I searched the scriptures, that it was the fulfillment of the 82nd Psalm, “I say you are gods, sons of the Most High, all of you; but you will die like men and fall as one man, O princes.” So I said earlier that the name of God is the key to the interpretation of the doctrine of God in the Bible and to Israel that name is I AM. So the word “the Lord”—and he reveals himself to the state called Moses—-is “I AM.” “Say unto them I AM has sent you.” But how do I know I AM has sent me? Well, I saw it. Is this really I AM who sent me? Who did he send? He sent me. Well, who is this mighty one that sent me? He was mighty…and here I am told it contains all the gods…and you and I fell. Listen to the words, “You will fall as one man, O princes.”320 ¶16

Now the word Yod He Vau He, which we translate I AM, its primary meaning is “to fall, or to cause to fall; or to blow, or to cause the wind to blow.” That’s the primary meaning of the word Yod He Vau He. We mustn’t forget that when we read scripture. Here is one being containing all of us, and the one who fell caused the fall. This is no after-thought, all predetermined…the way that God expands. So the one God, containing the gods, all of us, sons of the Most High, fell. He fell and caused to fall, confident that he contained the power to rise from this world of sin and death. And the first comes out, then the second comes out, the third comes out. It was one in the beginning; it’ll be one in the end. We’re gathered one by one, O people of Israel. As we are told in Isaiah, “I gather you one by one, O people of Israel.” So we are all gathered back into the same oneness that we were before the fall, but enhanced infinitely by the experience of the fall into the world of sin and death.320 ¶17

So everyone here, when I look at you it seems so insane to tell you this, I say you are gods, all of you, sons of the Most High, yet, nevertheless you shall die like men—who doesn’t die here like a man—and fall as one man. The one Rock fragmented into these infinite pieces, and then all are put together again to reform into the one man, this time transcending himself before the fall.320 ¶18

So the word that came to me was “Time to act.” So I say, in everyone is the actor; the only actor in this world is God. God is playing all the parts. God is acting. And it seems at moments a horrible part of the drama; at moments it’s a pleasant part of the drama. And then you have moments where you are on the wing and nothing is happening. But at every moment God is acting. The most horrible situation in the world, only God is playing the parts. And when I tell you it has sprung from a God that is love it seems incredible. Yet I stood before the God of love, and the God of love embraced me, and I fused with him. We not only became one, we are one. You can’t see the body that I wear through mortal eyes; these eyes die. You’ll need other eyes to see the garment that I wear, for there’s no divorce. Let no man put asunder what God has joined together. And we are brought back one by one and united with him. As we’re told in scripture, “He who is united to the Lord becomes one spirit with him.” So when you are united to the Lord you are one spirit with him, and no man or organization can put asunder that which God has joined together. We’re joined to the oneness, one by one.320 ¶19

When he said, “God only acts and is in existing beings or men,” this was not taking liberty as the poet would with words. He saw a vision and he told it in his own wonderful way…as he could really use words. I wish I had the talent in the world of men to use words as Blake did, for I could tell that same vision but no more beautifully than he has told it, “God only acts and is in existing beings or men.” He must have heard the identical words, “Time to act.”320 ¶20

Now if you are here for the first time, you might wonder, “What were the words ‘Down with the bluebloods’?” And because of your conditioned mind, you might think it means down with the social world. Hasn’t a thing to do with that. The bluebloods throughout history has been church protocol, the external trappings of the world that is a substitute for religion. All the so-called outward trappings, all the doctrines, the rituals, these, this is called collectively “the blueblood.” Down with it! I did not receive my knowledge of scripture from any man in this world, and my authority to preach it is not from any organization in the world. It came, as it did through Paul, by a revelation of Jesus Christ.320 ¶21

When he unveiled himself before me, I answered correctly and he embraced me, in fulfillment now of the gospel. “And when they bring you into the synagogue before the rulers, do not be anxious how or what you are to answer or what you are to say; for the Holy Spirit will teach you in that very hour what you ought to say.” You are divinely prompted. I heard no words. It came automatically, as though I’d been so well-rehearsed in what I ought to say that when this moment in time comes for you to answer, like an actor stepping on the stage, he does it automatically. He doesn’t take thought as to what he’s going to say. So take no thought; do not be anxious how or what you’re going to answer and what you’re going to say, for the Holy Spirit will in that very hour teach you what you ought to say, and you say it. Divinely prompted you couldn’t make a mistake. So no one is going to falter when they’re brought into the great assemblage of the gods.320 ¶22

You will see only two, really, there are others, but in the end there are only two: the one who embraces you, the risen Christ, who’s infinite love, and then the one who is the same presence, revealed only as might, God Almighty, El Shaddai. And that’s all that he is, infinite might without compassion, and the other, infinite love, nothing but compassion, and yet the same being. So “I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob, as God Almighty, but by my name the Lord (which is I AM) I did not make myself known unto them.” But, beyond that comes the greatest revelation, when he reveals himself as the Father. God is the Father, with the heart of a father. He could never be envious of a child, for he’d be proud of his son. He couldn’t in any way hold back his son from accomplishment; he would simply be proud of his son. So here, we are the sons of the Most High, all of us. Not one will be lost, not one in all my holy mountain.320 ¶23

So now, here on this level, while we are in the world of Caesar, there must be some use I can put to this vision. For here, while I wait to be called into the divine assemblage for no one knows—for he who fell is the one who caused the fall, and he who blew is the one who caused the wind to blow. So he is the wind and the causer of the wind blowing. And that is God’s elective love; the secret remains with God. No one knows this night where the wind…the uncertain nature of the wind’s course. Who knows how it will come this night and breathe upon you? If it breathes upon you, you awaken. You can’t stop it, there’s no resistance; you’re taken in spirit into the divine assemblage. “And so as the wind blows where it will, and you hear the sound of it, but you cannot know whence it comes or where it goes; so it is with every one who is born of the Spirit.” And the very word wind and Spirit are one in both Hebrew and Greek. The same word is used for both wind and Spirit. So no one knows when it’s going to happen, and it comes in the same unpredictable manner.320 ¶24

You don’t know…it’s so strange how it comes. Here I was a dancer, sleeping, and then suddenly, of all people, why should I be chosen? I was not a member of a church, not schooled in what is called some religious training, and trying to keep myself afloat without turning to others to help, and suddenly I am chosen. So the secret of God’s elective love remains his secret.320 ¶25

And so, it is simply a state. Alright, we are called, as we are told in Romans, we’re called according to his purpose. “For those whom he foreknew”—he foreknew us all, then—“he predestined us to be conformed to the image of his Son. And those whom he predestined he called; and those whom he called he justified; and those whom he justified he also glorified.” Well, these five terms, foreknew, predestined, called, justified and glorified, add up to a very strong affirmation of predestination. I know of no way you can take the five terms and interpret them to avoid a conclusion of predestination. You try it. Those whom he foreknew he predestined; those whom he predestined he called; those whom he called he justified; those whom he justified he glorified.320 ¶26

The implication is a gift of himself to the one that he glorifies. Justification is divine acquittal. No matter what you have done in the world of Caesar, and what haven’t we done; no man is without sin, but no man. No man can say that he hasn’t violated the commands of God…especially when we read that they must be done psychologically. For “You’ve heard it said, ‘You must not commit adultery. But I say the one who looks lustfully on a woman has already committed the act of adultery with her in his heart.’” Well, what man is not guilty? What woman is not guilty? If I take the name man generically, what individual in this world is not guilty of violating that commandment? Yet, he will justify him and in justifying him vindicate him. It’s divine vindication. And the minute you are completely vindicated by the embrace of him, you are glorified in his presence; you are one with God. From then on, you aren’t two, you’re only one.320 ¶27

So on this level, we take that command “Time to act!” and then we read scripture, “Drink no more water; take a little wine for your stomach’s sake and your many infirmities.” Well, water is a psychological symbol of psychological knowledge. It’s a symbol of psychological knowledge. I come into the field and there’s a well, and a stone covers the well. I roll the stone away and draw water and water my flock, then I roll the stone back. The stone is a symbol of literal truth. The water is a symbol of psychological interpretation of the literal fact. Now I turn it into wine, as told us in the 2nd chapter of John. I take the water and I draw forth water, but the water doesn’t come out, I draw wine. Wine is the application of the truth that I have heard.320 ¶28

So, if I have heard that I must repent…the very first word used “repent”…well, repent is to change my attitude towards life. I change it radically. Well, if I see you and you are not well and I’m going to help you, I’ve got to actually persuade myself that I have just seen the most wonderful embodiment of health that I’ve ever encountered concerning you, and so persuade myself that that is fact, when I meet you when I think of you I can only see that. But, I only see this new being in my mind’s eye relative to you. Well, then I’m not drinking water any more, I’ve applied it. I am now drinking wine for the afflictions of my world. So I go through life simply taking wine.320 ¶29

I’ve absorbed all the water that I could take. I have taken all the literal facts of life, turned them into the psychological truths that they represent, and then instead of absorbing more and more of these truths, stop it. Start now drinking a little wine: start applying the little knowledge that you have. And so you go out to repent. Not to feel remorseful, not to feel regretful for anything you have done, but to see those in need…which is only yourself pushed out, for we are one.320 ¶30

We started in the divine assemblage and we all fell as one man, and it became fragmented. When we’re all gathered together again it will still be one man and that one man is God. There is only God. So while we are fragmented and think there is another, we are at war with self. Now I see an aspect of myself and I heard that he really isn’t another, he really is but an aspect. Well, I don’t want this little finger to be hurting me all the time. The whole body hurts. If I say, “Well, after all, that doesn’t matter, I’ll cut it off” I’m just simply chopping off a part of myself. So you need discard no one in this world. We simply change the one that formerly we would have discarded as something that could not be redeemed. Everything is redeemable.320 ¶31

So we take every person in this world and change them in our own mind’s eye, and change them in us radically. We wait for a moment, to find it conforming to the change that took place in us, and the whole vast world only mirrors and echoes the changes taking place in us. So we stop simply drinking more and more water, by absorbing more and more of the psychological meanings of scripture, and we apply the little that we know. The application is now drinking wine. So we will drink wine from now on, and simply change our world to conform to the ideal that we would like to have in our world, the world in which we want to live.320 ¶32

And that is acting; therefore, God only acts and is in existing beings or men. If you don’t act upon what you have as knowledge, then God is simply asleep within you. As you’re told in scripture, “Rouse thyself! Why sleepest thou, O Lord? Awake! Do not cast us off forever.” “Wake, O sleeper, and rise from the dead.” If we don’t act, we are asleep, and we’re likened unto the dead. But to hear what we ought to do and to do it, is to begin to stir and come alive within ourselves.320 ¶33

So I say to everyone, I know this from experience. I am not theorizing, I’m not speculating; I am telling you what I know from experience. I have experienced scripture. I have experienced the Word of God. I can’t tell anyone in this world what it feels like. Not to the real extent that I would like to tell you what it feels like to have experienced scripture, to see how true it is…that everything here changes, all things fade.320 ¶34

There are those who have a billion and they want two billion. One young man is suing his father for a part of a trust fund that is already 300 million, and the father already owns one billion, and he doesn’t want to release one penny of it. The boy is thirty-one years old; the father is now seventy-six. He doesn’t know how near he is to where he [...], but he doesn’t want one penny of it taken from him. The son could use some of it…it belongs to the son. He’ll have none of it. Money is not for that purpose, he thinks. Money is to hold on to and invest until it grows. And the old story in the Bible, “O foolish man, your soul is required of you this night.” But he doesn’t know it.320 ¶35

So he holds on to a trust fund that his mother left not only to him but to his offspring. So he has offspring. And the three and a half million has grown in thirty-four years to almost $300 million. He’s been a very good steward, watching it carefully, protecting it and developing it. In thirty-four years three and a half million has grown to 300 million. Well, now one of the four entitled to his portion of it is asking for a portion, seven million, but seven million out of 300 million when he’s entitled to one-fourth of it. And the father…he has to bring suit…sue your own father that you love, at least I hope he does, in order to get him to cough up what is his own, and he is resisting it.320 ¶36

So I say to you, all this will fade. His billions will fade. Our fabulous world that we love so much, it will all fade like the grass. The grass will wither and the flowers fade, but the Word of God will remain true forever. This is the unchanging truth in the midst of these changing things in the secular world.320 ¶37

So when they say, “Is God is dead?” or “God is dead” and they make a very affirmative statement, it’s so stupid. But you can’t blame them, they have not experienced scripture. The very ones who made that bold affirmation are still gods. “I say you are gods,” not a few of you who will say God is alive, “I say you are gods, sons of the Most High, all of you; nevertheless, you will die like men and you will fall as one man, O princes.” If you’re a prince, then your father is a king. He is the King of Kings. And collectively we are the King, for the Father and the Son are one. So when we come back from our fragmented state in this world and all gather together once more, we form the one God. There’s only God.320 ¶38

So when Blake was asked, “What do you think of Jesus?” he didn’t hesitate, he said, “Jesus is the only God,” but then he quickly added, “But so am I, and so are you.” There’s no division in God. Although the Elohim is a plural word and, therefore it’s a compound unity, one made up of others, it is still one. So when asked, “What is the greatest commandment?” he didn’t mention the ten, or any one of the ten. He mentioned the confession of faith of the Israelite, “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord.” If you take the word, there are ten words. They are the Ten Commandments: “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord.” This is the greatest Commandment. And the second is tied in to the first, “Love thy neighbor as thyself.” For there is no other; he’s not really another.320 ¶39

So here this night, I tell you from experience that God only acts and is. So the most horrible act this night, it was God asleep; the most loving act is the same God in the act of waking. And the day will come, you and I will leave this world of sin and death and return where we were before, but our translucency is then enhanced. We were expanded beyond what we were prior to our fall into this world, which was a deliberate fall, it wasn’t an accident. It was something that was planned in the beginning: God’s way of expansion by self-limitation. He achieves his purpose by limiting himself to the limit called man, which is the limit of contraction; and then he breaks the shell and not only returns to what he was but beyond it, by such contraction.320 ¶40

So everyone will be saved. And there’s only one Savior and he’s housed right within you. “God is our salvation. Our God is the God of salvation; and to God the Lord, belongs escape from death”—the 68th Psalm. To God, the Lord, belongs escape from death and this is the world of sin and death. So, “Nevertheless, you shall die like men”—this is the world—“and fall as one man, O princes.” But because God is the God of salvation and to God, the Lord, belongs escape from death, and he who fell is within you, then be assured of redemption. You cannot fail. No one can fail.320 ¶41

But why not in the world of Caesar use what has been revealed to the nth degree in making for yourself and those you love around you a more beautiful world by acting; and no longer absorbing and drinking the psychological meaning of scripture but putting it in to practice by applying this law that you know. Now let us go into the Silence.320 ¶42

* * * [...] scripture from any school or any man. I simply read it now having had the experience only for confirmation of the experience. So my experiences parallel scripture. Now are there any questions, please?320 ¶43