Who Is Jesus Christ

Do you not believe in the historicity of Jesus Christ? A letter came this week, and the gentleman is here tonight. I’m glad he is, because it would take too long a letter to answer his letter. But he said: I was there last Friday, and during the question period a lady asked the question concerning the historical Jesus, and from your answer I gather that you said no — you do not accept the historical Jesus. I would go along with that. But do you not believe in the historical aspects in this, say, of — well, Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, or even, say, Neville — relative to your two omnipresent deeds? But tonight I’ll try to show you what I mean, based upon my own experience concerning the story of Jesus Christ. For as I am concerned, it’s the only reality. The only reality. And what you and I call the reality here, to me are shadows. All these are shadows.1188 ¶1

I’ll give you the story of a very humble poet, painter, mystic, essayist. We know him best as A.E. — the initials A.E. He was George Butler, the Irishman. And in his work called The Candle of Vision, he tells this experience. He said: Where it happened I will not tell you, but I will tell you what I painted. I entered an enormous hall, vaster than any cathedral, and these columns were made of living, trembling opal — all opalescence, and they were trembling and alive. Between the columns were thrones, and on each throne sat a fire-crested king. They differed: one wore a crest made of fiery feathers; another, the dragon. And he painted the word picture of the different ones. On the floor was this figure — a dark figure. And two kings passed their hands over the dark figure. As they passed their hands over it, their hands became fire, and fire came from their hands over this figure. And out of that dark figure rose a body — as tall, as huge, as majestic, as glorious as any of the others seated on their throne. And when he rose, he became aware of the hall and his kin, and raised his hand in greeting them. And they in turn raised theirs in greeting to him. He had returned from his long journey through darkness into the hall once more from which he departed. And all together moved towards the end of the hall like a burst of light — like the sun itself — and all vanished into the sun. Beings of light.1188 ¶2

I tell you: you did not begin in your mother’s womb. You came down from heaven to experience death — to experience what you could not experience in any other way. You have a premortal existence. You are, and always have been, a son of God. The word God in Hebrew is a compound unity. The word is Elohim. The Bible begins with the word: In the beginning, God — and that word is Elohim. It’s a plural word, a compound unity, one made up of our Father. We are the fragmented God in this world. Now, the call has gone out: bring my sons from afar, and my daughters from the ends of the earth. And we are called, and being called, one by one, and we are awakened after these dark garments, and we are the King, the Son of God. We were, prior to the dream that we are having here.1188 ¶3

So do I not believe in Jesus Christ? But tonight I’ll show you who he is. I think — I can — God Himself came and comes into human history in the person of Jesus Christ, but whenever he comes, he is invisible to mortal eyes, completely invisible. He is the hidden Christ, who will manifest himself only to a few mystics. The reason for it, so we are told, in the 14th chapter of John, when he said, “I will manifest myself to you” — Judas, not Iscariot, the one that is called Thaddaeus (well, here it is, Judah, the same word meaning “praise”) — and he said to him, “Lord, how is it that you will manifest yourself to us, and are you not to the world?” And then he answered, “Those who love me are loved by my Father, and they keep my word. They received the word” — or, the word is not mine, but the word of him who sent me. What word? Our discussion — they know the word is simply fulfilling Scripture. We are here to fulfill Scripture, as a man fulfills Scripture. He tells it; not everyone will receive it. The majority will deny it, and to them the man is insane.1188 ¶4

Those who believe in the historicity of Jesus Christ as a man born in some unnatural manner two thousand years ago will not accept the true story of Jesus Christ. They will not accept the fact that Christ is now buried in every child born of woman. It is the only doctrine — previously, the little form that he wears is the only cross that he ever wore. This is the cross that he wears, where he is buried in the human scar, and from the human scar he rises. And when he rises from that grave, everything said of him in Scripture, that individual in whom he rose, is experiencing it now. He tells it; very few will receive it. Very few, he will make himself manifest to — these few receivers, and they will see him, and there will be no uncertainty as to what they say they know to be Jesus’ life.1188 ¶5

So do I believe in him? Certainly, as he individualized, certainly you were going to be Jesus Christ, and yet your identity has not changed. You are completely individualized. We are the sons of God, and it rested in the same manner. That’s what I saw; that’s what I see. I do not see one being where it is all gathered together, and all of that identity. No, repeat: it is Jesus Christ, the same one, yet playing a different part in the body of God. All one body, one spirit, one Lord, one God and Father of all. So if I believe even the historicity — I certainly do, in this sense — but only in this: that it is taking place now in the world. He is being awakened in men, awakened in women, and as he arises in them, he is the same Jesus Christ spoken of in Scripture, and while he walks the earth he will have witnesses to it. They will see him and know him to be Jesus Christ.1188 ¶6

And when he departs this world — before the last time he will appear — then to many. He refers to the one called Peter, who is not a man; Peter is a state of consciousness. Then he appears to the disciples; they are not men, they are states of consciousness. Then he appears to over five hundred. Then he appeared to James. Then he appears to the apostles. Then he appeared last of all to Paul. These are all states of consciousness; they all must bear witness of who he is. He knows, because he has the experience of it. He talked about where he rose from his body, and his brother who preceded him in the rising — we did it, and he raises his hands in greeting to his brother. He hadn’t seen him since the journey began, and now the darkness is over, and he’s returned to the right, and they all meet him, and then together we all move into the right, at the heights of the great place where first he was — he lay there, dreaming the entire dream of life.1188 ¶7

So it took six thousand years. So what is six thousand years? He was told, in the beginning, you were taking six thousand years — but what would be six thousand years, when a thousand years is as a day in the eyes of God? They take you six days in the world of tourists, six thousand, and the horrors and things that you will do — and everything man has ever done, you will do. No one tell you that you’re so holy, so good, you’re going to avoid doing everything that man has ever done. It is discussed openly in the Bible.1188 ¶8

We take the most glorious character of the Old Testament, David. Reading carefully, you’ll find him in the Book of Samuel — two books — the Book of Kings — two books — the Book of Chronicles — two books. Read it; if you don’t think he’s a rascal, then I do not know what a rascal is. And yet he is God’s chosen one. There was an extortionist who goes to Nabal, the rich one, and he carries Nabal — the giving of money, a large sum of money, for protection. Well, that happens today: protection money — what protection? It came at the time of the sharing of the sheep, and Harris enabled this travesty, wealthy person, and now is the time to share the sheep, and he sends his messengers — David — asking for extortion money to protect him. Like someone come into you selling your little vegetables on the side, and you want protection money, and you say, “What? My people are nice people. They come, they pay in cash. If he doesn’t have cash tonight, I give him credit, because I’m more impressed by a penny.” And you say, “No, you need protection.” “I don’t need protection.” And then, within the week, you will know you need protection — they force kerosene oil all over your vegetables. Protection from whom? From the rascal. And he was the extortioner. Everything he said — Uriah into battle, knowing he would be killed, then he could get Bathsheba — then after, he simply foiled — you adopt Uriah — but Nabal, Nabal dropped dead from fright, and that he took Nabal’s wife before his neighbor’s eyes, each of his neighbor’s money — he married Abigail, did he not?1188 ¶9

So you take the character, and yet he always personifies humanity. Everything that men could ever conceive of doing, David did. Now you take all the generations of men, and all of their experiences, and actually congested into a single being, and projected — and that being is David. He is the son of God, who is playing all the thoughts of God. For God is made up of his son, and all the sons together, all the generations of men and all of their experiences, fused into a single being and personified, comes out as David. And David stands before you and calls you Father — then you know who you are. No one has ever seen God but his only son, who is dearest and nearest to his heart. He has made him known. For who is his son? Who is the one dearest to his heart? Are we not told in the Book of Acts, “I have found David, the son of Jesse, a man after mine own heart, who will do all my will.” And here is David, a man after my own heart who will do all my will, and he is the son of God. So when David stands and calls you Father, you know who you are — you were God.1188 ¶10

So the purpose of the whole thing is for God to give himself to his son, and raise his son to the level of the Father. That’s the purpose of the whole vast scheme. So God actually has a purpose, and he will not turn back until he has executed and accomplished the intents of his mind. In the latter days you will know it clearly, and that purpose is to give himself to you as though there was no one else in the world — just you, and you are God the Father. If God is our Father, then there was a child somewhere, and that child is David. So you have played, or are playing, or you’re going to play, all the parts in the world, so in the end you will say, “Forgive them, Father, for they know not what they do.”1188 ¶11

So, as far as this little garment — this is the garment in which I was born, from which I roam, from which, in the not-distant future, I will take off for the last time and move with my resurrected brothers into the fullness of light. This is the dark garment that all wear, whether the pigment be this color, black, yellow, pink, white. This is the dark garment in which we are dreaming, and we are buried in our scar — I mean, our scurvy remains — until one day we are called from the grave. Then who awakes? You, but how do you know who you are? Wait, it won’t take long — you’re awake, and in a matter of three and a half years you completely play within yourself the entire drama of Jesus Christ, and so you will know who Jesus Christ really is. No man looking at you can see Jesus Christ. You have to reveal yourself, make yourself manifest, to the one that you would unveil yourself to, and he sees you in spirit — he does not see you with the mortal eye.1188 ¶12

So when you are seen — a little innocent child of eight saw me; a lady who is now gone from this world, Martha, she saw me; there are two here tonight who saw me — one only recently saw me in the role of the part called Jesus Christ. I tell you, I’ve awakened from the dream. I know who I am. Yet this little garment still holds me, and will hold me until I take it off in the not-distant future. And I promise you, I will make myself manifest to you, and you will know it, or no one comes unto me save my Father calls him — but no one may be called in; he calls him for a purpose, and in that day I’ll make myself known. But while here, only to a few — well, so far I know of six to whom I’ve shown myself.1188 ¶13

A little one of eight, the innocent little one, and others grow in this world, and frankly, now they’re all women, as we’re told in Scripture. The one whose part was played by the male — but that is a state of consciousness. I’m not necessarily male, for Peter is simply a state of consciousness, and that was played by the little one, the innocent one, who was then only eight when she saw me in the road, and saw me as the King, as told in Scripture, and “I will wear the crown of righteousness, the crown of faith, I’ve kept the faith” — for all this was portion. Before I set sail I could not foresee what I learned, how the wind would sound after these things should be. I could not tell anyone while the journey was still in progress, until the end. Then I learned how that’s, for example — it’s a wind, a moan first, and then all of a sudden the whole thing unfolds within you, and you are the one spoken of in Scripture as Jesus Christ.1188 ¶14

So Jesus Christ is always invisible. He is the Christ, always the hidden Christ, and if you were to see him coming from without, you’re looking for the false one. You’ll never see him coming from without, by your mortal eyes. Today there are those great evangelists speaking to millions of people on TV, telling you the end of the world is coming, and they’re waiting for him to come on the outside — they’re looking in the wrong direction. He always comes from within. He rises from within the man in whom he is born, and he is buried in every child born of woman. That child couldn’t breathe, were it not that Christ is buried within him. Christ within him is his own wonderful human imagination. When he says “I am,” that flight — that’s God, but he’s asleep, and he’s dreaming the dream of life, and man is playing all these parts, even the extortioner. And who is doing it? God. Who is doing the murdering? God.1188 ¶15

Listen to the words in the 32nd chapter of Deuteronomy: “I, even I, am he; I kill, and I make alive; I wound, and I heal; and none can deliver out of my hand. I raise my hand to heaven, and cry, I live forever.” That is the Lord God Jehovah — he’s speaking in you. So anyone who kills with his eye, anyone who is made alive, I make him alive; anyone who wounds, I wound; anyone who heals, I heal; and there is none that can deliver out of my hand. There is only God in the world; there’s only one creative power in the world, and that creative power is your own wonderful human imagination. There is no other power; there is no other God.1188 ¶16

So the historicity — I say, God Himself came and comes, and don’t forget, turns into human history in the person of Jesus Christ, but whenever he comes — one of your awakens in a man — by “man” I mean generic man, male or female — as he awakens in that individual, he is invisible to mortal eyes. He is known to the one in whom he awakens as the one himself. It is he who tells his friends about it. But 99% will not believe it, because they know his origin, his physical origin, and so they will say, “Is this man Joseph’s son? Do we not know his parents? Do we not know his brothers and his sisters? What is he talking about, that he came down from heaven? How can he come down from heaven, when we know him? We know where he was born; we know everything about him.”1188 ¶17

So, to come back to the answer, my friend who wrote the letter, that his terrific — our historical Jesus — was not a name, I mean — the word Jesus means “Jehovah saved,” or “the Lord saving.” It could be John Brown, in whom he awakes. John Brown is known, the origin John is known, but he knows — that John Brown knows he isn’t John Brown, he knows who he is. When you awake, and your brothers meet you, are you going to identify yourself with that little garment on the floor from which you came? Yesterday you went through your door, and suddenly suffered from amnesia, and completely forgot who you are — your wife, your children, everything about you. No matter what the world does, it can’t bring you back to the memory of having a wife and having children. They can bring them before you, and you can’t recognize them; show you your own books, and you can’t recognize them; take you to the bank, you don’t recognize it, and you’re starving, and you have no money, and they can’t persuade you that you could sign a check — not with the name John Brown that you’ll now assume. You were, when you went into this state, you are Mr. Smith, but you do not know Mr. Smith; you only know John Brown, and here, under the name of Smith, you have a million dollars in the bank — you won’t believe it, and they can’t do a thing to bring you back to that memory. So then that memory returns — were you ever John Brown? When the memory returns, and you are the Lord Jesus Christ, will you ever — Neville — ?1188 ¶18

When the memory returns, and you are the father of David, and David’s father is Jesse, will you ever be anything other than Jesse? You know what Jesse means — the word Jesse means “Jehovah exists.” It is a form of the verb “to be” — in other words, “he who bears the name I AM.” That’s the Father of David, God’s name forever and forever is “I AM,” and there Jesse simply means, by actual definition, “Jehovah exists.” And so, when the veiling and memory returns, and here I’m looking right into my son’s face, and he’s David, and my memory returns down that: I am the Lord God Jehovah, and I believed that I was a little man who found it difficult to pay rent and to buy food and to do the normal things in Caesar’s world, and I, the father of David, and the father of David is Jehovah, the self-existing one, the eternal one, who owns all the cattle — a thousand hills are mine — and where I am hungry I wouldn’t tell you, I would slay nothing, for all are mine. And yet there were moments when I didn’t know where the next penny was coming from, because I suffered from amnesia. That’s why I went into that little garment, to pass through the world of darkness.1188 ¶19

And then comes that moment in time when you’re called from the grave, and you’ve awakened in the grave and come out of the grave, and you are the same tall, glorious, everlasting being that you were before you broke down and contracted yourself into that little body. All these things that you see, I tell you, they are giants; they are majestic in every sense of the word. The Egyptians built these things to their gods — huge, big images of God — they are dwarfed compared to those who wait for them, when you come out. And how could you come out of a thing that small and be so majestic, and be so fire-cresting, and so luminous — self-luminous was life in yourself — and they’re all waiting for you. And when you open your eyes, you recognize not only the place, but you recognize your kin. I’d raise your hands in salutation, and they raise their hands, and all together you move quickly, rapidly, into the waiting sun — that you — this is who you are. That’s your future; every one of you will awaken.1188 ¶20

So the call has gone out: bring my sons from afar, and my daughters from the ends of the earth — reading in the 43rd chapter of the Book of Isaiah: go and call them. The call has gone out, and not one will be long — not one can be held back. So when I awaken from this — that is called the historical thing — I will take it off, as a thing in which I lost my memory, and in wearing this, I forgot the being that I am. When I remembered who I am, must I still carry the memory of the thing that caused me to lose the memory of the being that I really am? So whatever historical claims made about this, this whole thing will vanish. This whole vast world will vanish like a dream, for it is a dream you are dreaming. This dream of life, for a purpose, you came into the limit of contraction called man, and then you will reach the end of the journey — as yours, it will be a horrible journey.1188 ¶21

Read it in the Book of Genesis: you will go into a land that is not yours, and in that land you will be enslaved, will be hurt, for four hundred years. It doesn’t mean four hundred years as you and I measure time. Four hundred is the numerical value of the last letter of the Hebrew alphabet — the letter is Tav. It has a symbol; the symbol of the four — that the last letter, whose numerical value is 400 — the symbol is a cross. This is the cross that I will wear for 400 years, in the sense that as long as I wear this, I am still within the journey. In the end, when I take it off for the last time, I return to the being I was before I started the journey.1188 ¶22

Am I not told in the 82nd Psalm: “God has taken his place in the divine council; in the midst of the gods he holds judgment.” And now he speaks the same word — the word translated “God” singular is Eloah; the word translated “God” in the plural is Elohim. So God, Elohim, has taken his place in the divine council, in the midst of the gods, and now he holds the judgment: “I say, ye are gods, sons of the Most High” — Olaf — “nevertheless, you will die like men, and fall as one man.” Only, when you rise, your rise is as a king. You’re going through the entire journey as a horrible journey, but when you come out, the purpose of it all is to awaken as the one who is God the Father.1188 ¶23

So all of us reach the limit of contraction — that little thing sleeping on the floor, even though it seems to be animated, and walks around the street. It is thought asleep in that wonderful place. Naturally, you are dreaming — you’re really in America, and fly into Europe, and fly into India, flying all over the world — you are dreaming it, but you are stationary in that little contracted body, and your brothers are eagerly waiting for your return, and you’ll come back on time. Now I tell you, right on the button, you’re coming back, and they will simply pass their hands above you, and sparks will fly from that hand towards life within themselves, and you begin to stir within, and you’ll awaken, and you’ll come out, and you’ll be just as majestic as you were before — which is equal to anyone present. You are the King, and you arise from that state into what you really are, and that all, in unison together, as you go quickly and vanish into the light — that’s the being that you are.1188 ¶24

So I cannot tell anyone that I believe anymore in anything other than the being that we really are. That being is Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is the reality of man, but he is not some little thing that you put off in space, and that he came 2,000 years ago — that’s not Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is your own true identity; this is your false identity. You will awaken one day as Jesus Christ. Did not David call him “my Lord”? He is not David’s son, as we’re told in the second Psalm, and David said, “I will tell of the decree of the Lord; he said unto me, Thou art my son, today I have begotten thee.” So then Christ asked the question: “What think ye of the Christ? Whose son is he?” And they answered, “David.” And he said, “Why then did David in the spirit call him my Lord?” Then he quoted the hundred and tenth Psalm: “The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit at my right hand, until I make thy enemies thy footstool.” And if David has called him Lord, how can he be David’s son? No — he’s David’s father, and David’s father is nothing more than the sum total of all humanity. David himself is that being which summarizes all of the experiences of man, and the father of it all is Jesus Christ.1188 ¶25

Now you argue — describe your God the Father. You wait on, tell me what I know. I thought speculations are not theorizing — Jesus Christ is God the Father. One day you will awake, and when you depart, for the last time, at that moment of departure you are Jehovah himself, who is Jesus Christ, and the sum total of all the experiences stands before you as the one who did all your will — so you forgive it all. It was all a part of the plan to send man through the horrors of darkness, to bring him out as God the Father. So the sons go through, to come out expanding — there is no limit to expansion, there is only limit to contraction. And so that body that the mystics see lying there, that body is the limit of contraction; that which comes out is expanded by reason of its journey, and there is no limit to that expansion, to that translucency, only the limit to the opacity, to the contraction in which it placed itself.1188 ¶26

So, to answer one letter tonight, because I really would need to know how to take a lot of time to answer it, and it takes too long — four years here. And so the letter is answered, and I don’t have a secretary to match it, and to dictate that to my wife would be too tedious and too long, so I’m answering it here, and your answer to the best of my ability. So the historical Christ — right here he is, hidden behind everyone who is here, and so, behind your face — you say, “I am Bud,” and you say, “I am Mary” — you’re taught by this name — for behind that mask which causes you to forget who you are, is the being that you really are, and that being is Jesus Christ. And Jesus Christ and Jehovah are one, and they are the father and the son, and the son is called David, and David is simply the sum total of all the experiences of humanity, viewed into a single being and personified, and that’s the sanctification. What comes out is that infinite, beautiful, eternal youth that is all David. So you paid it all, and you forgive it all. Now let us go into the silence, good.1188 ¶27

Now, are there any questions, please? Yes, do you have any questions?1188 ¶28

And you said,1188 ¶30

Yes, ma’am,1188 ¶33