A  Center  But  No  Centering

from  Assembly — Sunrise Ranch

Bill Bahan   April 30, 1981

You'd better believe that it is in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost that we serve.

Well, this has been a lively morning, looking at centers, more particularly centering. I think it interesting always when various things do come to the fore that need to be considered. You can always depend upon someone to give you something to work with and deal with. 

I received a letter this week from a server, and I have one of his quotes in the letter. It has bearing on what we've been saying and talking about and considering this morning. By the way, I liked what Dawn said about a blood clot somewhere—log jams—and a need for something to move to that, a need for something to move something along. This is the purpose of this Assembly, by the way. Certain things are brought to the Assembly so that we may deal with them; this is our body, we are responsible for this body. If there is a blood clot, we'd better do something. If there's a log jam, it's our responsibility. Now this particular quote from this server is just the evidence of a log jam. Very sincere server; certainly completely dedicated. Here's what he says: 

“As it stands now, we have four empty beds. I would be delighted to have a full house again. It would also help financially as well.” Full house—that's a good hand! Beats a flush, four of a kind. What happened to the full house he had? They left. Why did they leave? because he has a center, but no centering.

There is right now in his particular expression the inability to penetrate others. He's very diligent in wanting to run a center—we wouldn't question his sincerity—but the fire of the Lord is not in his expression. We're certainly not condemning this particular person. We are thankful for him. He was sent to us by the Lord, and he is, as I say, concerned with serving. But there is this inability to penetrate. That's our responsibility—not just wipe him off and say, “Well, that's too bad.” We need to find ways and means by which we can assist those who aren't penetrating—because it is this penetration, the spirit of the Lord in expression, that allows the penetration to the innermost heart of those whom we have opportunity to serve. 

One thing we need to do away with is the excuses that are used for not being able to penetrate. This past Autumn we were in New York, at Adelphi University. They had a big sign up there: “How can I soar like an eagle with all these turkeys around me?” That's usually the excuse, isn't it? It's these turkeys around me that are stopping me from soaring like an eagle. That's an excuse for not penetrating. Or the excuse that “there's no responding ones here.” There are responding ones everywhere. I was impressed the other day in a restaurant in Fort Collins. The girl brought me some garlic bread. I don't go for garlic bread; makes you strong physically and weak socially So I asked her if she'd exchange it, and I loved her answer: she said, “Surely.” Surely! Now here was something going on! Before we left there, there was a wonderful thing going on between the waitress and us, all over garlic bread. But it was her answer which showed the response. 

When we serve the Lord in truth, the welcome mat is always out, as was emphasized by those this morning. It includes everybody. In my own service, I do favor characters, those who do bring something different. The fact that they are bringing something different reveals that they have some degree of courage. Everyone is included in our service. But the problem is how about those in our body who desire to serve the Lord, yet there's a holdup, there's a block. We know we certainly don't write them off; it is our responsibility to find the ways and means by which we may open them up. Now if the spirit of the Lord is almighty, I think it could do even that. That it could even open up some of those who have been in this quagmire of serving the Lord for so many years! I've been doing some thinking on it, as to how this process works out, and what happens if they do get caught along the way—caught in the eddies so that they find it's an arduous task, serving the Lord. We find that they sometimes get tired, and you'll find them sometimes with no fire at all; you always have to build a fire under them to get them going. 

I have a little diagram on the board here, something I came in last night and put on the board that I've been thinking about. Initially, when a person begins to respond to the Lord, it's subconscious, as we know. The person's whole attention and response are in the environment. But something begins to happen underneath, without the conscious mind knowing what it is that's happening. Something begins to be felt; the conscious mind doesn't know what's happening, but the conscious mind is beginning to turn to the Lord. In that initial turning there is an acute angle, we might say. The person in this particular experience begins to experience something—things begin to look different than they did before. Actually, it seems like there's a tremendous amount of light because they've been in such darkness before. Well, as we know, it really isn't very much light; it just seems to be. It's twilight, really. But as the subconscious mind continues to respond and there is the light in what it is that is happening, the person begins to move in heart towards the Lord, standing up here (it's a hundred-and-eighty-degree turn, as we know). But coming to a particular point, probably around 90 degrees or so, the conscious mind begins to come into play, possibly classes begin to open up so that the person begins to see what it is that is required. 

Now this is a very vital time. The person was moving at this particular level, unbeknownst to the conscious mind, and this is good: the conscious mind can't interfere with the movement. Oh, it comes in somewhere along the line—the Son consciousness must come into the picture if this creative process is to continue—and probably along the 90-degree mark or so, the conscious mind begins to come into it. “And I turned to see the voice that spake with me.” Now, I really haven't seen yet, have I? I think he's like this, or I think he's like that. And I haven't really seen yet what it is. I've got all kinds of imagination as to what it is, but I'm still turning. “And I turned to see the voice that spake with me, and being turned, I saw.” There must be the complete turning, the movement is taking place, the conscious mind comes into play, and this particular period between the 90 degree and the 180 degree is the vital time. 

This particular server that we're mentioning, guess where he is? His conscious mind knows certain things that have transpired here or he wouldn't even have been around us. But he's here, and that angle completely describes it: obtuse.

There isn't anything sharp in expression. You might say he's now at the angle of repose. Let it RIP—rest in peace! That's where he is, that's where the situation is. He's not pointed, not producing a sharp impression in his service. So what are we going to do? Well, it's only as there is that complete movement that the Holy Ghost can begin to come upon us—“And ye shall receive power, after the Holy Ghost has come upon you.” It is the power of the Holy Ghost that allows things to be done—in his own experience, his heart is still impure. He probably isn't recognizing that impurity—after all, he's an Emissary! But it's there. What is it that's lacking? A word that I feel is lacking, an experience that's lacking, is the experience of lust. There's no lust. He's more concerned about the center, filling those four empty beds, than he is about lusting after the Lord. It's only as there is this lusting that there can be the cleansing. Lustrate: to make pure, to make clean. In that lusting, the Holy Ghost can begin to come upon us. 

It was somewhere along this phase that Paul got hooked up, didn't he? I've often thought it interesting that when he had his experience of conversion, it was on the road to Damascus. He never got there, but he had this experience. I think in Damascus they made some of the finest swords in the world. Paul never really got to the truth represented by Damascus—he stopped along the way, and he was honest about it. He said, “And now we see through a glass darkly, but then we see face-to-face.” Notice the difference there between the “now” and the “then”? Now then, we could make it now, couldn't we? Now—then. “And now, we see through a glass darkly.” Well if we're seeing through a glass darkly, we're dangerous, very dangerous. 

It's only when that complete turn is made, a hundred and eighty degrees, that it's face-to-face, and no longer is our face the face of some human being, but it is the face of the Lord. When there are those who come face-to-face with us, it isn't some Lord somewhere that we refer them to—but it's our own face. And this happens because there is the lusting after the Lord—this isn't done without zeal, without enthusiasm. What are those words in the 15th chapter of the Book of Revelation, about the sea of glass? “And I saw as it were a sea of glass, mingled with fire, and those who had gotten the victory over the beast.” That sea of glass was mingled with fire, and nothing is done without that Fire; that's the purifying Fire, it's the Fire which allows the lustration, the purifying, the cleansing to take place. 

Glass mingled with Fire. Glass is an interesting substance. It's classified as a solid, but its molecular components are that of a fluid. It becomes a solid when it's taken out of the furnace—and glass is easily breakable. A little pressure on it, and even the bulletproof stuff will shatter. Put a little pressure on the glass, and it'll crack; but that same glass, when it's in the fire—the sea of glass mingled with fire—when it's in the fire, it's then a fluid, it's then quite movable. It's the Fire that allows the work to be done, and we don't come to stand in alignment with the Lord without that Fire. We can see when there is the complete turning—and thank God that the conscious mind comes into play along the line. The heart cannot be purified without this coming into play. When it does come into play, it has the responsibility to allow the purifying Fire of God's love to be put down there in that receptacle which the Holy Ghost would use. When it's there, it works out very easily. Then we have the Father, and the Son. We've considered the fact that there's a very thin layer to the Son consciousness, but as we can see, it connects that which is above to that which is below. One thing, all in alignment. Centering. The Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. 

We may not go around as John of old, when he was offering baptism, but in our own service we know that we baptize with the Holy Ghost and the Fire. That Holy Ghost is there in our own experience—individually we've had our day of Pentecost, and we haven't run out like Peter of old but we stay in there. There's nothing that means more to us than to stay in there. In that particular outworking with Peter, John, and James, you notice not much is said of James; you hardly hear of him. The conscious mind didn't come into play too much in that particular situation. Well, in the outworking which we're concerned with, we thank God for that conscious mind. There is the Son, and we will accept nothing that comes up from below that isn't true to the Father. What needs to be done is done through the expression of the Father, under the direction of the Son, through the power of the Holy Ghost—because of the alignment with the Father. 

So I thank God for all that has brought us to this point so that we can see what's happening, and if what is happening in your experience and my experience is the truth, there is Fire, and it is a Fire that is unquenchable. There isn't any circumstance that's going to put out our fire. “I'll huff and I'll puff and I'll blow your house down!” You'd better believe that it is in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost that we serve. Centering—then we may invite others into our center.

© Emissaries of Divine Light