Of Supreme Importance

Of  Supreme  Importance

from  The Seed

Martin Cecil   May 5, 1974

Each year in the springtime the reality of resurrection is portrayed; and while this is recognized, and more or less taken for granted by human beings, they do not usually see it as possibly relating to themselves. First of all, except on a very extended basis they do not see resurrection as being particularly necessary. However, we have come to recognize that here is the immediate divine purpose insofar as man is concerned. So often people have spoken of the inscrutable purposes of God. These are, in fact, not at all inscrutable; there's nothing incomprehensible about them; just that man should be moved from the state of a dying soul to that of a living soul. How this might be done may be perhaps incomprehensible to human beings, but as attitudes change it becomes easy to see and understand what is to occur and the means by which it occurs. Let us not be hoodwinked into this foolish view of the inscrutability of the purposes of God. It may have seemed this way to most because there has been a stubborn refusal to allow the purposes of God to be achieved in human experience; and if they are not achieved in human experience, then human beings don't know much about them. But it is not because they could not know much about them; merely because they refuse to let them be achieved.

From the divine standpoint there has been a certain amount of maneuvering over the ages to prepare the soil, so to speak, for the achievement of these essential purposes. Various things have worked out in all parts of the world, both in the orient and the Occident, that finally somehow a setting might adequately be prepared so that the ultimate achievement could be brought to pass, the achievement which brings man again into the state of the living soul. Various patterns of religion were developed in human consciousness correlating with the preparation of the ground. There is, for instance, what was offered through the life of the Buddha; there is the record with respect to Krishna. Out of these and other specific events and people something was achieved in the consciousness of human beings to prepare the setting, so that finally it all might be brought to point and the required task completed. We need to see all these things with respect to human experience as relating to this purpose in a more or less general sense. But, obviously, when it can be brought toa final focus, there is the event of supreme importance. It's all very well to cultivate the garden and have the seedbed as it should be in the spring, but it doesn't mean too much until the seeds are sown. Then, of course, there is the requirement for the necessary climate so that the seeds may germinate and grow. Finally, because of this, the harvest may come.

People have become very wrapped up in the cultivation of the soil. There are numerous religious approaches made, and have been made all down through the ages, which simply related to this matter of preparing the setting within the scope of human consciousness so that the required seed could be planted. When the seed is planted, then the prior cultivation has reached a point of fulfilment and is not necessary anymore. If one were to continue to cultivate the garden after the seeds had been sown there wouldn't be much of a garden. This is just about what has been happening in the world. People cling to their traditions and their awareness of spiritual things, such as they are, imagining that their particular approach is about the only one.

Of course the sowing of the true seeds actually occurred at the time that Jesus was on earth, and this has subsequently tended to make those who call themselves Christians somehow feel superior to everybody else. But apparently nobody really understood what had happened, and the seed which should have been planted was put in a glass case, insofar as Christianity was concerned, so that everybody could come and look at it: This is the seed! Of course, a seed in a glass case is not likely to germinate; it must be planted in the right season, in the proper soil, when the climate makes germination rightly possible.

Now, there are those who may take the attitude that Jesus never existed. Well, whether He existed or not He certainly came into the consciousness of mankind; and that, after all, is the point, isn't it? We have noted the preparation that was specifically made before His coming, through the Israelites of old. And this might have obviated His coming, at least in the way He came, if that opportunity had become specific for the world. But it disintegrated, scattered, never adequately came to point so as to allow something to evolve out of it. However, what did remain provided the setting when Jesus was born into the world — or into the consciousness of men. And He was under the necessity, because of the previous failure, to refocalize the approach, bring it together again, and establish a new cycle that's been called, at least in one of its aspects, the New Testament. But here again, by reason of the lack of response, there was another failure on the part of human beings to recognize, appreciate and accept what it was that was being offered. Incidentally, that recognition, appreciation and acceptance has been peculiarly lacking ever since. Something has been clothed in the concepts of men, but the truth has certainly not been known. However, this one man undertook to allow all that was required of the human race to be brought to focus in Himself, and He moved through the cycle, from level to level in the vibratory patterns of consciousness, by which a living soul was once more established as a reality on earth.

This was the seed which should permit the plant subsequently to grow. All that was essential for the design of the plant was present in the seed. This is so with respect to seeds as we understand them, isn't it? When He was on earth our Master spoke of the mustard seed, a very small seed which grows into quite a large plant. But one would not recognize the form of the plant by looking at the seed. At one point, according to the record, He Himself commented on this; and these words are from the 12th Chapter of John: "The hour is come, that the Son of man should be glorified." There is a peculiar idea in the consciousness of many people about this, imagining that He was somehow glorified by being hung on a cross. The glorification was simply the return to the state of the living soul, the living soul which was consequent upon what has been called the resurrection man restored in the seed form. The essences were all present by reason of the experience of this one man. He moved through what was totally necessary, insofar as mankind was concerned, to experience the state of the living soul, so that in Him were the essences, the seed essences, which when allowed to germinate would permit the growth of the plant, or the tree — the tree of life, indeed — on earth, man restored to the state of the living soul.

There has been a lot of talk about salvation, and human beings couldn't see it anywhere, so they thought it must happen after they're dead. It should be fairly obvious, to anyone who honestly looks at the situation, that the place where salvation is needed is right here on earth. They even claim that it's all right in heaven, wherever heaven is; no salvation needed there. It's needed right here — and not some inscrutable process but the actual experience of a change of consciousness in human beings, so that they cease to be identified with the state of a dying soul and become identified with the state of a living soul.

This has seemed to be very mysterious to human beings, simply because they were unwilling to experience it. If one could retain the state of the dying soul and convince oneself that one would become a living soul after one was dead, then that was a happy ending. But if one begins to look at the thing with a little common sense there may be the recognition that changes are possible in human experience on earth now, and if they have not occurred it is simply because there has been an unwillingness to let them occur; there has been a won't attitude. This has often been translated in human consciousness as a can't attitude, but I don't think there is rightly any such word, really. It's always won't.

"The hour is come, that the Son of man should be glorified." Maybe He was speaking specifically of Himself at that point, but how about this hour as the hour which has come, that the Son of man should be glorified, not merely the seed but the whole plant?

"Verily, verily, I say unto you," — and here He was emphasizing something—"Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit." Now we need to look at this word "die" because there is a very peculiar misconception in the minds of most people. If you take a seed and put it in the ground, does it really die? It certainly passes away. But it germinates, doesn't it? Out of the seed comes the evidences of life — the life is released as the seed germinates, and what was before passes away. One might see this in relationship to Jesus, because human beings have been inclined to keep Him hanging on a cross. The cross, as Christianity has envisioned it, relates to crucifixion. And the seed has been preserved in that sort of a form. We still have a lot of crosses around. There will be no cross in our new chapel, incidentally, at least as a symbol of crucifixion. The seed rightly passes away when the plant grows. Of course, if you refuse to let the seed germinate, then there it sits.

What Jesus brought and offered to the world has been more or less isolated and set in a special place so that people could look at it — from way below, of course, so that they could say to themselves, "That is so exalted that we could never be expected to participate in anything of that sort. We're just sinners here, and we can't help but sin. So we're going to remain sinners and just look at Jesus up there" — wherever. The seed has been preserved in its glass case. If something has grown and developed that has been called Christianity it had very little to do with the seed. It has something to do with various ideas that certain ones had about the seed — particularly Peter and Paul — but the seed itself was set apart, remained alone. That's right, isn't it? Of course, there were those who said, "Well, you have to accept the seed as your personal savior," whatever that meant. An idea about someone was to be the personal savior, and a peculiar picture was developed in this way of someone who was called Jesus, having very little relatedness to the truth of the matter. So, actually, what was preserved was a false seed.

The true seed did fall into the ground, and has been present in the soil. We have recognized the setting of the Tone long ago, and now that Tone has really persisted, even though covered up with all this crust, until eventually the climate was such that it might germinate and begin to grow and reveal the form — which would not be the form of the seed. You can't tell what the tree is going to be merely by looking at the seed. If you have had experience with seeds you may be able to tell that way, but the tree isn't just a big seed. The oak tree isn't an enlarged acorn. It's something different, isn't it? And when the true plant grows you can forget about the seed, right? The very fact that this seed has been preserved is indication that the true seed has never grown, because once the seed dies in this sense there is the evidence of the growth to reveal what is right and proper by reason of this creative process. There is no more necessity to try to preserve the seed. Of course, as we have seen in this particular instance, the seed that has been preserved hasn't been a true seed anyway; it's been a human concept about someone called Jesus. That wasn't the reality at all, just someone's idea; and a lot of human beings have developed ideas on this score, but they've usually been based in some sort of prior concept developed by somebody else.

We have a picture up on the wall here that is someone's idea of Jesus. All it is, insofar as we're concerned, is a reminder of the true seed, that we might be concerned with letting that true seed germinate and reveal what the plant is, what the true vine is. And one could never tell what the true vine would be merely by analyzing the seed. This is just about what has been done, hasn't it? There has been an analysis of a human concept of what the seed is, and out of that has sprang what is called Christianity. But to provide the material by which the germinating seed may begin to take its true form, that has not been allowed except as it is beginning to emerge in this present setting; not just here but wherever there are those who are willing to relinquish concepts of the seed and get on with the job of letting the plant appear.

Clearly it was apparent to Jesus, at the time, that human beings would tend to do this sort of thing, but He sought to establish a reminder through what has subsequently been called the communion service, so that somebody somewhere along the line might wake up to the fact that the plant needed to grow. But this again became a method of preserving someone's idea about the seed: "We're going to swallow this bread and drink this wine, and somehow or other this is going to cause the false seed to germinate." No. It may remind people that a seed was planted, and that when there is the right climate it will germinate and grow. Looking at it in this way, obviously the right climate is important; and it isn't the right climate if human beings are looking at a seed — the wrong seed, incidentally — in the glass case and falling down and worshiping that. That doesn't make even the false seed grow!

So this matter of dying is not death in the usual sense, is it? It's just change. Dying souls need to die if living souls are to appear. You can't have a dying soul and a living soul in the same place at the same time. So the dying soul needs to pass away. In order for the living soul to germinate and grow, the essential requirements were fulfilled in the person of Jesus. He moved all the way through the whole creative cycle. In Him was the seed, then; the stage was set for what should creatively be the experience in human beings subsequently. Well, of course, such a thick dry crust was established on the surface of the soil that the seed has been underneath that crust. But finally, at a weak point in the crust, this germinating seed pushed through its little shoot.

It's interesting, isn't it, that it was really at the weak point, the weak point primarily of Christianity because the emergence is out of that. But where Christianity was strong and beliefs were determined, convictions were sure, that's the strong point, isn't it? That's the crust, and nothing can break through there. Only where there begins to be a little questioning, a little doubting, a little uncertainty that everything that has been said in Christianity was the last word, only so could the plant begin to thrust through the soil, appear above the surface, as something other than the seed. We don't have to try to maintain a human concept about the seed once the seed has germinated. Speaking of the bread and the wine, our Master said, "This do in remembrance of me"; but when you have remembered what it's all about, then you can forget the reminder because something is actually happening. Of course, in the subsequent verses it is made clear here what the word die really referred to: "He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal," being once again identified with a living soul.

A little further on there are these words, "And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me." This has usually been translated as referring to the fact that He was going to be lifted up on a cross. "Look to the cross," they say; look to crucifying the Lord! No, that wasn't at all what He was talking about, although that manifest event related to what was happening in the process by which He was moving all the way through in the cycles of resurrection. It only happened that way because it was imposed by human beings; it needn't have happened in that way; that was the human reaction. But what was really occurring was something else. He Himself said, "Judge not by the appearance." All that human beings have done is judge by the appearance. That's exactly what they have done insofar as Christianity is concerned — a direct contradiction of His specific instructions, "Judge not by the appearance."

"And I, if I be lifted up from the earth…" This could relate to the seed, couldn't it, the seed which falls into the earth and is below the surface, hidden. Except for the One who planted the seed, no one else would know it was there. And finally the seed germinates and grows. There is a creative cycle in this regard. It doesn't all happen instantly. Those who have looked at the portrayal of the true vine have rather imagined that suddenly there it is. No, it grows from a seed. It is an unfoldment of a life form, the form of the living soul which was called man. Presently we have non-man, the dying soul. But man is necessary on earth. The resurrection by which man is once more on earth is the immediate purpose of God. It has been for thousands of years, and finally it is coming to a point of fruition, not by reason of all the antics of human beings in their striving and struggling on earth but in spite of all that.

When we see this it reminds us of the worthlessness of virtually everything in which human beings place value. All the vast and marvelous works of non-man are nothing. What else could non-man produce but nothing? It looks like something, it looks grand to those who judge by the appearance, but the fact is that it is nothing. That's another sort of death, isn't it? So the seed germinates and grows because it was planted, because it fell into the earth, because the Tone was set, because the essences of all that was needed for the growth of the subsequent plant were present in the seed. That is indeed a marvelous thing, that it could have been established by one person who was truly alone. In spite of everything that could have been thrown at Him He did it. And because of this we certainly have a deep love and respect and reverence for the One who did it. But we recognize that what He did only has meaning as the seed germinates and the plant grows. And if we do have that love and reverence and respect, we couldn't possibly fail to allow the plant to grow, because if we did fail, then it would be tantamount to saying, "Let the seed rot in the ground!" And that is just about what human beings have been saying all this time — "Let it rot in the ground! We like this seed we have in this glass case and we're going to worship that." And if there is one thing that has been rife in the world it is idolatry. There are so many good people out there who are out-and-out idolaters. It's not the right thing to go around telling everybody that, but we need to know it ourselves for ourselves.

What was done on earth nineteen centuries ago is of supreme importance because the seed, with all the essences present in it, was planted; and, by all means, it is the deepest longing of our hearts to let it grow, simply because we love the One who planted the seed. And we wouldn't let all that go for nothing — it won't — but individually, for ourselves, we can make it go for nothing. In the total outworking it won't go for nothing, but from the individual standpoint there are lots of people who make it go for nothing while claiming at the same time that they love Jesus. That's blasphemy, isn't it? We begin to see things as they really are and not as human beings fool themselves into believing; because only the truth makes free: "And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." And that is all consequent upon continuing in His Word, continuing in the Tone which He set and allowing the germination of the seed so that the seed itself may pass away and the plant be revealed on earth, the plant which is the true Son of man. He provided the seed essences in this regard, but the Son of man needs to be known once again on earth; that is, man, the living soul.

"And I, if I be lifted up … will draw all men unto me" — lifted up from the earth, the germinated seed appearing above the surface of the earth, revealing what it really is. We can describe it — the true vine, the tree of life — but what is it? Only as it takes form may we know. It's not a matter for idle speculation; it's a matter of sharing the action by which it happens, because there is attunement with the essences that are present in the seed. And those essences emerge in a differentiated, expanded manifestation in human experience as there is a willingness that they should, as there is a refusal to stand in the way and prevent that unfoldment. There is the necessity of losing what human beings imagine life to be, of dying in that sense, that there may be the experience of resurrection, of movement into the state of the living soul. This occurs inevitably in and through and for those who are willing that it should and who do not think their human values are more important than the values which appear when they participate in the living process.

The human values include all the things in which human beings have put value, and of course highest among these, presumably, are the values of Christianity as it has been understood, or maybe of Buddhism, or Hinduism, or Judaism — anything. These are the values that human beings so desperately thrust forward: "Keep these values here." That's the crust, that's what prevents the seed from germinating and growing. One must lose one's life. What life? The life related to the values that one has known. Letting go of those values, an individual imagines that he is facing a yawning chasm, nothing. But the True Tone is present, the seed is germinating, the nature of its form is inherent in the seed. As there are those who are willing to let this occur in their own experience they find their life; there it is. But no one can find his true life without letting go of the false life — "Well, I'm going to hang on to a little bit of my false life now in case there is no true life over here." But a person can hang on to that false life a little too long, you know. Then it's proven out that it is false life, because life cannot die. It is the nature of life to be alive; life is eternal. So this false condition of dying souls which human beings experience does not acquaint them with life. Life is in the Son of man; that is, in the growth and development of that form of the living soul on earth. And it is to this, surely, that any intelligent person would give himself. But it takes more than intelligence; it takes a yielding in love.

Emissaries of Divine Light