This is the Real World
from Assembly at Sunrise Ranch
Martin Cecil May 5, 1980
"Emissaries of Divine Light is the name of a College from which we have graduated into the real world."
How much are we capable of enfolding and encompassing? When we graduate from school, spiritual school, we become responsible in a real world. In that world there are a lot of unreal people. We're not too interested in the school from which we graduated. I don't think even in the human world, after leaving school, one drags the school around with one, trying to tell everybody about it. Graduating from spiritual school, we have assumed a certain maturity of responsibility which is our own, individually speaking. Of course at this point we are aware of the whole, of the fact that our individual expression, while it must stand because it is the expression of truth, is also an aspect of a far greater truth. We are a part of that far greater truth to the extent that our expression is true—that we are mature enough to be spiritually responsible for ourselves. That doesn't take us into a position of isolation. It offers connection with the far greater truth of which our individual truth is simply an aspect.
We have a field of enfoldment and encompassment, immediately available to us as we assume our mature spiritual responsibilities in the individual sense. Mention is made in the Book of Revelation about the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven. I am sure you all recognize that this is the true state of spiritual consciousness, a new state insofar as human experience is concerned, which comes down from God out of heaven. Later, with respect to this holy city, there is indication that nothing should enter into it that defiles or whatsoever worketh abomination or makes a lie. In our own living, here is the holy place in which we abide. We find that there are others who abide in that holy place with us, so it is not merely an individual thing. Here is something coming down from God out of heaven and factually emerging on earth, because of us and all those who provide the means by which it may so emerge—a holy place into which nothing that does not belong may enter in.
Now we may see this, first of all, as a personal state for which we individually are responsible within ourselves. And we also see it as a collective state for which we are individually responsible too, that nothing should enter into that collective of the holy place. Only as there is such a holy place can there be the factual reality of the priesthood on earth. This is the basis for the enfoldment, and beyond that again the encompassment, which is our primary responsibility in the real world. All that does not belong in the holy place is excluded. But let us not merely look at it in a negative way, because then it would be entirely empty, wouldn't it? It wouldn't stay empty long; nature abhors a vacuum. It is a matter of letting it be filled with the real quality of spirit, consequent upon our own living experience.
But our concern is with this matter of enfoldment. We have individual spheres of enfoldment, which are, of course, at the same time included in the collective sphere of enfoldment. We never try to lift our individual spheres of enfoldment out of the whole, because immediately we would lose the reality of that enfoldment. We would lose our association with the holy place. So we extend an enfoldment to those who are beginning to see the light—we could put it that way. They only begin to see the light because of our expression of the spirit of God, individually and together, moving upon the face of the waters that are present in the consciousness of mankind, and out of that consciousness will come certain individual focalizations in response. These are those in whom the light is beginning to shine, so that they begin to see some more and understand more of the quality of life—and these require enfoldment.
The enfoldment is beyond the holy place, insofar as we are concerned, because obviously anyone coming will have those things that don't belong in the holy place. Therefore you cannot willy‑nilly invite anyone into the holy place who gives some evidence of experiencing an increase of light in their own consciousness. So here is a realm of enfoldment beyond the holy place. We have described this in terms of the outer court and the encampment. But we see this realm of enfoldment and keep it clear as there are those who are welcomed into it.
Within this realm of enfoldment there is rest. I suppose this is the first matter that emphasizes itself to a person. Maybe it did to us—at last we're home, so to speak; a feeling of rest. As the Master put it, “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” So there is a place of rest, where the turmoil may begin to drain away out of people. It is also a place of safety, where there is a sense of being protected. It is our responsibility to provide this. It is also a place of education. “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me.” All right, education. This is the nature of the place of enfoldment which we rightly provide. Are we going to say that this place of enfoldment is a very restricted place, into which only two or three people can fit? Or do we recognize the reality of it, which is vastly more than the holy place?
The holy place is, in this sense, a small place—there are not too many who are capable of functioning as the priesthood in the holy place, who are capable, individually speaking, of maintaining that holy place in their own experience, never allowing anything that defiles or works abomination or makes a lie to enter in. Only those who are of the priesthood are in the holy place. When there are those, and the holy place is present because of them, then the influence of that extends on out in enfoldment of others. And we have a place beyond us that is far more capable of including people than, presently, is the holy place.
If we use the symbolism of the encampment, well that's a big place, lots of room. We need to have this attitude, that there may be no exclusion of any point of light that begins to emerge because the spirit which we have been offering in our living has been moving upon the face of the waters of humanity. All right, humanity is spread around; there are quite a few of them out there. Are we going to say well, we'll take a dozen? Or is it going to be open?
We are capable individually and together of providing this large place of enfoldment. Perhaps it needs to be larger than it has been thus far. And it isn't the place of enfoldment with anticipation that those who are so enfolded are going to become hooked up somehow with Emissaries of Divine Light. Emissaries of Divine Light is the name of a college from which we have graduated into the real world. While we may have some college reunions on occasion, we are really about the Father's business in the world. And we are introducing people to that on the basis of invitation to the place of enfoldment. There are those who come in, and there is work to be done relative to those we enfold. Obviously there is the general pattern of rest which is offered, the provision of the sense of protection and safety, and then education. This education doesn't merely relate to what we have thought of as spiritual education in the orthodox Emissary sense: “Well, people must be brought to Class,” and so on. It isn't necessarily that at all. There is a far wider field of education than that. This perhaps is specialized education with respect to those who may, if they will, be included in the priesthood, to stand in the holy place. But the vast majority don't, or won't.
And yet there is something of education needful—a reconditioning of consciousness, to begin with. There are various means of providing this—enfolding them where they are, letting people alone, not trying to make them into something that we think would be better, but letting people alone. Let them be enfolded. There are various classifications of people who more easily relate to this area or that area. There are other gatherings we have, of many kinds. And there will be increasing numbers—if we are doing our job—wholistic gatherings, considerations in various fields, into which people may be invited and in which they may be enfolded. On this basis there is a beginning made with respect to a reconditioning of consciousness.
Some changes may be wrought, so that those concerned may feel more at home in the encampment than they did where they were before they became aware of the fact that there was an encampment. If we play our parts correctly they will have a sense of enfoldment; they will have the increasing experience of rest initially, a sense of protection, and begin to actually experience education without maybe telling them so. As long as we experience the reality, do we need to be told that we are experiencing it? Probably if we were told we would set up a resistance against it. That's the way human nature is. So we let it be, not a con game—not an Emissary con game—but the provision of what is necessary to allow some things to happen in people, about which they may not know is occurring. But they will only occur to the extent that those concerned are open to let it occur. It's not being imposed. If they are open to receive it they will receive it; if they're not they won't. So there is the enfoldment.
And beyond that again there is encompassment—the encompassment of everything, of all humanity, indeed of the world. It is all‑inclusive. We have our points of contact which increasingly enable a greater effectiveness in that encompassment. It has been, evidently, sufficiently effective thus far to prevent some final disaster from striking. But as it all intensifies there will need to be a greater control extended in a more specific way. It might be said that this encompassment could be compared to casting a net over the world, a net of control and containment, dominion and containment. The net is composed of interlocking meshes which relate to people.
We find ourselves associated with people who have, in one way or another, connections into the state of the tribes of the earth beyond the encampment. Usually these connections are those who come into the encampment, who participate in the enfoldment, and through them there may be an extension of the net of encompassment. We need to be alert in this regard, so that we do not take arbitrary Emissary attitudes with respect to anyone, thereby excluding that person from enfoldment. We see the value of people by reason of their associations. If such people are open to enfoldment, so that they come closer, then through such people we can reach what is beyond.
There are already the beginnings of such a network in various fields with which I am familiar—far more than even those who are the points of connection understand or see. We need to be aware that this is an open‑ended process. We think of things as being small because they are close, but it is through these apparently small things that the larger things are encompassed and the dominion of God begins to be an increasing reality on earth, regardless of the thrashings around of the dragon, regardless of the human‑nature state which still seeks to govern out there.
Here we have a consciousness of ministry which transcends, I am sure, the usual Emissary viewpoint, because it begins to become no longer an illusion, but the actuality. The actuality is related to people—and what we extend as enfoldment and encompassment is not some little viewpoint as a cult on earth. This is the real thing, and we reach a point of actually being willing to acknowledge this. There has been a hesitancy to acknowledge this, and the endeavour to maintain a cult, because it felt safer. But to really reach out—that is what is required!
© Emissaries of Divine Light
