Response! Lust! Passion!
Martin Cecil November 17, 1974 p.m.
As is usual after the morning service, I have received a number of excellent letters of response. There are many ways of response. Some of course are moved to come up to the house after the service and participate in the spoken word of response. It's interesting how human beings are inclined to get established in stereotyped patterns. Some feel that if the word response is mentioned, that means a letter. Maybe, but not necessarily. I would suggest that there are manifold ways of revealing response. The spirit of ingenuity is part of the spirit of God. I'm sure you have noted how very ingenious God is, and we, as human beings, were made in the image and likeness of God. Insofar as spoken response is concerned this tends to limit itself to a certain setting at a certain time. In other words it becomes more or less stereotyped; and the same with letters. Could anyone possibly imagine any other form of response? So how can response be revealed? Actually, the evidence of response is seen in what occurs in the individual's own life expression. One could go on writing letters for fifty years or more and never respond. The letters may be beautiful, they may touch upon realizations of a sort, but possibly the individual's life remains unaffected, in which case obviously there was in fact no response. Of course, I don't think it's possible for a person to keep writing letters for that length of time and not experience some little change in his life.
But surely some thought could be given as to the possibility of other fitting forms of response. Of course there are such things as gifts, which have always been offered freely by many; but I'm not thinking of that particularly. You know, in some of the religions of the world there is an exhibition occasionally of what is deemed to be response. Sometimes people roll upon the floor for instance. Now this might not be particularly fitting. I recall an occasion recorded in the Bible when King David went streaking through the streets as an indication of his hungering and thirsting after righteousness. His wife disapproved, but for him at that moment this apparently impressed him as the thing to do. I have given services where some black people were present who were rather accustomed to indicating their response during the course of the service itself. (I don't know why they necessarily needed to be black, but they were.) “Hallelujah! Hallelujah! That's right! That's right!” Now even that sort of thing becomes stereotyped too.
And yet, what is fitting? We presumably discover this to the extent that the veil is dissolved. Sometimes there is a reluctance to let the veil dissolve for fear of what might be required, but what is required when the veil does dissolve is something entirely natural; it is the truly natural state. Mind you, it may seem a little unfamiliar but it should never be looked upon as establishing some sort of requirements. As long as one is required to do something, it is liable to be an unnatural thing. On the other hand, there is also what we have spoken of as a returning cycle in response, which maintains an open door for the continuing movement of the creative cycle. If I speak to you this evening and there is no response at all, well obviously that would be that. Nothing would be moving and there would be nothing insofar as the continuing cycle is concerned. So response is necessary, and as I say, one form of it comes in letters, which can convey something of the spirit of the individual who is responding and indicate something of his vision and understanding, which all contributes to the continued movement of the creative cycle.
I am sure there are many ways of response that might be discovered. There are occasions when it is right for somebody to respond verbally right here in the Chapel. It's been done occasionally. But here again we need to be careful that it is fitting, that it is not a stereotyped thing: “Well now I think it's about time that somebody responded out of the congregation.” Each person has a responsibility in this regard, not necessarily for saying something on some particular occasion which would be repetitive, but in the experience of the moving of the spirit in the moment, something that is entirely natural to the person. If one is maintaining the veil there then nothing is felt and the individual just sits there. If the veil begins to thin a little then something becomes apparent, there's something moving here, and the individual may feel, well, there is a need for something. And if you don't on occasion feel there's a need for something I suspect there wasn't very much hungering and thirsting, because each one has a responsibility to contribute in some way. “Well,” we may say, “I contribute by washing the dishes; I contribute by doing my job day by day, earning money and contributing the money,” or whatever, and these are all ways of response; but don't get fixed in them as though that was all there was to response. Many could say, I“Well I've been doing this for years.” Is there nothing else, nothing else moving, nothing which would find a particular form of expression that is new, that hasn't yet been done for years? We need to keep alert, because we all carry a tremendous responsibility in this regard. The very word responsibility relates to it, doesn't it? It's the ability to respond. If you have not developed that ability to respond you are not in position to carry true responsibility. So it is something to consider, as to what might fittingly find expression uniquely through oneself.
Sometimes when we have response periods and somebody starts off and gives a pretty good response, then all who follow after just pick up what that first person said and everything goes into this one channel, as though there were no other possibility. There is properly a pattern into which response rightly falls, a pattern of relatedness—it's not as though everybody is supposed to go shooting off in all directions—but within the scope of that pattern of relatedness there is rightly a uniqueness insofar as the individual is concerned. Very often people are afraid that they're going to lose their individuality, and yet so many simply decide to lose it, apparently; they're just going to follow the crowd, be one of the sheep, just copy each other. Something needs to open up in a new way if this true hungering and thirsting is to be proven out. This relates to hungering and thirsting, doesn't it?—hungering and thirsting after righteousness. This may perhaps be a quiet thing. It doesn't mean we have to make a display of it, but obviously there must be hungering and thirsting present if the true expression of spirit is to appear, if it is to emerge. It certainly won't emerge in revealing the scope possible of human expression if one behaves like a vegetable. We are deemed to be human—until we prove otherwise—and therefore have potential for the revelation of God. This revelation only appears in the measure of the hungering and thirsting after righteousness.
We have considered some of the days of creation as these relate to changes that work out in our own experience. We have been aware of the commandment on the first day: “Let there be light”; and on the second day: “Let there be a firmament”; and on the third day: “Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear.” And we have seen what may be considered to be an unfolding sequence in this regard, an unfolding sequence related to our own experience. These three days have also a relatedness to what we have spoken of as the three Sacred Schools, a sequential movement, the first at the time of the children of Israel. And while that specific group of people failed to carry through and what was initiated disintegrated insofar as that specific group of people was concerned, this was a beginning point of a creative cycle which could then only move on from the standpoint of the Second Sacred School at the time when our Master was on earth. And even though the disciples and others failed to carry through in this, it was still a part of the continuing sequential cycle. What had occurred, had occurred, and there was no means of going back to cause it to occur over again. We need to recognize this insofar as creative cycles are concerned: if something aborts, you can't pick it up again; it's gone!
So there was the continuing movement relating to the Third Sacred School with which we have been particularly concerned. We have spoken of the spiritual expression plane approach, approaching at a new level, no longer trying to establish something first physically speaking: “We'll get it all lined up. We'll have some sort of an organization into which we will invite people to come and they'll pay their dues and express their beliefs and all this, and we'll have it all set up on this basis.” No, that's not the way it works anyhow, even from the standpoint of the First Sacred School. And neither are we going to do it from the standpoint of the mental approach, an intellectual figuring out of everything, the truth we're going to find. Never! But there is a spiritual approach which we have recognized as relating to a sensing of something, a sensing of something which cannot be defined, even though everybody first of all tries to define it. But to the extent that this has been done the real meaning has been lost. People like to have things in boxes, so that they know where they are, what they are—they think! Well you can't get the spirit of God into a box. What's put into a box lacks the spirit of God!
However there is the creative process which is of this sequential nature, coming to the fourth day of creation. Now the fourth day was the day when the fog cleared. “Let there be lights in the firmament of heaven.” They were already in the firmament of heaven but there was so much fog nobody knew it, until the point when the fog cleared. We have recognized this in relationship to our own experience. We're not endeavoring to make anything be. It is not a matter of building up, actually. That was the tower of Babel, wasn't it? It's a matter of becoming aware of what already is, what has been hidden by the veil or the fog; and on the fourth day properly the fog clears, and behold, the heavens, with lights in the firmament of heaven. There they are! They were there all the time but obscured by the fog. In other words, reaching this point where the veil is dissolved there is a different nature to the unfolding of the creative cycle, because instantly, when the veil is dissolved, the heaven is there. There has to be the creative cycle which permits the point to be reached when the veil may be dissolved; but when the veil is dissolved, that type of creative cycle no longer applies. We're not going anywhere.
There has been a concept of movement in relationship to the first part of the creative cycle. First of all, “Let there be light.” Then, “Let there be a firmament,” the firmament of the atmosphere of heaven in our experience. And then movement on and we come where the dry land appears; something begins to take form; there begins to be some evidence, in the external sense, of change. So there is the idea of movement in this way. It's just an idea; there wasn't really any movement, because the whole process was one of becoming aware of what was already there; but this is not clearly seen until the fourth day, when the fog is cleared. And there's the heaven, which has always been there, hidden by the veil but perfect behind the veil. There's been no distortion in relationship to the heaven because nothing of a distorted nature below the veil could penetrate the veil. Only when we reach a point where there is no more abomination, no more making lies, can there be the experience of the clearing of the veil, so that there is an awareness of the heaven that is present. Then nothing can enter into it that defiles or works abomination or makes a lie. The veil won't dissolve if there's anything of that nature present; it just stays there. And no matter how human beings have tried to force their way into heaven they haven't been able to do it, simply because the very endeavor to force one's way in somehow indicates the self-centered state, which doesn't belong in heaven.
So when the veil dissolves, the heaven is apparent. Now of course it doesn't dissolve in the twinkling of an eye. It thins, so that we can become aware of the brightest object, shall we say, in the heaven. And that dissolution takes place because of the hungering and thirsting after righteousness, which causes us to stop judging and begin to experience the spirit of thankfulness. We cannot by any means clamber up into heaven—no one ever has or ever will—because we do not need to go anywhere to find it. It is just exactly where we are, but obscured as long as the veil is in place. Now, we cannot be whole until the veil dissolves.
We recognize that the heaven is a part of this dimensional state. We are more familiar with other dimensions, what we may call earthly dimensions. The heavenly dimensions, having been obscured, do not seem like dimensions to us. When the veil clears we begin to recognize the reality of those dimensions. We have been able to describe what those dimensions are by using such words as love, truth and life, but the mere use of the words doesn't tell us what the dimensions are. We only begin to know the dimensions when the veil clears so that the reality of oneness may begin to be experienced, the oneness of heaven and earth. We do not know heaven as separate from the earth; it isn't separate from the earth. Anyone who imagines a heaven that is somehow separate from the earth is indulging in vain imagination, because it isn't the truth; it's simply a figment of human fancy. This heaven is one with this earth. “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth”—not two separate things but one thing with two aspects. But let us not think of aspects as relating to one over here and another over there. The heaven permeates the earth, and pull as you may, you can't really get them apart. The veil obscures the truth of this insofar as the human consciousness is concerned, that's all. The truth is true, regardless of what anyone thinks.
The wholeness insofar as one's own experience is concerned requires the dissolution of the veil; then there begins to be an awareness of what integrity means—integrity: heaven and earth integrated. Until there is the experience of heaven and earth integrated, for oneself, one doesn't know what integrity is. Then there begins to be a sense of wholeness, which is at the same time a sense of holiness. There is a holy ghost.
We were talking this morning about the unholy ghost—a ghost which is unholy, unsavory, unpleasant, no matter how pleasing some of its blandishments may seem to be to human beings. As long as the heaven aspect is absent the ghost lacks wholeness; it is therefore unholy, and the unholy ghost on the rampage is very destructive. Here is the power and, in human experience, mostly the power of destruction. The coming of the holy ghost, as it has been put, is only possible to the extent that the veil is dissolved. Then what is back of the veil is experienced as being back of and one with, permeating, what was before in front of the veil. Heaven and earth are one—a state of wholeness, which is the state of holiness; therefore the ghost, as it relates to the material aspect of being, is the holy ghost. The true ghost is no longer absent; it's present; it is wholly present in the dimensions of the earth of the individual. Of course it's not just an individual matter, because the fact is that we are not all separate people with walls in between us, the way it seems now. It seems that way now because the ghost is unholy; there's no sense of wholeness. The individual sense of wholeness brings with it the collective sense of wholeness.
So as long as the veil is in place, no matter how human beings strive to experience brotherhood and all this, it eludes them. It is impossible of experience on that basis. There must be wholeness in individual experience for wholeness in collective experience to be known. But this wholeness working out in individual experience, by reason of the creative process through those who hunger and thirst, is also working out in a collective sense. We can't pick ourselves out and say, “Well now I'm going to let it work out in me as an individual and I'm going to be whole and holy all by myself.” It's not possible, because we're part of a larger whole. So when the veil dissolves then the heaven is experienced as not only being right next to the earth but filling the earth, permeating the earth. This is the nature of heaven. The vibratory nature of heaven is what permits heaven to interpenetrate the vibratory nature of the earth. The higher vibratory pattern interpenetrates the lower vibratory pattern and they are one.
So it's not a continued sequential movement: “Well we've got as far as the fourth day now; the fifth day will bring us…” Where exactly? “We're going to find life; then on the sixth day we'll find truth, and on the seventh day we find love.” No, because when the veil dissolves there's heaven right next to us, right there, all of it, complete, whole, holy—it is holy. So the continuing creative cycle relates to the means by which this which is already whole and holy, this heavenly aspect of the individual, re-creates and clears the channel, the instrument, for the expression of this, physically, mentally, and in spiritual expression. The continuing movement of the creative cycle achieves this to the extent that the veil is dissolved, and of course as this is achieved the veil dissolves some more, until it's all clear and there is a state of oneness. That is MAN—the living soul!
As I say, it is not merely an individual matter. It is a collective matter, because there is a whole body of humanity, and this whole body of humanity must experience the clearing of the veil. Just as in our own individual bodies, in our own individual states of consciousness, there are those things which pass away, so also in the whole body of mankind there is a cleansing process. And that cleansing process has what human beings think of as unpleasant results. Ultimately people die, but before they die they suffer in various ways. This relates to the cleansing of the collective body, just as there is a cleansing of the individual body—not only the body as such but of course the consciousness of the body, and in fact it is the consciousness that is first cleared. And this, incidentally, relates to the fifth day of creation, where what is moving in consciousness is brought forth by the water. The water is what? The symbol of truth. It is brought forth by the truth, and what moves in consciousness is then of a living nature. The living creature it is called, which functions in the water and in the air. Here we see something which pertains to the unholy ghost beginning to become the holy ghost; the living ghost, not the dying one. Human beings sometimes have the idea that ghosts go on living interminably. Only when living or existing human beings keep them alive. The ghosts which haunt not only houses but human beings are kept alive by human beings. They have no life of themselves; they're dying ghosts. Let them die! But so many people want to keep the ghosts alive, don't they? Bloodsuckers they are, life suckers. Some carry them around until they have no more life left. Let the unholy ghost pass away, that the holy ghost may be experienced because we hunger and thirst after righteousness. This is our passion!
When our Master was arrested, unjustly accused, tried, sentenced, and the sentence was carried out, all this is spoken of as His passion. We didn't see Him making a big song and dance of it, and yet do you think He could have moved through that experience as He did, without changing character, if there had been no passion in Him, if there had been no real intensity of love and lust after God? Of course it was there, but the evidence appeared through what occurred in His own continuing expression of the true character. There it was all the way through, no shadow of turning, in spite of that horrible idea that was even put in the Bible, when He was supposed to have said, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” How ridiculous! Somebody heard him saying something all right, and didn't understand what He was saying; it sounded like one of the Psalms. Can you imagine Him quoting one of the Psalms while He was hanging on the cross? I don't think so. It was the expression of the spirit which was fitting in the moment, in character all the way through. He didn't deny God, or betray God. That was what Peter and Judas did, respectively.
Hungering and thirsting—and the evidence of that is known by reason of living, is known by reason of the true character displayed, by reason of the consistency of that true character, no shadow of turning. This is only possible to anyone as the veil thins and that true quality of character in the heavenly aspect comes through and permeates the earthly aspect. What sort of technique are you going to find to cause this to happen? There ain't no such animal! because wherever a human technique is used there is a self-centered human being present using it, and if one is identified with that, using this technique, one is not going to experience the dissipation of the human ego; it's busy maintaining itself by its technique. I don't care what the technique is called; it may be something most holy and precious in the mind of the individual; there are many such things. Some of the techniques are called churches or denominations. Loyalty is poured out in this way and the self-centered human ego is maintained in consequence. Others use techniques of whatever—yoga for instance. It may be that some truth is present in these techniques but that truth is not known and cannot be known on the basis of an application by a human ego. It is only when what is in the heaven permeating the earth finds expression through the earth that what may look like a technique may appear. We may be careful about what we eat for instance. We may be careful as to how we breathe. We may be careful to provide our bodies with needed exercise. We may be careful in many ways, but not because this is going to get us into heaven. We have experienced heaven first, and then all these things are added, in the right way. All that we do is an expression of heaven on earth, and every phase of our living, every detail of our living, reveals it. If this is so, what has been lost? All our capacities to live are then used to the full in the right way—righteousness—and we don't have to go chasing after any pleasures. It is all a pleasurable experience, not because we try to make it so but simply because it is so.
Oneness—oneness is Love. Wholeness is Love. Love is the first dimension to appear in this dimensional state, and Truth is a dimension of Love, and Life is a dimension of Love and Truth. All our capacities then proceed to add dimension to dimension in the revelation of God on earth. Hungering and thirsting—passion! Let our lusting then be after righteousness and not after pleasure and power or any of the things after which human beings lust. Let this power, this energy, be offered to God in our lusting after righteousness, that the veil may be dissolved; not because we want to get anything, not because we want to fulfil ourselves, but simply because we long for the truth of the experience of man, and that truth is God. I am deeply thankful for the increasing willingness to move with that spirit present in the heaven; we do it easily and naturally, and the awkwardness begins to dissolve as the veil dissolves. How thankful to God, then, we may be this evening to share this spirit in oneness, and to touch an increased consciousness of wholeness, the reality of love!
© emissaries of divine light
