I emphasized yesterday that it was our responsibility individually, and as members of this Assembly, to pose a question to the world. It seems from what someone said in a letter that there was some thought that the question was being posed to us. This would indicate that we have reverted again into the educational situation, so that we classified ourselves amongst those who are being questioned by the Lord. As long as it stays at that level, nothing is being achieved whatsoever yet. Hearing the question of the Lord, as presumably we have in the past, we may have answered, “Yes.” I trust so—otherwise we wouldn't be sitting here—but His concern is that the question should be asked of the world. In order for you to have the opportunity of hearing the question and answering it, someone had to ask it of you. Now it's our turn to ask it of others. We are not here to give the answer but to receive the answer. I suppose it could be said that the answer is made plain, rightly, if we are really asking the question, because the truth is revealed in our living, and that is the answer. We're not laying that on anyone—it's there for them to recognize if they will—but the very fact that the truth is in expression poses the question to others. So we are here to align ourselves with the Lord in the attitude toward all people, “I will demand of thee and answer thou me.” If someone does answer, “Yes”, then moving through the educational cycles they presumably will graduate at some point and participate in the further expansion of the sounding of the Tone or the asking of the question.
I might remind you of some words here: “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem. Thou that killest the prophets and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathers her chickens under her wings, and ye would not. Behold your house is left unto you desolate, for I say unto you, Ye shall not see me henceforth till ye shall say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.” Here was the dissolution of the Second Sacred School. The opportunity that He came to extend to the children of men had been so rejected that there was no door left to open insofar as the Second Sacred School was concerned—and so He was here introducing the Third Sacred School. He said, “Ye shall not see me henceforth until something happens.” He was speaking to those who would be present at any given time when the opportunity for the something to happen was available. He was speaking to the Jews perhaps, particularly in that setting, but He was speaking to all those who were looking for the answer, which is the usual human approach—human beings are looking for the answer. Glibly we say, “You are the answer.” If you are the answer, then you give it. So indication is presented here of what should occur by reason of the opening of another opportunity. The house of the Second Sacred School was left desolate—it wasn't available anymore for human beings.
As we have noted, there is the tendency on the part of human nature to look back and see something that it imagines it could use to advantage, and it has done this with respect to the Second Sacred School, and tried to pick up the pieces and make it work again, without the presence of the One who was capable of making it work—at least without His manifest presence on earth. There's been a tendency to try and get around that and say that He's really with us anyway, in the heavenly sense. But we realize that nothing can work except as there is the fact made manifest of the union of heaven and earth. That was the only basis that the Second Sacred School could have worked. That union was revealed in Jesus, of course. The earth must be on hand, even though the approach may be a heavenly one. The earth must be on hand if there is to be the generation of the substance that is required to make that heaven known. We realize this to be so now. There was some consideration of this, looking at it from the standpoint of the initiation of what is to occur from the standpoint of the first seal, or from the standpoint of the lowest level, from the standpoint very definitely of the earth.
So the Second Sacred School was gone and the Third Sacred School was yet to come. “Ye shall not see me henceforth till ye shall say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.” Well, we can look at this from the standpoint of those who are girding themselves to say, “Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.” We were in that classification, I suppose, at one point. There must be he who comes in the name of the Lord for anyone to say, “Blessed is he”—and this is our concern: the he that comes in the name of the Lord. This has reference both to a point of focus in this regard, and also to the identity of the collective expression of that One, because we are looking here at the Body of the Son of God, the Body of the Archangel, however it might be described. But let us see this not merely as a physical body composed of physical flesh; when the word “body” is mentioned, this usually is what flashes first in consciousness, something physical. But there is a spiritual body too, and it is this that is of primary importance. There can be no physical manifestation without a spiritual manifestation. We know that that is even true of our own physical bodies now. We've noted what occurs after conception, and how there must be the pneumaplasmic provision if there is going to be the building of a physical body—and so in this sense the spirit comes first, and then the pneumaplasmic body, and then the physical body.
The spirit must be present to activate and animate what is happening; but it will only activate and animate to the extent that there is the connecting substance of spirit, spiritual substance, pneumaplasm. When that is there, there is activation by reason of this fact, so that the physical substance which is brought, the inheritance which begins to put in an appearance, through the mother's body in this instance, may be incorporated into a form that isn't at all haphazard. It isn't haphazard because of what is present in the spiritual body. So if we speak of the formation of a body, let us not exclude the reason for that formation—namely, the spiritual body composed of spiritual substance. Only when that is so can there be a physical body. But with the tendency in human consciousness to have the treasure on earth rather than in heaven, if the word “body” is mentioned, immediately everybody thinks of a flesh body. A flesh body is very necessary, but it will only be present because there is a spiritual body to allow it to be present. There will only be life because of that spiritual body, because of the spirit which activates and animates the spiritual substance, which is turn activates and animates the physical substance. The physical substance, being activated and animated, then generates more spiritual substance, so that the greater wholeness of spirit may emerge.
We see this very specifically relates to what occurs from the standpoint of the Third Sacred School—the spiritual expression plane approach. The First Sacred School, yes, the flesh was about all that anybody could see, or were even interested in. So now we have the spiritual expression plane approach, as we well know, which begins to establish the true orientation. Of course, if the approach had carried through from the First Sacred School to the Second Sacred School, to the Third Sacred School, it would have brought the orientation ultimately on that basis. But as there was failure in the first two schools, then obviously it wasn't being brought forward on that basis. It had to be brought forward for itself, with the spiritual expression plane approach—and we recognize mental and physical implications. Here we come again to this matter of implications. The physical factors and the mental factors are simply implications that we may observe. They're not the first order of business at all. There are implications spiritually speaking with respect to mental function and physical function. We need to discover what those implications are. We cannot receive these implications, we cannot give them to anybody else on this proverbial platter we’ve been talking about, because the First and Second Sacred Schools are no more. That approach cannot be made. So having made the spiritual expression plane approach, we begin to discover that there are implications mentally and physically in this regard; but we need ourselves individually to allow these implications to flood forth into the experience of our living. We need to follow out implications, so that we see from the spiritual standpoint what is necessary mentally speaking and what is necessary physically speaking, because we have observed the implications. We haven't been given a set of rules, “Do this mentally speaking; do that physically speaking.” All that related to the First and Second Sacred Schools. But each individual, with the spiritual approach, must discover those implications for him- or herself.
Various hints or clues have been provided, which there has been an inclination for many, as you well know, to translate, interpret, into physical or mental terms. That's entirely taboo insofar as the Third Sacred School is concerned. That might have been all right, perhaps, if the approach was being made from the physical standpoint or from the mental standpoint. Then there was a code of rules, wasn't there? a Ten Commandments, and all this. But now we need to discern what it is that needs to find expression mentally and physically. We need to discover what the spiritual implications are in this regard, because we become aware of what is true spiritually speaking—then it needs to emerge out into expression; and this presumably is what we've been experiencing in whatever measure, with, however, a tendency to maintain something of a casing around us of the mental and physical factors which require an explanation somehow. We don't know what that explanation is, because we're not making that approach. We live from the spiritual standpoint, allowing the implications of that to flood mind and body. Then we're in position to ask the question, because we ourselves are then revealing the truth. The truth is there, so those of whom we ask the question are not left clueless anymore—there is the living truth. Very few are likely to recognize that fact, but nevertheless the fact that it is there exerts an influence and poses the question. The fact that Jesus was present back along the way certainly posed a question then. It was posed in a little different way because He was initiating the Second Sacred School, and carrying it through as far as was possible—but nevertheless a question was posed. “Will you or will you not acknowledge me?”—fundamentally was His approach from the mental standpoint. He continued to emphasize the works. “If you can't believe me, my own state, look at the works, believe those”—be willing to make a mental acceptance of this. “If you do that, then I’ll carry you through,” is what He was saying in effect.“I’ll carry you through the Second Sacred School, and we'll move on eventually to the Third Sacred School.”
But the answer that He received to that question was so blundering and restricted and uncomprehending that it wasn't worth anything. He reached a point where it was useless to continue in that way, and so we have these words which are an indication of the point that was reached when the shift took place, and He pointed to something that was to come. And we have an awareness of our responsibility to provide what is necessary so that others may say, “Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord,” because we ourselves, individually and together, come in the name of the Lord, and we're not answering any more questions. The question has been answered insofar as we are concerned—“I am come in the name of the Lord. Here I am. Because I have answered this question in fact and not in theory only, the spiritual body of the Lord has taken form to this extent.”
“He that cometh in the name of the Lord” refers to that One in whom we all live and move and have our being. “I and my Father are one.” The human mind would be inclined to translate this as though the Master should have said, “Ye shall not see me henceforth till ye shall say, Blessed is he or she who cometh in the name of the Lord,” or “Blessed are they who come in the name of the Lord.” No, because there's only One in fact—and we know this if we are coming in the name of the Lord. “I am come that they might have life and that they might have it more abundantly.” And we differentiate that spiritual coming according to our particular roles in the fulfilment of our coming, so that there may be for the world, “He that cometh in the name of the Lord.”
The question is then posed and the answer can then be given. Because it is a collective expression of spirit, there is an entirely different situation to what it was when it was only an individual expression of spirit. It is because of this collective factor—which relates to the Third Sacred School incidentally—because of this collective factor in spirit that the question can be posed and consequently the whole issue brought to point so that the answer must be given. “There shall be no more time.” The line is to be drawn. Every individual has the choice to make an answer one way or the other way—that's open. Possibly it might be argued that there is the imposition of the question, but even that doesn't seem to be an imposition. Sometimes human beings translate it as though it were an imposition because they don't really see the question; but the question is asked simply because there are those present who are in their living asking it—and those presumably include us. That's what we're here in the Assembly for—to allow ourselves to assume the role of the asker of the question.
Now obviously this role is not just one thing, in the sense of all of us being duplicates of each other. We have seen something emerging into form, we say, but if there is an external form of some kind, why is it emerging? Why is it putting in an appearance? Obviously not because there are some brilliant minds on hand who have sat down together and decided, “Well this should be the form and that should be the form,” although there is a tendency, when the form does begin to emerge, for the minds to get in there and interpret the form according to the concepts of the mind. This is the way good Emissary concepts are formed, instead of just leaving it alone, trusting spirit to bring forth its own form. It will bring forth that form step by step—not in a jerky way. You know that if the babe forms in the womb it's a very smooth process. It doesn't just jump from one day to the next. So there is a smooth unfoldment, which tends to be made jerky in some respects because the mind gets in there and tries to crystallize it at some certain point. Well I don't think you'd want a body that was all just one type of cell. There is a vast variety here. And one of the things that prevents the natural unfoldment of what is now occurring is the fact that people observe too much what is happening someplace else, which they think relieves them of the responsibility of letting their own implications be brought forth, to see what those might be, which the spirit was seeking to build in that location. Let us never imagine that we can collectively copy each other, any more than we rightly can individually copy each other. There has been the endeavor to do this individually too, and we have a whole row of the same person almost! What's the use of that? So, certainly, there is a design, and we recognize the reality of the design which needs to emerge out of the Core.
It is a Spiritual Core. It has physical form because the Core needs to be on earth, but it is the spiritual core on earth that is important. The physical aspect of it is only important because it allows the spiritual Core to be on earth. So we do not emphasize the physical aspects. We are concerned to associate ourselves, to experience, the spiritual aspects. One of the characteristics of the Core in its most focused aspects can be described by the words, stillness and quietness. This has been emphasized, hasn't it? “In quietness and in confidence is my strength.” Be still. So there must, collectively speaking, be a still place, out of which springs what is differentiated, spiritually speaking, taking form in a variety of ways.
Now there are those who rightly function more particularly in the Spiritual Core at the point of focus; but if everybody was in that Spiritual Core at the point of focus, there would be precious little connection with the creative field of our responsibility as a body. So there must be those who function at every level. Now the intent is to generate substance so that there may be substance firmly connecting upward and substance available to flood the world. This is the substance of Love. We may call it that without understanding anything because we use those words, necessarily. But our concern is to flood the world with the substance of Love, so that the impact of Truth that is present may bring to pass the essential answering of the question that is thereby being posed.
There is a design in this Body, this facility, this primarily spiritual facility, by which these things are accomplished, and there are those who need to function at all levels in this facility. There has been a tendency on the part of Emissaries very often to think of themselves as all being at the same level. Well, perhaps there's a little peak right at the Center where I stand, and a few others around there—this little peak sticking up out of a broad, flat plane. Everybody else is buddies on this broad, flat plane—“You're not any higher than I am; and you're not any higher than I am.” All these human nature attitudes have absolutely nothing to do with what we are about. There are roles to be played so that the machinery may be operative, and those roles differ. There's a great variety of them. This requires that there be those in manifest human form who are content in human consciousness to play the particular role which becomes obviously their own. Well, they will never find out what it is that is obviously their own if they are trying to compare themselves with everybody else, or trying to pick and choose the role that is going to be played. The role is already established, and no human mind is going to change that—so if we don't like it we'd better learn to lump it, because that's the way it is. Such a statement is quite true, but it hasn't had too much effect on most because there are still so many trying to pick and choose, trying to make it satisfactory to themselves, and vying with each other for position. That's human politics, isn't it? It has nothing to do with what we're about!
There are roles at the very Core of things, obviously. There is that necessity. There are roles in concentric spheres beyond that, all the way out, and no role is more important than any other role, because all of them are necessary. And one finds oneself playing certain roles. Now there are, in the external sense, maybe changes in those roles which work out, but I'm thinking of this from the spiritual standpoint. The whole exercise is designed so that the desolate world may be given an opportunity to say, “Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.” We can discern what the implications are with respect to this. We don't just sit there and say, “What does that mean?” Let a little spiritual thinking occur, so that you discover what the implications are. When you do this you'll begin to discover what the implications are for you, and you thereby begin to discover what your spiritual role is, because the spiritual role can never be handed to you—like one might say, “Well, this is your coat. This is the spiritual role. This is the robe you will be wearing now.” The spiritual role must come out of you. It can't be imposed upon you! So we have the responsibility, then, of extending the question to others in a recognition of what is required of others. They are required to answer that question for themselves. Not to sit there adoring us and saying, “Oh, that's wonderful; you are answering all our questions.” Some of you may have had a little experience of that along the way, where someone takes such a stance. That may seem to be a necessary step for some, but finally we lay it on the line spiritually and say, “You answer it. I'm not going to give you any answer. I will reveal the truth, but it is up to you to accept that expression of truth into your own living or reject it in your own living. That's all.” That's fundamentally the question, isn't it?
In order to accept it into one's own living there is an educational process necessary; but it is spiritual education, bringing people to the door, with the objective of going through it, that they may share with us in providing the spiritual expression necessary to pose the question to all people. So there are the spiritual essences at the Core, and then these essences are carried forth into key areas in the world, one way or another—and there are those who have roles to play in that regard. There are those who have roles to play at the very Core of things, there are those who have roles to play at the periphery of the Core, and there are those who have roles to play in between, so that there may be a whole thing and everything may be handled, everything may be encompassed. Obviously this necessitates that those to whom we pose this question should actually relinquish their human nature tendencies, so that they stop vying for position, so that they stop projecting themselves forward as something important all on their own. None of us carry importance all on our own. We're only important to the extent that we are participating in the whole, which is important.
So here we move as a spiritual body, in this formation a miniature spiritual body, playing the roles for the moment that are necessary here, seeing that we are providing a spiritual Core, and consequently that everything in our expression, not only while we're sitting here together but everything in our expression throughout the day, may be exactly right as a part of the expression of this Spiritual Core. We have a consciousness of responsibility in this regard—we say. We talk about responsibility, and human nature tends to shy away from it. But spiritual responsibility is something different. It's something that is naturally acceptable to the extent that we have in fact answered Yes to the question. Then, accepting that responsibility, obviously we're in position to ask the question of others. But again, let me emphasize the point that it is not an imposition. In effect, there is the evidence of the truth made manifest, and human beings come up against that. The people with whom we come in physical contact come up against that. And there are others with whom we establish vibrational contact in one way or another, they come up against that—unconsciously for the most part, until they come a lot closer. They sense the question being asked, and unconsciously they begin to answer it; and somewhere along the way they reach a point where it comes out consciously—this happened to all of us—and the answer coming out consciously may come out consciously, Yes; subconsciously, No. Well we're not too concerned even if it's No, because all we are concerned about is that the question should be posed and answered, and each individual is permitted to answer it for him‑ or herself. We make no demands. We do not require anything of anyone, but we know very well that everyone is going to have to make the choice—and we know this for sure to the extent that we participate in the process which asks the question.
“Answer thou me.” The question is asked by our living—but let us not imagine that the true living does not bring something very specific to bear. True living is not just drifting along in some sort of spiritual euphoria. It's very exact, very specific. We are conveying what is coming down from God out of heaven into the earth in this fashion, and those who dwell on earth are deciding for themselves as to whether they are going to participate in the process by which this may continue to emerge into manifestation or whether they are going to exclude themselves from that process. The process is not going to stop! It is going to complete itself somewhere along the line, and those who object to it will not be on hand at that point.
“Ye shall not see me henceforth till ye shall say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.” Have we not seen Him? The human mind may want to pin it down—“Well, we need Him in a particular form now, so that we can really recognize Him”—because the attention is being given to the form and not to the spirit. But we see spiritually, and we see Him. We certainly see Him if we have accepted the responsibility of being in His Name. In His Name is in His spirit, in His Word, in what He is. If we are in that, we see Him. “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.” Not this vast figure that human beings tend to imagine, because they translate everything in terms of form, but the spirit which is present now relative to our own experience, as we allow the focus of it to find expression. That is God—and that which so finds expression is not separate from all that God is, finding expression everywhere; but we do not imagine that something would be gained by having the experience of that. How could we? All we are capable of experiencing is what comes to focus in our own expression. We may rejoice in the glory revealed through others in whom the same thing is happening. Wonderful. But we don't want to possess God, do we, personally—there's old self‑centered human nature again—just to allow the individual expression, which is part of the greater expression. And we have a consciousness of the greater expression. You can't allow your individual expression of spirit to pour forth in your living without having a consciousness of the overall expression. Maybe not in a specific sense, but certainly as it relates to what is close to you; not in a specific sense insofar as the overall expression of God is concerned, but you're aware of the overall expression of God. And you're aware very vividly of what is close to you, and you're aware most vividly of what is pouring out through you—substance—substance flooding our worlds, the substance of Love, in which the question is asked. This is so when we abide in His Name.
The Christian world has got rather hung‑up on this business of “in His name,” without understanding it, apparently, at all. In His Name, in His spirit, a part of His spiritual body in experience, not merely to be honed for one day but in experience now, that there may be an outpouring of spirit because there's an outpouring of substance. We have substantial lives to live, substantial lives in a variety of roles. The roles tend to become more specific as the body fills out. As was noted before, in the beginning there were very few, so everybody had to do everything. Now it begins to be so that the distinctions in roles can be recognized, and we can intelligently associate ourselves in this pattern of distinction. We're not trying to grab anything for ourselves. We find ourselves gently and easily present in the particular role where we need to be; and we're not looking at somebody else, comparing it with somebody else. We are playing our role, and playing our role, we see the implications of that role, and we begin to see the implications as these implications relate to the implications of other people's roles. It all begins to come together because it's coming together through us; it's coming forth through the facilities of expression that we have. And it is one thing coming forth, One Spirit differentiated—a great variety revealed, but One Spirit just the same.
How beautiful to share these things, in this particular setting, with these who are here present playing this role here now. We are all playing a role as Assembly members, but within the Assembly there are particular roles—and it is the overall pattern that is the important thing, because this carries the greatest impact; but the overall pattern is also dependent upon the fact that we assume correctly our individual roles within the whole. To the extent that we are doing this, there is a spiritual impact. The question is being asked more vibrantly in the consciousness of mankind. There are those who will be participating with us in this, in other roles beyond this Core—between this Core and the periphery, way further out—and there will be those at the periphery who, because we are pouring substantial substance into this whole field, will find themselves with that substantial substance out wherever they are, and doing whatever they are doing, so that what is coming from the Core reaches the world of our responsibility. Praise the Lord for the design of Life!
There is the generation of substance now which is part of our responsibility now;but the substance is generated and it's there, and it is poured forth in whatever measure beyond us. But we find that when this particular Assembly pattern is no more that the substance is still there. It is then carried individually but we find that when we go where we're going, it's there too, because of what we've been doing here. And the sense of oneness, then, is not reduced at all by reason of the fact that we may not be associated together in the same direct way as we have been during this Assembly period. It is the spiritual substance which allows for the sense of oneness, and not the physical proximity in fact, although the physical proximity has a purpose for the generation of the substance in this particular configuration. And there will continue to be physical proximities wherever we are in various ways—sometimes smaller, sometimes larger, which still is concerned with the generation of substance.
