A Sea Of Glass Clear As Crystal
from Moment Of Truth #1 & #2
Martin Cecil September 6, 1981 am & pm
I am sure we all have some sensing of a climactic point being reached. I never like to contemplate failure—my whole concern, and I trust yours also, centers in this matter of victory. Victory, however, is not something that occurs through wishful thinking, just because we might like it to be so. There must be the fact to back it up. These things will prove themselves out. It is well, however, that we should all have an awareness of what it is that needs to prove itself out. The question might be put, “Can we individually, and consequently together, be counted upon?” This does not only relate to those of you who are here gathered this morning but to many others as well.
Obviously there is great joy in victory; by the same token there is deep sadness in failure. There have been many failures over the millennia of human history. One may be keenly aware of this in recalling the occasion when the Master, when He was on earth, wept: Jesus wept. These might be called the saddest words in the Bible. When there is one present who has a vision of what it is that is really happening, and what it is that could happen of victory or failure, then when those who are present act in a way that brings failure, what deep sadness there must necessarily be!
I do not wish to dwell upon the matter of failure because presumably, with all of us, no such thing will be allowed to occur. However let us not delude ourselves into imagining that this does not require something very specific of us, each one. We have had varying lengths of time, some of us many, many years, of participation in the unfolding creative cycle by which victory might be assured. We come to the moment of truth. It is not my intention to lay a heavy burden upon anyone, but it is well that we should face the facts—it could not be a moment of victory if we were to delude ourselves. So we come to this time prepared, to the extent that we are prepared. We might look back and see a certain amount of time wasted, but also there was time rightly used. The creative cycle has continued to unfold in our own experience, and in the experience of human beings on the face of the earth everywhere. There is really no separation between us in this matter, except that we have the greater responsibility because we have some conscious awareness of what it is. Most people don’t know. We do, and so this matter of victory is in our hands.
When the Master wept this simply indicated that what might have occurred at that time couldn’t be what it was intended to be. If it had been, it might have obviated the necessity for His own subsequent experience of mistrial and crucifixion. There was failure before, but victory from His standpoint later, however a very lonely one. It did open the door and initiate the cycle in which we now participate. We come again to the moment of truth. We have an awareness of what makes the victory possible, and indeed certain, if we associate ourselves with it. This is certainly something that cannot be achieved by human effort or so-called human wisdom. It occurs in the power of the spirit of the living God. It occurs on earth for the children of men when there are those present who embody that spirit in action. We do it factually and not merely in fancy. We have become aware over the years of the essential factors which must be present if the truth is to prevail in our experience and in the experience of the world. We became aware of these things probably quite some time ago—some even twenty, thirty, forty years ago. To become aware is not enough. Continually we have had the opportunity of proving these things out in fact.
One recognition we have had—mentioned in times past quite often but seldom really understood—is that the first failure of mankind occurred through two people and then multiplied. We may recognize that human emotions have, from the point of the original failure, wreaked havoc in God’s world, so that it is no longer recognizable as being God's world, at least not in human consciousness. This emotional control, prevalent in the world, is pictured as a woman—a whore, sitting upon a scarlet-colored beast. This picture is painted in greater details—not a very pretty one; yet it is the factual state, and here is the basis for failure. The impure hearts have been filled with emotions of various sorts, some of them looked upon as being good, others obviously bad; but whether good or bad the world has been governed by human emotions, supported by the human intellect which devises reasons for supporting these emotions, ever since the first failure.
I'm sure that we have finally come to the point where we recognize the devil when we see him. Maybe I should say, see her, but of course I don’t think the devil is particular as to sex. Man was made in the image and likeness of God, created male and female, so male and female are present in God, obviously—they’re present in the devil too. Men and women are not equal. Men don’t equal women, women don’t equal men. There is a truth to the word equality, but it certainly doesn’t lie in the endeavors of human beings to better each other. Men and women are not equal. There is quite a distinction here and it is right that there should be. There is the matter of complementation involved, because the true state is oneness. There cannot be a state of oneness without the parts being present. If anything is left out, then there is no state of oneness.
In this initial matter, relating to man and to God, there are two aspects, designated as male and female. The male isn’t the female, the female isn’t the male. But let them be put together on the right basis and there is the truth of oneness. The right basis is is already established in God. Human beings can’t make it. It already is so, but thus far everybody has rejected it. Why? Well because they want to have it their own way. Who is willing to let it be the way it actually is? Any endeavor that ignores that is futile, because it already is—the truth is—we don’t make it not be by ignoring it. It’s still there, and if we ignore it we find ourselves in troubles of various sorts, and then try frantically to do something about the troubles. But there is nothing that human beings can do about the troubles in that way. The answer is really very simple: accept the truth—not only accept it theoretically but factually.
These matters concern us, who would be inclined to claim that we understand, that we know. Here is the nub of the situation, relating to both female emotions and male emotions—the emotions of impure hearts, the emotions present in human beings everywhere on the face of the earth in this present world. The state is universal. No one was born into the world without inheriting the emotional package. Some inherit this part of the total package and some that part of the total package. Some people put greater store by their inheritance than others do but it’s always there in everyone. The truth already is. If we reject it we suffer and die; that’s all there is to it. Human beings have suffered and died because they rejected it. That includes all of us. Presumably we have begun to see the stupidity of such a state and therefore exhibited some willingness to let it be changed, because the opportunity of change has always been here. “The kingdom of heaven is at hand”—always.
Human beings have a habit of going along with the crowd—the crowd composed of individual human beings who have firmly held the door shut and suffered the consequences, and then bewailed their fate, complaining about it endlessly and trying to think up good ideas to get rid of it. The simple way has always been present and available for those who finally were honest enough to admit it. A certain measure of honesty has come into our experience. We are going to find out how much! It all hangs upon this matter of human emotions, the dominance of the impure heart. Let the heart be purified, because there is an awareness of the truth, a willingness to let the creative action of the spirit of the living God assume the dominant control.
There is a passage which we have looked at in times past, contained in the Book of Job, that speaks of these things. This is the oldest book in the Bible, so the availability of the truth has been present with human beings as far back as anyone can go. It has consistently been ignored down through the ages. It cannot be ignored anymore. The moment of truth comes, and God will not be mocked forever, just for a little time, very brief actually in the cycles of eternity—that has been permitted for man’s sake. These verses are contained in the Book of Job: “Canst thou bind the sweet influences of Pleiades?” Can human emotions be brought into the proper design of control? Unless they can there is no hope—failure is absolutely certain. By the same token it is in this field that victory is absolutely certain too. Can human emotions be brought into line in both female and male? The second part of this same verse is also included in what happens. “Canst thou bind the sweet influences of Pleiades, or loose the bands of Orion?” We can see this in terms of female and male. Because the sweet influences of Pleiades have not been bound in women the bands of Orion have not been loosed in men. Men have been bound hand and foot in the world as we now know it.
The female is required to be adequately in place if the restoration is to occur. She led the way down; she leads the way up—not in the absence of the male however. He certainly had a part in the fall too. Let no males delude themselves on this point. They have permitted the fallen state to be maintained ever since. But this does not deny the fact that women must accept their own responsibility in the design. There has been this sense of guilt and shame present, unconsciously for the most part, because of failure, but it seems safer to try to maintain their position of failure than to relinquish it. Emotions are not alone present in women. They are in men also, and it is because they are present in men that men participated in the fallen state, introduced by women. They thought they were going to get something out of it too—and they have! Everybody has, but not exactly what was expected or desired, certainly.
Oh no doubt many males—we can hardly call them men—have sought to achieve great things. There have been human giants who have been striding across the pages of history. They thought they were really going to accomplish something, build great empires, which all disintegrated and came to naught. Oh what futility! Because it seems, from the human standpoint, to take some time for these things to happen there is the illusion that really there is a rising up to achieve something great. But then somewhere along the way we find ourselves on the skids—right now for instance—because it’s all a futile waste of time. But the truth is true and all is well, unconquerable life prevails. Here is the victory that is offered to those who will accept it, who will allow emotions to be brought under the dominion of the spirit of God. Human beings are equipped with emotions; there’s nothing wrong with that; they have the capacity to emote. So I bring it to point, with respect to this matter of emotions. There is more to the picture than is seen solely on the basis of a consideration of emotions, but here is a central element. And unless we undertake to face this fact nothing else that we might consider would make any difference. “Canst thou bind the sweet influences of Pleiades, or loose the bands of Orion?” Here is the key to victory or failure.
In the words a sea of glass clear as crystal is the summary of all that women are. A sea of glass clear as crystal! In the female experience, both individually and collectively, this has never been known as far as present human memory goes back. So there has been no sea of glass clear as crystal upon which a man might stand to fulfil his responsibilities. When that is done the sweet influences of Pleiades can be bound in the design of the truth; then there is indeed a sea of glass clear as crystal.
The experience must be known of the sea of glass clear as crystal, within the heart of each one. The emotional realm of mankind has been a stormy sea, filled with violent tides and crosscurrents, with waves of murky water. The whole human race has been suffering from seasickness. All manner of sickness and all manner of disease may be seen as springing out of this seasickness—the emotional state of mankind. As long as it continues the way it is the sickness continues. There is no way of stopping it by trying to treat the sickness. Let there be a sea of glass clear as crystal, and there is no more reason for sickness.
I mentioned that Job was the oldest book in the Bible. There is a story here which carries considerable significance. There is also the story of the failure of human beings recorded at the beginning of the Book of Genesis. That story, and the story at the beginning of the Book of Job, are a portrayal of two aspects of the same thing. We usually hear about Adam and Eve because that failure has been emphasized in human consciousness, chiefly through the subconscious sense of shame and guilt. While initially it may have involved just two people, clearly enough it shortly involved considerably more, until now the whole human race is in this state of failure. Something different is portrayed with respect to Job. Job represents those who kept their integrity. So on the one hand there were those who kept their integrity, and on the other there were those who lost it. Because there were those who kept their integrity the possibility of restoration has remained a very real potential. In fact this restoration has been anticipated. This is portrayed in the Book of Job—thirty-eight chapters of mess, and then the fulfilment came. It came because Job had kept his integrity. He was asked by his wife to curse God and die, but he didn’t follow this female suggestion. The suggestion was to lose his integrity—he was badly afflicted; there seemed to be every valid reason for him to curse God and die, but he would not do that.
There have been those down through the ages who were represented in this story by Job, individuals who kept their integrity in spite of everything. We have various outstanding examples of this, coming to a point of culmination in the One called Jesus. He would not curse God and die, so He lived. Simple! There have been a great many people who have, in their various ways, suggested to me that I curse God and die. So far I haven’t done it. Usually that suggestion has been brought by a female, as it was in the story of Job, and as it was also in the story of Adam and Eve. Adam lost his integrity. Job retained his. Because that integrity was retained, there has been a continuity of integrity present among the children of men ever since, as well as a very broad continuity of the loss of integrity.
So we come to this present time when the sea of glass clear as crystal has begun to re-emerge so that God might speak out of the whirlwind and claim attention. This thread of continuity, maintained by those who have kept their integrity, has been so slight that most of the time it went unnoticed. But it was there, just as it was in Job, so that the time might come when there was sufficient substance present for the radiation of the spirit of God to become known in a direct, conscious sense. Something is called to remembrance by the Spirit of Truth. We and others have shared that remembrance to a certain extent, either by hearsay, which is one thing, or by actual personal experience, which is another.
When Job finally came back into position to receive what the Lord was offering, and had been offering all along, it turned out to be considerably more than it was at the time when the human failure first put in an appearance. This is an interesting thing to note. There are those who have thought of it in terms of God being particularly pleased with Job because he kept his integrity, and so He was going to reward him accordingly. That is a human nature portrayal—it doesn't happen that way. People are inclined to try to look back to what the true state was. It has moved on since then. There has been an increase, an expansion, a movement, occurring in all this blank space when human beings have been asleep. When the awakening comes, that is something else—it isn’t a repetition, over and over and over endlessly, throughout eternity. No—something new, something fresh, something building upon what went before. As the awakening comes, there we are. As is portrayed in Job, he had twice as much as he had before. This is rightly what is now occurring. There is simply the individual matter of awakening. As individuals we can only awaken for ourselves. So we awaken.
“Canst thou bind the sweet influences of Pleiades, or loose the bands of Orion?” This question is posed to each one of us, and is seen in terms of disturbed human emotion, running riot and bringing forth sickness and finally death. Can human emotion be brought under control and into the true design for right use? There is nothing wrong with the capacity for emotion. There is only something wrong when it is wrongly used. Now we become aware of right use, under the dominion of the spirit of God, which is accepted as the basis for the quality of our momentary living. When that quality begins to come out in our expression the sweet influences of Pleiades are bound, and when they are bound they are found to be sweet. They are pretty sour when they’re running rampant—very bitter.
We saw this in particular terms relative to the female aspect of being, so that the male aspect might be released into the creative expression of the Son, the conscious, directing element in man restored. This then includes the unconscious aspect—the intuitive aspect, particularly represented by women. There are these two aspects in both male and female, but rightly the unconscious aspect is represented by women and the conscious aspect by men. Here we have the Son and the Holy Ghost in concert—complementation. On this basis there may be the acceptance of right responsibility on earth portrayed in these words: “Canst thou bring forth Mazzaroth in his season?” What are we here to bring forth? “I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.” Mazzaroth portrays the true experience of life in man, male and female. This is to be brought forth, that it may be available not only within the body of mankind but beyond the body of mankind, to all the kingdoms of this world—that finally there may be some glory to them.
Life is moving everywhere throughout the whole universe. It is moving obviously in our galaxy and in our solar system. It is moving in the earth. Life is certainly not restricted to what is present on the surface of this planet. It is all-inclusive. If there is a bringing forth of life in our individual and collective field of responsibility there is association with life as it is brought forth everywhere. We can see various connections relative to the bringing forth of life in our environment close at hand and vastly further afield. There is life moving at every level, through everything, and if life is being brought forth through us, what is being brought forth through us relates to everything, it meshes with everything; and we find that there is a wholeness which moves all together to perfection. There begins to be awareness of what is necessary relative to that wholeness within the range of our own particular fields of responsibility. But this awareness is absolutely impossible until life is factually being brought forth. We know what we express.
“Canst thou bring forth Mazzaroth in his season? or canst thou guide Arcturus with his sons?” It is interesting that this goes quite far afield—in relationship to the great sun Arcturus. We don’t need to do anything about it; but Arcturus and his sons certainly have a relationship to what’s going on here. All life meshes together. So whatever it is that comes to focus relative to Arcturus and his sons in our own experience is rightly guided into the creative field which is our individual and collective responsibility. It is impossible to do anything rightly on the face of the earth without having what is done mesh with everything that is being done rightly everywhere else. Some of that which is happening elsewhere indeed has a particular relatedness to what is happening right here, and we no longer think of the universe around us as being millions of light-years away from us, because it is right here where we are. That right-hereness relates to spirit, not merely to the form of things. It may seem, form-wise, that some celestial objects are millions of light-years away. This is a concept of the human mind; it has little relationship to the fact of the matter. If we find ourselves expressing spirit, that’s what we know—and we do not judge by the appearance. We judge righteous judgment, which is the truth that is known when the truth is expressed. So there is much that comes within the range of the experience of man that has long been excluded by reason of human failure.
And finally, “Knowest thou the ordinances of heaven? canst thou set the dominion thereof in the earth?” This clearly has something to do with the reason for man’s existence. He was created in the image of God, male and female, to have dominion. All on his own? Of course not. That aspect of the matter went without saying in the beginning. The state of separation had not occurred yet. The dominion was the dominion of God, and man allowed that dominion to be brought to a particular focus for particular uses in the creative cycles. It emerged out of what is spoken of here as the ordinances of heaven, that which is ordained from that standpoint. Do you know what is ordained? The only way we can know it is to bring it forth, and then we begin to know. How are we going to bring it forth? Could the right influence relate to our immediate circumstance right here? Where else can it start? We can only reach something that is larger through the small thing that is right next to us. It is futile to try to jump over that.
So there are things ordained relative to the immediate requirement now. There are things ordained for us to share now. Certainly, from my standpoint, I have to be aware of something of this in order to bring it forth. As I bring it forth I know what it is—do you? You share it. Of course it has to filter through your consciousness a bit too, so it may get diverted there a little. But, increasingly, we begin to agree, because what is being brought forth is being brought forth as one thing for which each individual has an aspect of responsibility. It can’t possibly be all brought forth by one person. There is a need for all of us. Each individual has something to bring forth of Mazzaroth, and something to guide; and the guidance can be given because of what is being brought forth through the whole, not separate from that—something being brought forth even in Arcturus that relates to what we bring forth here.
I doubt if everything that needs to be said was said in these three verses. Here is a general view of something, which needs to be made very specific by each individual. So we begin to know the ordinances of heaven, and can set the dominion thereof in the earth. All this depends upon a sea of glass clear as crystal. It isn’t all that clear yet, is it? We’ve been looking at some things here, but there is vastly more to be seen and understood. It requires a sea of glass clear as crystal to let it happen—human emotions—we have the responsibility to let them be clear. Then the design of creative expression emerges, and it emerges in very specific ways which we begin to discover individually.
We arrive at the moment of truth. Every moment is a moment of truth to one who is the truth. It can show up now. To the extent that our experience of living is the truth, then each moment is a moment of truth. Each moment we know the truth to the extent necessary to assume right responsibility for that moment. And nobody can do it for you but you. I rejoice that we have come to this time when we may speak of these things, as I did this morning, quite forcefully. One can deflect the truth by taking the attitude that it doesn’t really apply to me. Let us share an attitude of honesty which allows us to be where we belong, in the sea of glass clear as crystal, so that the creative process may continue as it should, under the dominion of the spirit of God, because there are those who are willing to allow it to work that way. I trust that we may all be included in that number, for this is indeed the moment of truth.
© emissaries of divine light
