Israel—The Action Of God

Israel — The  Action  Of  God

Martin Cecil  January 2, 1977

We are assembled here in the Chapel this morning as sons and daughters of God, to do whatever is right and fitting in this time that we have together. It is not merely a matter of accepting some sort of passive responsibility: there are things to be done.

We have, I am sure, reached a point where we are not so governed by our reactions to circumstances as may have been the case previously. It is necessary that we should come clear of the control of our reaction to appearances; but that is not all, certainly, that is required of us. When we are no longer being governed by appearances round about we are then in position to express what is necessary as sons and daughters of God. There is much that is necessary in this regard; positive action, we could say. We are present here this morning to allow the right expression of positive action in unified radiation. This principle is set forth in very clear terms in the first fourteen verses of the 37th chapter of Ezekiel in the Old Testament. Let me read this passage to you.

The hand of the Lord was upon me, and carried me out in the spirit of the Lord, and set me down in the midst of the valley which was full of bones,

And caused me to pass by them round about: and, behold, there were very many in the open valley; and, lo, they were very dry.

And he said unto me, Son of man, can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord God, thou knowest.

Again he said unto me, Prophesy upon these bones, and say unto them, O ye dry bones, hear the word of the Lord.

Thus saith the Lord God unto these bones; Behold, I will cause breath to enter into you, and ye shall live:

And I will lay sinews upon you, and will bring up flesh upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and ye shall live; and ye shall know that I am the Lord.

So I prophesied as I was commanded: and as I prophesied, there was a noise, and behold a shaking, and the bones came together, bone to his bone.

And when I beheld, lo, the sinews and the flesh came upon them, and the skin covered them above: but there was no breath in them.

Then said he unto me, Prophesy unto the wind, prophesy, son of man, and say to the wind, Thus saith the Lord God; Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live.

So I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived, and stood up upon their feet, an exceeding great army.

Then he said unto me, Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel: behold, they say, Our bones are dried, and our hope is lost: we are cut off for our parts.

Therefore prophesy and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord God; Behold, O my people, I will open your graves, and cause you to come up out of your graves, and bring you into the land of Israel.

And ye shall know that I am the Lord, when I have opened your graves, O my people, and brought you up out of your graves,

And shall put my spirit in you, and ye shall live, and I shall place you in your own land: then shall ye know that I the Lord have spoken it, and performed it, saith the Lord.

Ezekiel was commanded to prophesy. [greatcosmicstory.blogspot.com/2017/09/valley-of-dry-bones-uranda-january-4.html] Prophecy is usually looked upon in the present human state of consciousness as predicting the future, foretelling future events. We need to see that prophecy is speaking the Word of the Lord. When the Word of the Lord is spoken, certainly that determines future events, so in this sense it is foretelling future events; but the prophecy is the action, the expression, of the truth in living, twenty-four hours a day. When there is a consistency in this regard the Word of the Lord is spoken consistently, and the effects of that cause appear; the Word of the Lord is sent forth to accomplish something and it does not return unto Him void.

Our responsibility, then, may be seen as corresponding with that of Ezekiel in this passage. The Word of the Lord must be spoken on earth, spoken in the valley. Elsewhere this valley was called the valley of decision. It is the valley of dry bones. Here is an interesting analogy of the present state of human beings: isolated dry bones. Looking at those isolated bones, could you really tell what the nature of the skeleton would be when they were fitted together? or what the person would look like when the skeleton was clothed in flesh? or how the person would act, what sort of character he would display, when the breath of life was in him? The bones have to come together. The sinews and the flesh must come up upon the reconstructed skeleton and the skin must clothe the flesh. But even so, there is yet the need for the breath of life. All these steps from the original point of just one dry bone, the individual—could anyone prognosticate, then, what the true state of man is? There are those who try to prognosticate in the past, looking backward, as to what some certain form was on the basis of the finding of a little piece of bone, but this is only possible (and certainly not very accurate) because there is already an awareness of what human beings look like now, or what other animals look like. If there were no consciousness of any of these things and some disembodied person found a bone, without any awareness of any forms, could he possibly reconstruct the form from which that bone came? Of course not! It's just as ridiculous to look at human beings now and try to imagine what the true state of man is. It's just as far away from being experienced as the single bone is from the completed living person. So it would be foolishness to try to imagine the true state of man. It is unimaginable. Our concern is that it should be experienced. Obviously if it is experienced, then it is known.

To be experienced there is the necessity for someone to prophesy, someone to speak the Word of the Lord on earth; not necessarily conversationally, although that can be included, but in the expression, the total expression, of living. Here is true prophecy, because when the Word of the Lord is thus spoken future events are foretold; they're going to happen. We do not need to try to figure out what it is exactly that is going to happen, but we know that the result of the speaking of the Word of the Lord produces the happening; and the happening that happens will be the happening that should happen, so we can leave it at that. Why would there be any necessity to try to figure it out, or try to explain to human beings the nature of future events? What would be the point? Who knows what they would be anyway? Speak the Word of the Lord and let the future take care of itself. It will, on the basis of this creative power.

When human beings consider their problems they try to figure out how to solve them. The practical expression of life from this standpoint is to find viable solutions to the problems that present themselves in human affairs, whether individually or in the international sense or anywhere in between. This is one reason why what we have to offer as sons and daughters of God is not considered to be of any great moment—fortunately so, because we're left alone. “There are some rather odd people”—peculiar people, we would say—"who are doing something, but it's not very practical.” Why? Because it doesn't appear to be solving the problem of inflation, for instance, or reducing unemployment, or unifying Canada, or settling the situation in southern Africa or in the Middle East or in Northern Ireland, or anywhere else on earth for that matter. These are the practical problems in the view of the present state of human consciousness, but the fact of the matter is that the sons and the daughters of God are not in the least interested in solving these problems. What in effect is being required by human beings of themselves is to settle all these things so that all concerned can continue in their self-centered state comfortably. We're not interested in the self-centered state, so certainly we are not interested in making human beings comfortable in their self-centered state. The questions that human beings ask with a view to solving their problems are the wrong questions, and certainly we are not here to provide an answer to those questions. Wrong questions can only receive a wrong answer, and they do, as witness the state of affairs in the world. And so the great intellects of the world try to solve these knotty problems.

By the way, the problems which we see on the surface, the popular problems that appear in the media, bear very little resemblance to what is actually going on in the world. If you are not anymore subject to human reactions to appearances then I am sure you will not be stirred up emotionally by those things which are presented to us through the media. This is one way by which human beings are kept distracted. They don't really see what's going on; they only think they see things that stir their emotions, and so they take sides this way and that. “Divide and conquer,” they say. But back of everything there is what might be referred to, I suppose, as power politics, including far greater scope than is usually recognized. In that area there is a completely amoral approach: morality and ethics don't enter into the picture at all, or scarcely at all. Morality and ethics, as human beings understand such things, are left to the masses, to stir their emotions, so that they look at various events and judge them to be unethical or immoral and feel justified in a self-righteous reaction. The emotions are stirred on this basis and human eyes are fastened upon something which has very little meaning actually, but it keeps everyone looking in a different direction from what is being undertaken from the standpoint of what I referred to as power politics.

Obviously there is a completely confusing condition here, and as long as human beings can be kept confused in this way they will not be in position to recognize what is actually taking place. But it's interesting to note that those who are involved in this pattern of power politics are also completely oblivious to something that is taking place back of that again. What is taking place back of that relates to this matter of speaking the Word of the Lord. If there is no one present, no prophet present on earth, to speak the Word of the Lord, then what is going on back of all human affairs leads to the obliteration of the human race. That's one way of clearing up the mess and solving the problems. Of course from the human standpoint it doesn't look as though any problem was solved, just simply totally eliminated because human beings were totally eliminated. In that elimination none of the humanly devised problems were solved in actual fact, because they didn't need to be solved. They just need to evaporate, dissolve, pass away. As long as human beings have their eyes fixed on their problems they maintain them in existence. They maintain them in existence by trying to find solutions, and of course the more solutions they think they find the more problems they have; so there is certainly no practical answer in that direction. The wrong question is being asked.

The very moment that a person finds the right question the answer is obvious. It only seems that there are no answers to questions, or it's very difficult to find them, when it is the wrong question being asked. If the right question can be formulated in human consciousness, immediately the answer is there; therefore it is clear enough that if the answer isn't there the wrong question is being asked. It's wrong in the sense of being meaningless, because there is no means of preserving the self-centered human state. This is where all the human effort is placed, in the endeavor to sustain the self-centered human state, and in that there are all kinds of problems; therefore it is assumed that the thing to do is to try to find the answer to them. But the self-centered human state cannot be sustained indefinitely; it will collapse and eventually pass away.

The bones have only remained in the valley with the expectation that at some point they could be called together, bone to his bone, and the creative cycle could be allowed to unfold according to the Word of the Lord, to permit what we have referred to as the restoration of man. For the restoration of man there must be some people around. If there are no people around, certainly man couldn't be restored—maybe re-created but not restored. What has been called the Plan of God, or the Cosmic Plan by some, we recognize as relating to this means by which man may be restored, the means by which the self-centered state in which man has been trapped may pass away without man passing away. If we want a problem, then that is the problem that was faced by the LORD, and He happens to know what the answer is! But human beings do not; they do not see the problem in its true terms anyway; they do not know what the question is.

For this re-creative process to occur there must be the prophet of the Lord; there must be someone to initiate the creative process by speaking the Word of the Lord. And again, it's not just a matter of saying words; it's a matter of the total expression of living. When the Word of the Lord is spoken on earth then the results are sure. The Word of the Lord was spoken at a particular point in human history through the lips of Jesus, and His whole expression of life was the Word of the Lord. Something obviously was initiated at that point, the results of which are inevitable. It is said that the mills of the gods grind slowly, but they grind exceeding fine. It all works out in the end, one way or the other. So there was an initiating point there, but of course there was an initiating point before that again within the range of our recorded history. It came to pass through Abraham initially: Abraham, Isaac, Jacob; and Jacob had his name changed to Israel. And so subsequent to Jacob the Israel pattern came into the picture.

There must be some significance to this particular word. I'm sure Jacob didn't change his name on the basis of a momentary whim, as some human beings do on occasion. There has been consideration on the part of many with respect to the derivation of the word, trying to understand what it might mean. I suppose we could correlate it with the chosen people, as it turned out, but there is more to it than that. The actual meaning could perhaps be best summarized by using the words “the action of God.” Israel—the action of God. This particular word correlates with another word, Jehovah—God in action on earth. But if God is in action on earth there must be the evidence of His action. That which gives evidence of the action of God on earth is Israel. It certainly doesn't merely indicate the Jewish people, and it certainly doesn't indicate a little strip of land in Palestine.

You may recall that there was a point in the life of Abraham when he stood upon a certain spot on the surface of the earth, which happened to be in Palestine, and the Lord instructed him to look northward and southward and eastward and westward, saying to him that all the land that he saw would be his and for his seed. I might read the passage: “And the Lord said unto Abram, after that Lot was separated from him, Lift up now thine eyes, and look from the place where thou art northward, and southward, and eastward, and westward: For all the land which thou seest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed for ever.”

How far do you think Abraham saw? Was it a clear day, or was it foggy? Of course the point is not with respect to physical vision; this is the usual human reaction, a material reaction. There was a man who stood on Marianna Butte in Colorado, not far from the Ranch, who looked around and claimed all the land that he saw. Well it took in a certain amount of territory, I suppose, but that is one way of looking at land ownership, so to speak; on the other hand one may have a greater vision. One can see, looking northward, that there is considerable scope included; likewise southward, eastward and westward. In fact when you've accepted a clear vision you have included the whole earth, and that is exactly what was being portrayed here. The whole earth belongs to the LORD, not just some little patch of it tax-free—the whole earth! The action of God relates to the whole earth, and the action of God is not a strip of land, certainly; it isn't even the earth. The earth is the particular setting for the action of God insofar as we are concerned as the sons and the daughters of God, but there is no means for God to act on earth without a prophet and without Israel. Israel is the action of God on earth.

That little strip of land that is nowadays called Israel came to birth with the idea of being the homeland of the Jewish people. I doubt if there's enough room for all of them there; but actually the Jewish people are no more Israel than the rest of the peoples of the world. It isn't a matter of earthly heredity. The only value of earthly heredity at the present time is that it allows people to be present. There wouldn't be anyone present at all if it wasn't for earthly heredity; but in view of the fact that people are present, earthly heredity has done its job, so we can get along to other things, namely heavenly heredity. From the standpoint of heavenly heredity the action of God is made possible. Earthly heredity makes possible the presence of heavenly heredity on earth but it is heavenly heredity now on earth which makes possible the action of God on earth. The chosen people, then, in this regard are chosen on the basis of their heavenly heredity, not of their earthly heredity. Out of every nation, kindred, tongue and people come the sons and daughters of God, establishing the action of God on earth. The land of Israel is the earth. It is the setting for the action of God. Man re-created is the action of God on earth.

Perhaps it could be said that the initial land of Israel is described as the Garden of God—the Promised Land, a spiritual land; but, as we have noted, that land is not and cannot be separated from the earth. That it has been separated from the earth in human consciousness doesn't mean that it is actually separated. It merely seems to be so to human beings, so that all that they see is the earth. And human beings in their self-centered state try to possess the land and so there is conflict in consequence, because everybody wants his own little piece; and one little piece isn't enough, he wants two little pieces; and so it goes. It expands onto the large scale internationally: every nation for itself. While there is a national pattern which relates to what I have called power politics, there is far more to power politics than nationalism. So human beings in their self-centered state have their eyes fastened upon their own greedy endeavors and perhaps upon mere survival, totally ignoring the truth, the truth which cannot be seen in that self-centered state. No matter how much knowledge may be gained, the truth is never seen, because the truth is that heaven and earth are one.

The Garden of God is present in the earth, always has been, largely uninhabited. But the very moment that there are inhabitants of the Garden of God, which is in the earth, then the Garden of God begins to become apparent in the earth. There are people living in it. It may not be seen by most to be the case but it actually is the case. It was true with respect to the Master when He was on earth. He was just about the sole inhabitant of the Garden at that time. Who else knew it? Apparently scarcely anyone, but it was the truth of the matter. He was in the Garden and He never left the Garden—witness the so-called resurrection. He was never anywhere else but in the Garden. The appearance was that He was in the tomb. It was that appearance because human beings live in the tomb, in the grave. That's what they see; that's all they see. They see and exist in a nonexistent state. The nonexistent state is the earth separate from the heaven. The earth wouldn't exist if it were separate from the heaven; therefore it can't be. But human beings exist on earth as though it were. That is a state of self-delusion, isn't it, complete self-deception, inhabiting an imaginary world full of problems, dream state, more of a nightmare state. Have you ever struggled to solve problems in your dreams? It doesn't work too well, does it? The best way is to wake up—no more dream problems, nothing to be solved!

We have accepted, presumably, the responsibility of wakefulness, that the Word of the Lord may be spoken on earth because there are prophets on earth. We have a different view of the meaning of the word prophet. Amongst other things, it is a very profitable condition. The Word of the Lord is spoken on earth to the dry bones and there comes a shaking. Did any of you notice that? In various ways you have been shaken, but the world of mankind is certainly being shaken nowadays. Why? Just by chance? “Oh it's always been like this.” It's always been like this, yes, but not so intense as it is now becoming and not in a situation where there is the action of God on earth now appearing. The action of God on earth appeared through those who were called Israelites of old to a certain extent. Their presence certainly shook things up in that area of the earth's population, but it didn't go very far. It didn't come to the point where there was a general recognition, with respect to the promised land, that it was anything other than a little area of material habitation; and that stuck, rigid state of consciousness has persisted even to this day. “The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein”; and when the Word of the Lord is spoken on earth the fact that the earth is the Lord's immediately begins to become apparent.

We're not particularly interested in solving the world's problems, or even our own for that matter. We certainly would offer human beings everywhere a Happy New Year. I doubt if too many will accept it. We won't wish it on them or try to impose it. It depends upon human reaction, reaction to the Word of the Lord spoken on earth. Let's make very sure that the Word of the Lord is spoken on earth! When it is, we find that is all that is necessary. There is a shaking and bone comes to his bone. We see it happening, a skeleton taking form. Which bones happen to be shaken first, come together first, is the business of the Word of the Lord. There is of course a reason as to why certain ones in certain places on earth do find themselves being shaken and coming together. It's not by chance. According to the media, and therefore according to human views in many places, South Africa, for instance, is a bad place—apartheid there; terrible thing! And yet it is a place where the bones are coming together. Interesting, isn't it? The LORD is not interested in human judgments or appearances. He is simply interested in letting what is right appear in the fulfilment of His purpose. Human concepts about justice or anything else mean utterly nothing.

Let the Word of the Lord be spoken and all things are made new. What is necessary in the unfoldment of that newness will come to pass. We may observe it coming to pass. [greatcosmicstory.blogspot.com/2020/01/a-great-company-without-number-grace.html] We certainly will be involved with respect to some of the events that occur in that coming to pass, but we rightly, as sons and daughters of God, live in the Garden of Eden. The Garden of Eden includes Eden, the earth. We live on earth, but in the Garden on earth. That is the only real place to be. If one imagines one can live simply on the earth without regard to the Garden, one will find out that it doesn't work, as human beings have been finding out generation after generation for twenty thousand years. It seems that people are slow to learn. Trying to live on earth as though the Garden weren't on earth is to die, because it's an unreal state; it doesn't exist, and so anyone who insists upon staying in that state finally finds out that he doesn't exist. All very logical! But living in the Garden on earth, we do live, but in a real state, something that is factual and not imaginary.

Living in the Garden on earth, the Word of the Lord is spoken. And when the Word of the Lord is spoken there is a shaking, and by reason of that shaking things come together and things fall apart—both! Our concern is with the things that are coming together. Whatever falls apart should fall apart—let it go! And so we may share in the creative purposes of God on earth, the action of God on earth.

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