The One Body Of Spiritual And Material Substance
Martin Exeter August 19, 1984 p.m.
An invitation was extended this morning, as you are all aware, to share the one true identity with me and with each other, so that the human ego could be dealt with. [greatcosmicstory.blogspot.com/2022/12/the-one-i-am.html] This is the only way it can be dealt with. Some of those who were present this morning did accept that invitation, so that there was sufficient agreement to do whatever was done.
This is the day the Lord hath made. It could in some measure be termed a red-letter day. This was and is so for those who have actually accepted for themselves this one identity. There was some acceptance of the invitation; others were a few steps away; and some might be said to be afar off. After the service there were those who spoke here in the Dome Chapel, and also in my home. Others wrote notes and letters; a few did both. The majority did neither. Very often those who are present at a service are moved within themselves; something happens for the moment internally, and that seems to have been considered by many to be adequate. Services have been given for many, many years and people have been moved internally for many, many years, and as long as it has remained just that it might be said that there was really nothing happening. If the internal movement causes something to be brought forth, then there begins to be some evidence of accepting the invitation that has been consistently offered over all these years.
Some might say, “Well I would have spoken here in the Chapel or at your house if there had been sufficient time.” Or, “I would have written if I’d had paper and a pen, and if I had had sufficient time.” I am reminded of an occasion, which was recorded in all the Gospels, but in the one according to Luke something was added. It was when the Master made what has subsequently been called His triumphant entry into Jerusalem. There was a good deal of joy and thanksgiving expressed on that occasion by those who were present, and others who were in the vicinity asked the Master to rebuke those who were expressing themselves in this way. They might cause trouble of some kind, it was supposed. They were probably making too much noise, and it seemed they were making a big deal out of not very much. The Master gave a reply, which you may remember: “I tell you that, if these should hold their peace, the stones would immediately cry out.” The rocks and the trees, all of nature in this valley, cry out. Only unyielding human minds and hardened human hearts can possibly restrain themselves. This should tell us something.
I have had a number of indications from various ones, mostly through letters, that there was a feeling on the part of those who wrote that they were somehow being excluded from certain gatherings at which they felt they had something to offer. It would seem to me that if this attitude was producing a sense of discomfort, or a feeling that there was consequently something wrong, it would certainly be revealing of a persistent human ego. Obviously, if one is sensible, one can recognize that everybody cannot attend every gathering. It is fitting that certain ones should do so in the particular instance, and anyone who is not included should rejoice that there are those available to be included, rather than feeling somehow excluded.
So much weight is given to the realm of form, externals. Oneness does not occur by reason of externals—we know that—it is by reason of spirit, isn’t it? If there is any unification in our experience it is based in spirit, not in form. We are always unified in spirit if we are willing to accept the expression of that spirit. There will always be objections and accusations if there is a refusal to accept that spirit, because without that spirit there is no sense of cohesion, there is no body, there is no evidence of oneness in form. The evidence of oneness in form comes because there is the experience of oneness in spirit first. The experience of oneness in spirit is indescribable in dimensional terms, in terms of form.
Many have interpreted the state of affairs in our Emissary Ministry as hierarchical. Any such interpretation reveals the fact that the individual does not have the experience of spirit in expression in his own living. It is the human ego imposing some structured human concept on what can only be known in spirit, and all these objections to the structures that are supposed to be revealing of the Emissary Ministry are evidence of childish immaturity. Oneness is in spirit. Let us experience that; then we’ll know what it is; otherwise we don’t. If we are constantly judging structures as we see them through our own structured consciousness we are far from spirit; we are afar off.
We have the opportunity of being where we belong: in spirit. There are very, very few thus far among all of those here present and throughout our ministry who can be trusted to abide in spirit. The vast majority keep ducking out by reason of accusation and judgment with respect to form, so that the centering then is in form, in externals. To that extent the centering in spirit is unknown. Yet there is a tendency to justify oneself in the judgment of external forms. This occurs in people who have been associated with this ministry for years—and still the accusation continues, the accusation which is directed at form, at externals. How about experiencing spirit and forget the form, that that substance in which spirit may be accommodated may be present consistently?
I would like to point to something, if I can do so without everybody becoming involved with external forms. I have always been faced with this seeming difficulty, that no matter what I would say, it would almost invariably be misinterpreted to apply to some structured form that the individual had in consciousness. We have heard that all things should be made new, but who is really willing to let it happen? Everything keeps being translated into old structures. We move together as though we had a ball and chain around our legs. It’s unnecessary; we clamp it there ourselves. [greatcosmicstory.blogspot.com/2020/09/implications.html]
We know there is no need for judgment, there is no need for accusation, there is no need to object to structures of form. We may be able to observe structured forms around, and certainly such observation will not surely be limited to the supposed structured forms of the Emissary ministry—there are vastly more than that in the world, aren’t there? And the structured forms we see we may be quite sure are a misinterpretation anyway, because if we are in fact judging and accusing and objecting, then certainly what we are observing is our own creation, not what’s there at all. So we might as well quit, that we might be ahead.
We have a certain awareness, and we make certain claims, that there is a supreme focus of spirit. That focus remains unknown to us, just a theoretical idea, until we are associated with the identity of that supreme point, until we are in fact a differentiation of that spirit. We cannot be that without the substance present in ourselves which will accommodate that differentiation. Without that substance we can theorize about it, and we can talk about it no doubt, and some of what we say may be quite convincing to somebody else, but in fact it is idle words until the differentiation is factual; and it is only factual when the substance is there, spiritual substance. That substance can’t be there if accusation, judgment, objection, rebellion, resentment, all these things, are still present internally in ourselves.
We have spoken of the sea of glass clear as crystal. That is exactly what is required: something that can’t be ruffled, that can’t be changed by anything external, something abiding. We see this as something that is present in each of us individually. To the extent that we have some experience of these things we are aware of something greater than ourselves as individuals; we find ourselves associated with something larger. What is it we are associated with? We have glibly talked of a body. Obviously there is some flesh around, quite a bit in the Chapel this evening, and we have some consciousness, theoretical or otherwise, that out of this flesh may be generated the spiritual substance that is needful. It couldn’t be generated if the flesh wasn’t here—none of us would be sitting here, would we? So it requires the flesh for this purpose. That is the primary reason for our flesh, initially at least: to allow for the generation of this spiritual substance. We abide in our physical forms, consistently allowing the heaven to be present. This describes the state of unruffled tranquility, for one thing, but a certain atmosphere within which a certain tone sounds, of which we have at least some awareness. And here is substance made available—if it is made available because we are trustworthy in this—into which spirit may come and be easily, naturally accommodated, the focus of spirit of which we say it is the one I am.
Because this substance has been so scarce in human experience the reality of the one I am has been nothing much more than a figment of fancy, if there was any consideration of it at all in human consciousness, and usually there wasn’t. We have had some consideration of it, and we have had the opportunity to let some substance be generated, so that this differentiated identity might be present individually. Because it was present individually—or at least to the extent it has been—and somewhat in expression, there has been a blending of the substance which is present by reason of the individuals concerned. This is spiritual substance; it is not in any way separate from spiritual substance, it is all one substance now blending in experience. The experience of oneness comes because of the spirit which is being differentiated factually through the substance that has been present.
This has produced what may well be rightly referred to as the Emissary Ministry—a spiritual body, a body of spiritual substance which is one. It is already one; it doesn’t need to be put together somehow. And to the extent that we find ourselves with this substance, differentiating the one spirit, we find ourselves to be one. That’s the fact, that’s what we know. If we’re not letting that happen we don’t know it. So there is what we may well call an Emissary body. The substance of which it is composed was indeed generated out of the flesh of those concerned, but it is spiritual substance. The substance of the Emissary body is spiritual substance, not flesh substance. If you try somehow to manipulate people into coordination in the flesh, obviously there would be failure, and that’s been proven out often enough. But if there is the constant awareness of the inseparability of what we are spiritually now being accommodated in spiritual substance on earth, then because our centering is in spirit and not in form, we are able to so live and associate in spirit that form confirms it. Form will only confirm it when it is a spiritual fact. It is not going to confirm what isn’t so, but it will absolutely, surely, certainly confirm what is the spiritual fact.
Now we have an awareness of something that’s been happening relative to the Emissary Ministry. It has been a rather embryonic thing that has been happening. in the first instance it has been called The Foundation of Universal Unity. Here is a form which can confirm the oneness that is present in spirit [ponder the implications and correlations in 2022]. Those of you who have been to Class will recall how in the initial development of the embryo in the uterus there was a little form there—a little flesh—designed to generate the spiritual substance required to allow spirit to build, on the basis of this spiritual substance, the form that should be. There is initially some flesh for the generation of the spiritual substance, but when the spiritual substance has been generated so that spirit may be present, then a new process proceeds, and form takes shape materially speaking. This happens in the mother’s womb, and it certainly has happened in whatever measure heretofore within the range of our own experience, if we are aware of what it is that is taking place. It certainly is something which transcends what occurs in the mother’s womb—it is something of which nobody yet has very much experience. It has to continue to occur for the experience to come, and only as it comes do we know what it is in that moment; but we do not know what it will be in the next moment and the next and the next.
Let us not lay forms on this which is occurring. It is a living form that is taking shape, and it has taken shape so far, spiritually through the substance of the Emissary Ministry, materially through the substance of The Foundation. It hasn’t stopped at what we have called The Foundation. It keeps on bringing layer upon layer into the picture. But all this is only happening because there is a spiritual body, and it can only take place to the extent that there factually is a spiritual body, and the largeness of that spiritual body. “The Emissary ministry” can be words describing that spiritual body; therefore if anyone has been judging the supposed structures that were present, that person is blind to the fact, which is the spiritual body. One can only know that by being it! And one will not be it as long as external form dominates in one’s considerations and in one’s living.
It is a matter of spirit. Well let’s let it be a matter of spirit, then, instead of constantly injecting form on the basis of our judgments. Let it be what it is! The spirit is present and in expression individually, unified, because the substance which is provided individually is not separate from the substance provided by others: it is all one substance. The spirit is differentiated in the substance, yes, but it is all one substance.
When the substance is truly there and the differentiations can occur, it is immediately found that they have a relatedness to each other. This relatedness is not interpreted according to the human structured concept of hierarchy; the relatedness is based in what needs to be done. If anything is to happen somebody has to take responsibility for it. While we do have many committees these days and people have begun to feel that they are more involved in the processes going on through the Ministry, what needs to happen doesn’t happen because of committees. It happens because those who are present take their particular responsibility according to the differentiation of their particular spirit—and there is always a mutual respect for one another. But in the spiritual sense there are many things which have to be taken care of spiritually. Who is going to do it? Are we going to hold an election? No, just let the spirit differentiate, and each individual will find that he fits on that basis, spiritually speaking.
We have many external tasks, and we have the necessity of assuming focus of responsibility for this, someone else for that, and so on. That is easily done when there is the differentiation of spirit in our own experience. Then we’re not trying to do something that we have no business doing, and we’re not objecting to someone else doing what we have no business doing. We begin to discover the easy yoke. But it can only be known in spirit. When it is known in spirit, and there is a mutual respect, there is mutual trustworthiness and mutual trust in consequence, then everything is taken care of with ease and naturalness.
If at any time judgment or accusation enters in, the substance of spirit is dissipated and we find ourselves shortly in a hassle of some kind. What is more important than keeping this substance inviolate? never allowing any human ego, our own included, to violate that substance, to cause a sea of glass clear as crystal to be a murky pond. The way it works is the way it works, and you can’t rightly inject, in your own expression and experience, a human ego which functions on the basis of its own ambitions, its own desires, its own intents, its own determinations.
There have been many human egos around who have tried to maneuver their human egoing so that it would somehow relate to what really should be happening, but it can’t be done. Ultimately every individual has to make a choice: Either I’m going to keep my human ego or I am going to accept the truth for myself in living. This choice is becoming more clear-cut in our consciousness, is it not? I trust so—that we may indeed be a spiritual body, which fact is confirmed in various ways by form, confirmed externally.
Now this confirmation comes through The Foundation—that’s what I have indicated as being the primary material body. The material body has more to it than a torso—it has arms and legs, even a head. But we see how this form can be a true form to the extent that the spiritual body is in place, the spirit is in action, and the form which is appearing is centered in that spirit. The form which is appearing will include many who are more or less unconscious of what is happening. But there are those who have some awareness, and those who have an awareness in these various departments that are putting in an appearance must recognize that what is being confirmed is the fact of the oneness of a spiritual body; therefore there is oneness of this material form appearing. It is not a bunch of separate entities going their own way; it is one thing, and it remains one thing only to the extent that that spiritual centering is there because the spiritual body is there and the spirit of that body is present in the substance of the spiritual body. It is all one thing. We know how these things work—surely we should by now. Let us let them work the way they work. And we know they don’t work if there are human egos injecting self-activity into the picture. This is why this morning I was concerned with the disposition of the human ego, because if allowed to remain it can wreck everything. It is useless—worse than useless: corrupt and destructive, no matter how good it may look to the person who has it, or to others.
The line is drawn—actually it has been drawn for a long time, but too many haven’t noticed it. Ultimately it comes to a point where no one can avoid it, but it’s a lot easier to acknowledge what the line is before one is thoroughly bent upon following out the desires of the human ego. That is the way to oblivion. It is the way to the oblivion of the human race. But the Lord has seen things differently and provided what is necessary to let the truth be unveiled unavoidably on earth. I can’t imagine anything more tremendous, anything more wonderful, than to be accounted worthy to participate in this. The material substance that is needed for these forms may be drawn easily into place as that spiritual focus is present and maintained consistently. There is nothing more important than that. Here is the whole meaning of life itself.
© emissaries of divine light
