New Heaven—Fine Substance

New  Heaven — Fine  Substance

Martin Cecil  April 18, 1980  Assembly

I think you may be aware that there has been a certain sluggishness about assuming responsibility for the creation of the New Heaven heretofore. The generation of fine substance—I wonder what that has really meant in the consciousness of most. Some sort of an imagination; but that generation relates to factual experiences. We may speak of refinement, possibly seeing it in terms of social behavior. There have been a lot of forms developed by human beings, which if they are adhered to, is considered to establish the fact of refinement. The forms do not make the refinement. Because this has been recognized by some there has been a tendency to pitch out the forms; but there was no refined spirit present, so you lost the form of refinement and became aware of the lack of refinement, because there was not any fine substance.

We have been concerned with the generation of fine substance, and this is what is required in the creation of the New Heaven—a level of substance which has been unknown for a long time in human experience. Yet there are those things which have been known. If forms of refinement have been developed, it was because somewhere, originally, there was the spirit of refinement. One cannot say that that spirit has been entirely lost, but the forms have tended to be emphasized rather than the spirit. We are concerned with the spirit. If there is the generation of fine substance the forms will reflect it. The forms may not conform to the ritualistic patterns that have been produced on earth, but they will never violate the reality of refinement, they will never appear as something coarse. This usually happens with human beings who are rebelling about the status quo. They don’t offer anything higher; they offer something lower, more coarse, as though that was going to improve the situation. Well, it takes it down the scale a little further.

Our concern in the creation of the New Heaven is in the creative cycles which raise things up. We are interested in ascension and what may be done in our association with the creative cycle already operating, which also is interested in ascension. In fact our interest in ascension, if we have it, has been produced by this creative cycle. We have become aware of the fact that there is this power at work to raise things up. Some people react to that by attempting to tear things down. Maybe we ourselves have done a little of that at times, perhaps with respect to each other, not thereby giving much evidence of love one for another.

By the way, when we are handling the particular responsibilities that are brought to us and we find people in difficulties of various sorts, we never rightly indicate that anyone’s difficulties are someone else’s fault. It has nothing to do with somebody else. One can offer what is needful to assist that individual to assume the right attitude and the right responsibility. But you never do anything that would justify that individual in imagining that he was really right with respect to the bad behavior of somebody else being the reason for his own bad behavior. It never is. We are responsible people. This keeps the heat on a person too. And while there needs to be care taken as to how much heat is generated, so that you don’t burn the individual up entirely, nevertheless it is by reason of the intensification of the working of the spirit of God that the creative achievement occurs. This may remind you of something else. It is not by much talk in and of itself. You do not really have to bend somebody’s ear. That is not what is going to get the job done. The less talk there is in such situations the better. There needs to be substance present.

We are responsible in this gathering for the generation of fine substance which will produce fine behavior. And this substance, which should be already present with us to the extent that that is true—then we have this unified substance, refined substance, which enables the action of spirit to occur. Spirit has a medium of expression, and it is our acceptance of the responsibility of providing the essential fine substance that enables spirit to do what needs to be done. It is done by the power of God and not by our own magnificent efforts. Any self-esteem in this regard should dissolve. Self-esteem relates to roles, the ones that we are leaving behind—the idea “I am important because I have this position.” True position is not external. True position may reveal itself in external ways, but one must be an expression of that true position for this to happen. Then something emerges in external form, but the nature of the form will be fitting to the occasion and it will not be a permanently established structure. Perhaps some of you on occasion may have built the structures for yourselves, and then you feel uncomfortable and you blame other people for it. That is not true behavior. We are here to generate the refined substance and let it be blended together, so that we can provide what is necessary for the action of spirit. But it is the action of spirit that does what needs to be done. And we can forget about our self-esteem in this regard.

So we have this fine substance blended together, and the beginning action of spirit—which we have seen in terms of a rider on a white horse, and of the creation of light, the tool that is needful for what subsequently occurs as the creative process continues. And the creative process is described as the firmament, the New Heaven. The composition of this New Heaven is fine substance, a fine atmosphere, a clear atmosphere, a sea of glass clear as crystal. Now this extends beyond us to the extent that it is already present in us. Our responsibility relates to what extends beyond us, if we are participating in the creative process.

Our concern is that there should be ample fine substance into which others may be invited, at the level that is suitable for them. And we are not in the business of judging anymore, so we are not saying of anyone that he or she needs to be at this or that particular level. We don’t know. We are going to find out. And the only way we can find out is to let the creative process work. If we have some pre-established view with respect to people, taking the attitude that “here is a good prospect for the Holy Place”—of course we wouldn’t have couched it probably in those terms, but there is a good Emissary prospect—we immediately put that individual in a structure of our own making. We have so much self-esteem that we imagine that we can determine these things. Well, if we have self-esteem we are playing a role that is not genuine. So we do not structure anyone into anything. Everything is permitted the freedom of revealing what it is. If the revelation is of something very fine, we rejoice. If the revelation is of something very coarse, that does not belong in the New Heaven, in the atmosphere which we are providing, we rejoice too, we let it go. Our concern is with the New Heaven—with this atmosphere, the clarity of it—recognizing that there are properly levels in this substance to which people may rightly relate.

In handling people it may seem on the surface, at times, that we relate to them. It may appear that way to the individual who is being invited into the fine substance which we are providing, because we invite them into a level of that substance where they can feel a sense of relatedness. It was said of the Master, when He was on earth, that he consorted with publicans and sinners. That does not mean that He was a publican or a sinner. It merely meant that those with whom He associated felt comfortable with Him because He provided the substance that was natural to them on the basis of such response as they had. There was no judgment. He was not interested in putting people down. Certainly this is not what we intend at any time. And we need to consider our attitudes and our actions with this in mind.

We have no hesitation about putting the devil down, and sometimes we can do this by talking in general terms. Now, I have done this, certainly, over the years in my services, when I have not zeroed in on any particular person but have spoken of the devil in general terms. When doing this, it may make certain ones who are rather closely associated with the devil in the particular field of which I am speaking uncomfortable. Well that is all right. You are not zeroing in on the person. He has his discomfort all to himself. Of course, very often a reaction may arise and what is being said is rejected, but for those who are in any degree honest, nothing which is offered in this way can genuinely be rejected. A person has to be dishonest to do it. Our concern is not so much with those who are dishonest but with those who give some indication of potential honesty, and we provide space at whatever level is necessary for such, so that they feel a sense of relatedness.

Now obviously, no matter at what level a person may relate, there are always factors, in everyone, of association with the devil, and these things will necessarily need to be dealt with, whether the individual is at the level of the Encampment or the Outer Court. These things will need to be dealt with. Even if a person is going to stay naturally at a fairly low level in the Encampment, these things have to be dealt with if there is to be the experience of the New Heaven insofar as the individual is concerned. One certainly could not hold on to the state of the old heaven and experience the New Heaven.

So there are always things to be relinquished. There is always essential creative change to occur. And while we do not anticipate either inviting or expecting everyone to come into the Holy Place, we also realize that no matter what level they find to be natural to themselves they will necessarily have to come clear at that level. In other words, we are not going to leave a mass of people in the Encampment who are still subject to the devil. “Behold, I make all things new.” This is the creative process. There is a New Heaven, and while there is time given—maybe not all that much more, but time given—for those concerned to come clear within themselves at the level where they are, they most definitely must come clear. Then there is the occupation of the New Heaven; there are people in it. We can provide an atmosphere, we can provide rich substance of a fine nature, but if no one accepts the invitation to come into it the New Heaven remains empty and to that extent remains meaningless.

There are those, obviously, who are responding to the invitation such as it has been thus far. Maybe many of these have been overlooked because there were too many concepts around as to what would indicate here was an emissary. Well, how are we going to define an emissary? Are emissaries those who are of the Priesthood, standing in the Holy Place? Or does the term relate to those who are even in the Outer Court, or perhaps still further afield in the Encampment? I suppose we need to come to the point where we either decide that the emissary relates to everybody within the Encampment, which would include the Outer Court and the Holy Place, or whether it only includes those that are in the Holy Place. From our standpoint everyone who accepts the invitation to come into the New Heaven, at whatever level, is included in the restored state. Now they are not yet restored. There is much to happen yet before that would be true. It is even possible that there is something to happen in us yet.

As we consider these things the distinction between people begins to dissolve. We may have a line around the Encampment, and there are those outside of the Encampment as yet. But if there were not those outside of the Encampment, how could there be anyone to invite in? So that line of demarcation is only a line in the sense of providing a safe place into which people may be invited. It is not there to keep anyone out, or on the other hand to keep anyone in. There is the choice to come in, and if one chose to come in, there is also the choice to go out. Now we have seen this at work in our own small program, ministry. People have moved in, people have moved out. Our attitude rightly is, “Let them come in, let them go out.”

But there must be somewhere to come into, and this “somewhere” is the New Heaven, a real place filled with real substance, but substance which is not all of one level. There is a complete spectrum—the bow, the total spectrum of life. And there is immense detail in that spectrum. This is what makes everything so exciting, doesn’t it? The idea of everyone being equal as meaning that everyone is the same is awful, isn’t it? We all equally have the opportunity of being wherever we might belong, but that does not mean we all belong in the same place. And there are distinctions in this regard. There must be distinctions if there is any design, and we are aware that there is a design. I don’t mean just from the standpoint of the fact that we have physical bodies that are designed in a certain way. But from the standpoint of the whole universe there is a design there of some kind. We may not as human beings understand the significance of it entirely, but there certainly is the evidence of a design. And there is a distinction between the sun and the earth. We should be happy that there is. And there is a distinction between person and person, between angel and angel, and we should be happy that there is. There is a distinction between male and female, and we should be happy that there is this distinction. Nobody can be happy separate from the design as it is in reality. Our happiness, our contentment, our delight, is consequent upon the fact of this design of which we are a part.

Human beings are manipulated in the world as we know it by stirring up their destructive emotions, and there is an inevitable going-down in the process. Our concern is going up. Some considerable consideration was given to this matter of sowing and reaping. Right sowing is important. We have seen this as it relates to the right handling of whatever situations come to us, so that the right seed is sown. We are immediately looking for results. We are going to let the garden grow. But we want to make very sure that we plant the right seed so that what should emerge will. Now this sowing and reaping, cause-effect state, in the earth has been at a very low or coarse level. It has been disconnected from heaven. That is why we are concerned with creating the New Heaven, so that there may be a New Earth connected to it. The New Heaven is not connected to the old earth. There are those who try to make it work that way, but it does not. The New Heaven allows for the emergence of the New Earth, which is not the old earth made over.

In this movement of cause and effect, as true seeds are sown the whole cycle is lifted to a higher level, so that when the harvest comes it will be at a higher level. This is the ascending process—a spiral going up; but it is the whole movement being lifted to new levels, the sowing and reaping going on within the movement. From the standpoint of the human state it is going down and down and down. Cause and effect, sowing and reaping, are going on, but the whole thing is going down, the first heaven and the first earth are passing away. And this can be allowed to happen now because there is, as yet in embryonic form, but nevertheless a New Heaven, with a New Earth relative to that New Heaven. If the New Heaven isn’t very much yet, the New Earth isn’t very much either. But here is our realm of concern. It is not that cause and effect, sowing and reaping, are going to cease. It is just that the whole process, the whole cycle, is being raised up. And it is capable of being raised up to the extent that the New Heaven is a reality. And the New Heaven is a reality because of the fine substance that is present in it.

Now we have some evidence of the New Earth, and therefore of the extent of the New Heaven, when we take a look at the fineness of that New Earth; in other words the fineness of our behavior, the fineness with which we handle whatever it is that comes to us. Heaven and earth are one, and if behavior remains coarse, then clearly there is not very much fine substance. When behavior begins to become fine, then we are made keenly aware of the fact of fine substance. And this fine substance is our responsibility at this present time, as the New Heaven is in the process of being created. And we invite others to participate in this fine substance and therefore to allow their behavior to reflect it. Insofar as they are concerned, our behavior is the evidence of the New Heaven for them. They will not rise up into the experience of that New Heaven themselves unless there is the evidence of it because of us. And if there is the evidence then there is something real, there is something genuine, and the power is present, the power of ascension, or the power of resurrection, raising up.

And let us recognize that power, or the energy with which we are concerned does not originate in the earth. This is the human view. You get it out of the ground somehow, as oil or coal—or looking up into the sky these days to see if something cannot be extracted from the sun. But the source of energy insofar as the human view is concerned is an external one, whether it be in the earth or from the sun, and perhaps there are some other possibilities here if people look around some more. But the real energy is spiritual energy. “And ye shall receive power, after … the Holy Ghost is come upon you.” Usually energy is thought of, in the human sense, as being the result of what you eat, because if you eat energy-supplying foods, then you will be big and strong and have lots of energy. It doesn’t always seem to work that way. What you eat certainly plays a part in the operation of your physical form, but if the energy output of your physical form is merely what you eat, then you will experience a continual depletion of energy. Obviously we do not, properly, merely live to eat or eat to live. There is something more to a human being than that.

So while there is the necessity for a functioning physical form, this functioning physical form has something to do. It is there to provide a facility for the action of the spirit of God. It is the action of the spirit of God that is, amongst other things, the life of the physical body and is the power of the physical body. And that power is reflected in the action of the physical body to the extent that there is the fine substance of connection by which the action of the spirit of God becomes a reality. And inherent in that action is all the power that is needed, and if that action comes forth through the facility that is available for it, then the power comes forth. It came down from God out of heaven, it is the experience of the action of spirit, and that is the creative power. And if the universe is operational, it is operational on this basis—it is not a mechanical contrivance—but what is really occurring is far more than merely sustaining either the universe or the individual physical body. Both are present for a far greater purpose.

We find this out ourselves to the extent that we experience the reality of spiritual expression. Then there is power, and we are providing the New Heaven, the substance, into which people can come and participate in the experience of this creative power. Then we no longer need to shop around to obviate this necessity. So we begin to allow the restoration of the true state, the New Heaven and the New Earth, new to us as human beings and new in the nature of its manifestation now, certainly, because it has never been that way before. But not new in the sense that it is not what has been happening in the universe as a whole right along. It just has been excluded from human consciousness and experience, that’s all. Now we are letting it be restored to human consciousness and experience, a New Heaven and a New Earth because there is this fine substance which we care for. We care for it in our own living. We hunger and thirst for righteousness, which is the experience that is known by reason of this New Heaven.

Now we have hungered and thirsted for this as human beings, but we also hunger and thirst as angels for this fulfillment on earth. We love the LORD, we love God, we love the creative process. We love it all, and it is the greatest longing of our hearts that this should be restored to the experience of mankind. And not just for the sake of mankind, but for the LORD. So we share this love and this longing together, and we let it become ever more intense, because in the experience of this intensity is the experience of the power of restoration, the power of resurrection. It is in the intensity of that movement in the expression of the creative power of God, His spirit, that we have a sense of real hungering and thirsting for the resurrection.

We see this mess around us with our eyes, not with our hearts particularly. What we see with our hearts is the resurrection, the restoration. This is the only thing that has any meaning whatsoever, and so all our expression is constantly given to that, and we are concerned that our living should be evidence of the movement of this power. And as we are aware of the movement of this power, we see how it is available, and brings to bear on people what is necessary for them to hear the invitation, to hear the word that is being spoken: “Come into the Encampment. Come into the True State.” And there are those who are willing. There may not be so many of those who will respond according to the ideas that we have had heretofore as to how people behave when they respond. We let them respond in their own ways, at their own levels, and they will come right in. We care for the substance which enfolds them. We let the Garden grow. We do this on the basis of our momentary living, our momentary action, the way we handle what is immediately around us. If that is clear, then it will be clearing at least beyond that; and when beyond that is clear, it will be clearing beyond that again. But unless it is clear at the core it sure is not clear anywhere else. 

I rejoice that we share this time of allowing the creation of the New Heaven, a clarity of experience in our handling of all things. This fine substance needs to be enfolded in our thankfulness. In the world as it has been it could not exist. It has not existed for twenty thousand years anyway, because as soon as anything was generated it was dissipated almost instantly. So we have the responsibility of keeping it in existence, the wealth of the Kingdom.

© emissaries of divine light