from
The Catalyst
Larry Krantz and Martin Exeter August 12, 1984
Larry Krantz — I was giving some thought to how a
catalyst works. In organic systems like our own bodies we call them enzymes,
and biological systems cannot exist without these enzymes, or catalysts. A
catalyst is something that promotes a certain chemical transformation, so that
a chemical entity moves from being one thing to being something totally different.
But the catalyst, or enzyme, isn’t particularly changed itself. A very tiny
amount of one of these substances can promote change in a tremendous quantity
of material, when present. Well isn’t this very much the purpose, one might
say, of the Emissary body, providing the stable catalyst for change? When
that’s present, even in small quantity—a few thousand amidst almost five
billion perhaps—if that is present and stable and isn’t changed by the
transformation that’s taking place, isn’t moved, isn’t upset, doesn’t leave its
centering, but remains the catalyst to be used again to hold steady during the
chemical transformation, then that catalyst is on hand to assist this dramatic
transformation that can take place from one state to another state.
It’s interesting—it
helps my own consciousness anyway—to see it this way. And it also emphasizes to
me that we need to hold steady, we need to be consistent in being that catalyst,
in extending that invitation that men and women the world around, in our
worlds—our mundane worlds or our dramatic worlds, whatever they may be—who are
coming to us, looking for true leadership and guidance, will find somebody
there who is steady and dependable, that the human identity with its narrow
vision and petty concerns, the different parts vying for control of the whole,
may simply be released, may be transformed in this chemical reaction, be lifted
up to the state of knowing our true identity—this divine entity which is vast.
So I appreciate the opportunity to share these thoughts with you.
Lord Exeter — Thank you, Larry. The example which
Larry has just given of the catalyst is very useful. The catalyst rightly
remains what it is. I think those who have been participating in the process by
which this catalyst has come into being sometimes feel that some dramatic
changes should occur in their own experience, presumably to assure them that something
worthwhile is happening. If such dramatic changes did occur it would utterly
spoil the value of the catalyst. The fact is that some dramatic changes have
occurred in the formation of the catalyst in the first place. To the extent
that we have some experience of what it means to stay centered, to stay steady,
to let happen what should happen without imposing our own designs upon it, we
find ourselves transformed people. I'm sure not too long ago we weren’t doing
any of those things, but now we begin to have a basis for doing what needs to
be done, and so we simply do it. In doing it we have the particular blessing of
noting what is occurring in other people by reason of the presence of the catalyst.
We see transformation ocurring. That doesn’t engender some sort of jealous
reaction: “I wish that was happening in me!” It's not supposed to be happening
in you. It’s just a delight to participate in the creative process. I have
spoken in times past about administering the creative process. This is the way
it’s done. You can’t administer it if you're constantly changing. You have to
be in place, you have to be competently in place, you have to understand what’s
going on, you have to know what the process is and to provide what is necessary
to assist in the unfoldment of that process—the unfoldment of the process in the
experience of other people.
I’m sure that we all have a very clear awareness of
the essential nature of this catalyst. We have called it a body, a spiritual
body in form on earth, put together without hands. There has been a hands-off
policy in this regard, to let it emerge according to whatever the design is,
and we only find out what the design is as it emerges. We don’t know ahead of
time, we don't try to make it be anything or keep it in some particular
structured form. We let the changes come, because that’s what the catalyst is
there for. We’re here to allow the transformation of human consciousness, are
we not? We know what that transformation is in our own experience, therefore we
are in excellent position to stay stable and steady and in place so that others
may experience what is required. It is not so much experienced because we talk a
lot. There are occasions when saying something is right and important; presumably
this is right and important in this particular setting this evening. But you
will note that I do not constantly talk. Some people have wondered a little bit
about that—I supposedly have so many pearls of wisdom to offer! I’ve offered
them. They’re all around, and you yourselves are part of that string of pearls.
So we let this occur.
Never underestimate the power of spiritual
expression! This relates to a statement with which we are all familiar, I’m
sure: “Come now, let us reason together.” We offer that invitation, but
reasoning together is not merely something of the conscious mind; it’s not
merely an intellectual procedure; it’s not just reason and logic. One can be
very convincing on the basis of reason and logic, and people may listen and nod
their heads—Oh, that seems right—but it had utterly no effect. There was some
ingredient missing.
We would have no ability to reason consciously,
utilizing the conscious mind, if it was not for the presence of the
subconscious mind. The subconscious mind, amongst other things, is the
residence of memory, and that’s useful. It’s useful this evening: we remember the language which we understand. The conscious mind doesn’t do that;
it’s a subconscious matter, and what is needful of language material is made available,
moment by moment, to the conscious mind. It’s certainly made available to my
conscious mind so that I can speak some more or less intelligent and
intelligible words. But the same must be true of you if there’s any understanding
of what I’m saying. So we share something on this basis, but it’s a combination
effort, isn’t it? We’re not sitting on the surface with the conscious mind,
merely looking at things intellectually; that has little effect. It is a
needful part of the creative process, but there is something else besides which
relates to what we call the subconscious mind, and this includes the largest proportion
of emotion.
“Come now, let us reason together.” The reasoning
process requires the presence of the subconsious mind and heart so that there
may be the ability to sense in a way that is not possible to the
conscious mind. If we pin all our hopes upon the understanding of the conscious
mind we’ll be left stranded on a reef; it’s very shallow. In order that there
might be depth under us we need to go into deeper water, and this requires the
subconscious mind, as we are well aware. All of this relates to what is being
conveyed through the use of the words “Father,” “Son” and “Holy Ghost.”
The conscious mind has been endeavoring to get along without the Father, and
the subconscious mind likewise, and there has been a certain amount of conflict
between conscious and subconscious, between mind and heart, so that there has been
confusion. This is the human state; there is confusion until there begins to be
a yielding, both consciously and subconsciously, to the Father, to Deity, to
whatever it is that is higher than both. Mucking around in the lower ranges of
conscious and subconscious function we get lost in a labyrinth, as human beings
are, and we lose the ability to reason.
The ability to reason only is present when the
trinity begins to put in an appearance in human experience: Father, Son and
Holy Ghost.
Son and Holy Ghost are absent as long as the Father is ignored.
The subconscious mind is not particularly rational;
it’s not supposed to be. The conscious mind has the ability to be rational but
usually it isn’t, because so much erupts out of the subconscious mind of
irrationality and the conscious mind becomes so busy trying to explain it away
that it doesn’t have time to function in a rational manner. It’s trying to
explain away what is irrational. That’s called rationalizing; it’s
rationalizing the irrational. Well that’s a futile undertaking. The irrational
is irrational, that's all there is to it.
But there is a means by which a proper control can
be exercised with respect to what is brought up to the surface of the conscious
mind out of the subconscious, when the Holy Ghost is an element in the process.
You might recall that Jesus said something about the Holy Ghost, the spirit of Truth,
which would be sent and it would bring all things of the truth to remembrance,
that there might be material available for the right use of the conscious mind.
The conscious mind is the facility for the Son. But there is no Son or Holy
Ghost without the Father; hence the necessity, which we have ourselves
experienced, of allowing heart and mind to yield to the quality of the Father,
which we have seen in terms of spirit, so that there may begin to be an
awareness of what we ourselves have spoken of as the True Tone. This is
something that you couldn't define using the conscious mind; it’s something
that you have to know, it’s something you have to experience. The only way you
can experience it, humanly speaking, is through conscious and subconscious
minds; they have to be available for that. They are available when
there begins to be a yielding to what is indicated by the word “Father.” We’ve
all known something of this, let it happen in our own experience.
So there is some sense to the words “Father,”
“Son" and “Holy Ghost,” the holy trinity, three persons in one. It’s all
one anyway: you don’t have a subconscious mind over here and a conscious mind
over there and the Father up above. We may have used diagrams to
indicate something, but the diagram was one whole. If it was a triangle, it wasn’t three little points sitting on the
blackboard with blanks in between them; it was one whole—indicated by the illustration. Maybe we didn’t notice that and we were inclined
to see everything in terms of separation, but that isn’t the way it is.
Factually there is no separation between conscious and subconscious minds, and there
wouldn’t be any conscious or subconscious mind at all if it wasn’t for the One
referred to as the Father. So here is a pattern of oneness, and we are in
position to let that oneness be our present experience, not because we’re
trying to figure something out with our conscious minds, not because we’re
somehow listening for some great emotional experience to come upon us, but
because we are accepting the responsibility of providing space for the Father.
That space is provided on the basis of what we have
referred to as the Tone. We know what the Tone is through our facilities,
conscious and subconscious. That’s how we become aware of it in the human sense
and, becoming aware of it, that is the important thing. The conscious mind is
inclined to say, “Oh well I’m becoming aware of this; now I understand what the
true character is. I can hear the Tone. Now how should this be applied in my
living?” You don’t have to apply it in your living. That maintains a state of
separation, doesn’t it? “Ah, here we are; here is this wonderful Tone putting
in an appearance! Now I can get hold of it and apply it in my living. Now I can
be a superhuman being!” Well we may not put it exactly that way, but that’s
what we’re doing. It is just the fact of the experience of the Tone that is
important. If we share something important in a service, it is that. It may be
helpful to use words, but it isn’t the words themselves. It is the fact of the
presence of what it is that permits those words to be spoken that is important,
and that is capable of being shared by all of us.
There is one Tone but we each find it
differentiated uniquely in our own experience. That happens when we let it be
differentiated in our own experience. It doesn’t happen because somebody else
sounds the Tone. We can’t really know what the Tone is except we sound it
ourselves. We have the equipment to let it sound; let us let it sound then!
Obviously that equipment, as we have realized, needs to be emptied sufficiently
so that the Tone may be encompassed in experience and does not get diverted by
all the human idiosyncracies which still may remain. So we share the process of the sounding of this Tone. We have had special opportunity to become familiar with it over the
years. That is the most important thing that has happened in our experience, if
it has happened in our experience—not all the knowledge we think we have, not
all the understanding of principles, but the sensing, the discernment, of the Tone.
And most of that discerning comes through the heart, comes subconsciously.
Because it comes subconsciously the conscious mind begins to be aware of it.
Minds are so busy, aren’t they? trying to understand, trying to figure things
out.
“Come now, let us reason together.” We can’t
exclude the subconscious mind. This relates to what we have seen as the working
of the Law—positive and negative. It relates to male and female.
The sexes have tended to become segregated. Men have been inclined to say that
they can’t understand women. Well that’s like trying to understand your subconscious
mind—what’s the point? The Holy Ghost is quite competent, if
allowed to be present. The subconscious mind can be clarified very easily, as
there is a willingness to move with the Tone in living. Then things which are
out of attunement with the Tone begin to stand out. And you don't meekly go
along with the clashing noise that results; you relinquish what is unfitting,
what doesn't belong, what is not harmonious to the Tone. That is easily done.
But the Tone must be present if one is to do it, and the sounding of the Tone
relates to the presence of the Holy Ghost.
This has been happening in spite of all our
conscious endeavors to figure it out. Doing that merely sustains the human state.
Being willing to be emptied out, we have found that there was something which
flowed in. And it didn’t flow in for our benefit particularly; it flowed in to
flow out again, if we were willing to let it flow out and didn’t try to grab
onto it, which is the habit of the conscious human mind. Ah! now I’ve got it. Let it
go; let it go; because if something has come in, let it flow out. We’re the means
by which this flow may occur. It is the flow of life itself.
This is what attunement is, participating in the
flow of life. Attunements have usually been thought of physically speaking as
being valuable, but it’s the flow-through in consciousness. The true state is
one of attunement. We don’t need to have attunements; attunement has us. And
whatever it is that needs to flow flows through, and because it flows through
we know what it is. If it doesn’t flow through we don't know what it is. For most
people it doesn’t flow through, so it is assumed that there isn’t anything
there; it’s impossible to understand. It’s impossible to understand until it
flows through. It cannot flow through until there is a willingness to allow it
to do so, and whatever circumstances we may have are the means by which we
allow it to do so.
So often circumstances are looked upon as something
that is being laid upon us. But that isn’t the way it is at all; it never
was that way. No doubt we have been functioning in a manner that was childish
in times past, when we should have been mature, or could have been mature, and
so we set many things in motion and the chickens are going to come home to
roost. All right, fine. That’s very little different from what’s happening with
everybody else. The only difference now is that we know how to handle it; we
understand these things. Let the chickens come home to roost! And as we accept
what comes to us as our responsibility to handle in a fitting way on the basis
of the Tone with which we have some experience, then the catalyst is present,
and whatever comes to us is transformed.
We know all about giving thanks—just give thanks! If you give thanks then you can’t blame
somebody at the same time. It’s just wonderful that the chickens are coming
home to roost! We can get rid of all the chickens that way. They can be plucked
and consumed for nourishment, and then they’re gone. But if we say, “I don’t
like these chickens that are coming home to roost; they’re really so-and-so’s
chickens!” and we try to shoo them over to so-and-so, then we have a whole lot
of chickens all around and we end up covered with feathers, and we suffocate. No, it’s all easily handled. We know how to do it.
We have been doing it, at least in some measure, or we wouldn’t be
here. It’s never worth doing half a job. If something is worthwhile doing, do
it, and do it right. And we are the only one who can do it right in our own
circumstances; there’s nobody else there. Sharing this, how much begins to be transformed
because we are in place and we stay in place. We’re never distracted. We can
never take the attitude that we don’t get along with so-and-so.
And behold, we are aware of the Tone, we are aware
of what the flow is in consequence, and we can move with ease and naturalness
in permitting all things to be handled on this basis. And we do it; we find we
are doing it together. We’re not trying to handle someone else’s business but just
take care of our own, and someone else will take care of their own, and we find
that all the business is taken care of. Isn’t it marvelous that we have so many
friends letting this happen? There may be vast numbers of people who don’t know
yet how to let it happen, but if there are those who are letting it happen
there is the catalyst. And that catalyst will transform the world; actually
it transforms the consciousness of human beings. How great and glorious it is
to participate in this unique process—it’s unique because it's never yet been
done. We're on the way. Let's keep moving on the way.
© Emissaries of Divine Light
The Process of Purification
Martin Exeter November 9, 1986
We carry the whole focus of responsibility. Our responsibility is, of course, within the body of which we are a part. The pulsations
of spirit move through this body in the creative process of purifying the
bloodstream, not only of this conscious body but of the whole body of mankind.
We have seen this in terms of breathing: breathing out in
repentance and in radiance of spirit, breathing in that quality of spirit which
permits repentance and the breathing out of its radiance. This is indeed a very
personal matter. Each one breathes for him- or herself. As there is the true
spirit of agreement in what the purpose of the breathing is, then this conscious
focus, at point here now but extending farther afield, provides a basis for the
cleansing of the life stream circulating through the whole body of mankind. If
it does not happen in those who have a conscious understanding of these things
it does not happen anywhere.
The bloodstream of the body of mankind comes to us in a great variety of
ways. It moves through us in the purifying process in our own personal
repentance of the moment, to flow forth again through all of this conscious
body and into the unconscious body of mankind. The cycle is constantly being
completed on the basis of this pulsation of breathing, using that analogy. Here
the essences of purification take place in each individually. Here is the
filter by which the bloodstream of mankind can be purified. It might be said to
be heavenly magic, but on the other hand it isn't magic at all; it's a natural
process for which as individuals we take responsibility. It only happens as the
individual takes responsibility, so that what presents itself for repentance to
us may provide the way by which repentance happens—one's own personal
repentance.
And so the whole bloodstream is purified. It isn't merely an earthly
process; it isn't as though there was a closed circuit. There is the heavenly
aspect of what is happening. The creative cycle flows out of heaven through
each one in the outpouring through repentance and through the radiant
expression of that spirit. It is the outpouring of life, the life stream, the
bloodstream, which circulates through the whole body of mankind and returns. It
is received again to be purified, but coming back in the ascending process
there is a movement which carries this current of pulsation into the invisible
realms, which we may speak of as heaven, where it moves in the heavenly sense
to return to be released in the same current as had occurred before in the
circulation of the life stream through the whole body of mankind.
The cleansing takes place, the purifying takes place, in the heaven, so
that on the returning pulsation the pure expression of spirit may appear. The
pure bloodstream—what Christians have with complete uncomprehendingness called
the blood of Jesus—is the purified life stream made available to the whole body
of mankind, that circulating through that body the purification may take place.
What occurs by reason of that purification must be allowed to occur without
human interference. If we do provide a proper point of spiritual focus in this
process we rightly have no compulsion at all to interfere with what happens in
the body of mankind.
Human beings are inclined to become involved in what is happening in the
body of mankind one way or another. There is a great deal of emotion engendered
in this regard in many areas where it is imagined that people know how things
should be. They are going to bring pressure to bear one way or another to make
them be the way they think they ought to be. They don't know how they ought to
be in the first place. We see this happening in all directions, but from our
own standpoint we may see it as happening much closer to ourselves than out
there in the world. People are very much inclined to project things away from
themselves. This is a very self-righteous stance which assumes that it knows
how things should be somewhere else in someone else, in the experiences that
are going on in the world.
But the cleansing process, while it will properly take place out there,
has its point of initiation right where one is, and it is in dealing with what
is brought to one in one's immediate circumstance and experience that may, if
it is handled correctly in repentance, release the pure stream of life into
what is occurring out there farther afield. But if it is not allowed to be purified
where one is, there is nothing pure to be extended into what is out there. The
life stream proceeds, through those who are merely concerned with what is going
on out there, in a polluted way, because it has never been allowed to be
cleansed in relationship to one's own personal experience right where one is.
There is where the cleansing takes place, where the purification may be a fact.
It can't be a fact anywhere else until it is a fact there. So the futility of
all this effort that is put into trying to make the world a better place is
clearly seen. This is a way of avoiding personal responsibility.
The personal responsibility is not primarily out there. It is right where
one is, right in one's own polluted heart where the repentance can have meaning.
No one can repent for what is going on out there, but one has the opportunity
of repenting for what is happening in one's own heart and for allowing the
pollution to be swept out of one's own heart in the outgoing breath, the
outgoing pulsation. Then that breath, that outgoing pulsation, will have its
effect in the larger world round about. And so there may be a sharing in the
natural creative process by which the bloodstream of mankind is cleansed.
There has never yet been an adequate facility for this to happen. Perhaps
I should modify that statement a little, because there was an adequate facility
in one man two thousand years ago, so that there was an initiation of this
aspect of the creative cycle, the initiation of a process in which we have the
opportunity of sharing now. It is no use looking back and saying, "Well
why didn't people share in it before?'' The point is: What are we going to do
now? It's the only time we have, after all. You can't change the past; whatever
happened happened. But it brought everything to this point where we are now and
where we may provide this focus for the purification of the bloodstream of the
body of mankind. Is that a large task? I would think so. But it is the only way
it can happen, as there are those who take the responsibility.
Partly because of blindness, ignorance, heretofore there was no adequate
responsibility taken for this process to operate effectively. But the time has
come. It either operates effectively now or there is no way by which it can
operate anymore. And if we have some awareness of this ourselves, then we are
immediately acquainted with our own responsibility in the matter. If the vast
majority of people on earth have no such awareness they have no such
responsibility, at least not in the direct sense.
There must be a point of
focus connecting the invisible heavenly aspect of the creative cycle with the
earthly aspect of it, and I think we should have reached the point where we are
quite capable of saying individually, “I am it.” We do not suffer from the
disease of false humility in this regard, which is in fact a way by which those
who know better find excuse for not doing better. It requires humility to
accept responsibility. If there is an attempt to accept the responsibility in a
spirit of arrogance the responsibility will not be accepted. It requires
humility, a willingness to relinquish one's own self-determinations in favor of
providing a point through which the creative process may work to purify one's
own heart. As that is made pure, or to the extent it is made pure, the onflow
of the current of life carries it into the whole body of mankind. So in this
process of cleansing, which we have correlated with the matter of breathing,
purification of human hearts may take place. This is what is going on.
© Emissaries of Divine Light
Threefold Pattern of Focalization
from Peter, James and John — John, James and Peter
Uranda
May 20, 1954 am Class
We remember the pattern that was
portrayed in the Master's ministry on the basis of what is popularly conceived
to be Peter, James and John. We would like to take note this morning of the
basic fact that if it is understood, this particular arrangement is all right.
If we recognize that Peter, James and John provide the proper pattern of
recognition from the standpoint of the body, then all is well. But if in that
pattern of perception Peter is conceived to be the point of focalization, and the mind does not perceive that
which is above and beyond, we have confusion. And that is the state of the
world consciousness with which you must deal. It is because of this confusion
that we do not have the adequate manifestation of spiritual power on earth. Our
ministry, our service, attunements, can be of consequence only to the degree
that there is the actuality of spiritual power reaching through us into the
world. Without that it turns into so many words and so many ideas which have no
more meaning than a host of other words and ideas to be found in the world.
We recognize that John relates to
spirit, James relates to mind, and Peter relates to the emotional realm—the
feeling realm. We recognize that spirit issuing from the supreme point of
focalization in the invisible realm must have a focalization in the outer
realm. If there isn't an overall focalization the various members cannot of and
by themselves come to focus. If the various members try to establish a focus of
and by themselves they fail. We could take any member of your body as such and
assume that that member of and by itself, without regard to the head, could
establish a completely satisfactory relationship to the realm of spirit, and we
would find that it was not so. If the factors that are in the head, from the
standpoint of the endocrine system, the nervous system, the brain and all the
rest of it, are not providing the
point of focalization for the body as a whole, the member of the body cannot of
and by itself establish a pattern of focalization directly with spirit.
But the pattern of focalization is with
respect to every member, and we are not to assume, merely because the head of
the body provides the essential primary focalization, that the rest of the body
is denied the reality of spirit—for it is not. And yet that particular false
concept is one with which you will be working and contending in every sphere of
service which has any relationship to spiritual things, because the human being
will constantly assume that a recognition of the primary focalization at the
point of the head suggests that the members of the body are denied their own
individual patterns of focalization and direct relationship in and with spirit,
which is not the case at all.
If we recognize this pattern and do not
put it “Peter, James and John” as if the true order did not exist, we are all
right. But the minute we assume that it is “Peter, James and John” on this
basis, we are wrong. From the standpoint of Deity the approach is John, James
and Peter. From the standpoint of the mass of humanity, which we call the body
of mankind—and from the standpoint of the individual, for every person has
individually the vibrational focalization factors of John, James and Peter,
every single person on the face of the earth; but if that focalization is to
have any meaning individually it must be established with respect to the whole
body—in the mass consciousness we have it Peter, James and John, instead of John, James and Peter. If we
realize the falsity of this concept and recognize that from the standpoint of
Deity it is John, James and Peter,
and we clearly establish that pattern in consciousness symbolizing these
factors of being, we will have a basis of understanding, a basis of viewing, a
basis of analyzing, which will stand us in good stead in every circumstance in
life. If we break that pattern and try to establish it on some other basis we
will fail, regardless who it is or how much effort is put forth.
We recognize that there are certain
religions where the idea is: “You are not supposed to understand why. That is
what you are taught; that is what you must believe. It is not a matter of the
mind having any part to play; merely belief—feeling. It is not a matter of a
recognition of the spirit in direct relationship with the individual; it is a
matter of feeling acceptance regardless of the working of the mind.” And the
mind is forced, from babyhood, to conform with that which is impressed upon
consciousness through the feeling realm by reason of fear. “If you do not do
thus and so you will go to hell or purgatory or somewhere. You will suffer. The
devil will get you.” So, not so much on a basis of love for God as a basis of
fear of God, the emotional nature is used as the primary point of focalization—concepts
and ideas of every sort are implanted, not only in the field of religion but in
the field of discipline for small children. “The bogeyman will get you. The
policeman will get you. Somebody will come and get you.” All those ideas are
utterly atrocious, in relationship to discipline for the childish mind and
heart. So we use the feeling nature—we
do not say fear has no place—but we recognize that mind is superior. However we also recognize that mind has within it
that which is given particular focalization below it.
There is an absolute principle which
must be realized if we are going to understand: that which is carried out in a
pattern of differentiation in the expanded expression must be in essence
contained in the point of focalization.
Now if you will really remember that, it will save you from many a pitfall.
What does it mean here, in practical application? That which is at the point of focalization,
which we speak of as John, contains
both James and Peter. That which is carried out to the point of
differentiation from John to James carries the vibrational factors of Peter.
The supreme point of focalization must contain the essence of all that is
focalized and made manifest in the differentiation pattern in the expanded
expression.
So you look at the nervous system and
you have simply the differentiated expanded expression of the brain which
reaches to all of the parts. Your nervous system is simply the differentiated
aspects of the brain in expanded expression connected with the parts or members
of the body. Now always, that is true. This, then, follows: If we are going to
think of James as relating to the mental plane, and he certainly does, we are
not going to assume that the mental plane is differentiated from, separate
from, unrelated to, the emotional realm. The feeling nature is contained in the
level of the true intellect. And there is one of the things that has not been
generally recognized, let alone understood, because the attempt has been made to
establish the intellect on a mental basis without regard to the emotional
factor which is inherent in the mind itself, and to do so establishes the mind
as something which it is not. It is only a part of a thing functioning on a
basis which tries to make it the whole thing.
Now this relates to you as a person. The John aspect of your own being is the first outmanifestation, in the realm of
yourself as a being, of that which is of the invisible focalization of Deity
which we speak of as your Father, or your God Being, your centering in Deity.
Whatever name you wish to use is beside the point as long as we do not get
confused patterns. The John aspect of your being is the first beginning point
of manifestation, the focalization of all else that is to manifest as spirit or
by reason of spirit. As soon as that begins to be a fact in manifestation with
you, and John is there, the John aspect begins to differentiate and we have the
James aspect of your being beginning to appear. But the James aspect does not function
on a basis segregated from the emotional aspect in its own level—the Peter
aspect is there. But with continued expressions of differentiation we come to
that which is primarily, dominantly, Peter. That relates, to a very high
degree, to the subconscious range, the subconscious
mind. Actually, while there might have to be some adjustments in your
consciousness on the point—so do not establish it with too fixed a sphere of
limitation—the Peter aspect of your being is the unconscious or subconscious
realm of the feeling nature, which in turn correlates with mind. There is the
aspect of mind which extends into Peter—and remember that the subconscious mind
is primarily the emotional nature.
If out of Peter we receive an impulse
which does not correlate with James, which is not controlled or directed by
James, and it is allowed expression, action, it also disregards John and makes
Peter the supreme point of focalization for your existence. And then you are
subject to every wind that blows. There is no stability. There is uncertainty.
There is fear. There is every sort of ill thing, until we begin to realize that
we do not deny Peter, as Peter denied the Lord, but we refuse to accept Peter as the supreme point of focalization in our
being. And how is most of the control extended into the body? In the range
of the automatic or subconscious. Every automatic function in your body relates
to the subconscious, doesn't it? Certainly. How many of you can, by thinking,
just willing that it be so, change the pulse beat of your heart? Now if you
select certain things to think about, about which you feel deeply, you may by
reason of feeling begin to have an effect in the body through the subconscious,
but it will not be by direct will or conscious intent. It will be indirect. It
still goes through Peter. So with the exception of the external patterns of
action—walking, talking, movement of the hands, etc.—we do not have very much
control on the intellectual level of consciousness in relationship to the
functions in the body.
Now the pattern of habits which we
establish and maintain in the conscious range has its influence in the
subconscious range. But the important thing is to realize that you are very
fortunate that God so constructed you that your mind as such does not have
direct influence and control in your body, because if you had the interference
of your intellect you would not be able to live. I will venture there isn't a
person here in this room that could live twenty-four hours if the coordination
of his internal processes, even in their primary aspects, depended upon
conscious control in the mind. Do you think you would live twenty-four hours? I
don't think you would live an hour, do you? No, I don't. How brilliant you are!
I wouldn't want it either. I am pointing out, however, some basic factors which
are vitally essential if we are going to learn how to live and how to serve
others, because Peter, the emotional nature, must not be allowed to take
supreme control in the body, even though Peter is the direct means by which
control is released in the body, influence made manifest. The control into the
body is primarily through Peter, into the realm of form. And that is not
limited to you as a person. That applies to the whole mass of mankind. Now if
this control level be used wrongly we call it black magic. If it is used
correctly we call it white magic. The point is that the right use at this level
is of the divine design, the magic of living, of beauty, of love and of life.
The wrong use at this level results in the distortion patterns of the world,
which are in fact elements of black magic.
Now James has the ability, by reason of
the essences which are differentiated into manifestation as Peter—the elements
in James differentiated as Peter are present in James, and by reason of the
factors of intellectual and feeling perception we have the means at our command
by which we may become acquainted with and learn to understand John. That is
our purpose here in this Class. And until the human being establishes a pattern
of right relationship with John, the John aspect of his own being, he cannot comprehend or become aware of, or know
in any way, shape or form, his own Lord, his own God Being, or en masse, the
LORD of Lords. We can have all kinds of ideas about, concepts of every sort—and
the world is full of them—but if you cut the nerves between the head and the
body, the fact that the nerves are in the body will not permit the normal
function. And it is just as true in relationship to mankind as a whole as it is
true in relationship to you as a person. In the John aspect of your own being, what do we have—the negative focalization of the positive aspect in the invisible realm, in the range of focalization—simply a
means by which the inner positive, or invisible focalization, is transferred to
the realm of outer form—a connecting link—the invisible part of
the chain and the visible part. If there is a break at the level where
invisible things are supposed to begin to be visible, what is going to happen?
The visible chain will be weak and of no value. It will not hold you up. So the
John aspect of your own being is the
connecting link.
Human beings try to understand the John
aspect, in one way or another, to whatever degree it is comprehended, without
correct function in relationship to Peter and James. And it will not work, try
as you will. You are going to let Peter be the control point in your being and
then learn to understand John? It will not work, because if Peter is the
control point, you are being controlled by external things, by circumstances,
what people say and do and what you think they feel, what you think their
attitudes to be—when you do not know. You are controlled by all these things,
and then you are a slave, pure and simple. It is from that slavery that human
beings are to be liberated, and the moment any human being is liberated from
that slavery, he or she begins to be a son or daughter of God. But that slavery
is there whether we like to admit it or not. No matter what we do about it, without
regard to James and John there is no liberation—and faith in Peter, hoping to
achieve that liberation, will not achieve anything, no matter how you struggle
or what method you use. You can go to the yoga philosophies of the Orient or of
India, or pursue any idea of developing willpower and mental abilities in the
Occident , and it will not work. You can get so far and you run
into a blank wall. Human beings everywhere, by the millions, are up against
that blank wall.
The only excuse we have for being a
separate or distinct organization is to provide something which is not provided
by other organizations—the means by which the individual as a person, and the
mass body of mankind as a whole, may begin to have an awareness of the John aspect of being, so that there may
be true comprehension of what we might call the Jesus aspect of being, the supreme point of focalization for the
whole, the LORD of Lords and KING of Kings. The focalization of Deity to us was
made manifest in the form, the body, the man, who was known as Jesus. But that
Jesus aspect of being, now invisible, can have no real or true meaning except
by the means which He Himself outlined. And it always works absolutely, whether
anyone likes it or not. Millions have destroyed themselves trying to make some
other method work, and it will not. There is just one way. And the more quickly
we come to that absolute conclusion and realization the better for us, the less
time and energy will be wasted, the sooner we will be out of the abyss of
nothingness into the realms of joy and peace.
Now, then, if we are going to comprehend
James we must start on the right basis. The popular idea is to judge all things
mental on the basis of the way you feel about it. You are going to let Peter
pass on everything that James says. “I do not like that idea, so I will reject
it. I like this idea, so I accept it, the way I feel about it. I am letting
Peter determine what is true or not true with respect to what James says.” And
it is a snare and a delusion. If the way you feel about it is going to
determine what you believe, you will never be a true server. What happens? If
we have a certain feeling—shall we call it prejudice?—a certain feeling of
aversion toward some idea, or something we think is an idea, and we refuse to
examine it because we have this feeling, we are going to remain in ignorance.
But if, regardless of how we feel about it, we will examine what James presents
with an open mind, what do we find? That when we see the truth the old prejudice,
or adverse feeling, falls away. We do not feel the same way about it anymore,
because we begin to feel on the basis of truth, not on the basis of all the
things that have been pounded into us since our babyhood. And there is the
difference between slavery and liberation into manhood and womanhood. If a
person continues to be subject to his aversions, to his prejudices, to what he
likes and does not like, he will be a slave until his dying day, a slave of
things not controlled.
You must learn to recognize that what
you feel about something is absolutely beside the point, that it should not be
allowed to have any weight at all. If you say, “I like this idea so much I
cannot give it up. I have too strong a feeling about it,” you are deluding
yourself. If you say, “I have too strong a feeling against that idea to accept
it,” you are deluding yourself. The way you feel will follow your intellectual
acceptance of truth once you see it and accept it. And there is no other way
which leads to mastery, to
liberation, try as you will. What you feel about it is beside the point, and
you need to reach the point of absolute conviction in yourself, where you will
say, and mean, “What I feel about this or that is beside the point. It is not
going to control me. My likes and dislikes are no longer going to be in
control. I am going to examine everything from the standpoint of the mind,
without adverse influence from Peter. I am going to examine. I am going to
analyze. I am going to learn to think, and I am going to learn to let my mind,
conscious and subconscious, function under the control of the spirit of God.”
This dual aspect of mind is contained in
James, as we noted, and it is not by pure intellect that you learn to see and
understand John. There is a feeling perception there. But this feeling
perception that works from James to John cannot work as long as Peter is in
control. You can say, “Well I am supposed to use my feeling perception.” Of
course you are. But as long as you are a slave, reacting this way and that to
every circumstance that arises, you are unstable and the Lord is not in
control. When you begin to use this feeling perception that arises out of James
in relationship to John, his brother—isn't that right?, in relationship to
John, his brother—it will not be because Peter is saying, “I reject that
because I do not like it. I accept this because I like it.” But there is
feeling perception there, and if you try to do it on a coldly intellectual
basis, logic and reason alone, do you think you will arrive? No, you must use
both of these aspects of perception as they are contained in James, and when
you do you will find that what you perceive by feeling never violates logic and
reason.
You cannot by logic and reason reach the
point of comprehending John. It is utterly impossible. Though millions have
tried it, not one has ever succeeded. It is a waste of time. But when you learn
to use the true perceptive qualities of James, beginning to understand John,
you will find that that which is perceived through the feeling aspect never
violates logic or reason, or what we might call the intellectual aspect of your
being. And if you perceive something that appears to violate, what are you
going to do? Jump to the conclusion, “Well now, I don't like this. I am going
to put it all aside”? No, if you are afraid of it you cannot approach close
enough to it to examine it. There must be control. If you are afraid to examine
any point which appears, it means that you have no faith in your own stability.
Is that not true? And you need to develop faith in your own stability, learn to
examine it. Then what you thought you saw turns out to be something a little
different. You thought it was this way and it wasn't. It was a different form,
different factors. And as soon as you see it as it really is, you have no
rejection of it—an acceptance. You no longer feel against it and you have
reached a point where you know the truth and the truth has set you free from
that which you feared. And it has not violated logic or reason.
The point I wish to reemphasize here is
that until you reach a point of right attitude toward Peter, try as you may,
you cannot begin to use the true perceptive faculties of James, and the feeling
nature is going to be mixed-up and you will not reach a point where you are
controlled by the spirit of God. Why have I, over this period of years here, been
so patient with all the people? Because I knew that each and every one of you,
perhaps inadvertently but nevertheless certainly, were under the control and
domination of Peter, regardless of what you thought in your mind, regardless of
what you thought you believed, or anything else. Peter is too much in control
to permit you to know the truth. The Master did not say, “And ye shall know how
you feel, and your feelings will make you free.” He did say, “And ye shall know
the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” And how are you going to know
the truth? By the perceptive faculties of James in the intellectual level. For
only so can you begin to comprehend John and begin to realize that which John
represents, or makes possible in manifestation in the realm of form.
This means that not by rule and
regulation, not by arbitrary attitude on my part, but by reason of your own
opportunity to observe the truth, you have reached a point where there must be
less subjection to Peter on your part. You may think, “Well I am going to lose
something good.” Oh no you won't. No, you will find things that are lovely and
beautiful and real, the blessings which God would bestow upon you. Nothing
worthwhile will be taken away. Only the thorns that irritate, only the ill
conditions that make one suffer, only that which spoils, will be taken away.
But there is still too much subjection to Peter in your daily function to
permit you to make the kind of progress you can make if you will remember these
things and if you will be sensible and remember that here there is
understanding one of another. But refuse to be blinded by Peter, refuse to
accept the way you feel about anything as conclusive, what you like or do not
like. Do not let it be conclusive. Move to the realm of truth and function on
the basis of James, and you will find that John, his brother, is near at hand,
and all will be well. God bless you.
© Emissaries of Divine Light
