Trustworthiness only begins to appear to the extent of spiritual expression, to the extent that the angel of life is in command of the human soul. For this to occur it is necessary to allow the increase of spiritual expression to occur. The increase of spiritual expression includes life, true living; truth, the design and control which are not of this world; and love. We know something about the meaning of the word Shekinah or the Christ. Shekinah, the Christ, is characterized by the fire of love, the fire that burns eternally. Because of this fire there is the light that glows, and because of the fire and the light, there is the cloud of glory. The cloud of glory characterizes life, the expression of life on earth in physical form; the light that glows rightly characterizes mental expression on earth; and the fire that burns is the fire of love, the central core of spiritual expression. In union with the angel of life there is union with Shekinah. In fact it is Shekinah, the Christ, which makes the union possible. In that union it may rightly be said, “I am the cloud of glory, I am the light that glows, I am the fire that burns.”
When we think of fire it is usual to associate it with something painful. If you put your hand in the fire—Ouch! But as has been stated before, fire obviously does not burn itself. I am the fire; that is my character. I am the fire that burns eternally. I am the light that glows eternally in consequence. I am the cloud of glory, which gives evidence of the light that glows and the fire that burns. Therefore in that experience the former things of pain and sorrow and crying are no longer present. Death is no longer present; death does not cohabit with life. Death is simply the absence of life. In truth, life is never absent.
If the former things are to pass away they do so to the extent that there is one present, incarnate in human form and in expression through human form, who may say, speaking truly, “I am the fire that burns, the light that glows and the cloud of glory. I am THAT I am.” I know, in your experience as human beings, thus far you have known pain, sorrow, trouble, discomfort, and you have been aware of what is called death. What is it, then, that suffers these things? It certainly isn't you, the angel of life.
The burning of the fire consumes the bonds of earthly heredity. This is the only way that those bonds will be consumed. You can't evolve out of them. At least the only way you can do that would be to die, which I don't think is evolution but rather devolution. It might be said that a person is trustworthy up to the level where the discomfort becomes sufficiently intense to cause him to revert into slavery. I have noted that there are those who are afraid of discomfort. This is one of the reasons why lethargy is so convenient, because it seems to offer the temporary opportunity to avoid placing oneself in a position of discomfort. One may hide in the shadows because there is an awareness that discomfort will put in an appearance if one comes out into the open. Of course the one being spoken of here is the human soul.
The bonds which bind the human soul may be seen in terms of heredity. Heredity is to be dissolved, burned in the fire. That will be uncomfortable for heredity presumably; and if that is the place of one's identity, then there will be an inclination to hide in the shadows, endeavoring to keep the fire from getting too close. From the standpoint of the angel of life the purpose is that the fire should be brought to bear upon the bonds. A person who is always hiding, humanly, from the anticipated discomfort of the fire will not let the bonds be burned, at least not for a while. It seems that it is possible to avoid discomfort in this fashion, even within the range of those who should know better and also should do better. But it is much easier to let the bonds be burned at low temperatures than to wait for the furnace to be heated perhaps seven times hotter than it is wont to be heated; then there is no avoiding it if one is to keep one's integrity.
Human beings everywhere, ourselves included—certainly in times past—have been accustomed to dance to the tune of the tyrant. That has been the compulsion of human existence. If there is a passion born in the human soul toward the angel of life, then the whole desire is to allow all bonds to be consumed in the fire. It is a lot easier to let them be consumed at a low temperature, one by one, than to hide in the shadows and wait for the violent explosion; because that will surely come.
Assuming the stance of the angel of life, the words, “I am the fire, the way of the fire, the way of union and of love,” may be spoken. And this is fulfilment indeed for the human soul, because the remaining bonds will be easily and naturally burned. Human heredity as a controlling compulsion will be dissolved. There is no other way by which this can happen. It is based in spiritual expression. If one is totally occupied with the expression of the angel of life, then the soul's discomfort is a very small thing. It certainly can be no distraction from one's true purpose, from the expression of one's integrity.
Now if there is spiritual expression, as there necessarily must be if we accept the responsibility of trustworthiness—this acceptance is in fact our integrity—then we are in the place of extending an invitation to all people everywhere to step into the fire with us, because we are there already. This is what is required to clear the hereditary state for mankind. You cannot invite anyone to step into the fire unless you are already in it. I suppose it's possible to suggest that it would be good for somebody else to get into the fire right away, but such a suggestion would ring rather hollow, I think. It rings true only when one is not merely in the fire but when one is the fire. Being the fire, we are not burned by it—but the bonds are. To the extent that we still have a little involvement with the tyrant of death, then it may be said that one is uncomfortable. But the fact of the matter is that one is not really uncomfortable; the bonds that have been present in the human soul are being burned. Good riddance! That's just wonderful. And no big deal is made out of the supposed discomfort. Thank God for it! Welcome it! Come out of the shadows to stand as the fire.
There are those who say, “When I come out into the open there's too much pressure. Bad business, too much pressure.” Well if one wishes to remain identified with the former things that are going to pass away anyhow, then discomfort is inevitable—pain, sorrow, all these things, and ultimately death. I would emphasize a point that it is not a matter of the soul trying to save itself alive. In human self-centeredness this has been one of the hopes and desires of human souls: that they may be saved for eternity. If we recognize what a human soul is, then I think that is rather a vain expectation. There have been some fanciful ideas in this regard, about corpses coming up out of tombs; but if all that was left was a little dust, it would be quite a trick to get it all together again—and who would want it?
I am the way of union, of love, of the fire; I am the truth, the light; I am the life, the cloud of glory. I am that I am, and consequently eternal. I inhabit a human soul which may be useful to me. It may hold out on me and suffer the consequences, the discomforts of so doing, but I am the one incarnate and the one who is here to make right use of my soul, right use of those with whom I am associated, right use of my circumstances, right use of all that comes to me. I can do this because I make right use of my soul. The right use of my soul is to allow for my spiritual expression, to allow me to express what I am. We are all here on earth to speak such words truly.
We do not necessarily anticipate that this human soul is going to live forever. I think that it is inevitable that it would change. In fact I don't think that as an angel of life we'd want the human soul as it now is to hang around us forever. It is useful now, it may be useful tomorrow, it may even be useful next year, possibly ten years from hence—who knows? All that is of concern to us is that we should be in position to make right use of it. Making right use of it, we are present in mind and heart and body in order to make right use of the environment around us, and as long as this present soul can be usefully so employed, presumably we'll make arrangements for it to remain. If it isn't of any more use in this way, then what would be the purpose for its continued existence? We have a realistic viewpoint; and what human beings think of as death, which is the passing of the human soul, means very little. It means very little to the angel of life who is in command, in the sense that its value is based in right use for particular purposes in a specific aspect of the unfoldment of the creative cycle.
If I am the way, the truth and the life, death means nothing; it doesn't exist! That the substance that composed the human soul may be reintroduced into the natural creative cycles on earth is quite satisfactory; that presumably is what should happen. It may be that if, as angels of life, we do play our parts wisely and rightly in these present human souls there could be a transformation in the realm of the human soul which is presently beyond imagination, or unknown. But be that as it may, all that is presently required is to make right use of the human soul in present circumstances, whatever they are. We don't make right use of our human souls with the expectation that changes are going to come in our circumstances to suit the human soul. Therefore it's quite useless for the human soul to have mental and emotional concepts and desires as to what the changes should be.
The only value of the human soul is to provide the opportunity for the angel of life to give creative expression to spirit in the present moment. What will ensue because of that is what should ensue because of that, regardless of any judgments that may creep into the consciousness of the human soul. Forget it. Let it be what it is; let it be what it will be. Oh yes, it's going to change, we can be sure of that; but let not the judgments of the human soul try to determine the changes on the basis of what it considers would be pleasing to itself. The changes come at the hand of the angel of life. On this basis we all stand as one, the angel of life on earth with a variety of human souls. This is very useful. It would be too bad if we all had duplicates of the same soul. That would not be very useful.
So here we are as angels of life, incarnate in these human souls of great variety, not by chance. Obviously, if the angel of life has incarnated in some particular soul, as is the case for all of us, it wasn't a haphazard business. Specific choices were made as to what would be most useful should the human soul reach the point of willingness to allow the angel of life, who one is, to do what one incarnated in that human soul to do. And all these human souls are related, in one way or another, because they have the opportunity of participating in a collective, unified body. The angel of life is also the angel of the way of union. And so union is the natural experience, not only between the human soul and the angel of life who one is but between all the human souls who are the embodiment of the angel of life. On this basis there is one functioning, unified, coordinated body in action on earth, administering the creative cycle. Not making the creative cycle be—it already is—but administering the expression of it within the range of creative responsibility right here on earth. Then the invitation may be extended to all people: “Come out of slavery to the tyrant of death into the way of the fire.”
I think in times past there have been some ideas about extending an invitation to others, usually on the basis that it would be helpful if other people would come on the mailing list, would attend Class, seminars, what have you. But if you think of that from your standpoint, it would be the fact for most of you that you would be inviting them into something else, not into something for which you have responsibility. In other words you're passing the buck, and it would not be a true invitation. The invitation is to come into your fire, your personal fire; not to say, “Well I think it would be helpful if you went into someone else's fire. Why don't you get in touch with so-and-so?” Now it may be that in inviting people into your fire the sensible thing for the particular person would be to connect them up with somebody else, should you not be on hand to do anything in a direct way. But there must be that in you, in your own personal experience, which has invited that person to come into the fire with you, and you are not just ducking out and passing the buck to somebody else. The invitation you extend is to come into your place, where you are; otherwise it is a phony invitation. We're speaking of all the people, whether they ever get on the mailing list or whether they ever come to a Class, whether they ever do any of the supposedly orthodox Emissary things. The vast majority won't, but they may come into the presence of the angel of life because you are incarnate in form on earth.
I think you are aware of the fact that while I may have on occasion suggested that it would be useful for a person to come on the mailing list or to go to a Class, that, in your own experience, has not really been the invitation that you have felt from me. It is because there was a place of the fire that you could come to that you could experience whatever you have experienced. There may have been some blessing known because of many things that have happened, that you have done, but I'm sure that you have always been aware of the fact that there is a safe place for you to come into insofar as I am concerned, an enfoldment, but also a fire. Some have preferred to stay out on the fringes, so that they didn't experience too much soul discomfort. Others have been willing to come in closer, and been willing to experience whatever discomfort was necessary. It was not made into a big deal; it was something that would necessarily happen.
Coming into the fire, there is the experience of the soul being restored. Now what that restoration for any particular soul might mean remains to be seen, and one shouldn't have expectations and feel slighted if it doesn't happen the way you expect. I'm pretty sure it won't, for any of us. Let it be what it is!—because until there is this yielded openness on the part of the soul, how can the angel of life come forth? And it is the coming forth of the angel of life that burns the bonds, so that there is a new experience known in heart and mind and body because it may be said, “I am present and in expression.” And the whole human soul is unified into the one—there is no separation.
We find, in the natural cycles of living, that we eat and drink day by day; we stay alive that way. Of course we breathe as well, and do other things, but we also excrete. That's as necessary, isn't it? There is something taken in; there is something left behind. This is all natural in the cycles of living. So, with the incarnate angel of life, there is a body and a mind and a heart, a human soul received; and various aspects of waste are left behind day by day from this human soul. Where is the mystery? Where is the mystery of so-called death? At that point just a little more is left behind, that's all. From the standpoint of the angel of life, that is all that is happening. It is human souls who bewail their passing, because they have this sense of separation and isolation and fear and all these things—pain and sorrow and all the rest—of their own choosing.
The door is open for the fulfilment of life, and we are all here to extend that life, which includes the fire, to all who will share it with us; but we must be that fire to have anything to share with anyone that is of any value. So we speak the Word to all people, “I am the way of union, the way of the fire; I am the truth; I am the life. Come unto me. Come unto me personally!” Not come unto EDL, not come unto Class, not come unto the mailing list, but come unto me! If that invitation is a true one, and someone comes, that person is received by you; and in the receiving there may be this suggestion made, that suggestion made, something else, but not to ditch your own responsibility. The angel of life would never do that. So we, all together in oneness, may extend this invitation to all people everywhere, “Come unto me.”
There is a simple line in the familiar hymn “All Things Bright and Beautiful” which goes like this: “How great is God Almighty, who has made all things well.” How great is God Almighty. If that is a question it could hardly be answered. If it is just an emphasis on the fact of God's greatness then we may have some consciousness of the truth of this statement. We cannot really know God Almighty. We can know about Him, I suppose. But this term has reference to undimensional God, supreme God. It would be impossible to describe that in dimensional terms. Also, because we are properly present here in a dimensional world we may find no necessity to try to get out of it into some undimensional state in order that we might comprehend what is there present. There is undimensional God and there is also dimensional God. Dimensional God was described by using the word Jehovah.
We have before considered that highest spiritual substance of the most intense vibrational nature which merges into the undimensional state. This substance fills the whole of what we would refer to as the universe. There isn't any place, dimensionally speaking, where it isn't; this is the reason for the idea of the omnipresence of God. This substance is of such a vibrational nature that it is capable of accommodating the spirit of love. The spirit of love is not, obviously, separate from God; it has been said that God is love. So the essences of God in the dimensional world are the essences of love, the union between this highest vibrational substance and the spirit of love. Here is the substance that fills the whole of creation, the whole of the space where creation is. It is undifferentiated. In this sense we may say all is love. Here is the union between the spirit of love and this substance which is capable of being one with love, so that love may emerge into the dimensional universe. At that level there is only love substance filling and composing all that creation is to be.
In order for creation to take place this undifferentiated substance must be differentiated The essence of truth is present initially in the process of differentiation of the original love substance At all the vibratory levels of substance below this highest substance the essence of truth is present. It is by reason of the spirit of truth in union with the essential substance that the differentiation of the original substance of love may transpire. So there are the essences of love and the essences of truth. At every level below the essences of truth, are present the essences of life. Here is the holy trinity: love, truth and life in the dimensional world by reason of the substance with which these spirits may find union. These essences rightly pour forth through the substance which is present at lower levels, initially what might be referred to as heart substance. When the heart is pure there is an open door of connection between this holy trinity and the earth, what we think of as the manifest world, the world of form as we understand it. This pouring forth is spiritual expression in this world of form—mental form, physical form.
As we noted this morning [greatcosmicstory.blogspot.com/2016/05/we-are-vitally-with-essences-from.html] the largeness is at the highest levels. Here is the creative process by which something is coming into the world. It is being differentiated and consequently narrowed down, brought to focus, in that process of differentiation; and we ourselves have a responsibility for allowing this differentiation to take place at the level where we are. In order to gain perspective in this regard we may well return to those simple words: “How great is God Almighty,” who in this process of creation has made all things well. But there is a very specific way in which it happens, and properly we are a part of the happening. Otherwise within the range of human experience the true happening is absent, it is lacking, and there are voids consequently on every hand.
I am sure that most if not all of you have given some consideration to The Song Celestial—The Bhagavad-Gita, in the recognition that here is a portrayal in symbolic form of the truth as it relates to human experience. The principal characters were Arjuna and Krishna: Krishna, the God in human form; and Arjuna, who was aware of the God in human form. After a great deal of consideration of earthly things there came a point when Arjuna felt that it was most necessary that he should begin to see things as they really were. So he spoke to Krishna along these lines, and here is part of what he said:
O Thou Divinest One!
If this can be, if I may bear the sight,
Make Thyself visible, Lord of all prayer!
Show me Thy very Self, the Eternal God!
Krishna can be seen as providing a focus point in the dimensional world for these highest essences. I suppose from a different approach we might say here was the Christ, the Word made flesh, the essences brought to a particular point of focus. But these essences are not something all on their own. As we have already noted, this substance, this highest substance, is present throughout the whole universal creation, everywhere. If it is brought to focus at some point, that fact doesn't extract the essence from itself; it is still the essence but merely brought to focus; it is still the universal essence. Here is the Word that was with God in the beginning, the Word that is God—God dimensional. There could be no God dimensional if there wasn't first God undimensional, but you cannot separate the two; there's no line of demarcation. This universal substance [greatcosmicstory.blogspot.com/2019/03/universal-substance-martin-cecil.html] at the highest vibratory level merges into the undimensional.
It is useless for us to try to examine the undimensional. Insofar as we are concerned it would be nothing. It isn't nothing; we discover that it isn't nothing by reason of dimensional God. So dimensional God relates to these essences at the highest vibrational level, the love essences, which in the creative process must be brought to focus, must be differentiated into the various levels dimensionally speaking. We have noted how this is achieved—not by reason of our experience particularly, but just looking at the picture—the emergence through the connecting substance of the pure heart into the world of creative action when we have a sense of the reality of dimensional God, the essences of love. These essences of love are not only brought to focus on this little earth, rightly, but everywhere else in the universe in various ways. Arjuna was asking for an awareness within the scope of his own vision of what this would be, the essences brought to focus throughout the whole universe. I think one should be a little cautious about asking for any such thing. However, according to the story here, whether brash or simply trusting, Arjuna requested this, and I have read the words. And here is Krishna's reply:
Gaze, then, thou Son of Pritha!
I manifest for thee
Those hundred thousand thousand shapes
that clothe my Mystery:
I show thee all my semblances,
infinite, rich, divine,
My changeful hues, my countless forms.
See! in this face of mine,
Wonders unnumbered, Indian Prince!
revealed to none save thee.
Behold! this is the Universe! —
Look! what is live and dead
I gather all in one-in Me!
Gaze, as thy lips have said,
On God Eternal, Very God!
See Me! see what thou prayest!
Thou canst not! — nor, with human eyes,
Arjuna! ever mayest!
Therefore I give thee sense divine.
Have other eyes, new light!
And, look! This is My glory,
unveiled to mortal sight!
Then follows a description by the servant of what was seen. I do not propose to read this now; we may have opportunity sometime. But here was something so vast, so tremendous, so majestic, that Arjuna went into shock, as might be supposed. So here are some more words of Arjuna, not all of what he said:
Be merciful, and show
The visage that I know;
Let me regard Thee, as of yore, arrayed
With disc and forehead-gem
With mace and anadem,
Thou that sustainest all things! Undismayed
Let me once more behold
The form I loved of old,
Thou of the thousand arms and countless eyes!
This frightened heart is fain
To see restored again
My Charioteer, in Krishna's kind disguise.
I read this this evening, without going into all that was said with respect to the vision, so as nevertheless to emphasize the majesty, the greatness, the vastness, of dimensional God; and dimensional God is only an aspect of God. It has sometimes been felt by those who were associated with this ministry that it was a little thing; human beings tend to be impressed by numbers. But to the extent that the heart opens and yields and the creative processes of purification take place, there comes some sensing of the smallness of this external world in which we dwell; I suppose in one sense it could be said, the insignificance of it when seen in the light of the reality of dimensional God, dimensional God revealed by reason of this highest vibrational substance filling the whole universe. God is omnipresent in this sense, in the dimensional sense. The substance is here where we are.If it is anywhere and everywhere in the universe, it is here where we are.
As the windows of heaven are opened, or as a door is opened in heaven, we don't go through into heaven; we become aware simply of what is already present with us. The wholeness of God is already present with us, brought to specific focus in the reality of the truth of our own being, so that this differentiated aspect may find expression in a fitting way according to the part which we are here to play. But what it is that enables us to play this part dwarfs into insignificance the circumstances, the environment, in which we play the part.The circumstance, even the earth itself, becomes scarcely discernible from the standpoint of true perspective, because whatever comes to focus of dimensional God in our own expression is not in any way separate or apart from the whole of dimensional God. It's not as though God had chopped off little segments from Himself and planted them here and there in human beings. This is the view perhaps that human beings have tended to have in their own experience of themselves, as being little chopped-off chunks, isolated from each other and from God. It's not the fact; it's a fancy. It's a fancy that immediately dissolves as the veil dissolves and what is true begins to emerge into experience.
If we see relative values here—I suppose you could also say relative size—then where's the problem about handling the affairs which are brought to us to be handled? And we may recognize again that these matters which do come to us do not come to us by chance; they are brought to us. It may be said that the true essences call to the material of this world to come home. As we give focus to these true essences, that's the call. We have a new outlook then with respect to what it is that comes to us, what it is that is present in our environment. It is brought to us, It is coming by reason of the call, the call of the essences to which we give focus. Here is the material answering the call.
You may say that some of the things that come to you are not particularly heavenly, they don't particularly appeal to you perhaps; but let us see these things in the true light. Here in fact is the material of this world coming again to associate itself with the true essences. The material of the world cannot actually help itself once the true essences are there. When we are giving focus to these true essences we see things in this way. We're not cringing as puny little human beings overwhelmed by their circumstances, trying to fend off the giants. We don't really see too many giants around anyway. I recall that when the spies came back from investigating the promised land, ten of them were very insistent that there were giants in the land. But two didn't give much emphasis to that.They didn't notice any giants around particularly, because those who have a right perspective couldn't possibly see any giants in this very small world for which we are responsible. In this sense nothing very much has been committed to our charge, certainly not when we begin to understand that of which we are simply a focus, a focus point of this vibrational substance in combination with the spirit of God, to which we have referred as essences, the true essences.
When the true essences are here, when we are providing the focus for them and giving expression to what pours out because of those essences, then something is going to happen in our world and there will be what comes to us in consequence. We don't have to question what it is that comes to us. We certainly know why it's coming to us. It is coming to us in response to the essences to which we give focus. And it is going to sort itself out: the material that belongs will come closer and stay; the material that doesn't belong will be set on one side. Maybe some of it has to wait awhile before it is capable of coming any closer; maybe some of it belongs somewhere else, at some other level where the changes are occurring; but we don't have to judge in the matter. We let it come to us. We're going to find out, on the basis of maintaining the focus of these essences in our living, what it is that belongs with us, what it is that is on hold, so to speak, and what it is that needs to move out. It will do it automatically.
It comes to us all mixed up together. It's not as though we're going to swallow the whole mass, but we let it come to us, that coming closer into the fire of these essences to which we give focus it may have the opportunity of being sorted out—and this is what will happen. We will discover that we have things to do, we have things to say, we have things to think, and there are times when it is altogether the right thing to keep quiet! But we are responsible for this sorting-out process and we can only handle it when we have a true perspective; otherwise we'll be afraid of everything that's coming to us. But if we have the true perspective and we have a sensing of the immensity of the essences which we represent, where's the problem? The whole perspective changes, and it doesn't matter what comes to us, it's a little thing. It can be handled with ease provided that we maintain the true focus.
If we let that slip then there could be problems, couldn't there? Where we see problems there is the urge to manipulate, and wherever you manipulate you create more problems. Someone had a computer in which they programmed the required information concerning a large city—all large cities have problems, you know, immense problems—and it was discovered by reason of what came out of this computer that no matter what anyone did, with the best of intentions, it would make the situation worse. That's the fact of the matter. No matter how you manipulate, with the very best of intentions, it makes matters worse. It may not seem to make matters worse in the immediate little bailiwick where you're manipulating; you may get things, temporarily at least, into shape; but how do you know what the repercussions are beyond and beyond and beyond? Difficulties will multiply, and of course eventually the chickens come home to roost. If by reason of your action something goes out, it's going to come back somewhere along the line and, depending upon what it is of course, you may find that it clobbers you. Then you say, probably, “Poor me!I'm being so badly treated; it's so unfair.” Not at all. The Law works. We may not be able to connect the particular clobber that hits us with the cause of it back along the way somewhere, and it's always easy to find someone who is handy to blame for it when the clobber occurs. But that is foolishness.
So we hold the focus of these essences in the space that we have provided where it is kept holy, and we need to be willing, indeed anxious, we might say, to let that space expand so that more can be accepted into it, both from the standpoint of essences and from the standpoint of what is coming to us by reason of the action of those essences; for when the essences are present they are calling to the lower vibratory levels of substance to take form according to the design that is provided, and the material starts to wake up and come home. As I say, coming home it comes home in a mixture. Consequently as it approaches closer the sorting-out process will transpire. It may be that a person sees something approaching and, if he has lost his perspective a bit, it looks pretty big. It's coming closer; he wants to hold it off. No, don't hold it off. Let it come closer, because as it comes closer the things that don't belong will begin to drop off, and by the time it gets to you it probably will be quite small. Well in the true perspective it was quite small at the beginning. It becomes almost infinitesimal by the time it gets to you!
But here we begin to see the association that we have at the crossover point, with the true essences on the one hand and the material of the world for which we are responsible on the other. We are responsible for letting the essences cross over into expression in our living and we are responsible for letting what is coming back be drawn to us. It's being drawn by these essences, that what is drawn to us may give form to these essences. The essences will be taking their true form in this fashion. Well in order to take their true form there's a lot of stuff that needs to drop off that doesn't belong, and it will do so if we hold it steady. I suppose one of the most obvious evidences of what happens when something is held steady was what occurred in the experience of Jesus long ago. He held absolutely steady, no matter what it was that was coming to Him. And it came right up to Him. But there was no wavering. There was no denial of the essences for which He was responsible at any point along the way, and what didn't belong fell away. And what did belong was there when He came forth from the tomb. Here is the evidence of the opening of a door on this earth through which anyone might come and let these principles in action be experienced in living. We share this understanding in whatever measure our hearts are pure, so that we may participate in the process, very keenly aware always of the quality, the nature, the character, of dimensional God, Lov —the vastness of that, the infinite power of that—so that we may be in position smoothly to handle whatever presents itself before us.
Obviously there is still some tendency to manipulate. We've been accustomed to this, to imposing something externally on things to try to make them work better. So we find ourselves in a transition experience, but increasingly, as the veil dissolves, we may be aware of the reality which comes to focus in our own expression, these essences which are primarily of love, then of truth and of life. And being aware of this, there are no giants in the land. What needs to be handled in our worlds may be handled from inside, not from outside. It becomes an organic process. We do not have to beat people over the head to try to make them behave. We do not need to carry placards around protesting against this and that. We just share in the process that works. None of those other things work. They're all attempts to manipulate and they make the situation worse than it was before.
So we participate in the easy way because we have accepted the easy yoke, the yoke of the true essences in our living. As we allow these essences to be the essential quality of our living we become quite familiar with them and we find ourselves in position to work easily with essences in an awareness of those essences and of what is happening by reason of those essences.What was it that the spirit of truth would do? Amongst other things, He would show you things to come. You know exactly what is to come when you are working with the essences that cause it to come. Your eyes are no longer fastened on the forms, fussing about the forms, worrying about the forms, trying to manipulate the forms, change the forms to make the world a better place for forms. You let the world alone in that sense; you leave the forms alone. You just let the material come to you, the material that composes these forms—you're not interested in the forms; the material is coming to you that composes these forms—and that material will be released from the forms which it had previously occupied, in order to give form to what is emerging by reason of the essences to which you give focus.
Here is the creative process. Obviously there needs to be, what shall we say, a little practice; it needs to be done. But one needs to be able to see what it is that's happening and how it is done, so that we may work intelligently in this field. Intelligence, we find, is part of the outpouring of those essences; we don't stay stupid!We begin to understand and to play our part in allowing the glory of God to be revealed on earth by reason of the forms which appear because of the essences that are present. How great is God Almighty, who does make all things well!
Most of us who knew Tessa Maskell are aware she passed away last week. James Maskell posted on Instagram, “My mother, Tessa Elizabeth Maskell, has taken the next step in her journey! So grateful to have spent four profound days together at the end of this week. The greatest compliment I can give [her] is that [she] inspired my curiosity and then life’s work and [she was] way ahead of [her] time.” James’ father, Rupert Maskell, wrote in an email, “Tessa passed away [June 30th] painlessly and in the company of our beloved son James, at Heathrow Airport. Her heart simply wasn’t in continuing life as an invalid, either in English or South African nursing homes. Her spirit was too fiercely independent for that. Her heart simply stopped beating and she was gone. So many emails and calls have since come in. I never fully appreciated how great an impact she'd had on so many lives.” People who knew Tessa would find it humorous and apropos (as she was wont to say) that she made her exit in an airport departure lounge—how very Tessa! Joyce Krantz, one of Tessa’s many close friends, has some insights to share with us.
Joyce Krantz— Just a few minutes ago, outside my window, about fifteen golf carts decorated in red, white and blue streamers paraded down the street honking their horns in celebration of Independence Day. Again, how “apropos,” for this moment of our celebrating and honoring Tessa’s independent spirit and her life. My reflections will be mostly centered on the latter decade of her time on earth.
I have known Tessa for many years but our lives did not intersect in a personal and intimate way until the last chapter of her life of 82 years. Many of us could share stories of Tessa. If she crossed your path, you would remember Tessa! She was a large spirit. People described her as indomitable and fierce. To me, she was like a lioness which, having been born in South Africa, seems a very appropriate image for her. She was determined, directed and comfortable living on the leading edge of change. If we were to put her in a category, Tessa was a mover and shaker and a force of nature. But the most outstanding thing I know of Tessa is that her heart was centered in passion for the truth. That's what she loved. Her radar was always on. If someone spoke the truth it was like all the wires in her nervous system lit up and it was a “life changing moment” in her consciousness, perhaps a “breakthrough.” “That was “brilliant!” Those moments of revelation never stopped.
Tessa led a purpose-driven life. She wanted to make all her time count and to play her part in awakening people to the truth of who they are and why they are here. I have a story: Tessa’s final residence was at Santler Court in the little town of Malvern, England. It was a residence for active adults 55 and older. She had a lovely condo that opened onto a beautiful garden courtyard. Across the way was a wing of the building with a comfortable gathering room where the residents could meet and have tea at certain times of the month. Tessa was looking forward to meeting her neighbors. So, after she attended her first tea, I asked her, “How did it go?” and her comment was, “Hmmm...” (When Tessa said “Hmmm,” it usually meant she thought there was room for improvement.) “I think I can do better,” she responded. Tessa did not like a lot of small talk. She wanted to get to the core of things, to talk meaningfully about how she saw life. So, she went to the person who organized the teas and asked if she could plan the next one. They were delighted. When the tea time came, Tessa arranged for everyone to sit in a circle with their refreshments. She introduced herself and explained that she was really looking forward to getting to know everyone. She then invited anyone who wished to speak, to share their world in the context of, “What are you thankful for?” and if one didn't feel like talking that was absolutely fine. By the end, people were coming up to Tessa thanking her for such a marvelous, uplifting experience of seeing each other in new ways. Tessa loved to collaborate and work with others. She understood that when you brought people together in a circle, if there was a solid foundation and starting point in what was clear and true, hearts opened up. What more solid way to begin, than a consideration of what we are thankful for?
Tessa was a core participant of the work that we consciously do through the Tone of Life teleconferences to deepen understanding of the truth of eternal being and our shared purpose and destiny. She offered her insights often; we have transcripts of her contributions.
In 2017, Larry and I flew over to England to visit Tessa. We had a marvelous experience touring around the Cotswolds in the areas where Tessa had lived. In some of the places she took us to there were people who knew her and were thrilled to see her. I felt like I was accompanying royalty. She was greeted with deep respect and great appreciation and fondness. Tessa held herself with dignity and when she spoke in her beautifully distinct and clear British/South African accent she commanded attention. I used to joke with her that she could read the phone book and people would stop and listen because they heard the authority in her voice; that's the effect she had.
I don’t know if Tessa had thought that her time was completely up yet on earth. She was actually waiting to board a flight to Cape Town to return to her familial roots where family arrangements had been made for her new residence. She didn't take that flight. She took another route.
I thought, what poetic symbolism that Tessa took her last breath sitting in a chair in the hub of one of the largest international airports in the world. For Tessa was a world traveler, a global citizen. She flew far and wide throughout her life, touching thousands of lives, inspiring and uplifting them the best she could. This time her flight was not horizontal but vertical. Tessa was aligned vertically to what is true, and always looked for the resonant substance in other prople no matter their race, creed, culture, background or country. They were all part of her field. And in the wake of this divine networker, all those live connections, those meridian grids she established in the earth, are moving upwards in the updraft of her ascension process. “If I be lifted up shall draw all men unto me.” Everything that is real and true endures.
So, I am delighted to focus a bit of Tessa's heart and her deep passion for life, for truth, for the reason that she was here, clearly never sleeping on the job. And we continue on with the job of expressing that one beautiful Tone that she did so fully.
John Gray — Thank you, Joyce. Tessa embodied the saying, “Wonders never cease!” Here is a short excerpt from Martin Exeter’s Being the Fire, August 15, 1982. In it he offered an angelic perspective on life in human form. Martin uses the word, "soul", here, in the same sense as it appears in the story in the Book of Genesis of the original creation of humanity. Soul refers to the human body, mind and heart which the individual angel of life creates and sustains for his or her own expression on earth.
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“We do not necessarily anticipate that this human soul is going to live forever. I think that it is inevitable that it would change. In fact I don't think that as an angel of life we'd want the human soul as it now is to hang around us forever. It is useful now, it may be useful tomorrow, it may even be useful next year, possibly ten years from hence—who knows? All that is of concern to us is that we should be in position to make right use of it. Making right use of it, we are present in mind and heart and body in order to make right use of the environment around us, and as long as this present soul can be usefully so employed, presumably we'll make arrangements for it to remain. If it isn't of any more use in this way, then what would be the purpose for its continued existence? We have a realistic viewpoint; and what human beings think of as death, which is the passing of the human soul, means very little. It means very little to the angel of life who is in command, in the sense that its value is based in right use for particular purposes in a specific aspect of the unfoldment of the creative cycle.
“If I am the way, the truth and the life, death means nothing; it doesn't exist! That the substance that composed the human soul may be reintroduced into the natural creative cycles on earth is quite satisfactory; that presumably is what should happen… We find, in the natural cycles of living, that we eat and drink day by day; we stay alive that way. Of course we breathe as well, and do other things, but we also excrete. That's as necessary, isn't it? There is something taken in; there is something left behind. This is all natural in the cycles of living. So, with the incarnate angel of life, there is a body and a mind and a heart, a human soul received; and various aspects of waste are left behind day by day from this human soul. Where is the mystery? Where is the mystery of so-called death? At that point just a little more is left behind, that's all. From the standpoint of the angel of life, that is all that is happening. It is human souls who bewail their passing, because they have this sense of separation and isolation and fear.”
Our human forms are temples of the living God, and we each are the gods that inhabit them.
Today is the fourth day of July—a fine day everywhere. In America, today is celebrated as Independence Day, commemorating the declaration 245 years ago of the United States as a nation independent of Great Britain. I am certain that far above and well beyond the external facts and factors involved at that time and since, the USA was founded to play a special part in the spiritual regeneration of humanity. A majority of Americans have pride in the social freedoms most citizens enjoy, and I am thankful for those too. Under a highly authoritarian government we might be restricted from assembling as we do, for example. But individual human freedom is not an end in itself, contrary to what many apparently believe. It has a greater purpose. Those of us who live in countries and societies where there is more openness and fewer arbitrarily imposed controls are indeed blessed. There’s a real reason for this. It’s certainly not to have license to be more self-serving and self-centered! We rightly count our blessings for external freedoms, but how very much more richly blessed are our body temples by the angels of life vibrantly present in our flesh and in our consciousness.
The real purpose of our bodies, minds and hearts begins to be known as they become independent of the control of external influences. If independence means anything, to me, it’s this. Rising up and coming out of submission to externals, we accept, and come into the experience of, identity in angelic being. Knowing—being one with—our true eternal selves, everything makes sense. I don’t mean to say by that statement that the insane world of human making makes sense—it doesn’t—but we can see and understand why it is the way it is. We are thus free in the world, just as it is. Wise spiritual leaders and teachers of all flavors and sorts correctly promote the premise that one must be free within one’s circumstances before one can become free from them.
Let’s not wait around for a restoration of an edenic state for everybody. The only way that can possibly come about for you and me is to be our divine selves in expression in the circumstances we find ourselves in, no matter what they are.
Of course, none of us are soloists; we are inexorably connected with fellow human beings whether, humanly speaking, we like it or not. The more we are our true angelic selves in experience and expression, the more obvious this truth becomes. In elevated spiritual perspective, we know the whole body of humankind is an entity, a single body, composed of innumerable subconsciously coordinated components. Every part, every person, has a true purpose, though not many may be conscious of it. But in angelic vision we see the interrelatedness and interconnectedness of what to most appear to be disparate factions.
This collective worldwide human body is a reflection of a collective angelic body composed of all the angels of life currently incarnate in human forms. Just as our personal physical bodies have intricate design, the collective reveals evidence of design to those who see. Our physical bodies have a single highest point, a vibrational apex we could say, in the pineal gland. Is there something analogous to a collective pineal gland in the body of humanity? Yes, necessarily so. Does that defy mental definition? Pretty much, so let’s not try to define or explain it. We know it by personal participation; then no explanation is necessary anyway.
The apex of collective divinity in the inner sense is the primary archangelic being for this world. It is said the Great Pyramid in what is today Egypt was constructed long ago as a symbol of the design of archangelic being in form on earth. That structure hasn’t had an apex, a capstone, for as long as human history goes back, but it originally did and is meant to. All the essences of the whole pyramid are contained in the apex point of the capstone. In fact, the pyramid itself may be seen as an expansion of its apex point. I have long appreciated an illustration which makes this clearly understandable: Picture the apex in place; now imagine raising the base of the pyramid up toward it. There are successively smaller and smaller pyramids as the base is raised, until finally the whole pyramid is but a single point.
Human minds might imagine that as one rises in the pyramid that everything becomes narrower and more exclusive as one approaches the capstone and the ultimate apex. But there’s an apparent paradox here. The higher levels are not more restrictive and exclusive, but actually quite the opposite. The higher one goes in the design symbolized by the pyramid—the pyramid is just a geometric representation, we remember—the more of the whole design is visible all around. In other words, the closer to the apex one is, the more inclusive and all-encompassing one’s view and understanding become. This is the view from the mountaintop, as it is put in many spiritual teachings. The oneness of all is evident from this inner high point.
Living at the apex, we recognize others who also live in this finest of places. We know them and they know us, without explanation. I’m not talking about necessarily appreciating one another’s hereditary humanness—that can be lovely, but it can and often does just get in the way. We all have outer foibles and petty weirdnesses. In angelic identity, residing at the apex point, we see and know and love that angelic presence in others, no matter all the human stuff. This is how oneness is known in actual experience.
Immediately as we are at home in this place where we truly live, knowing ourselves as angels of life, there appears a wonder in the heaven of our awareness: the very archangelic Lord of All in whom we live and move and have our being as individual angels of life. Among many other things, we know that His coming on earth is not a future event but a present experience in our own earths, now. In this ineffably glorious holiness, everything is made new.
So when someone we know slips their mortal coil and the individual Eternal One leaves a remnant body vehicle behind, we understand the creative process. “Where is the mystery?” Martin Exeter said. We are thankful for the life lived, as we are for our friend, Tessa, and we are thankful for its timely conclusion in form. All is just right. Many of us aren’t spring chickens ourselves anymore, and our times will come too. In angelic identity it is but a changing of clothes. I suspect we’ll be seeing a lot more of this in the world.
Our human forms are temples of the living God, and we each are the gods that inhabit them. Just so, the whole of humanity is meant to be and shall be the dwelling place on earth of the Lord Most High. As we receive the fire of His loving presence, by extending it into the world around us we view the world from His perspective, and it all rises inexorably—can't help it—and is transformed. That's how we accomplish what we are here to accomplish.
When we assemble like this, we temporarily create a living symbol, a mini-pyramid, in which the essences of the whole are present. To the extent that this is a clear, focused experience for each of us, what emerges thereby is powerful and uplifting, and life-giving. It is indeed a service—a service to our Lord and a service to the world. And we use what is at hand to connect, such as today, when we celebrate the marvellous spirit that we knew as Tessa, released into far greater size than previously. In a way, it describes our role for our whole presence, our whole purpose. So, it is wonderful to have these times together, to do this together.
