Members Of The Unit Never Think Of Unit Failure

Members  Of  The  Unit  Never  Think  Of  Unit  Failure

from  Cosmic  Fulfillment

Uranda   June 7, 1947

The Power of God cleanses and purifies.

If the individual is responding to God, the impurities are cleansed from the individual,

but if the individual is responding to the impurities, so that he identifies himself with the impurities,

then the individual himself is purged and removed out of his place.

I have touched upon the point in various ways many times, but we are just reaching a point in the Nucleus focalizations of consciousness where there can be a beginning in the sense of attaining a deeper comprehension or understanding of the central key point of our whole Ministry. 

I have pointed out many times that all things work on the basis of pulsation. We have considered recently, at various times, a twenty-two year Cycle in relationship to our immediate necessities of Service. The expanding pulsation, which was made manifest in its most dynamic form in 1936, just these past few months reached its highest completion point in the contracting expression of the Cycle, and that compressed point of contraction formed the end of one Cycle and the beginning of another—or that which makes possible the launching of the New Cycle which we have spoken about so often. 

Under the pressures of that contraction, or the completion of the Cycle, the Unit has been purged. We have recognized purgings in each individual member of the Unit—and those who are members of the Unit would be first to acknowledge the efficacy of those purgings—but the Unit itself has been purged also, and it is essential that we always remember that this Ministry is a Ministry for the Unit.

Our Ministry is never dictated by individual needs. Individual needs may be utilized in relationship to individual function, and we are concerned with individual function, but that which may seemingly be the need or desire of individuals, as such, never determines the course of our Ministry. That is something which, in the past, has been more or less confusing to some individuals. They have imagined that, because of some peculiar circumstance in relationship to themselves, the course of our Ministry should be controlled or determined on the basis of those individual needs or desires. Whenever the individual fulfilments could be worked out on a basis that was beneficial to the Unit they have been recognized, but when they came to a point where there was a clash, or where the course of Ministry, following out the individual desire, would have been caused to deviate from the course of the Unit function, the individual desire has invariably been ignored. Always the Unit function transcends the individual function. Always the Unit function is more important than the individual function, but the Unit function is made up of individuals who function. 

When individuals fail to carry through effectively—in other words, when they are purged from the Unit—that leaves a blank spot for a time which leaves it short of the wholeness of the ideal function, so that, instead of adding to the effectiveness, such function detracts from the effectiveness, and those who remain are forced to carry the added burden. They are forced to carry the burden that is rightly their own and also to carry the burden that rightly belonged to those that failed. But we remember always that regardless of who fails, the Power of God is greater than the power of man. The Power of God is sufficient for our needs. In other words, while the loss of a member of the Unit is a loss that is felt, is a loss of which we must take cognizance, and is a loss which brings an added responsibility to every remaining member. It must never be construed as being a loss that is beyond repair. It must never be thought of as a loss that might precipitate failure. 

According to precedents set in the past we might say that consideration of such a possibility as failure of the Unit should be considered, but that I have steadfastly refused to acknowledge or accept. While failure of individuals is something we have had to deal with time after time, meet and overcome, there is, from our standpoint, simply no such thing as thought or consideration or supposition of failure for the Unit, and anyone who starts being concerned about Unit failure invariably, without exception, reveals himself to be a focalization of member failure. Those who are functioning as true members of the Unit never think of Unit failure. They never think or speak or act as if Unit failure were even a remote possibility. At times I have touched upon it merely to satisfy the questionings of human minds but not because I, myself, ever seriously considered it.

All of this is important to a specific focalization of consciousness that I am seeking to draw out. When, in the Unit, every member of the Unit recognizes that as far as the Unit is concerned the thought or idea or concept or feeling of failure is simply nonexistent, in other words that there is no such thing, the whole consciousness of the Unit is established in a Vision of Victory. If we did not have the Master's Victory as a precedent, that would appear to the human mind as asking too much, but from the standpoint of that which the Master did, and portrayed, and made evident and available to us, it is not asking too much. In fact, we recognize that it is absolutely essential that we ask it. It is required. Sooner or later, in order to become a true member of the Unit, that Vision and Assurance must become an integral part of the consciousness of the individual member. Then, in that case, the individual is no longer a channel through which Life Currents are directed into destructive activities. 

I have been criticized many times by individuals who thought they were in position to judge because, according to their idea, I had not, either with respect to the Group or my individual function, achieved the results that they thought should have been achieved. Their criticisms, their ideas and attitudes simply revealed their own ignorance and showed that they did not understand the working of the Law. When the members of the Unit have remnants of failure consciousness within themselves, a portion of the Power that is released through them, the Current of Divine Love, is channeled into avenues that bring forth destructive results. Invariably those who have turned away and purged themselves from our Unit function have, on one basis or another, become fearful. That is without exception. They have become fearful of something or other in relationship to our function. The smaller fears that they had harbored within themselves over a period of time had not seemed to be very destructive, but when the focalization of consciousness became centered around doubtings those fears ballooned out, expanded rapidly, and produced almost immediate severance from that which is Divinely ordained in function and service on earth. 

Examining these failures, we see the operation of the Law in reverse, that is, in relationship to that which violates the Law and therefore brings destructive results. Conversely, when the conditions are right and the Power of Creative Current is working according to the Law, it produces the effect of drawing the members into a thoroughly unified Nucleus through which the Current may operate in producing constructive results, that is, constructive results for those who are truly responding to Reality. 

There is no means under the sun by which we may bring constructive results to those who are responding to unreality. Some have thought that I should be able to produce constructive results for anyone regardless, but that is not true. In any case, we can produce constructive results only for those who respond properly and who maintain proper response. If it had been possible to release high tension Currents of Power through the individuals of the Group who formed the material out of which the Nucleus of the Unit was drawn, most, if not all, of those individuals would have been destroyed by the Current and we would have been defeated in our work of establishing a Nucleus for correct Divine function on earth. 

Impatience in relationship to fulfilment is one of the greatest snares and invariably breeds self-activity in several forms, notably in judging on a basis of a critical attitude. Impatience engenders doubt, impatience engenders fear, and increased fear engenders impatience. So it becomes a vicious cycle that destroys. When these things are seen we begin to have a clear focalization of Unit consciousness in relationship to this expression which I would quote from the letter of June 3rd, 1937, written to me by Dr. John Oshanek: 

"When we view these points of Realization from the Mountain Top it all begins to have meaning. If we take each Emissary separately each is like a part of a jig-saw puzzle. We may not appear to mean very much to ourselves or to anyone else, but when we are placed in our rightful Places according to the Lord's Eternal Plan, we begin to make a picture—a picture that so many of us dreamed of quite imperfectly at times—the picture of the Motherland as it used to be in the days gone by, and will be again in the near future; and when we stop for a moment to think that we are being privileged again to work in unison toward that end, and are privileged to be partakers of this Service which many a prophet longed to be privileged to participate in, we reach the height of gratitude that is only possible through the medium of the Spirit." 

When we begin to view these things from the Mountain Top and see them in relationship one to another in true perspective vision, in the Light of Truth, we begin to see that Pattern through which the Power of the Creative Current of Divine Love may be released and made manifest on earth in bringing life more abundant to those who respond according to the One Law. Anything that tends to close or clog the channel, which would prevent the free flow of that Creative Current of Divine Love, is foreign to the function of the Unit. Because of our interest in Spiritual things, and our grasp of what may be classified as metaphysical Truth, we have all, for a long time, recognized that such things as fear and hate and resentment prevent the manifestation of the Will of God on earth in and through the individuals who indulge in these destructive trends of thought and feeling. 

To some degree a victory in relationship to these things was in evidence in the individual members of the Unit long before they became members of the Unit, and the victory in relationship to these things has been increasingly evident as we have come up to the present time, but now, in the beginning of this New Cycle, we come to the time and the place where it is essential that every member of the Unit should have a still deeper vision, a still deeper realization, a still more effective function in relationship to these things. 

Our Master, when He was on the cross and His Ministry on earth was finished, with the exception of His Resurrection and that which followed after, spoke the immortal words, "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do." All too often human beings have imagined that His expression related primarily to the soldiers who had thrust the spear into His side, to those who had crowned Him with thorns, to those who had spat upon Him and scourged Him, as if His Word in this matter was primarily an expression of pity for those specific individuals who had had a personal part in committing that heinous crime against God. 

Any such idea fails to grasp the great significance of the Master's Life and Ministry and Teaching, and the great significance of what He said on the cross, and the great significance contained in the fact of His Resurrection. Do you suppose that, because Jesus spoke those words on the cross, all those individuals who had participated in that crime were automatically and forthwith relieved of any ill consequence following upon their acts? Merely because He said, "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do," did they have no further responsibility in the matter? I think not. In the eyes of God that did not lessen their responsibility or their guilt one single iota nor did it remove from them the consequences of their ill acts. 

Let us consider. The Master came into the world to bring salvation to the human family. The human family is one body. That body of humanity has lived for thousands of years. The body of humanity has never died, since the day that the body of humanity that fell was told, "Thou shalt surely die." The body of humanity has lived through these thousands of years. It was this body of humanity, through the members that we may call its hands, that crucified our LORD and KING, not just the members of what we speak of as that generation but the body of humanity since the day of the fall until this present moment, for that body of humanity has lived through this entire period of time and it has always been the body of humanity. The body or humanity is guilty of that act, not just the hands of the body that perpetrated the act, but the whole body of which the hands were but a part. 

The Master's expression of Ministry never lost sight of the body of humanity. He was not thinking merely of the individual members of the body that perpetrated the action when He said, "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do." He was thinking of every member of that human body that was then or has been, up to this present moment. Individual human beings are only cells in the body of humanity. The cells in the human body of the individual change, but it remains the same body. The identity of the body remains the same year after year, regardless of the cellular changes within the body itself. So is it also with the body of humanity. This body of humanity that we know in the world today is the body of humanity that crucified our LORD and KING. The body of humanity has been under sentence of death for many thousands of years, but the body of humanity has never paid that sentence. 

Jesus Christ came into the world to make possible the formation of a New Body, a Body renewed and reborn, which should be free of that sentence of death. The world body crucified him and increased unto itself its sentence of death, but, nevertheless, He made possible the birth of a New Body, the Christ Body, that individuals who would let themselves be transformed and reborn, that they might be members of this New Body, might have a part in the Victory over the sentence of death. The world body is guilty of the murder of our KING. The world body has imagined that it could get away with it. The world body has imagined that it would not have to pay for its crime. The world body will find that the sentence of death that has been imposed, will be executed. All those who are members of the world body will have to share, or have a part in, the death of the world body, but He Who was murdered by the world body made possible the manifestation of a New Body on earth which should be free of the death sentence, and He made it possible for any man, woman or child on the face of the earth who should fulfil certain requirements, to come into that New Body, the Christ Body, so that, being a member of the Christ Body, he or she should cease to be a member of the world body under the sentence of death. 

The only hope of the continuity of man on earth rests in the Christ Body, because the world body must pay the price for its crime. If every man, woman and child upon the face of the earth were to share in that transition, if every man, woman and child upon the face of the earth were to share in Rebirth and become members of the Christ Body, we would all rejoice exceedingly and all would be well, for if all were members of the Christ Body by reason of Rebirth, the world body would have come to an end. 

This should be emphasized so that it may be clearly realize that the death of the world body does not necessarily require the death of any man, woman or child upon the face of the earth, for every man, woman and child on the face of the earth is offered the privilege of Rebirth whereby each may become a part of the Christ Body, and if that took place the world body would be no more. "God is not willing that any should perish but that all should have everlasting life"—but what is the beginning of that text? "For God so loved the world"—for God so loved the whole human family, for God so loved the body of humanity—"that He gave His only begotten son, that whosoever believeth on Him might not perish but have everlasting life." 

"For God so loved the world"—and almost with His last breath, our LORD and Master Whom the world-body murdered, said, "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do." He did not say those words to keep guilty ones from reaping the reward of their crime, but, rather, to make certain that the guilty ones did receive punishment for their crimes. He said those words to make certain that the sentence of death should be executed for the world body. That statement may sound strange on first hearing or at first glance, even to Emissaries, but let us consider. 

Suppose the Master had harbored any hate. Suppose He had carried any fear. Suppose He had focalized any resentment while He was on the cross. He would have clogged the channel and would have prevented the free flow of the Current of Divine Love into the world, and the Current of Divine Love purges and cleanses away and brings to nothingness all that is evil. He came into the world to open a clear channel for the flow and release of the Current of Divine Love into the world. He did that. He proved, for those who should understand, that He did that, when He said, "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.” He provided an absolute Focalization on earth which, (regardless of what all the members of the human body had done, and therefore regardless of what the human family as a whole had done), was absolutely clear, absolutely free from fear, from hate and from resentment. There was nothing to clog the channel; there was nothing to prevent the free flow of the Current of Divine Love into the world as far as He and the Focalization which Ho established, was concerned. That meant that He made certain that all those who were guilty should die. 

When the Power of God flows through any individual it must of necessity flow through the channels provided by the consciousness of the individual, and if that Current flows through channels of fear or hate or resentment then the very Power of God is utilized to maintain the conditions of evil in the world. Only when the members which comprise the Unit are free of fear, hate and resentment can the Power of Love flow freely and fully, thereby fulfilling its purpose, accomplishing that whereunto it is sent, uplifting those who respond, and casting down those who respond not. 

The Power of God cleanses and purifies. If the individual is responding to God, the impurities are cleansed from the individual, but if the individual is responding to the impurities, so that he identifies himself with the impurities, then the individual himself is purged and removed out of his place. When there is a clear recognition of these things, the focalization of consciousness in the Unit will begin to be ready to let the Power of God truly work in the lives and affairs of men, that all who will may leave the world-body and become members of the One Christ Body, and that it may be certain, even as it is certain regardless of what any shall do, that the world-body shall surely die.

If our Master on the cross had felt any hate or fear or resentment He would never have come forth from the tomb, and it would have been impossible for anyone to have become a member of the Christ Body. The formation of the Christ Body on earth would have been an utter impossibility, and the death penalty for the world body could not have been executed. The world body would have died in season, but it would simply have been a gradual disintegration into nothingness and nothing would have been left. No human being would have survived. The whole earth would have been nothing but an empty tomb—empty of life, that is, but containing the dust of the human body. But because He went through what He did, without hate, without resentment, without fear, we are privileged to become members of the One Christ Body, and all who will are likewise privileged. God's crowning creation on earth has the privilege of continuity on earth, and He made certain that the world-body should receive execution of the sentence of death.

There is only one choice, actually, before the children of men today—do they choose to remain members of the world-body, or do they choose to become members of the Christ Body? All other choices are merely incidental to this one choice, and every man, woman and child on the face of the earth is faced with the necessity of making this choice, whether he knows it or not and whether he likes it or not! There is but one Way of salvation and that Way requires acknowledgment and acceptance of the LORD of Lords and KING of Kings in a recognition that His Word is true: the Word when He said, "I AM the Way, the Truth and the Life; no man cometh unto the Father but by Me." 

When the individual members of the Unit have permitted the work of cleansing to be completed in themselves to a point where there no fear, no resentment and no hate, they will be clear channels for the work of the Creative Current of the Power of Divine Love on earth. Then God's Will shall be done on earth through them, and that is the only way by which God's Will can be done on earth. So, we are privileged to see still more clearly, still more vividly, in a still deeper realization, the secrets of Divine Love.

© Emissaries of Divine Light

The Lord Rebuke Thee

The  Lord  Rebuke  Thee

from  Assembly — Sunrise Ranch

Martin Exeter   July 29, 1980

The archangel disputes with the devil over the body of mankind, not by railing accusation but by rebuke. It is the body of mankind that is in question, finally. Heretofore it has been the devil’s domain. The identity of mankind has been that of human nature. But now there is a question, finally. The real alternative—the only one, incidentally—becomes evident, not to the body of mankind necessarily, at the moment, but to those who are associated with this alternative, which is the Way, the one Way.
 

We see the exactness, the intelligence of the Lord in making use of what is moving in the hearts of human beings when they are somewhat open to His spirit. There is a setting on this continent particularly (which didn’t arrive from nowhere either) in which the good seed may grow. Most have not seen this or understood it—how could they? It has only become possible to comprehend it as the seed began to grow.

The inalienable rights of man, male and female presumably, are enshrined in the Constitution of the United States—life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Because human beings are self-centered, they usually look at these things from that standpoint. We need to have life to get the fuller experience of it for ourselves, if we have the self-centered approach. Also, there is the endeavor to have liberty and to pursue happiness.
 

But these particular words, which have been rather thoroughly mistranslated, can convey the truth if we translate the spirit correctly which was back of them. Life, we know, is something to be expressed, to be given: “I am come that they might have life, and...have it more abundantly.” We reduce life by trying to increase it for our own benefit. The reality of life becomes known when we express it, when our attitude could be said to be one of giving. Aligned with the Lord, we are here to increase life—not for ourselves, but for the experience of the body of the Son of God on earth.

Liberty has something to do with the truth. So there is the spirit of life, the spirit of truth, enshrined in the Constitution. It’s not a matter of getting liberty, getting freedom, but of expressing the truth. Then there is the experience of freedom. Here again is something being given, something outgoing.
 

When people consider the matter of the pursuit of happiness, they see themselves running after it to try to catch up with it. But exactly those same words could be used in the reversed sense: Happiness may be pursuing human beings. It’s hot on the heels of human beings, if they weren’t so busy running away from it. The word “happiness” surely has a relatedness in consciousness to love. There is no happiness without love. So the spirit of love is included here, not as something to be gotten or to be experienced for oneself but to be offered, to be given, to flow, that we may provide a means by which human beings may be pursued by it. Once a person stops pursuing happiness and turns around, he finds that love is pursuing him, or her.

So here was a setting provided to make possible the expression of the Archangel on earth.

That expression would become possible to the extent that there were individuals awakening to an awareness of the spirit of love, truth and life. Now of course, this setting is brought to a particular focus in the United States, but it is not excluded from other places. It may be, and is, present in other geographical places on the face of the earth in somewhat different ways. There is the necessity of adjusting to the geographical position, the political situation, etc., in the way that we handle our own affairs. We handle them one way here in the United States, a little different in Canada—not much. But you go to some other countries and it’s quite different. The Lord is very ingenious—He can use most any situation.

But we see how the devil’s control hardens as one moves away from the setting where the true experience described by the words “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” is present. We have various areas on the face of the earth where the devil’s rule is much more evident; and he is not excluded from other areas on the face of the earth—certainly he is present right here. But the opportunity, the setting which opens the way most easily for human awakening and the actual experience of people of the spirit of God in action is obviously more in some places than in others. We are richly blessed, because we live in a place on the face of the earth where it is the easiest place possible, amidst the devil’s wiles. Woe unto us and others if we do not take advantage of it. 

Something has begun to emerge so that right translation could begin to be made of spirit, and we have shared in whatever measure in this. I think we have been a bit flabby. We haven’t really been on the ball because of this idea that, well, it’s all right anyway. We may begin to see that it certainly isn’t all right insofar as the vast majority of the population of the earth is concerned. The Western cult has tended to insulate those who belong to it from the rest of the world. There was a wall around, and you could hear a few faint cries the other side. We ourselves see that what has been done has been done on the basis of the human nature approach and therefore isn’t really capable of changing anything very much. It may alleviate some suffering here or there, but then it increases someplace else. Chickens have a habit of coming home to roost, one way or another.
 

So we have seen more clearly our own responsibility, and we are aware that only in the assumption of that responsibility do we come out of the cult state. I think maybe it would be more descriptive, more understandable, if the fallen state was referred to as the cult state, because that is exactly what it is. And while there are many people who have attempted and do attempt to place what we are about in the cult category—and those people were not only the ones who were disassociated from what we were about, but some of those who were supposed to be associated with it, because every refusal to accept responsibility is a determination to establish a cult. And we, in our experience, have found at times this endeavor to be strong—I know I have—that people have been trying to make a cult out of what we are doing. Those who are associated with it, let alone those who were beyond it.
 

That would defeat, of course, what we are here to do—which can only be done on the basis of the fact that all concerned have come to the point where they are capable of taking spiritual responsibility in their own living. And this does not scatter people abroad, of course, because taking spiritual responsibility reveals the fact that we are all part of one body, and we all take responsibility in that one body, just as all the parts of our body, most of the time, take responsibility for what they are supposed to be doing. If the parts of our body didn’t, how long would we last? And if one part of the body said, “Well, I’m tired of doing this; I would prefer to do whatever it is some other part of the body is doing,” and if everybody wanted to be the heart, where would the body be? Dead.

 

So taking responsibility brings us into position in the body, not because somebody said, “That’s your position—go into it,” but because we ourselves took responsibility and found that that was so. And when we actually do that, we can never duck out. There’s been a great deal of ducking out, one way or another. It’s sometimes been dressed up in pretty clothes. Sometimes it’s been described in terms of “Well, it’s an increased ministry that I’m going to be doing,” but in all too many cases it wasn’t that at all. The individual was still deceived, still ducking out from taking actual responsibility rather than imaginary responsibility, because the imaginary responsibility is usually someplace else, isn’t it? It may also be close at hand, when there are “ifs” in the situation: “If such-and-such was the case, then right here I could really serve.” Well, we accept spiritual responsibility and it doesn’t matter where we are.
 

Accepting spiritual responsibility, we may find that we move from here to there. In the cult state, some people consider themselves to be homebodies; others are trippers. We are not interested in the cult state, so it doesn’t depend upon the human nature background, the earthly hereditary, as to what we do at all. The Lord may use earthly hereditary to advantage on occasion, yes, and presumably we emerged out of whatever our earthly hereditary is so that we might do what we are required to do now. And that, in fact, never has been any hindrance. It only became a hindrance if we made it so ourselves. From the Lord’s standpoint, it prepared everything just perfectly: “Come along! This is the way it is set up!” And if we move with it, we find that that is just perfect. But if we keep bucking it, of course, we remain in bondage.

But now we begin to see the spirit behind the words of that Constitution as the inalienable rights of man. That is righteousness—not something that can be claimed humanly speaking, but something that is known when it is expressed, and that is righteousness. When life, truth, love characterize our expression, that expression is righteous. And we know the reality of life, of course, then, and freedom and happiness—not because we pursued it but because it caught up with us. Then we share it.
 

But now we see in the larger picture in the world how the devil has had his way heretofore and the body of mankind has suffered. Oh, how it has suffered! That suffering comes to individuals, those individuals who compose that body. Is it not to be expected that somewhere along the way the Lord said, “That’s enough”? As it was put, it repented the Lord that He had made man.
 

And what man is in this cultic state is brought to focus in the various areas of cultic leadership. The devil has many heads—the great red dragon had many heads; the beast had many heads. Our concern is that the archangel should be incarnate on earth to dispute with the devil over the body of mankind. While the body of mankind is tarred with the human nature brush all the way through, the primary responsibility rests upon those who are offering leadership in that body. We begin to become aware of how it is we rebuke the world. This is entirely different to what would be done from the standpoint of the cultic approach. The cultic approach builds up its armaments and gets ready for a real hassle. It brings railing accusation; it tries to run the devil out on a rail. But of course the devil is on both sides! So nothing is ever accomplished in that fashion.
 

“The Lord rebuke thee.” Now we have perhaps seen a little of this from the standpoint of our own personal experience in assuming spiritual responsibility for ourselves. There has been the need to face up to various things that were present in ourselves that we had likely been accusing others of. If you are in the business of accusing other people of things, you may know that what you are accusing them of is in you every time. When you reach a point where you are not accusing other people, then you can begin to see what may be present in them that is the fact and is not merely a reflection of what is present in you.

So we are discovering the nature of the rebuke. It has been a very little thing so far, a small, personal thing. But unless we have undertaken to let it be there first, we can never know what it is that is required from the standpoint of the archangel. The archangel must have a body in which all that needs to be rebuked has been rebuked. Then it is clear. Then the rebuke could be carried further in an effective way. But as long as we are just fiddling around with the little nonsense that still goes on in ourselves, there is nothing for the archangel. There has been all that occurring, hasn’t there?
 

In this Assembly that I speak these words now, they are a translation of spirit, the creative power of which is capable of rebuking all that needs to be rebuked that may still be present, brought here by all who are present. This is so if there is a willingness to let it happen. But if one tends smugly to hang on to one’s little human nature cultic state, then the power of spirit will do something else, won’t it? It won’t uplift. Now we see these things, if we stand where we belong, without any emotional involvement with them. That’s the way it works; we know it’s the way it works. We have known for a long time it’s the way it works. Why be surprised if it has to work now, so that we may find ourselves in position to provide what is necessary to the Lord by reason of this Assembly. It is the only reason that anyone is here—for this—insofar as I am concerned. Maybe you didn’t know it, but now you do. 

Assembly is not just a post-graduate course where one can sit back comfortably in the university surroundings and feel safe there, flabby. We are out of that. We are somewhere else, and what holds us in that old cultic situation must depart. It doesn’t depart merely because there is the strong current of the spirit pushing it out, because if that was all that were to happen, everybody would leave. It is dissolved because there is strong movement with the strong current of the spirit, and that is the creative action with which we are concerned. And this is the creative action that offers what is needful to rebuke the world.

Now of course, in reaching the world it is going to touch many people who have been consciously associated with what we are now about, some of them for many years, some more recently. And the Lord is mindful of the opportunities that people have had in a direct sense. He doesn’t expect more from anyone than they are capable of allowing to happen. You wouldn’t be here present in the Assembly if you were not capable of allowing something to happen that you have not allowed to happen thus far. And I think that fact needs to be clearly recognized, because this is the recognition of the Angel who you are. The Angel who you are has not been fooled by all your cultic antics at all. He knows what is there; you know what is there. Increasingly, you know what is there, don’t you? We all do. We cannot hide behind ignorance anymore. At least we see ignorance as being what it is: just an ignoring of what we know. And on this basis then something happens. We have the dispute—it has been in progress for a while, by the way—but we see that we are responsible for it, responsible for the rebuke. And if we offer the rebuke beyond ourselves, we will be pulverized if there is any necessity for rebuke in ourselves.

 

Now the Lord has been very patient and very careful over many, many years. You might remember that when He himself was incarnate on earth, He didn’t have that time, and neither did those who were associated with Him. How many of you have been associated with this ministry more than three and a half years? How much nonsensical fiddling around there has been, really. There is not a chance for that now anymore. And can we praise the Lord that it is so? I trust we can, because then He begins to have something on earth.
 

The devil has been busy gathering together his cohorts and forces, with the expectation of triumph. Mind you, most of the people who are in the position of leadership in the world don’t comprehend what is going on. Moving to another vibratory level we see that there is no need to resist it in the sense of struggling with it or getting into a battle with it. We know from our own experience in the past, when we’ve been struggling with all these things that we’ve been endeavoring to clear in ourselves, it didn’t work. All we did was to strengthen those things which should pass away. So I trust we’ve got way beyond that now. You don’t struggle that way anymore. You just simply are concerned to let what is right find expression. Everything else takes care of itself.

 

Now it sounds very simple, but of course you are aware of the fact that you have this situation coming up and that situation coming up, and this person to deal with, that person to deal with, and all this. And because of this perhaps you may deny the Lord, inadvertently even, and discover yourself in confusion: “Well how on earth can I handle this?” You can’t. Only the spirit of God can handle it. And we must have a constant and keen awareness of the reality of this in our own living expression. The only way we can have that is by letting it be constant and consistent. It’s not something we can just pick up like a weapon when we are threatened.

Here is the irresistible force, which requires an immovable object on earth if it is to operate on earth. The irresistible force and the immovable object are looked upon sometimes as being in conflict—What would happen if they met? They won’t. They are complementary. And it is by reason of these that creation occurs. When we align ourselves with these, we provide an immovable object at this level, and the irresistible force has something from which to proceed. Proceeding from the immovable object, it’s not going to push the immovable object out of the picture. If the object is movable, if we are movable, then we get pushed out of the picture when the irresistible force begins to work. But there always is something that doesn’t get pushed out of the picture; otherwise there couldn’t be an irresistible force, and there is. There must be something from which that irresistible force proceeds which cannot be moved. Everything else can be moved.
 

So here is an available force to do what needs to be done when we are aligned with it. We are aligned with it when the dispute is over insofar as we are concerned. How much dispute is still going on in your own experience? Well, we can let it dissolve in this setting. Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are all here, and we let the spirit of love, truth and life be translated correctly in our own experience. Then we are on hand with the archangel to dispute over the body of mankind. As I say, this dispute has been going on for a while in a very obvious sense insofar as we are concerned. It has actually been going on ever since the Master was on earth, but it has come out to this extent into the open because we are in position to experience it; there has been sufficient rebuke in us, sufficient disposition of the dispute.
 

The great red dragon is very ponderous. The archangel is very agile, leaping upon the mountains, skipping upon the hills.There is no place where he could be trapped by the great red dragon. As we begin to become aware of this in our own experience of living, fear is cast out. Now fear is still a factor in our experience. It shouldn’t be a controlling factor. It will be a factor in our experience as long as fear remains in the consciousness of mankind. We are aware of it; we have an association with that consciousness, so we know about it. But fear is cast out in our own personal experience to the extent that the spirit of God is in action, being translated correctly. The spirit of God includes the spirit of love, and love casts out all fear.

 

We see, we understand what’s going on. We have a facility here, physical form, with certain mental capacity, certain ability to feel, to sense, to comprehend beyond the physical and the mental. And this is an instrument in our hands, which is to be used rightly—righteousness—in this dispute. Right use is described by the word “rebuke”: to rebuke the world. Now of course we rebuke it in our own awareness, in our own attitude toward what it is that is happening. We have no use for the dragon. To the eyes of the Lord he is nothing.
 

But still there is the body of mankind here, over which the dispute is going as to who shall possess that body, whether it will be restored as man to the Lord or whether the devil will possess and it will die, it will be eliminated, it will be dissolved. That’s the question actually; that’s the dispute. Of course the devil doesn’t realize this. He thinks that if he gets hold of the body of mankind, he’ll have it made. But he himself has written his own death warrant. It comes to the point then, if he possesses the body of mankind, no more expansion. Kaput! So there is an end to the devil either way. The devil ceases to be anything when he has no body.
 

Well, if the body of mankind becomes again the body of Man, the devil ceases to exist. The union of God and man is all that is necessary to dissolve the devil, because the devil only existed in the consciousness of human beings who were not one with God. We may understand this now. He may cease to exist to us now, even though we may observe the fact that he hasn’t yet ceased to exist to most people. But to the extent that there is union between the spirit of God and what we are in the external sense, the devil is gone. Personally there is nothing more to dispute with.
 

On this basis, then, we are in position to share the Archangel’s action in disputing over the body of mankind beyond us, so that there may come a point when the consciousness of all remaining people no longer includes a sense of separateness from God. Union with God is the restoration, of course. Then there is Man once again.
 

We have the opportunity now of allowing the experience of man restored to be our own experience in this setting at this time. This experience, which we may know, obviously is not the ultimate experience which mankind may know. But it is our experience that makes possible the experience for mankind. If we sort of sit around sloppily, hoping that something will happen to cause mankind to be restored, we will have done absolutely nothing to cause it to happen. What causes it to happen is that there are those who share in the experience first, and who share in it in the sense of the reality of it—which has always been so, always been available to be experienced, but which does not yet include the whole of mankind. And we are content to be associated with mankind at this level in order to bring the salvation.
 

What was it the Master said? He didn’t come into the world to condemn the world but to save it. If we follow him, that is what we are here for exactly. And it cannot be done except there is the assumption of the spiritual responsibility which makes it possible. And this must be an individual matter, as he so beautifully demonstrated. He didn’t say, “Well it has to be all of these disciples as well.” He said, in fact, it can be done simply by reason of me. And what we are experiencing springs from that fact.

What power there is in the individual acceptance of spiritual responsibility.

© Emissaries of Divine Light