God  of  My  Body — God  of  My  Circumstance

     John Gray   June 16, 1996  Glen Ivy

  

Last month Allen Dorfman, Jim Wellemeyer, Pamela and I had the pleasure of leading a Glen Ivy event called “The Triune Ray,” based on the booklet of that name written by the founder of the Emissary program, Uranda, sixty years ago. The timelessness of his words was just as evident to me re-reading them recently as when I first avidly read them twenty-eight years ago. In the chapter of the booklet entitled “God,” Uranda wrote:

“God is the Expression of the One Law. Creation is the Reaction of the One Law.”

There is a very great deal in a few words! God is the expression of the One Law and all of creation is the reaction to that expression. God, in the sense that Uranda used the term, is a verb, not a noun: God is expressing, God is acting. Creation is response to that action. A Taoist saying that I enjoy goes, “He who knows, cannot explain. He who explains, doesn't know.” I trust I am not trying to explain the unexplainable and thereby revealing what I do not know! But God is a verb: the expression of the One Law.

In another portion of the Triune Ray, Uranda speaks of the law of eternal progress:

“Creation is eternal. It never ends. It never began. It is, and was, and will be, eternally. Thus is the law of eternal progress made possible. The eternal progress of the positive center, God, which includes the Divine Being within each individual, is not a progress of Inner Soul development, but ever a progress in further creative activity, i.e., continual creation.”

The law of being is eternal progress. I don't know about you, but for longer than I care to admit, I associated the word eternal with timelessness. When I looked it up I found it doesn't have much to do with time. The root of eternal means “vital force,” “long life.” Eternal means “living.” Progress is also an interesting word. Its root  means “to walk” and “to go,” with meanings such as “to go through,” “to lead forth,” “to go forth,” “to venture,” also suggested. So eternal progress carries meaning like: “life going through,” “life leading,” “life risking,” “life venturing.” The law of being is eternal progress. Uranda also wrote:

“Another law is: The Creator is responsible for His creation as long as the creation exists.”

Many people acknowledge in theory, in principal, or at least find the idea palatably acceptable, that there is something divine about human beings, that there is an innate divine presence called by various names. The fulfillment of a human being is in knowing—experiencing conscious oneness with—the divine presence. Knowing divine presence is one's divine identity. We might accept that idea as being valid, but honesty compels asking ourselves further questions, such as “but what is my actual experience of divine identity?” “God is the Expression of the One Law. Creation is the Reaction of the One Law.” In divine identity I can make the statement and it is true: “I am the God of this body.”

“I am the God of my body.” Say that to your body, quietly, now. “I am the God of this body.” Put your hands on it. Put your hands on your body where you want it to get that message. Where do you want your body to get that message most? Where does your body most need the reassurance that you, the God of your body, are present?

How does the God of one's body act? Caring? Loving? Probably many descriptives would apply. All of them are active. They have givingness about them, for God is the expression of the One Law—the giving, the radiation, of divine presence. As the God of your own body you are fully responsible for your body for as long as your body exists. In ordinary human identity we may often take our bodies for granted, paying attention only when they ail or hurt. The God of this body appreciates what this body is and does and permits to be. It is precious beyond measure because it allows me, the God of my body, to be present here and now.

Can we get out a little way beyond our body? Can I be the God of this setting? I am the God of this setting—not only the Tree of Life I AM in the midst of my personal garden setting, but the I am the God of the garden itself, the setting that I am in. I am the God of this setting. The setting may be physical, it may be a set of circumstances—things going on in your life with friends and family and work and home, whatever. These circumstances need your touch, need the hand of God of them on them to reassure, to bless, to let them know that the Lord is present.

“Lord” is a wonderful word. Its Old English root has to do with “loaf of bread” and the one who keeps and gives it. Bread is the bread of life, and the Lord is the “loaf giver,” the provider, the giver of life. I am the Lord of my body. I am the life giver. I am the Lord of my circumstance.

That isn't the usual identity people bring into their day-to-day lives. Coming from a more commonly experienced sense of self, people say, “I am the victim of this circumstance” or “I am threatened by it”—a potential victim. “I want to do the right thing” exposes a subtler form of feeling threatened. All these are reactive positionings. “I am ready to respond in the best way I know how to the conditions and circumstances that I face.” That is coping, often seen as the best a human being can do. But walking through the days of our lives in the identity of the God of my body, the God of my circumstance, our expression precedes us, filling the situation, and we don't position ourselves in a reactive place. I am not the creation. I am the loaf giver. I am the giver of life. This isn't a naive formula for more successful interactions with circumstances in the world. It is the best way I am able to put into words at the moment my experience of being the God of my body and the God of my circumstances.

There is a Zen notion about self that I find to be increasingly accurate as my experience of it grows: Self is a shifting reference position for consciousness, not a thing. Self as a thing is separate, because if there is the I or me there is also what is not me. This duality is a paradox because while there is me and not me there is also total connectedness between me and not me as well; the universe is whole. Dualities like that can scramble your brain! But from the point of view of the God of your circumstance, being the God of this situation, the sense of self is a shifting reference position of consciousness, and not a thing. The human ego is a thing, and things have magnitude. A point has position but no magnitude. Self is a shifting reference point for consciousness.

Lao Tzu is said to have said, “Through selfless action, fulfillment is attained.” I hold this to be true; it describes the spirit of service. “Through selfless action, fulfillment is attained.” What is selfless, as the word is used here? If the self of usual human experience is a thing, an ego, then selfless is obviously not that self. Here is an excerpt from Ray Grigg's book, The Tao of Zen, which expands Lao Tzu's statement:

“As the selflessness of this new consciousness replaces the willfulness of the old one, a formless identity grows and enters the larger design of things. Flowers and frogs and fishes and stones are honored as equals. This is not imposed by any moral, ethical or religious system. It happens spontaneously as self effortlessly dissolves into selflessness and an inevitable humility allows compassion. An empathetic awareness becomes deeper and wider as the narrow perspective of self falls away. In the words of Morinago Soko Roshi:

“‘Unless we... wean ourselves from this stubborn attachment to I, our inherent wisdom is clouded and our inherent compassion is blocked. As this weaning of  I takes place, the full range of awareness is dramatically restructured toward a softer, more inclusive way of perceiving. It is the essence of a process that initiates all mystical experience. This new consciousness creates a profound sense of insight and clarity, of peace and perspective. The world is experienced more directly and immediately as selfless insights see things the way they are rather than the way the self wants them to be.’”

“As this weaning of  I takes place, the full range of awareness is dramatically restructured toward a softer, more inclusive way of perceiving.” The self-as-a-thing, the ego, has hard edges and boundaries, is centered in itself, isolated. It doesn't softly permeate the circumstance I am in; it doesn't even fill this body. It is retracted, pulled back fearfully into itself, concerned about its future, missing the present. The “weaning of  I” allows our true presence to permeate body and circumstances—even very large ones—and really, fully be here.

Oak tree branches arch over the path above the garden here at Glen Ivy. I can look down the path for perhaps a hundred yards at one point, sunlight filtering through the leaves, as if looking through a living tunnel, well-lighted all along. When I look far ahead, focusing attention at a distance, that is where the point of my consciousness is expressed to. The objects in the foreground don't go away, but the focus of my attention is not on them. We're all familiar with a telephoto camera lens, perhaps through watching television or films. When the focal point is extended more distantly, the elements in the foreground blur and disappear from view, as if they were not even there. While you can't see what you're not looking at, what you're not seeing is still there; just shift the focus of attention, and there it is!

This ability to focus consciousness in radiant vision is one way we create in this world: we express our creative energy softly out, evoking response, creating. We're versatile, too; we can move this focus in and out, near and far, all the while present. I am the God of this body—I am the God of this circumstance. As I walk down the path, whether it is the path above the garden or the path of life, I can focus my vision far ahead or close at hand. In this focus of awareness is where the self abides. Be the God of your circumstance, shifting position. Move out, move in, be fluid, be flexible, be present.

I mentioned those dualities of self and not self, me and not me and the paradox that while there is me and not me, there is also wholeness, oneness. When our selflessness is big enough to include the self-that-thinks-it-is-a-thing, then this duality ceases to seem a paradox. It is just a fact. This is the key. I am the God of my circumstances. I can extend my focus of vision in any direction, to any extent. I am present. I am the loaf giver. I give the bread of life and I am responsible for the creation I am walking through for as long as it exists.

Some things don't exist very long—a passing scene, quickly gone. Other things, even memories, may exist for a long, long time, but as the God of this circumstance I am responsible for them as long as they exist. When I extend my awareness to somewhere else I may not be immediately aware of this close-in circumstance, but I am still responsible for it. In the Biblical Book of Revelation an image of divine presence is described as being full of eyes, within and without, in all directions. That may sound a little bestial, but it is a metaphor for how to be a human being. We can see in all directions: past and present, cardinal directions, up and down, in and out. The duality of past and present evaporates into now. The duality of me and not me merges into wholeness when I stop being centered in the self that is a thing. We must be willing to venture, to risk, to do that. What Uranda called the law of eternal progress includes risk. The vital force, life itself, ventures; it risks, it constantly expresses anew, and reaction, creation, result.

I am not a thing. You are not a thing. God is a verb. So are we. Knowing divine identity is not like being connected by a cosmic umbilical cord or a celestial phone line to a Great Something-Or-Other, elsewhere. That idea maintains the illusory duality of me and not me. In that case there is me, and the not me is God. If the not me is God then God is not me. That is not divine identity! The way we look at the world really reveals where our identities are. Where we look from determines how things look to us.

The word “King” is a great description of the focus of divine identity. The word may be somewhat disdained in some circles because “king” seems sexist, implying masculine only. It comes from a root meaning “to give birth,” however—an action generally not considered a male function! To give birth: the king is the expression of the One Law: birth, bringing forth. In its background roots, “king" also contains meanings which suggest “origin,” “the origin of family, of kind or kindred,” also, “beginning.” I am the King of my body. I am the King of my circumstances, I give birth to it. I am the origin of it. I am its beginning, I am the Lord of it. I give it the bread of life. I animate it. I am the God of it. I am the presence that sustains it. If I see all circumstances, regardless of size, in the same way that I experience being the God of my body, the way I relate to the world changes utterly.

Some wise recommendations that have come down to us suddenly become possible to fulfill, whereas once they may have seemed impossible to even comprehend, let alone do. For example, Jesus instructed us to love our enemies. You have to have enemies to think you can or cannot love them, and how you look at the world (which depends on who's looking) determines whether you see a person or a circumstance as an enemy or not. The God of this circumstance has no enemies.

Perhaps the idea of divine identity has seemed a distant goal, something to work toward someday. That places divine identity once again as if it were a thing, something somewhere else that I can somehow reach. Be a verb—express. Express divine character and you know divine character. To know God we must act as God acts. Be a verb. Don't be a thing. If you are a thing eventually you will be no thing. If you are a verb you are eternal, a vital force. Your identity is life itself.

I am compelled to live this vision in every circumstance—home and work and family, everywhere. And if I am the God of this circumstance and other people are in it, does that mean no one else is the God of this circumstance? Of course not. We all are Gods, and how God shows up where you are takes everybody. The Great Creation is collective, response to the radiant presence of everyone. If that radiant presence isn't available, if it is withheld, then to that extent God is not showing up in the world. That deficiency is evident!

I am the God of this body. I fill it with my love and the moment I actually accept that fact, I am never again isolated, I never feel apart or separate but at one with a much larger presence. There is a God, a bigger God, there is Lord, the Lord of more, there is the King in a greater Kingdom. The individual experience of divine identity is inexorably linked with the larger context in which we live and move and have our being. No one can know divine identity and say there is no King for this world. No one can know divine identity and say there is no Lord, there is no God.

“The Father and I are one,” Jesus said. Here is a statement made in divine identity. I am the father of this circumstance. I am the father of this body. I am the mother too. I am the author, the origin, the one that makes it so. I have the power to bless, to heal, to smile, and we all do. Let's use it. Let's be it.  Be a verb, not a thing. Take a walk along the garden path, and look down that living tunnel. There is not only light at the end of it, but light all over.

© Emissaries of Divine Light

Follow Thou Me

Follow  Thou  Me

Uranda   April 19, 1937

 

Nearly two thousand years ago our Beloved Master, the LORD of Lords, Who manifested as Jesus, spoke the Word which vibrates in the earth for all who will Respond in Love, “Follow Thou Me.” These Words are meaningless to those who do not Respond to them, but for all who Respond they are received as the Sacred Pass Word which admits the Earnest One into an awareness of his present Place and Function in the Kingdom of Reality. The vast majority of those who claim to be followers of the Christ prove by their failure to live in Reality that they do not Recognize the Secret of the Pass Word.

“Follow Me in the Meaning of My Life.

Follow Me in the meaning of My Words.

Follow Me in the Harmonized Function of the Great Plan.

Follow Me in the Release of Reality into the earth.

Follow Me in proving the Truth of Being.

Follow Me in the Flaming Way of Love.

Follow Me in Service that is Real, even the Service of the Temple.

Follow Me, for I AM THAT I AM.

Follow Me, for I AM THAT I AM is the Lord of the Sacred Seven

Who is the God of the whole Holy World,

and as I AM THAT I AM,

the One Who leads the Way in all the true functions of World Being.

All who are in the World are already following Me to the degree of their Love Response to Reality.

Follow Me,

for those Who stand by Me in My Reality are ordained of Me to Reveal the Reality of Being

to those who have fallen from the true estate through following after themselves.”

The Kingdom of Reality is here on earth now. In that the Kingdom is already here, all the efforts to establish the Kingdom are the result of the futile imaginings of the human mind. Insofar as mankind is concerned at this time, there are two Kingdoms functioning in the earth. One is the Kingdom of Reality. The other is the Kingdom of the Unreal. Those who follow themselves in self-love are living in the Kingdom of the Unreal. All that is of this Kingdom is passing and subject to constant change. In it there is birth and death. The Substance of which the unreal forms are made belongs to the Kingdom of Reality. All who are living in the Kingdom of the Unreal have stolen the Substance which they use in the unreal forms of their Kingdom. Only the passing forms are of the Kingdom of the Unreal.

The usurpers who have set up the Kingdom of the Unreal within the borders of the Kingdom of Reality, have taken unjustly all that they claim to own. These usurpers cling to their possessions for a little time, but they cannot take the substance which they have stolen beyond the borders of the Kingdom of Reality, no matter how much they may try to do so. Having stolen the substance, and made unjust claim to it, they have proceeded to mould it into forms pleasing to themselves, but they cannot give those forms life, therefore, the forms soon pass away, and the Substance returns to its primal state. Those who are citizens of the Kingdom of the Unreal have taken partial control of many of the Forms of Reality which have Life and belong to the Kingdom of Reality, but as soon as these forms are used in the way of the Kingdom of the Unreal, they begin to disintegrate, and are soon dissolved, and are thereby taken away from those who use them wrongly; and the usurpers call this process, by which the stolen substance is returned to the Kingdom of Reality, death.

Citizens of the Kingdom of Reality have gone into the Kingdom of the Unreal, carried the Truths of Life to those who have chosen death, but the usurpers have persecuted and condemned those who came to point the Way back to the Kingdom of Reality. When those who dwell in the Kingdom of the Unreal do think to “give” some of their stolen substance to those who Reveal the Way, they have a sense of self-satisfaction that is unreal, for they refuse to recognize that they have but returned a very small portion of that which they claim unjustly.

As I AM sent unto you by I AM THAT I AM,

I have spoken the Pass Word in the Flaming Fire,

“Follow Thou Me.”

Blessed are they who harken, and thrice Blessed are all who Respond in Love, joyously making restitution of all their stolen goods that they may be received joyously into restored citizenship in the Kingdom of Reality. All who Respond shall enter into the Joy of the Lord, and all who respond not shall have that which they have, taken from them. So is it established.

© Emissaries of Divine Light

The Processes of Death and Ascension

The  Processes  of  Death  and  Ascension

Martin Cecil   July 20, 1977  Class

Della Robertson passed away on Monday. To put it another way, the angel came forth but the form was inadequate to allow the revelation of the coming forth of the angel; so the form fell away. Rightly so. It is an in­teresting point but, I think it was after supper on Sunday, Della insisted upon speaking to me and to Lillian and to Grace, and there was something sensed at that time. She was in effect saying farewell for the moment. In other words, the coming forth of the angel influences the human consciousness in various ways. As we allow that coming forth to be more naturally experienced while we live and serve then we certainly, in the earthly sense, become aware of what it is that the angel is about and we find that it is increasingly an experience of our own true expression. In this particular instance there was an expectation and a sense of urgency, one might say, appearing through her consciousness which required that she make this contact. And as many of you would do, I'm sure, if you were going someplace else, you would wish to say goodbye for the moment. So this is in effect what occurred. The coming forth of the angel at that point influenced the consciousness to that extent so that there was an awareness of certain proper tying‑up of loose ends, so to speak. The particular means which was in effect by which the physical form might easily fall away is beside the point, really. What happened happened very quickly and we praise the Lord for Della's ministry on earth, and when the time comes to conclude it, well that is the way it should be.

That is the way it should be with respect to all of us, as far as that is concerned. But we need to be able to handle such things as they arise with other people. By the same token we need to be able to handle such things as they may arise with respect to ourselves; and there is some awareness as to when ones particular term of incarnation is completed, properly so. This does not mean that one should become morbidly interested in such things or indulge in speculation or imagination—which human beings are prone to do—but where there is a calm stability in expression in one's living there would naturally be an awareness of when the term of incarnation would rightly be completed. Now, in the present state of affairs, in the world the way it is, that completion is called death, death of the physical form. And things being the way they are there is nothing wrong with death. It is a very essential part of the creative process. While self‑centered human beings may try desperately to stay alive a little longer for their nefarious purposes, it would be a ter­rible thing if they were to succeed indefinitely in this regard. Let the waste pass away. And when the term of incarnation is complete what is left is waste insofar as that incarna­tion was concerned, but it is not waste insofar as the creative processes are concerned.

So, as I say, the way things now are there is an expectation that the one sure thing is death—death of the physical form—the separation of the physical flesh from its source of life, so that life is no longer being born in that physical form. This does not mean that there is any less life; in fact it just is not being born insofar as that physical form is concerned. Now, these things need to be understood as being quite natural under these circumstances so that there is no great song and dance about it. It is because human beings do not understand—they don't for the most part, have the substance available so that they could understand—that it seems to be such a big deal and such a tragic thing. It isn't really. It is a natural process the way things are. Now, in the true state there is properly what is called ascension, but in that circumstance where ascension replaces death of the physical form there would like­wise be a term of incarnation. The term in such case might be considerably longer than is presently known by human beings, because something more effective would in the creative sense be being done by all concerned; the angel incarnate revealed on earth and achieving what needs to be achieved. And whatever length of time is required to complete the particular cycle of achievement, well that will be the length of the term of incarnation. And while at the conclusion of that term there might rightly be farewells extended, there is no consciousness of finality in the matter.

Presently with respect to death it seems so final to human beings because they are merely looking at it from the earthly sense. From the angelic standpoint there is nothing final about it at all. To put it in a way that I think Uranda put it many years ago, incarnation is like eating a meal—when you have finished the meal you getup and go out and do something else. That does not mean you do not come back and have another meal. Now, that is not reincarnation as human beings understand it presently, because being earthly oriented they think of everything in terms of the physical form which is necessary but in one sense rather incidental. The incarnation is of the angel and the incarnation is not for the purpose of somehow improving the angel or that the angel may be becoming more angelic by incarnating. The point is that an angel is an angel is an angel and there is no need to improve on that state; but there are things to be done in the creative way. And so part of that doing, at least as it relates to this particular planet and creative field, requires incarnation in human form, and on this basis the creative purposes of God may be fulfilled.

In the world the way it is death is the natural experience, the separation of the human form from its source of life. Now, this relates to pneumaplasm of course because pneumaplasm is the connection between spirit and form; therefore there must be some sort of a disruption insofar as this connection is concerned if life ceases to be born anymore in the flesh. And so what occurs occurs in relationship to the pneumaplasmic field, and we just see the results of what occurs when the body is said to be dead. There is some dis­pute these days as to what it is that is the point of death. There are different levels of death, according to the human view of things. Someone may be pronounced dead and yet not be dead. Of course we see that the point of death is the point where there is a disruption to the connection, through pneumaplasm, between spirit and form; and that cannot exactly be measured, or there are not instruments that human beings have invented so far to dis­cern that point because it is not recognized as being there anyway. But it is spoken of in various ways in the Bible, for instance in the Old Testament. In the 12th chapter of Ecclesiastes: “Or ever the silver cord be loosed, or the golden bowl be broken,” and so on. The silver cord has a relatedness to the focalization of pneumaplasmic substance which provides the essential connection through the endocrine system. As long as that is unbroken that physical body is not dead, however it may appear. An example of this was with respect to the body of Jesus. The silver cord was not broken; the body was not dead even though it appeared to be dead and was accepted as being dead. The silver cord was still present; the connection through pneumaplasm was still a reality. And so, because of this, the resurrection was possible. Once the silver cord is broken the physical form is dead and it cannot be resurrected in that form again. The resurrection will take place, the second resurrection will take place, because the substance that composed that form is offered in one way or another to other forms of manifestation.

At the point of death the silver cord is loosed. There is a separation between the physical body and the pneumaplasmic body. The pneumaplasmic body has a relationship to the various mental levels of the individual, so that what is present at those various men­tal levels is still present in the pneumaplasmic substance. You may recognize that this has relatedness to what is called spiritualism, a most useless undertaking and endeavor, a fiddling around with dead things. Instead of fiddling around with dead bodies—sometimes people do this; they think it is useful in one way or another—there are other people who fiddle around with dead pneumaplasmic bodies and by the use of the available life force in living people these records that are present in the pneumaplasmic substance that is being associated with may be played back, so to speak. It is like a tape, playing back a tape. Well that is not the person.

You have heard many of Uranda's tapes and you recognize that they were originally spoken by him but they are obviously not him now. It is a tape of what he said. This is not to say that his spirit may not be touched by reason of these tapes. But the same principle relates to this matter of so‑called spiritualism. It has very little to do with spirit, just the spiritual substance which properly is in the processes of disintegration, just the same as the physical substance of the body is. They disintegrate separately. That is why most people have an aversion to walking through a graveyard at night, because while some pneumaplasm hanging around there which is contactable above ground, so to speak, and a person may have a sensing of this and it has been the origin of much fear and many stories.

Ghost substance. Well, ghost substance, if it is disintegrating substance, has no life of its own, any more than a corpse has life of its own. If it appears to have life of its own it is because someone gave it life, someone, some living person, gave it life; because obviously we all, being alive, have the experience of living pneumaplasmic substance. So pneumaplasmic substance may be alive in our own experience and we can by reason of this life force transmit life to pneumaplasmic substance which otherwise would not be alive. If there are ghosts which hang around in ancient mansions, clanking their chains and so on, it is because there is someone on hand who keeps them alive. Where there has been intense emotion involved—in relationship to death particularly, when the separa­tion takes place—this maintains the pneumaplasmic substance in existence. A sort of aura of substance is available to affect the emotions of somebody else who will then become emotionally involved and will animate whatever this other substance was.

These things mostly happen subconsciously, so the individual may say, “I wasn't emotionally involved.” Well there are emotions which relate to the conscious mind, certainly. There are spiritual emotions. But there are subconscious emotions at many, many levels, so one is not always consciously aware of what it is that is happening. The poltergeists which put in an appearance usually relate to the period of puberty of some young person and that young person has no idea whatsoever as to what it is that is going on and yet that person is responsible. We are responsible for a lot of things we know nothing about. That is something to consider.

But anyway, there is little value in spiritualism. We have those who are called mediums and if it isn't outright fraud—which a lot of it is of course—if there is some basis for it, it is still an unreal basis. And there may be some information gleaned from play­ing back these tapes. I suppose a very obvious instance of this was in Edgar Cayce's situation, and there are groups of people who are very interested in playing back his tapes. Well, all right, maybe they will learn something, but not anything particularly spiritual—information of various sorts, how to treat this disease or that illness, and so on.

Now, the way things are angels incarnate on earth in human form with a clear aware­ness of the restrictions that such incarnation will involve. This has been going on for a long time. There has been something unfolding in the creative sense by reason of the incarna­tion of angels, which has been completely beyond the comprehension of the human mind. How and why these things are brought to point at particular times it is not understood generally speaking, but obviously there are cosmic factors involved, far more than little fiddly things that go on in human lives.

In our various fields of service we will be faced with various things, all necessary. You can say, “For this cause came I into the world.” Regardless of what it is that arises, for this cause you came into the world: to handle that as an angel; that is why you are here. You begin to have this orientation, and one of the things it is necessary to handle now is death insofar as others are concerned at the moment, so that you know what is going on and you can be helpful in assisting a person to stay centered in the right place.

Now, this is difficult very often with people because there are so many relatives around who are throwing in a lot of junk that simply does not belong. If this point of cleavage between the physical form and the spirit is coming the person needs to be quiet, needs to be in position to move in this transition, and your concern is to help keep that person's consciousness, as far as possible, centered in the Lord so that he may remain connected in that way, because at the point of disruption, the point where the silver cord is loosed, physically speaking there is a separation between the pneumaplasmic body and the physical body. But the pneumaplasmic body may still be connected to spirit, and it will be in the ordinary course of events from the standpoint of those with whom you will be working, be­cause no doubt there will be some fine substance there that will maintain the connection. And you will find that when the disruption occurs, the silver cord is loosed, there is a point of what one might call glory because the physical form is no longer interfering with the angelic expression through the pneumaplasm; and there is a sensing of something very beautiful. This is very beautiful insofar as the experience of the individual is concerned to the extent that the connecting substance is still present so that the spirit and the substance are still one.

Now, this, if it is sustained, allows a continuing process of ascension. Not physical ascension anymore; the physical ascension, such as it was, was going on while the individual was alive; there was a movement upward, a transmutation, into the pneumaplasmic sub­stance. We say pneumaplasmic substance is generated out of physical substance. If the generation is of finer levels, we begin to see here an ascending, process, incense ascending before God. Well that can continue after what is spoken of as the point of death. All it is is the physical form separated from the pneumaplasmic body; the silver cord has been loosed. If a person is thoroughly oriented in the earth then the disruption will not only be with respect to the silver cord between the pneumaplasmic substance and the physical sub­stance but it will be between the spirit and the pneumaplasmic substance, because the indi­vidual had no angelic consciousness, virtually none at all. All the consciousness was simply of the human nature state and that is passing away.

So you can see that there is an important service to be rendered to people as they approach this time. Of course there isn't very much that can be done if the person has had no prior opportunity of understanding; however, there is something always, in any case. Fundamentally it is saying, “Look up. Don't look down; look up,” and you provide some­thing worthwhile in this regard beyond the words if when they look up they see you, they see the reality, of you. If all they can see when they look at you—and there is a refining pro­cess of vision going on here at that time—all they can see is another human nature person all bogged down, which is what is mostly seen at that point, relatives weeping and wailing and all this sort of stuff, which is deadly. It is an indication of the self‑centeredness of the people concerned—thinking of themselves. They are unhappy about what is hap­pening. They don't understand it and usually they translate it in relation to themselves. And it is almost invariably a thor­oughly self‑centered business, and that is no help to the person who is moving out of the earthly picture. Look up—calm stability—look up and see an angel at hand, see the angel who is ministering. Well, that will be seen by a person who looks up. And that is, one might say, the comfort, the assistance, during this transition period—to provide assurance: “It is working out quite naturally. This is fine.” Then the individual begins to discover that it is so, if they are not distracted by everything else going on around. And this business in hospitals is appalling, really. They are trying to keep someone alive at the point where they would naturally be bowing out of the picture. Of course most people have so little angelic consciousness that they do not know how to handle the situation; they do not know how to bow out of the picture in spite of all the fuss, because most people are in the habit of allowing other people to take over, at least insofar as their medical needs are concerned.

This incarnation of the angel is very clearly indicated in these words, familiar to you I am sure, the words of the Master: “I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world: again, I leave the world, and go to the Father.” Where is the big deal? Just a simple, natural process; only unnatural to the extent that the physical body disintegrates in­stead of ascending. Obviously, in the ascension of the physical body there is the ascension of the pneumaplasmic body and there is the incorporation of this then into the angelic ex­perience.

Now, we may have particular opportunities of serving those who are completing their term of incarnation and we can do it effectively if we have a real understanding of what it is that is happening. We can observe what is happening, we can sense what it is that is hap­pening: we can sense when the silver cord is loosed, for instance. Very often the last breath is a factor in this. People talk about, “Well, he drew his last breath.” Well of course there must be a last breath—but it is rather a remarkable thing in a way. There is a first breath and the last breath. When the babe is born there is concern for the first breath. The last breath relates to the loosing of the silver cord. Air is the symbol of spirit and when a per­son ceases to breathe of course there is usually a long outflow of breath involved and that is heard, one might say, as a sigh of relief: “It is good that that is over.” The silver cord is loosed. One—the angel that you are—is still on hand. One has been working with the pneumaplasmic body in any case. That is what you do when you are giving an attunement. You are not working with the physical body directly. You are still working with the pneumaplasmic body and helping to sustain the connection with spirit, so that there may be a continuing process of ascension. Where a server is on hand to do this it is a blessing indeed. Perhaps something may be done in this regard from the standpoint of the priest who puts in an appearance at such times, but he does not really know what is going on. He is doing it by rote. But the person may have faith in this, and that is the main ingredient again. He looks up. If you look up you go up.

In the processes of ascension insofar as the pneumaplasmic body is con­cerned it is absorption of that pneumaplasmic substance out of the dimensional world into the world which is dimensionless. That may continue for a period of time if the connection is sustained, but with most people, in the world the way it has been, the disruption has not only been insofar as the physical body is concerned but insofar as the pneumaplasmic body is concerned too, so that the pneumaplasm is left floating around, disintegrating. Of course there are those who keep such pneumaplasmic bodies alive—the pneumaplasm of relatives—ghosts—hanging on to dead relatives. And an older person very often becomes weighed down with all this rotting pneumaplasmic substance. Not a very pretty picture, but they are giving their life force to this and they have less of life force consequently for their own ex­pression. And they drag around all these ghosts out of the past.

Older people very often live more and more in the past, don't they, sustaining these ghosts. And sometimes a younger person's mother perhaps dies, and they have been very close to their mother and they wrap this—ghost substance of their mother around them and carry it on into their living. What a deathly state! Any emotion will keep dead people around, their pneumaplasmic substance. But let it go, let it disintegrate. What was right and true is right and true still. The angel is still living and well and probably glad to be rid of the physical form, to take a rest from all the nonsense that has been going on.

Our concern is to allow the true forms to appear on earth, and to do that we have to be oriented in heaven and share the responsibility of allowing that heaven to be revealed because we live on earth, so that when people look at us with any degree of perception they are looking up. And if they look up and keep looking up, they will go up.

© emissaries of divine light