2/9/68

Tonight’s subject is on power, creative power. We are told in the Book of Exodus: “And God said to Moses, I AM the I AM. I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob as God Almighty, but by my name, the I AM, I did not make myself known unto them” (6:3). In scripture, if you read it correctly, Jesus Christ is defined as “the power and wisdom of God,” infinite power. If you want to check it, you’ll find it in the 1st chapter, the 24th verse of 1st Corinthians.

So here the creative power of God is personalized. You and I are called upon to find this power, this creative power. The world will say “I am a Christian, I believe in Christ…oh yes, I believe in Christ.” “But do you know him?” Well, they will hesitate. You’ve got to find him. The challenge is given to us in scripture, “Examine yourselves to make sure that you are in the faith. Test yourselves.” I must test myself. You test yourself. Am I really convinced, am I assured, have I completely accepted the fact that Jesus Christ is really in me? If I have made the test and I’m not quite sure, I have failed. And this we find in the 13th chapter of 2nd Corinthians (verse 5), “Do you not realize that Jesus Christ is in you?” Alright, do I? If I am not convinced that this creative power of the universe is in me and personalized, well then, I have failed to meet the test. I can go to all the churches in the world and pray and light all the candles in the world, and give everything to the outside world…if I do not actually know this, then I’ve failed.

Is he really in me? Well then, put him to the test. I tell you that Jesus Christ is the eternal creative power of God, and Jesus Christ is your own wonderful human Imagination. Now, if you do not know that, you do not know Jesus Christ. But, you will say he is a person. Well, you’re a person, aren’t you? Jesus Christ is God the Father, but God the Father is Spirit, and those who worship him worship in Spirit and in truth. Well, can I feel the presence within me? I imagine…and so I start to imagine a state, any state. Now, will it externalize itself and become a physical fact that I may share it with another? Yes! I’ve done it unnumbered times and taught others to do it. Well then, I’ve found him, for he is the only creative power of the universe. Everything in my world that is now a fact to be shared with many was once only imagined. Name something that is now the fact that wasn’t once only imagined, just name it. If we know who Jesus Christ really is, the creative power of the world that brings into this world all things imagined then we have found him. But now do we trust him? Am I living by it? If I live by it, well then, I will find myself in the stream of life fulfilling scripture…if I live by it.

So we are told in scripture, all power in heaven and earth is given unto me. Is that true? Well alright, try it. What is truly the deeper meaning of power? Is it not effectiveness in achieving our purposes? So I have an objective and I think I have all the power in the world to achieve it, but I can’t seem to bring it to pass. Then where is the power? Today we have in our world a conflict and we have enormous power to wipe out the whole area, but we are unwilling to use it because that is not our objective. We can’t seem to find the power that will bring about the fulfillment of our purpose in spite of a seeming other power. We don’t want to wipe out these cities and move in to find complete waste. Yet where is that power that could bring about our purpose, the pacification of these ends? Man does not know Jesus Christ. He thinks his power is in nuclear energy or in money or in his social position or in his intellectual power and all these things…he thinks that is power. That’s not power. The only real power is Jesus Christ, and Jesus Christ is our own wonderful human Imagination. All you have to do is test it. But first of all, you must first test whether you really are keeping the faith…for this is what scripture actually teaches.

I didn’t learn it in Sunday school. I was born and raised in a Christian environment and as far back as my family goes I do not know of any other than the Christian faith. Yet I did not learn it in Sunday school, I did not learn it in church, and I did not learn it at home. I was taught to believe in a being outside of myself, some being that was born 2,000 years ago, who was crucified on a wooden cross by horrible beings who did not believe that he was the Son of God. That’s the story that I was taught, and my mother was taught it, and her mother was taught it, and it comes down this way. And that’s not the story. It hasn’t a thing to do with that. Here is a mystery, a fantastic mystery: That God became man that man may become God…and God is our own wonderful human Imagination, that’s God. He actually became man that man may become God.

So here, it was revealed to me. I did not receive it from a man, I did not read it in a book, I never heard it from another. It just was revealed to me: That God in man is his own wonderful human Imagination. Well, having no place to turn and no one to whom I could turn, I began to experiment to prove that it works. It proved itself in the testing. It proved itself in performance. And then I found myself moving into the stream of scripture, fulfilling scripture…that the whole vast story as told in scripture was unfolding in me. That instead of being another that I read about, I am playing the central part and the whole thing is unfolding in me. Then I began to tell it and then those who heard it and believed it and tested themselves to prove that they really were believing in it and holding to this faith, they began to move into the mainstream and the scripture began to unfold in them. So you go across the country and the whole thing is unfolding in those who believe it in its true sense, not the false sense. Then scripture is unfolding in them and the whole vast world as recorded in scripture is taking place in them.

So we are told, “Remain in the city until you are clothed with power from on high” (Luke 24:59). Every scripture mentions this fantastic power, and the power is personified in scripture as Jesus Christ. But having been taught that Jesus Christ is some individual distinct from himself, outside of himself, he simply turns to it…and it doesn’t respond to his prayers. Then he hears this. He turns to no one on the outside, because God reveals himself, after power, as I AM. So God said to Moses, “I made myself known unto Abraham, unto Isaac, unto Jacob as God Almighty; but by my name, the I AM, I did not make myself known unto them” (Exod. 6:3). Now he makes himself known unto Moses. These are all states of consciousness. Now, if his name forever and forever is I AM, how could I turn outside of self? I cannot point to anything outside of myself and say “I am.” I can say, “I am watching that, I am observing this, I am doing this, I am dreaming,” but I can’t turn outside, I cannot if I say “I am.” Well, that was the revelation that came second to man: That “I AM is my name forever and forever, and by this name I shall be known throughout all generations” (Exod. 3:15).

Then comes another revelation, that this I AM is a father. That the being who declared himself to be Almighty God, all power, then declares himself to be I AM and then declares himself to be a father. Well, if he is a father, then there is a son. The world was taught, as I was, that that son was called Jesus Christ. I know from revelation that he is not his son; Jesus Christ is God the Father. But there is a son…if there’s a father, there is a son, and that son is stated so clearly in scripture in the 2nd Psalm, and that son is David: “And I will tell of the decree of the Lord: He said unto me, ‘Thou art my son, today I have begotten thee’” (verse 7). Well, who would believe that this so-called secular history isn’t really secular history at all? It is supernatural history, it is sacred history. It hasn’t a thing to do with anything that took place in this world in a secular manner.

Yet today, I read where someone died in I think it’s Ohio, Rabbi Silver or Silverman, and he has traced his background back to David…all the nonsense in the world if he means it secularly. But he just simply…he died at the age of eighty-four, eighty-five and he can trace his background back to David, and David is not a character of human history; David is the eternal state where when one actually believes in the power that is God, exercises it, then suddenly he gets into the stream and awakens. As he awakens, here stands David before him and David calls him Father. Then he knows who he is: He is the creative power which is God.

Now, power in the Bible also is called God. Listen to these words, “And the high priest said to him, speaking of Jesus Christ, ‘Are you the Christ, the son of the Blessed?’ Jesus answered, ‘I am; and you will see the Son of man sitting at the right hand of Power’” (Mark 14:61, 62). Now Power in this sentence is a metanomen for God. You will see the Son of man sitting at the right hand of Power, as told us in the 110th Psalm, “And the Lord said unto my lord, ‘Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool’” (verse 1). So here, power is not equated…it’s a metanomen for God. Power is God. His first revelation to man is sheer power, El Shaddai, God Almighty. Then comes his name, I AM. Then comes his true character, that of a father who loves. Now his purpose is to give himself to everyone… himself! If he gives himself to me then he gives me fatherhood, for he is a father. But he must first give me power, then give me the awareness of who he is in me, which is I AM…and that is power.

Now if I believe it by putting myself to the test, I test myself. I’m confronted with a problem. Am I going to turn to someone else when I actually believe that all power resides in me as my own wonderful human Imagination? And I don’t need a hydrogen bomb, I don’t need money in the bank, I don’t need to know the “right” people, to live on the “right” side of the street, to do anything the world thinks I ought to do in order to get where I want to go. I simply believe in him. Well, I have found him in myself and not outside in the pages of scripture, so having found him in me as my own wonderful human Imagination, then to whom would I turn? I am faced with a problem, but then to whom would I turn for the solution? What now would I see were it true? That the whole thing dissolved before me, and the solution rises in its place. How would I see the world if that were true? What would I hear if that were true? How would I act if it were true? That all these things in my Imagination I discover to be Jesus, then I act as though all these things were true and call these things that are not now seen by human mortal eye into the world that they may be seen by all.

Well, can you prove it? I’ve proved it. I can only encourage others to try it. I can only say to everyone here tonight, if you’ve examined yourself to make sure, really sure, that you’ve completely accepted Jesus Christ of scripture as your own wonderful human Imagination, so that when confronted you turn to the real, the only Jesus Christ, not to a false Jesus Christ. If you turn to a false Jesus Christ, that includes anyone outside of yourself, well then, you don’t really believe. You haven’t quite made the test. You’ve made the test, but you’ve failed in the test. Turn only to self if you die. But you really don’t die, you simply depart from this one little scene in the play…but you don’t die. You move into an entirely different setup. So anything on the outside…let no one tell you they know what your future is or they know so-and-so. Your future is the fulfillment of scripture. So when one tells you that this is your future and that is your future, then they have not heard it to the point of conviction. You’re here to fulfill scripture.

Now, let me share with you a letter that came last week. The lady writes, “As the dream began, I knew I was twenty years old and just married, and here I am in the Basque country among the shepherds.” You know that’s northern Spain. In fact, they’re considered the world’s greatest shepherds. We bring them here…unknown to us they come here by our government; we import them to take care of our flocks, because really they’re considered the greatest shepherds. They go out with a thousand, they take care of their flocks, and bring back three thousand after the breeding. They live in the open and they will eat an injured animal and feed their dogs from that, and they do their own cooking, and just live in the open. Then they’ll come back after the breeding season is over with the little lambs and bring back three where they took up one thousand. These are the Basque people.

Well, this lady began her dream. She said, “I knew as the dream began I was twenty.” She’s older than twenty, but she knew in the dream, “I’m twenty years old and here I’m in the Basque country among the shepherds. We’re out now in a truck, an old truck. My husband—I only just got married—so my husband is driving the truck. I sat next to him and my sister-in-law sat next to me. In the back of me sat my brother-in-law and my father-in-law. My father-in-law sat just behind me.” Now, these are all in-laws, a sister-in-law, brother-in-law, father-in-law…that’s the relationship plus her husband who naturally is the brother of the brother-in-law. As they started it was daybreak, moving towards the home. The sun is just rising, just breaking, and they slept the night before on a mountain top. They must now travel over rugged, horrible, dusty mountainous roads. She gets progressively more and more tired, more and more weak. Her father-in-law, who sits behind, is absolute law. He is humorous and he is loving but his word is final. He tries to cheer them all up, because he knows the way. As she gets more and more tired then finally he makes the statement that just one more curve and we will come into our home. Sure enough, one more curve and here this heavenly scene appears, a valley, the greenest of green grass with this sparkling crystal blue river flowing through the meadows. In the distance, this wonderful home and the barn and flocks of white sheep, and two shepherds with their crooks and their dogs and a flock of geese. As they come in, she turns around and faces what was the father-in-law, and he suddenly grows tall and young. Here is a being growing tall and at the same time getting very young. She remembers this face somewhere in the dim, dim eternity…this face she remembers. Then it becomes luminous and the whole thing is so brilliant she wonders, “Was it his face or just that face?” But she can’t see it anymore, because the light is so great and the light wakes her. And here she is awake now in her room.

May I tell her, you have entered the mainstream. You played the part of Tamar in the 38th chapter of the Book of Genesis. Tamar married the first son of Judah and Judah is in the stream of Jesus Christ, if you know the genealogy: “And Abraham begat Isaac, and Isaac begat Jacob, and Jacob begat Judah and his brothers.” Now Judah was not the first, he was the fourth, and Judah married and had these three sons. He went down to a certain place and married someone outside, he married into Canaan. He married his first son to Tamar and he displeased Jehovah, and Jehovah killed him. So he said to his second son, “You marry your sister-in-law and raise up issue for him.” So he took her, but he knew that every offspring would not be his but his brother’s; so every time he had union with Tamar he ‘spilled his seed’ that he would not have a child. The young one was too young…when Jehovah also killed him because he displeased Jehovah by spilling his seed when the command to man was to multiply and increase in this world. So the third was too young.

Then came the day that Judah went down to the area where Tamar was for the shearing of the sheep. He was rich and he had enormous flocks. He went to see the shearing of the sheep. While there, Tamar heard of his visit and she took off her widows clothes and she sat in a public place and put a veil on her to have the appearance of a harlot. It could be the harlot of the temple, for there were professional harlots of the temple. But regardless of that, she appeared to be a harlot…and he proposed. She said, “What will you give me?” and he said, “I’ll give you a kid from my flock.” She said, “What assurance have I that you will give me a kid?” and he said, “Well, what do you want for assurance?” She said, “Give me your ring and the cord and your staff.” Well, he gave her these things and then he knew her intimately. Then three months later, it was brought to his attention that his daughter-in-law was pregnant. He said, “Let the law be fulfilled and let her be burned to death,” for that was part of the law. You either stone her to death, but in this translation “burn her to death.” So when they came to her to execute the law, she took these three items—the ring, the cord and the staff—and sent them off to Judah with the message, “The man who gave me these is the father of the child.” When he saw it, he said, “The sin is mine, not hers.”

So here, everything is “in-laws”—in-laws behind her, in-laws to the side, and the father-in-law behind her. Now it doesn’t mean that she had union in a physical sense. I’m not speaking of this when I speak of union…I’m speaking of union with states. We go into states and as we enter these states, that’s the union. Here, she became one with the stream, the mainsteam that comes to a climax in Jesus Christ, the power of God. I can say to her tonight, from your vision that you had that you have actually entered the stream, and no power in this world can stop you from coming to the fulfillment of it. I trust it is the immediate present…I do not know…because time is not time as we understand it here. It could be tonight. You’re in the mainstream. And the story that you told me, without using any biblical names, I tell you the 38th chapter of Genesis and the 49th, because your father-in-law, who had union with you, is the one to whom it was said, “The scepter will never pass from your hand.” He was called the lion’s whelp and from his hand that scepter shall never pass. All these are states of consciousness…only you’ve entered that state of consciousness leading up to the fulfillment, which is brought to climax in Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is God the Father. God the Father being a father he has a son and that son is David. David stands before him and calls Father.

This is power, real power. Hasn’t a thing to do with the ability to destroy this country. Oh yes, Russia could tonight, and we could destroy them, too, so what? We could release tonight x-number of nuclear bombs and destroy every major city in Russia. They could do the same thing here, and so what? May I tell you, the millions who would die on both sides still would not be dead. They would still be floundering to find the Father, for everyone is really searching for the Father. That Father is Jesus Christ. Man has been taught to believe he’s on the outside, and that they make these strange mental pictures of him as something on the outside that does not look like themselves. We are told in scripture, “It does not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, for we shall see him a he is” (1John 3:2). He can’t appear and not be just like the being to whom he appears because he appears within us. Not as something you see coming from without, but you see the Son coming calling you Father, and that Son is his Son. Well, if his Son calls you Father, then you know who you are when he calls you “my Father.”

This is power, real power. In the meanwhile, you can exercise it on this level. You don’t need to be the wisest person in the world, the strongest person, to be a member of the right set. They all have to be of this set or that set or the other to be on the inside, to be “in” and you get so tired of that word “in”…are you “in”? And you’re in what, in a mess? Up to your knees you could be in a mess and you think you are on the “in.” I tell you, accept this challenge. The words are, “Examine yourselves and make sure that you are in the faith.” Just examine yourself. Let no one examine you; you examine yourself and make sure that you’re in the faith. Test yourself. Have you completely accepted the fact that Jesus Christ is really in you? If you can say “not quite” to that, then you have failed the test. And although you believe in some other Jesus Christ, that is not Jesus Christ, that’s a false Christ. One billion Christians live in the world today and they all have a false Christ…it’s not the power that creates. They go and light a candle, light a little incense, give to the churches, give to the poor, and they’re trying to acquire merit by their outside activities…and that is not it.

Let no one tell you that anyone is prophesying for you. Your only prophecy is scripture and you will fulfill it. So when someone tells me what this astrologer said and what that medium said and what that one said, I get so annoyed with all this nonsense! I wonder have you heard me, have you ever heard me when you bring me anything about what he on the outside said. What’s going to happen to Johnson, who cares? What does it matter? Or Nixon, who cares? Or the queen, who cares? Or the pope, who cares? What does it matter? They’re all worshipping a false Christ. Or if they want to be shining in this world of men, all well and good, let them shine. Let them know this principle and shine for their little moment, but are they in the stream? Are they fulfilling scripture? Do they really believe in the only Jesus Christ? Jesus Christ is your own wonderful human Imagination. There never was another Christ and there never will be another Christ; that is Christ.

Now someone will shoot you and say, “Now get rid of him, because that is blasphemy.” Well, may I tell you, we have support for it in scripture. The most bold claim in the world you find in scripture: “Are you the Christ?” “I am,” said he. Read it in the 14th chapter of the Book of Mark, towards the end, 64th or 65th verse, “I am; and you will see the Son of man sitting at the right hand of power.” Well now, “What more do we have to listen to?” they said, “This is blasphemy.” Then he quotes scripture to tell them in the Book of John (10:34-38), “Is it not written in scripture (and scripture cannot be broken)…that “I say ‘You are gods’? And if scripture said you are gods, is it blasphemy when I say ‘I am the Son of God’ and ‘the Son and Father are one’?” You can’t divorce God the Creator from his creative power, they’re one. So if he is the creative power he’s also one with the creator, and he makes no bones about it. I speak of it as a person, because I’m a person. I treat this as a person, I’m personalized.

So I say to everyone accept Christ, accept him as your own wonderful human Imagination, and don’t falter. If tonight you think, “Suppose he’s misleading me?” If you’ll believe me, may I tell you, I have fulfilled scripture. I have fulfilled the entire story as told in the gospel. And it’s not done physically, for I was born as you were, with all the limitations of the flesh, just as you were, having nothing in this world when I came into it, and not much today…I live. But here, without anything, it just unfolded itself in me. Because I didn’t have much, possibly I had to stand upon my own feet and believe in myself…and asking no one to help, and not stealing, not lifting one thing from anyone when I had nothing. When I had nothing, I’d go without it. You can’t eat? Alright, so go without it…that’s his. Why must you take it, because you don’t have and he has? I saw they had more than they needed, but I didn’t take it from them. I simply pulled in my belt and walked home fifty blocks when I couldn’t find any friend of mine who had a dime that I could buy soup greens to take home. That’s all I wanted, soup greens. I walked up fifty blocks, couldn’t find a friend who had a dime in the Depression, walked back. But here were all the soup greens. I could have even asked these Italian fellas with their cart to give me, or just trust me, they would have, but I didn’t. I walked back hungry and had nothing. If the next day I could do something to earn a dollar or earn a quarter, alright, then I had soup. And that was it.

I didn’t feel that because I didn’t have anything and they had they should give it to me. It never occurred to me that another should give me anything. And then I got into the stream of life and then the things began to unfold in me. But no one owes me anything in this world. The government doesn’t owe me one penny. I am happy in this marvelous land of ours and everything is here, so I’m enjoying it. But the government doesn’t owe me a nickel. When it taxes me, it gives me a road on which I can walk; and I can turn on the water, they have their reservoirs, they’re doing these things and I can get water. So I don’t feel really that they owe me a nickel. All I have to do is to trust Jesus Christ, and Jesus Christ is my own wonderful human Imagination. I have no desire to pile it up, and say, well now, I’ve made a million…a million of what? A million shadows?

So that is not my concern; just to tell you who Jesus Christ is and Jesus Christ is your own wonderful human Imagination. There never was another and never will be another and if you trust him…I use “him” advisedly because it’s a person, and you are that person. You’re a person so that’s you. Well then, you will never fail if you trust him, because he will never fail you. So tonight, when you know what you want, just believe that you have it and sleep this night as though it were true. Because Christ is in everyone and he will use anyone or all for that matter, to aid the birth of your assumption. Dare to assume it and you’ll know the truth of what I’m talking about.

In the end of the Bible, the very end, the 22nd chapter of Revelation and Jesus Christ is speaking, he said, “I am the root of David, the bright morning star” (verse 16). In the 2nd chapter of Revelation, “The one who conquers, the martyr, the witness”—for martyr means “witness,” the witness to the truth of scripture—“I will give him the morning star” (verses 26, 28). In other words, he gives you himself and he is God the Father. But he is the root of David…well, the root is the father. The root of a tree is the father of the tree. In Macbeth, Banquo is made to say, reminding this one of the prophecy of the three weird creatures, that “I myself,” (Banquo is speaking), “I, myself, become the root and father of many kings.” He wasn’t in line, but “I, myself, become the root and father.” He equates the two—root and father. So if I am the root, I’m also the father. So I am the root of David. And the world can’t see how David can be the son of Jesus Christ. This is not flesh and blood, this is all spirit. These are the eternal states, and David is the eternal state of the son who calls anyone who enters the mainstream and comes to climax, Father. And that’s the story. So the very end of the Bible, the 22nd chapter of Revelation, I am the root and also the morning star. I will give the morning start to the conqueror, one who has finished it, completed it, and lived the faith.

So tonight, you test yourself. I wouldn’t test you…I’m not here to test anyone. I can only tell you, just examine yourself to see, am I really keeping the faith or am I going to call someone and say things are horrible and then appeal to something on the outside. Am I really keeping the faith? So I just ask you to test yourself to see whether you’re keeping the faith. And if you can say yes, I always turn to my Imagination and I imagine a certain state and come high or what, I will remain, die or not. But if every little rumor is going to move me around like a ship without a rudder, well then, I’m not keeping the faith. So it’s entirely up to us. Are we really testing ourselves? And if you cannot say within yourself, I always turn to my Imagination when confronted with a problem and solve it there, and remain faithful to the imaginal act that was the solution of it, well then, I have failed the test. And it’s just as simple as that.

But may I tell you, we remain in this world which really is a world of death until we enter the mainstream and come to the climax. You can’t believe how much this world really is a world of death. Everything in it even though it seems so much alive, my visions would not support it, it’s dead. And life is in man; life is man’s own wonderful human Imagination. Life really is an activity of imagining. And so, one day you will discover it…that everything in this world is a symbol, but everything, I don’t care what it is. Your closest, dearest friend, your wife, your mother, your father, your brothers, your children, they’re all symbols. Everything is a symbol, and it’s dead, revealing and telling you who you are. And we’ll take that up next week.

Now let us go into the Silence.

Are there any questions?

Q: (inaudible)

A: No…Emeth, when I spoke of faith? Well, amen is Aleph, Mem, Nun, just like we have in the Bible. When you hear something in church and we respond, we say “amen to that”…that it’s true, so be it, amen. Well, emeth—Aleph, Mem, Toph in Hebrew—it means “truth,” but it’s also translated “faith.” But it means “truth”…Aleph, Mem Toph. Look up the word “truth” in Hebrew and you’ll find in your concordance the word giving you “emeth.” So emeth is truth. But these both are translated in Hebrew and they’re alternating as faith.

Thank you.