1/31/69

___(??) on this level it’s only a symbolic representation of the dying, being buried, and being raised with Christ. The action itself, although it represents all of this, is not really important. In the mystical sense it’s all important, for it comes just before the realization of being God the Father. As Paul describes it in his letter to the Ephesians, and he puts it sixth in the great unit, and he said, “There’s but one body, one Spirit, one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of us all” (Eph. 4:4). So he puts it just before the realization of being God the Father.

Now, he tells in his letter to the Romans that “We were buried with Christ by a baptism into death, so as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too may walk in newness of life” (6:4). Baptism implies complete immersion. As we are told, “As Jesus rose up out of the water, immediately he saw the heavens opened and the Spirit descending upon him like a dove” (Mark 1:10). He rose up out of the water…did it ever occur to you that the bodies that we wear are almost 100 percent water? In these bodies we are buried: this is the great water in which we are buried and remain buried until that moment in time when we rise up out of the water and see the Spirit—not only the heavens completely transparent—but then we see the Spirit in bodily form as the dove descending upon us. This descent upon us is the gift of a new form; that is to say, a new manner of existence, a new unification, so that each while conserving his individuality actually becomes God the Father.

So Paul places it as sixth in the great unit. He mentions seven, but the last would have to be the source of it all, God the Father who is above all, who is in all, and who is through all. But he places baptism as the sixth. So he starts off with the body…there is in the end only one body. This is unification, one body. One Spirit he places second, then the one hope, the one Lord, one faith. Now he comes to baptism, the sixth, one baptism, one God and Father of us all. So just before we become aware of being God the Father of all—not just God the Father but of all—this baptism takes place.

Now, the clarity spoken of in scripture…the heavens were rent and then he saw not only this complete translucency but he heard a voice and then he saw the Spirit in bodily form as a dove. All of these took place in the soul of the individual who experienced them. They were not seen or heard by the crowd. Jesus is the personification of redeemed humanity, so I can use the word Jesus representing all who have had the experience. So all that is said concerning this story took place in the soul of Jesus, that is, the individual who has had the experience. It was not shared by another, not on this level.

So he said, “I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how I am constrained until it is accomplished!” (Luke 12:50). Well, all scholars interpret this to mean the crucifixion; but it is not, for the crucifixion began the whole thing; that was the death…buried in these bodies of mortals. It reminds us of that 2nd verse of Genesis, the 1st chapter, “And the Spirit of God hovered upon the water.” It’s a creative act. The word means “incubate, to hatch out.” It’s all buried there, for “We were all united with Christ in a death like his and we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his” (Rom. 6:5). So we’re all hatched out after incubation, one by one, from these bodies of water. We come out of this; this is the great flood in which all of us are inundated in a world of illusion. Then the Spirit is hovering, incubating, and then one day we are lifted up out of this body.

So we are told, “And when Jesus came up out of the water, immediately the heavens opened and then he saw the Spirit just like a dove descending upon him” (Jn. 1:32-34). Well, that was not seen. If you read the Book of Mark and the Book of Matthew it wasn’t seen by anyone but Jesus. So bear in mind Jesus only represents redeemed humanity. It’s the one body into which every being who has that experience is incorporated…incorporated into that one body, that one Spirit. It’s the only hope of man, the one hope; it’s the only Lord, not a bunch of little lords running around; the only faith by which we should live, faith in this; and it’s the one baptism culminating in the one God and Father of all. You become the God and Father of all. So here, this is baptism in the true sense of the word.

I know in 1926 when my mother came to see me in New York City she hadn’t seen my son, who was then two years old. One of the first questions she asked, “Is he baptized?” I said no he’s not. “Oh, how could you do this? Suppose he dies tonight?” I said, “What would that matter? I would lose a lovely boy, but what would it matter?” Well, she said, “He wouldn’t go to heaven. If he isn’t baptized he couldn’t go to heaven.” I said, “For your sake, Mother, next Sunday we will have him baptized.” So I arranged with this minister in the Episcopal Church to take him in and name him and he’d baptize him by sprinkling a little water on him in the name of the Father and of the Son and Holy Spirit. She was satisfied that should something happen to him and he died right then or right after, he is saved in the sense that he could get into heaven.

We are told in scripture, “Unless you are born of water and the Spirit, you cannot enter the kingdom of heaven” (Jn. 3:5). This is the water; you actually come out of this body. Your whole head opens up and it’s transparent. You’ve never seen such translucency. You don’t realize that you’re still inundated until you see the dove. The dove is not moving its wings, it’s not in any way making any effort. It’s floating. If it’s floating, then it’s on water. And you’re coming up towards that which is above you, which is floating. It simply is the fulfillment of the story of Genesis, for man is the ark of God; he’s not a phantom of the earth and the water. He is the true ark containing everything within him. There isn’t a thing good or evil that is not contained within him. So he is the ark and the dove is the symbol of the Holy Spirit.

We’re told that Noah stretched forth his hand and received the dove and brought her in unto himself. There she remained within the ark. So on his hand the dove descended. I know in my own case when the whole thing became completely translucent, I only knew that I am inundated by reason of the hovering of the dove…it was simply floating. Well, a dove doesn’t float. It was simply floating, seemed to be floating, and then I ascended and came out of the body of water. So when he came up out of the water, then the heavens opened, and there he saw the Spirit like a dove descending upon him and smothering him with love.

Well, I know in my own case, when this voice of God personified as a woman spoke and said, “He loves you” when it was so obvious this bird did love me, it’s smothering me with love. But she added, “They avoid man because man gives off such an offensive odor. And so, because of the offense, they avoid man, but his love was so great for you that he penetrated the ring of offense to demonstrate his love for you.” Well, I was reading recently a work called The Dialogues of Buddha. Now these are the alleged works, for how would anyone know what Buddha said? These are called The Dialogues of The Buddha, not just a Buddha, translated from the Sanskrit by Rhys Davids. Now, these words—and I’ve never seen them before, they came long after my own experience—he said, “In the eyes of the gods, human beings are stinking, disgusting, revolting, and are counted as such.” Well, I know in my own case, this voice of God spoke similar words, but not in that manner. She did say that “Man gives off the most offensive odor, but his love was so great he came through and penetrated the ring of offense to demonstrate his love for you.”

Well, I mean, on this level you wouldn’t think that Buddha was wrong or that she was wrong if you think of TV and all the others and the deodorants. We must really be stinking, because one of the biggest things is simply deodorants…that everyone in this world must have a guard, this guard against this, this guard against that. We really must be in the eyes of someone the most offensive. But he wasn’t speaking ___(??). We are in a world of death. We are actually put into a world of death, and came down deliberately, not because of anything we did that was wrong. For, when the whole drama is over and the incubation is over and we once more rise from the world of death, we are infinitely greater than we were prior to the descent into death. It was for a deliberate purpose. If you can call it a fault to overcome any limitations ___(??) prior to the descent, for we’re ever expanding, forever and forever. There is no limit to expansion; there is a limit to contraction, a limit to this opacity that is this water-body called man.

So here, we are all in these bodies. Have you ever seen the result after cremation of one who weighed 200, 300 pounds?—just a little bit of ash. You could put it in a small, little can, no bigger than a little Campbell Soup can. Well, where did those 300 pounds go? It was all water, all water. So here we are inundated, not in some general flood, but general humanity. And individually we are put into these garments of water. So as Paul said quite wisely in the 6th chapter of Romans, that “We have actually been buried with Christ by a baptism into death, and just as he rose by the glory of the Father, we too in newness of life” (verse 4). When this happens in a man’s world, no one here sees the results, because they didn’t even see the events that he encountered. No one saw the dove descend upon him; no one saw the transparency that he saw; no one heard the voice that he heard of the love and affection of the one who descended upon him. It was all something transpiring in the soul of the one who had the experiences. You tell it; some believe it and some do not. The majority do not believe it, for they have been conditioned to believe in Jesus as a little individual unit who lived and died 2,000 years ago. They can’t see Jesus as the personification of humanity, the redeemed humanity. They can’t see Christ as a cosmic presence buried in all; they see him only as some tiny little thing. And that is not the story at all.

So, if I cannot enter into the kingdom of God unless I am born of the water and the Spirit, well, this is the birth of the water: you finally emerge. Having been immersed in the water, your exit from that state is your birth. And then the descent of the Spirit upon you is your birth in Spirit. This then qualifies you for the new form, the new manner of existence, the new unification with Christ on an entirely different level. For God is now raised to an entirely different level by his descent into this world. So it started out one person at a time, and then the second, the third…but all form into “one body, one Spirit, one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism,” and then comes the final, “one God and Father of us all, who is above all, through all and in all” (Eph. 4:4).

So whether you were baptized or not hasn’t a thing to do with it. That is only a symbolic representation of this great mystery, and it is the final mystery, and it’s the last in the great series. So when one experiences the baptism as I’m trying to explain it tonight, at that moment you are an entirely different being. No one sees it unless they have incurrent eyes. But no one in the outer world looking at you can see it. You are one with God the Father. You are God the Father, without loss of identity. That is the great mystery. There is no absorption into that—yes, one body, one Spirit, one God—but no loss of that individuality. That is the great mystery. That was the purpose of it all. We were individualized before. We aren’t going to lose that individualization; by coming down we simply increase it. We tend forever and forever toward greater and greater individualization…that is the descent into this world of death.

But the bodies were bodies of water. And he hovers for that interval of time over the water, because something precious is buried there. It is himself that is buried there, and he simply hovers over it, he incubates it until it hatches. When it hatches, it breaks the water. It comes up out of the water, and immediately the heavens open and the Spirit, in bodily form of a dove, descends upon him. Then the voice of God, Bath qol, the woman who speaks, or she speaks the words of God, and then you hear of the tremendous love that God holds for you in bringing you out…to raise you up by his glory. Therefore, you now receive the glory that is God and become one with God the Father, remaining in the world for a short interval to tell it to those who are on the verge. But tell it to all in the written form, because what you leave behind you and they may, tomorrow or tomorrow or tomorrow, pick it up and read it. It might spark something because everyone eventually must be seeking God more than anything else in this world. On a certain level they seek money, they seek security, they seek love and affection in the world of Caesar. Well, that’s all right, but there will come a day when he will seek God more than anything else in this world. Nothing will satisfy him but an experience of God.

So this is the baptism of which I speak. If you have not been baptized, take my advice, don’t become ___(??). I did it for my mother’s sake. But if you are not baptized in the Christian faith, it doesn’t make any difference whatsoever. That is only a symbolic representation of this great dying, being buried, and being raised again with Christ. But you don’t have to go through the shadow world in order to actually fulfill the story. Hope one hope, that you may fulfill the real baptism tonight or tomorrow, whenever it is. For this is what I speak of when it comes to the mysteries of scripture.

So here, if you know of anyone who is not baptized and they are desirous…like a friend of mine one day came to me and said, “You spoke of baptizing your son…well, I have five children and I haven’t baptized them, and I would like to baptize them, and would you be the godfather? Would you arrange the baptismal for me?” Well, I arranged it and he and his wife came over with their five children and they were all baptized. It was the most dried and cut thing ever, but he wanted it, he felt it should be done. Well, it satisfied him and I was the godfather, the proxy. Now he has his five and they’re all baptized. Well, it’s all right. I was, without my consent, at the age of three or four. Mother had me baptized, and we’re all baptized, but certainly I had no knowledge of what was taking place.

But the real baptism, you are the sole actor; there’s no one but you. The crowds do announce it. Now, Luke implies in his story that others saw it, and if you read Luke carefully and take the first four verses, you will see that Luke is not telling anyone that he is going to be exact either chronologically or in any other way. He starts off in the most marvelous way: “That in as much as many have undertaken to compile a narrative of the things that have been accomplished among us, just as they were delivered to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the Word” (Luke 1:1-4). Now that phrase “from the beginning” is a translation of the Greek word Anothin. Anothin means “from above.” We find it in his argument with the great Sanhedrin, Nicodemus, when he said to him, “Unless you are born from above you cannot enter the kingdom of heaven” (Jn. 3:3). Well, that word Anothin is translated here “from the beginning.” He tells us that there were eyewitnesses and ministers of the Word.

Now he goes on to say, “Well, it seemed good to me also, having followed all things accurately for sometime past”—that phrase “for sometime past” is a translation of the same word Anothin. In other words, he’s telling you that he too has had the experience, for he’s not listening to people. He has had it, for here “from above” he knows exactly what he’s doing. But he does not claim that the story that he’s going to write is going to be an exact chronological story. He rearranges it…because he ends with the crucifixion, and he knows from his own experience it comes first. But, he’s going to tell a story. As Tennyson said, “Truth told,” or “embodied, in a tale shall enter in at lowly doors,” so you tell it on a certain level where people can accept it. So, truth embodied in a tale shall enter in at lowly doors. You tell it as though it took place here in the outer world for the whole world to observe. And the story is not true…it’s not true on this level. But the whole vast world has accepted it on that level…which has kept the story alive.

So Luke cannot be condemned for telling it the way that he did, because he addresses now the one for whom he wrote it, “That you, O excellent Theophilus”—that means “one who loves God” as you do—“that you may know the truth concerning the things of which you have been informed.” Alright, so you have been told these stories and you’ve been informed that you may know the truth. Well, he knows in his heart that the truth one day will come to the surface, but he will keep it alive by some eternal form, and you will hear it as though it took place on the outside and you will worship an exterior Christ. You will worship some outside God and live by it and go to church and do all the things that the church demands of you until one day it erupts within you and you know the truth of the story. So there is no judgment concerning what the Evangelist did.

But Mark doesn’t do it that way. When Mark tells the story he just tells it. You cannot read that first chapter of Mark and find anyone present who saw the descent of the dove, who saw the clarity of the heavens other than the one who is having the experience. The same thing is true of Matthew. But Luke, for reasons which undoubtedly are very good, told it as though the crowd watched and so did John. At least John the Baptist witnessed it…he had at least one outside. But, there is no one who witnesses this story. And that’s why when you tell it, because you still are in the eyes of those that you address the little one that they know, and you don’t make an impression. They know all your weaknesses, all your limitations, all you frustrations, everything…“And so how can you tell me that the story written of our dear Lord has unfolded in you?” because they are looking for something entirely different. They don’t know that re-enactment is constantly coming. So when he said, “I have a baptism to be baptized with; and now, just now, I simply wait for its fulfillment. Now I am simply constrained until it is accomplished.”

Well, you take the one body waiting for all to come…that is the constraint. The one Spirit waiting for everyone to awaken…that is the constraint. The one being waiting for all to that hope—“Set your hope fully upon this grace that is coming to you at the unveiling of Jesus Christ” (1Pet.1:13)…to have that one faith. Well, he is constrained until everyone was once more brought into the one body, the one Spirit, the one God and Father of all. So, baptism comes at the very end, just prior to the taking off of the garment for the last time, when at that moment you are one with actually God the Father, who is above all, through all and in all. And so where would you go after the last? You’re in all, actually in all, and once more hovering, waiting for those that you’re incubating to rise from the dead, for they are all buried in these garments of water.

So, then you read it carefully…and don’t be misled by what you’ve been conditioned to believe. For I know in my own case I was trained as my mother was trained concerning baptism. Yet because of my divorce…not my divorce, I was separated…and it was one of those peculiar feelings between my first wife and myself. She had the little boy for a while, then I got him for a while, then she got him for a while. He went back and forth like a swinging door. So when my mother came, naturally, she was concerned was he baptized? When I said no then she went through the ritual and we baptized him. She was so concerned for his Christian future that she persuaded my wife to allow her to take him to Barbados. So off she went, thrilled, and she took him down for a couple of years. Then my wife, unannounced, uninvited, appeared and demanded him. So she brought him back…again swinging doors, back and forth, until finally when the divorce was granted he was given to me. At the age of twelve, I got him outright. And that was his background. But her concern was for his Christian future, because that was how she was trained and that’s how she trained us.

So, whether you were baptized on this level or not, it doesn’t really matter. Set your hope fully on the real baptism: when suddenly the heavens open and you’re coming up out of the water and hovering above you is the Spirit of God, looking at you with the most loving expression…but floating and you are coming out. As you come out you do exactly what Noah did, for you’re only fulfilling scripture, and Noah put forth his hand and the dove lit upon him, then he brought the dove in to himself. And then the dove, from my own experience, smothers you with love, smothers you with affection; and the voice of God will speak and it does need a person as its agent. It doesn’t come in some strange way, it comes as a person. And so the voice comes as a person. Here is the woman who tells you of his great love for you…that’s why he penetrated the ring of offense. Then, you never thought yourself offensive prior to that, you never thought anyone offensive, but it is to those who contemplate the world of death a horrible disgusting place. But nevertheless, whether you were horrible to those or not, it happens this way, and this is the great mystery of baptism.

Everyone will have this baptism even though they did not have the other baptism. For the other is only a symbolic representation of this great mystery of the death of God, the burial of God, and the rising of God. He was buried in a body of water as told us in that 6th of Romans (verse 4)—also in the 12th chapter of 1st Corinthians. You’ll find it all through the letters of Paul, so much is said of his baptism. Well, one thing this baptism does for us, we lose completely all human divisions as told us in the 3rd chapter of Galatians (verse 27). After the baptism we are “in Christ,” and when we are also “in Christ,” there is neither Greek nor Jew, neither bond nor free, neither male nor female. In other words, there is no division whether that division be of race, whether it be of class, or of sex, because in this resurrection of which I speak we are beyond the organization of class, of race or of sex. For, we are one with the risen Lord who is all.

He is everything in the world. So if it’s black, he’s black; if it’s pink, he’s pink; if it’s white, he’s white; if it’s male, he’s male; if it’s female, he’s female. No matter what it is! So he’s above all divisions in this world. It’s put an end to all human divisions and you don’t see people as you formerly saw them. You do not in your dreams meet them as you formerly did…everything changes. And the only thing that hasn’t is your little body which is still limited with all the frailties, all the weaknesses of man, until that moment in time that you are relieved of it. The moment will come to depart this world, but it will come after this. For after this, you have finished the race and you’ve fought the good fight and you’ve kept the faith, and now there’s laid up for you the crown of righteousness (2Tim.4:7). The crown is the laurel leaf…not some little ___(??) in your head…it’s the laurel, the leaf of the victor who really ran the race and came out. He fought the battle, because this certainly is a battle, a horrible battle, when all day long man fights in this world. He doesn’t know the law of God, so he doesn’t know how to apply it. He wars against the shadows of his own creation.

But here, set your hope tonight upon this: it’s the final of the seven unities. We start with the great unity in the confession of Israel, “Hear, O Israel: The Lord, our God, the Lord is one” (Deut.6:4). Now in the language of the Christian, this great creed, this great shema of Israel, is that which we find in the 4th chapter of Ephesians, “the one body, the one Spirit, the one Lord.” And here it is emphasized right through, so it parallels this. But the sixth is this wonderful one concerning baptism. I can’t tell anyone the thrill when it happened to me on the first day of January 1963. It was the 1,260th day from the first to the last. The last day was the first of January 1963, that’s when the whole thing was fulfilled, the whole thing was done. Well then, now here it is six years later and I am still, like Paul, telling the story. He spends his day from morning ‘til night telling the story of the fulfillment of God’s promises to the fathers. Many believed, many did not…but he kept on telling it. And no one knows how he departed this world, for not a thing is said in the Book of Acts—which is the story from the 9th chapter on to the end—how he left the world. The churches tell you he was martyred; not a thing in scripture tells you that at all. The word martyr means “witness”—he witnessed to the truth of the Word of God. And they call it a martyr. I call nothing in my life a martyrdom. Even if I was shot this very moment, I wouldn’t call it a martyrdom. My martyrdom is witnessing to the truth of the Word of God. Man has completely misunderstood the word martyr and they call it someone who is violently destroyed from this world. It isn’t that at all. Are you a witness to the Word of God? Everyone must be in the end.

And the very end is the baptism. That’s when you’re incorporated into the body of the risen Lord as the risen Lord, without loss of identity. So you’re given a new form, a new manner of existence, a new unification. Because you are unified with Christ in death, now you’re unified with Christ in the resurrection, a complete new unification. In this unification there is no loss of identity, none whatsoever, and yet you are the risen Lord. You are God the Father, Father of all. And I will know you more intimately than I could ever know you in this world. No one in this world could ever know another as he will know that other after the resurrection. Because he knew him before the descent, he will know him after the ascent. There will be no loss of individuality, just simply a greater and greater individuality; and all back into the one body, the one Lord, the one God and Father of all.

So you set your hope this night fully upon this grace that is coming to you. And may it come now! On the other hand, I must confess from my own experience that it does take 1,260 days from the first to the baptism of which I speak. But what is that to wait? It’s only three and a half years from the first. So may the first take place tonight, because no one knows when it happens. Do not for one moment dwell upon what you have done in this world as any restraining power, because no one can tell me that he is innocent of unnumbered things of which he is ashamed. In my own case, I have a perfect example of one who could never have judged myself so kindly. I could never in eternity judge Neville that I know as kindly, as gently, as compassionately, as mercifully as I was judged to be what I became. So how on earth could I say to anyone that you aren’t qualified! I didn’t come to judge. I do not know what you did and, may I tell you, I don’t care. But don’t you put up a barrier because you did certain things of which you may be ashamed…that that is a delaying motion in your world. Forget it! Because when he shines his mercy upon you then all the past is wiped out. “Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow” (Is. 1:18).

So it doesn’t really matter. I’m not encouraging you to go out and violate your codes, no. But I’ll tell you, you have a burden that you’re carrying, that you shouldn’t carry it. You’re carrying a burden of things you have done or things you should have done that you did not do. And that burden…in your own mind’s eye you think “I’ve got to unload it first, overcome it first, before I’m qualified.” Not a thing could be further from the truth because you cannot earn the kingdom of heaven. You cannot acquire any merit towards it. So if you’re carrying such a burden, just forget it if you can, and hope…set your hope fully upon this regardless of what you’ve done. The Father, maybe this night, hovering over you…and you don’t see him because you’re immersed in water and don’t see him, but he is incubating you and warming you into this that could actually break through the surface of the water. And so one day…and I hope it is in the immediate present…that he will come.

Now let us go into the Silence.

* * *

Q: (inaudible)

A: The ad will be in tomorrow’s Times…a small little ad. It always comes out on Saturday on the religious page, and so to get within the ad, I cut the title down to Wonder Working Power, but I really mean The Wonder Working Power of Attachment. And it works miracles in this world. Everyone in the world who has succeeded, they have used it either knowingly or unknowingly. So I have the two titles. I couldn’t now tell you the second one; I’ll have to read it tomorrow morning. But I do know on Monday it’s The Wonder Working Power.

No questions? Was it that clear? I hope so! Because I couldn’t tell you anything lovelier than the story that comes just before the end…and this is the one that comes on the very last day of the 1,260 days that are allotted in scripture. On that day, you come up out of the water, and then the heavens really are rent, a translucency that has no circumference; and then you see him floating, looking at you so lovingly, in the form of a dove. Then you do exactly what you’re told in Genesis that Noah did, you stick your hand out and he lights upon you. And then comes that affection and love that is indescribable, and the voice of God speaks.

Little did I know that in The Dialogues of Buddha, which I only recently read, that centuries before our story was told, he said that in the eyes of the gods human beings are stinking, disgusting, revolting, and are counted as such. Well, that is exactly what in her own wonderful way the voice of God spoke to me, but it was the most pleasant way to describe it. She said, “Men give off such an offense, a frightful offense that they avoid them, but he so loved you he penetrated the ring of offense.” Well, the word offense would encompass all the terms used in The Dialogues of Buddha, but they are not as offensive as that one word…because it leaves you to use your own Imagination as to what are we that we offend. But Buddha said “stinking”…and this is the world of death. But one can get accustomed to anything. If you work in the stockyards in Chicago, I dare say that you could get accustomed to it and it would not be to you offensive when you went to work in the morning. You can go to any place and after a while of adjusting the thing doesn’t offend. So we are adjusted to the world of death and it doesn’t offend us. But those who are not, who are living in eternity and who contemplate the world of death, it is offensive.

Q: Traditionally, Neville, at least in my experience, water as been equated with Spirit. But your experience seems to indicate that water is synonymous with body, of this physical world.

A: I would say that Spirit to me, I equate Spirit with wind as I do in both Hebrew and Greek. You hear the wind and you can’t deny it’s a peculiar, unearthly wind. That is the current of air that you hear and you don’t think of any other element but wind. Wind and Spirit are the same word in both Hebrew and Greek. But in water…I know in my own case when I experienced it, I came up out of the water. The reason I knew it…in spite of the transparency which would not allow me to see water, I knew it by reason of the floating of the Spirit, for he hovered over me. He actually hovered. But he’s not a water bird; it’s a dove. There it was on top of the water. So in rising, I came up out of the water.

So I know that Jesus is the personification of the redeemed. But man has taken Jesus to be a single little being when he really is the corporate body…he is God himself. As the word implies, Jesus is God, it’s Jehovah, same root, Yod He Vau. But water to me is not Spirit. Water to me is simply just what is said here…the bodies are water. I am not a chemist, but I am told that almost 100 percent of the body is water. What actual percentage I do not know. But I do know I’ve seen an urn retuned to me after cremation when I cremated my dear friend Bob ___(??). Well, there was just a little handful of ash. He was a small man, but even if he weighed 300 pounds it would be no bigger. For all the others ___(??), it’s simply water. So they may put it in a big urn for you, but when you open the top you’re going to see just…like a few little ashes of cigar if you went right down to the end. It would be practically nothing left from the body after cremation. So out of the dust ___(??) and then comes the water ___(??) that second verse, “The Spirit of God hovers upon the water,” and then everything begins to come up out of the water. So he’s bringing up out of these the being that was buried with himself, as you’re told in that wonderful 6th chapter of Romans. It’s a marvelous…of course, the whole of Romans is written so orderly, the whole thing. From beginning to end it’s the most orderly of the entire works as though this, if he never wrote anything else, this is it. But then he does elaborate on it in all the other letters… (Tape ends before Neville finishes.)