検索キーワード： 著者 "Neville Goddard" すべてのカテゴリー

I think you're all aware that this is the most dramatic week in Christendom and yet I dare say that not an nth part of one percent of those who call themselves Christians really understand what it is all about. It's the story of the fulfillment of God's purpose. That's the week, the triumphant march into Jerusalem, the crucifixion and then the resurrection. And it's told as though it took place on earth. That's how the story is told. Man cannot think abstractly, so it's told in the form of a story. And man has mistaken the story for the reality.

Examine yourselves to see if you are holding to your faith. Test yourselves! Do you not realize that Jesus Christ is in you? Now, faith is not complete until through experiment it becomes experience! When you test the Christ in you and prove from experience that it works, then you have the faith. But first you must find who Christ is, where he is, and what he is. You are not called upon to test a tradition of man as something on the outside, but Jesus Christ who is in you!

"All that you behold, though it appears without it is within, of which this world of mortality is but a shadow." If you will but enter a state in your imagination, and assume its truth, the outer world will respond to your assumption, for it is your shadow, forever bearing witness to your inner imaginal activity.

Every natural effect has a spiritual cause and not a natural one. A natural cause only seems to exist. It is a delusion of the perishing vegetable memory. We do not remember these moments in time when we imagined certain states. When that imaginal state takes form we can see it with the outer eye; we do not recognize our own harvest and deny that we had anything to do with these natural effects that are taking place in our world.

I say imagination creates reality, and if this premise is true then imagination fulfills itself in what your life becomes. Although I have changed the words, what I am saying is not new. Scripture says it in this manner: "Whatsoever you desire, believe you have received it and you will." This statement goes back 2,000 years, yet even before that Jeremiah tells of the same principle in his story of the potter and his clay.

Tonight, we will take two aspects of the great mystery: true forgiveness, and the immortal eyes which see into eternity. "He said to them, 'When two or three are gathered together in my name, there I am in the midst of them.' Then Peter said, 'Lord, how often shall my brothers sin against me and I forgive them?' and the answer came, 'Seventy times seven.'"

This series is really a combination of both the law and the promise. Tonight, naturally, will be the law, and yet some parts of the promise may be woven into it. The title, as you know, is Imagination Plus Faith. So, we will have to define the words as we use them.

"In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. The Word became flesh and dwells in us." (John 1). Our physical birth is God's incarnation, for incarnation signifies the assumption by a divine being of human or animal form. When you were born your little human form was assumed by God. Christmas marks the departure from God's incarnation and your birth as God.

"He is our peace, who will make us both one by breaking down the wall of hostility, that he may create in himself one new man in place of the two, so bringing peace." This being of peace is a person, not a doctrine or philosophy. He is a person who breaks down the wall of hostility between you who are seated here and your true identity, who is a son of God, one with his Father.

Sit quietly and ask yourself who you are, where you are, and what you are. Your answers will reveal your state of consciousness: your body of belief. Paul said, "We do not look to the outer things, but to the things unseen, for the outer things are transient, but the unseen things are eternal." Your beliefs, seen by the mystic, are personified. They form a state, which completely controls your behavior. Any modification within your body of belief will result in a change in your outer world.

Paul was the first man in history to be set free. His letters, forming a quarter of the New Testament, were written approximately 30 years prior to the four gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. His first letter, chronologically speaking, was to the Galatians and began in this manner: "Paul, an apostle - not from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father who raised him from the dead." That statement, if understood, tells the entire story of salvation.

Those who experience the Christian mystery are charged with the responsibility of telling others. Their aim is the awakening of faith in God. For, as Paul, I ask the questions, "How can men call upon him in whom they have not believed? And how can they believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how can they hear unless there is a preacher? And how can men preach unless they are sent? As it is written, 'How beautiful are the feet of those who preach good news!'"

The unknown author of the Book of Luke (like all the others) wrote only of his own experiences. Turning to his disciplined mind in self-contemplation, he is Jesus turning to his disciples and saying: "Scripture must be fulfilled in me. All that is written about me must be fulfilled." Beginning with Moses and the prophets, and the psalms he interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself. And they said to one another, "Did not our hearts burn while he opened to us the scriptures?"

In the ninth chapter of the book of Mark, it is said, "All things are possible to him who believes", and in the 19th chapter of the book of Matthew we are told, "With God all things are possible". Here we see God equated with the believer. You believe you are a man or a woman. You believe you are here, but are you willing to believe you can go beyond what your reason and senses dictate? You do not have to limit your power of belief to what your reasonable mind dictates.

Faith is not complete until, through experiment, it becomes experience. God's promise cannot be tested. It cannot be earned, for it is given by grace. But your faith will be increased when you experiment, when you test God's law. It is easier to accept the Christian faith than to live by it, but you must live by it for your faith to grow!

The evangelists of scripture, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, are anonymous names of men who wrote salvation history. They introduced characters who never walked this Earth, but whose names are significant. In the book of John, we find the story of Nicodemus. Now, Nicodemus is not mentioned in any other part of the Bible, or in any historical records of the time; so we see Nicodemus was not introduced for some historical purpose. The word means "conqueror of the people; all victorious".

Tonight's title is the Family Portrait. Thirty-odd years ago, a play appeared on Broadway called The Family Portrait. It was a study of Jesus and starred Margaret Webster and Judith Anderson. They played the parts of Mary Magdalene and Mary the Mother. The central figure - Jesus - never appeared on the stage, just as it should be. The brothers appeared, bringing the news of what he had said and the reactions of the crowd and the concern of the two Marys.

I am going to ask a question which you can silently answer yourself. Have you lived this life of yours in such a way that you desire to live it again? Well, if you haven't, you'd better listen very carefully to what I will say this morning, if you have not already started, for may I tell you the next life is this life. When the eye is opened, you will see it, that man, unless he awakes and changes the tracks of this life, he walks them forever. So if you have not lived this life in such a way that you really desire to live it again, you start now to interfere with these tracks and laying new tracks.

We must go on to higher and higher levels, for that is the purpose of the teacher. I would like to look tonight into what it is to my mind, the greatest book in the world, the Bible, and show you a section with which you may not be familiar. It concerns the Seven Eyes of God, from the visions of Zechariah. He saw a stone with seven facets, and the Voice said that this is actually the seven eyes of God that reach over the entire world. For these seven eyes are really in man, for man is the earth of God.

"We have only to raise Imagination to the state of Vision and the thing is done." (William Blake) Just imagine it! That is all you and I are required to do. No matter what it is we desire, we have only to raise imagination to the state of vision, and the thing is done! Now, when the prophets of old used the word vision in scripture, they meant all of the senses, either individually or in combination.