Christ in You
PART III – DIVINE HUMANITY
Author: Joseph Benner
Year: 1918
Christ in you – Joseph S Benner – Part 3
I IN THEM
“THOU IN ME”
“SEEK AND YE SHALL FIND”
“THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD SHALL COVER THE EARTH”
THE WILL OF GOD
WORKERS TOGETHER WITH GOD
FIRST LESSON
I IN THEM
I WANT to unfold to your understanding something of the meaning of God immanent and God transcendent. God and man are not separated, and never have been. After our lesson on the mind and soul you are quite aware of the oneness and unity of life. You are in every living thing. You are round about everything that is. You cannot separate yourself from anything that lives, moves, and has its being. You are in the rock, the crystal in every bud and twig, in all places at all times.
You have always been. The sense of separateness is false understanding, and brings only confusion of mind.
Is not this feeling of unity more than a relation to God? Is it not the One speaking and breathing through all forms—all Creation—the creator and the created? How sayest thou: “Show us the Father?” “He that hath seen Me, hath seen the Father.” Oh, priceless truth, now our privilege and joy to enter into! “I and the Father are one.”
How are we going to live, so that this knowledge may be used for all? You dwell in the uttermost parts of the earth, you have your responsibility there, here, and everywhere. You are not without a witness, and you know nothing but the one good, one will, not a union of spirit with parent spirit, but an at-one-ment.
Knowing only one Lord—one God—one Christ—this is not a mystery to you any longer. The race is unfolding, and you are unfolding; and just as you yield to truth and love, so all are helped. I cannot put this too strongly, for in it is the answer to all the seeming mystery of pain and the sorrows of life. Surely He hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, and is doing this even now.
Will you reverently consider why you seem to be a limited part? Is it not because you have looked upon God as apart from yourself, thought of the indwelling Christ as Jesus of Nazareth? Do you not see for yourself how childlike has been your understanding? Your dependence upon some one, something, proved your childlike consciousness; and even as a child learns to say: I am myself, so will the whole human race say, as we now say together: I in you and you in Me. I am Myself. This understanding is putting Christ on the throne, lifting Him to where He deals with error and sin as a thing outside Himself. The truth dawns, and the inner Christ reveals to man his birthright, his true power, and henceforth he becomes one with, for and through all. Think for a moment how you dishonour Jesus as teacher if you hold Him responsible for the forgiveness of your ignorance. Hath He not said: All that the Father hath is yours, is mine? He hath also given you the key, the power of appropriation by faith.
SECOND LESSON
“THOU IN ME
KEEP in mind the previous chapter, and you will be led back to it and find that all your life is going to teach you that the God-Man Christ is all in all. This truth has to be made one with the outermost limits of creation, just as a leaf learns by drawing from its source its oneness—more than unity—with the tree. There is a condition of consciousness in everything that lives. The real you knows everything about itself, but the leaf or seeming unit can only learn slowly, by its life of dependence and unfoldment, its own place and meaning. Every atom contains the whole. The whole of God is in the blade of grass. Try to banish the thought of distance or space, and know that what you see contains within it its true life; the thought is within every expression.
Your first and lowest consciousness of life was movement. Your highest is love. The seed thought is always hidden within every phase of life through which you merge; it moves, quickens, and brings forth seed (thought). This is true of all creation. Your first movement was in secret, yea, in the lowest parts of the earth. This is symbolized in every physical birth; the whole of creation is manifest to the seer. The truths of life are simple and open. I do not wish to cause you vain speculation, but we desire to be of real practical use to you at the stage of unfoldment where you now are. However low in the scale of evolution—that is, spiritual evolution—a soul is, it can be perfect of its kind, and should be free from sin, sickness, and death. This is our glorious message for you. We would have you know yourselves. Get back to the cause.
Why are people suffering and sinful? Because they willingly choose to dwell in a divided consciousness of good and evil. Whoever for even a second has seen that there is no evil, has passed from death to life. He has entered the Heaven of Heavens, he has seen God. The Fall is a thing of the present. It is a false understanding.
Why have we tolerated this consciousness, seeing that God cannot fail? The real you has never tolerated it. There is only one consciousness really; it is deep within yourself all the time; it always has been, and now is around you; and because of it and its livingness you are shaking off the shadow of ignorance—a condition of growth—and rising into pure being. In the great process you will know that sin and ignorance are less than the morning mists now being dispelled by the inner sun, the fire of the love-life. To become aware, while in the shadow, of the reality of this one true life is the solution of everything, for with this true understanding you must know that all is well for ever. That you are one with this movement means that you are emerging into fulness and freedom. See how it is lifting the whole race! We see its potent healing power everywhere; we rejoice with you. You are entering into the kingdom of life and light.
Death and sin are conquered now and for ever.
In our next lesson we will discuss the way of ascent from your present condition.
Peace and joy and the sweet fellowship of the heavenly host be yours, as you consider these truths.
Nothing is impossible to him that believeth.
THIRD LESSON
“SEEK AND YE SHALL FIND”
THE question may be asked: Why are so many people still in bondage even with this knowledge? We are in earnest, and are willing to be and do what we can. It is good for you to give your heart to the understanding of wisdom. Knowledge is not understanding. To know God we must be God-like. Because we long for perfection, we are already at its beginnings. Do not regard any of these things as distant or outside yourselves: that is the spirit of separateness. Let us meet the seeming difficulties together, the weights and hindrances of your everyday life, for the truth will set you free.
Many of you seem to be in bondage to the climate, to lack of heat or to unevenness of temperature. Your bodies are subject to many influences. I too suffered in this way, and I would gladly help you with my experience. How could I understand that what I needed was within? I thought it necessary to be warmly clad, to avoid chill, and to take food to sustain life. Ah! if I could only show you for a minute a spiritual being who has passed this stage, you would know beyond all doubt that Christ is the bread of life, the true daily bread, nourishing both soul and body, able to supply your every need.
As you awake in the morning you look outside and see cold; now you both see and feel cold. You must see before you feel a truth or a falsehood; this is a law. We shall straightway begin to reverse the order. You will look within and see only God, you will feel and understand God. Your feeblest effort in this direction must have its reward.
Read this truth into every detail of the day, and live in the assurance that God cannot fail. See reality, God, behind every shadow. As you go into the outer, cast out fear. Be not anxious, and the very elements will be at one with you.
This is the rule of the spiritual. Your whole supply for every need is within yourself. The day is at hand when man, on the earth, will be a true spiritual being. Even now you have expressed yourself in the present phase, and the God-Man is seeking a higher form of manifestation; but all must co-operate, and you are learning the laws of the spiritual kingdom for this end, that sorrow and sighing may flee away, that the sons and daughters of God may hunger no more. Your responsibility is great, but your work is for eternity. Do not lose heart. Be of good courage. The work may seem slow, but God is in it. The result in yourself will be first a sense of command, and later you will smile at your old fears and limitations, for you will be at home and at rest in any climate or circumstance.
Do you not see for yourself how your thought has been concerned with your dependence upon material warmth, food, and sustenance? Later you will put these in their true place, and life will open out its treasure. At present your whole time and thought are given to caring for the daily outer life. Think what the spiritual being with its higher faculties could enter into if you gave half as much time and thought to the true life!
Live simply. Take no anxious thought for the things of today. Let the dead bury their dead. Follow ME. I am within.
FOURTH LESSON
“THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD SHALL COVER THE EARTH”
THE day of the Lord is at hand, is here. Truly the Lord Christ has come in great glory. The signs are in earth and sky. Lift up your heads. The King of glory has come in. This is the wonder, the silence of this new birth.
What does it mean for you? The consciousness of Christ is dawning in every lowly heart. The supreme man Christ is on the throne, and darkness is under His feet. God tells this blessed secret to the dwellers in the innermost, that they may carry the tidings to the very outermost. The Lord our God is One Lord, even Christ. There is something for you to do in this work, but all good, all knowledge is within oneself. The real need for help is great. We see souls imprisoned in limitations, thirsting for living waters. My people would die for lack of understanding. Man is divine, and God is ever in the midst.
Your true consciousness is the knowledge that One and One only fills all space. When you silently think of this you will know that in this understanding, in this continual realization, true freedom lies. You will cast off everything alien to this; nay, you will transmute the very sins and ignorances into the pure gold and wealth of life. These must be the healing of the self by the Self, the forgiveness, the whole redemption from your Christ, your indwelling Lord. You are in all and through all, in every place, since hidden within yourself is the centre of all worlds.
As you write these words we are near you, and many would like to come back and tell you the glorious news, to open your eyes that you may see in very truth—”There am I in the midst.” So far you have understood clearly the one Self of all, when you have looked within, but now we will try to look out upon seemingly separate personalities and still see the One only. To recognize the one Lord in all is to lift them into the consciousness of the Christ, and this is just what the spiritually taught are doing. You must each do your part where you are.
Help souls to cast out fear. Fear is one of your foes. In one way or another you allow this false condition to cloud your vision and drag down your spirits. Get rid of6 fear for yourself and for others. There is absolutely nothing to fear. The indwelling Christ is Lord supreme.
Remind yourself constantly of your true nature. Declare that the light dispels darkness, and see this law in action. I no longer, but Christ the Lord God omnipotent reigneth. See what this little enemy fear has done, a very fox, spoiling the vine. In your immediate environment, the body, fear affects its circulation, digestion, and gastric juices. I only use these words so that we may swiftly ascend to a higher plane. Fear not. There is none other God but ME.
Once rid the race of fear; and love, joy peace, would spring up. Now this must positively be done in each one of you. In fact, the universe has been conquered when you have won. Your own Christ has conquered sin and death.
Face life and circumstances with the certainty of the I AM with you and in you. Only thus will you honour God. Try from this moment to forget the small you, false and shadowy, and cast it off for ever. Here I would say that only love is Lord. You can fill the whole mentality with love thoughts, so making a rich soil for the growth of good. You have nothing to fear. You are in God and God is in you.
Cleanse your hearts, and not your garments. From within must the true forgiveness arise, and not from without. Be clean every whit, whole and perfect. Be positive; know that you must make your circumstances, and not wait for events and then act. You are blind and miserable till your inner eyes, “the eyes of11 the understanding, are opened.” “It is high time to awake out of sleep.” Use these God-given powers for the good of every one. There is nothing outside God. God and man are one. Confidence and trust are the antidotes for anxiety and fear.
FIFTH LESSON
THE WILL OF GOD
WHAT a long time it takes us to understand the will of God!
You often use the phrase, “I have made up my mind.” This has a great deal of meaning, if you pause to consider it, for in that very process you begin to bring into manifestation the desire of the mind. Thus you say: “I see a wrong condition in my mind, my mentality, my circumstances; I will make up my mind, this shall not be.” You mentally set in motion the forces of the universe, seen and unseen, to accomplish your will.
You see, it is impossible to live carelessly or lightly on the spiritual plane, and these lessons would be of no use to any one who has not been aroused to true spiritual consciousness, the consciousness of the divine humanity, the I AM. How can the will of God be expressed except through life, through humanity, in the hearts and minds of beings who exist in Himself? Therefore know that the will of God is operative in yourself.
Then how is it that the things we will and desire do not come to us, you may ask.
Because deep down in all your desires, thoughts, and purposes there is an undercurrent, as it were, the thought within the thought, the desire within the desire, and what you most truly desire is always at the root of all your fleeting impressions and moods of the moment. Have you not often felt that the very thing you desire is not for your eternal good? Well, that very glimmer, that faint suggestion, is from the self of you that is making your life. You know within yourself the very quality, the very experiences best suited for your highest good. Once you give full play to this subtle suggestion behind all your thinking, you are one with the will of God, which is your own will. This is the voice of the spirit, heed its whisperings. Do not sin against the Holy Ghost, or you will lose eye and ear and become blind and deaf. On the plane of the senses this is most disastrous, because you are just where you are to do the will of God. It is your meat and drink. So delicate and so subtle is this holy inner voice that you must be very quiet and meek, if you would hear it. Let Jesus speak to you again and again, read the Gospels until you are led more and more to remove the veil which hides you from your true self. I have only answered your question, but hope to speak to you again on this subject.
Peace, Heavenly Grace. God lives in you, He is your life.
SIXTH LESSON
WORKERS TOGETHER WITH GOD
THERE really is no such thing as space. For you, as for us, the spiritual law of attraction operates, but your consciousness of limitation, of distance, makes you blind and deaf to a great extent. At a later period of your unfoldment, to desire is to possess. Thus, if we wish to see you, our thought is a vital force, we are in your actual presence immediately, we are so close to you. Thought is so potent, so swift; every thought of ours becomes an outward expression; although you may not see it, you cannot think without a result. Be very careful that you think from the spiritual plane. The phenomena of time and sense are like children’s toys to us. They will be discarded as you dwell in the higher consciousness. What divides us now is simply and only that you are not dwelling in, not breathing, seeing, hearing from the spiritual plane. Every effort to rise helps another; but see to it that you are watchful, vigilant, purposeful, and loving.
You partake of the inflow and outflow of the breath of God. This is best described as waves, impelled by an irresistible law, and your whole planet is continually being swept over by this mighty healing breath. I am explaining this for purposes of healing, and hope to explain later that there are periods of outflow and recall. We wish you to breathe forth your healing currents in unison with the almighty good. Your cooperation is necessary for individual needs.
Noon and sunrise are good times for raising conditions of false consciousness into the great One, especially the conditions known to you as feverish and nervous, or the consciousness of weakness. Other cases I hope to explain as I see you coming into contact; but previous to the expression of your desire for the healing of the body and a change of circumstances, breathe out a strong positive assurance of mans unity with God. Your highest good is to banish the idea of separation from God.
Bands of us are striving to influence men and women to free your land of asylums, reformatories, prisons, and similar places. Their inmates could be helped and healed so much more easily if they could be brought in contact with those who have learned the great truths we come to teach. We do not give these lessons for any other reason than to help your world, which we love. We hope to be of practical use in freeing your world from suffering, which is caused by ignorance. By this we do not mean that you escape discipline, but how can you begin to learn your real purpose for being if you are in bondage to false conditions? God did not purpose that your life should be spent in overcoming false conditions. He has a magnificent purpose, a part for you to take in His work.
God bless you and keep you alive unto Himself and dead to sin. Amen
SEVENTH LESSON
THE CREATIVE ENERGY
IT is the silent, creative great One, dwelling in the abyss of each, in whom we live and have our being. I am being taken within the centre of life. Again I am in the centre of power, but this time I remember that I have always been. The process of creation is always present, it is not a past series of events. There is no sense of past or future, but of a continuous present. I have already described the great, silent energy and the lack of colour and sound when in the centre, but this time the desire of life is upon me, the sense of lack. I desire beauty and colour. I am the positive one, and the virility and strength of the atmosphere around me lacks its opposite.
With the desire I will, and soon the will, which is the producer, directs my forces. There is a new power about me. I am surrounded by a great arc of light, and I become conscious of a heart within myself. I love, I will! The arc, which was of a varying shade of gold, slowly becomes roseate and glowing; the electrons of light are no longer colourless, but softened and shaded by pink. Love expresses the beautiful in colour. I am answered in myself. I am both positive and negative, male and female; and out of this consciousness, beauty of form and shade seem born; yet as I write this I know that perfection has always been, though I bring it into evidence by my will and desire. Colours surround me, and millions of shades seem to evolve from three—red, blue, and yellow. They harmonize and blend, and the place seems full of sound and form. I have desired, I have willed. The colours emit the sound, and soon I see the forms of flowers. These colours cannot be seen on the physical plane, though they are full of light and breath. As you see, this is extremely difficult to describe, as also for you to imagine, but the colours breathe and live, and are inter-related to sound and form. There seems no division between the moving shades and the appearance of elegant and delightful shapes. Truly I am in a place of beauty, which is born out of the two in one. There is a sense of completeness, a harmony of many parts. The great energy is softened by beauty, and love is the breath of this life.
The teacher speaks. You could not bear this for long, and the meaning will unfold to you. One single drop of dew contains what you have seen with the eye of the soul. The Creator is in the atom. Yes, truly, the whole of God is in the blade of grass. By this know that space is a meaningless word on the true plane of being.
Everything is in the universal soul; the Christ mind alone comprehends. The one Self is creative, having both natures.
In heaven there is neither marrying nor giving in marriage. This is the highest consciousness of Christ.
EIGHTH LESSON
GOD THE ONLY LIFE
I WANT to tell you how real, how true it is, that nothing exists outside God, and I can best help you by the description of an experience of my own. Life both here and there is a constant unfoldment, always fresh, a continual revelation.
I have already told you of my entrance into the spiritual world, and now may I speak of one of my steps into a greater fulness of God, into life more abundant? I had learnt many things, the spiritual faculties were quickened, and I was always learning that our especial need is to have greater capacities for God, to do as Paul says continually—”Yield yourselves unto God.” It was most wonderful to discover that my thought instantly produced an outer environment; in fact, my thought came into being at once. For instance, I desire quiet for meditation—I am instantly in a grove and all is stillness, inviting repose. I think music—and at once I hear sublimest strains, ravishing and melodious. I am satisfied—the music gently ceases. Truly, eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, all that awaits us when we are in God. I desire to help, and I am sent to people who are climbing up; and oh! the joy of helping them to their own. This is my longing desire for you. Be ye holy (healthy), for I am holy (healthy), says God. Happiness and health and all good is God. There is no secret initiation, no mystery in God. You only need the heart of the child to enter the kingdom. It is true in a beautiful sense that there is nothing hidden which shall not be revealed. All things are open and are yours. You are not always able to understand because you are not sufficiently evolved; but never forget that all is yours, for ye are God’s.
Even this exquisite joy around me, even the knowledge that my thought made me, did not seem enough, and I longed intensely for God above all else, until I realized that nothing but the Infinite could satisfy me. This thought, this desire, was not answered in the usual way, but one of the shining ones who go in and out among us stood beside me and said, “Are you ready for the cleansing waters? Your prayer is heard.” At the same time the spirit within repeated the familiar words: “Ye shall surely find ME.” “Yes, yes,” I said, “all for God,” and I fell on my knees in an attitude of prayer. Then began the cleansing by the waters from the River of God. From within there arose a cleansing stream, that made me aware of its workings in my heart. My limitations must go. I, who thought I possessed relatives, friends, home, must learn that God must enlarge my heart with greater loves, more friendships.
There are no limitations where God is, no claiming of personalities. God is all. The waters were bitter, but you must do this for the great gain. Your ideas and thoughts are not God’s thoughts, nor are your ways God’s ways.
Ah, it is true, and it will be your eternal good to know this now. Everything that seemed peculiarly my own was simply swept away until I was as nothing, and longing only for God. The Angel spake again with great love and tenderness—”Thou shalt know thyself by this test: art thou content to be nothing, and know nothing?” With great faltering I answered “Yes.” The reply came, “Know God, and thou shalt BE.” I think there was a long time of quiet. I seemed to become conscious of fresh surroundings. I seemed in the centre of the worlds, in a place of strength; I was conscious of the heart of love, far above my understanding—the rest and comfort of a great strength, and yet I suppose the best description for you is that I seemed in the atmosphere of God—knowing nothing but God—wanting nothing but good; and yet aware that it would take me aeons to understand, to know and grow in this heavenly consciousness. Soon I saw our earth, I saw the blindness of men; though dwelling in this wondrous love they were content to live in shadow, in pain. “Lord, I must go to them, tell them,” I thought. The voice of the Spirit spoke within—”I am God, and beside me there is none else.” “Amen, Amen, Amen,” I answered.
To dwell consciously in God is to inbreathe and outbreathe harmony and love. I am without limits, I revel in freedom, I cannot think sin, sickness, or death except to remove them; they have become to me less than vapour. God is all in all, and no one can be outside God. Even your very stones and rocks are interpenetrated by the God-life. “Awake, thou that sleepest, arise from the dead”; “Christ is the light of the world.” Oh for a thousand voices to proclaim the truth that nothing is but God! Rise out of your false, shadowy consciousness and mount into the consciousness of love. “Truly He maketh my feet like hinds’ feet.” I know that in me the Christ has ascended to His Father; henceforth “the Father and I are one.” In me the Trinity of the Three are one, and yet three.
Spirit is substance, nothing can be real except God; but joy of joys, as I met relatives, friends, and dear ones, I knew, how more than ever they were mine beyond thought of loss or separation! All I had lost was the fear of losing. God’s thought is the only reality; the world is God’s thought. You are yet to learn that all realities are in God’s thought. You are to express them. Rise, dear heart, and take your place with us, that you may know God only, just where you are. Love never faileth. Begin now. This is the true way to bring in light and love, conquering death by the sacrifice of the body of sense, to rise in newness of life.
I will come again. I have told you of this experience only to help. I would not have done so unless you were able to apprehend it. It will be meaningless to the seekers of wonders and signs.
You must let self utterly melt away in order that Christ may come to His own.
NINTH LESSON
HE GAVE HIMSELF
AS you unfold in the consciousness of God, many inexplicable things become clear. One is the purifying process of pain. It is safer and grander to suffer, because, rightly viewed, it is sure to perfect the soul. Have you not sometimes felt the shallowness and the emptiness of joy? I tell you it is impossible to know true joy—the heights of joy—until you have known corresponding depths of pain. This is the process called “the refiner’s fire.” It is cleansing; it is good, and not evil. True joy—the joy of Heaven—should saturate the whole being, and touch the inner consciousness with a sense of its eternity, its everlastingness; and the suffering has prepared a place that joy may enter in. Learn the wisdom in these words—
“As sorrowful, yet always rejoicing.”
Now I would show you the difference between necessary suffering and useless pain, which is disorder; likewise between true joy and transient false joy. Divine humanity can attain the throne of the universe only by the way of the Cross. This is the way of sacrifice. Do not too hurriedly dismiss the pearl in the old orthodox teaching, it served its day and generation most efficiently. When man thought of himself as a separate and outside unit, only this teaching could help his unfoldment, so thank God for the ladder of dead creeds—dead selves. But now the divine Man is arising; He has burst the old bottles; the new wine of life cries out for space and freedom, as the sap does in the tree. Beware, for here is your danger; the suffering begins, which shall make the path by cleansing and burning up all that hinders the uprising of the divine in earth, air, and sea. The Son of God is come, and your very experiences of pain and suffering are the heralds of His approach.
There is much more to be revealed to you, but we leave these messages with you to help you to live and express the highest within you, knowing that Christ will perfect that which concerneth Him, and ye are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.