The Most Practical, Yet Most Profoundly Spiritual

You know, quite often I find myself taking too much for granted. Because I read scripture all day, really, I’m inclined to believe most people do…and they don’t. So yesterday a friend said that he lives so far away and could I favor him with simply a short visit and he would drive in these many miles if I would see him. In talking to him…now he’s been coming here for quite a while, he’s a doctor, and in talking to him I discovered that I really take too much for granted. For then he said to me, “You know, now I see it, I see it clearly. I thought I saw it before, but now suddenly I am seeing what I should have seen before.”

So tonight, you’ll find this the most practical, really the most practical and yet profoundly spiritual. In the 25th chapter of the Book of Matthew you will read the words, “Come, O blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world” (verse 34).Well, to whom is he speaking? Now read on. This whole chapter is simply one parable after the other. This is now the last parable. It begins with the virgins, the ten virgins, the wise and the foolish. Then he goes into the talents, those that he gave five talents, two talents, one talent and their use or hiding of the talent. Then comes the last, and this is now explained, “For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was naked and you clothed me, I was a stranger and you received me.” He mentions all these things. “I was in prison, I was sick, and you visited me.” They are surprised, for they are now invited to inherit the kingdom prepared for them before the foundation of the world. They said to him, “When did we find you hungry and gave you food, and when did we find you in thirst and gave you drink, and naked and clothed you, and a stranger and welcomed you, and sick and in prison and visited you?” He said, “As you did it unto the least of one of these, you did it unto me.”

Now, the world is looking for some external Christ, something on the outside. Now if tonight…suppose someone in this community could be assured that Jesus Christ as an external being was present. Why, the entire social world would turn itself over for the privilege of entertaining him. Why, you would have such a battle in the social world to entertain him it would be like a slaughter. Just to give him a piece of bread, a glass of water, just to touch him, to talk to him. They’re looking for the wrong Christ. “As much as you’ve done it to the least among one of these my brethren, you did it to me.” If perchance you had a chance, wouldn’t you simply jump to serve a Christ? Well, can you believe when you do anything to anyone in this world, you’re doing it to Christ? If you don’t, you don’t know Christ. If you do not know that whatever you do to anyone in this world you are doing to Christ, you do not know Christ. You’ll wait forever to see him coming from without. He can’t come from without, he is within. “Awake! Awake!” said Blake, “you sleepers in the land of shadow, wake! expand! I am in you and you in me, mutual in love divine. I am not a God afar off, I am a brother and a friend. Within your bosoms I reside, and you reside in me” (Jerusalem, Ch. 1, Lines 6-26). But the man does not believe it. “And the perturbed man away turns down the valleys dark.” He will not believe it. He’s looking for some external savior, some external God.

So I said to my friend the doctor, whenever they come to your office seeking help, you are serving Christ. Now Christ comes disguised…it’s just disguised…he’s wearing a mask. It could be a black mask, a white mask, a yellow mask, a pink mask, a sick mask. In your case, they’re coming to you, you’re a doctor, so they’re not feeling well. Do you know any part of scripture where he was sick? No. Yet he does make the statement, “When I was sick, you visited me” Yet it’s not recorded that he was ever sick. There’s only one record where he asks for a drink…they didn’t say he was thirsty. He asked the woman of Samaria, “Give me a drink” and then she said, “You, a Jew, talk to me a Samaritan? Jews do not talk to Samaritans” (John 4:7-10). Then he explained to her the difference of the two waters. “Had you asked me, I would have given you living water from which you would never thirst.” Then he explains to her for the first time who he really is. It’s to a woman. He never really revealed who he really is until now. She said, “I know Messiah is coming, and when he comes he will lead us into all things.” Then he said to her, “I who taught you am he.” It’s the first revelation when he first reveals who he really is. It’s always to woman that he reveals it. In the very end, he appears first to woman. It is the drama as it unfolds in this world. So if you could do anything to anyone and believe you’re really doing it to Christ, you’d be amazed at what would happen in your world.

Now let me share with you two stories told me. When I came back from Barbados this year the letter was waiting for me. My friend is here tonight. But I haven’t used them, because it was not the occasion. Tonight is the occasion to use them. He said, “A friend of mine in my office—and I call him a friend, we have lunch almost every day together—he started telling me all of his problems concerning the lack of finances, how far behind the eight-ball he was. Well, I don’t always believe everything that I hear, so I appeared to be interested, but I really wasn’t. I was indifferent to all that he said. I listened as though I heard, but I didn’t hear. I heard it but it made no impression whatsoever, and I wondered to myself, how can he really believe the things that he’s telling me? But after a series of luncheons where he’s repeating this negative state of how much he owed and what he needed, I thought indifference is not really the thing, I must do something about it. So I simply began to listen and I heard him tell me that he had more than enough and enough to share. This was back in February or March of this year.

Then he said, “In either May or June of this year, he tells me that he came into an inheritance. He didn’t tell me how much, but the first thing he did he bought himself a boat that sleeps four. Now the boat, this cabin cruiser sleeps four. Then he sent his oldest son off to college. Then he had extensive repairs and enlargements on his home. Then he bought himself a new wardrobe. Then he bought himself a new car. Now the last item” said he to me in the letter, “I know he had no intentions whatsoever of buying any new car. But these things I know that he did—he bought himself a cabin cruiser, he enlarged the home and had repairs on the home, a new wardrobe, sent his oldest son off to college, and then bought himself a new car. Now I know,” said he in his letter to me, “more and more who I am, the power that is resident in me. I heard it. I ignored it, but that’s not enough, to be indifferent. I must do something about it.” And so, “As you did it to the least among one of these, you did it unto me.”

Now he said, “This is a trivial thing, but after all, we all have a measure of vanity in the world. I go every week to have my hair cut and for the longest while I’ve been going to a barber. Even though I moved away I would drive into his suburb just to have my hair cut. And then he moved away. So I thought, well now, I’ll look within my radius where I live to find what I wanted, trial and error, and finally I found a shop. Four barbers. I sat at the first chair—the owner occupies the first chair—but he would not take off enough of my hair. I would tell him every week, ‘You aren’t taking off enough. Take off more hair. I don’t want this…it’s something I don’t want,’ but he would not do it. So I watched the other barbers, the other three, what they did to the other customers, and I finally thought I would go to the number four chair. Well, number four, if you know a man’s barber shop, if there are only four chairs, the fourth is the last. Those who are not there by appointment, they send them off to number four, because he is simply working his way up to number one, if he ever gets there.

“So I saw what he did and I went to his chair. I began to talk to him and I asked him if he liked barbering. He said he loved it. He couldn’t afford to take a course, but he would like to go and mentioned a certain school—I do not know these schools—a certain school where it’s considered tops internationally and he would like to take everything that they offered.” He said, “When I discovered he really wanted to be a barber and to be the best barber, then I felt easy in doing what I’m going to do. So I then began to listen and have him tell me how he passed, how all these things happened. Well, I began to do it, and to conclude the story, he came top of his class. He went to the school, came top of the class in all the things that they taught. And then he bought out the barber shop, displaced the owner, let him go, displaced two others, brought in others.” And he said, “Today, I am only there every Saturday at 11:00, because by appointment I have made it a permanent date with me. He has a receptionist now to answer the phone. It is so busy you can’t get in, you can’t walk off the street and get any appointment, so there is a receptionist added to the service to answer the phone and make appointments. I have my date set up every Saturday at 11:00. And I did it when I was convinced that he really likes being a barber.”

Well, what’s wrong with that? Suppose there weren’t any barbers. We’d all be beatniks. How could we cut our own hair? Suppose there weren’t waiters in the world. Suppose there weren’t ladies who were willing to come in and clean our homes. That’s Christ! When Doris comes home and cleans our place every Monday, that’s Christ coming through the door. One day when she came through the door and she told me of a friend of hers who had had an accident and the car was smashed, I said, “Well, Doris, was he injured?” She said, “No, he wasn’t but the car was.” I said, “Well, forget it. You can always get a car, you can buy a car, all kinds of things, but you were made by God. Only God made you. So you aren’t injured, they were not injured, and the car was injured…forget the car! But you were not injured!” Do you now, it changed her completely.She said, “No one ever told me that.” I said, “Don’t you go to church?”—she’s a Catholic, she goes to the Catholic Church—“Weren’t you told that God made you because he loved you? He didn’t make anything he didn’t love and here you are. So man in this world makes cars, makes all kinds of things, and you can replace them. But how can they replace you, Doris?” It has completely changed Doris’ life…to tell her how valuable she is in the eyes of God that he made her.

So here, he prayed for another. Now let me give you the side benefits of this praying for another. He said, “While I imagined these lovely things for my friend, who would give me all the negative states in the world about lack of money, in the same interval while he because one who inherited this money that allowed him to buy a cabin cruiser and a new car and extensive changes at the home and new wardrobe and everything, my children, and I have three, were named beneficiaries of an estate going on all the way back seventy years.”And so, like Job, he prayed for his friends and his own captivity was lifted. Only when Job prayed for his friends was his captivity lifted, theirs too, but his own. Because if man could only realize that I dwell in every being in this world; there is nothing but myself. I am looking at myself pushed out. I can’t behold another. Every being in this world is myself made visible. So everyone who comes, if I don’t see Christ in them, that I’m only dealing with Christ, well then, I don’t know who I am, really.

So as Blake again said, “God himself enters death’s door with everyone who enters and lays down in the grave with them, and shares with them their visions of Eternity until they awake and see Jesus, and the linen clothes lying that the females had woven for them, and the gates to their Father’s house” (Milton, Plt.32, Ln40). So here, he enters, well, his name is I AM. Do you say “I am”? Therefore he entered. You couldn’t breathe if you couldn’t know that you are. Knowing that I am, is saying “I am”—that’s God. So God enters death’s door. What’s death’s door?—some cemetery? He never entered any cemetery on the outside; he entered us, my own wonderful human Imagination. This skull is where he lays down and shares with me the dreams of eternity until I awake. When I awake I will see Jesus. See Jesus as something “other”? No. I see the linen clothes and then I realize who I am. I do not see him as another.

When you actually see Jesus, you know Jesus; and to know Jesus is knowing him as yourself. You will know him because you know that God’s only begotten Son is calling you Father. When he calls you Father, then you know who you are. He said, “I and my Father are one.” He said, “I’ll tell you before it takes place, that when it does take place, you may know that I am he” (John 14:29). Now what did he tell us? He said, “I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you.” Read it in the 14th chapter of the Book of John (verse 20). “I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in your.” Well, if I am in my Father and then you are in me, well then, you are in my Father. Now he tells us in the 10th of John, “I and my Father are one” (verse 30). Then he tells us that here David in the spirit calls me Lord, calls me Father (Mat. 22:43). If he calls me Father, well then, who am I? And because there’s only one Father, and he calls you Father, then you’ll know I really am you (Eph. 4:4).

As Blake so beautifully said, “We are one.”Actually one…there’s only one Father, only one Son. Not a bunch of little Davids running around and a bunch of little fathers running around…only the Father.So if he calls me Father and there is only one Father, then I know who I am. Then he calls you Father, so “I tell you before it takes place so when it does take place you may believe I am he.” And because you dwell in me and when it takes place in you, you will know I am he. It takes place in the whole vast world, and they’ll know I am he…and I AM is the name of the Father (Eccles. 3:14). There is no other Father.So the whole vast world must awaken to this wonderful plan. When we awaken, we have extended our creative power beyond what it was when we conceived the plan, and then entered death’s door, this limit of contraction.

Now here in this audience, this small audience, I can’t tell you my thrill when night after night I hear from you as the letters come. Here, if you take into the depths of your soul in the night, called a dream…and here this lady writes me, “I no longer go with this boy, but in the dream I met his mother. She said to me, ‘What do you think of God?’ and I said, Christ is not external, it is all within.” When you carry it into dream where attention is usually the servant of vision and not its master, and yet you can bring this to the surface, your conviction is in the very depths of your being when you can answer that in the depths.

Now, a chap who has been coming only recently came down from the north, and he said, “I was having a dream just recently, and in my dream I’m trying to find someone. It is important that I find someone, who it is I do not now but I must find someone. There’s a crowd discussing…I’m not interested in the crowd or their discussion I am still feeling for this someone to bring this someone into my family. Then there’s a space in the crowd and a young man occupies the space, and pointing his finder at me said, ‘You are Father.’” Now, that’s a foreshadowing, that’s not the event, that’s a foreshadowing, a prefiguring of the event. But the mere fact that he saw the foreshadowing it is not far away. But it’s not the event; it’s the foreshadowing of the event.

And here, to get this in the morning’s mail or to get it here when I leave on my lecture night, I can’t tell you my thrill to look out and see it all awakening. Because I tell you, everything that you want you can have right here, really. Just as my friend did it for the barber, and did it for his friend; and while he was doing it for his friend, his three children became beneficiaries of an estate that has been in liquidation for seventy years. Seventy years! He made his departure from this world back in the 1890s and now in this day and age, in the ’60s, the next century, they’re all named beneficiaries of this estate while he prayed for his friend…fulfilling scripture. He is fulfilling scripture—that’s the story of Job. And may I tell him, that’s the last chapter of Job, the end of the journey. It could come to him suddenly—all of the things that have happened to us who are here this night, the three of us who I think of, who have had the entire unfolding of scripture. One, the complete beginning, the birth from above; it will not be long before he has it all. And his could happen just like this, because he, by this, is at the end of Job…and Job is the story of the whole vast world.

Job is the story of the whole vast world. In the very end, all the evil that the Lord had brought upon him was removed. Now, the Lord brought it. As we’re told in the 9th chapter of John when the question was asked, “Who sinned, this man or his father or his parents that he was born blind?” He said, “Neither this man nor his parents, but that the works of God may be made manifest” (verse 2). So everything is taking place in order, and now he’s come to the end of the journey. I’ll tell him he has. Even though he has not had the mystical experience of the birth from above, he’s at the end of the journey. How long it takes between the mystical experience of the birth and fulfillment?—three and a half years. And he’s a young man.

Now, just before I took the platform a couple came back to tell me that our friend Jan, who is here tonight, that they met her, met her in a dream. He woke in a drowsy state, but it was so impressive…“I will not return any more.” Now, she hasn’t brought it back, but they brought it back and told me. So she in the depths told them she’s not returning any more. Well, that means resurrection. For your told in the 20th chapter of Luke that when the question was asked, “Whose wife will she be in the resurrection?” and he said, “You do not understand the scriptures. In this age they marry and they are given in marriage. But those who are accounted worthy to attain to that age, they neither marry, nor are they given in marriage, for they cannot die anymore. They are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection” (verses 33-36). So when she tells in the depths of her soul to the one who heard it, and coming through to the surface of his being he has to record it. He turned to his wife and said, “Record this, I am still too drowsy but record it.” And then she records it for him…what he heard her tell him in the depth of his soul, “I’m not returning any more.”

So I say that we’re all awakening, all awakening. So what does it matter what the outer world looks like and what it really does! There are two: the outer man, the inner man. So we’re trying to patch up the outer man? We’ve been patching him up forever and forever, and you’ll still be patching him up, may I tell you. You try to be someone in the eyes of others…to go back to what I said earlier, who this night would not really give their right arm to really serve Jesus Christ! Don’t you think that if our cardinal knew tonight that he came to earth and he was in the city, being the cardinal, he wouldn’t want to entertain him? And he would take the second place…he would not put himself at the head of the table. He would see that the Lord is there. Yet he’ll pass by one in need. You don’t have to give one nickel to anyone to help; you do it all in Imagination. He didn’t give his friend one penny, the friend inherited. But he did give his friend the gift, he used his talent; therefore, he implied by what he did he multiplied the talent. He is among those that I spoke of earlier, “Come, O blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom of God.” Why? What did I do?Well, when I was hungry you fed me, when I was thirsty you gave me drink, when I was naked you clothed me, when I was a stranger you welcomed me, and when I was in prison—in this case, financially imprisoned and he was sick at heart because of the limitation—you visited me. He didn’t give him one nickel, he simply used his God-given talent, that God gave him, and he exercised it and multiplied it. He multiplied that talent. Didn’t give him one nickel and yet he gave him everything.

So this is what I’m talking about, that you simply use the talent that God gave you. Someone buries the one, he’s afraid to test it, because if it doesn’t work then what? Then he has nothing. So he buries the talent. Others have the five and they make ten; two, they make four, and they are highly commended for their investment of the talent. So you’re not called upon to share anything physically with others, but you do share it in your Imagination by seeing them as you would like to be seen were you in that position.If you were in need and someone had the power by imagining you to be affluent, wouldn’t you like them to exercise that talent? Well now, that’s what he did and that’s what happened.

So I ask you to take me seriously and simply go out and determine within yourself to be on that right side; for he separates them as a shepherd separates the flock, the sheep on the right and the goats on the left (Mat. 25:32-41). Now although you are told in a harsh way in scripture that the ones on the left who did not apply their talent are condemned to everlasting hell, forget it! It is simply remedial—that man has to be once more…he has to enter the same world. People die here but they don’t really die. They find themselves restored to life, and it’s simply remedial. So they continue until finally they take that talent and they use it. So you will die…we all die, that’s inevitable. That’s the greatest certainty in the world that everyone’s going to die. Well, why tell someone who is just about to get married, you know that eventually you a going to be parted through death. Wouldn’t that be the most horrible thing, to tell them to dwell upon that stupid thing! But that is a certainty. It has to take place. They’ve got to reach that parting way in death. If they don’t before in some other law court, they’re going to part in death. But why tell them that?

But whether they die or not, they’re going to be restored to life, instantly restored to life. As they’re restored they find themselves in a world just like this until they use their talent. That talent is not giving a million dollars because you have a million dollars to build a church or to build a museum and all these things. That’s not using your talent. When you did it to the least of one of these my brethren you did it unto me. So to give it…and put your name on a plaque; and say, “If my name will not go up on that plaque, you don’t get this building. And if you don’t house my paintings in this room and name it after me, you will not get my money.” And their paintings are atrocious…they know nothing of painting and buy it only based upon the tag. So they buy a tag and it costs $100,000 and you wouldn’t give it wall space if you had any taste whatsoever. But they will give you a million dollars if you’ll take their collection and display their awful taste. And so, because you need a million dollars you take it and name it after them, and hope that they will not long survive so you can change it. And that’s the world over.

Well, that’s not using this talent.When you use this talent, you take anyone that you see and treat everyone you see as though you’re treating Christ. Well, what joy if you know you’re actually treating Christ. So I say to my friend the doctor, when anyone comes through the door…an old lady who is really in pain or can’t pay you…Christ came in. And treat Christ! No matter what it is, just treat Christ. Then see what happens in your world, just as it happened to my friend. After all, when you have three children and they’re all minors and they must go through school and you want them to go through college, and then they fall heir to something that is now seventy years in litigation. Just imagine seventy years! And finally while he is praying not for himself but a seeming other, he was really praying for himself. So the 25th chapter of Matthew: When did we do it? When did I actually see you in what and I gave you anything? When you did it to the least among one of these my brethren, that’s when you did it to me. And when you didn’t do it, that’s when you did not do it to me; when I was thirsty and hungry and naked and in prison and you did no do it. It is just as simple as that.

So don’t put out your hand and give him anything.Quite often you’re not helping at all; you’re simply perpetuating a bum. But when you do it in your mind’s eye and see him not in that position, and wonder what it would be like if now you could pass him by and he’s well dressed and he’s affluent and he’s going off to do something wonderful in the world, helping people, in business, in everything that is marvelous, well then, that’s when you did it, as you walked by. You’re only walking by yourself. And Christ is the reality of every being in the world. There’s only Christ. So Christ is the true identity of every being in the world. So you walk by, who can you pass? So this one is a lady of the evening…that’s Christ. That’s the way she’s making her living. Alright, suppose now she actually was affluent. She could still play the same part if that’s what she feels towards life, nothing wrong. If that is how she feels towards life, play that part, but not really in the gutter. Lift her up in your mind’s eye and see her in the most glorious way. Don’t condemn anything that man is doing, for God is playing everything that man is playing. There’s nothing but God in the world. So when you see this and you live it, then you will know.

Now a friend of mine, again, she said, “I was having this wonderful dream about David, and I said to myself, I must remember this. At that moment when I said I must remember this, then I woke. I didn’t remember it and I fell back to sleep again. But it was all about David, the most beautiful things about David. Then when I was waking in the morning I heard these words, ‘Thou art like a wing’d star and I have shot thee very far.’” Now, she said, “It was not winged but wing’d. It was….she spelled it out, wing with the apostrophe and d, just as Blake would emphasize how he wants his words expressed if you should read them. He would always write it that way. Whenever you see Blake write a word and here he puts an apostrophe, rather than the e, d, he puts the apostrophe and just the d, he wants you when you read it to give it that same pronunciation. So she said, “I heard it was not winged. ‘Thou art like a wing’d star and I have shot thee very far.’” But it all came after dreaming about David. She couldn’t remember what it was, but these are the words that came through. Then she woke quickly in the morning and wrote them down.

So what a joy to me to see everyone awakening…and all, if you haven’t completely had the birth, foreshadowings. Not only your own foreshadowings but those because they’re all one bringing back to the surface what you told them concerning your not returning here anymore. And all of this is part of the wonderful drama. So I ask you to go out and try it and try it, and do what my friend did concerning the barber. He first wanted to be sure he wanted to be a barber. And I am very grateful there are barbers in the world. I’m grateful that there are every…that everything that I need there’s someone to fill it, like my Doris who comes home. She’s like a member of the family. Go into the restaurants…suppose there were not waiters, suppose there were not cooks, dishwashers, what the devil would we do? So, everybody is playing a part, but the one playing a part is Jesus Christ. There’s only Jesus Christ, there’s nothing but Christ.

So you give out of your wonderful human Imagination, just as he gave to the barber and just as he gave to his friend in the office. One now owns the barber shop and you can’t get near the place. You will call in for an appointment, but it’s always filled up because he saw him as the most successful barber. He wanted a barber in his neighborhood that would be so successful he wouldn’t have to start looking for another barber and going out of his way to another barbershop. So he anchored him there as a most successful barber having discovered he wanted to be a barber. Then his friend, going to lunch, didn’t want any part of this stupid nonsense that he was talking about. And now, if he discusses anything, he can discuss his weekend on a cabin cruiser or his journey with this new car or what he’s done with his enlarged home. These things he gave him. And the man is totally unaware of the giver. He thinks that when the money came by inheritance that was the giver. That could have gone on into litigation just as it did back in 1890, and all those who are mentioned are now dead, and now these are now named. The estate is about to be given.

Let us go into the Silence.

* * *

Are there any questions, please?

Q: I’m interested in the metaphysical interpretation of numbers and wonder where I could find them.

A: Of numbers? You mean individual numbers or the Book of Numbers? Oh, well, every Hebrew letter has a numerical value and a symbolic value, and that’s easy to discover. You can find that in any good Bible, really. The 119th Psalm gives you the letters, and you can tell…well, I do have a chart at home that I could bring where every letter has its numerical value. Now, what book could I recommend that would give it? My Bible, The Interpreter’s Bible, will give it and other Bibles would give it. The Companion Bible would give it. The 119th Psalm is acrostic. There are twenty-two letters to the Hebrew alphabet and the 119th Psalm has eight verses to a section, and each verse begins with one letter. So the first letter begins with Aleph and each verse is Aleph; it begins Aleph, Aleph for eight. Then it goes to Beth, and begins Beth, Beth for eight. Then Gimel…all the way down and Daleth all the way down. So it goes all the way through the alphabet. There are twenty-two letters in the alphabet and each section would have eight verses, so eight times twenty-two would give you the number of verses there are in the 119th Psalm. It’s the longest psalm in the entire Bible…the longest chapter I should say.

Well, each begins with the letter and it goes down and it goes all the way down to the last letter which is Tau. You will find in the King James Version over the break the Hebrew letter. The Revised Standard Version has removed it, but in the Kg. Jas. Ver. you will find the Hebrew letter over each one. Well now, that’s the order of the numbers. But they jump…for instance, Aleph is one, Beth is two, and so on, but then they jump. They don’t go eleven, twelve, thirteen, they jump from ten to twenty to thirty to forty, and that’s how they go. So you do down to the tenth letter which will be Yod, that will be ten, and your next letter is going to jump to twenty, rather than go to eleven. But I know the Companion Bible gives it, a complete analysis of numbers. And then the Interpreter’s Bible, that gives a section on numbers, especially in the dictionary of that Bible. But each letter in the Hebrew alphabet has not only a numerical value it also has a symbolic value. Like Aleph is an ox, Beth is a house, Gimel is a camel, Daleth is a door…so, he said, “I am the door.” Now that is four in Hebrew —he is the Daleth, he is the door. And “You cannot enter in any other way unless you enter through me, I am the door.” There is no other way. I AM is the only door. And you either come unto the Father through me or you don’t come to the Father. So when you come to the Father, you’ll know him only as “I am he.” There’s no other way of knowing him.

So there are twenty-two letters and there are five finals. The finals are simply magnified. But there are twenty-two legitimate letters of the Hebrew alphabet from Aleph to Tau. Tau is the symbol of the cross and its numerical value is 400. So, we’re exiled for 400 years, meaning as long as we wear this cross. We are exiled in a land that is not ours where we are enslaved. But he will bring us out of this land into a kingdom already prepared for us, where all that we had before we multiplied a hundred-fold. But we wear the cross…and these are the 400 years. Not 400 years as I would measure time, but as long as I wear the cross.

Do you have another question?

Q: Well, why do they say 400 years…it’s symbolic?

A: It’s symbolic, my dear, 400 years. They said he was thirty when he began his ministry, or about thirty. That’s symbolic. Yet you can take it within the area, it’s thirty. Yet thirty is Lamed. It’s the twelfth letter of the Hebrew alphabet and Lamed is “the ox goad.” So he goads us. He goads every person in the world. When you hear this truth you’re goaded. “I can’t believe it. You mean that I can look at you and you tell me the most horrible story of limitation, and that I can actually goad you into applying this? You want me to accept it and swallow it and live in this stuff?” And I said, if you dare to assume that you are now the one that you would like to be, and persist in that assumption, you will become it. That’s goading you…asking you to really take this challenge, that’s a goad, an ox goad. Have you ever seen them take a huge big pole and push it into the side of an ox? It’s not a very pleasant sight.

I was born in Barbados where in those days we plowed with oxen. We would yoke the ox, and then men on the field would take a pole, a regular long wooden pole, and push it right into the side of the ox and goad him into plowing. This brainless beast would simply plow and plow and plow. He would goad him and goad him. Many a time I felt like shaking him for doing that to the ox, but that is part of the training of the world, to goad the ox into moving that plow. These plows were not made mechanically perfect, you know, these are wooden things. He would get stuck and he’d blame the ox. With all of his strength he couldn’t move that and he would goad him, and the two would move forward or the six would move forward to plow it. That’s part of the world An ox-goad which numerically is thirty, and so, it’s Lamed, “the whip.” And we’re all moving by blows, blows, blows. You either believe it or you don’t believe it. If you don’t believe it, well, you may rest in clover tonight, but wait for tomorrow…you will not be in clover. The carpet is pulled from under you until you really begin to live by Christ.

So today they think, I’ve inherited a billion so I can sit down and now rest upon it. So the Czars thought so too, and so did Khrushchev. And they pulled the rug on a Khrushchev and now he comes with his little paunch and he comes to vote as he’s told how to vote. He isn’t telling anyone else how to vote, he is told how to vote. He comes…the thing who paraded, pounding the place with his shoe at the United Nations. He was the biggest aspidistra in the world. Everyone…just to touch him…touching a big, big thing. Now there he is completely ignored. He comes to the poll and he casts his little vote as he’s told to do it. So the rug is pulled from under him as it’s pulled on everyone until they find Christ…and Christ is your own wonderful human Imagination!

Good night.