In this lecture, Neville Goddard explores the metaphor of walking on water as a demonstration of the power of the human imagination to create reality. He explains that water symbolizes life and psychological experience, and that by changing the facts in our imagination we transform them into spiritual truth. Through examples of affirmations and imaginative acts—such as revising another’s words or pre-visualizing a completed task—Goddard shows how belief in unseen outcomes leads to their physical manifestation. He emphasizes that there is no limit to creative power when one refrains from doubting or sinning against the Holy Ghost—defined here as limiting one’s own imagination. The lecture connects biblical stories, such as Jacob removing the stone and Jesus turning water into wine, to illustrate the principle of altering perceived facts through faith. Ultimately, Goddard invites listeners to continuously practice imaginative acts—constructing scenes of fulfilled desire—to prove and experience the divinity within themselves.
The Bible is addressed to the Man of Imagination, he who is immortal and cannot die. “The Eternal Body of Man is the Imagination. That is God Himself. The Divine Body, Jesus, we are his members.” (William Blake)
Ted Kennedy recently gave a eulogy for his brother, in which he quoted a passage from George Bernard Shaw. The thought was this: “Some men see things as they are and say, Why? I dream of things that never were and say, Why not?” When you think of your birth into this world as an act of God, can anything be impossible to God? Not knowing how or why you are here, you sin against the Holy Ghost when you dare to put a limit on the power that brought you here! There is no sin against the Holy Ghost other than man’s belief that something is impossible to his own wonderful human imagination! I want you to go all out! To put no limit on God’s creative power. To imagine that which is unimaginable and to walk on the water, through faith.
Water symbolises your acceptance of life as psychological, and its drama as taking place in the Imagination. When you cease excusing yourself or anyone for life’s experiences, and begin to rearrange the structure of your mind to feel your desire is fulfilled, you are walking on the water. Scripture speaks of the stone, the water, and the wind. Accept the facts of life and you are stepping down on stone. Change the facts in your imagination, and you have turned them into psychological truth, which then becomes a spiritual experience. When you live by this principle, you are walking on water, towards your birth from beyond.
Let me now share some experiences of a friend who practices the art of walking on the water. In his letter he said: “There is a lady in my office who was constantly talking about the absence of decent, eligible men in her life, claiming they were all riffraff and no good. Six weeks ago, while driving home from work, I revised her words. I heard her tell me she was dating a marvelous man and sharing the wonderful things they were doing. Recently this lady was so glum, I reminded myself to revise her words again, so I did. Yesterday she spent twenty minutes telling me of the perfect gentleman she is now dating. He must be terrific, for this lady is now walking in ecstasy.”
Then he continued, saying: “An associate asked me to write a news review for his client. I gathered all of the material together that I would need, put it in a folder and placed it on my desk, which was piled high with pending work. Then one Friday my associate said: ‘My client wants to see me next Monday at 9:00 A.M. in his office,’ and I realised that I must produce the news review at that time. Immediately I sat down and imagined it was 5:00 P.M. My review was completed, read by my associate, and approved. I heard him say: ‘It is just fine.’ Satisfied with that scene as my end result, I found the folder, sat down at my typewriter and typed four pages, as everything flowed smoothly. At 5:00 that afternoon my associate stopped by my office, read the report, and said the exact words I had heard him say in my imagination: ‘It is just fine.'”
When you truly believe that imagining creates reality, you will know there is no fiction. How can there be fiction when imagining is forever creating its reality? You may hear something you do not like, but because imagining creates reality what you heard was first imagined, or it could not have happened. When you revise the hearing by stopping the action and rewriting the script you are walking on the water, imagining the reality you desire to hear and appear in your world.
My friend continued his letter, saying: “There are certain things in my life I do not understand. Last Sunday, as my wife, our youngest son, and I were planting summer flowers, I realised that I was experiencing – in detail – what I had dreamed as happening last winter. At the time I thought the dream must have been symbolic, but not knowing the symbolism of flowers, I dropped it. Now I do not understand the relationship between a night dream – which I did not control, and last Sunday’s planting – which I did control.”
Every event in life contains within itself something beyond its physical experience. Flowers symbolise the growth of plantings. During winter, when nothing grows, he planted seeds, which he will harvest not only in the world of Caesar, but also in the world of the Spirit, as we all do. I urge you now to use your imagination and walk on the water. Plant the seeds of desire in the depth of your soul and allow them to flower on earth. If you do not see their harvest immediately, believe what you did, for it will come whether you recognise it or not. And do not sin against the Holy Ghost by saying something is impossible, for God is your own wonderful human imagination and nothing is impossible to imagine.
When someone tells you something, although you may deny its truth or possibility, you must imagine in order to understand their words. Unless, of course, they speak in a foreign tongue, then all is nonsense. As Paul said: “I would rather speak five words with understanding, than ten thousand words that cannot be understood.”
Don’t think of the reasons why you cannot have your desire; simply think you already have it! If you tell yourself it is not possible, you are sinning against the Holy Ghost.
I know of no limitation to the power of God. David is described in the Book of Samuel as ruddy, with beautiful eyes, and fair of skin. If you judge from appearance, then certain races would be excluded – but David is not of this world. David is he who rises in us because of the descent of the seed of God. Whether you are Caucasian, Negro, or Oriental, Christ – God’s seed – descends and plants itself in you. And when union between that descending, higher seed and that which is only an animated being takes place, you are individually lifted into a supernatural world, where you know yourself to be the father of God’s only begotten son, David.
I urge you to use your imagination for everything that is lovely and loving. I don’t care what your desire may be – your imagination will give it to you, for the human imagination is the divine body the world calls Jesus. Because you can imagine and I can imagine, we are members of that one divine body, and all things are possible to him. There is not a thing impossible to God. All you need do is imagine its fulfillment!
Faith is an experiment which ends as an experience. Experiment by believing you already have all that you desire, and you will have the experience. Test yourself like my friend did. He experimented with the thought that the lady had a wonderful boyfriend. He then imagined hearing her tell him about the new man in her life. Then his experiment became her experience. You are the center of the world in which you live. A seeming other is only an extension of yourself, for the center of your being is protean. It is he who plays the parts of all the seeming others. I challenge you to experiment with a new or better job, a husband or a wife, a new car or home. Don’t try to analyse your desires or blame yourself, for the moment you do, you discover unnumbered things which are unlovely, and the moment they are thought, they are formed.
No one is without sin. At some time everyone has mentally coveted or stolen. Describe a man in unflattering terms and you have stolen his good name. Everyone is guilty; therefore, do not analyse yourself, for if you do, you will miss your mark. To worry about what you may have done, is to waste your creative power. You will reap the tares as well as the wheat, as every imaginal act fulfills itself. But start now to plant something lovely – not only for yourself, but for your neighbour, friend, or child. Fall in love with the idea that he is happy and secure. Feel the satisfaction that comes when one recognises his harvest, for if a harvest is not recognised, there is no satisfaction. But when you do something consciously and see your harvest, you will receive enormous satisfaction.
Prove your thoughts have creative power by consciously imaging constantly, and walk on the water. No matter what happens in the course of a day, revise it. Make the day conform to what you want it to be, and you are walking on the water.
Genesis tells the story of Jacob, who saw a well covered with a stone. Removing the stone, he drew water for his flock. And when he put the stone back, everything appeared to remain the same as before, so no one knew who had rolled away the stone and removed the water. In the New Testament, Jesus performed his first miracle by filling the stone jars with water and drawing out wine.
Facts blind the I of imagination. I have come to cure this blindness and show you how to remove the acts of nature. The woman in the office shared her facts, as well as the man who had been bawled out. Discovering imagination to be his well, my friend removed those stone facts from his mind, and drew the truth he desired to hear out of his imagination and placed it in another vessel – another fact. Pour water into any container and it will not care what shape or size the vessel may be. Freeze the container and the water will have taken on its shape. So if you remove the stone and draw out the water, you can place it into any shape you desire and it will externalise itself.
Do not let a day pass without practicing the art of walking on water. Every time you use your imagination lovingly on behalf of another, you are mediating God to the seeming other. So many people use their imagination un-lovingly, yet they are still mediating God to that other.
Millions of people believe that someone has placed a curse on the Kennedy’s. Do you know that such powers do exist, because imagining creates reality. William Butler Yeats once said: “1 will never be certain it was not some woman treading in the winepress who started the subtle change in men’s mind. Or that the pressing out of which so many countries were given to the sword, did not begin in the mind of some shepherd boy, lighting up his eyes for a moment before it ran upon its way.” Who knows who, this night – feeling hurt and betrayed by a friend – will set his thoughts of anger and revenge into motion, with no thought of regret. Perhaps he does not know the art of forgiveness or have the desire to forgive, thereby allowing his thoughts to move and build and build until they come to their inevitable end – by outpicturing themselves in his life. But as George Bernard Shaw said: “Some men see things as they are and say, Why? I see things that never were and say, Why not?” I tell you the incredible story of Jesus Christ, the pattern which man must follow in order to escape eternal death, and say, Why not?
How can we who were physically born by the grace of God, yet cannot make one hair on our head or fingernail grow, dare to put a limit on God’s power? If the grace of God gave us physical birth, cannot that same power give us spiritual birth into a higher world? The promise is: “You shall be born from above.” If God makes such a promise, he has the power to keep it. And he does, through his gift of vision. Born of flesh by a power beyond ourselves, we are destined to be born into a spiritual world by a power beyond ourselves, because God’s seed descended and united with us. It was planted by a creative act; and when that seed is fertilised, it erupts, the pattern awakens, and we move into an entirely different age. God’s pattern has erupted in me. I am telling you my story in the hope that you who hear it will believe and prove its truth for yourselves. I have told you of Caesar’s law, taught you how to walk on the water and use this psychological law to change your world – not only for yourselves, but for others.
No one needs to remain behind the proverbial eight-ball if he knows this truth. There is no need to beg or ask anyone for anything, for everything lives in the human imagination, ready to appropriate and be made visible.
Everyone will be born from above, for everyone is God and there is nothing but God. No one can fail; but God’s story must be heard and believed. So God sends himself as the messenger, by choosing an individual and impregnating him. The person may or may not know what is happening, but in the perfect interval of time, birth will take place. Everyone here is called for a purpose. If you have not been united with this seed – wait, for it is sure and will not be late. There are those who have been conscious when they received the seed. Others have not; but when the child is born does it matter whether the moment of conception is remembered or not?
It’s all the fulfillment of a perfect plan within God’s eternal body, each filling his specific order. There are those who will be the apostle, others the prophet, still others the teacher, the helper, and the healer. There are different levels in the body of God, but it doesn’t matter, because in that body we are all one.
Take me seriously. When you know what you want in life, construct a scene which would imply your desire is fulfilled. See it as clearly as possible. Feel its naturalness. Experiment until you know the scene and all it implies is real. Now, to the degree that you believe in its reality, your experiment will become your experience. Do not stop there. Keep on imagining and share your results with others. Tell them how to free themselves from this bondage to Caesar.
When you know who you really are, you will not envy anyone. How could you, when you know you are God, and they are only yourself pushed out? If tomorrow, something comes into your life that is not to your liking, do not accept it, for this fact blinds the I of imagination. Remove the blindness by asking yourself what you would like, in place of what seems to be. Enter into that thought. Revel in it as though it were not a fact. Persuade yourself that it is. Believe in its reality and it will become your experience.
Now let us go into the silence.
In 'Walk on the Water,' Goddard elevates water to a symbol of the fluid, ever-changing realm of human imagination, where walking upon it signifies mastery over perceived limitations. He contrasts 'stone facts'—our rigid acceptance of circumstances—with 'water truths,' the malleable scenarios we create through deliberate mental imagery, illustrating how consciousness shapes experience.
By presenting real-world examples—such as revising a colleague’s remarks or pre-visualizing a work project—he clarifies the practical technique of 'revision,' showing that imagining the desired outcome with feeling triggers its externalization. These case studies underscore his assertion that imagining is not fantasy but the precursor to concrete reality.
Scriptural references—from Jacob’s removal of the stone to Jesus' first miracle of turning water into wine—anchor his teaching in religious tradition and validate the creative power of faith. Goddard argues that imagination is the divine body, the very essence of God within us, making each person both the creator and the theater of unfolding events.
Finally, he broadens this principle to a universal spiritual paradigm, declaring that every individual carries God’s seed and can be 'born from above' through imaginative practice. By constructing and dwelling in inner scenes of fulfillment, and by consciously planting seeds of desire, listeners are guided to transcend limitations and live in the continuous manifestation of their ideals.
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