Neville Goddard on 2 Corinthians 11:23-27 - Mystical Bible Interpretation

Read 2 Corinthians 11 in context

Scripture Focus

23Are they ministers of Christ? (I speak as a fool) I am more; in labours more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequent, in deaths oft.

24Of the Jews five times received I forty stripes save one.

25Thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have been in the deep;

26In journeyings often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils by mine own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren;

27In weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness.

2 Corinthians 11:23-27

Biblical Context

Paul catalogs the manifold sufferings he endured for Christ - beatings, imprisonments, shipwrecks, hunger, cold, and danger. It frames his ministry through endurance under peril.

Neville's Inner Vision

Viewed through Neville's lens, these external hardships shed their sting when read as inner states of consciousness. The I AM witnessing these events is the true minister; the pains, perils, and privations are not external taxes on the body but images moving across the screen of imagination. The list becomes a mental inventory: fear, fatigue, scarcity, danger - each a signal to revise and anchor attention in the truth that the inner minister already presides over all, and that the power of imagination can turn shipwreck into a voyage inward. The real danger is identification with the sense of lack, not with the I AM; thus Paul's endurance is the discipline of remaining awake to the presence of God within, regardless of appearances. When you feel pressed, you are asked to assume a new state, to revise the story, and to feel the reality of your inherent safety, unity, and abundance as if it were already there. The ministers of Christ are those inner self-conditions - peace, courage, faith - that carry you through any outward storm.

Practice This Now

Imaginative act: In the next moment, declare I am the I AM, the Lord within, and revise the current trial as a conscious movement of inner life; feel the reality of safety and divine presence now.