Original Consciousness Unfolding 1948

CONSCIOUSNESS UNFOLDING

By sharing this chapter from an early work, I hope to introduce dedicated students to the added consciousness of Joel’s unedited works. During his life, he often fought over changes, not wanting them regardless of grammar and syntax rules. You can see here, how powerful his early works were. These writings were transcripts of his extemporaneous talks to students.

Chapter I

God Is Individual Consciousness

CONSCIOUSNESS…the Revelation WITHIN YOUR OWN BEING..THE REVELATION

OF YOUR OWN BEING. This is not an experience that takes place from me to you. It is an experience that takes place WITHIN YOUR OWN BEING.

The Kingdom of  God is WITHIN YOU. As a matter of fact, you are the individualization of ALL THAT GOD IS.  “All that I have is thine.”  So classwork is to REVEAL THE INFINITE INVISIBLE WITHIN YOU to that part of you which we call the outer or the human being. Of course, it is not a human being at all. It is Divine Being.  But the world interprets the human scene as a human one, so that what is appearing to the world as a human…as you or as me…is now receiving from within the depth of its own being, the revelation of its true nature. And Truth that is True is Universal.  

The impartation, then, in this work, is not the work of the intellect, and your receiving this is not in the realm of the intellect. This is Divine Consciousness revealing Itself AS INDIVIDUAL BEING.  In talking to this class, I am talking to this class, I am talking to a state of consciousness on the level of my own, because otherwise you would not be here.  And if I were talking down to you feeling that you know less than I, then I would not be here. 

The Master said, “Those who have ears, let them hear; those who have eyes, let them see.” And as I did not go out seeking you, it must be that you who are here are of the same state of consciousness as I am, and ready for the same unfoldment and revelation from Mind.

None of us could give this Truth to just anyone, because – “The things of God are foolishness with men.” Never doubt that for a moment. The Things of God are foolishness with men.  And if you are in agreement with what we say here tonight, you are merely in agreement with the Things of God. On the other hand, to those who have not been led here…those who are not yet ready for this particular unfoldment and revelation of God…what we say tonight would sound foolish and ridiculous.

Do not try yourselves to teach this message for at least a month. Let it solidify AS YOUR OWN INDIVIDUAL CONSCIOUSNESS. In a month from now it can be really your own. If you should try to teach it right away, you would be teaching only what I have SAID. But if you will wait a month, or two or three, and let the words of it go round and round in your own consciousness until you CATCH THE INNER VISION OF what takes place here, then it will become YOUR OWN.  You won’t teach it then in my language, in my words, or use my experiences. It will become your individual unfoldment of the SAME TRUTH.

Now about this teaching…you know in metaphysics you cannot teach the LETTER of Truth and get far. In metaphysics THE TEACHING IS THE IMPARTATION OF SPIRITUAL CONSCIOUSNESS. Unless the teaching has actually become MY OWN CONSCIOUSNESS, you will not be able to take it in. In other words, if I give you something that I have heard or read or memorized, it will catch the FIRE of That and it will take root in you.

Therefore, you cannot succeed in teaching this until it has first taken root in you and become the very fibre of your being. One of the sad things in metaphysical practice is that we make statements to ourselves and to patients which we have not really demonstrated within ourselves and which have become no part of our consciousness.

Suppose we say – “There is no error.” Now, there is no more profound Truth in the world than the statement – “There is no error” – and in the very voicing of it, the whole mortal universe should collapse. But it doesn’t. Over and over we hear it said – “There is no error”- yet the old world goes right on in the same old way.  Why? Because it is not an idea EMBODIED in consciousness.

A practitioner may say to a patient – “There is only one Life and That is God. This thing is the Christ Appearing.  This suggestion is not a Reality and is no part of your being.” When the practitioner has the CONVICTION and CONSCIOUSNESS of that, very, very often the error disappears…the disease, sin or lack disappears.  However, if the practitioner merely repeats what he has heard and what he has read in books and has remembered and is only hoping and wishing it were true – THAT WILL HAVE NO POWER. NO! The Things of God are foolishness with men.

We must now add   – “The things of men are foolishness with God.”  Try to remember that when you take any of your human problems to God, you are making yourself ridiculous. The minute you try to think in terms of a sick body being made well by God, or of unemployment being solved by God, or of a war being stopped by God, or of your favorite candidate being elected by God…THAT IS RANKLY FOOLISH.

The things of men…the things of this Adam-dream…this world existence…are UNKNOWN to God.  That is what makes healing possible…disease has no real existence. Inevitably, when disease and distress hit up against a consciousness that KNOWS this Truth, they fall because of their own nothingness.

Another thing about class work: In the Christian Science field a student gets to go through class instruction with only one teacher and he never again can go through the class unless for some reason that teacher is set down by the Mother Church organization.

The result of this is partly good and partly bad. If you happen to get one of the really fine teachers, you are set. This rule keeps you from wandering all over and going from teacher to teacher aimlessly. Normally you will stay with that one teacher until his teaching and instruction has taken root and become a part of your consciousness and has externalized itself in harmonious affairs in your world.

The bad part of the rule is that, in the event you do not get one of the good teachers, you miss out for life and must go through the rest of your human experience without being properly taught. The only thing you can do is pray that you will be re-incarnated and then have another chance with another teacher!

Now in the metaphysical world outside of Christian Science you have the opposite extreme. You have no supervision. You are free to come and go and run here and there. The result is that there is a continuous running back and forth from one teacher to another and then again to another, often without giving any one teaching a chance to take hold in consciousness. This does not permit any teaching to really implant itself in consciousness.

That, of course, is the bad side. That is where liberty comes down, sometimes to license. We must have liberty, but we must also use it wisely.

In my particular work there is no rule one way or the other. There is no rule limiting anyone to this teaching or to these classes. Nor is there any rule that prevents anyone from going through the classwork with as many different teachers as he may wish. But I would like to say this from the standpoint of my eighteen years of experience in teaching and imparting unfoldment. Try not to be one of those who run back and forth from teacher to teacher and teaching to teaching, from book to book.

Yet I do not mean to limit yourself. Go to those whom you feel drawn…sit at the feet of the Master and take it in. BUT – give it a fair chance to do something within your own consciousness. Then if you find it has not met your need, do not run immediately to the next teacher coming to town. PRAY TO GOD…GO WITHIN YOUR OWN CONSCIOUSNESS. Pray –“Father, lead me to the one…to the teacher…to MY teacher.” Then when someone appears on the scene and you feel drawn to his teaching, or if you find a book and say – This is my message!” – go ahead.  It is in the line of progress – YOUR progress.

BUT ALWAYS REMEMBER THAT TEACHING AND BEING TAUGHT, IN THE SPIRITUAL WORLD, ARE ACTIVITIES!

The import and purpose of this teaching is to unfold YOUR SOUL to your individual BEING. It is to unfold and develop the Soul Capacities OF YOUR OWN BEING. You must select a teacher of metaphysics with much more care than you would select a voice teacher or language teacher or dramatic teacher. You should select a spiritual teacher with the same care that you select a mate, a profession or a religion. There is nothing more sacred than spiritual teaching. There is nothing that will do more to lift you and me out of our mortal material sense of life than correct spiritual teaching.

For the teacher, this is a Sacred Ministry. A teacher must live so as to be able to impart Divine Realities. As I have said before, that can be done only from a state of consciousness which is acting it and living it. On the student’s part it is a Sacred Ministry in that it means the development of HIS OWN SOUL. It means lifting one out of the dangers, diseases, lack and limitations of mortal existence. How very careful you should be in the selection of your teacher!

BE LED OF THE SPIRIT. Do not, on the one hand, feel restricted or limited, so that you feel when you have been through one class you never can go through another with another teacher. On the other hand, do make it a matter of Sacred Rite…the Search for this spiritual teacher.

Then when you have had some instruction, or have found a book, sit still with it for a while. Give it an opportunity to work WITHIN YOU. The mere reading of a book or listening to a teacher will not reveal the depths of the message.