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Talks on Truth
Lesson 7
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[Talks on Truth]
[Charles Fillmore's Works] [Unity on the Web Home Page]
Lesson VII
Ye Must Be Born Again
And no one hath ascended into heaven,
Save he that out of heaven descended--The Son of Man
--John 3:13 (Rotherham translation)
JESUS SAID: "That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and
that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit." "Except one be
born of water and the Spirit. . ." Who and what is this
that is subject to so many births?
2. This important invisibility that takes on these protean
forms is man, according to Jesus. But what is man? Plato
told his students that a good description of man was a
"biped without feathers." Diogenes learned of this
definition, procured a chicken, and after plucking its
feathers, turned it loose before Plato's class with the
words, "Behold Plato's man!" This is a peculiarly fitting
illustration of the ignoble end of all definitions that
circumscribe man to form.
3. Jesus evidently referred to an invisible something that
was first born of flesh, then born of Spirit.
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The inference is that this something is capable of an
infinite number of experiences in birth and rebirth.
4. What is this invisible something that says, "Before
Abraham was born, I am"? Who are you, born into this round
of experiences through which you are now passing, and
whence came you? What is it that says "I am"?
5. When your voice says "I am," does it do so on its own
responsibility, or is it moved by an invisible One? Who is
this invisible One, and what is His relation to the voice
through which He speaks? These are the most important
questions that were ever put to any school on earth. When
we begin to consider them, in even the most primary way, we
are entering the realm of the gods.
6. Over the entrance to the Greek temple was written, "Know
thyself," and it is always written over every door that
opens from ignorance to wisdom. "Know thyself"; know who
and what you are, where you came from, what you are doing
here, and where you are going. If you want to know all
this, meditate upon the I AM.
7. Your mind reverts to Moses and to Jehovah; you think of
a mighty I AM away back in history. You do not connect that
far-away I AM that inspired Moses with your own little
everyday "I am" that struggles in the "brawl for bread."
Yet there is but one I AM. It cannot be cut into parts; it
is Principle. That which says "I am" in all men, women, and
children is identical. It is like the mathematical 1. All
the combinations of figures that were ever conceived are
but the repetitions of this digit. It is the son of
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the principle, mathematics. It is inspired by its principle
and all the possibilities of that principle are open to it.
8. Your I AM is the Son of the God Idea, and all the
possibilities of the Principle, through that Idea, are open
to you. To "know thyself" is to know that you are I AM, and
not flesh and blood.
9. It is this I AM that is born of flesh and born of
Spirit. It is not flesh, neither is it Spirit, if by Spirit
is meant a state of consciousness. It is just I AM, the
center from which all states of consciousness are
generated. Speaking definitely, it is never born into any
state of consciousness, because it always transcends all
conditions. It is the supreme Dictator that determines the
state of consciousness in and through which it will
function. "I will be what I will to be" is its dictum.
10. I AM may choose to be born into the flesh, and it may
choose to be born into the Spirit. By its decision it sets
in motion the machinery of the universe to carry out its
will. "Legions of angels" hasten to obey its call when it
knows who and what it is.
11. It is evident that we have, at some time, chosen to be
born into the flesh or we should not be in it. If we have
had enough of the flesh, it is our privilege to drop it out
of our mind and to be born of Spirit. "That which is born
of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit
is spirit." The "flesh" is a state of consciousness, the
"Spirit" is a state of consciousness.
12. The ego or I AM functions in these states
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of consciousness, according to its desire. The moving
factor of the I AM is desire. It desires a certain
experience; on the wings of that desire it carries itself
to a place where it can be fulfilled. In the process of
fulfillment the ego may forget that it has ever so desired,
but the law never forgets.
13. If you are functioning in the flesh, you may be sure
that you somewhere, sometime, desired an experience to
which this answers.
14. There are no accidents in the laws of Being.
"Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap" is
another way of saying that for every cause there is an
adequate effect. This law of sequence is the balance wheel
of the universe. Like all other laws that inhere in Being,
it is good.
15. The ego can have any experience that it wills to have.
If it wills to revel in sensation, a state where sensation
holds high carnival is provided. If its appetite for
sensation is satiated, other states are open to it; it may
be "born of the Spirit."
16. But before one can journey hence, the tangled ends of
this experience must be straightened out. "Let all things
be done decently and in order" is written over the door of
all of God's playhouses. If you choose to function in the
realm of sensation, if through any cause you have brought
about disorder, you cannot leave until harmony is restored.
17. If you lack wisdom, there is a way provided to get
it--"The Spirit of truth . . . he shall guide you into all
the truth."
18. Your real self is that which says "I AM." It cannot be
described, because description is limitation,
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and your real self is unlimited in its capacity to be. It
is the all-possibility, yet it is ignorant of the states of
consciousness into which it is ushered until it has
experienced them. In the flesh consciousness it is will. In
the spiritual consciousness it is love. Both are blind
unless will is married to intelligence and wisdom is
married to love.
19. There are people who have had enough fleshly experience
and now desire to be born into the Spirit. That desire will
open the door into the Spirit. You have only to desire to
be, and you will surely find the way to be that which you
desire. There is no exception to this inherent principle of
Being. You have sometime polarized your desire in the
direction of the flesh, or you would not be having the
experience of the flesh.
20. Do not condemn the flesh or bewail your lot. The flesh
is an obedient servant, and it now expresses your idea of
what form should be. In its virgin purity it is the
immaculate substance of Being. If it appears corrupt or
subject to corruption, humanity has made it so through
ignorance, and humanity must again purify it by restoring
it to the heaven of its consciousness, when it will cease
to be flesh. That which the world conceives to be flesh has
no existence whatever in Being. It is a malformation of the
substance idea of Being, and must be transformed by right
conception of divine perfection, before the mortal can put
on the immortal.
21. Thus all things are right here, ready for our using, to
function through, in the fulfillment of our desire to
experience sensation. If we have failed to
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get satisfaction, the fault lies not in the substance but
in our use of the substance. Now that we wish to transfer
our experiences to the realm of Spirit, to light instead of
to sensation, we have but to comply with the conditions of
that realm in order to make the desired change.
22. There is a primal substance, and all states of
consciousness are in it. We do not have to go anywhere to
find it; it is here. We are basing our present experiences
upon it and calling it flesh. If we desire to see it as
Spirit, we must so call it, and must seek to know the
mental attitude on our part that is necessary to make it
show forth the conditions of Spirit.
23. "The kingdom of God is within you." It is not afar, nor
is it hard to find, if your desire has headed you in its
direction.
24. Do you really want to be born into the Spirit? The
majority of people would answer this query in the
affirmative without a moment's thought. But this is mere
impulse, and does not involve a careful consideration of
the most important matter ever presented to the I AM.
25. To be born into the Spirit is to come into an entirely
new and different state of consciousness. This has a mighty
meaning back of it. What makes up your present
consciousness? Is it not largely the things of sense?
26. Analyze your surroundings and see whether they are not
based upon the perception of the five senses. You swing in
your little orbit of family ties. You believe that you were
born into the world through
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a chain of fleshly ancestors to whom you are bound by a
filial love that to your present understanding is
inviolable. Yet He who passed from the flesh consciousness
into the Spirit looked back and said: "Call no man your
father on the earth: for one is your Father, even he who is
in heaven."
27. So the I AM that desires to function on the spiritual
plane must drop all belief in fleshly parentage. It must
count as rubbish all pride of ancestry and "blue blood." It
must forever cease to talk about the social prestige of
"our family"; it must not bolster up the mortal man by
considering ancestral reputation to be of any weight. This
form of human pride must all be denied as a dream of the
night, because it is one of the strong cords that bind the
I AM to the flesh.
28. Every tie of earthly relationship must be recognized as
the passing condition of a brief fleshly experience. Your
children are not yours as you have looked upon them. They
are egos like yourself; through some similarity of desire
they have been attracted to your mental stratum. They may
be older than you in experience and in wisdom. Do not let
your affections throw both them and you into a little
vortex of family selfishness. You will love them with a
love that will help to lift them into the eternal heaven
when you know that they are not yours alone, but that all
men and women compose one great common family with God as
the Father-Mother. "For whosoever shall do the will of my
Father who is in heaven, he is my brother, and sister, and
mother."
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29. The I AM was born into the flesh through desire, and
desire keeps it in the consciousness of the flesh. The five
senses are simply avenues of one great central
desire--sensation. The I AM desired experience in
sensation, and the five senses are the five formulated
avenues through which it enjoys that experience.
30. Sensation is not an evil except when you choose to let
it crawl on its belly through the fleshly avenues. It is
the serpent that beguiles man when he turns it outward into
mere seeming--hearing, seeing, feeling, tasting, and
smelling. In the wilderness of sense, Moses lifted it up.
Moses was the law that the I AM sent forth.
31. You must make a law for this serpent that is holding
you in the sensations of the flesh. You desire to be born
into the Spirit, but you cannot rise out of the flesh.
Something binds you down. Like a captive balloon, you are
tugging at the guy ropes that fasten you to earth.
32. Mind is the only causative power. By the power of the
Word, it makes and unmakes all laws governing in personal
life. The I AM floats in mind and formulates the words that
set mind in motion.
33. If you are bound to the flesh, the cords that hold you
are words. If you want to be unbound, it must be
accomplished by words. The cords are states of
consciousness that you must dissolve. This dissolving
process is accomplished by words that express
denial--negations.
34. The denial looses the bond. In your cutting yourself
free from the chains of Egypt (ignorance),
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your I AM must go forth and make laws of denial, the
dominant idea of which is negation--"Thou shalt not."
35. "Thou shalt not commit adultery" is a denial that
regulates the animal consciousness and helps it along the
path to higher things; but Jesus said, "Ye have heard that
it was said, Thou shalt not commit adultery: but I say unto
you, that every one that looketh on a woman to lust after
her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart."
36. He was laying down the law of the spiritual
consciousness--instructing those who wanted to be born out
of the flesh into the Spirit. In that realm the flesh man
with his carnal sensations has no part. "And Jesus said
unto them, The sons of this world marry, and are given in
marriage: but they that are accounted worthy to attain to
that world, and the resurrection from the dead, neither
marry, nor are given in marriage.
37. Do not be deluded by those who cry, "All is good,
therefore all the desires of the flesh are good and should
be indulged." Jesus plainly said, "That which is born of
the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is
spirit," definitely indicating two states of consciousness.
38. The I AM is always the same. Your identity is preserved
wherever you are, in the flesh or in the Spirit; but the
two states are as distinct as America and Europe. When you
are in Europe, you come into relation with people and
surroundings quite different from those in America. So the
one who has let go of the bonds of the flesh and come into
the things
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of Spirit finds himself in a new and different country.
39. In the flesh, his sensation was turned outward through
feeling, and man was bound to the eternally rolling wheels
of birth and death by physical generation. When he is born
into the Spirit, he cuts off the indulgence of the
external, and is delighted to learn that sensation finds an
interior faculty through which it expresses itself in
perpetual ecstasy. Had he continued to indulge the desires
of the flesh in the external, he would never have
discovered the enduring faculty of the internal.
40. Jesus said, "In my Father's house are many mansions";
that is, there are many states of consciousness, Each state
is good for him who enjoys it. Therefore we should not
condemn the flesh consciousness, nor those who prefer to
remain in it. Neither should we who are satiated with the
flesh, continue to bow down and worship it, nor believe the
subtle argument that it is Spirit because it came forth
from mind.
41. In claiming your unity with Spirit, you must be willing
to conform to the conditions of Spirit. If you are not
sincere in your conformity, you will be torn in the
conflict. You cannot worship two masters.
42. When you have renounced the fleshly consciousness and
have resolved to live in the Spirit, you have made a
covenant with the Most High to leave the domain of the
flesh forever. You have entered into an agreement with your
invisible self that is far more binding than any man-made
contract could possibly be.
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43. If you agreed to go to California and to remain there
for a consideration to be paid by your employer, you would
be in honor bound to carry out your contract. You would
arrange to leave the things of this region behind you; you
would faithfully seek to prepare yourself for the new
requirements in that country. This is exactly the attitude
that you should take when you have agreed with the Father
to do His will and to be born into the Spirit.
44. You are going into a country entirely new to you, and
your experiences will be strange and wonderful. The customs
that prevail in the flesh consciousness will not fit the
spiritual consciousness.
45. Paul says, "The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy,
peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,
meekness, self-control; against such there is no law. . . .
If we live by the Spirit, by the Spirit let us also walk."
46. Are you bringing forth this kind of fruit?
If not, you may know that you are not being born of the
Spirit, for "by their fruits ye shall know them."
47. A large number of students of Truth are at this time
complaining because they are having trials. They say, "We
have denied and affirmed for years. We have studied science
and understand it.
We are faithful to the hours of meditation and are stanch
defenders of the Truth, yet we do not demonstrate. Why is
it?"
48. "If we live by the Spirit, by the Spirit let us also
walk." Here is the key that will open the door of causes
for you. Do you also walk by the Spirit?
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How about the habits of the flesh consciousness? Do you
still give them rein?
49. Remember that you cannot perform a single act without
putting your consciousness into it. All things are
sustained by your conscious thought projection. Every time
you indulge in any of the sensations of the flesh, you are
binding the I AM to the fleshly consciousness.
50. Spiritual thinking is the pioneer that opens the way
into the new birth, but it must be followed by spiritual
acting on the part of every faculty.
"Present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable
to God, which is your spiritual service."
51. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus laid down the law for
those who desire to follow Him into the regeneration--to be
born again. If you seek this spiritual birth, examine your
daily life and see whether you are conforming to its
requirements.
52. If you are angry with your brother, you will be in
danger of the judgment. "Agree with thine adversary
quickly." Does this allow the intervention of the courts to
settle your disputes? Did you ever know a man who went to
law, to agree with his adversary quickly?
53. Judicial courts are not known in the Spirit, and you
can never be born again or expect the help of the Spirit in
your affairs so long as you believe in securing your rights
through such contentious channels. If you are sincere in
your desire to be born into the Spirit, shun all the
entanglements of the world's legal machinery. It is a snare
and a delusion. Your triumphs through its methods will in
the end turn
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to dust and ashes. "If any man would go to law with thee,
and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also." Trust
the defense of your rights to the law of Spirit, and you
will be victor in every instance. You may appear to lose
both your coat and your cloak, but do not worry. Your judge
is the almighty equilibrium of the universe, and all men
and all things are obedient to it in its "day of judgment."
54. Do you love your enemies? Do you bless them that curse
you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that
despitefully use you? This is required of one who seeks the
new birth.
55. Are you laying up treasures for yourself upon earth,
"where moth and rust consume, and where thieves break
through and steal"? If so, remember the primal law of
thought generation--the gluing of the ego to the things
that it consciously seeks; "for where thy treasure is,
there will thy heart be also." You cannot float out into
the ethereal substance of the Spirit, with bags of gold in
each hand.
56. Do you allow your mind to drift with the current
criticism of the world, magnifying the error and minimizing
the good? This mental habit of the ignorant flesh is carnal
judgment--darkness and ignorance seeing themselves
reflected in all the universe. Beware of this subtle
adversary who goes forth ostensibly to reform the world.
57. According to Rotherham, Jesus said:
Why, moreover, beholdest thou the mote, in the eye of thy
brother,
While the beam in thine own eye thou dost not consider?
Or how wilt thou say unto thy brother,
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Let me cast the mote out of thine eye,
When lo! a beam is in thine own eye?
Hypocrite! cast first out of thine own eye the beam,
And then shalt thou see clearly to cast the mote out of the
eye of thy brother.
58. O Son of God and Son of man! realize what and who you
are. Know consciously what Jesus so succinctly stated: "No
one hath ascended into heaven, but he that descended out of
heaven, even the Son of man," the one having his being in
heaven.
59. Your being is in heaven--the spiritual consciousness.
You descended from that high estate; you belong there now.
You are there now if you will but realize it and will but
comply with the laws of heaven. God is here now in our very
midst. The Spirit is here, taking account of our every
thought. The Father loves us with His infinite love. We are
His in Truth, and must be His in consciousness.
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