The Arc in the Heavens

You NEVER SEE THE SUN that is causing the rainbow, — and yet you know it is there. “No man shall see God and live.” Power cannot be seen by the eyes of man, — but he can see the results of it embodied in the infinite shapes of his consciousness.

The mist which went up and watered the whole face of the earth after we took unto ourselves the belief that we could create, has so completely enveloped us that we believe in the distorted shadows caught on its surface as realities. We believe that we are in a world filled with all manner of ugly shapes and forms against which we must fight. There is no escape from this through the teachings founded on such beliefs.

And so we sit in our cave of dreams, watching the pure White Light pass through the spectrum and break into a thousand colors, nuances and tints. We watch a horrible war unroll its bloody canvas before us and think it real, — yet it lies only within the thought of man and is projected by his divided thinking. We believe the ugly diseases of man are a reality, and then try to rid ourselves of the pictures patterning on the screen of our body. The moment the thought of it is snapped, the illusion disappears, the screen is white and clean, — and we say, “I have been healed”.

No, you have not actually been healed. You have merely disintegrated the false belief which held the picture in place, and without which there could be no picture. Health is the out picturing of LIFE, and therefore eternally existent. You do not make it, handle it, nor yet control it. You recognize it, — and it is then established on the earth.

All these ugly pictures of life are but the uneasy, terrifying nightmares of the dreamer as he lies on his tortuous couch of belief. He clutches at the shadows, — only to find they are nothing but empty

“This dreaming, — this somnambulism, — -is what we on earth call life, — wherein the most undoubtedly wander, as if they knew right hand from left; yet they only are wise, who know they know nothing.”

There is nothing of a permanent nature to be known from the findings of the human thought. How could the mind which is “a liar and the father of it” give forth anything but lies.

“When a man loses his life, he shall find it” when he lets go of the limited concept of life, he will find his infinite life everywhere present and immediately available to the degree he is able to ‘take’ or accept. Jesus knew this so well that He passed through the dream pictures of human belief and dispersed the mists that clung with such apparent reality to man.

Man, the most noble creature God created and endowed with ability to LET the never-ending LIGHT into manifestation, is bested by the least animal or “beast”, as he is more wont to call them. Carlyle has something pertinent and full of promise to think on:

“The horse I ride has his own whole fell. Strip him of the girths and flaps and extraneous tags, and the noble creature is his own seamstress and weaver and spinner, — -nay, his own boot-maker, jeweler and man-milliner. He bounds free through the valleys with a perennial rain-proof court-suit on his body; wherein warmth and easiness to fit have reached perfection; nay, the graces have also been considered, and frills and fringes, with gay variety of color, fealty appended, and ever in the right place, are not wanting. While I, — good heavens, — have thatched myself over with the dead fleeces of sheep, the bark of vegetables and the entrails of worms, the hides of oxen or seal, the felt of furred beasts, and walk around a moving RAY Screen, over-heaped with the shreds and tatters from the charnel house of Nature, where they would have rotted, to rot on me more slowly.”

Carlyle is being a bit facetious, perhaps, — but he is aiming at the same ONENESS which Jesus knew. “You are clothed with the Spirit.” Recognizing this, the material counterpart of it will be seen and will be available. This is beyond the confines of human thought, and there is a way to “work” it out from appearances, — but there is also a definite way to bring it to pass when you BELIEVE.

There’s that word again, — BELIEVE. It is the last hurdle for the human mind, — the point of departure from the prison-house of evil.

When Adam was caught in his attempt to establish his equality with God as a creator, he was ashamed because he was “naked”. Why? Because he was in the presence of SIGHT which was not stepped down to the surface of things, — but saw through it. So does this penetrating Light of God go through the multi-colored beliefs of man, discovering the perfection of man, — naked, — or free from the ghastly clothing of disease, fear and limitation, — of which he is ashamed.

We are a little afraid of the “come unto ME” when we are faced with nothing more apparently solid than a sea of water, — but there it is. We have tried all the other things and ideas. They have all failed, — and now this step. It may be your situation is a common, prosaic one, — but nevertheless, you must STEP out if you expect to reach the boat. And how can you STEP OUT if you do not hear anything more than the mere words “come unto ME”. You have to HEAR that which said the words, not the words, — but the something which makes it possible, if you will obey.

So the sea that lies before you is only one of the dreams from the phantasmagoria of the dream cave. Do you see why the command is so often made, “Rise”, when you cannot rise, — “Open your eyes”, when you are blind, — “Stretch forth your hand”, when you are in a straight jacket of paralysis. You do none of these movements physically, or because you “try” to do them. It is something that happens when you have “touched” that wonderful agreement within you. After that, the words “Stretch forth your hand” run through the withered arm like a flow of electricity through the feed wires of a great city, flooding it with LIGHT. Every physical manifestation is preceded by the spiritual recognition of the PRESENCE within you. “The Lord is in His Holy Temple, — let all the earth rejoice!” — and it does, because the earth is born anew and the mists have cleared away.

So now we know that healing is recognition, — and not the result of words, or prayers, or aphorisms.

“What is man, that thou art mindful of Him?” Mindful, does it say? Did you ever think of this, — that God is MINDFUL of you? And what then? Well, more than you could ever imagine in your limited human brain-mind.

It is all so in reverse to what we have been thinking, — but it works. The ONENESS of LIFE becomes more and more apparent as you step out on the waters of human belief when you have HEARD the WORD commanding you to do just that impossible thing. “Come unto ME.” In the final analysis, there is no other place to go, — and it is the place you have been seeking lo! these many years. And these time and space elements are also mere limitations put upon eternity by the fallen Adam thought. He must have a beginning and an ending to a thing which was never born, — nor can never die, — but is ETERNAL in the Heavens.

If he does not hear this word, he will accept as his lot the death shroud, woven of beliefs, the chiefest being ‘three score years and ten’, — and many times much less. All this in spite of the command “Be yetransformed by the renewing of your mind”. What does it mean, this “transformed”, — a temporary change for the better, or actually re-formedinto the transfiguration of your True Self?

Many cry for transformation, — but could you take what goes with it. A grandmother said to me, following an evening lecture, — “Yes, I could take it, of course, I would like to be eighteen years old again”. “But”, I said, “How would you gain entrance to your home, if this happened to you? You don’t suppose you could convince your husband that an eighteen-year-old girl is his seventy-year-old wife, with grandchildren of twenty, do you”?

Yet it is possible in the Spirit, — but with this, so is it with most manifestations of Spirit, — can you take it, — and pay the so-called price of it all? Are you sure? Well, just to the degree you stand up to the Spirit, can it come through.

But this has nothing to do with the imagination of the human mind which thinks the change from one state to another does not mean the cracking up of shells of limitations, which may at the instant seem like a definite loss. If you cannot lose your life, you certainly cannot find it. Or if you are still looking back on the shells which you have thrown off, you may wish to “return to Egypt”, — finding it more comfortable and easy for the moment at least.

To “Follow ME”, is not a dramatic trailing off through palm-covered roads, — but a trek into spirit, — although you may not make a move physically.

All this revelation is so secret and so far-removed from the human world of thought, that you are commanded to “Tell no man”, — no, not any, — not a single one. When you are ready, “SHOW”, — and then there is no argument pro or con. No one believes you can and will be healed of an incurable disease, except those who are healed, — and they do not need to be told, — they will SEE.

Deeply hidden in the cloak of human thought is this beautiful Naked Truth, — swathed with the Garment’s of Light, which will be stepped down to a point of visibility to you and to the on-looker.

There is a reason for the HOPE that is within us, — and this evidence comes to the surface in daily life in a thousand ways. The cat, caught in a tree, will bring out all the neighbors and even the fire department, because there is THAT within which wants to help. It is in all of us, and happy is the man—:who can see through the heavy shroud of human thought and find that spark. “Sermons (silent ones in stones, — and good in everything”, — and so it is.

And there is Life, Happiness, Success, within you, in spite of the diseased clothing you may be wearing. “Seek and ye shall find”, — yes, it says “YE SHALL”, — not maybe nor perhaps, — but definitely and utterly. You cannot fail if you follow ME. “Believe on ME”, — your Divinity, — and be saved from the beliefs of the human mind.

Words and language are only the outer garments of thought. That is why diplomacy flourishes so definitely, — saying one thing and meaning another, — always leaving a loop-hole of escape. But in the final analysis only the import of the thought carries through, — and so you may say “Peace, peace”, — and there is no peace. If there is no consciousness of peace, then there can be no peace. Peace will never come to the world until it is within man himself, and then the world cannot escape it. It will manifest as a natural thing, instead of something that must be held in place by legislation.

So you live in a world within a world, — and the LIGHT of your world is all that is real or permanent. Jesus, living— in the Kingdom of Heaven, exuded such LIGHT that we are still finding our way by it after two thousand years. It is the ONLY Light that ever came to the Adam-world. All else is a picture of a picture, — and a copy of an original is already filled with defects. When this is passed along for a time, the original light becomes dim indeed.

“I AM the LIGHT of this world”, — THE Light, — the ONLY Light, — for I AM the Light of God, and in that Light there is no darkness. All the flimsy garments of Adam and his beliefs are cast off. You look through and discover the Veritus, — the Naked Truth.

“Heaven and earth shall pass away, but MY WORD shall endure forever”. One heaven and one earth after another, made of the mists of the Adam mind shall disintegrate and pass away. But there is no change in Spirit, God. The only change that takes place is our concept of HIM. Our concept of health one day, is changed into a greater concept the next, — and so with wealth and happiness.

And so the “enlarging” of the borders of the tent of things takes place with never-ending variety. If we are to die daily, we must be born anew daily. The things of the former life must go with the dying, — and the wholly NEW must come forth.

So that invisible SUN which is casting its gorgeous rainbow across a dark cloud, is always there. And so is God! “Fear not, — it is I”, — be not afraid. Keep the secret in your heart and SEE.

The type-setter rarely ever understands the story as he sets his type. He is working wholly with the mechanics. The most wonderful revelations and stories may pass through his fingers, — but except in rare instances, he must read the book later if he wishes to know what it is about, — even though it is his handiwork as far as its make-up is concerned. So it is with us, — we can live life in a mechanical fashion, without the slightest concept of what is in it. But, —

“When the inspiration of the Almighty is come unto you, it shall lead you into ALL things”,— and give you that extended vision which can see through the shabby garments of human thought and; discover the pure nakedness of your SOUL. It can see all that has to do with the man under the fig tree, and it can see through every fabricated or prefabricated material of the human thought.

Yes, — there is the “Arc in the Heavens”, — the “Cloud by Day”, — the “Pillar of Fire”, — the “Burning Bush”, — and a million other ways I can talk to you. Can you hear what I AM saying? I AM the VOICE!

 

Walter C. Lanyon