Fourth Way

A way to classify theology

2011-12-17T01:51:00.000-08:00

I'm now fully embarked on Historical Theology by Gregg R. Allison. I find it to be a very good book because it doesn't have a trace of "I'm a hot shot scholar and this is my big work" but is just a solid rendition of historical theology, and it feels complete. It has 33 chapters, so I'm just going from chapter to chapter straight through. I've already learned a lot in the first two chapters which encourages me to read it all.

But in the first chapter he has a useful chart, which I can't replicate here obviously, showing the relationship of all the types of theology. There are five: historical theology, exegetical theology, biblical theology, systematic theology, and practical theology.

Exegetical and biblical theology really are the foundational work that becomes systematic theology, so I can include them in 'systematic theology.'

So if you want to get a complete understanding of theology you learn systematic theology. Then you learn historical theology (which is not foundational to systematic theology, the Bible is foundational to systematic theology, but it is how each doctrine developed in time and thus gives a grounding of sorts to systematic theology).

Then, the mysterious practical theology. Practical theology is just what it sounds like. Practical doing. Spiritual formation. This is where the ideas, practices, and goals of the Work reside. It is also where other schools, mystical schools, Eastern Orthodox ways, etc. reside. Spiritual warfare resides in practical theology. Etc.

So see it like this:

Historical Theology > Systematic Theology > Practical Theology

This helps to see in perspective where the Work resides vis-a-vis Christianity in general.

C Influence

2011-12-16T23:54:00.000-08:00

I've been reading the Wisdom of Solomon (part of the Apocrypha originally included between the Old and New Testaments in the King James Version), and it is really a 19 chapter long almost hymn to Wisdom personified as a woman (as is the case in the Book of Proverbs as well) and goes through the early history of the Israelites from the perspective of Wisdom.

Christians traditionally (and with some biblical warrant) have decided to just see this personification of Wisdom as being Jesus.

But it got me thinking about the old problem of correlating the Work teaching with the biblical.

So I listed all the sources of higher influence, and here is what I came up with:

Jesus
The Holy Spirit
Wisdom
Angels
C Influence

[and I'll add]

Olympian gods and goddesses
the Muses
Inspiration

So then I was trying to separate each one regarding different types of higher influence, but here is the main point of what I'm saying here: I concluded that the Work language was intentional (and brilliant) in labeling higher influence as C Influence. (The 'C' part isn't really supposed to stand for 'conscious', yet C Influence is conscious influence, and there is only one source for what is conscious and that is God Himself.) Because it all comes from the same source ultimately, God, and that simplifies and takes unnecessary imagination or empty romantic (or whatever) speculation out of it.

But anyway, just seeing higher influence as C Influence makes it so you don't have to worry about trying to differentiate the source, as long as the source is ultimately God. And Jesus is God, the Holy Spirit is God, Wisdom is Jesus personified as a woman (strange, but there it is), angels are messengers of God. (And Olympian gods and goddesses and the Muses are really just poetic depictions of the above. As for the word Inspiration, it really means what comes from the Holy Spirit as well.)

C Influence is conscious influence - pure - not constrained in its action by time or place.

Of course B Influences *contain* some C Influence, but it is mixed with A Influence, and some B Influences have more of C Influence in them than others.

To receive C Influence pure you have to be in at least the third state of consciousness, or self-consciousness, or self-remembering.

I brought up prayer awhile back in this context. Think how much more effective prayer will be when done in the third state of consciousness. Also, think of how Jesus said fasting effects the power of prayer, and 'fasting' is a metaphor for non-identifying.

I also think healing can happen more effectively if you are in the third state of consciousness and able to be reached by the forces that can heal. But I wouldn't want to tempt God on that speculation, just have it as something to think about.

Spiritual formation

2011-12-15T20:19:00.001-08:00

I was doing searches on Practical Theology and came upon the term 'spiritual formation' being used a lot. Basically by this term the mainstream church is wrestling with the fact that is lacks a practical element in what it is doing. The Work would be an example of a system of spiritual formation (but only if connected to the commands and teachings of Christ).

Here is an article that gives a good sense of why the mainstream church is skeptical of 'spiritual formation' and also why it needs it:

http://www.dwillard.org/articles/artview.asp?artID=81

* * * * * * *

This really is where we see the intersection of the Work and Christianity. There is nothing new under the sun, so it follows that there would be some connection. The key to seeing it is in how the mainstream church has perverted, so to speak, the discipline of Practical Theology. They have really buried it, first, but then redefined it to mean 'pastor studies' and what not. Yet it is what it sounds like it is: taking systematic theology to the practical, doing level.

Now it's being called spiritual formation. To get a good sense of what is going on with it just google the two words spiritual formation and follow the links.

Spiritual formation

2011-12-15T20:19:00.000-08:00

Found a connection between C. S. Lewis and Ouspensky

2011-12-15T04:34:00.000-08:00

This is from the book Planet Narnia: The Seven Heavens in the Imagination of C. S. Lewis by Michael Ward:

"He [Lewis] was a keen amateur astronomer who had a telescope on the balcony of his bedroom and enjoyed visiting the Oxford observatory. He knew about such things as Venus' Albedo and was conversant with the broad outlines of the work of such figures in in astronomy and physics as Schiaparelli, Ball, Jeans, Eddington, Schrodinger (his Magdalen colleague, and Hoyle, as well as that of more speculative writers such as Dunne, Abbott, Hinton, and Ouspenski."

In a footnote I was led to a book called We Remember C. S. Lewis (ed. Graham):

http://www.amazon.com/We-Remember-C-S-Lewis-Memoirs/dp/0805422994/ref=lh_ni_t

and was surprised to find that J. I. Packer apparently knew him and wrote an essay for the book. There is also another reference to Ouspenski vis-a-vis C. S. Lewis on page 112. Nothing more than a bare reference though.

Law and Gospel

2011-12-06T10:04:00.000-08:00

The Law. (The power of sin in fallen man.)

You have to see the Law as a manifestation of all the sin and events and forces of sin in the world. What you move in and come up against. Also all that is the spirit of Satan in fallen human nature; the accusing, shaming, moralizing, projection of guilt, policing of environments to maintain the fear of man, respecting of persons and all the rest of it, it is the Law manifesting through people collectively, becoming a real, tangible, monstrous thing. Sexual energy, to all degrees of drunkenness and violence, is its currency and blood. This is the Law as it effects and works through fallen human beings. This is the Law as the power of sin. (Rom. 1:25-32*)

The Gospel (To be separated unto.)

The Gospel is the Law defeated. The curse overthrown. Death and darkness and the drunkenness of violence and concupiscence made ineffective; a mad show that no longer engulfs. Attacks, yes, but no longer engulfs. To be separated unto the Gospel is to be made free of the Law and the power of sin.

+ + + + + + +

Rom. 2:1-2** thus refers to fallen man described above. Fallen man who collectively acts out the monstrous presence of the Law defiled and turned upside-down as it is in the heart of fallen and corrupt man. Beating out the power of sin, and engulfing the world in the wild and banal-lascivious and bloody hold of the Kingdom of Satan. Ultimately sacrificing human suffering and death to that Kingdom.

+ + + + + + +

* Rom 1:25 Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.
Rom 1:26 For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature:
Rom 1:27 And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet.
Rom 1:28 And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient;
Rom 1:29 Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers,
Rom 1:30 Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents,
Rom 1:31 Without understanding, covenantbreakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful:
Rom 1:32 Who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them.

** Rom 2:1 Therefore thou art inexcusable, O man, whosoever thou art that judgest: for wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself; for thou that judgest doest the same things.
Rom 2:2 But we are sure that the judgment of God is according to truth against them which commit such things.

Imitating Christ with Work practices

2011-11-06T11:41:00.001-08:00

An interesting thought for a person who knows the Work and is a Christian...: seeing Work practices in the context of the imitation of Christ.

One advantage is it can give a complete picture, pull everything into a contained whole.

Another thing is it could give courage to face the world as something different from the world, rather than hang back and be fearful of seeming different and thus staying conformed, ultimately, to what the world demands.

Once a person gets past the common stumbling block of thinking they *are* Jesus, or the other of engaging in worldly moralism instead of self-interested, conscious, self-aware glorifying of God.

[Interesting, I spent about 10 minutes searching the internet for an antonym of moralism, or moralize, and couldn't find anything, so I struggled to finish the above sentence. At first instead of 'glorifying of God' I had 'presence', but changed it to glorifying of God. So in a sense, I suppose, the opposite of moralism is glorifying God.]

Perhaps in another real way repentance can be an antonym of moralism.

Higher church, grail, Kingdom of God - examples

2011-10-28T20:37:00.001-07:00

Some ways you are effecting the Kingdom of God, or furthering it, when you just think you're merely in the third state of consciousness is you are effecting all your time body and anybody who is connected to it, and by extension anybody connected to those other people. That's effecting people in other parts of time. That is one way. You can be in the third state lying down in a sewer pipe like a hunted dictator and effect the Kingdom of God. Don't confuse the metaphor of the knight and horse and battle with reality. The metaphor is real, but you may just be walking down the street. Mundane events. An incident where somebody tries to get you to internally-consider. An event that happens to make you be in a strong state of identification with it. Some event tries to get you to blow up. Lose your aim. Mundane events, but your world.

Move up a level (after success in overcoming those events of friction) and things may get more strange. Possibly more dangerous. Possibly more protection for you though at that point. One needs control, though, the farther one goes.

Other examples of how being in the third state, directed by God's will, able to be directed by God's will (Real Will)... A child who dies in an accident at a point in time and space doesn't die because you are there at that moment and it changes the event. I'm not saying you do some heroic act, I'm saying maybe you just have to be THERE. Just changing an event by your very presence. I've experienced this and told you guys about it. A toddler running from its mother between parked cars into a parking lot. Prior to that event, I was just there, very much in the third state, had been for days, the mother and father were strangely walking around outside, not knowing why, kind of out of place, I intentionally delayed my departure, didn't know it at the time, there is always a seeming reason, but you are acting from God's will, Real Will, in that state. Then, I move, I get in my car, I have a clear view of the scene, the child burst away from the mother, the mother freaks and runs, terror on her face, and there I am waving at her, totally stopped, and an event that occurred in time was changed. What did I do? Nothing. Except be in the third state, and be a strange presence in that scene. Probably another car hits the child, but I delayed the action by saying to my nephew, "No, you play with your friend." The older sister of the toddler. Something an adult usually doesn't do. I'm unusual. I'm self-remembering. I don't feel a need to go anywhere. I'll sit there and watch some kids play. An unusual detail is the older sister got mad at me for no reason and threw one of her toys at me. She was mad because her little sibling wasn't going to get hit by a car that morning? Maybe. She knew at some level I was a strange presence in the scene. Wasn't suppose to be there.

This is when I was really doing marathon self-remembering exercises. But see how mundane it is? God can use you if you are able to act from Real Will, which is God's will. Some law prevents it unless you are in the third state or higher. Like somebody said, not even God can beat a full house with three-of-a-kind. He obviously can do miracles and anything He wants, but in the general course of events, in this maze of laws at this level, the law of will is different from the law of accident or mere cause and effect.

Another example of how you can effect events when just in the third state is - and this is speculation based on the Bible - you can effect the movements and activity of the spiritual world where you are. The Bible says the prayer of a person of great faith is more effectual. Most likely the mere presence of a person in the third state or higher effects the war in the spiritual world. Maybe the evil forces clear out. Maybe they focus on you and not on some unknowing vulnerable victim. Maybe *one person* can effect negative spiritual bondage of an entire geographical area.

Eventually, in deep, marathon states of self-remembering, you start to see the moving visible world of things and events from the higher perspective. You read the language of it. In real time.

Another thing: you're in waking sleep, standing on a street corner, certain cars and people pass by you. On that same street corner at the same time, but you are in the third state, different cars and different people pass by you. The Work metaphor of birds on different telephone wires. Each wire is a different line of time though occupying the same place and time. - C.

Higher church, grail, Kingdom of God

2011-10-28T13:56:00.000-07:00

And remember that there are no churches the grail knights attend in those stories. An isolated chapel, a hermitage, usually to encounter someone who can give them information they need. But no churches. Grail Knights are not churchians. Remember also that they operate in a sort of in-between world. There's a little bit of the Valhalla thing where they can fight and be wounded, yet be cured of their wounds. Knights die and reappear later. Maybe just a forgetful author, or maybe an intentional detail.

What ties it to Jesus and His army and the Kingdom of God is you are a soldier in that army and you are on the battlefield when you enter that self-remembering realm. That third state of consciousness and higher emotion realm. As Man #4 and eventually #5.

Without the armor of God though you are vulnerable.

Once there though you are able to be used, to be helpful, to be effective for the goal of the Kingdom of God when you are on that spiritual battlefield. And you can't know what is happening in the way flesh and flesh senses know what is going on around them. You can just be a knight *staying on your horse*, dealing with whatever friction comes your way, overcoming, moving on. The effect you have on the battlefield will be more than you can discern. The effect on others, etc.

In the higher world you manifest as something else. Your will you as that higher manifestation will have is God's will. You can see now how God's will *is* your will. The more that higher body develops the more Real Will becomes conscious. So think of yourself moving and acting down here while your higher body is moving acting up there. You want your higher body to be under the influence of God's will. Real will. It will be, if you are truly in the third state down here, and staying on your horse (emotion, higher emotion). - C.

ps- As I was writing this post I was thinking of Don Quixote as well as Grail Romance. There is school connection there. Don Quixote depicts the type of the person who is pathetic in the face of the world once they move on. Cervantes took a different approach, and perhaps it depicts different things than Grail Romance is intended to depict, but seen in this light you can see it as a school document. The connection Cervantes has with Shakespeare in the minds of literary critics going back is significant. Just a little aside. It may be good to have Don Quixote in you to draw on when you go through the process of true separation from the world which all the above assumes.

pps- There is also the confusion among the most biblical of theologians as to how to differentiate the visible church and the Kingdom of God. It's a matter of scale and development.

From: c. t.
To:
Cc:
Sent: Thursday, October 27, 2011 6:27 PM
Subject: Re: a prayer book and rambling notes and qoutes

Yes, and also the real metaphor of the Grail knight depicts the Man #4 (and #5) experience. That is both solitary (the trackless forest) and community (when levels are transcended and the community of the Grail Castle is reached). The Round Table still depicts the worldly level. They have to ride off on adventure, stay on their horse (higher emotion), meet friction (fights, not get thrown) overcome and transcend levels of reality. - C.

From: S
To:
Cc:
Sent: Thursday, October 27, 2011 5:56 PM
Subject: RE: a prayer book and rambling notes and qoutes

Man number 4 means conscious development, so I imagine the church of man number four would in some way mean a connection (even like what we have here) between others who are on that path. Not necessarily "Groups" in the Gurdjieff Foundation kind of a way but the genuine meaning stated in Matthew 18:20 "For where two or three are assembled in my name, there am I in the midst of them."
Its interesting that its such a small number. It suggests gathering for genuine reasons, to talk or share ideas, rather than for a sense of community in the hundreds and all that goes with that.
This is church for man number #4
Date: Thu, 27 Oct 2011 23:58:50 +0100
Subject: Re: a prayer book and rambling notes and qoutes
From: quickeningspirit
To:
CC:

I can easily agree with the religions of Man 123 idea. It's the interactions and energies at work between these that I was mostly looking at.

Also, I'm equally uneasy in an Anglican service as Catholic - I'm not sure I've ever experienced Orthodox, but that doesn't matter. There is even something (well numerous things) I find very attractive in each of these.

You make the subject interesting, if it's a question, what does the Man #4 Branch look like? This might be a mystery. It can't have the same solid footprint for the same reason that G spoke of the Work as belonging to the Slyman.

On 27 October 2011 22:38, c. t. wrote:

Preliminary reply (on a tiny keyboard)... Might not we be well-served to think of the issues involving church and church branches under the rubric of Man #123 and Man #4? I've written this before, but it's a big subject, central really to everything we discuss and do in our everyday lives. It is so obvious that Eastern Orthodox is the Man #1 branch. Roman Catholicism is the Man #2. And Protestantism is the Man #3 branch.

We then have to acknowledge that Protestantism has a controlling presence among the three. Resented by the other two. That is because intellectual center has to control, to a basic degree, emotional and instinctive/moving/sex center. And IC's standard has to be sola Scriptura.

So being truly balanced we'll seem more Protestant. So from there we move into what the Man #4 'branch' looks like.

This is why we have interest in the two other branches. The music, the practices.

Obviously the Work is the language of the #4 level. What do you think on this thus far? - C.

On Thu Oct 27th, 2011 2:06 PM PDT quickeningspirit wrote:

>I have a book titled A Method of Prayer by Eugraph Kovalevsky. It's a Praxis
>book, same publishers as Mouravieff. It's essentially part of the
>French/Russian Orthodox tradition. Anyway, an aside.
>
>It covers.
>the Jesus prayer - which was my original interest in buying it
>the Lord's prayer
>commentaries by the 'fathers'
>
>In the section on the Lord's prayer the author explains that the Lord's
>Prayer is THE Christian Creed. It belongs to the Faithful. While the Creed
>eg Nicene (*I believe in one God ...*) was intended for catechumen (novice
>Christians/beginners) - and not until they were 'illuminated' were they
>initiated into the Lord's Prayer. In Church service, catechumen and
>'outsiders' departed after the Creed, and the doors closed. A practise
>symbolically maintained by Roman Catholics and something the author appears
>to hold in such regard that he'd like the practise reinstated. (It's already
>sounding weird.)
>
>It's an interesting book but flicking through it, I'm continually reminded
>of the issues that led to the Reformation. This is one thing that I don't
>understand, speaking more broadly, the Orthodox tradition stakes its
>legitimacy on grounds of an unbroken tradition whilst claiming Western
>civilization is disconnected. There is this claim that the western Christian
>aims at moral perfection whereas the true and obviously Orthodox
>understanding is for a life of theosis. What is this tradition that is so
>important to the orthodox? If I accept it then it is the chain of conscious
>beings, and C influence. What I don't accept is that it exists in a Church,
>though perhaps G thought Mt Athos had it? Praxis website/Robin Amis promote
>and sell this general view:
>
>http://www.praxisresearch.net/cart_product.cfm/prod_id/36625/bk/1/tid/264
>http://orthodoxinfo.com/general/theosis-english.pdf
>
>"We now live in an age where Western civilization
>lives and acts contrary to its Christian heritage, yet it
>still believes that it knows about Christ and His Church.
>The West fails to appreciate that over one thousand years
>separate it from this tradition. As a result, the West’s
>perception and understanding of Christ and His Church
>has become clouded."
>
>"Theosis is personal communion with God “face to
>face.” To the Western mind, this idea may seem incomprehensible,
>even sacrilegious, but it derives unquestionably
>from Christ’s teachings. Jesus Christ was the
>fulfillment of the messianic dream of the Jewish race;
>His mission to connect us with the Kingdom of God
>– a Kingdom not of this world."
>
>If you look into it you'll see that Orthodox types don't really understand
>the protestant position. They are confused by the multiplex of denominations
>and the lack of any tradition. I think they feel cornered. They don't
>generally disagree with the Protestant critique of Roman Catholicism but
>they consider dependence on the Word a flaw (they attack Sola Scripture)
>that has led to endless personal interpretations which result in Jehovah's
>Witnesses, Methodists, Baptists, Wesley and, Calvinists, etc. This diverse
>range of interpretations within the protestant world is perceived within the
>Orthodox as a sign of grand vanity. They are appalled by Calvin's
>Institutes.
>
>What I see and the description on the treatment of catechumen above points
>up how the Word was controlled through an elite administered liturgical
>practise. And, although that book is so evidently christian and concerned
>with God and Jesus Christ, and the mysteries therein, I still get this
>background taste that this could be any of a dozen mystical eastern
>teachings on holiness.
>
>I suppose it's just a very different thing to something like Berkhof. I read
>one orthodox critique challenging Sola Scriptue by drawing attention to the
>body of theology that protestants rely on ... how hazy! Tho I can see a lot
>of value and use in this prayer book, and in the Orthodox church too, but
>I'm not convinced they have what they claim to possess. They certainly don't
>know anything about what they critique and they don't understand how the
>Holy Spirit works either.

Objective understanding

2011-09-21T11:58:00.001-07:00

It's a big deal getting understanding of biblical doctrine. Seeing it, accepting it, valuing it. It builds your spiritual body. The same with getting parts in relation to the whole understanding of the word of God. It's unusual. As I'm here reading endless chapters of the Old Testament I sometimes think how unusual it is compared to what is happening everywhere else all around me. Not that I'm special, just how different it is.

You have to engage this living language of the Old and New Testaments until it fuses into something higher, until you see it as truly universal, until its seeming provincial, localized aspects fall away. Then it becomes true objective understanding. There's nothing under the sun (or beyond the sun) within time, or in eternity, that can't be understood by it (other than God, completely).

In the above I am assuming Man #4 type efforts and development into Man #5.

John Calvin on Eschatological Pilgrims

2011-09-21T04:32:00.000-07:00

John Calvin on Eschatological Pilgrims

Let us always look at our Lord Jesus Christ. And for as much as we know that God's Son is come down hither, and will hereafter receive us into his glory, yea, and that God hath made him head of the angels as well as of us: let us assume ourselves that although we be here in this world, yet notwithstanding, we be but as pilgrims and cease not for all that to be citizens of heaven whereunto we be led by hope. And for the same cause he saith in another place that we be set already in the heavenly places. And how? By hope.

—John Calvin, "Sermon 16 on Titus 3:4-7" in Sermons on the Epistles to Timothy and Titus (facsimile of the 1579 edition reprinted by the Banner of Truth Trust, 1983) 1235.

http://www.kerux.com/documents/keruxV18N3A6.htm

The influence of objective-consciousness

2011-09-21T03:04:00.000-07:00

We need influences to get self-consciousness and objective-consciousness. The influences that develop us up to the Work are B Influence. Objective-consciousness needs its own influence. C Influence is needed (which practically means being in the third state of consciousness at least, which means doing the Work). Objective-consciousness also needs material influence, or knowledge. Something higher than mere literature the way C influence is higher than B influence. That material is the living word of God.

You can't have objective-consciousness without knowing the plan of God, or plan of redemption.

This objective-consciousness via the word of God is obviously more than just knowing true doctrine and the Bible really well, because it is *on top of* having self-consciousness, which most theologians, for instance, don't have. We're faced with our ignorance and weakness - and sin - when doing the Work, and just being awake to ourselves that knowing the Work requires.

The Book of Revelation is a test for objective-consciousness. Interestingly a person like Calvin with all his understanding said he didn't understand the Book of Revelation and left it alone. This shows the boundary between Man #1,2,3 and Man #5.

Further birth

2011-09-14T20:37:00.001-07:00

I am beginning to tangibly feel - physically feel - being in covenant with God. What it is. I'm feeling it from the words in the books of Samuel, Kings, and Chronicles. The feeling is directional internally. By that I mean it is also an emotional sense of being on-the-mark in following God or being off-the-mark in rebelling and falling away to idols. And it's not a law thing, or a following rules thing. It's a physical/emotional feeling like a new body coming to fruition inside me. It involves the two conscious shocks as well. You can begin to see how this phenomenon, this reality, this growth, solves problems of God's will vs. individuality. You can see how a new world opens up when you are 'in' this. This is also obviously the Work teaching of developing higher bodies and developing Real Will and so on. It's elusive (at least for now, at the beginning of it), yet it is real and something you can 'feel.'

Objective consciousness

2011-08-06T21:18:00.000-07:00

Getting understanding of the plan of God in all its elements in revelation and history and human nature is the material of objective consciousness. Notice it includes everything under its umbrella, even pagan religion, i.e. understanding of pagan religion, and everything else.

The language of cosmoses, that elusive language that must be pondered and found, is the language of objective consciousness. Revelation can be seen in this language.

C Influence and contacting it by being in the third and forth states of consciousness is the source. Conscious influence, only one source of that: the triune God.

+ + + + + + +

That last email was meant to give the elements of the higher realm Work operates in. It was inspired by picking up and looking through Kline's Kingdom Prologue. Kline wrote in the language of cosmoses, thought in it, and applied it to very orthodox Biblical doctrine. Anyway, when you think of the mundane and how to gather all you've learned to transcend to the higher realm, think of the three things mentioned in the last email.

OK, something substantive...

2011-07-06T18:04:00.001-07:00

Two practical efforts: 1. Read the word of God. It is living language. It changes you. Separates your spirit from your soul (Heb. 4:12) and enables the light to enter and the Spirit to speak to your spirit. Etc., etc.

2. Enter into a Work effort until you provoke your limit then keep your Aim in view through the dust and confusion and the whole maelstrom of being at your limit, and act from the Work rather than from life and in *all that* you make real progress. You want to be there, in that maelstrom which is being at your limit, and you want to struggle to extend your limit, and you keep your eye on your Aim through all the confusion and dust and explosions and so on. It all has its natural beginning, middle, and end, so just persevere in it until a conclusion of that particular effort. That changes you over time.

There must be a third...?

3. Prayer.

An observation with symmetry

2011-07-01T04:56:00.001-07:00

It's interesting, observing the average church Christian makes me value Work (Fourth Way) ideas, practices, and goals; and on the other hand observing the average Fourth Way/Gurdjieff type makes me value the word of God, regeneration, and biblical doctrine.

Having said that it's better to be shallow and saved than to be unsaved, but I just don't think the Holy Spirit leaves individuals he has regenerated in a state of valuing shallowness and wanting to stay there. In fact I know He doesn't.

Death

2011-05-01T03:45:00.001-07:00

Reading Human Nature in its Fourfold State gives clear and deep insight into Work teaching.

On death, it is clear the unregenerate are in death - and hell - now. Not in the sense that this world is hell. In the sense that in the fullness of their living time, in that living interval, they are in death and hell, just as the born again - regenerated by the Word and Spirit - are no longer there. The born again have left that realm - which to the living is a spiritual realm - and the world senses this and shows hatred for them.

When the unregenerate die they experience death and hell, yet in all their living time they still maintain the pride of life and rebellion against God. Then when their consciousness is in the flesh again - recurrence - they go back to their old vomit. They do this until the harvest when they will no longer be able to do it. The theatre and time cycle within which recurrence happens comes to an end, eventually. The second coming, the end of time, the harvest when the wheat will be separated from the chaff.

Unless they experience effectual calling and regeneration, in which case they leave the bondage of death and hell in the spiritual realm, the world hates them, they separate from the world, belong to God, and go to be with God when they physically die, which has already happened in the spiritual realm.

Context brings Biblical statements into practical light. To walk in the Spirit can be seen clearly when you picture yourself in the spiritual realm now, in that interval between death and birth, but which exists now in the living time recurrence sense.

We can also see how when we sleep, or fall, and we don't walk in the Spirit in that dark realm, how we make ourselves vulnerable to all the forces of hell. O [I say, like a 19th century poet], to be an awake, pure spiritual warrior in that realm now, continually until death and resurrection into God's Kingdom, glorified.

We know how to do it now; and we certainly have influences to further teach us.

The metaphor of planting

2011-04-04T23:49:00.000-07:00

Just read this post by some crazy person:

http://electofgod.blogspot.com/2005/12/being-child-king-is-dangerous.html

I really liked the metaphor of 'planting' for the second conscious shock. It is concrete and doable. You take a hit, it triggers resentment, or would usually, and you just allow it to be planted in you. Boom, just got stabbed, I'm being mocked, treated badly, yeah, yeah, I'll just take the hit, it's like a plow that just broke the surface of my being, and I'll let that hit, or stab, be planted in me. Now, in time it will grow. And what it grows into will be something very different. Because it is really just energy. But since its uniquely the result of the second conscious shock (or the process of the second conscious shock) it will grow into things like real will and things associated with higher centers.

All the while I will have had to have been in the third state of consciousness. Self-remembering. Also, what that hit will grow into will be things associated with the fourth state of consciousness.

Conscience

2011-03-27T13:19:00.000-07:00

Awhile back Paul (probably a long while back) was mentioning the central role of conscience in the Work. I never really singled it out in my own writings. I think I was, though, when talking about discernment and being able to discern 'on-the-mark/off-the-mark'.

Going through Ouspensky's Fourth Way I came across a short definition of conscience O. gave which is worth sending along:

"Conscience can be defined as an emotional feeling of truth on a given subject."

I remember now, I did write on conscience. I connected it with my own experience of becoming awake to all the kinds of lying we engage in. That is conscience becoming unburied. It started with me before I connected with the Work. Like, you say something, then you pause and your eyes drift away, and you say, "That's really not true." Or, you see and note a contradiction in yourself, what you've said, your actions, beliefs, etc. Or, you state that you dislike something, then you state that you've engaged in the same behavior. That is conscience becoming unburied.

Ouspensky I think gave some unhelpful - or clumsy - descriptions of conscience in the same section of the Fourth Way. Not necessarily wrong, but clumsy. Saying conscience is feeling every emotion all at once that you can feel towards something. I can see what he was getting at, but it was a clumsy way of putting it (and I recall later in the section when it became obvious he confused his hearers he kind of admitted it was a clumsy way of putting it), and that might have steered me away from focusing more on conscience in my own notes on the Work.

But it's clear conscience is the control center. Consciousness - in intellectual center - is important too, but it's a slower center and it wavers weak and strong so dramatically, so that our level of consciousness can't really be a steady watchman. When conscience, though, is on watch we can really know, for instance, when we have gotten into (or are getting into) a state of strong identification; or that we are internally-considering; or that we are indulging negative imagination, etc.

Conscience like that appears after we have done a lot of self-remembering work.

It's clear in this sense that a working conscience is a part of Real Will.

Remember this

2011-01-22T20:47:00.001-08:00

Remember this: development that stays with you in the spiritual realm is not about holding a lot of surfacy knowledge in your mind at the same time. It is about developing your essential self. Your essence. It's kind of beyond words and ideas and so forth in this sense, though influences are carried in such ways.

So, for instance, just reading the Bible complete does more for you in real development. Reading Homer complete. Deep languages. Learning music. Athletic development. But also if you identify spiritual warfare and the knowledge associated with it as most important then having the *language* of the Bible in you complete is more real for development than reading twelve commentaries on a particular book of the Bible. Obviously. Also, with Work, seeing just one feature of false personality in real time in yourself and managing to have some real degree of control over it does more than going through the mental gymnastics of figuring out time and recurrence and so forth in that purely surfacy knowledge way. Obviously.

Pure and simple clock and real will efforts at rote, backlash, schedule, and event self-remembering and non-identifying do more than you can see or feel at the time of doing it. Development for these kinds of deeper efforts is like the slow hand of a clock: no visible movement, yet movement.

Something important, difficult to articulate

2011-01-17T23:28:00.000-08:00

I think it's a big thought whether God can trust me. *He* knows, but for us to ask the question it creates a unique, important perspective.

Here is something in the same realm: internally orientating ourselves in the moment as if we are now in God's Kingdom. I don't mean acting as if we are watched. Just shifting context and perspective. Coming out of worldly thoughts and behavior that are silly or worse.

The Work practice of New Thinking is involved here.

I.e., is being obsessed with some resentment worthy of a being who knows of and has been called into God's Kingdom?

It's something you *feel* in the moment. Of course wrapped up in all Work practices and being.

It's big because it's a thought that controls and contains most all else.

Three connections of the Work and Christianity

2011-01-01T13:55:00.000-08:00

Three connections of the Work and Christianity:

1. Progressive sanctification
2. Spiritual warfare
3. The Two Conscious Shocks as means of being in covenant with God

A summing up on this subject of the Work and Christianity

2011-01-01T11:37:00.000-08:00

The Work is like theology where you constantly have to go back and reiterate the basics. Then you sound like - to some - you never knew the basics, or that you're not aware that you are going over old, well-known things.

Let me sum up this subject I've been stumbling over too long:

* * * * * * *
The ideas, practices, and goals of the Work can be done without the foundation of regeneration by the Word and the Spirit, but it will ultimately just be screwing around leading to emptiness or parlor games or worldly groups focused more on sex and money and power than provoking and extending limits.

The ideas, practices, and goals of the Work done on the foundation of regeneration by the Word and the Spirit become (with the Word of God though an extra-biblical language) the substance of progressive sanctification and the means and environment of spiritual warfare.
* * * * * * *

Trip to the underworld

2010-12-29T03:57:00.000-08:00

I had a trip to the underworld yesterday. Because of unique circumstances I stopped in at a gas station I used to go to everyday in my old days. Before pulling into it I thought, "I could run into someone here..."

As I was getting back into my car after buying something to drink then that someone appeared. He was forlornly holding an empty red plastic gas can and making gestures to his pocket as if he needed some money, though he never asked for money. He kept looking at me. "Do I know you?" I queried. He said his name. Yes, he knew me. I recognized the name, but not the face. He was a shade from the realm of the dead.

We greeted each other. I asked him if he needed some money, and gave him a 20. Then he started talking. It was like giving him blood.

He had a strange knowledge of everybody I'd known in my old life. Strange because he wasn't even in all those circles, but his knowledge was coming from the spiritual realm. He talked and talked and talked, and told me what everybody had come to and was doing now. Who had died, who had gone astray of the law.

Then he began to fade, and I gave him another 20. He began to talk animatedly again. I asked him about everybody whose name I could remember. But he mostly didn't need any prompting.

After we'd exhausted all the names from the past he made an obligatory gesture to exchange numbers or see if I'd want to go golfing or something, but my reaction was distanced. We said goodbye, and he went his way, and I drove off.

It was a trip to the land of the dead. He was the shade that came forward.

I keep getting this shock (the Two Conscious Shocks as means of being in covenant with God)

2010-12-09T00:04:00.001-08:00

Every now and then when I'm reading some secondary source explaining Calvinism (or attempting to) I come across a particular shock that is delivered to me.

The seals of being in covenant with God (He does His part and we do ours) are baptism and the Eucharist. These two seals correlate to 1) the first conscious shock of self-remembering and accumulating higher energy (the Spirit to ever greater degree, whatever our limit, what we can handle); and 2) the second conscious shock of non-identifying and 'eating our suffering' so to speak (conscious suffering), loving our enemy, identifying with Jesus and His suffering in life and on the cross, and not indulging internal-considering, etc.

If you don't yet know classical Covenant - Federal - Theology it is merely biblical doctrine unwatered down, un-negotiated down to the demands of our fallen nature. Calvinism is a nickname for apostolic biblical doctrine. Hardcore. Accepting true doctrine - propositions from the Bible, as difficult as they may be to accept - to the point of it effecting inner re-orientation in us from being man-centered to being God-centered. It is also armor of God.

But this shock I get is powerful knowledge. To actually *know* how to be 'in covenant' with God. I mean *after* monergistic quickening and regeneration and conversion, to actually know *what it is we do.* The two conscious shocks. And they are what initiates the wayfaring. And wayfaring is warfaring, as the saying goes.

I'll write this post 80 times - the Armour of God

2010-11-23T16:03:00.000-08:00

All boils down to having the armour of God. Developing in the possession of and the use of the armour of God. Eph. 6:10-18. It's all there.

When you die you need the armour of God. While alive on the Way you need the armour of God. Especially obviously, though, when you die you need the armour of God. Some live to enjoy life as much as they can. Others live to be able to stand on that day.

You need to be in the Kingdom of God and have the armour of God. Being in the Kingdom now though doesn't make unnecessary the need for the armour of God.

Work ideas/practices/goals, faith, Bible, prayer, progressive sanctification, building being, awakening, etc. It is all in the armour of God.

The two conscious shocks are in our ability to 'stand'. The two commandments of Christ which come under 'truth'. Righteousness comes from Christ. We are clothed with the righteousness of Christ, not our own. Obviously the entire truth of the Word of God has to be known.

And notice the accent is put on spiritual enemies and forces and powers.

The two conscious shocks activate your progressing on the Way. They put you on the Way. The armour is your defense and means of victory when assaulted on the Way. The goal is to be able to stand on that evil day, and prior, to develop being as high and fully as possible.

Sitting here, rainy day (13 languages)

2010-11-20T17:19:00.000-08:00

At a college, rainy day. Looking at an edition of the Iliad. Start writing a list in the back of it. Title list: Deep Languages.

This is really what we seek (deep, higher, living languages) to develop and to get beyond ourselves. To increase understanding, consciousness, real will...build being.....even the Holy Spirit comes via the living language of the Bible.

I came up with 13:

Bible
Iliad and Odyssey
Fourth Way/the Work
Classical Music
War
Wealth
Grail Romance
Athletics
Performing Arts
Plutarch
Thucydides
Folk Tales
Classical Covenant - Federal - Theology

Salvation is foundational. C Influence is beyond, requires 3rd state of consciousness. The moving, external world of things and events becomes language with it.

Some of the languages/influences effect necessary development. All-center development. Some are ends in themselves.

Plutarch and Thucydides seem out of place there, but I see them as monuments or architecture that deliver language beyond their words. Structure. Other similar works could be included, not many though.

The ones that are ends in themselves are Bible, biblical doctrine, Work development.

The two conscious shocks are the Grail, the two commandments of Christ, the sacramental presence, the key to union with God. What all mysteries and secret schools and higher visual languages and traditions that are true lead to and describe. - C.

An email exchange, C. S. Lewis, Dark Powers, spiritual warfare, general law, etc.

2010-11-11T04:47:00.000-08:00

Here's a good quote from the Business of Heaven (the quote is from Mere Christianity) -

"One of the things that surprised me when I first read the New Testament seriously was that it talked so much about a Dark Power in the universe - a mighty evil spirit who was held to be the Power behind death and disease, and sin. The difference is that Christianity thinks this Dark Power was created by God, and was good when he was created, and went wrong. Christianity agrees with Dualism that this universe is at war. But it does not think this is a war between independent powers. It thinks it is a civil war, a rebellion, and that we are living in a part of the universe occupied by the rebel. Enemy-occupied territory - that is what this world is. Christianity is the story of how the rightful king has landed, you might say landed in disguise, and is calling us all to take part in a great campaign of sabotage."

Notice he says 'surprised' to find this in the New Testament. I'm always surprised to find it left out of most orthodox (small 'o') mainstream theological works.

Paul, you have been attracted to the Book of Job in the past. Thinking about the General Law as the Work describes it, and the spirit of Satan as a Christian learns of it from the Bible, the difference is the General Law plays out mechanically in the world. It works through sleeping, mechanical human beings. Yet there is also an element that seems to require a more active, conscious presence. The latter is like when the devil and his spirits (demons) may focus on you and try to tempt you and so on. Also, perhaps our deepest, ongoing suffering, things none of us really ever talk about, things from birth, or things that would make us seem like whiners or uncool - 'rule' type things that are given to us to help us separate from the world - these things seem like what we see in the Book of Job where the devil goes to God and says allow me to mess with this individual and let's see if they still give their allegiance to you. So God allows it. And we suffer. But the General Law type of phenomena is less personal and more mechanical and a result of the big forces (flowing away from the Absolute vs. flowing back towards the Absolute).

So here, without trying to, I've identified the famous three-front war in spiritual warfare: the world, the flesh and the devil.

The world is the General Law.
The flesh is the temptations and so on that come from our inner being, yet an inner being that has reins attached to it held by the devil and his army.
The devil is things like 'rules' that God allows the devil to give you, or to afflict you with, to try you.

It may have been wrong for me, using the Homeric analogy, to say that C Influence can sometimes be the source of needed friction. Yet, maybe not. That can also be a source. Athena slamming Odysseus' ship, giving him problems in his return. Then also being his main contact with conscious influence and help.

Basically you get it from all directions when you are in the process of awakening. And you must need to get it from all directions. - C.

--- On Thu, 11/11/10, c. t.
>I blow hot n cold with Lewis. (But at least he's consistent!) A Year With CS Lewis is good.

I know, probably any anthology of Lewis will give a similar impression. The Business of Heaven, though, I think is designed to address various Christian/religious subject matter.

Lewis of course is not literature that is deep language. It's surface knowledge. Really, what Lewis does is compliment and 'direct' one's thoughts and understanding. He plays around at foundational levels though which can be helpful even if you already know the foundational level. He usually ends up residing on middle ground, or a common sense ''what is all the fuss?", we're still in the flesh, leave extreme reactions and find the middle road and stay to it, etc.

He can also 'norm' you after you may have come into contact with some sneaky off-the-mark influence, or you have drifted.

In that sense he seems like an old teacher that is maybe good to run into every now and then but holds no potential for further, deep, being development.

For that you need to take in language. Higher visual language. Living language. Language inspired by the Holy Spirit. I mean regarding words on a page. Lewis would say, "Read Euripides, don't read me." Or Homer. Or the Bible. Which I'm doing now. I'm securely into my 7th complete reading currently on chapter 25 of Genesis. I've read Genesis like 3 times in a row now in aborted starts on my 7th complete reading, but this time I will plow on.

- C.

--- On Mon, 11/8/10, quickeningspirit

I blow hot n cold with Lewis. (But at least he's consistent!) A Year With CS Lewis is good.

I've just started Euripides. That's 8 plays. Completes the trilogy with Aeschylus and Sophocles. I also note that it bags the first 7 works in the Mortimer/Adler Great List. Not that I was ever thinking of doing that.

If you are doing India for the umpteenth time, you might as well change tack and pick out some of the Mahabharata - it'll keep you busy. I imagine if you can hone in on the right books, it could be revealing and an interesting contrast to some of the works that you have tackled previously.

BTW Mawsynram is a nice village I can recommend for you to visit. It's in the north east and I think very much to your liking. ; -)

Spiritual Warfare and Work Sentences

2010-10-07T03:30:00.000-07:00

The 3 Great Divides & Two Great Practices:

1. Worshiping the creation rather than the Creator

2. Seeing Jesus as merely a great teacher rather than Lord and Savior

3. Thinking one can be justified and made righteous by one's own works rather than by faith in the finished work of Jesus Christ in His life and on the cross (self-righteousness and self-justification vs. the righteousness of Christ and justification by faith alone in Christ)

Two Great Practices:

1. Act now as if you're in the Kingdom of God now, and God can trust you.

2. Do the two conscious shocks as the means to being in covenant with God.

Overriding Kingdom of God Attitude:

Gratitude over resentment always for everything.

+ + + + + + +

In every locality/event there is something to hold on to. To discern and use as a foundation for that place/event.

Leverage in the spiritual world involves containing force.

Initially meeting the forces in a contained space with strength and fearlessness and awakeness and honesty towards what you're up against is necessary to be able to then stand within that space with presence and power. Honesty in accepting and acting upon what you discern is necessary. If you discern/intuit unfriendliness yet pretend all are friendly you will not survive that environment. Innocence works and protects somewhat in early stages, but not when real stand-your-ground-and-be-present warfare is demanded.

Aim devours emptiness (vanity) in an event. Aim can be simply testing and tempering being. Aim can also be discerned in any event or action along the lines of the three lines of Work.

Influence can be gathered from seemingly still air. The stars invisible in the blue sky.

The six approaches work for particulars; a general stance of awake wariness is best for the overall situation.

Thoughts will be thrown just like words and should be intentional. Thoughts too should confront challenges and nonsense from the environment. If your words be clear and intentional but your thoughts be unintentional, chaotic, and dishonest - or just vain - you will not set your presence and control your own domain in the environment. Though the devil cannot listen to your thoughts you can throw your thoughts to such a degree that the shallowest in the environment can pick them up.

Moving inward and vertical in time (fifth and sixth dimensions; first and second conscious shocks) to the moment (the moving time of the environment or event) gives speed of perception advantage. Feeling the force and direction and fullness of time. Seeing her world history in an eyelash. A god at the tea party more inward to and above the moment. Still visible to crude sense, invisible otherwise is the god if not showing shame or fear inside. If a god through and through.

Acting on what you are able to know and to see and foresee is different from merely knowing and seeing or foreseeing the thing/event. Prayer is action bridging the vision and the event in time.

+ + + + + + +

1. Self-remembering ignites our being (cosmos) and fills it with a higher energy.

2. Non-identifying defines and secures the boundary of our being (cosmos).

3. Separation (I from 'it') sets the true north of our being (cosmos), orientating us and setting us on the foundation within.

4. External-considering orientates us with other cosmoses.

5. Transforming negative emotion connects our cosmos with the Kingdom of God and feeds us through that connection.

6. Learn to see cosmoses, to discern them.

7. When born you are a cosmos and a cosmos knows what it needs (the infant cries). When you die you are still a cosmos and you acclimate as a cosmos to the new state and situation you come in to. You are a cosmos within a cosmos(es) in contra-distinction to cosmoses.

8. The world and the devil and false personality (the flesh) wants you to 'come apart' as a cosmos; to have breaches in the boundary of your cosmos, a promiscuous traffic with the world. To stand your ground is to maintain the boundaries of your cosmos; to not allow anything external - the world, the devil - to connect with features within your cosmos that make up false personality and thus control you (control you, or, your cosmos); i.e. to attach reins within you as cosmos. (If the features of false personality are not manifesting then false personality is not there, and if not there then there is nothing for the world and the devil to attach reins to from without to control you.) The world and the devil want to be what fills your cosmos, to make the content of your cosmos to be the impressions and illusions and fears and desires and fascinations of the devil's kingdom.

9. The practical observation of cosmoses is seeing them in oneself. Becoming conscious in a higher and lower cosmos is like becoming conscious of different centers within you (emotional, instinctive, moving, etc.) with their different speeds.

10. A person single (no marital mate, no lover) is one kind of comsos. A person married or with a lover is another kind of cosmos. I.e. the two states have potential for different kinds of complete cosmoses (ideally, we can say, charitably). The single person develops the complimentary sides within his/her being. It's romantic to think that two people can develop as two, but two people are the norm of the world, and in such a situation the person who is part of a 'couple' *won't* be in conflict with the world or with one's flesh or the devil. Hard truth.

+ + + + + + +

#
Christian says:
October 29, 2009 at 10:01 pm

Money (or worldly gain), power (or worldly honor), and sex (or worldly pleasure) are not idols they are temptations.

A false idol is something like left-wing politics (Marxism, communism, socialism), or worship of the state; or environmentalism, or worship of mother earth; or multiculturalism, or worship of the ‘noble savage.’

These things don’t just replace God, they are sacrificed to (including human sacrifice) and they make the worshipers conscience feel easy. These false idols forgive their worshipers.

It’s difficult for modern day Christians to see real false idols because most modern day Christians are completely in the power of the false idols they can’t see.

Again, money, sex, power: these are staple *temptations* in the devil’s kingdom, they are not false idols.
Reply
#
Christian says:
October 29, 2009 at 10:13 pm

Unbelievers have a consciousness of guilt – of sin – that they need to have expiated. They refuse to approach God or the only Mediator between man and God, so they set up a false god.

Molech and Baal were not temptations.

Worship of the state is not a temptation. It is a god that is sacrificed to and that gives expiation to a sense of guilt and sin.

The Hollywood ‘liberal’ who makes a ton of money then gets involved in left-wing politics and issues is looking for expiation and is seeking a god to perform that for him/her.

They will sacrifice their freedom to these false gods. Their individuality. Regarding multiculturalism they will sacrifice their culture and civilization and the very safety of their neighborhoods (the ‘noble savage’ can do no wrong, in fact the more the ingratitude, the more the violence, the more the hatred directed by the noble savage to the false idol worshiper's culture the more the false idol worshiper will feel expiated for their 'sacrifice').

People will sacrifice humans to the state. Genocide. In some cases when abortion is a dogma in a person’s mind it becomes human sacrifice.

Money, power, and sex doesn’t expiate the innate sense of guilt and sin in a person. They are not false idols, they are temptations.

Interesting a modern Reformed author would write a whole book on idols and get it so wrong. This is because Reformed Christians have forgotten about subjects like false idols (spiritual warfare would be another).

Read John Owen’s Biblical Theology to learn about false idols and the worship of false idols.

+ + + + + + +

Observe (with conscious labor and intentional suffering) these 7 things:

1. Yourself and active reasoning
2. The person(s), place, thing, event your attention is on
3. Place, or surroundings
4. Your aim
5. The different points-of-view, intents, self-interests and motivations of others around you
6. The unspoken and spoken communications and the web of relationships between others and with others around you; and forces and laws in effect
7. Your conscious role

Sin

2010-10-06T23:49:00.001-07:00

I think what actually anchors us experientially to the plan of God and the fact of the History and Plan of Redemption is the fact of sin and the existence of evil. This is something we can see in ourselves and see in the world. I think it's the best apologetic, in the practical realm, for believing in what is revealed in the Word of God, not that it is needed if you are regenerated, but it is there to be observed.

Adam in the Garden was truly innocent, yet he had the ability to sin (which he demonstrated by eating the forbidden fruit). He had 'ability to sin and ability to not sin.'

Fallen man is different. Fallen man now has ability to sin and *inability to not sin.* In other words, fallen man is incapable of not sinning. We have original sin in us from birth, and we actively sin the first chance we get. Did you steal that candy from your sister when you were two years old? Yes, you did. Broke the 8th commandment at two. Probably earlier.

Regenerated man is different from fallen man (and similar to Adam in the Garden, though not identical). Regenerated man still has ability to sin, but unlike unregenerated fallen man he now has *ability to NOT sin* (this is similar to Adam before the fall, yet regenerated man is not 'innocent' like pre-fall Adam). Not everything he does, in other words, is as 'filthy rags' to quote Isaiah. Regenerated man can actually struggle with his old, fallen nature and not sin. It's a struggle though.

Glorified man is in an unusual state, different from all the above including Adam in the Garden (glorified man is in a higher state than Adam was in in the Garden). Glorified man has *inability to sin.* That isn't just saying glorified man merely doesn't *want* to sin and holds himself back from it, it is actually a higher state where, kind of like we see in elements of the Olympian gods and goddesses, glorified man literally *can't* sin no matter what he does. Sort of like where higher centers only have positive and no negative.

Threading the needle

2010-10-05T18:13:00.001-07:00

I'm going to try to thread the needle in gaining a rarer, deeper, more striking understanding of the Bible, each book, at a deeper level. I mean: it is difficult to do in this sense: secondary reference works on the Bible usually go in one ear and out the other. They seem to always have a shallow effect. It's also difficult in that the Bible is such a big book. Issues of endurance and tactics and approach come into play.

Of course I already have the overall Plan of God in understanding; as-well-as a general reading understanding of the Bible; as-well-as apostolic biblical doctrine from systematic and biblical theological sources and so on. (Which is a lot! Probably most of everything...)

Yet, what I'm getting at is this: can I bring Deuteronomy to mind and really know what is going on in that book? No. Not until I read it *while* taking notes (notes really make a difference, which is why the reference works fail [i.e. if you are only reading them], you really have to take your own notes to get things in memory and understanding).

Good reference works are rare too. Kline wrote a commentary on the Book of Deuteronomy (available in PDF form on the web). Anything Kline writes is worth reading. There are probably other good general commentaries. It's like reading the phone book, though. Which gets back to tactics and strategy for doing this. You can't be stuck in the mode of reading a phone book.

At my level of all this really Meredith Kline is coming to the forefront. His Kingdom Prologue and all the other books of his. Deep and striking insights made on the foundation of Federal Theology.

Here's what I'm really getting at: Kline's striking observation that the real end times climax begins when Satan and his followers make a claim on ALL the world. That observation is typical of Kline. He got it from the Bible, but it's the type of observation that comes from a 'different level' of engaging the Bible. Those understandings are in there. You have to know the system of the Bible (Federal Theology) and God's overall Plan of Redemption, but then you have to have a deeper parts-in-relation-to-the-whole understanding of the Bible. One where connections and inner meanings and striking insights can be made, or come to light.

Pilgrim politics, for instance, is another insight. It's in the Bible, but not in the eXoteric commentaries. We have to 'see' that for ourselves. And everything else that is currently not in our understanding.

I don't want to confuse any of this with *basic understanding of systematic theology and the overall plan of God.* I have that. That doesn't change or get bi-passed. I'm talking about insights made *on and within the foundation* of apostolic biblical doctrine, or Federal Theology.

These types of insights, too, come when you go to the Bible with a question or with something that is troubling you. The actions and words of Muslims, for instance. One can just abandon oneself to allowing them to yank our chain all the time. Or scare us. Or annoy us to no end. "We will plant a Muslim flag on the White House," said one of them on a major political morning show the other day. If you go to the Bible for understanding you see that God controls the devil's armies (Assyrians, whatever), and they are God's monkeys. They do what God allows them to do. Yes, we react (mainly we don't allow the devil and his armies to make us give up our faith or become their cowering slaves or whatever). In the Bible I looked up even the word 'terror' and what came up surprised me: inferences of God being the terror, using nations to bring terror to His backsliding peoples or to other rebellious nations.

We're also told to *confront the devil* and he will run. But the understanding we get from the Bible itself turns the volume of our out-of-control emotions down, and gives us a perspective on the battlefield, in space and time, and people, places, things, events, and contending ideologies and forces: darkness and light.

Re-reading that last email it sounds like I should just read Kline's Kingdom Prologue. I don't need to reinvent the wheel! (It *is* the one book in my possession that I can actually learn new things from. That and his other books. I mean, I do a lot of screwing around with stuff I already know. That's a feature of common human nature though. Truly learning something new takes more effort and a different mind set. You have to catch your breath too. Absorbtion and initiation is part of the piece meal approach over time too, it should be said. - C.

If I were a person who knew nothing about the Bible, Gods Plan or Christianity, what books would you recommend I read in what order?

S

I've had trouble with this question before. It's a difficult subject because it involves so many things. You have to have the Bible in you from complete readings. You have to have the Holy Spirit in you giving you discernment for the truth and motivation to know it...and ability to accept it.

The above requirements are going to separate out most people right off the bat.

It also is not encouraging that most graduates of seminaries and schools of divinity who becomes pastors and bishops and what not don't have the parts in relation to the whole understanding of apostolic biblical doctrine and God's overall plan of redemption.

Also false teachers are legion (and also inept teaching), which makes the process of getting the wheat difficult.

So we are talking about something quite rare and unusual to have.

Then again if it's too complicated it's probably not on-the-mark. It's simple once you get it. Like playing an instrument, I suppose.

For systematic theology:
Beginner: Concise Theology - J. I. Packer
Intermediate: Manual of Christian Doctrine - Louis Berkhof
Advanced: Institutes of the Christian Religion - John Calvin

For the history of redemption (God's overall plan of redemption):
Beginner: Articles like this: http://gospelpedlar.com/articles/Bible/cov_theo.html or this by Vos: http://www.biblicaltheology.org/dcrt.pdf (though Vos is hardly beginning level)
Intermediate: Human Nature in its Fourfold State
Advanced: Kingdom Prologue, and God, Heaven and Har Magedon - Meredith Kline

I'm talking about ultimate understanding. Most Christians don't get near it, and don't have to. But if you are inclined to get parts in relation to the whole understanding of lesser things and then turn to the ultimate thing, the Word of God, then there you are. It's not as easy with the Bible and the history of redemption because you are getting your arms around - or trying to - a cosmos that is not wholly in existence in our space and time. The history of redemption begins from eternity, for instance. And ends when time ends. Yet that isn't the end for glorified man. Also, God is not wholly understandable by us. We can know what He gives us to know, which is a complete understanding for His and our purposes, but the understanding of it has a ceiling beyond which is mystery.

The simple backbone of systematic theology is the Two Adams (federal theology) - Adam from the Garden who fell, and the second Adam Jesus Christ. We are either under the federal head of one or the other. Old Adam from birth, Jesus Christ by faith. What that is, how that happens, why it happens, etc., is the subject matter of systematic theology.

The simple backbone of the Overall Plan of Redemption can be described by covenants (three in particular) or by the four states of man vis-a-vis sin.

For the latter: 1. Man in a state of innocence (Adam in the Garden, were God makes a covenant with him - the Covenant of Works - where is Adam fulfills the covenant he will be given the Tree of Life, but he fails and falls and all mankind falls in him. 2. Man in a state of fallen corruption. This is historical time as we experience it. Nature has fallen too. This world of good and evil and mixtures of joys and sufferings, and sometimes horrible sufferings, is the after-the-fall state of man and nature. 3. Man in a state of regeneration. When an individual is regenerated by the Word and the Spirit - born again - they transfer into a wholly different state than the fallen state. Yet's it's still a struggle with one's fallen nature, but the victory has been achieved (by Christ). Once regenerated always regenerated. 4. Man in a state of glorification (and unregenerated man in a state of eternal hellfire). At physical death, or ultimately at the Second Coming and end of time, the regenerated man is glorified and is in the Kingdom of Heaven. Those are the four states of man in the history of redemption. Created on high, a fall, then a rise back up - drawn back up and also climbing once you have the Spirit in you and are able to climb - to a level that is higher than where you were created at.

The three covenants of Redemption, Works, and Grace describe the mechanics of all the above. They are difficult to get understanding of because sources use different terminology and get petulant about what they demand to include or exclude. It's a subject one just has to get initiated into after absorbing a lot of material and seeking the on-the-mark line of truth. - C.

ps- Search the categories at Monergism.com for other books. It really is a search. You have to find it on your own. Though someone who knows can help with questions and answer type exchanges.

pps- Spiritual warfare is woven all through it all too. Something that gets overlooked in most books. The forces of darkness that battles the Plan of God and the individual who is awakening into the Light. Then another subject is getting to understand why each part of the Bible exists. The histories, the prophets, etc.

Its a lot... A whole journey. I'll save this email for future reference!

S

>>If I were a person who knew nothing about the Bible, Gods Plan or Christianity, what books >>would you recommend I read in what order?
>>S

I really rate Packer's Concise Theology. It delivers very well on each relative subject and intentional or not, it does work at different levels. It's very clean and tidy. I'd package and organise it differently, I'd make much more out of the Biblical references too, but the content is great. Berkhof I'm less enthusiastic about. There's nothing really wrong but I do go to Packer first.

Oddly the two authors I've soaked up more than others are Kline and Vos. Neither of whom I would have discovered off my own bat. We're all dependent on others in some way to direct our attention. And then it's valuation. I have enthusiasm for both authors, although there are times when Vos is too dry and intellectual. He's difficult to recommend really. Kline however is almost mystical, with his word inventions and allusions. In that sense you can miss his point but then he stands (like Vos) to some serious study and like Vos is full of brilliance and Spirit. I love them both and yet I'm not sure in answer to Simon's question that either would be ideal recommendations.

That question demands a plan.

1. Read the Bible. Don't think about it or try and 'get it', just read it.
2. Read Bunyan's Pilgrims Progress.
3. Read The Embattled Christian by Zacharias.
4. Read Packer's Concise Theology

For me that hits the key note: the battle, warfare and struggle of the Christian way.

Understanding of the rest is something you can pick up through articles on monergism (like C suggests), and other sites - lots of useful mp3's to listen to and really, loads of books but you just can't recommend them at the outset but only as a person comes into either understanding or degrees of interest or inquiry.

You could just say read the Bible and also study Genesis and Romans.

- Paul of England

And this old post is the practical reason to get this complete understanding:

http://electofgod.blogspot.com/2008/07/doctrine-is-armor-of-god.html

- C.

ps- It's worth noting that Vos, Berkhof, and Kline are considered to be representative in the 20th century of the true line of Reformed doctrine. They all three explain things on the foundation of Classical Covenant - Federal - Theology. (Berkhof is of course more of a straight professor who produced a very well-put-together text book; Vos and Kline are biblical theologians who truly filled out Reformed Theology, mainly in the area of eschatology.) All this means is these three guys have few quirks (Berkhof zero, unless you consider infant baptism a quirk, I don't, because it doesn't effect Federal Theology despite what the more shallow defenders of infant baptism claim). Vos zero as well (though like Paul stated he wrote for academics and can be hard to understand overall - biblical theology as opposed to systematic theology is strange to begin with...requires initiation); Kline's biggest quirk is his Framework Hypothesis, which is a unique reading of the 6 days of creation. It is too clever by half, and really not worthy of adopting or defending. But it doesn't effect his theology overall which is orthodox (small 'o'). If you go back a few generations, Thomas Boston is a major source for on-the-mark Federal Theology. But, again, it's difficult to recommend these guys because, well, for the reason I stated in the first response. Self-motivation is necessary. But the practical end point is the post linked above. It's good to have a practical reason for the study, even if spiritual warfare doesn't cover every reason to know it.

Recurrence thought

2010-09-24T00:21:00.001-07:00

I'll bet once in Hades, in the interval between death and birth, in the recurrence sense, that we get *intensely* nostalgic for our 'past' life. No matter how much it may have been less-than-ideal. We get *intensely* nostalgic for our childhoods and the places and things and people we remember about it.

I mean *intensely.*

You see this power of nostalgia playing out in our human nature in the here and now.

All the negative is forgotten. The danger no longer exists. The unpleasantness is no longer felt.

And when you look at the past from the vantage point of being in the future you tend to see *possibilities* in that past that either weren't there in real time or that you were blind to anyway back in real time, but the *greater vision* of the times that looking backwards gives us makes the times more interesting. Less of an experience of being enchained in humdrum circumstances and necessities and situations and more a vision of what was happening in history and how one could do this or do that and how it is all so opened up and interesting and everybody you know is young again...!

To greater or lesser degree each person would feel and see this.

This draw of nostalgia would not effect (effect as strongly, I'll say) a person who has awakened in life. They, in effect, have *already* seen the bigger vision and it holds little enticement to them.

To use Plato's metaphor, the person who has truly awakened in life would draw less water from the river of forgetfulness (I know that metaphor clashes with how I've put it above). The thirst for the water of the river of forgetfulness would also be, in this sense, the desire to experience the 'past' once again. The draw of nostalgia.

We have to remember our fallen nature hates God

2010-09-06T02:25:00.000-07:00

1.

Celestial fire...higher energy...it is the Holy Spirit. The H.S. is God. Our fallen nature hates God. Here is something to observe: in the backlash state when we are full of accumulated energy (after self-remembering effort), and we are castigating people, from memory, in real time, the usual internal-considering, i.e. in the midst of a negative emotional blowout, try to observe how everything you are saying is *really* directed at the Holy Spirit. It's *supposedly* directed at some girl, some guy, some event, memory, whatever. No, see that it is directed at God.

Then note the language you use. "Creep. Fuck off. Who are you? You're nothing. I'll fucking kill you. Screw off. Compared to me you're nothing."

You think you're talking to some human from some past event in your life. No, you're talking directly to God.

This is a powerful and true realization.

You're castigating the Holy Spirit within you. Grieving the Holy Spirit.

2.

This is why this interval - this second conscious shock - is nigh impossible to cross. Because we are spitting at and fighting the only force that can get us across: God.

Celestial Fire - Higher things need higher language

2010-09-04T01:31:00.000-07:00

1.

Rare, new things need new, higher language to be identified. Work language is higher language, but I mean everyday language to identify something like the higher energy that is accumulated by self-remembering effort. Maybe the Work language has fallen short a bit here in not providing one, but maybe it's something we have to see eventually on our own and provide it.

Example: celestial fire. It captures the Work as practice. We're burned by it, illuminated by it, emanate it. Consume it.

I got the phrase from John Owen, Calvinist theologian. Psalm 104:4 alludes to it.

My main point: when we see higher levels of energy as celestial fire we react differently to it. When we get emotionally negative as a result of having accumulated such energy by self-remembering we see we are being burned by something rare and higher: celestial fire. I.e. we focus on the energy itself and not on what's making us angry and resentful and out of control in the backlash state and difficult events.

When we focus on the higher energy itself we are not in a state of identification with people, events, whatever. "I'm all angry because I have celestial fire in me. I have to embrace the celestial fire, not grieve it. Not fight it. And what's happening in my thoughts and imagination and events out here in the world...is nothing. It's between me and celestial fire. My limits."

2.

This idea may sound new agey, but really it isn't. It's using language to identify something that is new and rare. When we say 'higher energy' (the result of self-remembering effort) those words don't really denote the rare substance of what we're talking about and dealing with. Higher energy? We've all had high energy. Kids have it. Such words mingle to closely with mundane things.

So celestial fire, though it may sound grandiloquent, is the type of new language needed to identify something that is new and different.

Really, it is biblical too. The Bible uses such language. Fire. Having fire. The Holy Spirit as well is what we are accumulating. Jesus had the Spirit 'without measure'. The only human who *could* have it without measure. We can have it by increasing degree, but our limits are provoked blow out. We "grieve" the Spirit. We're a temple of the Holy Spirit once regenerated, yet we defile the temple.

That is the struggle. Provoking limits so as to then extend limits, with subtle effort.

And it's important to repeat that when you focus on the energy itself (the celestial fire) you aren't focused on the subject(s) of your resentment (whatever they or it is in the moment when you're indulging intellectual and emotional and physical negativity). You realize, whatever difficult thing is happening, that it is the 'celestial fire' that you are in the presence of and that you don't want to 'defile' it by using it for resentment and anger and so on.

Before all the subjects of your resentment were in the forefront. They are tangible (even if negative imagination and bad memories). Now, the higher energy itself is forefront because it has a name; something that identifies it as being rare and new...and present.

A fact of recurrence

2010-08-21T03:21:00.000-07:00

I'm going to give you a fact about recurrence: we are in Hades now - that interval between death and birth - just as we are here now at this mechanical point of our living time (which we perceive as a circle, but which includes more than this one - linear time - dimension).

When we awaken now, in this mechanical point of linear time we awaken in all the time of our time body or our living time. Which means we also awaken in that interval between death and birth which I call Hades, because the Bible uses that word, and because Plato gave a pretty good - if not exactly close - description of it in the Myth of Er.

When we awaken in Hades it is very noticeable there. The forces of darkness and light exist there. When you awaken there - in Hades - it is like you are walking out of the camp of darkness into the camp of light, and there is friction and opposition to you at first when this process begins. Eventually you have the armor of God to protect you.

This friction and opposition to you in Hades also is mirrored in the now of this physical life. The world gives you friction and opposition. The reins the devil has on your internal being - your fallen nature - gives you friction and opposition. The devil overall gives you friction and opposition.

Think of how many little victories are attained over you when the process begins and commences. Because you are innocent to the fact that you are in a battle. Yet think also of how your victory is inevitable (seen from the rear-view mirror of having been regenerated by the Word and the Spirit).

People might have pleasant death experiences simply because they have no opposition or friction from the darkness because they are not swimming against the current of the darkness, or the Kingdom of Satan.

People who experience difficulty may be in in-between states of awakening and regeneration.

People who experience triumph have been fully regenerated by the Word and the Spirit and have awakened *and have already engaged in the spiritual battle here and now and also in the spiritual realm.* They are not innocent of it all. They are fully soldiers of Christ with experience of the battlefield.

It's clarifying to see this 'point' in time (in our so-called circle of time, which is like the first dimension of time, a linear dimension, making a 'circle') as a *mechanical* point. Mechanical in terms of our consciousness. Once we increase level of being and attain the third and fourth levels of consciousness we are no longer just mechanically moving around that line that forms a circle but we are moving inward from that line (which forms a plane) and we are moving upward from that plane (which forms a three-dimensional manifestation of time.

This solves the problem we have when we think: "Why am I only conscious here, at this age, now, at this point of my linear life-to-death experience?" The answer is: because when we are in a state of mechanical level 'consciousness' we are stuck in this 1st dimension of time, this line which to our perception forms a circle, and the fact that we are stuck in *a point* in this line (a point which moves like a train on this line) seems to be a mechanical law of existence. That's the answer though: it's *mechanical.* But when we begin to truly awaken we awaken in all of our time, and we begin to move - consciously (by degree) - in all dimensions of our living time. And that includes becoming awake in that interval between death and birth, where we are NOW just as we are here in this physical body and world now.

+ + +

If you want to really feel the power of this Work get the whole-time-perspective and feel that you carry with you. That you operate within the theater of. All that that means. The effect you have on others in your time, who are not just living alongside you now but who are no longer here, yet exist in all their time including in death. In that season in Hades. That interval. Where you exist now as well.

Think of the spiritual battle.

Think of how much more radical your thoughts and words and deeds and actions in general now are with this full-body-time in view.

If you're able to think this now it means you've already been through the motions of recurrence. All the development. The different experiences. The different identities within, or covering, the same person. The type fulfilling its mechanical fate while emerging and developing, a living kernel in essence, in the mechanical ride. Eventually overtaking the mechanical ride as something bigger than the law of fate. Will. Real will. Real consciousness, real understanding. A full body with the full armor of God; a full robe of righteousness (this gets into the Christian reality) which is the righteousness of Christ.

Types, categories, patterns, the language of cosmoses

2010-08-08T04:56:00.000-07:00

Here is some deep knowledge. If you can begin to see common or universal types, categories, and patterns (in everything) it changes you internally. It changes your relationship to people, places, things, events, ideas. It's a way of seeing that higher being has. There is more individuality higher up. Just like in works of literature or music, the higher the work the more unique and individual it is. The lower the work the more common and numerous it is. To put it colorfully: angels see humans as types. If you've broken down out of a type you will be more noticeable and unusual. Perhaps in an in-between state of development. Heading higher. Everything though, people, families, things we tend to think of as unique and different from each other, to higher perception fall into common types and categories and patterns. This perception takes the illusion out of what we see. It takes much of the everyday charm of life away from us as well. It gives greater understanding but diminishes our interest in everything. It also subdues our emotion regarding things and also gives us insights into recurrence. This subject would be a part of the language of cosmoses.

A good-natured, laughter of the Gods pursuit of C Influence is in order

2010-08-06T16:40:00.000-07:00

I've let you guys down by adopting this lame "everything sucks now" line. Talking about myself is not a good idea. Not productive. The fact is, I havn't even opened a Work book in many, many years. The biblical doctrine I have understanding of now I had understanding of many years ago too. I'm being almost lunatic repetitive, revealing perhaps a bit of a compulsive, obsessive disorder. A trace. Also, a shut-in mentality. Nothing unusual, mind you, when you've actively pursued and devoured every higher influence that exists, pretty much. Every category and level anyway. Without becoming an Olympic athlete or playing at Carnegie Hall or publishing the great American novel. You don't have to. You don't have to be Casanova to get the measure of flesh. Again, repeating myself (I was writing on this theme back in the early years of this decade, if it's still this decade and not the next decade). It's like, I've used up all my water, and I'm only half way across the desert (water being influences and desert being life span). Yet there is C Influence.

There *is* more.

Laziness is a disorder with me too. (Realizing this, actually writing it down, perhaps the subject was now coming out of the pit that was the stumblingblock. Rising up, yes, blinking at the sun...)

A good-natured, laughter of the Gods pursuit of C Influence is in order. The Work, Homer, and the Bible are the foundation for that. The Faith being everything, of course, but the Work and Homer being some sort of 'sight line' keeping to the straight and narrow... - C.

A list of higher world things, just like lower world things

2010-07-24T00:22:00.000-07:00

You have to find, or connect with, the people, places, things, events, and ideas (or language) of the higher world.

Something about historical time and eschatology

2010-07-22T17:21:00.001-07:00

I'd had some left-over difficulty (mainly due to not pondering and meditating upon it but letting it hang there) in trying to see the history of redemption in a temporal context. It *is* temporal, but then it becomes non-temporal. Sort of leaves time. Shoots upward, eschatologically.

It's like this: Adam in the Garden; then the fall of man and creation (still in historical time here); then (leaving historical time) individual regeneration by the Word and the Spirit; then (the end of time) glorification.

Of course when we are regenerated we are still alive in historical time, but of those four states - innocence in the garden, corruption after the fall, regeneration by the Word and Spirit, glorification after physical death - it's difficult to place individual regeneration in a historical 'time-line'. Regeneration is also, meaningfully in this context, when an individual is separated out from the world and becomes a stranger in this world; in this world not of this world. And a bit more timeless. Out of recurrence, even, it can be argued.

(In this sense the Work teaching is the unavoidable 'making-more-complicated' by 'pressing' into it intellectually - pressing into the Truth - of which the Bible and the simple-yet-profound and probably rare experience of regeneration actually IS.)

I'm not discounting the Work teaching at all in the above, simply stating that much of the experience described is contained in the experience of regeneration; and really what the above refers to is the 'Work person' who does not *have* regeneration by the Word and the Spirit. This is the 'making it complicated and intellectual' referred to, really. I had regeneration prior to connecting with the Work teaching. Prior to that I'd come into contact with it, but couldn't - or refused to - connect. It's a big difference we can forget: having the Spirit *and* Work understanding vs. not having the Spirit and merely having Work books and the attendant babble that usually accompanies it all.

In God's plan He is *gathering* his elect (believers, his people). The analogy of fishing is used in the Bible. Once a fish is 'hooked' and pulled up out of the water it is no longer in its world. When you are regenerated - gathered into the Kingdom of God - you are pulled up out of the world and out of time. Then you say: "Gentlemen, this world of ours is a bore!" or many similar things. (It's murky, it's cold, there's a lot of horror of fish eating other fish...)

Some thoughts upon wandering through Work forums on the internet

2010-05-28T01:54:00.000-07:00

I've recently been going around the 'net to various Fourth Way sites and forums and reading bits here and there. It causes unique reactions for me. I mean feelings, thoughts. Much of what I find on the 'net doing this comes across as helter skelter, almost hellish in a sense. And you find the usual forum nonsense. The control, banning (not me, I havn't been participating, but of people who are not conforming to the moderator's program, all that). The usual nonsense.

The usual scent of cult activity and personalities not far away, if not directly present (though that seems rare on the internet).

It also makes me question my own relationship with the Work. I saw one comment that referred to "B Influence junkies" and wondered if I'd fallen and rested comfortably a bit into that characterization.

But more deeply questions of connection come to the fore; that vertical connection that was once so real.

It seems that when I was in that connection I didn't realize how I was viewed by the world (and really didn't care). But I know now.

I think what my parents must have thought (but strangely I seemed to in some way have brought them along with it, evidence being my father's talking of recurrence on his death bed). In their old age they were kind of living in a timeless realm anyway at that point. Their past life, and eras of their lives were pretty far away at that point, and they were static, in the same house at the end for years, same chairs, same routine.

The fact is, you're going to effect your entire family when you truly change internally and develop to some real degree. Without realizing it of course because that is not part of your motive or anything you are aware of at the time.

I think prayer to the Holy Spirit for guidance here is in order. At this stage. We rarely think of praying directly to God the Holy Spirit, yet He it is that guides us in our sanctification after regenerating us and after our conversion.

That's really what is going on, perhaps. A larger stage (as in theatre) is reached. (I always seem to want to spell theatre the English way when I use the word like that.)

Just as in the past when I had a real connection I wasn't aware of it being real spiritual warfare, at least not directly, yet then that aspect comes to the fore in a big way. A bigger stage. Less innocence.

Before I didn't have the armor of God, let alone the full armor of God. Now I am conscious of needing the full armor of God.

The Holy Spirit doesn't abandon us, yet graduation seems real regarding stages of the Work. That can't be denied.

I can walk down the same roads, metaphorically speaking, as I did back then, doing the Work, yet the difference I have to recognize is the spiritual warfare nature of it. I've sort of recognized that in the last several years, yet I've not been walking those old roads like of old. I've just been recognizing spiritual warfare in everyday life experiences, including more rare experiences.

Two things: prayer for guidance to the Holy Spirit, and also a recognizing of that hardcore Work practice of being present for duration, depth, and frequency. Both are needed. The latter doesn't become beneath us. It is what leads to true change and true new realms. The former, all of the faith, is the foundation and guidance and everything too. But that true effort of self-remembering, non-identifying for real duration, uncomfortable, and then dealing with the backlash, and everything else, is what makes your connection real or not.

Big perspective post (dead on a gurney II)

2010-05-25T01:11:00.000-07:00

With my uncharming 'dead on a gurney' post I was trying to do something I'll try again here.

It is necessary to look at humankind and history and individual lives and ask what is the most important thing that could happen with an individual in an individual life?

Making millions? No. Being famous, even for impressive reasons like discovering or inventing something? No, again. Obviously those are good things and worthwhile, but they are not the most rare, unique things that can happen within an individual in an individual life.

Developing Magnetic Center, regeneration by the Word and the Spirit, true awakening, getting out from under the tyranny of vanity and worldly pride and self-will, becoming God centered rather than man-centered, having saving faith, these and similar things are the rare and unique things that can happen to an individual in an individual life.

They involve higher influences (B and C influence), they involve the Word of God and the call that becomes effectual internally, they involve painful separation from the world (the General Law, the world of sex, all that) including the pain of being forced to see our own nothingness, and in that they involve the breaking down of personality and the developing of essence.

The Work language gives us understanding of these ultimate things. Biblical language and doctrine does as well in a different way.

Roles are played in life, in history, influences are created, God's providence puts all beings in their place, where they need to be. I say this to say we can't put down the world or make null all parts and forces and directions of life in the world. Yet when we look at individual lives, in history, we can see what is most unusual and rare and unique.

So when we make contact with such things...realize it! *Continually.*

We have to continually get perspective.

Much of all this development requires unusual *self-motivation* (or inwardly motivated action) or internal (conscious) shocks rather than the usual external shocks mechanical life is excited and controlled by. It's unusual for us. We're use to things just 'happening.' We have to formulate aims. Engage in active reasoning. Live from the Work rather than from life.

Pool reading

2010-05-23T15:45:00.000-07:00

Ignore the title of this post. It's just free association for now.

I've always been on to the need to have a basic list of books that are balanced and ultimate influences for you. Yet I've never really married to that the advantage (or necessity and need) to re-read certain influences to really make them our own. Not all books (influences) are worth re-reading, or need to be re-read, of course, but a handful are worth it.

Along the lines of Luther's (and many other peoples') comment that it's better to know a handful of books well than to know many books to a shallow degree.

When you come to a point where you've read basically everything (every level and category or genre of book) you are always wondering what to read now. Rarely do you think of going back and re-reading a great influence.

So beyond a rock like list of basic books one needs also to engage in pool reading. By that I mean having a basic pool of influences that one gets to know really well. The notion of pool here means not just the particular books that make up your definitive list itself, but all secondary works on the subject of those books, or critical essays on each one, or similar works in their category, if that applies, etc.

For the Bible and Federal Theology this is obvious.

Wealth of Nations and On War less so, though it applies.

I guess the main point is to get to know a handful of influences really well. When we begin with influences we can't know what are worthwhile in this sense, but as we get understanding of the entire field, so to speak, and can discern the handful worth knowing really well, then all this applies.

I don't know if I'd ever get much from reading a work of fiction more than once. Perhaps so in some cases, if a lot of time has elapsed, just to see how one's understanding has developed over time. Liker reading an old journal or diary.

Homer definitely. Very little worthwhile secondary literature on Homer though. You have to write your own. Which I have. Here and there.

Shakespeare is most likely a main candidate. The first time we course through Shakespeare we are a bit fazed by it all. And wondering if it's really as great as it's reputation. So to struggle with that (and assuming it is, since it's hard to go up against a vetter like Time) we have to go at it multiple times over time. A worthwhile influence for that.

I just know I've been delinquent in re-reading great influences, other than the Bible and Homer and Reformed Theology and the Work. You shouldn't really just read Herodotus *once*, for instance. Or Thucydides. Works might suffer upon second readings, but so what. You learn something.

Dead on a gurney

2010-05-17T04:00:00.000-07:00

Picture yourself lying dead on a gurney. Look at your lifeless face. See others looking down on you. Professional people who see corpses often. Another dead human.

Now think of what you did in your life that had any real meaning. You read a lot of books, but did any of them produce any real change? Your effect on other people, etc.

Here is how I see the real positive change: did you awaken in a real way during your life? In the way that language such as becoming God-centered rather than man-centered suggests?

Did you really get above the dark and silent internal tyranny of your vanity and pride and become able to recognize anything higher than you? Did you recognize your Creator? That is a real development. That is real change. Looking down on that dead face on the gurney one could say something really happened for that person in their life. A real change.

Such things as recognize original sin in oneself. And active sin. The need for a mediator between yourself and God. It is not 'normal' to be able to recognize such things.

Let alone did you come to where you could discern and value the difference between self-will and Real Will (or God's will in you)?

At this point the corpse has a half smile.

A final word on 'sacraments'

2010-05-14T01:14:00.000-07:00

I think the best way to understand the 'sacraments' is this: prior to being regenerated by the Word and the Spirit ritual sacraments (baptism and the Lord's Supper) provide for the currently unregenerate a visual parable to teach them and keep them drawn towards Scripture (ideally).

After regeneration though ritual sacraments become vain matter. Regeneration itself is baptism of the Holy Spirit. What the Lord's Supper symbolizes is union with Christ which a regenerated Christian has in reality.

The unregenerate in the church (especially leadership) never want to think anybody is regenerate. So the regenerate Christians have to just silently grin and have understanding for them. While at the same time not allowing themselves to be drawn into dead ritual or an experience of the faith that is beneath them. (Intentionally chosen words there.)

Fear God, not man. Don't ever exalt man and ritual above the Word and the Spirit. (Man being cleric or scholar or anything else.) And don't succumb to those who demand that man and ritual be exalted over the Word and the Spirit. That is a point of difference that defines the battle-line in the spiritual world. A soldier of Christ - a true spiritual warrior - does not concede or play such games for *any* reason or justification or demand on the part of the currently unregenerate.

The 3 Covenants of God's Plan of Redemption

2010-05-13T23:38:00.001-07:00

Faith, hope, charity

2010-05-12T20:58:00.000-07:00

Came across something recently. This verse:

1Co 13:13 And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.

means this: faith and hope are still forward looking (or are in things still yet unseen), yet love now is the beginning of the same love that will exist beyond the veil.

Dostoevsky, interesting

2010-05-09T19:54:00.000-07:00

It's interesting (to me, anyway) that when you write a list of Dostoevsky's major novels, novellas, and stories there aren't that many.

About a baker's dozen:

The Double
Notes from Underground
Crime and Punishment
The Gambler
The Idiot
The Eternal Husband
The Possessed
The Brothers Karamazov
White Nights
A Nasty Story (also trans. as 'A Disgraceful Affair')
Bobok
A Gentle Creature (also trans. as 'The Meek One')
The Dream of a Ridiculous Man

Dostoevsky is interesting because he portrays the psychology a person who has developed into being able to see and value the Work possesses. Experiences are similar. Alienation. Isolation. The insulted and humiliated. Embarrassment as a means and an end in development. One I love, the 'scandalous feast' or 'scandalous gathering' where the veil is lifted on the facade of societal unity and people are exposed and things get crazy. D. has these scenes in all his major novels. The love triangle (which doesn't need to involve consummated love). The figure of the 'dreamer.' The dreamer as idealist who wants to transform his squalid reality into something more noble, more lofty, more beautiful. It ends badly. Reality triumphs. Though the ideals are vindicated in various ways. Then, isolated consciousness has recognized its isolation. Love this quote from Notes from Underground: "...to tell long stories of how I defaulted on my life through moral corruption in a corner, through an insufficiency of milieu, through unaccustom to what is alive, and through vainglorious spite in the underground - is not interesting..." Another motif is the motif of the double, the lack of unity or oneness in a person. Obvious Work theme. Then, the General Law, depicted as the social nexus (the outer, collective world) that impinges upon the inner, personal world. These clash in the aforementioned 'scandalous feasts' or 'scandalous gatherings.'

In the above paragraph, in places, I have paraphrased Richard Pevear in his Intro to the Bantam Classics edition of The Eternal Husband.

I didn't mention one other theme because Pevear presented it as confused. The theme of separation from 'what is living' leads to violence towards what is living. What is confusing is Pevear doesn't say if 'what is living' is the isolated individual or the collective social milieu.

For us, Work types, we can see that there is an element of violence going on, and criminal behavior is always close. Perhaps a percentage of inmates of prisons are in very early stages of development (recurrence) and succumbed to violence. I always use to say: "Don't get yourself into a prison cell!" when talking about accumulating higher energy in early stages of development.

A stinging recognition

2010-05-05T20:05:00.001-07:00

While reading a discussion of the Trinity on a forum (one person who should know better was refusing to recognize the orthodox biblical teaching on the Trinity) it reminded me of a realization - a sharp, as in stinging, realization - I had recently. I recognized that I was dishonoring the Holy Spirit by neglecting the language He introduced me to and taught me (enabled me to understand).

To clear my mind on the Trinity after reading that forum discussion I read J. I. Packer's chapter on the Trinity in his Concise Theology, and at the end of that chapter he notes that part of having a biblical understanding of the Trinity - of accepting the biblical teaching - is we are reminded to honor all three Persons of the Trinity, or Godhead.

I.e. pay equal attention and give equal honor to the gracious ministries of all three Persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Just got a glimpse of...higher time 2 (disappearing from our living time now)

2010-04-20T16:34:00.000-07:00

Following on that last post think about this:

The problem of how we can exist in all parts of our living time at the same time doesn't really appear (i.e. the problem doesn't become a problem) until a person begins to awaken and thus having a 'point' of consciousness in that living time.

It very well might be that before we awaken we are just totally mechanical throughout our 'time-body' in our living time and there thus really *is no* single point of consciousness, but 'you' throughout all of that 'time-body' is equally mechanically-asleep, going through mechanical motions.

Sure, there is the phenomenon that people wake up when in contact with another person who is awake (sometimes they do), and that fools us, if we are the awakened one. But normally that person is just dead, mechanical asleep in their life all the time. Their 'I', or 'point of consciousness moving around the circle of their time', so to speak, is Imaginary 'I', so their whole time-body is imaginary 'I', one thing, happening at the same time. We are seeing them at a particular point, but they are no more awake at that point than at any other point of their living time.

We, on the other hand, who have awakened in our time (let's be generous to ourselves and describe us that way) just 'may' in fact *disappear* from every other part of our living time. I.e. *right now.* Because Imaginary 'I' holds that all together, but once Observing I appears (a degree of Real I) boom, we are here, and no longer everywhere at once in our living time.

Think about that. Relations disintegrate. People from your past start to fade away. (I.e. because *you* have faded away from their time).

Graduation is in store. You have begun to awaken and are now 'present', thus you graduate. You disappear from your time. And that is happening NOW. You as a child, for instance, are no longer in those times and spaces. Those events. You are here now, right where you are now.

Graduation must happen once a person awakens. That means literally disappearing from your living time. Which occurs *while you are still alive*. My childhood is no longer 'there' because I am no longer there in mechanicalness, going through the motions, because *I am here.*

Read this again, and think about it. It is interesting.

It is eschatological as well. It brings an immediateness of results of awakening to the present.

Just got a glimpse of...higher time

2010-04-19T17:26:00.001-07:00

Just got a glimpse of how you can be in difference parts of your time at the same time. It had to do with a key and a lock. The door to the building I'm living in. I started having a feeling of presence when I was at this door and putting the key into the lock. Each time. Over time. Saying things, feeling things, like: "What am I doing here?" and "Here I am again." So this particular event built, and then just now I got a glimpse of how I could be here putting this key into this lock while at the same time be in other parts of my time. *Not in the usual way we can only think that*, but in a "I just ate psychedelic mushrooms and saw beyond linear time" way. Yet no mushrooms involved.

Hate to bring mushrooms into that. It cheapens the explanation, or the realness, of the experience.

We have to wonder, though, why we are alive in all our living time (childhood on up to now) yet we are only awake in this time and place right now, and I think it is because it's like a train moving across a landscape and the towns and cities (you at different times of your life) it passes through are still there and active and alive, but you, the train, are only there in one of them at a time. The train would be some 'thing' apart from your physical body that stays with you in linear time. And the you that is past, the town that is 'back there', that still exists, is really you, but is a you that is not much awake and goes through mechanical motions. You can see how when a person truly begins to awaken things get strange for all their living time. I can look back at childhood, in school, and see things that can only be explained by such strangeness. Strange anger at you from others. Memories of being in a sort of bubble of higher awareness yet not pin-point on anything. All kinds of strange things can be going on. You could be in a different gender, yet some 'ex' is acting towards you as if you were still the you they knew.

(I still say gender is easily flipped in the womb. Genitalia goes internal or it goes external. Boys and girls both have the material for breasts. Then all secondary sexual characteristics are the effect of hormones, or whatever. Voice, shape of body, hair growth, etc. Having children will seem to lock you into one gender or the other in your time, but I also think even such a profound thing can be easily changed, such as a sibling having your children. My sister had a little girl *after* she'd had an operation regarding her uterus that practically made it impossible for her to have another child. That little girl *had* to be born in her time. Children, families, it all is more involved in universal types than we can see up close. From a higher perspective you see it. So there can be mix and match without profound changes in the person's fate. That's what I'm getting at.)

Getting the vanity and pride knocked out of you is the unpleasant part. The 'rule' or rules God gives you that are designed to get you separated from the world (the general law). You can either deny the existence of the rule, or you can accept its existence and allow it to do its job. Yet that is the painful baptism. Being truly separate. *Truly* getting your vanity stabbed to death over and over. Your pride as well. Enduring *contempt* coming at you. Especially if you've been used to being liked and all that. Recognizing that the treatment you are now getting is probably how you treated others too when you were asleep and in your worldly strength. Then having no where to turn, or to go, so you 'go' into higher influences. You go vertical.

Simple and plain 2

2010-04-17T02:30:00.001-07:00

See, with this 'simple and plain' post I'm identifying a simple, compact way of orienting oneself in the face of everything, internal or external.

Php 3:14 I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.

That 'pressing into the battle' sense.

Thinking of Shakespeare?
Thinking of angels?
Thinking of your job?
Thinking of social life?
Thinking of new technologies?
Thinking of changing demographics?
Thinking of boredom?
Presented with images from media?
Having trouble with your flesh body?
Having vague thoughts of Work teaching?
Forgotten the Bible from past complete readings?
Lost the key?
In fragmented mind set?
Driving, sitting, walking, talking, doing, showing, categorizing, strategizing?

Whatever it is, you can think 'spiritual warfare' and you have the means come to mind and the goal.

I would like to instill the unique and universal truth of Federal Theology into whoever will listen and learn. It's sounds, I know, just like 'one of any number of theologies', but it's not. It's the theology of the Bible. Unwatered-down, un-negotiated down to the demands of fallen man. It's the structure and mechanics and substance of God's plan from eternity. With it you place yourself. And you understand where you stand and what you stand on. It is the foundation and building structure of mystical union with God.

The Work is a language of the Holy Spirit, a language of war.

Simple and plain

2010-04-15T23:58:00.001-07:00

The Work can get too intellectual, and with the inclusion of biblical faith it can seem to get all mixed up.

Here it is simply and plainly:

Spiritual warfare.

The three-front battle (which includes our fallen nature, the Old Man within us, which is what much of the Work teaching is involved with). The flesh, the world, and the devil. False personality, other people, and the Kingdom of Satan and all its forces.

When you think of the two conscious shocks - of doing them - think of 'pressing into the battle.'

Who wants to press into a battle? Obviously it's not comfortable.

Well, if you can see the goal of doing it, and value that goal, it's different.

The Celestial City, as Bunyan depicted it. The Kingdom of God. The Holy Mountain of God. The New Jerusalem. Heaven.

Once you know the battle exists you are in it anyway. But to remain back and away from the front lines means to decay into 'Village of Morality' sleep and mechanicalness and Imaginary 'I' that overtakes you to become what you are.

Not good.

The Work has always been closest to two historical classes of Christians: the mystics, and the Puritans. Not surprisingly they are the two classes of Christians who actually wrote on the subject of spiritual warfare. They knew it.

Federal Theology becomes mystic. Calvin's writings become mystic. They become the necessary foundation and framework for the spiritual warrior's understanding of the terrain and of himself. The Work as well. School knowledge and practice (or being).

To make that simple: what is contained in Louis Berkhof's Manuel of Christian Doctrine. But seeing the 'whole' of it. The three covenants, the connection between the two Adams (Adam in the Garden and Jesus Christ). Five solas. Doctrines of grace.

Then Work teaching.

(I just picked up a new trans. of John Calvin's The Secret Providence of God, and he sounds like a mystic once again. A very sharp one. Something that won't be understood by the common unregenerate academics in the Reformed environments of today.)

It all comes together though in spiritual warfare.

Pressing into the battle by the effort of self-remembering and non-identifying for duration, depth, and frequency. Then relying on prayer and the Sword of the Spirit, the Word of God, and faith, the Shield. The full armor of God (Eph. 6:10-18).

That second conscious shock lifts us to new realms. Out of those surprise battles, if we don't fall from our horse (emotion) and we keep our sword, and we move on.

That very 'moving on' needs to be valued as well. It is a continual moving away from the world. Can we do that and still be in this world? Of course we have to say we can. Sanctification itself is, by God's plan, meant to take place after regeneration and conversion in the remaining time we have in the flesh. We also influence others.

A list to sort out the lines between secular and sacred histories

2010-04-06T19:36:00.000-07:00

1. History as the four states of man (innocent, fallen, regenerated, glorified). Thomas Boston's Human Nature in its Fourfold State is the best source for this.

2. The history of revelation. This is 'biblical theology', as opposed to systematic theology. Vos (Biblical Theology) and John Owen (Biblical Theology) are good sources of this.

3. The history of redemption from eternity to eternity. This is the subject of classical Covenant - Federal - Theology. From the Covenant of Redemption made before the foundation of the world, to the Covenant of Works made in the Garden with Adam, to the Covenant of Grace which plays out in historical time until the consummation (second coming of Jesus Christ). This history can be gleaned from good Reformed systematic theologies like Berkhof, and - to a further degree - from Meredith G. Kline's God, Heaven and Har Magedon. Herman Witsius' Economy of the Covenants Between God and Man is another. There are a few on-the-mark sources for this.

4. The history found in any universal history of the world. Anything from H. G. Wells Outline of History to J. M. Roberts History of the World, to Susan Wise Bauer's ongoing four-volume history of the world. Secular, temporal, known history of man and cultures and civilizations on this planet. This category also includes philisophical histories such as Hegel's or Spengler's and every other kind of history one normally thinks of as history such as the classical historians or histories of individual nations or what have you.

5. The history of idol worship. This is a bigger category than it looks. It is basically secular history, yet at the more unseen level. It includes all other world religions - other than Christianity, that is - as well. John Owen in his Biblical Theology has a series of chapters on the history of idol worship that contain knowledge you won't find anywhere else, least of all in any modern day works.

6. The history between the two Advents of Jesus Christ. This is what is found in the material of the Book of Revelation, for the most part. It is a mixture of secular and sacred history. Historicism which reads the Book of Revelation as history gets at this.

7. The history presented in the entire Bible. I.e. the history of creation, of the Israelites, of Jesus Christ, of the apostles, etc. The Holy Bible, AV1611 is the source for this.

8. The history of the micro individual level: Work history. This is about Fourth Way ideas, practices, and goals. If one is a Christian unaware of such teaching then skip this one. Yet Work history is real history, for an individual. You are the historian for this.

9. The history of the micro individual level: regeneration, conversion, sanctification. The Holy Spirit is the historian of this.

10. The history of Christianity and the Church. This has always been an awkward category of history. It is blatantly temporal and unhidden and, really, in the secular category of history, yet it touches on the divine workings of the Triune God's plan of redemption in history. Phillip Schaff's 8-volume History of the Christian Church is the ultimate source for this.

11. 'Mesoteric', or in the middle between exoteric and esoteric, history such as material on the '12 Tribes of Israel vis-a-vis Europeans' is a real, if muddied and easily-mocked, category of history. Grail romance and related 'history' is in there too. 'Serpent seed' material. These types of things. It is real history if for no other reason that it has ability to bring people to the faith, if by a necessary oblique gateway.

This list now is left at an uncomfortable '11'. That is rare for me. I can usually fill out a 7 point or 10 or 12 point list. Maybe it is an 11 point list because this subject is a bit helter skelter. Or maybe I shouldn't have included 'Work history' above. Whatever the case I'll leave it as is, and hopefully it will provide something to work off of for anybody pondering this subject.

archiving an email

2010-03-28T00:21:00.000-07:00

If anybody thinks I've become less serious let me just remind everybody that I outlined the Plan of God for a reason. It is the substance of the understanding derived from objective consciousness. All that about Federal Theology (which is Covenant Theology systematized), about the Bible, about all the subject matter of systematic theology (which includes what is going on inside man), bringing it together, seeing the parts in relation to the whole, that is a big part of everything. A big part.

I'm getting reminders of it all as I read actual Reformed theologians writing things now that I was writing on their blogs back then. (I wasn't banned from all of them, by the way.)

You need the Spirit to discern such things. But to have it all as a whole is obviously very valuable.

My point is you all didn't follow me much into all that territory, this is OK, we're all in different stages and all that. But it's not like I was doing nothing.

The more real understanding one gets of the Plan of God the closer one gets to supernatural realms and beings and events.

The catch is the love for the world (including indulging resentments and fake sufferings via things that happened when one was solely in the world) that seems to be the hardest thing to cast off. It's what prevents the second conscious shock.

The two conscious shocks are the real 'sacraments' of the Faith.

An insight, Christ and death

2010-02-16T14:45:00.001-08:00

I recently had an insight I think is worth something. Awhile back on Plain Path Puritan I wrote a post about how when Paul the apostle says all I want to know is Jesus Christ crucified what he is saying is that is a way to remember *all*, the history and mechanics of redemption as summed up in the name Jesus Christ. It's shorthand and assumes knowledge of what is behind it, the whole.

Then I was thinking that for the Work a similar summing up would be: death.

Because death is the ultimate testing ground for development of being. And the two conscious shocks are eschatological in the moment. With the first you enter the fifth dimension of time, and with the second you enter the sixth. Vertically you break planes. And each is a real *dying* in the moment. Especially the second conscious shock (but the two conscious shocks are two sides of the same coin).

Remember those exercises I called 'death tests' where you would decide at a certain time or event or sound or what have you you would try to be awake right in that moment (I think that was the exercise, it may have been even better than that, but I don't recall at the moment). But the point is *that* really is what all the effort points to: being awake at the point of death.

Also I was thinking: it is really a powerful thing to imagine our own physical death. Try to sense and visualize what it is and will be like. Get that sense of entering eternity, so to speak. The more you do that the more use you get to the fact of it. Intellectually you can get beyond fears by seeing things like your body being a cosmos, and how you will have a spiritual body that will still be a complete cosmos. You won't dissipate like smoke at death.

Of course that spiritual body is what we try to develop with Work efforts. The more consciousness, understanding, and real will we have the better the 'seed' we sow at death.

So, with Christianity and salvation and faith we think: Jesus Christ.

With Work ideas, practices, and goals we think: death.

They contain the core of each and go beyond mere intellectual memory into a deeper emotional memory and understanding.

Interesting extract from A. W. Pink on body, soul, and spirit

2010-02-07T01:13:00.000-08:00

What is below is from Pink's Gleanings In Genesis, 1. Creation and Restoration. (I've bolded some parts.)

5. "And God divided the light from the darkness." Hebrews 4:12 tells us, the Word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart." This is not a figurative expression but, we believe, a statement of literal fact. Man is a tripartite being, made up of "spirit and soul and body" (1 Thess. 5:23). The late Dr. Pierson distinguished between them thus: "The spirit is capable of God-consciousness; the soul is the seat of self-consciousness; the body of sense-consciousness.’’ In the day that Adam sinned, he died spiritually. Physical death is the separation of the spirit from the body; spiritual death is the separation of the spirit from God. When Adam died, his spirit was not annihilated, but it was "alienated" from God. There was a fall. The spirit, the highest part of Adam’s complex being, no longer dominated; instead, it was degraded, it fell to the level of the soul, and ceased to function separately. Hence, today, the unregenerate man is dominated by his soul, which is the seat of lust, passion, emotion. But in the work of regeneration, the Word of God "pierces even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit," and the spirit is rescued from the lower level to which it has fallen, being brought back again into communion with God. The "spirit" being that part of man which is capable of communion with God, is light; the "soul" when it is not dominated and regulated by the spirit is in darkness, hence, in that part of the six days’ work of restoration which adumbrated the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, we read, "And God divided the light from the darkness."

2 Corinthians 4

2010-02-03T11:18:00.000-08:00

Read 2 Corinthians chapter 4. This chapter is about living in the flesh after regeneration. The already/not yet state that can perplex or tempt one to whine. Read the whole chapter with this verse in mind:

2Co 4:7 But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us.

This is a constant theme. Being constantly humbled and not being allowed to think we are the cause of what God does. Regeneration is an act of God in us, nothing we do. Justification is by faith (something itself worked in us by the Holy Spirit) and not works so that we cannot boast. And here we are in earthen bodies even though regenerated and justified and in God's Kingdom. In the Old Testament the theme emerges whenever Israel - or even a gentile nation - thinks that when it wins a battle or war it is they that do it and not God. They usually get sent a message of the truth of that in some way.

A note on biographies

2010-02-02T22:49:00.000-08:00

Biographies are interesting as a category of books because they can be phantasmagorical in this way: when you have some higher energy in you, and you already know the basics of history and philosophy and arts and sciences and music and the human nature and ways of the world you can get from literature in general then a biography, really about anybody, will give you all sorts of impressions and bits of information that you can put together and see so much more between the lines and from a higher perspective and so on. A vision of the times the person lived in. All the human nature of the relationships and so on. You know, the sense that everything falls into patterns and types, and that there is nothing new under the sun; also the sense that you can see the universe in a grain of sand. A mere detail, or event in the life of the person can give a window onto so much more. History books do this as well. Maybe biography more because the focus on a single life makes the impressions stronger for seeing the universal in a detail.

Here's an idea... Modern Library Chronicles

2010-01-23T00:53:00.001-08:00

I came across a volume in this series called London, by A. N. Wilson in a used bookstore. The series itself intrigued me. They are a series of 'chronicles' published by Modern Library, usually around 200 pages, give or take, on different things in history, by different authors.

It's occured to me if one were to develop an eccentric hobby of collecting everything of something you wouldn't completely waste your time doing it with this series. I mean if you actually also read each one.

Here's a Wikipedia page with an apparently incomplete list of the series.

Each may not be the 'best' source on its particular subject, but, hey, you are just collecting each one and reading it. With a goal to get every one. Eccentric, yes, but better than collecting figurines of donkeys or something.

And a benefit is the series editorial style of the books, coupled with the fact that each has a different author, is such that each would give you, in a light way, little facts and images and events and so on such that would contribute to the base of your already accumulated knowledge. Just some new things to add to the mental furniture. Nothing that will effect spiritual development or give you deep language or anything, but, you know, just an eccentric goal/hobby to pursue...

. . .

2010-01-16T12:02:00.001-08:00

"So he prayed, and far in the depths they heard him, all the Nereids, Phorcus' chorus, virgin Panopea and Father Portunas himself, with his own mighty hand, drove the racing Scylla swifter than Southern winds or a winging arrow, speeding toward the shore to find her berth in the good deep-water harbor."

- Bk. 5, lines 267-72, Virgil's Aeneid, Robert Fagles trans.

Feeling there is nothing to do, and the reality of it

2010-01-11T23:14:00.000-08:00

The situation we can find ourselves in where we say: "There's nothing to do..." I think can only happen when we get above the necessities of basic survival. Basic survival is obviously something to do. Something to keep one busy. I don't just mean a job one goes to everyday. I mean, when you have to make your own shelter, grow your own food, make your clothes, etc. When those things get easier we realize we don't have anything to do, and instead of seeing it in the context of basic survival having become easier due to culture and civilization we live in we make of it a philosophical thing and we get all existential about it. It's a full belly talking.

But also: when we *do* have free time to pursue higher things, like B Influence, that is something to do as well. Meeting A Influence demands is something to do, but then pursuing B Influence too is something to do. It is when you exhaust, truly exhaust, B Influence that you can *really* feel there is nothing to do.

But then you still have C Influence to contact and engage. But that requires a new level of valuation and effort.

Lombardo's Homer

2010-01-05T19:04:00.000-08:00

I just read some of Lombardo's Odyssey (last part of book 13), and it reminded me that his translations of Homer are unique. Plain, but you seem to get a closer sense of it all. The conversation between Odysseus and Athena seemed like I hadn't even remembered it.

It just doesn't seem like a waste of time to re-read Homer. The language is real, from a higher source, and powerful. If what is left after B Influence and regeneration by the Word and the Spirit is spiritual warfare and increasing level of being and understanding then Homer still has something to offer.

And its of course in picking up higher (visual, symbolic, metaphoric) language to then be able to see what you can't see now. Even if it's carried in just a detail, or if it's contained in a bigger structure that we can't see all at once as we are going through it. Even if you've picked up most of it from previous readings, I suspect the well is deep enough to have more.

Why faith, as a grace, in particular

2009-12-29T21:11:00.000-08:00

Look at this simple passage from Thomas Watson's Body of Divinity. It's one of those striking things that when you see it explained like this you wonder why you never thought of it before:

+ + +
What is the condition of the covenant of grace?

The main condition is faith.

Why is faith more the condition of the new covenant than any other grace?

To exclude all glorying in the creature. Faith is a humble grace. If repentance or works were the condition of the covenant, a man would say, It is my righteousness that has saved me; but if it be of faith, where is boasting? Faith fetches all from Christ, and gives all the glory to Christ; it is a most humble grace. Hence it is that God has singled out this grace to be the condition of the covenant. [emphasis mine]
+ + +

What I'm getting at is not the fact that with faith is no boasting (vs. works, etc.) and all that. That is basic doctrine. What I'm getting at is even *thinking* about why 'faith' is *the particular grace* (and not any other) that is the condition of being in the covenant of grace (basically of being saved).

In other words, that word faith we just kind of say; and it gets knocked around, of course, by the atheists and others (blind faith, no evidence, etc.), and as a believer one just basically accepts the word and the act. But it seems vaguely abstract still. Yet we can see it more practically with the above explanation from Watson.

(And, again, for any who don't know me, I am not having a bell rung in my head over the fact that faith is different from repentance or works. The point is, basic doctrine aside, it's unusual to think 'why faith rather than any other grace.' Christians don't generally have that question enter our minds. Not in the way Watson presents it above.)

How's this for a simple effort

2009-12-20T05:20:00.000-08:00

Here's a simple Work effort: self-remembering/non-identifying while reading the Bible complete.

That would guarantee x number of hours of self-remembering effort anyway. 100 hours? I don't know. Havn't figured it out. Doesn't matter. The value is being in the third state while taking in the words of the Old and New Testaments.

A really very simple and easy-to-remember goal. (No falling into waking sleep while reading though. You'd have to be honest. Mark out a section and do it. If you don't have an end point for each session you'd just drift into mechanical-ness. Chapters are obvious and would work, but probably aren't ideal; but if you have a Bible with section headings that might be more helpful in identifying complete sections.)

An observation on the potential shock of illness

2009-12-19T21:45:00.000-08:00

There is a pastor of a popular big church who recently was diagnosed with a brain tumor that has spread. He had a seizure in Nov. and has been through the hospital mill for a month, including having an operation.

I don't want to name him, but here is just an observation I had regarding him. I saw him in a video, and he struck me as the usual 'church' type, with the churchy language, breathy, God is so good to us, I just love you all so much, we just have such a loving God, etc., etc.

In his recent Twitter feeds, after the shock of this major illness and the dire prospects ahead of him, he sounds different.

Like: well, today was at least something of a normal day. Sheesh.

I havn't heard him actually talk (havn't seen him on video) since his operation, so I'm just going by impressions from words he writes, but I think you can see a normalization process after the shock. I really think many of these church types are so dead asleep and fake (I don't necessarily mean that in the negative way), caught up in how they are supposed to be and to sound and stuck in an artificial groove that it may take such a shock to shake them out of it.

Nobody needs such an illness, or wants to talk about such an illness blithely, yet when one asks why do such things happen to people we can't assume the person effected doesn't need the shock.

Note left at Parzival's

2009-12-18T23:48:00.000-08:00

It's serious, C Influence. It's true what the Work says, it isn't repeated because it is somebody's effort. Focused effort. If there are no students it ends. There's no point.

The written word is foundational and lasts as long as its published or saved. But conscious influence itself is the direct effort of a person. I appears, is used or not, and if not goes away.

One can become a source of C Influence oneself. Through time even. Here is where you see the effort involved. To be a source you have to make the effort to be awake yourself. It's real effort and doesn't last as some mechanical force.

The Holy Spirit is different, but I believe He operates along similar lines. One can have more or less of the Spirit, and one grieves the Spirit more or less. If one is indifferent to the Spirit then...does the Spirit lessen in you? I didn't say forsake you (once in you always there in a salvation sense), but in a sanctification sense one can be in a dry desert.

Conscious influence, wherever it is coming from, is Holy Spirit influence. I.e. if it is truly conscious then there is only one source, ultimately, for it. We can get it from the source, and we can get it from the communion of the saints. The saint doesn't have to be present in our time. Connected to our circle of time, perhaps, but not necessarily present.

A string quartet from Joseph Haydn

2009-12-05T02:46:00.000-08:00

The Op. 33 String Quartets are generally thought to be under-noticed. Here is a good live performance of No. 1:

1st movement 5:59
2nd movement 2:23
3rd movement 5:36
4th movement 3:11

Beethoven's 2nd Symphony, and - not connected - a passage from Kline's Kingdom Prologue

2009-12-05T02:01:00.000-08:00

Pretty good performance of Beethoven's 2nd Symphony. Complete in one video. Herbert von Karajan.

In Kline's Kingdom Prologue there is a striking passage (which I can't copy from the PDF) where he states what triggers the end of history. It involves common grace. The children of the devil have always been permitted by God to live if they recognize coexistence with the children of God. When the children of the devil, though, begin to assert a claim to total domination of this world then God's common grace for them ends. They cut off the branch they are sitting on.

You see this happening today. In the end days the devil deceives the nations which means all the devil's peoples the world over (which is unique) unite against the people of God. Iran's crazy leader back slaps with Venezuela's crazy leader saying they will destroy America. Islam proclaims they will take over Europe. Etc.

If you have discernment for good and evil you see this.

Of course these things happen in other eras, but the question is is it different today due to the world-wide nature of it? It probably is. America was a safe place for Christians to take refuge in. Now America has been breached by the devil's children in a unique way as never before with the fall of the two towers.

The new global leftist schemes to create global tyranny are part of it (the craziness of climate change treaties are just a part of this but representative). The note is on 'global.' Total domination. *No where to run, nowhere to hide.* No refuge for God's pilgrims. No right to exist without capitulating to the great anti-Christ idol.

In demanding sole dominion on this planet the devil and his followers are sowing their own destruction.

This is part of the anti-Christ crisis Kline outlines. It happens prior to the flood as well. When it happens now it triggers the end of history.

Go to this link and read from page 214 (the actual page number in the book) starting at the heading 'A. Anti-Christ Crisis', and read that 'A.' section through page 216. It's very short, yet the language is worth engaging.

This is an example of the kind of insights Kline's works provide that are unique in mainstream theology.

No more mystery on the three lines of work

2009-11-22T22:37:00.000-08:00

First line work kind of lends itself to the campus, and the cloister, and the study.

Second line work is for the traffic of everyday life.

Third line work is teaching.

Best performance of this song, Verve, On Your Own

2009-11-22T10:51:00.000-08:00

Listen to this a few times to get the musical phrases in memory, then the song will be very enjoyable.

Bonus: an underrated song from the Cranberries last album. Maybe I'm influenced by the video (influenced positively), but I think when you first hear this song it seems kind of 'ok', like album filler, but as I listened to it a few times it grew on me. She's got quirky and catchy phrasing, like getting three or four angular notes from a single word...

Just a note to my old email correspondents...

2009-11-22T01:25:00.000-08:00

Just a note to my old email correspondents... I've been just now reading some old email I wrote in exchanges, various exchanges, going back to 2002 (don't remember when the email correspondence started), and it's useful to do. For my own emails I can see immediate things that give me perspective on where I am now. Like I could immediately see how much I changed when I finally began to 'conquer' the exoteric level of biblical doctrine. It kind of brought out some old - pre-'Work' era - traits and characteristics of my personality that should have been left to the past and that I rather indulged, in some real ways quite insanely. (Like saying the same things over and over for...*years*... Relishing the emotional indulgence and all that...)

I've also seen in my actual life here how I was so successful with the Work in the 90s because I had - and this may sound trivial or even off-the-mark regarding what the Work is, but it's not off-the-mark - a contained 'space' to do it in. The world can *really* effect your efforts. Of course the Work is defined as an effort done in the traffic of the world, but I mean the first line of work type efforts more. For those efforts you need a contained space to work in. Boundaries that create a cosmos you operate in (actually a cosmos that is 'school'). I had a neighborhood that was quiet and relatively distraction-free, that I knew well, with well-worn pathways, so to speak. (Looking back I could even discern a difference in my experience when I would go out of this cosmos and did first line work elsewhere. I could discern mocking demonic influences coming around me.)

I havn't had that old 'space' for awhile now. I guess I've made attempts at re-creating it around here where I live now, but nothing complete and contained has come together.

Other than my old neighborhood I also used a run-of-the-mill Community Center which was useful because so few people were ever there in the big green spaces it provided. I would walk the parameter of it, and it became a similar cosmos like contained space for first line work. I still have that area.

But that may be like going back to an old school you graduated from long ago. Then again a place that 'works' is a place that works, so...

Like I found a larger 'orbit' financially I might have to find a larger orbit for first line of Work school cosmos.

[Addendum: Another thing I should have added to this post is just how much I've been overtaken by the crap shit world in recent years. For instance, I actually act like I *care* what people of the past think about me. When I was in my strength, in the '90s, I had gotten to where I truly didn't give a fuck.

Physical decline can add to this weakness.]

[Addendum 2: it occurs to me that the body is a cosmos too, and needs to have its boundaries defined. Even in terms of clothing. Language of cosmoses is in everything. You can find a connection and new insights with anything.]

Don't know why she dropped out of my musical memory; another sharp, early influence into essence

2009-11-07T08:41:00.000-08:00

Mental gymnastics aside

2009-10-23T01:18:00.000-07:00

Having gone through the scant Work teaching on cosmoses again I'm reminded of the practical aspect of it all. Seeing the different speeds and phenomena of centers within you. The mental gymnastics of calculating differences of time and phenomena in different cosmoses is - though worthwhile to a point - something that goes up against the fact that trying to see and understand something with a current level of being and understanding that is not capable of seeing and understanding that something is not practical. You have to increase your ability to understand and see. And this, anyway, brings the teaching on cosmoses back to its practical level, which is, again, observing them within one's being. There is also the practice of observing different cosmoses in the world, but that too requires a higher vision and understanding.

The visual of a cosmos, what a cosmos is, is very useful regarding the two conscious shocks though. The very fact of a border and breaches in the border and so on.

The conclusions I arrived at way back when still stand. The road is before you once you know of the two conscious shocks, how to effect them, having the necessary level of valuation to effect them. Provoking limits so as to be able to then extend limits.

The spiritual battlefield and growing responsibility

2009-10-14T23:11:00.000-07:00

One thing that happened today is for the first time since my new situation (living where I am) my old self sort of showed itself, but it's all new. I was snapped at (in a way where the person exposes contempt for you), and I didn't react the usual (old) way at first, I knew it was internal-considering (Work term) I was feeling, yet a moment or two later despite 1) being awake to it, and 2) having the power to not indulge in it, I lashed back, moderately, though with equal contempt. Worse because though I could see the contempt in my own words I know he couldn't see the contempt he showed me.

Here's the point: I am now not a rookie soldier on the battlefield. What I did was delinquent. I was being a delinquent soldier in Christ's army. As usual the world lets you know. I went out right after that and was met with unusual crude violence/behavior from people, not directly, but enough to let me know those forces are out and about and when I am delinquent they appear and get closer. A reminder.

I could only pray. I'm good at that when I have no other option. Ask forgiveness and ask for strength and ask for what only God can give, grace, his will, ask for God to give the most important things to the person you lashed back at. Then repeat as needed.

But the battlefield is real. And when I indulged resentment (I'll not use a Work term again) that was a failure in the spiritual world on the battlefield not only letting myself down but letting my King and fellow soldiers down. You can know this and feel it. You control your environment with your level of being. When you fall and are a delinquent soldier you let the army you are a part of down. It's serious. Little things seemingly, very serious depending on how far you have developed and how much responsibility you have been given.

The warfare is real. You do your part by being awake and loving your enemies, but in that conscious shock(s) real manner.

Prayer in spiritual warfare situations

2009-09-16T21:33:00.000-07:00

I was thinking recently of a scenario that seems untenable. A scenario where a person has power over you and is shamelessly unethical and 'out to get you.' Like if you were a new recruit in the army and you were the son of a famous political figure, and the sergeant (or whatever) over you hates that political figure, so the sergeant gets it into his mind to make the political figure look bad by having the son wash out of basic training.

So whatever the new recruit does, even if on a scale of 1 to 10 he does everything at a 12 but the sergeant writes it down as a '2' every time, so the recruit is thinking: "There's nothing I can do about this. It will sound like I'm whining if I complain, and this guy isn't going to be honest. It's an untenable situation."

What came to me is this: in this kind of situation there *is* something you can do. You can pray to God to defend you against the person.

I was in a similar situation when my parents were dying. I naturally turned to prayer as an act of spiritual warfare.

But it is a real realization (an "ah ha!" realization) when you remember that you have prayer as a recourse for such situations. And I think God answers the prayers robustly in such imminent spiritual warfare type scenarios. The recruit would still have to give 110 plus percent effort, but with the prayer that sergeant would no longer become an unbeatable force. He would probably be exposed.

But the main thought is the recourse to prayer we have and remembering it.

There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body

2009-09-04T04:59:00.000-07:00

The fact of cosmoses gives understanding of what occurs at intervals such as death or birth. A human being is a microcosmos, a complete cosmos. When the end happens (end of time, or physical death) you, as a cosmos, a microcosmos, will be just as you are now in terms of being a cosmos. The needs of a cosmos will be sought and met. You will find and settle into your new circumstances and state. You will stand. You won't be in chaos. You will assess the new conditions and you will settle into the mutual self-sufficiency of cosmoses within each other and in contra-distinction to each other.

Luke 21:19 In your patience possess ye your souls.

The above verse is from the chapter in Luke discussing what happens in the day of the Lord.

In other words, at such mysterious and seemingly catastrophic intervals such as death and birth you will still be a cosmos. You will have unity and boundary and completeness. A being. The general thought we have regarding the moment of death is some vague chaos or our being - who we are, what we are - turning into something as steady as smoke in a room. There may indeed be a sort of initial chaos (and each person's ability to 'stand' in that moment will be different due to difference in development of being), but it will be the kind of chaos that is filled with intentional action to discern surroundings, discern a problem, do what is necessary to achieve a settled situation.

Like when a car tire blows out. Chaos, yet all attention is immediately directed to the necessary step-by-step process of taking care of that particular problem, and achieving a normal, settled state.

We're not without a body when our flesh body dies. I can hear someone say reading what I've written above: "But when we die we are incomplete because we don't have our body, so we are in fact *not* a cosmos, or microcosmos, at that point until the resurrection of our flesh body."

We have a spiritual body.

1Co 15:44 It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body.

That spiritual body may await glorification at the consummation of God's plan of redemption (the second coming, final judgment, and resurrection of the heavens and the earth), yet at physical death it is a spiritual body none-the-less.

So we are as complete at the death of the physical body, in terms of being a complete microcosm, as we are right now having a body of flesh along with a soul and spirit.

The notion that our flesh bodies themselves resurrect is asinine. Dust to dust. The example of Jesus is unique. He had to maintain a semblance of his flesh body to fulfill God's plan. To show that he did in fact resurrect. Yet notice he could walk through a wall and appear and disappear, doing things a physical flesh body can not do. He even kept his wounds again to show that he was in fact Jesus Christ who was crucified and came back to life on the third day. We don't have that burden on us. Our flesh bodies can turn back to the earth. Turn to dust. Our spiritual body represents our resurrection.

Rom 8:23 And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.

The above verse is spoken by a man *in* his flesh body. He's not referring to the redemption of his flesh body. He's not speaking of 'waiting' for the resurrection of his flesh body. At death he will have a body. A spiritual body. That spiritual body is what is also eventually glorified at the consummation of God's plan. (I.e. yes, it is important to know our bodies resurrect. That is the promised victory over death. But we have a physical body and we have a spiritual body. Our body is sown a physical body and raised a spiritual body. That is the promised resurrection. The promised resurrection *is not* our dead flesh bodies, their molecules or whatever, rising up out of the ground or the sea to reconstitute as a new flesh body for us. That is an asinine reading of Scripture. And where it is held it is held alongside a very juvenile notion that thinks and says: "Hey, flesh is cool! Sex is cool! Cigars and good beer is cool! Christians shouldn't be against such cool things!" Flesh withers as the grass, grasshopper. You can be cool in a spiritual body too, if you must, in whatever way your currently juvenile mind needs to feel cool.)

The hanging loose thread is this: "But don't reprobates have spiritual bodies too? They have to have *some* body to stand at the judgment! So the difference between reprobates and elect is reprobates don't get their old flesh bodies resurrected and the elect do!" No, the difference is: reprobates judged to hell don't get glorified, which is the true resurrection of the body. The spiritual body.

1Co 15:50 Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption.

* * * * * * *

...the language of cosmoses. It's a powerful language to see things we can't see without it. We gloss right over the fact that we are a microcosmos of the macrocosmos. The world and the devil and false personality has a motive in keeping us thinking we are incomplete in this sense. (Saying a microcosmos is complete is not the same as saying it has no need for an outside source of nourishment and medium to live in and life source itself.) But the world, the flesh, and the devil want us thinking we are not even a microcosmos and hence not complete on that level. I.e. not having boundaries, and unity, and will and so on. Just a fragmented consciousness living in a hall of mirrors enslaved to the illusions and temptations and fears of the devil's kingdom.

We imagine death and think we will dissolve in some way, even while thinking we won't go into nothingness, but just be some willowy, smoke-like thing at the mercy of whatever is on the other side, YET, we know we are a microcosm. We know we have a soul and a spirit and a body. The theologians even play the world's and the devil's game in saying you won't have a body, but the Bible says you have a spiritual body. You don't cease having a body when your flesh body dies. You have body, soul, and spirit now (hopefully the Spirit of Christ), and you will have body, soul, and spirit when your flesh body dies.

The baby cries when born because it - as a microcosmos - knows what it needs in its new situation. It really takes control. Jesus uses the analogy of father and child saying what father will give a child a stone when he asks for bread? Then he says, do you think your heavenly father doesn't know what you need and won't give it? (Of course we can insert examples of evil people who even abandon and kill their children, but God is not evil, and most humans don't treat their children that way either, so the analogy is not weak because of evil.)

When our flesh body dies our microcosmos, now a spiritual body, will know what it needs and will have power to take care of things.

This gives us something concrete to visualize and understand regarding the mystery of that interval called death. To realize it NOW.

Desert ethic

2009-09-02T03:40:00.001-07:00

6/13/08 - If we're in the desert currently (now, not yet; between Egypt and a not-yet place; in the world, not of the world; "strangers and pilgrims on the earth" not mindful of the country whence we came out, but seeking our heavenly country) what is our desert ethic?

Is our desert ethic:

1Th 5:16 Rejoice evermore.
1Th 5:17 Pray without ceasing.
1Th 5:18 In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.

Yes.

- C.

ps- The grand attitude of the Kingdom of God: Real-will gratitude over self-will resentment.

Death

2009-08-29T22:10:00.000-07:00

Update: Here's the book by that scientist who researches the death experience:

http://www.amazon.com/Art-Dying-Peter-Fenwick/dp/0826499236/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1251681887&sr=1-1

He's actually a real research scientist. This book seems to be for the general audience though.

He is associated with this website:

http://www.horizonresearch.org/

There are some PDFs of his more scientific articles...

* * *

I heard a radio program of a scientist who studies the dying process and experience. Much of what he said was what I saw with my dad.

I think most people who die are already sort of dead on the inside, so there doesn't seem to be much happening at the moment of death. Drugs can probably dull things too. My dad was not on drugs and not terminal or in pain, just his heart running down, so he was a good case to see some of the things this scientist was talking about.

People, relatives, coming for the person. The dying person beginning to naturally start to use 'journeying language' ("It's time for me to go now. I'm leaving now." etc.) In my dad's case he reverted to his pilot experience and his language in the last hours of his life were literally of a pilot about to take off. He was doing checks, talking to ground crew, tower, talking to his co-pilot, giving advice, all war-time context too. He was looking up, seeing things. Looking at me, saying, "See that?" He was also talking in a strange way to people in the room we couldn't see. Yet when I'd speak to him he'd 'come back' and speak to me in his normal voice.

One story the scientist related was a woman on her death bed speaking with her son. The woman believed that when you die you go into nothingness. The son believed in life after death. They discussed it, argued, etc. Then a point came where the women was going, and she turn to her son and said: "You're right."

Stories of attempted suicides who had such a powerful experience (good experience) with the near death afterworld that they tried to commit suicide again to experience it.

But back to the usual. That people seem to be sort of dead to it all mostly (not that I've observed a lot of people dying though).

I think it is a powerful thing to imagine your own death. Your ability to 'stand' in that moment. How your level of being will manifest in that scenario. Will you need relatives meeting you? Or are you beyond that. Angels? Are you going to be with God or are you going to recur again. But just imagining that feeling of presence in that moment. How much of it will you have. What have to developed truly in this life along the lines of level of being. It's a powerful motive to want to continue to develop consciousness, real will, and understanding.

Work effort and spiritual warfare (and the nature of eschatological Work experience)

2009-07-18T12:20:00.000-07:00

> I can say that when I have undertaken
> real hardcore efforts I've done that without exception
> or consideration to my job. I can say also as a result I
> entered into a very peculiar realm of conflict which gave up
> great insights into why the 4th way is so powerful. Not to
> embrace it and take it wholly into every aspect of your life
> may be a missed opportunity. I can't go into detail on
> the events that took place during those intense periods but
> you can imagine that it was utterly shocking, unbelievable
> and absolutely (without doubt) beyond what you would ever
> expect to occur in the workplace and yet outrageous events
> that should never have occured manifested in the midst of
> routine work-a-day events - as if it were normal.
> Whilst I understand you are talking of containing your own
> explosive higher energy and the consequences of losing
> control I have found that the real dangers (of being at your
> job whilst making intense effort) come from the wild things
> that manifest thorough other people. I'm inclined to
> read this also towards something more than General
> Law, as if that were only a small manifestation within
> something far greater and more inimical. But these are words
> and worthless. What I got from that experience is this: the
> 4thway, some alleged shortcut, is way too direct and
> forceful for most of us to dare embrace let alone tolerate
> the unlimited abrasions, it's natural enough given that
> we are really very delicate things, hence why there are
> 4thwayers kicking around 30 years later - the real work is
> so abrupt, seemingly brutal and efficacious that it
> doesn't require all those years. Not that you would
> abandon the work but something should shift siesmically
> within otherwise you aren't there on the rockface. That
> is the raison d'etre for the host of the G groupies.
> They don't do. It's also why you need a relationship
> with Jesus Christ if you do - why you need to understand the
> need for contact - without it, it's a contemptuous and
> violent city full of mauraders that want to fuck you up the
> ass and push you in the dirt.

This is an epic take on this whole subject. It gets directly to what we have been touching on lightly here and there but not getting to the center of.

Earlier you'd said that you had never really experienced some of the General Law stuff myself and others have talked of, but it seems you've been making a distinction we weren't. Whether you call it General Law or not, though, (I do, it just becomes a more active force) what you describe is *the* experience.

What I see as epic in your take on it is a really forceful description of just how weird and direct and crazy it can be. (You actually used better language to describe it.)

I've been sort of on to this lately when I've stated that the Work doesn't prepare us for the *spiritual warfare* aspect of what we go up against.

You say we don't want to abandon Work efforts because of it, yet what we experience seems to suggest that the push-back eventually (and rather quickly) can go to martyrdom of any number of types. We must cut your head off for Allah.

Perhaps the metaphor of the grail knight might give perspective. When the grail knight is alone in the trackless forest being drawn and navigating with higher emotion, awake, then suddenly is set on by a number of knights who are trying to kill him, then in the midst of that melee it could very well seem like ultimate *terminal point* experience for the whole process, but we know that if he stays on his horse (so to speak) and battles through the episode then he moves on, usually now in a bit of a higher world.

Also, we maybe don't *have* to be Stephen, being stoned to death as we see higher visions. I mean, we *can* too have protection. But maybe it's the out-of-control element of the forces around us, potentially so, that makes it seem like stoning to death is inevitable if we go down that road far enough.

I've experienced it directly. I've experienced humans speaking to me like devils. I experienced them do irrational and criminal things to hurt me. A lot of false witness. More than one episode of that. Several over the years.

This is a subject of what to expect on the battlefield. And what one needs when on the battlefield and no longer an innocent participant.

I'll read your email again later and try to write something more. - C.

--- On Sat, 7/18/09, <> wrote:

> From: quickeningspirit <>
> Subject: Re: Haven't done this for a while...
> To: "W" <>
> Cc: "c. t." <>, "" <>,
> Date: Saturday, July 18, 2009, 6:50 AM
> I can say that when I have undertaken
> real hardcore efforts I've done that without exception
> or consideration to my job. I can say also as a result I
> entered into a very peculiar realm of conflict which gave up
> great insights into why the 4th way is so powerful. Not to
> embrace it and take it wholly into every aspect of your life
> may be a missed opportunity. I can't go into detail on
> the events that took place during those intense periods but
> you can imagine that it was utterly shocking, unbelievable
> and absolutely (without doubt) beyond what you would ever
> expect to occur in the workplace and yet outrageous events
> that should never have occured manifested in the midst of
> routine work-a-day events - as if it were normal.
> Whilst I understand you are talking of containing your own
> explosive higher energy and the consequences of losing
> control I have found that the real dangers (of being at your
> job whilst making intense effort) come from the wild things
> that manifest thorough other people. I'm inclined to
> read this also towards something more than General
> Law, as if that were only a small manifestation within
> something far greater and more inimical. But these are words
> and worthless. What I got from that experience is this: the
> 4thway, some alleged shortcut, is way too direct and
> forceful for most of us to dare embrace let alone tolerate
> the unlimited abrasions, it's natural enough given that
> we are really very delicate things, hence why there are
> 4thwayers kicking around 30 years later - the real work is
> so abrupt, seemingly brutal and efficacious that it
> doesn't require all those years. Not that you would
> abandon the work but something should shift siesmically
> within otherwise you aren't there on the rockface. That
> is the raison d'etre for the host of the G groupies.
> They don't do. It's also why you need a relationship
> with Jesus Christ if you do - why you need to understand the
> need for contact - without it, it's a contemptuous and
> violent city full of mauraders that want to fuck you up the
> ass and push you in the dirt.
>
>
> 2009/7/17 W <>
>
>
>
> > This is why, though, I've always wondered about
> doing Work
>
> > efforts when you have to perform at a job. The people
> involved with
>
> > G. and O. didn't seem to have jobs. And I know the
> Work is unique in
>
> > that you do it in the traffic of your everyday life,
> but still. If
>
> > you'd been full of explosive higher energy and at
> your limit at that
>
> > moment...
>
>
>
> I think there is something to that for sure.
> Personally I don't do
>
> hard core SR efforts at work but things are going to arise
> where you
>
> will be tested and you have to Work as you see fit wherever
> you are.
>
> The results of any hard core Work effort will carry over
> into the work
>
> days though so its unavoidable that one is going to have to
> make Work
>
> efforts of some kind whilst at work. The hard core efforts
> have that backlash and
>
> you cant know when that is going to surface and then one
> becomes much
>
> more emotional in general. I think the on-the-mark approach
> might be
>
> to not plan any Work efforts at a place of work and leave
> it at that.
>
>
>
> W.
>
>
>
>
>
>

* * * * * * * *

OK, I've read your email (below) again and saw the part I was going to come back to:

> What I got from that experience is this: the
> 4thway, some alleged shortcut, is way too direct and
> forceful for most of us to dare embrace let alone tolerate
> the unlimited abrasions, it's natural enough given that
> we are really very delicate things, hence why there are
> 4thwayers kicking around 30 years later - the real work is
> so abrupt, seemingly brutal and efficacious that it
> doesn't require all those years. Not that you would
> abandon the work but something should shift siesmically
> within otherwise you aren't there on the rockface. That
> is the raison d'etre for the host of the G groupies.
> They don't do.

Remember how I use to describe my own Work history as episodes of fast work where *much* would get done? And how just even *one* intense event of seeing something in real time (like my library experience with seeing internal-considering in real time) seemed to stand out for years. Or, how if I just once truly engaged in self-remembering deeply for like five or six hours and entered strange realms how I'd remember that. Or, how seeming everyday type effort (though with zeal) like in spontaneously writing down all the 'roles' I play in an average day, week, month, years, life, and how that list turns out to be definitive and complete and a big moment in my development.

That last example is good. How the Work happens, how development happens, in those few zealous efforts and in the events that are seismic (we can see after-the-fact).

I don't want to discount or not mention the fact that I did a lot of everyday self-remembering effort in the midst of that.

But when (I'm thinking as I'm writing) I maybe got gun shy of the 'troubles' and discomfort the big events get involved in that I didn't get what one should get from the more mundane effort. I was doing the mundane effort and avoiding the battles. Sort of. Except when life events themselves provided unavoidable material.

But what you write (taking into consideration as you do that we don't want to justify laziness or avoidance of discomfort) is something that hangs over all this Work history and phenomena. (Thinking aloud again) I suspect maybe it has to do with time. Higher aspects of time. We experience something in that eschatological NOW in those seismic Work events and moments and it stands out in our linear 4th dimensional memory and how we perceive our life history and the flow of time once we do go back into the usual perception of things.

Connected to this subject is that G. quote I found awhile back where he said once you become aware that you are asleep you are awake to a basic degree already (I can't remember the exact wording).

And there again: my initial moment I remember to this day of reading Ouspensky's POMPE for the first time, in a bookstore, connecting with it completely (ready for it) driving to a store somewhere, parked in the back of the parking lot, foggy, rainy early afternoon, looking out over the black top of the parking lot through the windshield of my car, holding the Ouspensky book as I read it more, then looking up through the window and saying, knowing what this means: I am here. (That may read kitschy, but you know what I mean.)

That is one of those seismic moments that shifts ground and changes things.

The feeling of malaise in regards to Work efforts (too mechanical, all that) is a line of effort with no intervals being forced, I suppose. Do re mi...do re mi...do re mi...

But you also add the part about the G. Foundation types who are around 30 years doing the same thing. Because they aren't really doing the Work. I agree, of course. How that relates to a true effort with the Work though is what I am contemplating (as I write this now)... I suppose what comes to mind is the truly new direction of coming into real faith. That's a continual shock on the Old Man within. G. Foundation types aren't usually known for that. As a group anyway.

Worldly things have happened too, but if I mention them it sounds shallow, but strange things. Things I wouldn't have expected to ever be involved in.

But like you say, it *is* difficult to be in an environment where we are being attacked with strange intensity and bizarreness. Though the Grail knight metaphor I mentioned again in the last email may mitigate that a bit. I.e. they are 'storms', and storms don't last forever. We have to weather them, and then we are in a higher world. (Even if we die.) - C.

* * * * * * * *

One thing we have to recognize is the fact that when we first became involved with Work ideas, practices, and goals we had certain defined limits to our being.

Then with effort limits gets extended.

Limits have to be provoked as well to potentially then be extended.

So degree of being is real.

I've written that when I first started doing self-remembering efforts I could become quite an interesting sight in my surroundings. You get through those stages, but limits are real.

After limits reach a certain degree of extension, you rest and look around. Kind of what a climber does on a summit. Maybe show some renewed interest in where you use to be. But generally you're . . . actually there is only going back down, or going beyond summit. And beyond summit is Real Will which occurs in a less visual (climbing) way. - C.

* * * * * * * *

> The climbing analogy poses something
> interesting viz being at the summit, you can only descend
> but being down on the plain after the summit is different in
> that you can always ascend another mountain and you have new
> skills so the climb is always different and one is always
> learning new things and engaging with different facets of
> the rock face and hence of ones own inner being. Interesting
> analogy.

That's a good extension of the metaphor. I was actually struggling to find more than the negative 'go back downwards' and the difficult 'go beyond summit' alternatives. One can probably be beyond summit back down on the plain too.

The original mountain climbing metaphor for the 2nd conscious shock was you climb to the summit then back down, but the average altitude of the plain rises each time. - C.

Two items on Bible reading

2009-06-22T05:23:00.000-07:00

1. Lately when I've taken up Homer to finish yet another reading of the Iliad and Odyssey I have had Penelope speaking to me to read the Bible. (This is not a remark on Homer by Penelope; Penelope is just saying you have that language, now read what is real and living and true.) And I have to add this for certain types of Christians: no, Penelope isn't *actually* speaking to me. Penelope, though, in the visual language of the Homeric epics, represents something in ourselves that is of a higher elevation and nature than what we normally deal with and use...

2. Remember that prayer for understanding is something we can do before reading the Bible, and I have found it often noticeably effective (not that we need to or even can see the effect in real time). In fact, it seems to me that though it often seems strange to pray to the Person of the Holy Spirit, and it is rare for Christians to do it, to pray to the Holy Spirit for understanding of the Word of God seems very natural and right.

Some thoughts on getting understanding of sex

2009-06-21T05:20:00.000-07:00

You know I'm always thinking about education and getting understanding and I think about how one would do that in different eras, and it occurred to me that the difficult area of getting understanding of sex is interesting to think about regarding rural areas and past rural times. If you think about it, children saw animals, farm animals, copulate (or whatever the correct word is for animals) and that event alone would pretty much give a young person all they need to know about sex. They'd see the mechanics of it, and they'd also see the animal nature of it and hence put it in context. It would make them modest (that's what the animals do, and I'm a human, but, hey, I have those body parts, but still, it's no big deal, it's what animals do) but not weakly modest because it would be modesty based on understanding of it. Also, you could see how it would give the mother or father the opportunity to naturally instill adult wisdom on the subject to children. Also, the children would see animals giving birth. They'd see the whole process. Everything. So the innocence with which youths in rural areas and on farms and such are always portrayed is not really true. They have understanding of that big area of life and they got it in a natural way. Yes, they are not the same as kids in the city who have to furtively get glimpses of the nether side of life, however they can do that, visual pornography, prostitutes, written word. You can see though which youths are in the better situation for having a mature understanding. And a real understanding.

I will share a second conscious shock insight

2009-06-16T18:57:00.000-07:00

It came to me that when you say 'transforming negative emotion' you are talking directly about the General Law and Law of Exception in this way:

The Ray of Creation flows in both directions, away from the Absolute, and back towards the Absolute. The General Law maintains things to be in the control of the flow away from the Absolute. The Law of Exception allows a flow against that current back towards the Absolute.

Like swimming up river.

Now connect that with this: the 2nd conscious shock allows vertical movement in the 6th dimension of time (just as the 1st conscious shock is movement towards the center in the 5th dimension of time). Picture that time diagram I drew a long time ago. So when you transform negative emotion in the 2nd conscious shock way you are doing it *in the face* of the General Law (which is usually provoking the phenomenon/event itself) and moving 'up', but also moving 'up stream' in the Ray of Creation.

None of this is new, I know, but I'm trying to get at the new connection...

With the above in mind you can now see clearly that each confrontation with the General Law is your ticket - if you allow your personality to die and not become resentful and identified and so on - to take a step up that Great Highway of the Ray of Creation.

It's really just a matter of 'seeing' those General Law confrontations in a new light. *They* are where it all happens regarding vertical movement and vertical development of being.

And things get supernatural. People get bizarre around us. We expect it because we are like Jesus even in their midst. They want to kill us.

But if we're continually stuck in the mode of crying "Injustice!" when we are bizarrely treated we are just inane. We have to see that we are different. As different as Jesus, whose experience we experience.

This verse gets at it:

Rom 8:36 As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.

Then, if we meet it as spiritual warriors and wayfarers:

Rom 8:37 Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.

7th reading of the Bible

2009-06-14T13:24:00.000-07:00

When I have to resort to Henry James to find something - anything! - to read in the category of novels I think I may be at the end of a cycle.

I'm continually intrigued about how to go about a final 7th reading of the Bible (after I finish my 6th). I mean, how to *really* get it cut deeply into memory, will, and understanding (more so than it already is, I should say, hopefully). Since there is nothing new under the sun I suppose I can research it.

I suspect though that 'speed' is a necessary factor. Speed of perception that is. Simple higher emotional center activity. Faster centers. And a clean, copious notebook.

One new thing with the Bible is to 'see' higher contexts. Like seeing the realm of death in the 12 Dancing Princesses (and you see the higher context of the realm of death in Psalm 18 as well). That type of higher context. That makes you see the language anew. And more deeply. Even if you don't understand immediately what you see, it will be there for when things appear before you and give you opportunity to see the new meaning.

General Law and Law of Exception

2009-06-11T07:15:00.000-07:00

I'm not going to become anemic.

A while ago (years? months? I don't remember) I stated that in all my presentation of the Work I probably should have made spiritual warfare a more prominent, foundational element in the presentation.

The Work idea for this is: General Law and Law of Exception.

Obviously I wrote about the General Law (less on the Law of Exception), but my main focus from the beginning was for 'beginners' after all. Hence my main focus on B influences and describing what self-remembering actually is, and so on. (Actually not just beginners, but the necessity of clearing the ground that the false and dumb teachers had set.)

Another thing, lately, is my need to get a 'seamless' robe constituting the Bible and the Work. Spiritual warfare is this.

I was shocked a bit recently in coming across a site where a person (not a Work person, or a Christian) was describing the General Law very accurately (with understanding that comes from experience). Describing it from an angle of being harassed in general by gangs or whatever. This person had found Ouspensky's and Mouravieff's writings on the General Law and then wrote about it rather impressively (I also suspect they came across my various writings through general searches because I see my language being used). I was shocked because this is the element of the Work I myself had let slip from my approach or my general awareness when thinking in Work terms. All that happened to me recently regarding my family was just pure General Law manifestation, just rather hardcore levels of it.

Read the first four posts listed on this page at this person's site, you'll be impressed (and perhaps inspired to re-hit the ground running):

http://gangstalkingjournal.com/blog/

The Law of Exception embodies things I've also been touching on that are foundational, but that have hung around the periphery. The necessity of accepting you are doing something unusual and rare. That you are a prophet, a priest, and king and what that means. Avoiding the vanity and pride while not avoiding the reality that you are not common. Etc. - C.

To make us search His Word

2009-05-31T20:41:00.000-07:00

"The principal subjects treated in the Scriptures are presented to us more or less piecemeal, being scattered over its pages and made known under various aspects, some clearly and fully, others more remotely and tersely: in different connections and with different accompaniments in the several passages where they occur. This was designed by God in His manifold wisdom to make us search His Word. It is evident that if we are to apprehend His fully made known mind on any particular subject we must collect and collate all passages in which it is adverted to, or in which a similar thought or sentiment is expressed; and by this method we may be assured that if we conduct our investigation in a right spirit, and with diligence and perseverance, we shall arrive at a clear knowledge of His revealed will. The Bible is somewhat like a mosaic, whose fragments are scattered here and there through the Word, and those fragments have to be gathered by us and carefully fitted together if we are to obtain the complete picture of any one of its innumerable objects. There are many places in the Scriptures which can be understood only by the explanations and amplifications furnished by other passages." - A. W. Pink

Don't know why I didn't think of this before

2009-05-31T11:17:00.000-07:00

I've thought of a new element to my 3x5 card self-remembering technique. After you check off 4 straight boxes (meaning an hour of self-remembering) then rate that hour effort with a numbering system like 1 to 10. Or, I was thinking maybe to keep yourself from getting to clever just a numbering system of 1 to 3.

1 = not a good effort really at all. I didn't make an effort for continual self-remembering. I may have been awake enough to 'x' a box out at each 15-minute interval, but that was about it.

2 = average effort. Not good enough, but not in the total slacker '1' realm.

3 = totally diligent, high, continual valuation effort. I was taking nothing more importantly than staying awake in the moment. No daydreaming took over. I didn't considering other thoughts or matters to be more important.

So at the end of a row of four boxes I leave a number rating that hour's effort. 3's will be rare, unless I get tired of seeing worthless 1's and 2's.

This is necessary to stop the natural downgrade on effort over time.

Remember, the third state of consciousness is to the second state what running is to walking. It takes effort. Then the goal is to make the third state your 'average' state.

A small little exercise (an email)

2009-05-27T09:21:00.001-07:00

I've grappled over the years with how to get a real and deep understanding of the Bible *from the Bible*, but obviously also representing classical Covenant - Federal - Theology because we're not smarter than the oceanic mass of Christian theologians who have gone before. But I mean, really getting the 'whole' and the parts in relation to the whole in a complete way. I've pondered making notes on each chapter. I've used reference outlines. Etc. The Bible really doesn't respond to such tactics.

Now I'm think of this might be the approach: to actually write a narrative. A book. Your own book. Not to be published.

You could make a character to be central to it. A young man, like a young knight, who is learning about himself and the grand structure of the Plan of God he is in.

As he is put through a standard journey he develops being and his understanding develops and sees more and more and ultimately sees the whole and the parts in relation to the whole.

This:
http://www.monergism.com/thethreshold/articles/onsite/qna/covenant.html
and this:
http://www.monergism.com/thethreshold/articles/onsite/qna/whycovenant.html
are what it's about, but to see it all and from the Bible, like this:
http://www.monergism.com/thethreshold/articles/onsite/qna/covredemp.html
and to be able to narrate it and truly understand it is what the act of writing the book would bring about. (Those articles from here: http://www.monergism.com/thethreshold/articles/onsite/qna/FAQs.html)

Like a fantasy novel, but it's all biblical.

OK, get started you all. Just a small little exercise... - C.

The main thing (an email)

2009-05-27T02:56:00.001-07:00

Other than all the biblical doctrine, the Federal Theology that a person just has to pick up and understand over time, the main thing written lately is really truly seeing how the two conscious shocks are how you practical do the faith. How you practical are 'in covenant' with God.

Like, if I walk out of this stupid office building I live in (actually I'm very grateful to have such shelter and I actually like it) and I stop and look around me, and I am present, and ever deeper so (the first conscious shock) I am closer to God; and as I go along if I am able to not be identified or not internally-consider when a difficult event or situation arises then I am intentionally-suffering, like Jesus (the second conscious shock) and it is like descent of the dove inspiration and higher energy (an external shock) and it increases my level of being and literally takes me into higher worlds.

This is all done compactly now, in the present moment. To have such an understanding and ability is uncommon for Christians. To know of it is rare.

When exoteric level Christians think in such terms they can only cling to the ritual of the two sacraments (or the various rituals of the Roman Catholic Church if that is their church). But with knowledge and understanding of the two conscious shocks you can go beyond such a level, beyond ritual, and effect those two mysteries in a real way in real time.

Isaiah 32:1 sheds light on the hierarchy that will exist in the perfect Kingdom where Jesus is King. There will be princes under the King who will rule in righteousness and who will have eyes that can see and ears that can hear and all will be known and so on. Level of being is also talked of in Paul where he says some will be like planets, some like stars, etc. It is rare grace to have knowledge of such things as the Work teaches (i.e. along with regeneration by the Word and the Spirit).

So now you are as practical and simple in the faith as a knight on horseback (higher centers) with sword (the Word of God) and shield (faith) riding through the trackless forest. Wherever you are, whatever you are doing. If you are making the effort to effect the first conscious shock and you are able to effect the higher will, real will, of the second conscious shock in time when such events occur (the battles of the knight, out of nowhere, where if he perseveres, stays on his horse basically, he enters higher landscapes and new events and situations and so forth.

There is a crowning incident, a goal, a terminal point castle or mountain as well. That is the crown level where higher functions become permanent.

I can do that

2009-05-26T02:46:00.001-07:00

I think I should try to be less of an exasperated basher and more of a teacher. People can benefit so much from just one particle of what someone like myself can give them. Just a simple book list even.

People are just starting out, just like I was back when.

Something very big

2009-05-25T03:30:00.000-07:00

If you havn't watched that woman's video I recently sent the link to (http://deathisnotdying.com/eventvideo/) this may not come across, but as I watched it I was reminded of how the connection that Christians have, are supposed to have, seems so much to be so much just merely words. Not that that is small or not powerful (inner states are reflected in one's words), but it is the hesitant intellectual groping for tangible explanation of it all each believer is left to do. "He...died....for..me, so...that..." That type of thing. I know it's real, and I know there are experiences people can't talk about as well, but it makes me think of -- conscious shocks.

Look at this very common section of a church's statement of beliefs:

"(12) Baptism and the Lord’s Supper

We believe that baptism and the Lord’s Supper are ordained by the Lord Jesus himself. The former is connected with entrance into the new covenant community, the latter with ongoing covenant renewal. Together they are simultaneously God’s pledge to us, divinely ordained means of grace, our public vows of submission to the once crucified and now resurrected Christ, and anticipations of his return and of the consummation of all things."

Think of how the first and second conscious shocks correspond to these two sacraments. How they are the deeper teaching, the deeper experience of them. Self-remembering as an act that puts one in the presence of God (entrance). And the conscious shock of 'eating' suffering, or eating friction, (fake, real, whatever), that second conscious shock, as the 'ongoing renewal' of our being in the covenant or Kingdom of God.

Conscious labor, intentional suffering. This really speaks to the example of Jesus which is our example and forerunner.

This is tangible (and I don't speak as a Greek who always needs to see a sign). After all sacraments are signs. Visual parables. If just seen as ritual they are 'something', but God the Holy Spirit does lead some into the deeper teaching of it.

Jesus also said be awake and love your enemies. The same conscious shocks. The Work tells us what occurs within us when those shocks are effected. When we also see them in the context of worship (presence of God) and spiritual warfare (assaulting heaven) our valuation is changed.

We have, in effect, a real, practical understanding of the faith that is practiced right here, right now. And the closer we get internally and vertically to what we know as Real I the closer we get to Jesus (we have something practical to realize that with), and the closer we get to objective consciousness the more we are in the Kingdom of God now. - C.

CHRISTIAN

2009-05-22T02:34:00.000-07:00

Erasmus said, "A spiritual temple must be raised in Christians." I think he was speaking in the context of having the Word of God, but the metaphor is larger and very complete.

This is a good visual. Practical. If you're a spiritual temple, walking around, aware of being a spiritual temple, it is hard to indulge very un-spiritual-temple-like features of false personality.

I think I can solve much of my current angst by being a Christian first, being in that mystery, subordinating it to nothing. Not that I do anyway, but I'm conscious of the split in the language of the Work and the Bible always nevertheless.

Putting on a seamless robe that represents CHRISTIAN and see the Work as a Christian school after that. Use the Work to understand Jesus' teaching of practical level doing, see it as a language of the Holy Spirit, a language of knowledge and being, of doing, but the Word of God is supreme.

I do this anyway, but I am guilty of being ashamed or reticent to do it all out for fear of the reaction from the unbelieving world. Even the half-believing world. I flinch. Not *too* much (I always overstate).

And once for all one needn't be in a 'church'. One need, though, be in the invisible Church of which Christ is King. - C.

ps- We've been over this before, but it bears repeating: when you do the two conscious shocks, and when you connect with conscious influence, you are connecting with God. Conscious influence can only come from God. There is a spirit of disobedience, but it is obviously a slave to features of false personality. It is aided by vanity, worldly pride, and rebellious self-will. Violence, depression, lust (identifiction), resentment (internal-considering). Sleep. Imaginary 'I'. A Christian who has the Work teaching - and who has understanding of it, or capability to understand it - is a Christian who has been given a great amount of grace from God. It is armour as well, and it may be God equipping you for duty a bit higher in calling than the average Christian; for now and beyond.

Less scattered Work writing

2009-05-18T20:01:00.000-07:00

I will develop a better way of writing about the Work. Better context and practical relevance. A clearer picture for each part, to see the power in each part. It will inevitably involve spiritual warfare because that is where the practical level of the Work and Christianity meet. Spiritual warfare also contains increase of being because increase of being enables a more adept war-making ability.

In pursuit of mystery

2009-05-13T17:58:00.000-07:00

It occurs to me what I've been missing in my life recently is the search for the mystery of everything. The Bible says it's for kings to search out a mystery. I did that with B influence and mesoteric and esoteric subject matter, but stopped. No more 12 tribes, conspiracy, following lines of ideas from book to book, writer to writer, even the mystery of C influence school. It all stopped. I got exoteric. Well, when Jesus - God - says with faith you can tell a mountain to move and it will move I believe it, but it moves in ways an exoteric mind can't or refuses to see. The exoteric Christians pulled me down (oh, I can't blame them). Believe the Bible. Fear only God. Search out mysteries. Be a king.

In Search of the Miraculous may not just be a commercially drummed-up title.

I.e. the element of being on the *trail of mysteries* when one is coming up the mountain of influences and developing understanding is really a very big element in it all when you stop to think of it.

All the life you see around you seems so *short cycle* and dead (and I don't say that like a teenager but like a Christian who knows sin and being dead in sin). By short cycle I mean the patterns of activity, the cars going and coming, the routine of daily living, over and over, and the veneer of it all that seems to hide anything deeper.

I was very much adept at pursuing that *deeper* behind the veneer, but then once I came to the Work and the Bible that pursuit seemed to have come to an end. Yet it shouldn't.

Pro 25:2 It is the glory of God to conceal a thing: but the honour of kings is to search out a matter.

I, as usual, overstate my own indictment to make my point. I, of course, continued the search within the context of the Work and of biblical doctrine and the plan of redemption. Yet I think what I lost was being *conscious of being in pursuit* of mystery.

Making contact

2009-05-09T01:10:00.001-07:00

This quote:

I bring it up because this snippet brilliantly highlights a common misconception in our society today: that Christianity is somehow about being good enough to be a Christian, when it’s actually about understanding that we’re bad enough to really need Christ. -Mockingbird Blog

reminds me of my saying about the Work: it's not about being good, it's about making contact. The same could be said of the Christian faith. Legalists and antinomians will always get it wrong, but there it is.

Two conscious shocks and the cosmological teaching

2009-05-06T22:20:00.000-07:00

The two conscious shocks are what is practical. Everything is in them. And, wonderfully, they are the practical connection to the deep teaching of the Bible. They are how one is 'in covenant' and union with Christ. Real I. Remember that battle of H24 to H12.

The cosmological teaching of the Work is there to mirror the psychological teaching. Macro and micro. It is true where it is the same as the psychological teaching. To get *too visual* with the cosmological teaching is to get off the mark with it. To start visualizing ladders in the stars and galaxies and all that. It has to be practical and when it is yoked to the psychological teaching, and practical observation of the psychological teaching it is true.

Objective-Consciousness

2009-04-30T15:17:00.001-07:00

Self-consciousness is above waking sleep. Above self-consciousness is objective-consciousness. What is the material of objective-consciousness? I say (and this goes back to my Work approach of "What is practical?" and "What is on-the-mark?") if objective-consciousness is going to be what it sounds like (like something ultimate and real and mature and serious) then it has to have to do with our Creator's plan of redemption and with discernment that comes from the Holy Spirit and the Word of God. Biblical doctrine. The deep history of the heavens and the earth. Biblical anthropology and all the 'loci' of systematic theology.

But what it comes down to is this: those deep, or foundational, insights that have appeared here and there over time, such as how the four states of man show how fallen man gets confused and assumes one state while missing the actual state he is in. Like, the universal thing where people naively think man is innocent (i.e. they assume man is still in the Garden, before the Fall) and not in a state of sin. That type of foundational insight is part of objective-consciousness.

Another is this: the fact that without a Mediator (and the one and only Mediator Jesus Christ) life is cruel and barren. Lands become wastelands, peoples and cultures become hellish.

Another is this: the fact that the sense of anarchic evil all around and how there is no protection from birth to death, i.e. that this feeling can overwhelm...before one realizes that there IS protection...in God. I.e. protection is possible. To the most vulnerable infant and on up.

These aren't great examples because objective-consciousness really is best seen as 'vision'. When you are able to 'see' the deep history of Revelation, or the effect of the Fall, or spiritual warfare, or the deep patterns and events of politics in the world (the fact of 'pilgrim politics' is an example of 'seeing' a deep reality that is happening, and it explains - gives understanding - of what is happening).

To become 'mighty in the Word' is a phrase that touches on objective-consciousness.

Step back from the money-making and the family responsibilities for a moment and see what is potential for developing real understanding.

There is the big area of developing understanding in self-consciousness. Then there is the big area of developing understanding in objective-consciousness.

Objective-consciousness also plays out in more immediate, personal, ways. Interactions with people, events, etc. On a foundation of self-consciousness. Using the necessary higher center energy.

What I crave after reading a classic novel

2009-04-22T23:01:00.000-07:00

As I read these classic novels I find that I actually *crave* an underlying structure that is found in the hero journey or quest.

In Anna Karenina it was buried deeply in the development of the Anna character which is perhaps why I was frustrated reading it.

But after finishing AK I was actually looking for something like Quest of the Holy Grail, or even finishing my current Iliad reading and then the Odyssey again.

The Bible from this angle can be seen, ironically, from good systematic theology. When I read of justification and adoption and glorification and so on that is part of that ultimate hero quest. The reality of it.

I just realized something too with Berkhof. I had read him wrong many years back. I thought in his Systematic Theology he had said he disagreed with the republication of the Covenant of Works, but he wrote the re-*establishment*, and now I recognize that difference. I know that is technical stuff, but basically I'm saying that Berkhof guy is very on-the-mark.

Seeing this underlying quest structure or parts of it in novels is kind of the same as trying to see it in Shakespeare. Identifying it. Shakespeare may have written a single play on one aspect, one deep psychological aspect, of that ultimate, overall quest. Novels and plays as literary forms can only hit it like that.

For imaginative literature (including sacred literature) the Bible, Homer (including Greek myth in general), Shakespeare, and Grail Romance seem to be the basic influences. A little bit in pure folktale too, like Grimm's.

These are works you *just read.* You just read them to get the language. The higher language.

In different ways great classical music communicates the same as well. Not by itself, but certainly in its own powerful, unspeakable way. When you engage it in a cosmos sense. Each work a cosmos. Not just background sounds. Hear it. Get it in to memory.

Great, foundational subjects like war, wealth, government as well. von Clausewitz, Adam Smith, Montesquieu...perhaps the Republic...

The Work sources - Ouspensky - as the school knowledge.

History - great history, classical historians, world histories - seems to play a role of preparing one in a 'good householder' sense to get the ultimate from the other influences mentioned. History ideally gets you above the world in understanding. Out of the maze and opaque confusion and illusion. Seeing the nature of power and the nature of human nature and the ways of the world in a clear light and having it become real understanding so that you are able to exit, or transcend, that miasma of the vain splutterings and intellectual and emotional bondage of the world.

A little journal I've started (not cyber)

2009-04-08T00:27:00.001-07:00

Tonight I bought three little notebooks that each have 40 sheets or pages. A good number.

In one I've started a journal, or really just a record, of 40 Books Read Complete. Each page will have a book listed on it and the date I began and finished it.

I've started with with a few books I've read recently since 2005.

Thus far I have:

1. Vanity Fair - Thackeray
2. Holy Bible, AV1611 (5th complete reading)
3. Manual of Christian Doctrine - Berkhof
4. Pearl of Christian Comfort - Dathenus
5. Tom Jones - Fielding
6. Crime and Punishment - Dostoevsky
7. Anna Karenina - Tolstoy

After Anna Karenina [update: Anna Karenina has been finished] 33 more. I've written at the front of the notebook 'great or interesting books.' But a defining thing is: to be read *complete.*

Here is what I wrote at the front of the notebook:

"Not a list of *all* books read from 2005 to the last entry, but the main ones read complete. An effort to reconnect with great books to keep the mind alive. A simple effort to start and *finish* 40 great or interesting books in this current time of my life."

I also plan on including some great books I've already read complete as part of the 40. That way, as the little effort commences I can rebuild, so to speak, the foundation, and also choose books for a balanced selection of categories. With a concrete number - 40 - and the amount of time involved that it will take this kind of approach can develop into something meaningful.

6th complete Bible reading

2009-04-07T00:07:00.000-07:00

'08 GOAL (now '09)

6th complete reading of the pure and whole received Word of God (AV1611):

Genesis ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50~~ Exodus ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40~~ Leviticus ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27~~ Numbers ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36~~ Deuteronomy ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34~~ Joshua ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24~~ Judges ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21~~ Ruth ~~1 2 3 4~~ 1 Samuel ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31~~ 2 Samuel ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24~~ 1 Kings ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22~~ 2 Kings ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25~~ 1 Chronicles ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29~~ 2 Chronicles ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36~~ Ezra ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10~~ Nehemiah ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13~~ Esther ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10~~ Job ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42~~ Psalms 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 Proverbs ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31~~ Ecclesiastes ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12~~ Song of Solomon ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8~~ Isaiah ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66~~ Jeremiah ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52~~ Lamentations ~~1 2 3 4 5~~ Ezekiel ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48~~ Daniel ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12~~ Hosea ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14~~ Joel ~~1 2 3~~ Amos ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9~~ Obadiah 1 Jonah ~~1 2 3 4~~ Micah ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7~~ Nahum ~~1 2 3~~ Habakkuk ~~1 2 3~~ Zephaniah ~~1 2 3~~ Haggai ~~1 2~~ Zechariah ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14~~ Malachi ~~1 2 3 4~~ Matthew ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28~~ Mark ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16~~ Luke ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24~~ John ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21~~ Acts ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28~~ Romans ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16~~ 1 Corinthians ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16~~ 2 Corinthians ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13~~ Galatians ~~1 2 3 4 5 6~~ Ephesians ~~1 2 3 4 5 6~~ Philippians ~~1 2 3 4~~ Colossians ~~1 2 3 4~~ 1 Thessalonians ~~1 2 3 4 5~~ 2 Thessalonians ~~1 2 3~~ 1 Timothy ~~1 2 3 4 5 6~~ 2 Timothy ~~1 2 3 4~~ Titus ~~1 2 3~~ Philemon 1 Hebrews ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13~~ James ~~1 2 3 4 5~~ 1 Peter ~~1 2 3 4 5~~ 2 Peter ~~1 2 3~~ 1 John ~~1 2 3 4 5~~ 2 John 1 3 John 1 Jude 1 Revelation ~~1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22~~

Finished Oct. 8, 2009

Ten great Russian novels

2009-04-03T14:18:00.000-07:00

I was reading a book of literary criticism (Tolstoy or Dostoevsky - George Steiner), and the writer said casually that these ten novels are the great Russian novels of the golden era of the 19th century (golden era for Russian novels):

Dead Souls - Gogol
Fathers and Sons - Turgenev
Oblomov - Goncharov
War and Peace - Tolstoy
Anna Karenina - Tolstoy
Resurrection - Tolstoy
Crime and Punishment - Dostoevsky
The Possessed - Dostoevsky
The Idiot - Dostoevsky
Brothers Karamazov - Dostoevsky

No surprises except perhaps Oblomov.