The Awakening of Faith Neville Goddard Lecture November 28-1969

The Awakening of Faith
Neville Goddard Lecture
November 28-1969

Those who experience the Christian mystery are charged with the responsibility of telling others. Their aim is the awakening of faith in God. For, as Paul, I ask the question: “How can men call upon him in whom they have not believed? And how can they believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how can they hear unless there is a preacher? And how can men preach unless they are sent? As it is written, ‘How beautiful are the feet of those who preach good news!’ But not all have heeded the gospel, for Isaiah says, ‘Who, O Lord, has believed what he has heard from us?’ So, faith comes from what is heard, and what is heard comes from the preaching of Christ.”

Now Christ is not a person outside of you who lived 2,000 years ago. Christ is the cosmic being who became humanity by burying himself in every child born of woman. Ask the average person if they believe in God and many of them will say, Yes. But when asked to define Him, they will describe someone other than themselves. So, “How can men call upon one in whom they do not believe?”

I tell you: the only God in the universe is your own wonderful human imagination. When you say: “I am,” that is God. There is no other God other than he who is encased in the limitation of your little garment of flesh. How can you call upon him, when you do not believe you are he? And how can you believe in him of whom you have never heard? What preacher ever told you that your own wonderful human imagination is God? They paint a word picture of a god outside of you, but that is not the true God. And when someone comes and tells you who He really is, the idea is blasphemous. No one wants to believe that he is creating the conditions of his life; but God is the only causative power, as there is nothing but God. Everything is caused by Imagination. He is the only reality. So, how can you believe in him of whom you have never heard? And how can you hear of him unless there is a preacher? And how can there be a preacher unless he is sent?

This morning’s paper contained an article saying that scientists have discovered that the so-called throne Peter was to have sat upon 2,000 years ago is only 900 years old. They have now taken the chair out of its encasement, but are keeping it as a holy relic, when it was never any more than a piece of wood upon which some self-appointed nut sat while calling himself the emperor, the pope, or holy one. But now after a thousand years of nonsense the truth has been revealed. What are we going to do when man does not want to hear the truth that he is responsible for his own life, that his imagination is the only God?

When you look out on the world you may think you had nothing to do with its creation, but you did. You do not know it yet, because its purpose has not been revealed to you. But by the restriction and limitation of your own creative power, you became your created world that you may expand beyond it and create a still greater world for even further expansion of yourself. God is ever expanding his illumination. He took upon himself the limit of contraction called man, the limit of opacity called man, that he may break the limitation and expand. That’s the glory of it all.

I have experienced scripture and am under an obligation to tell it. Like Jeremiah, “If I say, ‘I will not mention him or speak any more in his name,’ there is in my heart as it were a burning fire shut up in my being, and I am weary with holding it in and I cannot.” I must share my experience with others to encourage all to believe in God, but it is my responsibility to tell them who God is.

When men believe the characters of scripture to be historically true, they are taking truth and modifying it to the limitation of the weakness of the human soul. They are not characters of history, but personifications of the aspects of the human mind. This is true from Jesus, down. Jesus is the personification of the fulfillment of the plan that you set up in the beginning of time. Having created the plan before the world came into being, you and I entered our creation. Jesus is the fulfillment of our plan. When his story fulfills itself in you, you must tell your brothers who are sound asleep, to wean them from the nonsense told year after year of some external God to whom they must pay homage, when there is no external God. It is Christ in Man who is his hope of glory, and Christ is God’s plan of redemption which was set up before that the world was. That plan is in the depth of every being, waiting to be awakened and fulfilled.

Now we are told that the Pattern Man said: “Unless you believe that I am he, you will die in your sins.” Put the little word “is” in this sentence as: “Unless you believe that ‘I am’ is he, you will die in your sins.” Those who heard that statement did not know that he was speaking of the Father, but the Father is the cause. Just as your father is the cause of you – for without a father you could not be, so must all life be fathered. So I say to you: “Unless you believe that your I am is the father of your life, you will continue to miss your goals in life.” Your I AMness is the Lord Jesus Christ and there is no other. How do I know this to be true? Read his story as told in the gospels.

Having been born from above, he said: “I am from above and you are from below. Where I am going you cannot now come.” Why? Because, having fulfilled scripture he is returning to the source with the knowledge that he is the source. It isn’t that you will not come, but that you cannot come until you have fulfilled what you agreed to fulfill before that the world was.

You and I agreed to dream in concert and we will not break our pledge to each other. We came down from heaven and descended right into our creation, where we are playing the parts we agreed to play, and as long as we think of God as another we are sound asleep. But when the time is fulfilled, one is sent to awaken his sleeping brothers, saying: “He who sees me, sees him who sent me, for I sent myself.” And who am I? I am the one you call God. I call him Father, for, having found him I know that He and I are one.

We are told that the one who was sent was called Paul. It was Paul who spent his days from morning to evening testifying to the kingdom of heaven and trying to convince all to whom he spoke about Jesus, both from the law of Moses and the prophets. Some were convinced by what he said, while others disbelieved. But he welcomed everyone who came. That’s all I can do.

Having had the same experiences as Paul, all I can tell you is what I have experienced. I know that Jesus Christ is the only reality. He is God the Father, housed in you as your awareness of being. You will know this to be true the day you are possessed by a peculiar vibration which scripture calls “wind”, saying: “The wind blows where it will and you hear the sound of it, but you cannot tell whence it comes or whether it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”

When the wind possesses you, your entire body will vibrate and you will awaken in the tomb where you buried yourself, to realize that no man took your life; you laid it down yourself. That you have the power to lay it down and the power to lift it up again. You laid your creative power down within your own creation (which is Man), for “Eternity exists and all things in Eternity independent of Creation which was an act of Mercy.” Man is part of the eternal structure of the universe and you laid yourself down within Man. That was your act of mercy.

Now, I would like to change the word “creation” to “re-creation”, for it is a transcending of one’s own creation. I, Divine Imagination, came down into my own creation, and by recreating it I transcend it to awaken myself from this body of death. One day you, too, will awaken within your skull to find yourself entombed. You will come out to find the symbolism of scripture concerning the birth of Jesus Christ surrounding you.

But it’s all about you, not another, for you are Jesus Christ, coming out of Golgotha – your own skull. The babe wrapped in swaddling clothes will be there and those who witness your birth are there; but they cannot see you, as you are now God’s begotten and God is Spirit. Jesus Christ is a pattern, buried in you, which you will experience one day; then you will know that the Bible is your own personal, spiritual biography.

Let men have their so-called holy relics and all the other things, and forgive them as they do not know what they are doing. They are the blind leaders of the blind. The other day someone asked me if the Bible was all I ever talked about. They thought it was very limited and monotonous, but I find it a never-ending mystery.

I preach Christ crucified on humanity, not on some little piece of wood in the Near East 2,000 years ago. There never was any man who was crucified in that manner. Oh, we have insane men, like our Hitlers and Stalins, who will crucify a man because of his belief. In our own land men have hung other men on trees thinking they are doing God’s business; but that’s not the story of Christ, for he became humanity that humanity may become God.

Now, no one ascends into heaven but he who first descended from heaven, the son of man. Buried in you is that son, who is going to come out of you; and, coming out of you, he is the son of man, one with the one who descended from heaven, who is God. Listen carefully: “I am the root and the offspring of David, the bright morning star.” Yes, I am the root, the father of David; yet I am David’s offspring. So the father of David and the offspring of David are one and the same being. David, the symbol of humanity, always does the Father’s will. Everyone and everything here is doing the Father’s will. Say “I am.” That’s the Father. Condition your “I am” by saying “I am prosperous” and you are doing the Father’s will.

In the 3rd chapter of the Book of Samuel (the word “Samuel” in Hebrew means, “his name is God” (Sam-u-el), the Lord spoke to the boy Samuel, saying: “Those who honor me I will honor and those who despise me, they shall be lightly esteemed.” In other words, your concept of yourself is either your honor or your dishonor.

If you feel little when you meet someone, you are dishonoring God. Have you ever met anyone you thought more important than you? He may be richer, bigger, stronger, or more handsome. He may be everything you think you are not; but if you felt small in his presence because he had more money, was wiser, stronger, or better dressed than you, you are dishonoring God, as God’s name is I AM. And “He who honors me, I will honor, and he who despises me shall be lightly esteemed.”

The boy Samuel, believing God to be another, heard a voice seemingly coming from without; so he went to the prophet Elijah (which means “My God”) and he was told to go back and dream again. This he did only to repeat the dream. Three times he heard the voice calling him, until he knew who the Lord was and grew into his oneness to become the great prophet.

The Samuel in you speaks, saying: “Those who honor me I will honor, and those who despise me will be lightly esteemed.” If you feel inferior towards anyone you are despising the name of God, which is “I am.” Don’t let anyone make you feel little. They may try to do it, but only if you feel small already. If you don’t feel little it does not matter what or who they are. You may not have a nickel in your pocket, but you won’t feel little when you know that God is your imagination. You can’t be more than God, so you are God. Do not walk the earth in an arrogant way, but never let anyone put you down.

I was born on a little island called Barbados. The island is just like a large farm, where everything is planted in order to produce a dollar. We planted sugar cane from which we received its produce of molasses, rum, etc. When I was a child we had no chemical fertilizers. The animal products called manure were used to put life back into the fields. When we would scatter this on the field to fertilize it, we would call it broadcasting. (This was long before telephones, radio, or television.) Now we have a broadcasting industry which tells us that we will lose our hair, teeth, and everything, if we don’t buy a certain product. Isn’t that BS? And then from BS they go to MS (that’s more of the same thing as it’s piled higher and higher). That’s the world, so let no one here make you feel little. You are God! He is buried in you as your own wonderful human imagination.

In the 13th chapter of 2 Corinthians, Paul invites you to test God, saying: “Come, test yourself. Do you not realize that Jesus Christ is in you?” That’s quite a challenge. If Jesus Christ is in you and you know he is your human imagination, which you believe creates reality, you can test him by imagining that you are what – at the moment – your reason denies and your senses deny. Now, can you believe in your imagination? Can you awaken your faith in the true God who is your human imagination? Try it. Walk as though you were the person you desire to be. Ask yourself how you would feel if it were true, for feeling creates life.

This is brought out in scripture. We are told that Isaac was blind when he said: “Come close, my son, that I may feel you.” He could not see what he was assuming, so he sought the feeling. Throughout scripture you find the blind father calling his son to be felt and touched. When Joseph placed his sons before Jacob (who admitted being blind), he crossed his hands as he blessed the boys, then justified his act.

Now I ask you: what would the feeling be like if your desire could be felt? How would you feel now if you were the man you want to be? Catch the feeling and believe in Jesus Christ, knowing he is your imagination. Everything is possible to imagine, but it takes faith to create its reality. Just as I said earlier: first you must hear then acceptance will come through faith.

How can men call upon him in whom they have not believed? The average person does not believe in himself. Before I wrote the first chapter in my book, Your Faith is Your Fortune, I wrote one little line saying: “Man’s faith in God is measured by his confidence in himself.”

 I can’t tell you what criticism I have had because of that statement; but it’s still there, for I know it is true. Your faith in God is measured by your confidence in yourself, because your true self is God. So, how could a man call upon himself when he does not believe in himself? And how can he believe when he has never been told? And how can he be told unless there is a preacher? And how can there be a preacher unless he is sent? So one who has experienced scripture is sent, as I have been sent.

So I say to you: you don’t owe anything to anyone because God Himself became you. Even though you can’t pay rent and you haven’t eaten much today, within you is the being who owns the universe, who created and sustains it. His name is “I am.” Rather than calling upon his name, call with his name, by saying: “I am free, I am wealthy; I am rich, and I am healthy.” The “I am” that you are is the creative power of the universe.

I have personally experienced the story of Jesus Christ in detail, so I know what I am talking about. I am not theorizing. Christ in you is God’s plan of salvation and God in you is your “I am.” When you experience the story of Jesus Christ it will be in the first person, singular, present tense. You don’t see another. You are the one who first resurrects and is born, as scripture unfolds itself within you. I stand before you as a witness and, like Paul, I spend my last days from morning to night testifying to the kingdom of God and trying to convince everyone that Jesus Christ is the fulfillment of the law and the prophets. You came here only to fulfill scripture. Christ is in you and must fulfill himself in you, so let no one make you feel little, and don’t you feel arrogant.

I cannot meet anyone I do not respect. He may be the one who shines my shoes but he is God. I am shining my own shoes in the being who is doing it and I respect him. He has to pay rent, buy food and clothing. Just because he plays the part of shining shoes doesn’t mean he is less than. Behind these masks we are all brothers. I knew you before that the world was. At that time we were one being who is God. We are made up of a brotherhood of infinite brothers. Yet, in spite of the number we will all know each other individually and distinctly, as we return to the one being. We came down and became fragmented into our own creation. We are going back to the one being we really are, who is God the Father. You are He and one day you are going to know it from experience.

Now let us go into the silence.