Jesus Speaks...

Concerning a topic such as this one, it is extremely important not to confuse substance and semantics. God's Presence is infinite, and all words are finite. It simply is not possible to use any words to adequately describe God's Presence. God's Presence cannot be understood but must be experienced in order to be fully appreciated. Thus, the question is whether people will focus on the words we use or see beyond them and open their minds and beings to a direct experience of the Infinite Presence within themselves—which is the only place you can find God.

Of course, thinking that particular words are more important than the hidden meaning – the Spirit – behind them is a function of a particular level of consciousness. Thus, it is highly likely that people at a certain level of consciousness will indeed argue with any particular wording we use. And as a result of experiencing this over and over again, we realize that when we talk about the topic of God (indeed, this applies to all topics, but especially to the topic of God), we must choose a wording for a certain level of consciousness and accept that those at a lower level will take offense and argue with our wording. That is why I so often talked about those who have ears to hear. (Sometimes even those at a higher level of consciousness will argue with our wording because they fail to see that it is not meant to give an absolute and infallible truth – which cannot be done with finite words – but is adapted to a particular level of consciousness that is not their own.)

As I have said several times before, there are levels on the path. Indeed, the path can be compared to a spiral staircase, leading from lower to higher levels of consciousness. The central issue that determines a particular person's level on the staircase is the degree to which the person is identified with form and thus believes that form or matter has power over his or her Spirit.

At the lower levels, a person believes there is no God and thus he or she has no Spirit. Such a person is fully identified with form and thus believes form or matter has complete power over his or her identity. At a slightly higher level, a person believes in a God, but it is the remote being in the sky that acts as a sort of personal magician who is favorable to some people and condemnatory towards others.

As a person grows towards a higher awareness, the concept of God will change very gradually, and this will eventually open up people's minds to a more sophisticated view of God. This can lead from a religious image of God as the external entity to a more spiritual, mystical view of seeing God inside oneself and eventually within all form. Yet the determining factor is a person's willingness to question his or her mental image of God. You are always at some level of consciousness and this level has a corresponding image of God.

How do you move to a higher level? Only by being willing to question your image of God. So the question is what it will take for a person to reach that willingness. For some it can take many, many lifetimes, as for example some fundamentalist Christians are reincarnated scribes and Pharisees who would not let me challenge their mental images 2,000 years ago and are now using my teachings to justify not questioning their images of the external god in the sky.

When I walked the Earth 2,000 years ago, I knew most people were not ready for the view of God I presented, but I also knew that I was giving teachings for the future, namely today when many more people are ready to understand and eventually internalize my teachings about the kingdom of God being within you, "I and my Father are one" and other such teachings.

As a person becomes more open to oneness, it is natural that the person will go through phases. In the beginning, the concept of oneness with God will be just that—a concept. This means it can be argued for or against or that a person can argue about a particular wording. Yet common for this level of consciousness is that there is no direct, unfiltered experience of oneness with God. There may be a partial experience, but it will be colored by the person's mental images.

As we have explained many times, the identification with form begins with and is a function of the consciousness of separation, the duality consciousness. The central feature of this state of consciousness is that because it is separated from God, it can never experience oneness with God. Thus, God must be understood, viewed or related to as a remote being that is not known through direct experience of oneness but is known mainly through concepts, meaning mental images.

There is a stage of the path where a person has begun to have some direct transcendent experiences, and their function is to provide a frame of reference that shows the person there is a reality that is outside his or her mental images, his or her mental box. The all-important question that determines the person's further progress is the person's willingness to question his or her mental images, even to question how they color the person's perception of life. Those who become as little children and are willing to question with an open mind and with no attachment to past images will make the swiftest progress. Those who become attached to a certain image – or even become prideful in thinking they have the only right image of God – will make slow progress or even regress.

I trust some will understand that you make ultimate progress when you come to the point, where you realize that no mental image could ever give justice to the infinite Presence of God. And thus, you need to question any and all mental images in order to open your mind fully to an unfiltered experience of God's Presence. In other words, there is a phase where you gradually refine your image of God and your relationship with God. Yet the ultimate outcome of that phase is that you let go of ALL mental images of God and even give up the idea of having a relationship with God.

One of the more subtle initiations on this path is giving up the concept of oneness with God. Did you take note of my wording? I said that you give up the "concept" of oneness. I did not say you give up oneness. What is the difference? As long as you hold on to any mental concept, you are actually having a relationship with that concept instead of the real God. It is like our often-used example of a person wearing colored glasses. The person is not seeing the world as it really is but is seeing an image of the world that exists only inside the person's mind. Some people have been so in love with their self-created image of God that they have had a relationship with their concept of God for many lifetimes. Only when they have had enough of relating to a graven image of God, will they gradually open their minds to the possibility that the real God is beyond ALL images and concepts.

As stated in the letter above, you can only have a relationship between parts that are seen as somewhat separate. The most subtle aspect of the duality consciousness is that forms – which clearly appear separate to the senses and outer mind – are seen as truly being separate rather than being expressions of the One, indivisible, underlying reality. Thus, once parts are seen as separate, they can have a relationship. This simply is not possible in oneness. Being one with God goes beyond any relationship because in oneness you are not relating to another being who is seen as being separate from yourself. Furthermore, only when there is separation is there a need for an image or concept. You need no image to describe what you are experiencing directly and with no filter.

So you see my point? There is a stage where you begin to open your mind to oneness as a possibility. Yet it is seen only as a possibility, as a mental CONCEPT rather than an actual experience. And even though you can, during this stage, have mystical experiences, your mental images will color them so you still feel like you are having a relationship with an external entity. This may give you a sense of oneness with that entity, as even a personal relationship with another human being can give you a sense of oneness.

Yet if you keep questioning your mental images of God, there comes a point where you give up the sense of having a relationship with an external being. This does not happen in an instant but very gradually, as you begin to experience the true oneness that requires no contrast.

Take note of the following remark from the question: "I find it hard to comprehend that two parts of myself loving each other can be as vibrant as the two parts of myself being in love with another, another that we are extensions of. The vibrancy and richness comes forth in the essence of it being a relationship, when something/one that's not you fellowships with you."

This describes very well the stage where a person still has not seen through all of his or her mental images. I am not saying this to in any way find fault, for as I have said this is a perfectly natural stage on the path from separation to oneness. Yet it also illustrates what we might call the fundamental allure of the duality consciousness, namely that the contrast between two opposites or separate parts makes life SEEM richer. It is indeed this very allure that has caused so many people to become trapped in the epic mindset, and those who are not willing to question this mindset simply have not yet had enough of the contrasting experiences that you can have only in duality.

Again, I am not here finding fault, as the Law of Free Will gives you a perfect right to have such contrasting experiences for as long as you like. Yet there eventually comes a point when a person begins to question whether this contrasting experience is all there is to life. And that is the moment when a person truly begins to long back for oneness—in which there, by nature, cannot be such contrasts.

How does it feel to have oneness with God? Well, here is a subtlety that at lower levels of consciousness will seem illogical, nonsensical or even contradictory. Take the statement: "My experience of God is that God is also a larger entity. More than me, more than the sum of all of us, all of the ascended hosts, etc." This is perfectly true, in the sense that you are an individualization of God and thus the totality of God is indeed more than you, more than me and more than all of us.

And it is precisely this sense of God as a larger entity that makes the dualistic concept of the almighty being in the sky seem so alluring. So how can you – as an individualization of a larger entity – come into oneness with what will (at least while you are still on Earth – always seem like a larger entity?

The way out of this seeming enigma is to contemplate, first of all, duality and the need to go beyond contrast. You might begin by contemplating the concepts we have explained of how the Buddha has no enemies and refuses to give the two dualistic polarities any power. You may also contemplate the need to free yourself from the dualistic struggle by never seeing yourself as being in opposition to or in a battle with other people or even dark forces. You understand, I trust, that I am not here talking about actions but about your state of mind. When I challenged the scribes and Pharisees, you might say I was opposing them, but the essential consideration was my frame of mind. If I had truly been seeing myself as locked in a dualistic battle with them, I would not have made my ascension.

You can then begin to realize that there is an experience of unity and oneness that is far beyond anything offered in duality. For example, you have the concept of bliss which has no opposite and thus is different from happiness, which is contrasted with unhappiness. Incidentally, overcoming the craving – the addiction, we might say – to contrast is a very subtle and difficult stage on the path. It can often lead to a state of almost schizophrenia in which life seems to have no meaning. It can lead to a form of depression in which life seems to have lost its purpose or its appeal. Yet the reality is that it is the dualistic battle that has lost its appeal to you, but you have not yet truly locked in to the bliss that is beyond contrast.

Navigating this stage can become like the dark night of the soul or the Spirit in which you actually feel you have been abandoned by God ("My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?"), your higher self and the Ascended Host. The reason is that we do indeed have to withdraw for a time until you begin to find the Divine Presence in yourself. If we continued to appear or respond to you as external entities, we would only reinforce the concept of separation and that would actually freeze your growth at a certain level. It can take a lot of patience to get through this stage, yet by making a simple shift in consciousness, it can also be over very quickly. In fact, it is precisely your attachment to your mental images – and your willingness/unwillingness to question them – that determines how long it takes for you to navigate this stage.

One might say that the key to making it through this dark night is to solve the enigma of individualization. Yes, you are an individual being. But you are out of the whole. So what is your real self? Is it not the whole? Obviously, you do not get to this stage without realizing there is a higher self beyond your mortal identity. So the question is how quickly you can expand that sense of what is your higher self, until you realize that your I AM Presence is out of a higher Being, who is out of a higher Being and so on all the way to the Creator. So what truly is your real self? Is it not the totality of the Chain of Being, which encompasses all there is?

How do you overcome the illusion that individualization means separation? By realizing that God is you and you are God. Thus, there is no God but the greater self that you are. Because even though you are an individualization, you have the potential to experience the whole. The Conscious You is – as we have explained many times – beyond form, and that is why it can transcend any form – any mental image of God – and experience the totality of God.

And while it is indeed difficult to experience this totality and still maintain an existence in a physical body on planet Earth, it is certainly possible to have an experience of oneness with God that makes all concepts, words and mental images become vain and irrelevant. And that is when you stop having a relationship with a concept and begin to experience the infinite nature of the true God. And at that moment, the barrier between self and Self begins to break down, eventually leading to the point where you cannot maintain an existence on Earth and ascend into the ascended consciousness, in which the enigma of individualization is resolved through experiencing the oneness that is beyond contrast.

So how does it feel to have oneness with God while you are still in embodiment and realize you are an individualization of a larger entity? Well, again, words are inadequate. Yet using the vocabulary in the letter that started this discussion, we might say that you go beyond having a relationship with an external entity. You stop looking for or appealing to an external entity and instead begin to see God as being inside yourself. Thus, instead of thinking that an external being will come and do something for you, you begin to allow the internal God to do things through you.

So how do you come into oneness? By transcending the stage where oneness is a concept and becomes an experience that you prefer not to put into words. You see, the ego and the duality consciousness are perfectly capable of creating a very sophisticated concept of oneness that might even give you a sense of oneness. Yet as long as you are attached to words, you are not in oneness, as no words are needed to experience oneness. Words are needed only to DESCRIBE oneness, and a description is necessary only when oneness is a concept and not a direct experience.

So how do you know when you are in oneness? Well, the answer to the question. "Am I in oneness?" is ALWAYS "No!" For when you truly are in oneness, the question becomes irrelevant and disappears from your mind as the dew melts before the rising Sun of your Presence.

from askrealjesus.com