A: Of course not. There is nothing in the universe but God. God is the universe. God Itself, infinitely manifested and formed, comprises the universe. The only reason then for discord is our acceptance of a belief contrary to that. Now, that isn’t your belief or my belief. That is a universal belief, and we become victims of it in some measure. There is nobody on earth who is not a victim of that belief. So far, there has never been an individual on the earth who has not, in some measure, been a victim of the belief that they had a mind or a life or a soul of their own apart from God. And a few of the great mystics, like Jesus, have risen so high above that belief as to have almost achieved the full freedom from the belief of a selfhood apart from God.
Absolutely, when we take the stand that God is the very essence and substance of all form, God Itself is the activity and the law of all being—that’s all there is to the whole thing. But the reason that we stand here teaching it is because of the ignorance of it . . . this thing that’s grown up that we call the Adam man, the Adam dream, this sense of selfhood apart from God.
And our purpose in being together here is to break down that belief, not to change the world. The world is God in expression, but we are here to help each other rise above the belief, the universal belief. And that is why in The Infinite Way teaching, we never say that the fault is yours, or the error is in you, or it’s your wrong thinking, or your sin that has brought this on you. Always in our work, the only reason for any discord is the universal belief of a selfhood or activity apart from God, which we, in some measure, are entertaining.
1This copyrighted excerpt is from Recording 0007B1: 1952 New Washington Series, “Questions and Answers, Including Supply, Tithing, Giving.” It is posted with kind permission from the Estate of Joel Goldsmith, which holds the copy protection on the recorded classes and the copyright on the transcripts. The full transcript of this recording is available at The Infinite Way website or by calling 1-800-922-3195.
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