Neville Goddard Lecture - Our Potter (CLEAR Audio) Full HQ Lecture(1)

The speaker discusses the concept of imagination and its connection to oneself and to God. They emphasize that each individual's imagination is their own creator and the only true God. They also talk about the importance of trusting in one's own imagination and using it to shape their reality. The speaker mentions that the purpose of coming into this world is to prove one's creative power and to eventually return to their true divine nature. They also mention the need to approach life with childlike trust and belief in order to fully understand and accept their experiences. The speaker concludes by stating that everyone's imagination is connected to God and that the true awakening of imagination is what the world truly desires. But I discovered who he is. He is my own imagination. So I turn to my own imagination, and I want to know what did you imagine yourself to be today? Broke? Unemployed? Let out? What did you do this day in the potter's house? For the potter is your own wonderful human imagination. Now this day, what was the concept you held of yourself? It's entirely up to me, for there's no one to whom I can turn. I have to turn to myself, for that is the potter, and that is the only Jehovah, that's the only Lord, the only Jesus. So they ask, what do you think of Jesus? Blake replies, he is the only God. But so am I, and so are you. Jesus is God awake. He is the Jeremiah when he sleeps. That is Jehovah, who will arise. He does rise, and when he rises, it is God awake. So I will go down, if I know the story, I will still go down while I still sleep. I am not fully aware of the fact I am the being spoken of, but I will test it, I'll try it. I'll go to the potter's house, and the potter is my own imagination. Now this day, what did I imagine? Was it called in my hand, or was it something that I thought lovely, and I want to preserve it, and make it a real state in my world? Or could I change it somewhat and make it better? Well, if I can make it better, well then make it better, because there's no one to whom I can turn. I must go to my own heart, on my own bed, and then when I do what I am called upon to do, be silent. Have complete trust in that which I've done. If I have complete trust in it, it must come to pass, because there is no other creator. There's no creator in the world but your own wonderful human imagination. And that is the immortal you. It cannot cease to be. For in this little garment that you're now wearing, for creative purposes, is taken off. And you do it, you take it off on time. No matter how the aim comes, you take it off on time. Whether the world calls it suicide or not, every death is a suicide, because there's no one else to take it from it, even though he shoots me. No matter what he does to me, it's only myself, because we're all partakers of the one divine nature. We are all co-existent with God, and God and man are inseparable. They're one. So I cannot turn to another, although in my blindness I've burnt incense to a false god. I am called upon to be perfectly still and know that I am God. As we are told in the forty-sixth psalm, the tenth verse, to be still and know I am God. I kill, I make alive. I wound, I heal. I do all these things, and there is none that can deliver out of my hand. The thirty-second chapter of Deuteronomy, the thirty-ninth verse. There is no one doing anything but God, and God and man are one, but the man of whom I speak is your own wonderful human imagination. That's the real you, the immortal you. So in the book of Amos, he asks the question, Does evil befall a city unless God has done it? Does evil befall a city unless God has done it? Now, we know who God is. All the horrors of the world that befalls us, God did it. But who is God? Our own wonderful human imagination. Yes, even the earthquakes, the volcanoes, every horror of the world, and every lovely thing in the world, our own wonderful human imagination did it because that is one with the Lord, Jehovah. There is one with God, and there is no other God. Now, if you think that is atheistic, well, you may think what you will, but I don't think you would. But the world, not yet brought into this concept, would think it so. Yet I am telling you, before we began to fall, we didn't fall because of some mistake we made. This was a deliberate descent in consciousness to this level, for a purpose, to prove our own creative power, that we could actually come down into this world and face death, what seems to be eternal death, and conflict. Not pretend we are dying, but actually die, and see them all die around us, and still conflict. But before we came down, we set up a plan. We prepared a way for ourselves to return, and that way is described in scripture. And I've told it night after night after night. For no one can really see you, the real being that you are, but see the mask that you wear, but not the being that you are. Not through mortal eyes can they see it. His glory is completely hidden from mortal eyes. But you will know it when you see the sun. That sun, the sum total of all the experiences of the world, stands before you, and then you know. Memory returns. You stand before everyone in this world, and memory will return. And then comes the final curtain, when it comes down on all, and we are the brothers that we were before that the world was. Everyone glorified, everyone returned to the glory, that he deliberately, consciously gave up, to assume the limitation of his garments that we are wearing now. And we will not shirk it, and all the garments, all the weaknesses, we took upon ourselves. I am telling you from experience. Here, yesterday morning, it's four, a little after four, and these very wise men, seemingly wise men, of the medical field, and then a woman, an attractive lady in her forties, and she was a psychiatrist, also of the medical field, but a psychiatrist. And I was brought into the picture of the three, and they gave me all this nonsense. And I said, I know exactly your intention, but to me it's all stupid, it's all nonsense. Then came to my mind, that which I knew I wrote a number of years ago, before that the world was, which we call it in scripture, but memory returned. They were so wise, these grand adults, I said, except you become, as a child, you cannot enter the kingdom of heaven. And they looked startled, I said, I know. I'm intelligent enough to know what you are telling me. I understand every word you are telling me, but I do not accept it. Now, a little child may not understand what I am telling the child, but the child trusts me. It has confidence in me. I will say, I believe you. Unless you, with all of your so-called wisdom of this world, of outside conscious world, can drop it and believe the story, that I will tell you. For if I told you what I have experienced, you in your present conscious state could not accept it. You have to turn and become, as a child, to really accept it. If I tell you of a different kind of a birth than that which you know, and the only thing you know, and you give me all this, I didn't use the word baloney, that's what I meant, all this nonsense, and you came to me and placed your face against mine, I said, I know exactly what your intentions are. That's your therapy. May I tell you, it's stupid. I have done a thing wrong with me, and secondly, your therapy is nonsense, sheer nonsense. But if you only listen for one moment, I will tell you what your reasoning mind cannot accept, what it will become as a child. Well, I know from my own experience, I have a little nephew. He came through from Thailand recently, and he came over and I told him a story. He could not understand my story, but I said, you believe that, Roger? Yes. He believed it. He couldn't understand what I'm talking about, but he trusted me, and in trusting me, he believed it. So Blake, in writing his friend Samuel Palmer, he said, you could see what I see, but you do not trust or cultivate it. All you have to do is to simply work up imagination to the state of vision, and it's done. The whole thing is done. So you can see what I see, and you can do what I do, and all you need to do is to work up imagination to the state of vision, and the thing is done. So he did not claim for himself something apart from Palmer. He was talking to his friend Samuel Palmer, who thought, now you're in doubt with a certain faculty. Yes, I do have the faculty, but I cultivate it. I have the faculty, but you have the faculty, because we are one. Jesus, yes, is the only God, but so am I, and so are you. Jesus is God awake, and I'm telling you from experience that he sleeps in all. Oh, I call him Father. Call him Joseph, who sleeps. He is the dreamer. When he wakes, he is Jesus, and Jesus, who calls himself the Son, is one with the Father, but now the Father is awake, for in the end there is only God. There is only the Father. So I tell you, your own wonderful human imagination is God. It is not like God. It is God. There is no other God, and you cannot separate it, not for one moment. If you do, you will burn incense to false God, and you'll make all kinds of things on the outside of yourself and worship it, and that is not God. I'm speaking of the immortal you that cannot die. It cannot die. That is God, so confident that it could overcome death. It gave up its duty, its glorified body, and took upon itself this, and became obedient unto death, even death upon this cross, and yet could overcome it. But I tell you, not one is going to fail. Many will doubt it, but not one can fail, for I would leave the ninety and nine who awoke and go in search of the one who is to receive. I cannot, for one moment, rest if one of my brothers is not redeemed. And may I tell you, the world may not believe it, may not know it, but it's the true and true and real awakening of imagination that the whole vast world aches for. That is a spiritual experience that crowns and redeems experience. It's that great event that actually crowns this experience. So without death, what would this experience be? It's the awakening of the being who deliberately fell asleep who has this experience, because his power is so great. Unless he gave up his power and his glorified body, what challenge could you give him? So he had to completely give it up and take upon himself the restrictions and the limitations of man, this little thing here. But that which is now dreaming in man is one with God and is God. That is the Father. So O Lord, thou art our Father, we are the clay. Thou art our potter, we are the work of thy hand. Our imagination is the Lord. Our imagination is the Father. I'm in search of the Father. I'm in search of myself. I'm looking for myself. And when I find him, I find him only through the means that I set up in the beginning before that the world was. And that was a son. For if I'm a father, there must be a son. So I set him up in the beginning, that when I go through all the experiences that I could ever have in the world of death and decay, when I come out of it, it has to mold itself into one being, and that is the fruit of my effort, and he's my son, and his name is David. When I meet David, suddenly the whole thing returns, and here is my memory. That which I gave up returns, and he stands before me, and he calls me Father. I am his Lord, I am his Father, and I know I am, and he knows I am. And that is the crown that redeems the experience, the horrors that I've gone through. For I've played all the parts, not one part that I have omitted. Yes, the thief and the judge, the murderer and the murdered. I have played every part in the world, and that's why today I can actually say, Father, give me myself, forgive them, for they do not know in their state of sleep what they do. Read them just as they are, but tell the story over and over. How often, Lord? Seventy times seven. Keep on telling it and telling it until it gets through and starts to shake the dreamer within the one who is listening to you. So unless you turn, said he, and become as a child, you cannot enter the kingdom of heaven. And so all the educations of men, all these wonderful honors that we have tried upon each other, they bury the mind and stop it from actually becoming like the child. What I am telling you, I could never have discovered through reading. I never could have found it in a book. It's in the Bible, but I didn't see it until it happened. Now, I share with you what's already in the Bible, but I didn't know it until I experienced it. And when I experienced it and began to re-research scripture, to find it was always there. When I read that chapter, did I realize that thou, Lord, art our father, our potter? I always thought it meant something on the outside. And then I searched and searched to find that potter means imagination, to mold into a form. But the word is our potter, not the imagination, our imagination. Thou art our potter. It means the Lord, and the word is Jehovah. We've sung it as Horenoi. Horenoi is what we use instead of saying Jehovah. All right, so it is called the Lord. Defined in scripture as the self-existent, the eternal one, that has no beginning and no end. That is the God, the only Lord. And he's father. But it's our father. O Lord, thou art our father. And now our father is our potter. And I've discovered our potter is our imagination. So I'm my own father. But I didn't know it. And how would I know? Well, that father is the father of David. For David said, I will tell of the decree of the Lord. And he said of me, thou art my son. Today I have begotten thee. For who would have thought for one moment reading that story, that's thousands of years before this moment in time, that it's speaking of me, speaking of you, that we are the father. Who said to David, thou art my son. Then comes the deep, deep dream. And we dream these horrors of the world. And then comes that moment in time when I call myself from the deep. For I am the father. I am the Lord. And so I call my own dream. And I awaken myself. As I have predetermined at a certain moment in time, after I've played all the part. But how long, how vast, how severe, the anguish ere I found myself, were long to bear. But I found myself, and the only one that could have revealed me to myself, was my son. For I set up in the beginning before that the world was. So then we are told, for no one knows who the son is except the father. And no one knows who the father is except the son. And anyone to whom the son chooses to reveal what he has to reveal in the end, in the fall away. Now you take that 78th chapter of Psalms. It's, the title of it is Ascets. That is, the psalm is the psalm of Ascets. Ascets means to gather together and to be called. All those things are put together. And then he said, I will open up my mouth in a parable and utter dark things from of old. Dark things from of old. Things that are difficult and hard to understand. Then now he goes through the entire story of Israel as recorded in the Old Testament. And he tells the entire story, and he tells you it's a parable. He tells you the dark things, hard to understand. And then he comes to the end, nice long chapter. And what does he say? And the Lord awoke as from sleep, as a man rising out of strong dreams. And then he declares, David. David is his prince. David is his shepherd over all the people. At the very end he recalls all the things through which man has gone. And there he comes, the Lord begins to awake. And he awakes as one out of sleep, like one waking from wine, strong wine. As there was a drunken sleep where all things could happen. And then he awakes. And who does he call? He calls David. And the whole thing ends on the note of David, after the entire series of parables. So a parable is a story told as though it were true. Let either one who hears it, wrestle with it. Let him discover the meaning behind the story. It's told as though it were true. Now one has to discover the fiction from the fact. What is it trying to convey? It's telling a story. You pass through the Red Sea. You will look up the serpent in the wilderness. He's telling all these stories. And then he comes, and then the Lord awakes. He awakes from the parable, and finds the colonel. He finds the truth. And then he calls David. So David comes into view, and David stands before you, and calls you father. And the joy that comes upon you when you see your sons standing before you. You have no other child but David. For your child in this world is a brother. I have a son, I have a daughter. They're both my brothers in eternity. I have a wife, I have other brothers here. They're all my brothers in eternity. For in eternity we're all about the organization of sex. We are the Elohim. And the Elohim is the plural word. One made up of others. Elohim. So all of us are the God who came down. So when you hear the word tomorrow, or you think of it tonight, do not let the mind jump to something on the outside. Commune with your own heart upon your bed, and then be silent. But see that you commune as you want to mold that picture. For the whole verse is this. Be angry, but sin not. Commune with your own heart upon your bed, and be silent. But it doesn't tell you not to be angry. The day is an explosive day. Explode. Be angry, but sin not. Sin means to miss the mark. Don't now go to bed, and let the sun descend upon your anger. All right? Explode. Get it off your chest as it were. Now take the whole thing that you would throw away in the past as a broken vessel and you can't repair it. No. Keep the same vessel and rework it now into a new shape as it seemed good for you to do. So at the end of a day, or I'd say it wasn't a good day, explode. And then, but sin not. Don't let the sun descend upon your anger. Stand right there and simply rework it. Rework what being. Rework yourself. You are the clay. This thing here is seeing the world based upon what you assume that you are. So now you actually do it. Now let me share with you a story. The lady is here tonight. This is the mother. She says, our son kept talking and talking and talking that he wanted a mini bike. Well, his father and I did not want him to have a mini bike. But he kept on talking and talking and talking about it. So one day I thought, now I will show him. I said, now tell me, Dusty. If you had your mini bike, where would it be now? He said, in the garage. She said, all right, it's now in the garage right now. There it is. Now will you go and get it? And where would you use it? Well, he said, I will use it in the driveway. Well, the mother said to Dusty, well, you know you can't do that. For we have made it and they have stated in no uncertain terms. They will not tolerate a mini bike on their driveway. And their driveway joins ours. So they will not allow it. Now where else would you use it? Well, I would use it on the street. I would drive it in the street. What is that allowed? The mother said. Well, he said, I don't know. Well, go and call the police and find out. So he went to the phone and called the police. And the police said, no, you're not allowed to use a mini bike on the street. All right, that was that. Now where else would you use it? Well, in the May lot. The May has a huge big parking lot, May Company. I'll go over there and use it. Well, you have to have permission. All right, go and call the May Company and ask for permission. So he went to the phone, called the May Company and they say, no, we are open seven days a week. And so we cannot allow a mini bike in our parking lot for we have to use it for our customers seven days a week. So when he got that, he went to his room for a half an hour. And when he came out, he said, I have made a decision. I don't really want a mini bike at all. And then the mother said, you know, how often I've done the same thing. I thought, really, I want this, really want this. And then I asked myself, now what would I do with it after I got it? Now I have it now. What am I going to do with it? I discovered, you know, I really don't want it at all. But may I tell you, having lived in one apartment in New York City for 14 years, the last apartment we had before we moved out here, we lived almost 14 years in that apartment. It was a seven-room apartment, a duplex. I had no idea what junk we stored over 14 years. We called in our sister-in-law, that is Bill's two sisters, and her aunt and said, pick out all these things. We took one third of our furniture and said, there it is, take what you can. What you can. What they couldn't take, we called the church and said, send your van for it, for your thrift shop. We gave away a third of what we had accumulated. And when we came out here, I regret that I hadn't given away 50 percent, or maybe two thirds. When I came out here, I couldn't find places for my books. I gave away over 400 books that I held. I didn't need. I read them. That was part of my growth. As a man grows in this world, he is growing from a God of tradition into a God of experience. So these were part of my growth in the God of tradition. And then I still kept them. Well, maybe someone can use them now. So I gave a friend of mine, who lives here, well over 400 books. I gave another 50 or so books, and all these, and I still have too many books. You grow and you outgrow, and you grow and you outgrow. And all these things that we kept and kept and kept for 14 years, we accumulated. Where we kept them, I really do not know. Under the bed, under this, all places. And finally came the day of movement. That's why, not to burden my wife, I hope I go first. That she'll have the pleasure of reading out what we have now. Because I couldn't face it, really. The thought of all that you accumulate, that we've been here now 10 years in the President's Department, and knowing what happened after 14 years, I despair when I think of what eventually must take place when we do move, as we all have to move in this world. So, the mother is perfectly right now in taking that little lesson, which she had learned before. I want so-and-so, but if I really had it, then where would it be now? Then she comes to the conclusion, I really don't want it at all. We must have it. I have a sister-in-law. She's now a widow. My brother Lawrence died. She always has, she must have the biggest of everything in the family. My sister, who could well afford anything in this world, for she really is the richest of all, because all the mothers see to it that she keeps everything that she's ever made, and they invest it for. But she had a lovely string of pearls. No, the sister-in-law had to have a bigger string of pearls, something fantastic. But it came now through little diamond earrings. She had to have the biggest thing in the world. She wouldn't go to her own husband to pierce her ears. She wanted them pierced, so she could carry these big things in her ears. So she went to her brother, who also was a doctor, and he, unfortunately, made the hole too low. These things are so big that they'll pull her down to here. Now, they cannot be the world's best diamonds, because you can't have diamonds that big and only pay $8,000 for them. The two rings cost $8,000. Well, you can't have an $8,000 diamond that big and be a good diamond. She doesn't know that. So, no, she can't wear them. They're rather in a safe. But she had to have the biggest thing in the world. And she's only known this story that my friend knows tonight. If I had them, where would they be? On my ears? Yes, that's why I bought them. Would they be comfortable? Never thought of that. Never thought of these enormous things pulling on her lobes. And now she has the two rocks. What good are they? Were I she, I'd give them away. Give them to anyone who wants to have this nonsense. But no, she can't part with anything that I do know. And now she's traveling the world over, and all her things are in storage in Barbados. More silver than you would need to open any silver shop. More sets of dishes than you'll need to open up and feed a hundred without borrowing a dish. She has more and more. So, that's what one gets without thinking. If I had it, what would I do with it? Now, I'll tell you a simple, simple technique. Set your whole mind on what I've been telling you from night to night, on the grace that is coming to you, which means that you will awake. And when you awake, you own the world. You don't have a little cottage. The world is yours. For the world is God, and you are God when you awake. The whole vast universe is the Lord, and you are the Lord. You can't separate the reality that is man from the creator of the universe. They are one. So, set your hope fully upon that grace that is coming to you at the unveiling of Jesus Christ within you. For Jesus Christ is God awake. So, when you awake, He awakes in you, as you, not as another. Then the whole vast world is yours, and you see it through entirely different eyes. You see everything differently. A beauty that no one, looking only through mortal eyes, could ever conceive. So, when you go home, try to remember what I've told you. And when you read scripture, it's all about you. So, when you read, O Lord, thou art our Father. We are the flesh. Thou art our Father. We are the work of thy hand. Remember, these three are interchangeable terms. My imagination, the Father, and the Lord are interchangeable terms. And now I'll go down to the potter. Well, the potter, I just discovered, is my imagination. I was standing still, and now, in my own imagination, wonder, what did I this day do? What did I imagine? Now, if what I imagine this day is spoiled, is not what I want to make real in my world, don't discard it. Rework it into another vessel, as it seemed good to you today. You don't discard anyone. Just simply rework it into an entirely different vessel, as it seemed good to you today. And if one will not accept it, pass on. Perfectly all right. Do it anyway, and let it be. Eventually, they will awake. And when they awake, they are our brothers. And we will wait for eternity, if it takes eternity, for everyone to come back. For we are incomplete if one is missing, and one cannot be missing. For the Lord is made up of all of us. He has no being without us. We are members of the Divine Body, all of us. And we share in that divine nature, the same creative power. And may I tell you, when you're clothed in that garment which you gave up, wherever you go, it is perfect. Automatically perfect. You don't have to raise a finger to make it so. It is perfect, because you're clothed in your glorified body. But I should dwell upon what you really are. And don't turn to the left or the right. Don't burn incense to any false god. Commune with your own heart upon your bed, and then be silent. What would it be like if it were true? Can you answer that? If you could answer that, then what was said in that first epistle of John, the fifth chapter, the fifteenth verse? If we know that he is his in whatever we ask, we know that we have obtained the request made of him. What a promise. If we know, we hear, but don't I know what I've heard? Don't I know what I've just done? Well, all right, that's the one spoken of. But can I really believe what I have just imagined? Can I? Well, then I must know now. If I put in my trust in this one, which is my own imagination, well, then I will know I have obtained it. It's already been done. Now wait for it. It's done. Like a shipment. I have complete confidence in a shipment coming, if I have ordered it. For you order, and then you wait. It may come by slope rate. It may come by express. It may come by air freight. It'll come. The vision is maturing, and if it seems long, wait, for it is sure, and it will not be late. Now let us go into the silence.