1. In our first lesson we learned that there is One Mind. This Mind teems with ideas and these ideas have expression. Mind, idea, and expression form a trinity which is the metaphysical interpretation of the religious terms known as the "Holy Trinity": Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. These three are one, and if we study them as Mind, Idea, and Expression we can better understand how they are one.

2. Man is created in the image and after the likeness of God, the One Mind. Man forms states of consciousness in this One Mind by his thinking and feeling. By studying the activity of his own mind (his consciousness) he can find out how the One Mind creates.

3. Everything that we see with our physical eyes was first an idea, and back of the idea is Mind. No house is built, no garment made, that was not first an idea in someone's mind. After the idea is expressed — acted upon in mind, worked out in consciousness we have the manifestation, that which is cognized by one or more of the five senses.

4. Ideas are begotten or generated in the One Mind, eternal Omniscience, becoming causes from which all that is, is produced. Mind is the matrix of all wisdom, knowledge, and understanding. Out of the One Mind, ideas arise and are born in consciousness, asking for expression, asking to be recognized and accepted. When an idea comes into consciousness it is filled with creative power, and is on its way into manifestation, which it attains if given consent by the will of the individual.

5. Before there could be a man, there had to be an idea of man. God, the Father, Divine Mind, created the idea of man, and this idea is His Son, the offspring of His Mind, the perfect-man idea. The Son is the I AM, Christ, the Word, Jehovah, the only begotten of the Father; the name "Son of God" was given to this idea because it proceeded from the Father, God, and was God-created. The Son, being the expressed image-likeness of the Father, is perfect, even as the Father is perfect. All that we find in Divine Mind, we find in the idea, in the offspring, in the Son, "who is the image of the invisible God, the first born of all creation" (Col. 1:15). "For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily" (Col. 2:9).

6. All that Divine Mind, the Father, ever begets or impregnates in consciousness is the idea, and this idea is the cosmic creative power that is active in Omnipresence. It is the image or seed-idea that is hidden in all forms of life and which causes the expression in the invisible and the manifestation in the visible realms. In its various forms of activity in man it is known as Christ, Jesus, and Jesus Christ.

7. From the historical standpoint the terms, Christ, Jesus, and Jesus Christ, are names or titles that are applied to the man of Nazareth who was the fulfillment of the Jewish prophecy of a Messiah (Isa. 9:6-7). the man born in Bethlehem of Judea of the virgin Mary (Matt. 1:18-25, Matt. 2:1), who grew up in the city of Nazareth (Matt. 2:23); who performed all manner of miracles (Matt. 11:1-5); who taught a relationship between God and man as Father and Son (John 10:30, John 17:1, 21); who is our Elder Brother (Matt. 6:9, Matt. 23:9); who was the Great Physician (Matt. 12:15, Matt. 14:14); who was our Friend (John 15:14; our Way-Shower (John 14:6, Luke 9:59); the Great Overcomer (John 16:33); who was crucified in Jerusalem (John 19:16); was resurrected from the dead (John 20:1-31), and ascended into heaven (Mark 16:19); was the inspiration of and the chief character in the Four Gospels of the New Testament (Matt., Mark, Luke and John); the guiding Light to Paul in his great missionary journeys (Acts 9:10, 20, Romans 1:1, I Cor. 1:1, Eph. 1:1); and the voice of revelation heard by John, the writer of the Book of Revelation.

8. From the metaphysical or the spiritual standpoint, the terms Christ, Jesus, and Jesus Christ, represent spiritual principles and laws that are eternal and omnipresent. They were active and they found fulfillment in the man, Jesus of Nazareth. They are in every human being and will find fulfillment in everyone, when the same spirit of devotion and obedience is cultivated in the mind and heart of each individual.

9. Christ is the image of God, the Word, the Son, the Law, the pattern of perfection in each person.

10. Christ is the composite idea that contains all the divine ideas that are necessary in the unfoldment, development, evolution and expression of a self-conscious spiritual man. Christ is the "seed of God" that is able to reproduce itself out of the substance inhering within it. Christ is spiritual man, I AM, Jehovah God, the Lord God.

. Jesus is the understanding use of the Christ principle, the understanding use of the pattern of perfection.

11. Jesus is the energy and the understanding to bring forth in the visible realm all that is in the "seed," the Christ. Jesus is the growth of the seed. Jesus is the unfolding and the developing of all the qualities or ideas of Christ. One might have the pattern and all the necessary substance to make something, but unless there were an understanding and use of both, nothing would be produced. There could be a perfect seed, but unless that seed was planted and given an opportunity to grow, it would never produce fruit. Jesus is the name of the principle in man that ever works to bring forth the perfection of man that is contained in the spiritual principle as a Son of God, the Christ. Jesus is the perfect response and obedience to the law of life, the law of growth and unfoldment. Jesus is the individual unfoldment and evolution of the Christ, the "seed of God."

12. Jesus Christ is "the Word [which] became flesh" (John 1:14). Jesus Christ is the perfect manifestation of the "seed of God," or the seed bearing fruit.

13. Jesus Christ is the perfect fulfillment in man that is manifested as the result of the conscious union of the Christ idea and the Jesus principle in the human consciousness. In other words, it is the manifestation of the Christ idea that has been understood and intelligently used by the thinking and feeling phases of man's being. Jesus Christ is the ideal man in God-Mind who is expressed and manifested in the flesh. This Jesus Christ principle in its activity unfolds all that has been infolded as God's idea of Himself. It evolves all that has been involved as perfect man. Jesus Christ is the Omnipresent Principle, present with us as the fulfillment of the promise, "Lo, I am with you alway" (Matt. 28:20).

14. God is Eternal, Omnipresent, Omniscient, Omnipotent, and so also is His Son, Jesus Christ. We do not always readily grasp this because we have been accustomed to think of the ministry of the Son as limited to the few years during which the Christ was manifested in the physical form of the man that walked by Galilee. As an idea of God, or as the creative power in the Father-Mind, the Son, or Christ, has always existed. We think of the birth and the crucifixion of Jesus as the beginning and the end of the life of Jesus Christ on earth, notwithstanding He stated, "Before Abraham was, I am" (John 8:58); "Lo, I am with you alway" (Matt. 28:20); "And now, Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was" (John 17:5). The Son has always existed in the Father-Mind as the universal principle of God individualized, and so He always will.

15. From John's Gospel, we learn that "In the beginning was the Word [Logos — thought expressed], and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him [thought]; and without him [thought] was not anything made that hath been made" (John 1:1-3).

16. Divine Mind creates by thought. "Logos means thought expressed, either as an idea in mind, or as vocal speech" (Eadie's Biblical Encyclopedia). Logos is the Christ, the Son, the living Word, the creative or working power of God. By Him were all things made. Ideas are the cause, the beginning of everything — all states of mind, all conditions, all beliefs, all things. The law of creation is the law of thought, of mind activity (expression), and the words and forms in the physical world are the product of the idea, the manifestation.

17. "In the beginning was the Word" (John 1:1). Instead of using the word beginning we might truly say, "At the source is the Word." The "beginning" is always now, for it has to do with things eternal, and not with time. As ideas inhere in Mind and Mind is one with its ideas, so the Father and the Son are coeval and there are continual interaction and intercommunion in will and purpose. This Word, this Son, this Christ of God is eternally associated with the Father in the glory of creating, "that all may honor the Son even as they honor the Father" (John 5:23), for Father and Son are one, as Jesus taught. "I and my Father are one" (John 10:30), "I am in the Father, and the Father in me" (John 14:10). The Father-Mind is in its Son-idea, and the idea is always in the Parent Mind. These are one, and yet the Father is greater than the Son, as that which begets is greater than that which is begotten.

18. Jesus continually identified Himself with and as the Son, and not with the limitations of personality. "For he said, I am the Son of God" (Matt. 27:43). This constant identification with the Father was the secret of His power and of His success in overcoming all adverse conditions, including death, for He thus appropriated in His own consciousness, the Presence, Power, and Light of the Father-Mind. He demonstrated the highest type of embodiment. He is the normal standard for every individual to follow. If one's life does not show forth harmony and wholeness he can, by appropriating the Christ ideas in his thoughts and feelings, build a new consciousness that will produce desirable results according to the high standard of Jesus Christ.

19. For ages, the Hebrew prophets had predicted the coming of the Messiah, yet when He came they knew Him not, because they lacked understanding of His real nature. In their opinion, the Messiah was to be a king and ruler of David's house, who should come to reform and restore the Jewish nation, and as High Priest purify the church. The lineage of David suggested to the mind of the people the pomp and glory of Solomon's reign restored in a temporal kingdom on earth. Although the great majority of the Hebrews did not recognize Him as the Messiah, there were some who did. They became the founders of the Christian religion.

20. When quickened in spiritual understanding, we know both the Father and the Son, not only as abstract principles but as our own indwelling life, substance, and intelligence. We know that since we are the off-spring of God, made in His image and after His likeness, we are the sons of God, and that Jesus is our Elder Brother. He came and taught us of the Father and of our true relation to Him as sons of God. He came and by His living words and example made it possible for us to be quickened to a consciousness of the Christ in us, the hope of glory. This Christ in us, or the spiritual consciousness in us, is "even the light which lighteth every man, coming into the world" (John 1:9). Jesus came to open the minds that are blind with ignorance and in bondage to the belief in materiality, that we might behold the glory of our own indwelling Christ. The statement "Now ye are the body of Christ" (I Cor. 12:27), promises the possibility of a universal incarnation of the Christ in every individual. This manifestation of perfection is not limited to Jesus. Paul's words to the Corinthians, "Glorify God therefore in your body" (I Cor. 6:20), proclaim the fact that the God-nature may become manifest in every person.

21. The Word is the seed which is planted in the consciousness of man and here it germinates and takes root. The Word, the Christ, the divine idea of perfect man, is received into consciousness by faith and there it begets a new creature. Just as the rain waters the little seed planted in the earth, so does the act of thinking upon an idea nourish it and cause it to grow, and if, like the seed in the earth, the Word is kept in the mind long enough to become established, then does it grow and produce "after its kind." We know that if we remove a seed from the earth after it has begun to germinate it will wither; so a young idea, an immature thought, will wither if it be dropped from or abandoned in mind before it has become strongly established in consciousness. "Wherefore if any man is in Christ, he is a new creature" (II Cor. 5:17). He is begotten by the Word, and since every seed brings forth "after its kind," the perfect idea of man will bring forth the perfect expression of man and the manifestation of perfect man.

22. The result of this perfect expression and manifestation of man will be felt in every phase of his being. His mind will become more alert and more efficient; his body will become healthier and more radiant; his human relationships happier; his affairs will become more harmonious and prosperous. Everything that concerns him will be perfected. "Jehovah will perfect that which concerneth me" (Psalms 138:8).

23. God's idea of man is that man shall express the life, love, substance, intelligence, power, and strength of Divine Mind. Jesus realized this when He said to Pilate, "To this end have I been born, and to this end am I come into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth" (John 18:37). Divine Mind seeks to interact and intercommune with man's mind through the perfect idea, the Christ, to the end that man shall be consciously one with God in actuality as well as in ideality. It is through manifest man or human beings that the attributes or ideas of Being (God) are brought into manifestation, and in order to manifest Christ (man's innate perfection), man must consciously identify himself with that perfection (the Father in him) in the same way that Jesus did. "I and my Father are one" (John 10:30). Man identifies himself with the Father as Jesus did, by recognizing his spiritual nature as the Son of God, the image of God, and by knowing that he has within him as potentialities all the qualities of God. Through the wise and loving use of these God qualities or ideas, he brings forth the likeness of God in the flesh; he proves his oneness with God in every thought, feeling, word, action and reaction.

24. Man is to abide or dwell continuously in the same spiritual consciousness in which Jesus dwelt and to let His teachings abide in him. "Have this mind in you which was also in Christ Jesus" (Phil. 2:5). Jesus was always conscious of the omnipresent life, the enduring strength, the unfailing love, the eternal substance, the perfect wisdom, and the omnipotence of God. He realized His oneness with the Father in this way. His words were expressions of living ideas and these ideas must abide in man's consciousness, where, as seed, they shall spring up and bear much fruit. When we ask in the name of Jesus Christ, we ask in the nature of His divine Presence and in the name or nature of the image-likeness within each one of us, and in a spirit of willingness to submit our unfolding consciousness to the guidance, direction, and teaching of the Holy Spirit. In this phase of spiritual attainment. "Ask whatsoever ye will, and it shall be done unto you" (John 15:7), because to ask in this consciousness is to ask in His nature or name, which is I AM.

25. When we seek and find and enter into and abide in this Son-of-God consciousness, we shall experience the more abundant life. "And the witness is this, that God gave unto us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. He that hath the Son hath the life; he that hath not the Son of God hath not the life" (I John 5:11-12). Abiding in this consciousness we are free from sin and the effects of sin. "In him is no sin. Whosoever abideth in him sinneth not" (I John 3:5-6). In the Jesus Christ consciousness is all power. "All authority hath been given unto me in heaven (mind) and on earth [body]" (Matt. 28:18).

26. In this Jesus Christ consciousness, we find that perfect love fulfills the law. "God is love; and he that abideth in love abideth in God, and God abideth in him" (I John 4:16).

27. Jesus Christ is our wisdom. "But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who was made unto us wisdom from God" (I Cor. 1:30).

28. In Jesus Christ we lay hold of and become consciously one with the very life, substance, and intelligence of Spirit. Man is in Truth the Son of God, the expresser of divine ideas, and his business is to establish God activity on this planet. Until he consciously recognizes his relationship and establishes his conscious connection with the Father, he is not a free channel through which God (Good) may flow. This God-activity in man begins with the celebration of a holy communion with Divine Mind in man's consciousness. Man must take his attention from outer, temporary things and through aspiration open his mind toward the divine, and consciously claim and assimilate living, radiant substance. "I am the living bread which came down out of heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live forever: yea and the bread which I will give is my flesh, for the life of the world" (John 6:51). This is the "bread" which Jesus meant when He said later, "Take ye: this is my body" (Mark 14:22). The body which Jesus bids us appropriate in consciousness, is a body of spiritual ideas. "He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood abideth in me, and I in him" (John 6:56). "Blood" is a symbol of life; "body" is a symbol of substance. "Eating and drinking" symbolize an appropriation in consciousness. Just as we breathe air substance so that the blood or life stream of the physical body may be purified and may carry to the several parts of that organism the elements necessary to strengthen it and give it more physical life, so do we also appropriate Spirit substance through the breath of the Almighty. "But there is a spirit in man and the breath of the Almighty giveth them understanding" (Job 32:8). This is done in order that the living Word may carry divine ideas into our consciousness, letting them circulate freely and purify the thought current, thus giving our body of ideas more abundant life.

29. It is not sufficient to train the conscious phase of mind (thinking) only; we must take Truth into the body by the power of the Word. The subconscious phase of mind (feeling) is that phase of mind which works in, or operates the body in its subliminal functioning, and this must be deeply impressed with divine ideas. We have so long left our body out of the plan of salvation that we shall find it well to say to it, "Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world" (Matt. 25:34). At the close of the passover feast, Jesus "took a cup, and gave thanks, and gave to them, saying, Drink ye all of it; for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many unto the remission of sins" (Matt. 26:27-28). What is the "cup"? The "cup" is the consciousness of eternal life; it is the chalice that holds the wine of life; it is the body that must bring forth the fruit of the living Word, and that must thrill with the joy and harmony of living. To drink of the cup means to take in faith the ideas of life, substance and intelligence, knowing they are the Truth or Reality of the body temple. By affirming Truth in faith the conscious phase of mind "eats," or appropriates from the Superconscious or Christ Mind, and then passes its consciousness of Truth on to the subconscious phase of mind, for there must be complete assimilation. We must become consciously one with these ideas. They must be woven into the flesh, must be felt in every fiber of being, poured into the body consciousness for the remission of sins against the body. So man should affirm;

Christ in me is my eternal life. Christ in me is the substance of my body. Christ in me is the intelligence of my being. Christ in me is my wisdom. All power is given to me through Jesus Christ. Through Jesus Christ I express and manifest eternal life here and now.

30. This appropriation of divine ideas renews the mind and transforms the body so that it shows forth the pure, immortal, incorruptible body of Jesus Christ. "This is the bread which cometh down out of heaven, that a man may eat thereof, and not die" (John 6:50).

31. Jesus also said, "This do in remembrance of me" (Luke 22:19). Have we grasped the true meaning of these words? He meant that this spiritual appropriation was to be done by everyone, in order that the "body of Christ," the body of divine ideas, might be remembered and every cell and organ made alive with the life, substance and intelligence of Christ, the image of God.

32. Through the appropriation and the assimilation (thinking and feeling) of living, radiant life, substance, and intelligence in our consciousness, we blend our consciousness with the Father-Mind and our heart with the Mother-heart of God and there is a harmonizing of every part of our being — spirit, soul, body — with the Jesus Christ principle. As our mind (conscious phase or intellect) and our heart (subconscious phase or feeling nature) are cleansed of untrue thoughts and feelings, our body will take on the life and light of our innate divinity and show forth or manifest the living light, as was shown in the body of Jesus at the time of the transfiguration. "And as he was praying, the fashion of his countenance was altered, and his raiment became white and dazzling" (Luke 9:29).

1. The religious terms for the Holy Trinity are:

Father Son Holy Spirit

The metaphysical terms are:

Mind Idea Expression

Father is the source, origin, essence, root, creator of all; Son is that which proceeds from, is begotten of the Father; like Him in nature and essentially all that the Father is. Holy Spirit is "the whole Spirit of God in action" (Jesus Christ Heals 182); the working, moving, breathing, brooding of Spirit, made known to man through revelation, inspiration, and guidance.

Holy Spirit is the creative principle (communicated as the life and energy of creation) which animates the universe and finds a special sphere of activity in man. By its operation, man becomes not only "a living soul" but a rational being created in the image of God. The Holy Spirit is the source of the higher qualities which man develops: the indwelling Counselor, Advocate, Comforter, Spirit of Truth.

Metaphysically interpreted, the one Mind is the source, origin, cause, substance in which all good (as ideas) inheres. Idea is that which emanates, springs forth from the one Mind; the only begotten of the one Mind, perfect as the source from which it springs. Expression is the working of the one Mind through the action of creative power moving through the Idea (Son) to develop the ideas of that Mind. (Restudy Lessons In Truth Lesson 11 Annotation 7 and How I Used Truth Lesson 7 Annotation 9).

2. An understanding of our own mind and how it operates will aid us in understanding how the one Mind, Spirit, creates. What we term our mind is not a mental sphere that is separate from and independent of the one Creative Mind; it is the consciousness each person makes for himself, through using the one Mind essence (ideas) and the God-power, inherent in him. This one Mind essence is omnipresent and links all together as one life, one Mind, one Spirit, causing vitality and consciousness through the universe at the level of each species of creation.

The Christ Mind inherent in each and every one of us is our portion of the God substance that is for our own use. Out of this Christ Mind (Superconscious), which is ours to bring forth, we are to develop a supermental consciousness termed the individual Christ consciousness. We are able to transform our personal mental sphere by prayer, by keeping in contact with God Mind in order to receive revelation, inspiration, and the guidance necessary to keep our life harmonious.

The human consciousness — the consciousness of humanity as a whole, of mankind as a species — may be likened to the strata of the earth. It ranges from the shifting, unstable sensations of the sensual, instinctive, intellectual, intuitional, psychical, emotional formations of personal man's thought, to the stratum of abstract ideals. Philosophers have been prone to regard these ideals as too high for the ordinary man to reach in his daily living.

3. All that appears (manifests) in the external world is a symbol, an appearance resembling a causative idea. The cause of the concept of the original divine idea is found in the consciousness from which the concept or the idea comes forth. Nothing could appear externally that was not first an idea, planned and worked out in detail in consciousness. The one Creative Mind (Divine Mind) is the source, the origin, of all perfect ideas which act as first causes or spiritual patterns, ever seeking to come into manifestation through man.

A perfect idea (ideal) born in the consciousness of manifest man is like a seed. This seed grows, is developed, and mentally expressed in its fullness. The last step of the process of its development is the visible manifestation. The original cause of the perfect idea (ideal) was the Christ Mind (Superconscious) in which it was first ideated.

The individual's consciousness (thinking and feeling), his mental sphere, may have in it a variety of groupings, each characterized by what he regards as worthy and clings to. These groupings are states of mind, or states of consciousness. But the one universal consciousness, Divine Mind, contains all the ideas that manifest man has idealized as perfect; as God consciousness, this universal consciousness contains the substance and the spiritual ideals that are the perfect patterns for all that men shall ever know.

4. The term "idea-man" as used in this lesson refers to God's idea of Himself as perfect man operating in the earthly sphere of Being. The standard set for this perfect idea-man is that of a "god," an exact reproduction of the principle of perfect good which is in operation in the heavenly sphere of Being. "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth" (Gen. 1:1).

The source of this perfect idea-man is the one creative Mind the Father, the origin of every created thing. God, the Father, imaged Himself as a perfect man with dominion over the earth and everything in it, bringing into manifestation every needed good for "abundant living."

Perfect idea-man must form a mental concept of the nature of the earth and its inhabitants, so that he may understand the elements with which he will have to work in order to attain this mastery. The primal qualities of the God nature are wisdom and love, with which man must be acquainted in order to govern the birds of the air, the beasts of the field, the fishes of the sea, and the creeping things of the earth that God has created. Wisdom and love, which imbue man with Godlikeness, will guide him in handling this mastery aright.

According to Biblical terminology, other names given to this perfect idea-man are: Jehovah God; the Lord God; the Christ; the only begotten of the Father; the Son of God. This perfect idea-man can be called the Son of God for he is created by God in His image, and after His likeness.

5. First means not only that which precedes all others in the system of numbering, but also the highest, the foremost, as regards character. First-born is the "first brought forth; preeminent." According to the ancient Hebrew custom the first-born in a family was the highest, the chief, the leader. As such he inherited as a birthright his father's authority and a double portion of the father's possessions. He also succeeded to the priesthood provided he had no physical blemish.

The "first-born of all creation" is the God-idea originating in Divine Mind. However, the reference in the Scriptures to the "firstborn of all creation" is to the idea-man, the image of God, regarded as the beloved Son in whom the Father is well pleased. This idea-man is imbued with the power to develop a consciousness of the nature of God. His "double portion" is the Presence of God and the power to form divine substance into thoughts, things, circumstances, and conditions. Man is the only part of creation that can separate the elements (ideas) of God and view each one by itself.

Mind, idea, and expression in Truth are one, but in the process of producing a supermental consciousness composed of ideas, they function separately, in a sense. The perfect man as the Idea of God is the "first-born"; then there is the mental concept of this man-idea which is expressed in manifest man's consciousness by Godlike thoughts, feelings, and words which are consciously carried into the body by the creative Word. In due season, this mind activity results in eternal life in the biological or physical body. "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us" (John 1:14).

6. From the historical standpoint the terms Christ, Jesus, and Jesus Christ are names or titles applied to the Man of Nazareth, the great Healer, Teacher, Overcomer, and resurrected Lord, who according to Christian belief is the Savior of mankind. "You shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins" (Matt. 1:21).

As brought out in the lesson material, from the metaphysical standpoint Christ is the image of God, the Word, the Son, the Law, the pattern of perfection in each person. Christ is the I AM identity; the perfect Self of every person; the divine pattern in every man; a name for the first phase of every man's threefold nature (spirit, soul, body).

Jesus (metaphysically) is the likeness of God; the understanding use of the Christ pattern. (This is covered comprehensively on page 2 of the lesson material.)

Jesus Christ (metaphysically) is the radiant, living Presence, the perfected consciousness that is carrying out God's plan in every man. (Covered more fully in the lesson material.)

7. When one is quickened to spiritual understanding and knows the Father or Christ (the Son or I AM) within, he will be perfect both in expression and in manifestation. "I in them and thou in me, that they may become perfectly one" (John 17:23).

We will know the one Mind as the Source from which we spring and the nature of Absolute Good which we inherit as the son of God. We will know the ideal image or the divine pattern which we, as manifest man, are seeking to unfold. We will know that we do have the faith, the ability, and the energy to express this ideal with its correlated divine ideas.

As the result of all this "knowing," we will be conscious of all the good that is within us and will bring it forth into expression and manifestation. "You will know the truth, and the truth will make you free" (John 8:32). Because our unfoldment is from within outward, when we know Christ as our indwelling life and light, we begin to think, feel, speak, act, and react in a Christlike manner.

In a way that men could understand, Jesus taught them what had been "lost" to their consciousness through the ages — that man is God's son, created in His image with the ability to express His likeness. We have not only the example and inspiration of the life of the Nazarene among men, but His doctrine has become living words that, when rooted in our consciousness, will grow and bear the fruit of God consciousness. This "fruit" is health of body, peace of mind, harmonious human relations, and prosperity in all of our affairs.

8. The Son is not limited in time. His throne, like the throne of God, is "for ever and ever" (Heb. 1:8). The Son is not limited in knowledge because the entire God nature is inherent in Him. Manifest man may use the light of intelligence inherent in his real Self, the Son of God, for whatever he needs to know in order to express himself in any state of being. In referring to the Son, Scripture says: "He reflects the glory of God and bears the very stamp of his nature, upholding the universe by his word of power" (Heb. 1:3). The Son is therefore stamped with the seal of the Almighty.

If we have accepted falsities, limitations, in our mental processes we do not need to harbor them indefinitely. Through the power of the I AM (another name for the Son) we are able to erase, by denial, all false beliefs. Then by affirmation we are able to take on the life, light, love, and liberty that are ours as heirs of God. We learn to "walk as children of light" (Eph. 5:8).

9. The word logos comes to us from the Greek language. In that language it means the word or form that contains and expresses a thought, also the thought itself. As used in this lesson (written with a capital "L") it means the Word of God, the Seed of God that He created out of His own substance as "that I AM"; the image of Himself as Creator and First Cause of all that is. The Logos includes all the underlying principles or ideas of Being (God). In the Holy Trinity, the Logos belongs to the second phase, the Son.

The Logos, as the creative power of the one Mind, is called also the Christ, "the only begotten of the Father" (John 1:14 A.V.). The work of the Logos is to reproduce the God nature: "And the Word became flesh" (John 1:14). (How I Used Truth Lesson 1 Annotation 1 goes more comprehensively into the subject of Logos or Word.)

10. The word Father is used here as a symboi of the one Creative Mind, everywhere present in its absolute purity and perfection. The word Son is used here as a symbol of the Idea of the one Mind bringing forth the entire nature of God (comprising all divine ideas). Thus the Son is both the "image" and the "likeness" of the Father. God's creative power moves through the Son, the Word (or as Charles Fillmore calls it in Talks on Truth 68, "the working power of God") to create life and consciousness in all creation. The creative power of God, broadly interpreted, may be termed "thought"; however, this includes the whole gamut of life, feelings, desires, sense perceptions, scholarly intellections of self-conscious entities, to the abstract visions of the philosophers; also the life and intelligence of all creations below man, in the animal, vegetable, and mineral kingdoms.

As "thought essence" is the unformed substance of the one Creative Mind, and as this substance encompasses and supports all of its ideas ("sons"), governing all their activity, then the Father as the one Creative Mind is in all His ideas.

The Father is the one living Mind; the Son is the one living Idea (ideal) or Word, "living" together, working together, acting together. There can be no separation between the Father and the Son, for they are one in nature, in will, and in purpose.

Let us think of the relation of the Father and the Son in reference to our own mentality. We cannot separate an idea from the unformed mind substance — the idea is always in our mind, and our mind is always in the idea.

11. Jesus declared, "I and the Father are one" (John 10:30). When Philip said, "Lord, show us the Father, and we shall be satisfied," Jesus' reply was, "He who has seen me has seen the Father" (John 14:8, 9). Jesus was keenly conscious of the character of God and of His relationship to Him. He knew that His character was one with that of God; that His identity was divine.

Jesus knew God as unlimited love, as ever-present, abundant life. He knew God as infinite wisdom and supply. He knew God as the Father, who is ever ready and willing to supply every need of the human heart. Jesus knew that as a son of God He had access to every blessing of God the Father. Jesus did not simply believe that the words He spoke were true — He knew they were true. His words had deep meaning, for they were vital, living words that carried conviction, and more important, they produced immediate results.

12. Jesus recognized Himself as God's "image" and knew that God's "likeness" was in the process of being brought forth, yet He continually affirmed that the Father within did the work.

It is a law that we manifest as that with which we identify ourself. Jesus' custom was to identify Himself with His real or Christ self, the Son of God, the Word, the I AM, the Logos. If we would identify ourself with God as Jesus did, then the errors of human consciousness, built up through acceptance of the concept of man as merely a biological organism, must be denied. We must refuse to use the powers of the I AM to produce conditions in mind, body, and affairs based on false conceptions.

"Man can use I AM power to restore health and bring increased happiness ... some people are using this power in a material way, neglecting soul culture, building up the external without taking the intermediate step between the supreme Mind and its manifestation in the outer" (Jesus Christ Heals 124).

13. Many of the ancient Hebrews failed to recognize Jesus as the Son of God because they were expecting a Messiah who would come among them and reign like a king on an earthly throne. They were looking for a great personality to come and lead them into racial and religious supremacy.

Since the true Messiah was then as now primarily an ideal in God-Mind, the worldly-minded people of Jesus' time were unable to discern the Christ Spirit as revealed by the Nazarene. This does not mean that these people did not have the capacity to know the indwelling Christ. It means that they had misinterpreted the Scriptures and centered their attention on the "letter" instead of the "spirit" of their own sacred writings. Many people today do not recognize the Son of God as He stands knocking at the door of their soul. Human beings are often too busily engaged in the hustle and bustle of the outer world to acquaint themselves with this Presence and Power that is within their own being — "Christ in you" (Col. 1:27) — or they are ignorant of its reality.

Then there are those who yearn desperately for the coming of the Savior but who "crucify" Him daily through putting Him outside of themselves — waiting for and expecting an outer personality just as did the ancient Hebrews. The Messiah was there in the Nazarene's day Just as He is here today — as the real nature of every man waiting to come forth. If we would know the glory of the Christ or Son-of-God presence, we need only recognize Him within and let Him come forth in our everyday life in our thoughts, words, and deeds. "Observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age" (Matt. 28:20).

14. We understand "the Word" (John 1:1) to be the activity of God in every man; God's creative power; the divine essence that is immanent in every living creation, including man. Since the Word is the begetting, creating, generating factor in all creation — the impulse of life seeking expression and fulfillment — man was "begotten by the Word" when God "breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being" (Gen. 2:7). The Authorized Version reads, "and man became a living soul."

There is also a "begetting by the Word" in the individual consciousness of every man. We read in I Peter 1:2: "You have been born anew, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God." This is a quickening and rebirth into spiritual consciousness when one becomes keenly cognizant of the qualities (attributes or ideas) of God within him.

Realization of the inherent creative capacities of life, love, wisdom, power, and faith, and giving expression to these capacities in experience, represent a "begetting by the Word."

15. Manifest is the word commonly used to refer to that which stands forth in the outer where it is perceived by the senses. We "manifest" Christ by setting up Christ, the indwelling, the Anointed, as a standard for ourself to live by in our every thought, word, action, and reaction. We "manifest Christ" by identifying ourself with God-Mind, the Father — that is, by making ourself consciously one with God-Mind. This causes us to grow spiritually in purpose, interest, use, and effect.

Identification with God takes place in our own consciousness, our mind, through the divine ideal, the I AM, and is carried out in desire, thought, word, and deed. It is God's will that man express Him in His fullness. To do this we must know ourself to be the offspring of God, inheritor of His eternal life, love, wisdom, power (i.e., all divine ideas). We must know also that we are possessed of the ability and the understanding to bring forth these ideas.

"Divine ideas are man's inheritance ... All the ideas contained in the one Father-Mind are at "the mental command of its offspring" (Charles Fillmore Christian Healing 13).

"Manifesting Christ" is bringing into visibility that which, sown as seed-ideas, has taken root in the "soil" of the human consciousness, to be unfolded in all areas of an individual's life. The visible manifestation in the flesh is the final step, the result of the "new nature" (Eph. 4:24).

16. We "abide in Christ" when we dwell consciously and continuously in the realization of the one Presence and one Power, God, the good omnipotent, active in and through us. As we carry this consciousness out into our every day human experiences, we shall show forth or demonstrate the "fruits" of the kingdom of God. "He who abides in me, and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing" (John 15:5).

When we abide consciously in the Christ, our salvation is complete. We are saved from belief in ignorance and sin, and all their effects. This is the true "atonement," the at-one-ment or redeeming of our entire consciousness that it may function as one complete spiritual unit. Jesus said, "If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love" (John 15:10). In a true sense, if one abides (dwells consciously and continuously) in the living Word of God, Christ Jesus, then all things are already provided lavishly for him.

17. The divine attributes, or ideas, are brought into expression and manifestation by manifest man. Primarily "expression" is the inner working of manifest man's mental sphere to unfold or form a concept of the God ideas contained in his spiritual Self, "that I AM," the image of God. Man possesses the entire God nature in an undeveloped state. The elements (ideas) that make up this nature are to be released as manifest man gains a consciousness of them through prayer and experience. They are not to remain latent but are man's to use for the unfoldment of the Godlikeness in manifestation.

God's work of creating the spiritual patterns (ideas) and providing the substance as the resource for man to use is finished. It is manifest man's part to get in touch with the indwelling Lord, his Christ self. Through prayer he gains knowledge of the essential nature of each quality or idea and learns how to co-ordinate all in an orderly way. Thus he may satisfactorily manifest these ideas to take care of the problems that confront him in daily living. Manifest man is the channel through which God-Mind flows. Man may receive all that God-Mind is and give forth as fully as he receives. This constitutes obedience to the law of giving and receiving.

18. "Asking in His name" is asking in the nature of the indwelling Christ, the I AM identity. It is asking in the consciousness of the power that the name Jesus Christ carries. It is asking in the "fulness of the Godhead bodily" (Col. 2:9 A.V.). It is asking in the consciousness that all that is in Jesus Christ is in us, awaiting our recognition and acceptance.

"We ask 'in His name' by asking for that which is divinely right and good. We ask 'in His name' when we ask in our own God nature, or in the consciousness of our own Christ self, the I AM within. ...

"The name Jesus Christ has come to represent all that God is, expressed in and through man. However, speaking the name is more than the use of just two words — it is the actual expression of the I AM (or Son of God) nature which Jesus manifested" (How I Used Truth Lesson 3 Annotation 6).

"Asking in His name" makes us conscious of the power of the spoken word to give definite form to ideas. Ideas that remain unexpressed in the invisible are not of much value as blessings for manifest man on earth. "Asking in His name," speaking the word, clothes an idea in form and enables the blessings to come from the unformed into the formed realm. It opens the door between our soul and our spirit, and good flows into our life in the form required to fill any need. "Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him" (Rev. 3:20).

19. First we relieve the body of our former beliefs that it is merely of fleshly origin, that it is limited in any sense of the word. Study of spiritual principles reveals the body to be in reality the temple of God — God's life, substance, and intelligence in manifestation.

"The body is the meeting place of the life and substance attributes of Being, consequently body is an important factor in consciousness. Body is not matter; it is substance and life in expression" (TALKS ON TRUTH 158).

When denial has erased our misconception about the body, then we can accept the truth about it, namely that it is an instrument of Spirit, an ideal form based on a divine body-idea in Divine Mind. We perceive the body to be the manifestation of the God nature in the exterior world. We come to know it as an expression of the organizing power of divine love (the attracting, unifying power) united with wisdom. This revelation or vision of the body will redeem it from the belief that it is of animal origin, giving it its rightful place as a vehicle for God's life, light, and love. Affirmation, silent or audible, of the truth about the body gives us a more reverent regard for it and the bodies of all persons. "Be transformed by the renewal of your mind" (Rom. 12:2).

It is through our affirmation of the living Word of Truth that thoughts of life, light, and love are impressed on every cell of our body, and it is thus "saved" from corruption and death and transformed into the "body of Christ." In the work that is done regarding transformation of the body, both the conscious and subconscious phases of mind must be trained, as the lesson material points out.

20. Examples:

"Father, I give thanks for Thy presence in me as the indwelling Christ."

"Through prayer I come into a realization of the indwelling Christ, my hope of glory."

"As I abide in Truth, I come to know the Christ indwelling me."

"O Christ within me, I know Thee as my life, intelligence, supply, and support."

"Father, reveal Thyself to me and through me as the living Christ."

(Note: Two of these affirmations are written in third person (about the Christ); the other three are written in second person (speaking directly to the indwelling Spirit).