1. “In the beginning was the Word,

and the Word was with God,

and the Word was God.

He was in the beginning with God;

all things were made through him,

and without him was not anything made that was made.

In him was life, and the life was the light of men” (John 1:1-4).

“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us,

full of grace and truth; we have beheld his glory,

glory as of the only Son from the Father” (John 1:14).

“But the word is very near you;

it is in your mouth and in your heart,

so that you can do it” (Deut. 30:14).

“The grass withers, the flower fades;

but the word of our God will stand forever” (Isa. 40:8).

“So faith comes from what is heard,

and what is heard comes by the preaching of Christ” (Rom. 10:17).

“Then I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse.’

He who sat upon it is called Faithful and True. ...

He is clad in a robe dipped in blood,

and the name by which he is called

is The Word of God” (Rev. 19:11, 13)

<2/a>. All Unity students are familiar with the expression “The Word of God” and should understand that it means not the Bible, as we have been taught in the past, but the living Word which in the be-ginning was with God and was God. The Bible is the outer testimony of men who have discerned to a degree this eternal Word of God.

4. John’s Gospel explains that all things were made by the Logos— the Word of God-~and “without him was not anything made that was made, (John 1:3). Since the things of Spirit are eternal and omni-present, they belong always in present time; thus it is proper to say, “without him is not anything made that is made.” This brings directly to man’s understanding the formative power of the Word as a present active agent in the world.

4. The word Logos comes to us from the Greek language, and in that language means “the word or form which expresses a thought; also the thought.” The early Greek philosophers regarded the Logos as the rational principle of the universe. When this term was introduced into the principles of the Christian religion it had reference to the second person of the Holy Trinity, considered as the ex-pression or incarnation of divine reason. Divine reasoning, or reasoning from the premise “in the beginning God” (Gen. 1:1), puts man’s mind in an orderly way of working. Therefore, the Lord is the mediator between man and God, or between the human conscious-ness and the universal God consciousness (Divine Mind) which Jesus always spoke of as the Father, the Origin and Source of all ideas.

5. The divine Logos, which is God in His capacity of creative power, includes all the essential characteristics of Being, with the potential power to express them; it is the thought-word; the power to produce itself out of what is inhering within it. The Word, inhering in God, is the urge or desire for a full, free expression of All-Good”,, Perhaps one of the simplest and clearest definitions of the Word is to be found in Talks On TrutH, by Charles Fillmore, page 68:

6. To produce works, there must be a working power. This is exactly what the Word is—the working power of God.”

7. Thus we come to realize that as the second aspect of the Holy Trinity or the Godhead (God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit), the Word is also the creative Idea of God Mind or Divine Mind, the Son of God, spiritual man, termed also the Christ, the I AM. So each human being may say of his spiritual nature: “I am the Word of God spoken forth in perfection.”

8. “This Word is a generative center with all the possibilities of God ... It is the idea of God, the image and likeness ... So the ‘seed,’ that is, ‘the word of God,’ is man; not the external thinking personality that has a consciousness of separation, but the internal spiritual germ” (Atom-Smashing Power Of Mind. p. 135).

9. People are curious to know how the manifest universe was created. From ignorant man who merely wonders to the man of science who seeks to inquire into the mysteries of creation, there is a reaching out after knowledge concerning the creative process. There is both an “involutionary” and an “evolutionary” creation. The first chapter of Genesis relates the creation by involution. It shows how the divine qualities (ideas) are spoken forth by God’s Word “let there be.” Then on the sixth day of creation God’s Idea, in which is wrapped all the God nature, comes forth as spiritual man or God’s Word. This man, the image-likeness of God, the Son, the Christ, has “all the fullness of the Godhead bodily” (Col. 2:9), therefore has all the essence or nature of all that is God. The next step will be the “evolutionary” phase of creation when manifest man makes his advent upon the visible plane.

10. We might liken the “involutionary” and “evolutionary” aspects of creation to the process through which the oak tree passes. There is enwrapped (or folded into) the acorn—its expression or fruit—all the nature and characteristics of the oak tree. The acorn is right there all through the process and participating in it. In the acorn is embodied all that the oak tree is, even to the image of the parent tree.

11. The man we are referring to here is the Word of God, the epitome of Being, termed also spiritual man, the Christ. God “spoke” His word which came forth as spiritual man when He said, “Let us make man in our image [the active and passive phases of God’s nature], after our likeness.” The mission of this “man” is to evolve or unfold in the manifest world all of the nature or image of God before creation can be said to be complete. This fulfills the “evolutionary” side of creation.

12. In the first chapter of Genesis it is related that God created by His word. When the power of the Word is understood, there is no mystery concerning the work of creation.

“God said, ‘Let there be light’; and there was light” (Gen. 1:3).

“God said, ‘Let there be a firmament’ . . . And it was so” (Gen. 1:6-7).

“God said, Let the earth bring forth’ . . . And it was so” (Gen. 1:24).

13. These commands were spoken into expression by the creative power of His Word (the Word of life, power, love, faith, et cetera), for when God “speaks” it is done in the realm of the ideal.

14. “By faith we understand that the world was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was made out of things which do not appear” (Heb. 11:3). “By the word of the Lord the heavens were made, and all their host by the breath of his mouth” (Psalms 33:6).

15. The creative process then, whether it is the breathing into the soul of man or the uttering or growing forth from spiritual man into manifest or outer form, is all accomplished through the Word, the creative power of God, the divine essence that is immanent in every living creation. We see then the twofold nature of the Word, first the creative power of God “speaking forth” as the divine fiat—”Let there be”—-and then all the qualities or nature of God finalizing in His Word as “spiritual man.”

16. “In pure metaphysics there is but one word, the Word of God... it is God as creative power. . . . The perfect Word of God is spiritual man” (Christian Healing, p.61).

17. Everything in God is in man. The whole universe is in man. He is the Word made flesh. It should be remembered that this refers to spiritual man, the real man. Every individual “makes” his own world, and he does this through his word, the activity of ideas in his consciousness. Only to the extent that he knows the qualities (ideas or attributes) of Being, such as life, love, wisdom, power, faith, order, and so forth, does he use them righteously to “make” his body and his world. Man, in his unfolding human consciousness only partly realizes the wisdom, substance, life, and power of God, and therefore does not actually create? he merely “forms,” and his work is not always enduring because it is not always based on Truth. (See pages 93-94 Atom-Smashing Power Of Mind.)

18. If a builder should lay bricks without mortar, his masonry would be faulty. The same is true of man’s use of words; if some of the elements that should enter into the perfect creative Word are lacking, man merely forms. “All words are formative but not all words are creative” (Twelve Powers Of Man, page 29). All the substance or essence of God is in the creative Word and no element can be lacking if man would have satisfaction. If man leaves out of his thought-word the consciousness of divine life, of divine love, of divine wisdom, of divine substance, he “makes” or forms a perishable body and world. But when he is quickened or made alive to the Christ consciousness, he “makes” an imperishable, incorruptible body and world of pure Spirit substance.

19. “Every idea is a seed, and will bring forth according to its character, modified somewhat by the kind of mind soil in which it is planted. There is a lax-/ of growth in mind parallel with that of earth. A thistle seed will al-ways produce thistles, regardless of the character of the soil” (Atom-Smashing Power Of Mind, page 139).

20. Men are begotten - quickened, and born into spiritual conscious-ness by the Word of Truth. “Of his own will he brought us forth by the word of truth that we should be a kind of first fruits of his creatures” (Jas. 1:18). “You have been born anew, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God” (I Pet. 1:23). Peter here goes on to say: “All flesh is like grass and all its glory like the flower of grass. The grass withers, and the flower falls, but the word of the Lord abides forever” (I Pet. 1J24-25). When man is begotten by and born of the Word of God, he is no longer flesh “like grass,” but is enduring and abiding, not subject to death and corruption. The body becomes a member of the body of Christ, redeemed, glorified by the Word. To “make” a perfect body, man must consciously understand and use the fullness of the Word of God, all that is included in the original Greek Logos, and come to know himself as the very Word spoken forth by God.

22. Jesus told Nicodemus that it was necessary for men to be born anew (experience the “new birth”). “Unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God” (John 3:5). The being “born of water and the Spirit” signifies the same sort of creation as shown in the first chapter of Genesis; namely, that there has first to be an instilling of the spiritual principles in the soul of mars, so that the soul would send them forth into the body in-stead of building a body that is perishable; for “that which is born of the flesh is flesh.” The “new birth” is a complete change in consciousness from the limited beliefs of the human consciousness to acceptance of the Truth. It is birth into the realization of oneself as the son and heir of God.

23. “The Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing; for whatever he does, that the Son does like-wise” (John 5s19). Let us then see what the Father does that we may do likewise. As recorded in Genesis, the first fiat of creation is “Let there be light” (Gen, 1:12). “Light” means intelligence. “Dark-ness’8 is ignorance, Man’s first word in bringing forth his world should be “Let there be light.” Instead of saying, “I don’t know,” thus producing darkness, man needs to say, “I am illumined with divine intelligence,” or words to that effect. By your word your world will be lighted with divine understanding. Every true word that you speak lives, no matter what the appearance may be. “The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life” (John 6:63). “So shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth; it shall not re-turn to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose” (Isa. 55:11), Suppose we are not wholly illumined at once; suppose the darkness does not at once comprehend the light; we need to be sincere, patient, and persistent in declaring, “I am the light of the world,” and have faith that our word, being Truth, is spirit and life, and shall bring forth its fruit.

24. When Jesus said, “The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life’8 (John 6^63), He knew that His words of Truth contained the life, the power, the substance of God. Understanding the power of His words, we realize the force of His counsel: “If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you will, and it shall be done for you” (John 15:7). And again, “If anyone keeps my word, he will never see death” (John 8:51). Our part in “abiding” and “keeping” is to understand His words. The only way this can be done is to so write them in our heart (subconscious) that they become embodied in the flesh and in every area of our life. We do not “keep” His words by merely giving intellectual assent that they are true, or by just committing the words to memory. We must consciously live the ideas back of the words by adding feeling until they are established in consciousness. Then the words of Truth manifest in our daily life spontaneously. Clarity and efficiency in the conscious phase of mind (intellect) are produced. Love, compassion, and understanding in the heart (subconscious feelings) are experienced. Health and vitality in the body are realized. Harmony, abundance, and success in the affairs are made manifest. These changes that take place following the “new birth” are actually the restoration of man to his true estate as son and heir of God.

25. “He shall have whatsoever he saith” (Mark 11:2 3 A.V.) is one of the most wonderful statements in the Bible, and has summed up in it the whole understanding of man’s power and privilege in using the powers of the creative Word through his word. Nothing is of more practical value to man than the understanding that he “makes” his own body and all the conditions in his life by the use of his word. By his word, good or not good, he makes his heaven and his earth. What he binds on earth (form) is bound in heaven (mind); what he looses on earth (form) is loosed in heaven (mind). By the power of his word he can bind his organs, or he can set them free; he can bind his muscles and his brain cells, or he can set them free.

26. When ignorant of the power of the Word each person makes many conditions in mind, body, and affairs that are not in harmony with Truth, and it is in such conditions that he often cries out against God as the cause of his troubles, or gives up negatively in what he calls meekness and submission to the will of God. Man was taught in the past that God was a supreme and arbitrary ruler who brought un-happy conditions on man to punish him for his sins. Neither the attitude of rebelling against God nor that of giving up submissively to conditions alters the situation. Harmony and rightful conditions are restored only by an awakening to Truth and by putting Truth into expression by the Word. When a person arrives at that state in consciousness where he knows that he is the Son of God, the heir to all that God is; when he becomes possessed of all these qualities in his own mind, he realizes that he is here to give expression to the Word (his own divine nature, as well as God’s creative power). If he would manifest perfection, he must express the Word in its fullness. The Word contains the very substance of God, or all that God is. Man must become familiar with the nature of each and all of the God qualities (divine ideas) that make up the Word in order to express God fully. Every word that has in it no consciousness of divine love makes discord, because love is the great attracting, harmonizing power, and the Word of God is not expressed in its fullness through man’s word so long as this unifying power of Being (God) is omitted. This understanding will do away with the use of all condemnatory, critical, faultfinding, and angry words.

27. All words that man uses carelessly in regard to life, words that do not. carry the realization of divine life, fail to bring forth the manifestation of perfect life and health, and this “falling short” makes many of the conditions called sickness and disease. Man can-rot bring into expression divine, unlimited qualities of Being until he first becomes conscious of the Christ Spirit within himself. He cannot manifest that which he does not consciously possess in some degree in his own mind.

28. Words that do not carry the consciousness of divine power, Christ power„ produce negative conditions. The result of their use is failure to manifest the Christ dominion and mastery.

29. Words lacking the substance of Spirit are “empty words” and pro-duce conditions of hunger, lack, and poverty. Much of what is called sickness and disease in the world comes from feeding on “empty words” — words that are devoid of Truth,, Such words leave a vacuum in the mind, and the sensation of emptiness is expressed in the body and the affairs. The soul needs to be fed with the very substance of Spirit {in the form of divine ideas) in order to satisfy its longings and desires, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God” (Matt. 4s4). We must realize that words of Truth have power to nourish the soul, the body, and the affairs because they are expressing divine ideas. “Thy words were found, and I ate them, and thy words became to me a joy and the de-light of my heart” (Jer. 15:16).

30. The use of words without wisdom makes and keeps ignorance in the world. We find it literally true that “on the day of judgment men will render account for every careless word they utter” (Matt. 12:36). Idle words are words that do not measure up to the standard of the Word of God. This warning of Jesus would be better heeded if man realized that every day is a day of judgment; that every day some of the “word seeds” come to fruition as pain and suffering in some form or other, for every word of ignorance makes its mark in the body. Ignorant words cast a shadow over man’s path, and he cannot see the way* They dull his 6ars until he cannot hear the counsel and guidance of Spirit. He knows not what causes him to stumble, but it is his own “empty words.”

31. All of us realize to some degree the effect of words. Every word has a threefold power: first, the force of the primal idea; second what has been put into the word by the race use; and third, the intelligence and feeling given to it by the speaker. We must analyze our words, because every word produces a result. Jesus Christ had a consciousness of the power of words far beyond that of the average roan. He proved that His words had life by healing the blind, the paralyzed, the leper, the woman who had an issue of blood. How did He generate a healing energy so great that it filled His garments? It was not done apart from the law. There must have been a cause. The cause was His realization of the infinite substance and life of God. His understanding came through His mastery of the flesh and His conscious union with Divine Mind, Spirit. Creative, enduring words are spoken out of the Christ consciousness and not out of the limitations of personal consciousness. The unenlightened personal consciousness is barren of life-giving substance. The Word is the indwelling Christ, spiritual man, the immanent or personal God of each individual. The “lost word” is but one way of saying that man has so dulled his consciousness of his spiritual nature that he has lost the power to consciously hear the “still small voice” of the indwelling Christ.

32. When one wishes to speak the word of power one should become vary still and make conscious union with the Christ power within through realizing “I AM power.” Thus, the student consciously unites himself with the source of power; he has made himself consciously one with the divine idea of power. When through this communion with his source he is filled with the consciousness of power, he can speak the word that will have in it the very power of God.

33. When one wishes to speak life-giving words, one should first enter into the consciousness of omnipresent life; make his conscious union with it through realizing that “I am life—abundant, limitless, eternal life*” Whatever God is. His Son, spiritual man, the Christ must be. The aim of manifest man is to be consciously one with the Christ of God, not a separate personality. When man thinks and feels this union with the one life, he will be able to speak healing, life-giving words.

34. One of the ideas in Divine Mind is substance, and its Scriptural name is “the earth.” “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void” (Gen. 1:1-2). The substance idea must be formed in the mind of man and established through faith. This forming of substance is symbolized by the appearance of “dry land” as recorded in Genesis 1:9. Out of the substance idea the personal ego has conceived forms (matter) which are the structures that man has formed. The substance idea in Divine Mind is expressed in what science called at one time the “universal ether,” and now refers to as space-time or energy. Man has God’s creative power as his formative power of thought which he uses to make substance into form. Every thought and every word works in the universal substance and out of it man “makes” his body and his environment. The unenlightened man believes in ignorance, death, and impermanence; thus, he impresses his beliefs on all that he shapes. As a result, the forms that he molds by his thoughts carry out his concepts, change, and disappear. The substance or mind essence of which the forms were made is resolved back into its original substance and is again subject to the thought of man to shape it into something else. The form, or what man calls “matter,” is not lasting, but the substance back of matter endures forever.

35. One can overcome belief in poverty by entering into a realization of the omnipresent substance of Spirit and man as heir to it. From this realization we speak the word of abundance. First, we are to make conscious union in mind with the substance idea by claiming, “I am Substance,” and then become conscious of our identity as one and the same substance as God. We are each the substance of all that we can ask or think. What men call “matter” is formed substance—formed in the individual life according to each man’s thought-word, thus manifesting in various forms. All belief in matter and material conditions as being the source of man’s good will be eliminated from man’s mind when he understands the true nature of the substance that lies back of all form and appearance.

36. Men have discerned that there is a “fourth dimension” in which forms lose their separateness, and the primal elements become inter-penetrating. This is a concept of spiritual substance and under the divine law, man’s body and all things in the universe come into divine unity. Realization of oneness of Spirit substance eliminates all resistance, opposition, and friction. The bodies of all persons who enter into this consciousness will be translated into spiritual ideas; wherever the thought is, instantly there the body will be. Jesus illustrated this when He passed into a room while the doors were closed. This is the realm of pure Being. In Atom-Smashing Power Of Mind, by Charles Fillmore, on page 62, reference is made to this fourth dimension as the “kingdom of God.” Note also the following:

37. “The fourth dimension is that which embraces and encompasses the other three; it is realization ... It is the process in which forms lose their apartness and be-come one under divine law. The human mind, with its limited reasoning faculties, is bound by time, space, and conditions. By itself it can get no further into the spiritual realm than reason will take it; but when we invoke the aid of the Christ in us we go beyond reason into the realm of pure realization; then we have attained the consciousness of pure being, the fourth dimension of the being” (Keep A True Lent, page 170).

38. This “realization” is knowing and feeling the Presence of God active in us. As Mind is free and unlimited, all of Mind’s creations should be free and unlimited, but the human consciousness, reasoning from outer appearances, allows itself to be bound by time and space.

39. This does not mean that men are not to have bodies, nor that they come into spiritual consciousness by the separation of spirit, soul, body. Man, as a trinity is spirit, soul, body; in his present state of consciousness he functions in a three-dimensional world as idea, expression, and manifestation. In man’s trinity or threefold nature of spirit, soul, body, his spirit is the God-Idea of man; his soul is his expression or unfolding of the God-Idea through his consciousness; and his body is the manifestation of what his soul has thus conceived. (See Annotation 4, Lesson 3, Lessons In Truth.)

40. It is the divine intention that man shall manifest God. All that is in Mind must be expressed and manifested by Mind’s perfect Idea (man). In order to do this man must consciously unite his spirit, soul, body and keep them together. His physical body must be trans-muted by the power of the Word and moved by the action of the Holy Spirit. The soul is no longer to give the body a “bill of divorcement,” for the body must become the manifestation of the Divine (Holy) Trinity or Godhead. As perfect ideas of life and substance are realized in consciousness, they will be expressed, and the same spiritual conditions will exist in manifestation (body and affairs) that are found in mind. This is the redemption of the body, raising it beyond the three-dimensional realm where it functions under the physical laws into the “fourth dimension,” namely, realization, or realm of Divine Mind.

41. “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, you have no life in you” (John 6:53) seems to the human being a hard statement, but to the one whose spiritual understanding has been quickened it is no mystery. The “blood of Christ” is life, and His body is pure Spirit substance. Man appropriates (“eats” and “drinks”) this substance in the form of the Word. “So, he who eats me will live because of me” (John 6:57). (See Annotation 15, Lesson 4, Series I.)

42. It has been stated that man makes a new body at least once a year. This being true, it seems strange that there should be, year after year, an appearance of increasing age. The reason is found in man’s ignorance of himself as the Word of God, and his ignorant use of the Word. When he builds ne\^ cells, instead of building them in the under-standing of substance and life and all that he is in Christ, he builds them in the ignorant belief of the world, after the pattern established in the race mind in its ignorance of Truth concerning the body. When he awakens to spiritual understanding he builds anew and becomes a “new creature” (II Cor. 5:17). “We are members of his body” (Eph. 5:30)

43. In his preaching and missionary journeys, Paul represents the spiritualized will carrying the Word through the body, building in righteousness and order the various centers of the organism. We too must carry the Word into the uttermost parts of the earth (body).

44. We must consciously free the life center from all the ignorant thoughts that have been stored there. We are to tell it that it is not limited to threescore years and ten of imperfect manifestation, but is one with universal, omnipresent, unchanging, perfect, eternal life. We must tell it that it is not carnal and evil, but pure with the purity of Spirit. It must be told that it is not material, but that it is the pure substance of Spirit in form. The Word (of life, strength, vitality) will set it free, quicken it to activity, and promote an inflow of the pure, rich, spiritual substance of life.

45. We need to speak to the power center at the root of the tongue, to deny all inefficiency and declare, “All power is given unto me in mind and in body.”

46. We must go in consciousness to the love center near the heart and tell it the Truth. We must deny that it is filled with selfishness and affirm that it is filled with the substance of divine love, pure universal love.

47. Then we need to quicken the substance center, back of the pit of the stomach, with the word that there is one pure, spiritual substance, and that out of it the body is formed in perfection.

48. In the strength center, at the small of the back, we should speak words of strength—words of courage, steadfastness of mind that cause the body to stand upright.

49. We are to think of the intelligence manifest in every organ and in every function of the body. Whether we are awake or asleep, the blood is busy, carrying on a work that requires intelligence greater than man has yet consciously understood. If man’s ignorance did not interfere with these processes, they would build a perfect body and keep it in perfect order. This they will do when, by the power of the Word, the old error conditions, that are established in the subconscious are dissolved and perfect union is made between the conscious and the subconscious phases of mind with the Superconscious or Christ Mind (realm of divine ideas).

1. The Word of God is Divine Mind in action. It is God in His capacity as creative power. God, Spirit, Being, I AM, the original Cause, said "Let there be ..." (Gen. 1:3), thus speaking Himself into expression. God, Divine Mind, from Himself creatively produced or brought forth that which He is. The Word of God is the expression of God's idea of Himself; it is simultaneously the idea and the expression of the idea. It is the rational thought which in its perfection (for God is perfect) is a creative idea. That is, it contains or has inherent in itself the ability to produce from itself. Spirit knows itself: God is, I AM eternally Being.

In his Gospel, John used the phrase "Word of God" for the "Logos," and through this medium we reach the understanding of God's perfection incarnated in the man Jesus. "The Word became flesh, and dwelt among us" (John 1:14), Jesus manifested God's creative power in all its fullness.

The word Logos in the original writings means all the inherent qualities inherent and active in Being (God); the creative power, the ability to reproduce out of itself that which it is. The Logos is the Word, the thought-word, the creative idea, the total of all the God qualities (ideas, principles, or laws of God). The Logos is the rational principle of the universe; it is both reason and speech. In man, the Word is called: I AM, Jehovah God, Lord God, Christ, spiritual man, image of God, composite idea, only begotten, Son of God, Seed of God. Thus the Word, as spiritual man, belongs to the second phase of the Holy Trinity.

Perhaps an important function to remember about the Word is that mentioned by Charles Fillmore in Talks on Truth 68:

"To produce works, there must be a working power. This is exactly what the Word is — the working power of God."

The office or function of the Word of God (Logos) in man is to build states of consciousness; to reveal to man's human consciousness the inner workings of his spirit, soul, and body; to reveal to man the powers and possibilities of his own being; to light the way; to give man understanding and inspiration.

The relation of the Word of God (Logos) to man as a human being is that of Father of his human consciousness. It is that in man which will enable him to produce or bring forth all that has been infolded within him (Involution). It is the plan, the purpose, the image, the choice, the will and intention of God for man as a human being that will enable him to unfold (evolution) and to manifest or show forth the "likeness" of God. It provider the power that we use as our formative power of thought, in our thinking, feeling, speaking, and acting. It also provides the power that we use to form the substance of God into things, circumstances, events, and conditions in our everyday life.

"With the early Fathers of the Greek Church the divine Logos had a peculiar significance which only those who had delved into the innermost of existence could comprehend.

"Philo made the divine Logos the embodiment of all divine powers and ideas. He distinguished between the Logos Inherent in God, corresponding to reason in man, and the Logos emanating from God, corresponding to the spoken word that reveals the thought. The former contains the ideal world; the latter is the first-begotten Son of God, the image of God" (Teach Us to Pray 167).

2. The universe, the aggregate of all that is, was created by the Word of God ("God said"), the creative power of God moving ideas into expression or activity. This process is described in the first chapter of Genesis as taking place in a step-by-step activity as "God said ... and it was so" (Gen. 1:6,7). The character of God's creation is "good" and "very good." Essentially, man and the universe are perfect. The expression and manifestation of the perfect ideal creation is left to man as a co-worker with God.

"God creates through the action of His mind, and all things rest on ideas" (Mysteries of Genesis 14).

Charles Fillmore says further in the same book, on pages 26 and 27:

"God does not create the visible universe directly, as a man makes concrete pavement, but He creates the ideas that are used by His intelligent 'image and likeness' to make the universe. Thus God's creations are always spiritual" (Mysteries of Genesis 26).

3. God "created" man's world in the ideal but man "makes" his world through the activity of ideas in his consciousness — ideas of wisdom, power, intelligence, substance, and love. The real man is the embodiment of God, and all of the God substance is within man, as well as the power to make this substance active. However, in human consciousness, man only partly realizes the power and wisdom that belong to his real Self, and he uses God substance by separating it into parts in his thinking instead of using it in its wholeness, or "righteously." He falls short of the perfection which is his as a son of God because he "makes" his world according to his own limited concept rather than according to the divine plan.

Through the Christ, or true Self, we all have the power to bring into manifestation whatever we hold in the ideal. However, unless we are consciously unified with this Christ principle within ourself, and guided by it in our thinking, then our forms (formationn) are not permanent. "All words are formative but not all words are creative" (Twelve Powers of Man 29). When man glimpses the Truth, then it is his privilege to make the change in consciousness so that the use of his formative power of thought is based in God and his words then begin to "make" a new world for him, to conform to the plan created by God.

4. Man may have a perfect body and a perfect world when he understands and makes the right use of the Word of God — the creative power of God, which operates through his formative power of thought. The Word contains all the attributes (ideas) of God. When the thoughts, feelings, and words of man are charged with a full understanding of Divine Mind and its inhering ideas, and this knowledge is consciously applied in all functions of his life, then he will be able to show forth a perfect body and a perfect world.

5. A birth is coming into a state of existence. As Charles Fillmore explains it:

"The first birth is the human — the self-consciousness of man as an intellectual and physical being; the second birth, the being 'born anew,' is the transformation and translation of the human to a higher plane of consciousness as the son of God" (Charles Fillmore Christian Healing 26).

When he is born into the human realm, man's desires and interests have to do with the satisfaction of bodily appetites and the required routines of life. The second birth is when man awakens to the truth of his real nature.

Jesus said, "Ye must be born anew" (John 3:7). This being "born anew," or coming into a new birth is an experience that takes place in man's soul (his thinking and feeling). Charles Fillmore says further in Christian Healing 26, on the subject of the new birth:

"The second birth is that in which we 'put on Christ.' It is a process of mental adjustment and body transmutation that takes place right here on earth ...

"This being 'born anew,' or 'born from above,' is not a miraculous change that takes place in man; it is the establishment in his consciousness of that which has always existed as the perfect-man idea in Divine Mind."

The Holy Spirit, God in action, is ever moving in man, urging him to recognize and become conscious of himself as a spiritual being, a son of God, ever one with God. When man responds to thins inner urge, he experiences the "new birth." He experiences a spiritual conception, a divine seed-idea of himself, in his feeling nature. When he nurtures this seed-idea by his loving interest and attention, it germinates. Through continued attention, this new concept grows and grows until it fills the whole consciousness with a realization of man as the perfect son of God, created in the image and after the likeness of God. A seed germinates, grows, bears fruit as the sun and rain work upon it, and so the seed-idea of spiritual man grows and bears fruit in man's soul (mind), body, and affairs. This growth is called the "new birth" or being "born anew."

6. When we have been "born from above," born into spiritual consciousness, we leave behind the thought that power lies in our human consciousness, our human "self," and we look to the intelligence of the Word (the indwelling Christ) for guidance. The first "God said" (Gen. 1:3) was for light, intelligence, understanding, and this should be our first "word." Every word carries with it the power of some type of fulfillment, and when our word is based on Truth, it will not return to us void.

"So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it" (Isa. 55:11).

When the new birth takes place in one's mind and heart, that one becomes a new creature in Christ Jesus. There is an influx of new ideas, new concepts, new feelings, and new experiences. There is an outpouring of the Holy Spirit as new light, new life, new substance. The results that corne from the new birth are beautifully expressed in Lessons in Truth 86:

"You will no longer dwell in darkness, for the light will be within your own heart; and the word will be made flesh to you; that is, you will be conscious of a new and diviner life in your body, a new and diviner love for all people, a new and diviner power to accomplish."

But we must ever bear in mind that the results are very practical. The Annotations covering Lessons in Truth Lesson 8 Annotation 1 and the following Annotations make this very clear, by outlining the improvements in mind, body, and affairs. Good outer results must follow the change in consciousness as a result of the new birth; by the law of mind action, our body and world of affairs become orderly and in keeping with the divine plan revealed through the new birth, so that we actually experience heaven here and now.

7. Man has "whatsoever he saith" regardless of whether he thinks and expresses from the human consciousness or from the Christ consciousness. In reality man is the Word of God made flesh. God creates by means of His Word. Man being like God also forms or produces by the power of his thought-word.

Through ignorance of the Truth, our thoughts and words have very often lacked the realization of the attributes (Ideas) of God, and we have thus made conditions that are not in harmony with God's plan of good. Functioning in human consciousness only, we "form" or "make" structures that have no real foundation, but fortunately these manifestations of inharmony and discord may be taken apart (denial) and reproduced (affirmation) in a higher ideal when we become conscious of the true spiritual pattern upon which to build. Then what man "saith" of the good, he has in manifestation. We must, however, bear in mind that whatever we claim — good, bad, indifferent — by the law of mind action must come into our life. Therefore, all of our Truth study is to train the consciousness to release (denial) that which is less than good, and lay hold of (affirmation) that which is true and good.

8. The very nature of love as the attracting, harmonizing, equalizing, binding (or cementing) idea of Divine Mind requires its inclusion in man's words if he would hope to have them effective. Ignorant use of words makes conditions which are not in harmony with Truth, and body and affairs suffer. When our words do not express love they are incomplete, for the Word of God includes all the attributes of God. In Annotation 3 of this lesson (Series 2 Lesson 6 Annotation 3) the quotation from Twelve Powers of Man 29 referred to all words as being formative, but not necessarily creative. To be creative, all words must include love; then the otherwise perishable human construction becomes an enduring, spiritual, immortal structure. When love is included in our thought-word, it heals, constructs, blesses, and uplifts all to which it is applied. Lack of love In our words means confusion and corruption.

9. Spiritual understanding begins the healing of a rebellious state of mind because it makes us open, receptive, teachable to the guidance of God. Rebellion is open defiance and resistance toward an authority to which one owes allegiance. One rebels because he believes he is not being rightly governed, and his conditions are not satisfactory. Man has been taught in the past that God caused sickness, poverty, and inharmony; that these negative conditions were the will of God for him. Though man recognized a being he called God, as the supreme ruler and governor of all things, he rebelled at such conditions being imposed on him.

As we come into the understanding that our own thoughts and words are the cause of the undesirable conditions in our life, we no longer rebel and blame God. Understanding the law of mind action, that mental causes produce manifest effects of like nature, we begin the renewal of our own mind. When we realize that the Word of God is God's creative power at our disposal as our formative power of thought, we become victorious in the governing of our own mental sphere.

10. Words which express the ideas of life, health, vitality, strength, joy, order, purity, perfection must be used in restoring the soul and body to health. Such ideas are imbued with the power of God, and the soul and body respond as we recognize and claim our heritage of perfection as a son of God. However, in order to maintain the health consciousness thus established, we must seek to keep all our thoughts, feelings, and words constructive and harmonious.

In considering how the Word is carried into all phases of our being, we need first of all to remember that the Word is spiritual man, the spiritual phase of every man's being. We sometimes term this phase the Christ, the I AM, the Seed of God, every man's divine nature or pattern at the center of his being. When we become conscious of this phase of our nature, we are able to use our formative power of thought to direct the Word (God's creative power) into soul, body, and affairs. The spiritualized will (See Series 2 Lesson 6 Annotation 18) has to be called into action as words of Truth are spoken to the various centers of consciousness, thus blessing the different parts of the body organism. Through the right action of the will faculty, the intellect (conscious phase of mind) speaks positive, constructive words to the subconscious phase of mind — "the letter"; then the Superconscious (Christ Mind) illumines the words and "the spirit giveth life" (II Cor. 3:6).

We can think of the Word as being carried to all parts of the body by the life essence, symbolized by the "blood." The body is nourished by spiritual substance, symbolized by the "bread." The life currents in the body are accelerated by the positive words that we speak when we affirm the truth of our being — the Word. When we speak thus we are not trying to change anything, but to realize that which is eternally true. As our thoughts, feelings, words, actions, and reactions are charged with the spiritual power that is ours, in the realization of our divine sonship as the Word of God, our blessing is mighty to accomplish God's good purposes. This is true communion. "Thy words were found, and I did eat them; and thy words were unto me a joy and the rejoicing of my heart" (Jer. 15:16).

When we recognize words of Truth, we respond to them in thought, we realize them in the feeling nature, and they become manifest in the world of form.

11. Words of power, dominion, authority cast out negative beliefs from the consciousness and erase the undesirable conditions produced by these negative words in body and affairs. We must declare positive words in the faith that the qualities they represent are ours to use by the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ; that the ideas back of the words — the Truth underlying them — is mighty to make them manifest. Denial of that which is unlike God or good is necessary to erase the negative beliefs held In the consciousness and the negative conditions in the body and the affairs. We must never lose sight of the fact that we have been given (as a tool of our mind) the power of denial, which can sweep out of mind and outer life all that does not belong to a child of God. As we use this process effectively, we are able to take control of our thoughts and thus of our experiences.

12. To build a consciousness of abundance, we need to use words of faith, substance, love, service, joy, prosperity, opulence, plenty, gratitude, fulfillment. These words have as their sustaining power the God-ideas which enrich our consciousness and replace beliefs of lack, poverty, failure, and so forth. Whenever a thought of insufficiency enters into our mind (consciousness) we should immediately deny it as having reality and replace it with an idea of the bounty of our loving Father. Repeatedly doing this, using the power of the Word, we build a consciousness of abundance which in turn fills our life and affairs with all good.

13. Consciousness is direct knowledge, knowing for one's self, a constant habit of thought. We attain the high state of consciousness which enables us to speak real creative words by a process of mental development, growth, unfoldment of the divine attributes (ideas) latent within us.

To attain the desired consciousness, we must learn to discipline our thinking and our feeling; learn to take our attention away from persons and things in the outer. Then in the stillness of our own soul we are able to think and feel the essence of the ideas of God, rather than have our attention on the imperfect and limited beliefs that we hold when we are not enlightened as to the truth of our being.

Through meditation and prayer on that which is divine and perfect, we attain an understanding of our divinity. "Whatsoever things are true ... think on these things" (Phil. 4:8). When this knowledge is really ours, we may speak our word and "it is so."

14. Substance is the idea of perfect form or body in Divine Mind, but is itself without form or shape; it is the Mind essence out of which everything both visible and invisible is formed.

"Substance has its source in a mental idea of form and shape. ... Substance in Divine Mind is an idea of perfection in form, but man's thought usually caricatures it" (Charles Fillmore Christian Healing 44).

Substance can be termed "the body of God" (i.e., the embodiment of all good). It is omnipresence — that is, it is omnipresent and formless until by the action of our word and the molding effect of our thinking and feeling it is formed into tangible or visible forms and shapes. So far as the rest of creation is concerned, substance takes the forms and shapes to fit the needs of the particular species under consideration.

When substance is recognizable by the senses, we have what we term "matter," which is formed substance. The perfection of the form depends, in man's cases upon the degree of man's understanding and use of substance and how he has applied his spoken word to mold substance.

Substance, being a spiritual idea, does not change; matter, being formed in the world of visibility, is subject to change; and so far as man is concerned, his thought action can influence matter. Substance is constant; matter is the variable manifestation of substance.

"God substance lies back of matter and form. It is the basis of all form yet does not enter into any form as a finality. Substance cannot be seen, touched, tasted, or smelled, yet it is more substantial than matter, for it is the only substantiality in the universe. Its nature is to 'sub-stand' or 'stand under' or behind matter as its support and only reality" (Charles Fillmore Prosperity 14).

15. The fourth dimension is the realm of divine ideas — the kingdom of the heavens. This is explained clearly by Charles Fillmore in Keep a True Lent 170:

"The fourth dimension is that which embraces and encompasses the other three; it is realization, the doing away with time and space and all conditions. It is the process in which forms lose their apartness and become one under divine law. ... when we invoke the aid of the Christ in us we go beyond reason into the realm of pure realization ...

"The one way to enter the realm of the fourth dimension, or of realization, is through scientific prayer, commonly named 'the silence.'"

16. The physical body can be redeemed only by raising the mind to the fourth dimension, by taking the mind beyond the three dimensions of the earthly realm to the realm of divine ideas where the body-idea is recognized.

The earthly body is substance in visible form and as such is still subject to the physical laws which operate in substance. But when ideas of life and substance are perceived in consciousness, then the three dimensions of idea, expression, manifestation will be embraced in the fourth dimension of realization, or the realm of Divine Mind. Then the same spiritual conditions will be found in the manifestation as are in Spirit or Divine Mind.

The process of body redemption requires that we first of all unburden the body from the belief that it is only flesh. Through understanding we come to recognize the body as primarily the temple of God. We need to bear in mind that there is but one Principle, God, the one substance from which all must emanate. There is but one law or activity of that Principle on all three planes of consciousness — the immutable law of God. When we can view life in this way, we are able to perceive chat the body is an instrument of God, a spiritual form, an expression and manifestation of the organizing power of God.

"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 in substance and life in expression" (Talks on Truth 158).

This concept or vision will redeem the body and raise it to its rightful place as the perfect channel for the unfolding of life and love. Such thoughts give us a reverent regard for the body, and a desire to have every body manifest the beauty and perfection of the ideal body held in God-Mind as a body-idea. Through the action of the Word, we impress thoughts of light, life, and love on every cell of the organism. Our reward is a hearty response of wholeness, and the body is thus redeemed to health and strength.

17. To "keep" the word of Jesus is to hold in our conscious phase of mind the truths that He enunciated, until they settle down into our subconscious or feeling nature, becoming living, acting realities within us. It is the work of the subconscious to bring forth or manifest our body and affairs. Just to read over the words of Jesus or to commit them to memory does not "keep" them — that is only the "letter." We are to live them consciously, so that the divine ideas back of them are made active in the subconscious, which in turn can bring them forth as good results in our life. Such results do not come at once, for the old error thoughts built into mind and body have to be erased by denial and the truths of God built in (affirmation) by the activity of the Word — "the spirit [that] giveth life."

18. As the lesson material points out, Paul represents the spiritualized will carrying to the different thought centers ("assemblies," "churches") or mind faculties the Word of Truth, and building them up into a knowledge of their perfection in nature and function through spiritual thinking.

Paul was a missionary to the early churches. The word church means a religious assembly, or the Lord's house. The individual1s consciousness is the "Lord's house," and assembled within it are groups or aggregations of ideas as thought centers. It is the Truth that makes us free, but we do not manifest our freedom unless we will to do so. Thus we can see the wisdom of calling the will the executive power of the mind, represented metaphysically by the apostle Paul.

19. We carry the Word (Logos) to all parts of the body through the movement of consciousness by our thinking and feeling. We bring to every part of the body the Word of life, the Word of strength, the Word of energy, the Word of vitality, the Word of wholeness, by consciously speaking these qualities (silently or audibly) with deep feeling as a blessing to the various organs and functions of the body.

Our times of silence — the Lord's Supper or Holy Communion — will reveal the truths we are to speak, for we will "eat" of the substance of God and "drink" of the life of God. As mind and heart are cleansed of untrue thoughts and beliefs, our body is free to take on the life and light that belong to it as part of our divine inheritance. As we feed the mind consciously with God-ideas, wo are carrying the Word to the various parts of the body.

"It is your duty as expresser of the divine law to speak forth the Logos, the very Word of God, and cause the Garden of Eden, the everywhere present Mind-Substance, to manifest for you and in you in its innate perfection" (Charles Fillmore Christian Healing 70).

20. When spiritual law has unlimited expression through man, the result is that man stands forth a victorious master to whom all good things are possible. We act in a Godlike manner when we are consciously one with God. All the so-called miracles are performed with ease and freedom because we understand our divine nature. These things are perfectly natural then, just as natural as breathing.

When spiritual law is given unlimited expression in our thinking, feeling, speaking, acting, and reacting the result is joy, peace, health, plenty, and happiness, as well as harmony in all the relationships of life. It brings about the restoration of that which the prophets have spoken, when

"The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose" (Isaiah 35:1).

Peace, power, and plenty,   Words that are heaven-born. Say them, ye hearts that are weary,   Till hope in your soul is born. For words are things that lift on wings   The one that believes them true, And whatever you will when the mind is still,   You may call to the soul of you.      — Henry Victor Morgan

TruthUnity Note: this poem by Henry Victor Morgan was also quoted by Frances Foulks in Effectual Prayer. Henry Victor Morgan was born in 1865 and was widely known as a metaphysical preacher of the early 20th century. Hw and his wife published "The Master Christian" from the early 1920s until his wife's death in 1931. Afterwards, it was published only intermittently. He was minister to the Church of the Healing Christ in Tacoma, Washington, until 1952. He died in 1952.