Reply to Ms Appleby's Comment Re Paul's Change of Gospel Message in "Neville Goddard and the Development of the Gospel from Mistake to Correct"

On July 12, 2013, I posted "Neville Goddard and the Development of the Gospel from Mistake to Correct," a poorly written (but not wrong) message about how the Gospel has been changed (I think I still owe the article a rewrite.) That article has attracted some of my highest traffic and the greatest vitriol in responses from Christian fundamentalists (see http://imagicworldview.blogspot.com/2013/07/neville-goddard-and-development-of.html?showComment=1467841816924#c1337588376689351049).

In the article I stated that Paul changed his view regarding the gospel after the nonsense he wrote to the Thessalonians and gained the maturity he displays in Ephesians. I also pointed out that the "Devil" we contend against is our own ignorance -- the ignorance that resulted from the amnesia we accepted to transition from being God's consciousness to a human's consciousness.

Regarding that article I received the well meaning comment below, and I would like to respond to it here where you might see it, as opposed to having it hid away in an ancient comment section. (I add the salutation and closing; and yes, this might still be edited):
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Mr. Steele,

Paul never CHANGED his original belief or message about Who Jesus Christ was (is)...he was writing to two different groups of believers, with different backgrounds and needs at those specific times....Thess. had been converted from mainly idolatry and he encouraged them in their suffering, instructed them in the way of holiness and corrected their misconceptions about Christ's return by making sure that they lived their lives directed by the Spirit of God and believing what he had taught them....to the Ephesians he was instilling that as BELIEVERS in Jesus Christ that they...both Jew and Gentile...were one in Christ and to walk worthy of this new life in Him....and he NEVER told any of them that they were "God" themselves....in fact he warned them: Ephesians 5: 1: Be ye therefore FOLLOWERS of God, as dear children;....and goes on to say:..........15/See then that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise,
16 Redeeming the time, because the days are evil.
17 Wherefore be ye not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is.
18 And be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess; but be filled with the Spirit;
19 Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart TO THE LORD;
20 Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ;
21 Submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of God.

AND

You state there is no 'devil' - yet Paul himself refers to him and warns of him in

Ephesians 6:
10 Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might.
11 Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.
12 For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.
13 Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.
14 Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of righteousness;
15 And your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace;
16 Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked.
17 And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God:
18 Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, and watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints;
19 And for me, that utterance may be given unto me, that I may open my mouth boldly, to make known the mystery of the gospel,
20 For which I am an ambassador in bonds: that therein I may speak boldly, as I ought to speak.

There are so many instances where you simply ignore the context of the whole of what is written and have come up with a 'different gospel' completely.

Bonnie Appleby
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Ms. Appleby,

Thank you for reading my article, "Neville Goddard and the Development of the Gospel from Mistake to Correct." It might interest you to know that I answered another critic of that article some time ago (http://imagicworldview.blogspot.com/2016/02/criticism-of-neville-goddard-and_25.html). I hope you will read other of my articles and consider their overall worth.

Yes, I have come up with another, different gospel completely. The original. And it was not by ignoring the context of what was written, but by being more thoroughly immersed in context. I see by your standard, pat evangelical quips that you are a Bible student. I am writing that you and others might see that EVERYTHING YOU "KNOW" IS WRONG. That was what I realized when I first believed on Jesus, when I first got a glimpse of that world. But I knew that I had been deceived before, and that I would be deceived again. It took me close to forty years to understand that the "Devil" is the active and dynamic ignorance within our own spiritual selves. All that Paul said in Ephesians 6 applies. It is our own ignorance which deceiveth us that we must resist and eventually overcome. Come on, let's go!

Because all my teachers and I are subject to deception by "the Devil," I have always actively disproved what I am taught and subsequently believe. I keep what I cannot disprove. I know that I -- all of us are wrong, and that our mentally conceived "God" is too small. He is beyond our knowing. I know that things are real in that they "are," but they are not necessarily what they purport to be, nor what I believe them to be.

I imagine you have an anchor for your faith: a vision of Jesus, a healing, an observed miracle, or the hearing of his audible voice. You know that was real and your faith is anchored in that reality, so do not be afraid to look at HOW it is real. Look into the context in which the Bible came to be; let the picture you have of it be challenged.

Certainly Paul had all the attributes of human thought. He did not start already knowing all things. I am not making this stuff up. In my article I cited the learned Dr. C.H. Dodd's The Apostolic Preaching and Its Development. Did you read it? Get it. I am not kidding -- get it new or used or pdf (http://religion-online.org/showbook.asp?title=539). It will absolutely be worth it. And whatever you do, READ IT!!! Especially chapter three. Here is just a little bit of it:

"C.H. Dodd is recognized as one of the great New Testament scholars of the twentieth century. Dr. Dodd was for many years Professor of New Testament at Cambridge University. This book of three lectures was published by Harper and Row, 1964."

From The Apostolic Preaching and Its Developments, pages 62-64:

"For Paul, with his strongly eschatological background of thought, the belief that the Church was the "people of the saints of the Most High," now revealed in the last days, carried with it the corollary that all that prophecy and apocalypse had asserted of the supernatural Messianic community was fulfilled in the Church. But the eschatological scheme of the apocalypses had been profoundly disturbed by the fact that the Messiah had come and the Kingdom of God had been revealed, while yet this world continued to exist, and the people of God were still in the body. The Messiah indeed had Himself passed into the eternal order, but His followers still lived 'in the flesh' (though not 'after the flesh'). How, then, could it be true that the prophecies were fulfilled which spoke of the congregation of the righteous being transfigured into the glory of an immortal life?

"Paul found the answer to this question through a restatement in more thoroughgoing terms of the unity existing between the Messiah and the Messianic community. Christ, said the keryigma, was Son of God 'according to the Spirit of holiness.' The same Spirit dwelt in His Church. Thus the 'communion of the Holy Spirit' was also 'the communion of the Son of God' (1 Cor. 1: 9). It was not enough to say that Christ, being exalted to the right hand of God, had 'poured forth' the Spirit. The presence of the Spirit in the Church is the presence of the Lord: 'the Lord is the Spirit' (2 Cor. 3: 17). Thus the 'one body' which the one Spirit created is the Body of Christ. To be 'in the Spirit' is to be 'in Christ,' that is to say, a member of the Body of Christ. The personality of Christ receives, so to speak, an extension in the life of His Body on earth. Those 'saving facts,' the death and resurrection of Christ, are not merely particular facts of past history, however decisive in their effect; they are re-enacted in the experience of the Church. If Christ died to this world, so have the members of His body; if He has risen into newness of life, so have they (Rom. 6: 4); if He being risen from the dead, dieth no more, neither do they (Rom.6: 8-9); if God has glorified Him, He has also glorified them.(Rom. 8: 29-30). They are righteous, holy, glorious, immortal, according to the prophecies, with the righteousness, holiness, glory, and immortality which are His in full reality, and are theirs in the communion of His Body—'in Christ.'

"This is the basis of Paul’s so-called 'Christ-mysticism.' It is noteworthy that as his interest in the speedy advent of Christ declines, as it demonstrably does after the time when he wrote I Corinthians the 'futurist eschatology' of his earlier phase is replaced by this 'Christ-mysticism.' The hope of glory yet to come remains as a background of thought, but the foreground is more and more occupied by the contemplation of all the riches of divine grace enjoyed here and now by those who are in Christ Jesus. 'Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ!' (Eph. 1: 3).

"This was the true solution of the problem presented to the Church by the disappointment of its naïve expectation that the Lord would immediately appear; not the restless and impatient straining after signs of His coming which turned faith into fantasy and enthusiasm into fanaticism; but a fuller realization of all the depths and heights of the supernatural life here and now. The prayer of the Church as taught by Paul was no longer, 'Let grace come and let this world pass away. Our Lord, come!' (Didaché, 10: 6) but 'to be strengthened by His Spirit in the inner man; that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye being rooted and grounded in love, may be strong to apprehend with all saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height, and to know the love of Christ that passeth knowledge, that ye may be filled unto all the fullness of God' (Eph. 3: 16-19)."

I hope I caught all the typos in that.

It was a greater perspective which caused Paul to make a "restatement" . . . of the unity existing between the Messiah and the Messianic community. Paul was a Pharisee, he came from a culture that saw God as separate and divided from us. When he became a Christian, he knew everything he knew was wrong, but he was still looking from that cultural background. What the Messiah MEANS grows on you as you mature and your perspective expands. Your mind makes constant "restatements," else why bother going to Bible study?

So yes, you are correct, Paul never changed his view of WHO Jesus Christ is, but he changed his view of WHAT Jesus Christ is: "He" has become us, and we are included in Him!

We do not ignore contexts, we learn them so that we might grow. "Hear, O Israel, YHWH your God, YHWH is one!" (Deuteronomy 6: 4) means one thing if in your mind God is separate and divided from you, and something entirely different when you realize that the "one" that God is INCLUDES YOU!

That part of your mind which is ruled by God is Israel, and this applies to every child born of woman. Moses, a master of the ancient myths, discovered Israel in his mind, and killed an "Egyptian," a thought of ignorance. God-thoughts bless us -- jethro -- and contemplating this Moses discovered Elohim/Ashur; that our imagination is the process of God's manifestation -- YHWH. The "Old Testament" is a discourse on this fact: "God said, 'Ye are God'" (Psalm 82: 6). Not gods, but God.

There is no New Testament. The Gospels are primers, explanations of THE Testament: Ye are God, YHWH, for YHWH is Christ, and Christ is you. You know from your study of Hebrews that Paul said that Abraham and Sarah (and thus all of the Testament) are allegories. These are states. Being a "friend" of God means getting to know that we are one with Eil, the Shaddai. Discovering the reality of this fact gives way to Issac -- Laughter!!! From the joy of it! "I, this stupid little human imagination, am YHWH, the imagining of Eil, the Source and Provider of all!!!"

That, Ms. Appleby, is the good news. Not that Jesus Christ has come, but that you are him! He has been the same forever: the Becoming One, and you can -- must learn to -- do as he does: imagine to cause blessing. That is why I so often promote Neville Goddard in my blog -- that is what he was all about. We do not disbelieve that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh, we just believe that the flesh he comes in . . . is ours!



Foremost you want to become familiar with v-a.com and v-a.com/bible/. Victor is the most convincing person I can direct you to inform you that you do not actually have the Bible. What you have is a fraud, a corrupted and much edited perversion of the scriptures. THAT is why you have the wrong gospel. You think that reality is dualistic, when in all actuality it is non-dual. You believe, because there it is right in Exodus 3: 14, the God's name is I AM THAT I AM -- that the Eternal is wholly other. Except it isn't there. God said that his NATURE is "Ahiyeh Ashur hiyeh," which I have made about twenty attempts to translate. Basically, it means that Eil, the Ineffable Most High God, is becoming manifest through our imagining, contingent mainly upon our faith.

You need also to be aware of Appendixes 30-34 in Bullinger's The Companion Bible. They document a bit of the Old Testament's editing. You can find them online.

I found Thomas L. Thompson's The Mythic Past informative, as is Col. J. Garnier's The Worship of the Dead or the Origin and Nature of Pagan Idolatry and Its Bearing Upon the Early History of Egypt and Babylonia. They liked long titles back then.

You won't like that these books are written by arch-Pagans, but don't be afraid to read The Jesus Mysteries and Jesus and the Lost Goddess. They are very informative. Spoiler Alert: the "lost goddess" is our being in God's oneness.

Then, to get your head straightened out, read Rabbi David A. Cooper's God is a Verb: Kabbalah and the Practice of Mystical Judaism and Rabbi Jeff Roth's Jewish Meditation Practices for Everyday Life. Remember the adage, "Roses are red, Violets are bluish, If it wasn't for Paul, We'd all be Jewish." Or something like that.