Ascended Master Jesus through Kim Michaels.
What I have given you in these first few chapters is a new view of the mission and teachings of Christ, and I am aware that for most people this will be a revolutionary view. I am also aware that most Christian preachers will say – if they ever read it – that it is a blasphemous view, and they will use their literal interpretations of the official scriptures to denounce my words. They will say that I could not possibly be the real Jesus Christ, for he would never say anything that is contrary to the scriptures or their interpretations of them. Thereby, they demonstrate that they have entered into the same mindset as the scribes and Pharisees, who denied the Living Christ because I did and said things that were contrary to their interpretations of the Jewish scriptures.
Yet I know those who have open minds and hearts can now see that there is a very logical and practical reason why I will indeed say things today that go far beyond what I said 2,000 years ago. The reason is that humankind has risen in consciousness, both in a spiritual sense and in terms of people’s knowledge of the material world. Therefore, I can tell you things today that people could not “bear” – could not accept, could not comprehend – 2,000 years ago. As one obvious example of this, people today have a far greater knowledge of human psychology, and thus I can indeed give you a better understanding of the central factor that prevents you from attaining salvation. Because of the lower consciousness people had 2,000 years ago, I could only describe that factor in parables and hint at its true nature. For example, I described it this way:
1 Judge not, that ye be not judged.
2 For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.
3 And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?
4 Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye?
5 Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother’s eye. (Matthew, Chapter 7)
Few Christians seriously consider the deeper meaning behind that statement, because they think it doesn’t apply to them. They think that because they are “good Christians,” they don’t need to look for the beam in their own eyes—they just need to follow the outer rules of their religion and then I will do all the work for them. Yet God is no respecter of persons (Acts 10:34), and my statement does indeed apply to all people. Or one might put it this way: not all people need to look for the beam in their own eyes—only those who want to enter the kingdom of God.
Thus, those who want to consider themselves disciples of Christ should be the first to seek a deeper understanding of exactly what hides behind the expression “the beam that is in thine own eye.” What exactly is that beam and how does it prevent you from attaining salvation? So far I have said the following:
- The first step toward becoming a true follower of the Living Christ is to realize that you are trapped in a limited state of consciousness, namely what I call spiritual death.
- By acknowledging that the Living Christ can appear in the flesh, you realize that it is possible for you to overcome that state of consciousness, even while you are still here on Earth.
- Yet this is no automatic process because spiritual death forms a closed mental box that prevents you from seeing beyond the graven images that make up the box.
- Therefore, the beam that is in your own eye will prevent you from seeing what you need to overcome. As I said, “first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly…” In other words, until you remove that beam, you cannot clearly understand the teachings of the Living Christ.
- The beam in your eye is made up of a number of illusions – mental images – that obscure the truth. Many people – even many religions – see these images as absolute and infallible, and this unwillingness to look beyond the mental images is what makes them graven images, meaning unchanging images that stand between you and the Living God.
- After you recognize the Living Christ, you enter an interim stage, in which you must systematically purify your consciousness from these graven images.
- The major challenge during this interim stage is to overcome the very subtle temptation to impose your mental images upon the Living Christ and his teachings—thereby preventing Christ from leading you outside your mental box. You can even use the outer teachings of Christ to reinforce your mental box, as Christians have demonstrated for 2,000 years and continue to demonstrate today.
- If you fall prey to this temptation, you will no longer be following the straight and narrow Way of Christ. You will instead be following the broad way of anti-christ, whereby you use your mental images to create the belief that you are guaranteed to be saved.
- The real challenge is whether you will allow the Living Christ to expose all of your graven images or whether you will seek to hold on to some of those images and the sense of identity based upon them.
Will you be willing to leave behind any and all graven images and the attachments to anything on Earth? Will you seek to save your mortal sense of identity or will you be willing to lose that “life” in order to follow Christ?
Will you follow the true path of Christ, or will you fall prey to the subtle temptation of anti-christ, namely to think you can enter the kingdom of God while – for any number of subtle, intellectual reasons – maintaining certain dualistic images? Will you believe the lie that you can be saved by doing outer things without removing the beam in your own eye?
The conclusion is that the essential element for any true follower of Christ is the willingness to see something that you cannot see, to allow the Living Christ to expose to you what you cannot see on your own. We now need to add to this that there are things people do not want to see, and this is most clearly demonstrated by the scribes and Pharisees who refused to see the shortcomings of their religious world view and their personal psyches. They would not give up their mortal lives in order to follow Christ.
Yet all people have an element in their psyches that will try to prevent them from following Christ. Take note that this is a subtle force—it is hiding behind the beam that you do not see. Thus, it is perfectly possible to be a member of a Christian church – or any spiritual organization for that matter – and follow all of its rules and doctrines while denying the Living Christ. It is possible to be a Christian scribe and Pharisee—dancing around the golden calf of a graven image of Christ instead of looking for the Living Christ beyond all graven images.
During my physical mission on Earth I had limited options for describing the force that resists your freedom. Thus, I had to describe it in veiled, symbolic language in my parables, where I referred to it as the beam in your own eye, the tares among the wheat, the house built on sand, mammon and other such indirect expressions. However, in today’s world, most people are aware of a modern name for this force, namely what is commonly known as the ego.
Obviously, there are various definitions of the ego, but in this course I will use the term to refer to a force in your psychology that resists your efforts to rise above the consciousness of spiritual death and follow the Living Christ into the consciousness of eternal life. You may think that definition is too general, but at this point I do not want to give a more specific definition. The reason being that I first want to talk more about the major effect of the ego, namely that is causes spiritual blindness that prevents you from seeing the reality of Christ.
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A perceptive person will notice that what I have given in these first chapters is a description of salvation that is in stark contrast to the description given by most Christian churches. Christianity generally portrays salvation as something that I give to people, and it is an instant, or guaranteed, salvation. It is also a passive salvation, where I do the work for you, and if you live up to certain outer requirements, I simply have to save you.
Yet what I am describing here is a form of salvation that is neither instant, nor guaranteed, nor passive. It is a process that requires you to consciously and actively purify your consciousness of all graven images. And, of course, I trust you can begin to see that when I walked the Earth, I did indeed describe this inner way to salvation. The official churches later created the outer, instant, automatic salvation as a way for them to control people—just as the Jewish priesthood had placed the outer religion between people and salvation.
The stark reality is that I always preached the real salvation, which is indeed a gradual process, whereby you must actively and consciously seek to uncover the beam in your own eye and remove it. This is not to say that you can save yourself entirely by your own power, for as I have described, salvation is an interactive process between you here below and I – or another ascended being – above. What I offer as my part of the bargain is a morsel of my Christ consciousness, which is what I often referred to as the kingdom of God or the kingdom of heaven. Take note of how I repeatedly attempted to make people understand that this is a gradual, interactive process:
31 Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took, and sowed in his field:
32 Which indeed is the least of all seeds: but when it is grown, it is the greatest among herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come and lodge in the branches thereof.
33 Another parable spake he unto them; The kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven, which a woman took, and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened. (Matthew, Chapter 13)
Can you see how I made it clear that entering the kingdom of heaven – as a symbol for attaining the Christ consciousness – is a gradual process? The mustard seed takes time to grow, and the leaven takes time to raise the whole loaf. When you have descended into the consciousness of death, you cannot pull yourself up by your own bootstraps. The absolutely only way for you to escape spiritual death is to receive a morsel of spiritual life, which can only come from the Christ consciousness. Therefore, you do need an external savior in the form of a representative of the Christ consciousness who descends into this world and becomes the Living Christ—the Word incarnate.
The Living Christ offers you a morsel of spiritual life, a morsel of truth, but this will not automatically save you. You must accept that truth, you must take it into your consciousness, and you must multiply the talents you have been given. Only by watering the mustard seed, only by allowing the leaven of truth to raise your consciousness – by challenging your graven images – will you go through the interim phase and overcome the consciousness of death.
Yet this morsel of truth is offered to all people on Earth. Those who met me physically received it directly from me, but because I won a physical victory of being the Living Christ on Earth, it is not necessary to meet a physical person who is the Living Christ. You can now receive a morsel of Christ consciousness through the Comforter, but in order to do so, you must search for that Comforter in the only place it can be found, namely in the kingdom of God that is within you.
NOTE: The rest of this dictation is available in the book: Master Keys to Personal Christhoood.
Copyright © 2008 Kim Michaels