Concept · Study Path
Neville Goddard on Sin as missing the mark
Sin defined as failing to realize one's chosen goal or ideal — literally missing the mark — rather than moral transgression. To keep missing an aim is to keep sinning against it.
Read these 8 lectures in order — they carry this idea most heavily, earliest first. After each one, take the suggested question to the mentor, who answers from Neville's own words.
Neville Goddard Lectures: “The Friend of Sinners”
April 24, 1964…So I will say to this lady (who is here this night) I have heard it, having received your letter, and will continue to hear what I have heard until what I have heard you will echo. You will echo it because I am doing it unto myself; because, I, as you, do not want the two things that you mentioned in the letter. Now let us go into the Silence. ___(??) attention to the book table. All the books ___…
Neville Goddard Lectures: Jacob’s Ladder: Christ
April 15, 1968…So I tell you, Mr. Hoover was perfectly right…condemned as he was. He sent me his little pamphlet. I gave it to a man to use on NBC and he never returned it. Mr. Hoover signed it for me and asked me to send a copy of my book Awakened Imagination, which I did. He said he would put it in his library at Stanford University. So he accepted my book and he sent me his pamphlet. I, in turn, gave it to El…
You Can Forgive Sin
March 29, 1963…So that’s our power. We have power to forgive sin, and sin only means missing the mark. If you don’t have a mark in this world, you can’t sin. It doesn’t have anything to do with some moral issue, no, do you have a goal? Do you have some objective in this world? If you have an objective, then this is how you realize it: suppose it were true. Now he tells us in the 8th of Romans, “Let us walk now n…
Neville Goddard Lectures: “What Does the Lord Require?”
November 20, 1964…You write some story of our late President…or you go back, say, to Mr. Roosevelt. You couldn’t write a biography of him without saying the man was paralyzed; he couldn’t stand on his own feet unassisted; that he always had a cigarette in his face with a long holder, and you’d paint such word pictures of a man and you can see him vividly in your mind’s eye. But not a thing is said about Jesus Chris…
Sons Of The Most High
April 15, 1968…When you dream tonight of numberless people and awaken in the morning to find them gone, where did they go? Are they not all in you, created by and acted by you? Then are you not protean? You, all Imagination, are God the dreamer, imagining the many parts you are playing. This very moment is a part of your dream, and those around you are there, playing their parts because you are imagining them. Y…
Neville Goddard Lectures The Mystery Of Forgiveness
January 13, 1969…So the Son of man has authority to forgive sins. Well now, you can forgive sin. And sin is simply a man missing the mark. You don’t ask the man’s permission, you don’t ask his consent, he doesn’t know what you’re doing, but you are moved by some emotion. Instead of sympathizing with him and keeping him in that state, you empathize with him. You do it in your own Imagination. Having done it in your…
The Sin Against The Holy Spirit
February 19, 1963…In the end of John 20, he appears, and the inner room was completely filled and he was shut out as it were. They wondered if he really rose. He appears in the midst of them and shows them the marks upon his body to testify to the reality of this appearance. Then he said to them: “Peace be with you.” Listen to it carefully. He said: “Receive the Holy Spirit.” If you forgive the sins of anyone they …
Neville Goddard Binding And Loosing The 1964 Lectures
January 14, 1964…Now we are told, when man really discovers it, it is the blood of Christ Jesus that must be shed. Well, how could I shed the blood of Christ Jesus? Yet I am told, without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sin; therefore, what is sin now? Sin is “missing the mark.” If I have a goal in life and I do not realize it, I am sinning. I don’t care what the world will tell me, it’s the one s…