Where Are You From

Where Are You From?

Neville Goddard 12-13-1963

“Where are you from?” This you will find in the 19th chapter of the Book of John. And the rabbi said to Pilate: “We have a law, and according to that law he ought to die, for he claims he is the Son of God.” And their law would not allow that, for we know where this man is from, know all about him; and when Messiah appears no one will know where he is from. So his claim is false. When Messiah appears it will be mysteriously done. And yet we know exactly where this man is from. Even his own brothers do not believe in him. “And he said to his brothers, ‘My time has not yet come, but your time is always here.’” And then he repeated it, but qualified it: “My time has not yet fully come.” He knew his time. He is speaking of two entirely different times, two entirely different worlds, two different ages. So: “My time has not yet fully come, but your time is always here.” But “my time had not yet fully come.”

So Pilate said to him: “Where are you from?” And Jesus gave no answer. Pilate said to him: “You will not speak to me? Do you not know that I have the power to set you free and power to crucify?” And Jesus answered him: “You would have no power over me unless it had been given to you from above; therefore he who delivered me to you has the greater sin.” He does not answer Pilate’s first question, but he corrects Pilate’s misunderstanding of power. He does not answer: “Where are you from?” He doesn’t answer him because Pilate would never understand; and he corrects Pilate’s misunderstanding – which is the world’s misunderstanding – of power. Pilate thought he had the power to set him free or to crucify him. He was simply telling him he had no power whatsoever unless it has been given from above.

For, one day you will have this experience, and you will taste of the power of the new age. You will see a scene just like this. As you taste of the power of this new age, you will know it is all animated, and you are the power animating it. You will arrest within yourself an activity that you sense, and at that moment of arrestment everything stands still and is dead; it’s made as though it were made of clay. Not just the outer aspect, but your brain, that is so fluid and so alive and so pulsing – that, too, if you opened up the skull would be like clay. The heart that pumps – that too would be like clay. The whole thing including all the inner works would be frozen. Then you would release within yourself the activity which you have arrested and everything once more would become animated and would continue in its course and would perform its intention. Then you will know what he means by “this time,” which is forever – as against “His time,” when he said to him: “Brothers, my time has not yet fully come, but your time is always here.”

Now, man’s conventional view of time – including our great scientists – is that the future develops continuously out of the past; but that is not the Biblical view of time. The Biblical view of time is: what appears to be so new in our world is only the appearance of the return of phenomena already old. The whole vast would is moving on a circle, and all of this is already so, so that the entire space-time history of the world is laid out and we only become aware of increasing portions of it sequentially. But it is on a curve, and therefore what seemingly is past isn’t really; from the Biblical view, it is your tomorrow. It hasn’t receded into a past; it’s advancing into a future and it is forever.

Now listen to these words: “What had been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done; and there is nothing new under the sun. Is there a thing of which it is said, ‘See, this is new?’ It has been already, in the ages past. There is no remembrance of former things, nor will there be any remembrance of later things yet to happen among those who will come after.” (Eccl. 1:9-11).