The Immortal - Book 1
-- by Joseph John (JJ) Dewey
The First Communion - Chapter 4
Drinking coffee at Denny's seemed to be a strange situation
to have the greatest spiritual experience of my life, but that
was where it happened.
After we received our coffee and exchanged several pleasantries
about the Christmas season, I had to show my curiosity. "I'm
full of questions. I want to know the meaning of the bells, who
you are and what you mean by mission."
"One at a time," he smiled. "What do you want
to know first?"
"Do you know why I heard the bells?"
"The bells were tuned to your vibration and I was calling
for you. The spiritual law is that I could not come to you, but
you had to respond and come to me. You heard the bells and came
to me as I anticipated. That is all I will tell you right now."
"Well, I'll take any morsel I can get right now. Can you
tell me who you are? Obviously, you're more than a bell ringer
and I think more than any ordinary man..."
"If I just tell you outright you will not believe me,"
he said. "Hold your right hand up and let your fingertips
touch mine."
I felt kind of weird doing this. I looked around and saw we
were fairly secluded in a corner so I thought what the heck
and put my fingertips next to his.
"Now look at me steady in the eyes," he said.
It seemed a strange thing to do, but everything about this
man and events leading up to our encounter seemed strange, so
I thought I had nothing to lose and looked him in the eyes as
we touched fingertips. At first nothing seemed to happen.
"Keep looking," he said, "and free your mind
from all thoughts."
As I cooperated with him I felt my mind begin to drift. I thought
we were having a Vulcan mind melding, for I sensed a merging of
our two souls in a way difficult to explain.
He pulled away his fingers and asked: "Now you tell me...
Who am I?"
I drew back in a start and exclaimed: "I know who you
are. You're John!"
He smiled and said, "You've known all along my name is
John."
"But you're not just any John. You are the John!"
"And which John is that?"
"You are John, the fisherman, the son of Zebedee, the
apostle... the Beloved... How do I know this?"
"I transferred some of my memories to you. Do you believe
them?"
"You're right. If you told me outright I might have thought
you were a crackpot, but seeing your memories makes it hard to
deny. A part of me believes what I received but another part says
this is impossible. My mind has to make sense of all this. I have
to ask a couple of more questions."
"Ask away."
"Two thousand years have passed since the days of the
apostles. This means that either you are now an angel sent back
to the earth or are a resurrected being... Or perhaps I am just
dreaming all this."
"It is none of those things," he said.
"But what else could it be?" I asked.
"There is one more possibility that you missed. A hint
is given in the Bible." He then reached into a bag he carried
with him and pulled out a very old looking Bible. He found a passage,
pointed to it and said: "Here. Read this...Verses 22 and
23 in the twenty-first chapter of John."
I picked up his Bible and looked at it. The print was very
old. It seemed to be a King James translation, but the type was
an old Roman style. "I suppose this is the very first King
James Bible published," I said half joking.
He glanced back somewhat serious and said, "Not quite.
The first edition was bulky and not practical to carry around.
This is a later but still very old edition."
"Of course," I said, humoring myself. "Now which
verses was it you wanted me to read?"
"Twenty-two and twenty three. Keep in mind Jesus and Peter
were talking about the apostle John, who you now remember to be
me."
I paused and read the verses: Peter seeing him (John) saith
to Jesus, Lord, and what shall this man do? Jesus saith unto him,
If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee? Follow
thou me.
'Then went this saying abroad among the brethren, that that
disciple should not die: yet Jesus said not unto him, He shall
not die; but, if I will that he tarry till I come, what is that
to thee?"
"I remember this scripture," I said. "It is
very mysterious. It seems to leave it up in the air as to whether
John will die or not. I remember reading several legends that
he was boiled in oil and still survived."
"That's not a legend. I was boiled in oil. In addition
to that I have been crucified, tortured, stabbed, hung and shot
several times."
"So, you went through all that and you never died?"
I asked, amazed.
"Notice the careful wording of the scripture. It indicates
that the will of Jesus is that I tarry until he comes again, yet
he did not say that I shall not die. I have died several times,
but was revived again and healed by God... something like the
experience of Lazarus except when I was revived I was able to
choose the age I was to be. I usually pick the early twenties."
"But now you look like you're around sixty. Is that the
age you picked this time?"
"No, my friend. The last time I died I was revived looking
about the age of twenty-one. That was back in 1944. Since that
time I have been aging normally. My body presently has an age
of about 71 years of age."
"You look good for seventy-one," I remarked with
a smile.
"I've learned to take reasonable care of my body and have
learned to overcome sickness. I have not been ill for about 1500
years, and even then I was careless and poisoned by an enemy,
so I was not ill for normal reasons."
"So, how did you die in 1944?"
"I was hung with piano wire by a wayward brother."
"He must have been wayward all right. Who was this person?"
"Adolph Hitler."
"Hitler!" I exclaimed. After a moment of absorbing
the moment I asked, "So were you in a concentration camp
or something?"
"No." He paused a moment and continued, "I lived
among the Germans and assisted in an attempt to overthrow the
Nazis from within."
My eyes widened. "I remember reading about a rebellion
against Hitler lead by a one-eyed, three-fingered man."
"That man was Claus Schenk Von Staufenberg who made a
very brave effort to remove Hitler from power. I was there working
with and encouraging the little band of conspirators, but not
everything a disciple does succeeds. After Staufenberg failed
in his attempt to kill Hitler everyone who even smelled like they
didn't like Hitler was killed. I was unable to escape and was
one of those rounded up and hung with piano wire because they
couldn't find any regular rope."
"So, do you experience pain when you are killed?"
"When I am injured I feel what anyone else would feel,
but have learned to neutralize discomfort by detaching myself
from it."
"So when you die, and are revived, do you have the full
memory of your past?"
"When I am revived I lose a lot of my memories, but then
through contemplation I have learned to retrieve the important
ones. That is an advantage I have over others, if you want to
call it that. I have a memory that goes back 2000 years. If I
were to write the story of my full life it would take many volumes."
"So, what have you been doing the past 50 years?"
"It's a long story, but I will give you a skeleton outline.
After I was revived I saw that the next major threat was the Soviet
Union and have spent most of my time there. I am not allowed to
be a major player, however. My mission is to work with and inspire
and teach people who can change the world in a positive direction.
Therefore, in Russia I worked with those who sought freedom and
democracy and encouraged them to forge ahead. The Christ told
me that my work helped in the preparation for the falling of communism
and the Berlin Wall."
"I also traveled to China and worked with the Christ to
inspire the students at Tianamen Square, but as I told you, not
everything I do succeeds immediately. Even though the attempt
at democracy in China failed, we planted seeds that will materialize
in the next attempt."
"We now are living in a time of great opportunity. The
authority and tyranny that ruled Communism in the Soviet Union
has basically come to an end. We still have China and Third World
nations who will have nuclear weapons to worry about, but I saw
a window of opportunity where I could take some time off and offer
some pure spiritual teachings to the world. I have been looking
forward to this for lifetimes. I just hope you are ready for what
I have to give you, my friend."
"I've always been interested in philosophy", I said,
"and the spiritual side of life. If you want to teach me,
I'm a sponge waiting to be filled. I'm curious about one thing
though. Why did you pick me?"
"Christ selected you. He tuned my bells to your vibration
and sent me to Boise to send you the call."
"The call?"
"Yes. Before any great work is accomplished, there must
first be a free will response to a spiritual call of some kind.
You had to make a free will response to the bells you heard and
seek me out as I sought you out. The disciple must meet the Teacher
half way."
"So, this mission you have for me... Is that also based
on my free will?"
"Of course. You can accept or reject it. Few disciples,
however, reject a teaching mission. Instead, the problem is that
most of them wind up messing it up by seeking glory for themselves
instead of passing it along the chain that links us to the One
God."
"And what is this chain?"
"Whenever true knowledge comes to the earth it comes through
a chain of souls that are linked to the One Great Life. If you
accept your mission, you are linked to me, I am linked to Christ,
and Christ is linked to the entity he called Father in
the New Testament. The Father is linked to God with such oneness
that He is one with God and is God in every way that the average
man can conceive. Any links higher than the Eternal Father are
so far beyond us that it is futile for the average person to think
about them."
"You mean there are lives higher than Jesus or the Father
of Jesus?"
"It does not do a lot of good going into detail about
this now, for it will offend some people as truth always does.
I have been killed a number of times just because I was seen as
a heretic."
John continued, "I will say this one thing. Imagine the
consciousness of just one cell in your body. Next imagine the
consciousness of all your cells put together, which consciousness
is your own. The gap in consciousness between you and a cell is
so great that communication on an individual basis is not practical.
Yet, if you have a problem with your foot, which is composed of
billions of cells, you will pay attention to healing it and in
the process benefit not only the foot as a whole, but also the
billions of individual cells within it."
"The One God governs over a large universe and right now
this sector is a sore foot. You and I are cells that are working
in conjunction with many other cells to heal the foot. That is
all I will tell you about this at present. We must press on to
your mission for I'm not sure how long I have with you."
"Why aren't you sure?"
"If a world crisis surfaces I may be called away from
you."
"OK. I'll try to not distract you." I said. I was
amazed at myself for being so believing for I am usually fairly
skeptical of outlandish or unusual claims. But the reason I could
not seem to question the validity of this man was that he seemed
so familiar, like an old friend, and I could not deny the memories
he planted in my mind. I had to ask, "What is my mission?"
"The first part of your mission is to teach the Keys."
"What are the Keys?"
"There are Twelve Keys of Knowledge, Twelve Keys of Understanding
and Twelve Keys of Eternal Life. I am to teach them to you and
you will teach them to others."
"Are you sure you've got the right guy?" I asked.
"I've done a little teaching, but I'm no Moses."
"Moses didn't think he was a great teacher either, but
he did OK."
"Well, I would refuse to teach anything that doesn't make
sense to me," I said.
"That is exactly the quality we are looking for in a student,"
he said.
"I'll tell you what," I said. "Give me some
of your teachings, I'll think them over and we'll go from there."
"At least you are willing to start the process,"
said John, "but I can only give you the keys one at a time."
"Well, I guess it wouldn't hurt to learn a couple of them
and then if they make sense I could continue."
"A logical conclusion," stated John.
"So, when do we start?" I asked.
"How about now?" said John.
"Right now? I'm afraid I'm not prepared. I don't even
have anything with me to write on."
"This is not your standard method of teaching," he
said. "You do not need any paper."
"What do I need then?"
"You need to use your understanding as you never have
before..."
I was silent for a long 15 seconds in anticipation.