Is is possible to percieve God as an individual entity? 

Can the core essense of All That Is manifest in spirit form as an all-knowing, all-loving being? 

Can spirits in the afterlife will the appearance of this almighty entity through intent? 

Before reading Swedenborg's Heaven and Hell, I thought of God/All That Is/Source in nonphysical, nonhuman terms, and therefore did not consider the possibilities of the above questions .

However, Swedenborg's material has given me a new perspective upon the matter.

Swedenborg says there are three heavenly realms, the highest realm consisting of beings of the highest, or deepest, levels of love, goodness, and truth, and the lower two realms being made up of beings of decreasing levels of these godly qualities. 

Each realm has innumerous communities of these angelic beings, each community expressing their love, goodness, and truth in a different way than the other communities.

Swedenborg has a rather advanced perspective of what God is, especially for his time.  He believes God is the very essence of life, God is within all that is in heaven, and that the angels in heaven are therefore also parts of God, for the essence of God is within them.  He says angels are reflections of the totality of Heaven and God.  He sees everything as intimately connected, which I agree with.

Swedenborg says he has witnessed these heavenly communities as large groups of angels, and also in the form of one single being, as if all the beings of that community merged together to form one angelic entity.  He says these communities are also reflections of Heaven and God, in a larger form. 

He goes on to say that the angels in the true heavens perceive God in the same way- as a single entity.  Although God is actually much more than a single entity, he is at the same time able to manifest as one supreme angelic being. 

This actually makes a bit of sense to me.  Although God/All That Is is essentially nonhuman, I see no reason why God cannot manifest in an angelic/humanoid form.  Do you?

Sorry Dude, but I'm going to have to write a long answer without being certain of what I say, because I'm still trying to figure it out.

To begin, in the beginning, I believe there was just one being known as God.  God figured out what his existence is about for a while until he reached the point when he decided to create the many beings he created. By creating them and seeing what they found out, more knowledge was obtained.

Through all of this, God never lost his ability to exist as a being that is to some extent independent from what he created. I say to some extent, because he used parts of his own being to create everything. Where  else would he get the ingredients, since nothing but himself exists?

Regarding whether he would incarnate himself as a person such as Jesus,  I could come up with intellectual explanations as to why he would or wouldn't, but my intellect could be wrong. So I'll state what my experience has told me thus far.

When it comes to the night in heaven experience I speak of, in the past I've stated that I was able to have it eventhough I was an atheist, because I was basically a good loving person. Recently something has occurred to me. As I stated before, at the beginning of the experience I came to understand in a way that was certain that the story of Christ is true. This really surprised me, yet I accepted it as fact, because the manner in which I understood was much more certain than my old way of thinking.

Perhaps, and this is the new part, I was allowed to experience heaven after finding out about Christ, because I accepted what I found out.

Even though I found out about Christ during this experience, as far as I can remember, I didn't find out one way or the other if he and God are the same being.

One night about 2 years ago I tried to remember the above experience with Christ, and I tuned into the memory deeper than I usally do. I tuned into an understanding of how Christ has divine authority. Whenever I accepted this fact I found myself ascending in some way (e.g., moving towards the light), whenever I didn't, I found myself descending in some way (e.g., walking down a stairwell).

The question is, does Christ have authority because God gave it to him, or because he is God?

I have also shared about how I read one night that the  Gospel of Thomas speaks of Jesus as if he was an enlightened being; Matthew, Mark and Luke speak of him as a messenger of God; and John speaks of him as if he is God.

Later that evening I prayed for a dream that told me which gospel presents an accurate statement of who Christ is. In the middle of the night I woke up to write dream notes, and I saw the light of a spirit flash that was much bigger and radiated more energy than any spirit flash I've experienced before.  The presence of this spirit felt divine and more real than this World. It worked on my energy for about 15 minutes in a manner that was beyond how my kundalini ever did so. Ever since the energy in my upper chakras has been more alive, balanced and clear.

I didn't see nor hear Jesus during this experience, yet I felt like I was in contact with his presence. Plus, such a visitacion seemed like a natural response to my prayer. Plus, he has shown his human image to me a number of times.

For the above experience, I don't know if Christ was telling me if the Gospel of John is correct, or if he was simply telling me that his spirit can visit anybody he wants.

I asked Christ for a clarification a number of times, but haven't received an answer. I don't know why this is so (perhaps I missed it).  There have been numerous times when I haven't received an answer for a question. In some cases, such as this case, perhaps it is up to me to find the answer within.

Just to add something to what everyone else has said so well - Vaisnavas have a doctrine of 'acinta-abhedabheda" or "inconceivable oneness in separation" as regards the Ultimate Godhead/Krishna, which makes a great deal of sense to me. . .

If there is an actual God of all and everything I feel this entity could do whatever it wanted. Even appear in a movie as George Burns.

I haven't read ES yet and I'm just starting Seth stuff, but it feels like ES has his own impressions that he brings with him as we all would and while I enjoy the subjective experiences of others as much as anyone I have to let those fall by the wayside and grab from each source the things that resonate for me.

I've been putting it off but I'm going to read him too, but I guess the angelic visions and the punishments have kept me at bay...but alas I'm ignorant at this moment and I don't want to be.

My understanding from both TMI and Bruce is that they encourage you to explore and report back your findings and don't pretend that these focus levels are "set in stone," or that their observations about cosmology are "the way it is."  I can't speak for others, but the reason I bring up other explorers' observations, whether astral or NDEs is that it can only expand our understanding, especially where we find commonalities from people of different backgrounds.

M

Regarding the light Dude spoke of, there was a period of about two weeks where three times while awake my consciousness would suddenly shift for a moment and I would see this bright golden light that seemed to be far out in space, yet it was also close. It felt intense, divine and familiar. I figured it might be my higher self light, but perhaps not.

At the end of my night in heaven experience I saw like a bright star, and I believe it represented Christ.

Regarding what Seraphis1 wrote about finding it odd, Robert Monroe and Bruce Moen didn't say anything in their books about what they found out about Christ.

Perhaps they didn't find information about Christ because they didn't seek it.

I sought answers and found some. Swedenborg sought them and apparently found out a lot. I'm still reading his book, so I haven't come to any definite conclusions. Perhaps his descriptions are so body based because this is what people from his time period could understand.

Recoverer

That's pretty cool man.  I've decided to dedicate my future projections to exploring the true heavens that Swedenborg speaks of.

I'm still reading Swedenborg and figuring out what he's about, but he speaks of states of being that are beyond the hollow heaven paradigm.