PAPER 100
RELIGION IN HUMAN EXPERIENCE
100:0.1 THE experience of dynamic religious living
transforms the mediocre individual into a personality of idealistic power.
Religion ministers to the progress of all through fostering the progress of
each individual, and the progress of each is augmented through the achievement
of all.
100:0.2 Spiritual growth is mutually stimulated by
intimate association with other religionists. Love supplies the soil for
religious growth -- an objective lure in the place of subjective gratification
-- yet it yields the supreme subjective satisfaction. And religion ennobles
the commonplace drudgery of daily living.
1. RELIGIOUS GROWTH
100:1.1 While religion produces growth of meanings
and enhancement of values, evil always results when purely personal
evaluations are elevated to the levels of absolutes. A child evaluates
experience in accordance with the content of pleasure; maturity is
proportional to the substitution of higher meanings for personal pleasure,
even loyalties to the highest concepts of diversified life situations and
cosmic relations.
100:1.2 Some persons are too busy to grow and are
therefore in grave danger of spiritual fixation. Provision must be made for
growth of meanings at differing ages, in successive cultures, and in the
passing stages of advancing civilization. The chief inhibitors of growth are
prejudice and ignorance.
100:1.3 Give every developing child a chance to grow
his own religious experience; do not force a ready-made adult experience upon
him. Remember, year-by-year progress through an established educational regime
does not necessarily mean intellectual progress, much less spiritual growth.
Enlargement of vocabulary does not signify development of character. Growth is
not truly indicated by mere products but rather by progress. Real educational
growth is indicated by enhancement of ideals, increased appreciation of
values, new meanings of values, and augmented loyalty to supreme
values.
100:1.4 Children are permanently impressed only by
the loyalties of their adult associates; precept or even example is not
lastingly influential. Loyal persons are growing persons, and growth is an
impressive and inspiring reality. Live loyally today -- grow -- and tomorrow
will attend to itself. The quickest way for a tadpole to become a frog is to
live loyally each moment as a tadpole.
100:1.5 The soil essential for religious growth
presupposes a progressive life of self-realization, the co-ordination of
natural propensities, the exercise of curiosity and the enjoyment of
reasonable adventure, the experiencing of feelings of satisfaction, the
functioning of the fear stimulus of attention and awareness, the wonder-lure,
and a normal consciousness of smallness, humility. Growth is also predicated
on the discovery of selfhood accompanied by self-criticism -- conscience, for
conscience is really the criticism of oneself by one's own value-habits,
personal ideals.
100:1.6 Religious experience is markedly influenced
by physical health, inherited temperament, and social environment. But these
temporal conditions do not inhibit inner spiritual progress by a soul
dedicated to the doing of the will of the Father in heaven. There are present
in all normal mortals certain innate drives toward growth and self-realization
which function if they are not specifically inhibited. The certain technique
of fostering this constitutive endowment of the potential of spiritual growth
is to maintain an attitude of wholehearted devotion to supreme
values.
100:1.7 Religion cannot be bestowed, received,
loaned, learned, or lost. It is a personal experience which grows
proportionally to the growing quest for final values. Cosmic growth thus
attends on the accumulation of meanings and the ever-expanding elevation of
values. But nobility itself is always an unconscious growth.
100:1.8 Religious habits of thinking and acting are
contributory to the economy of spiritual growth. One can develop religious
predispositions toward favorable reaction to spiritual stimuli, a sort of
conditioned spiritual reflex. Habits which favor religious growth embrace
cultivated sensitivity to divine values, recognition of religious living in
others, reflective meditation on cosmic meanings, worshipful problem solving,
sharing one's spiritual life with one's fellows, avoidance of selfishness,
refusal to presume on divine mercy, living as in the presence of God. The
factors of religious growth may be intentional, but the growth itself is
unvaryingly unconscious.
100:1.9 The unconscious nature of religious growth
does not, however, signify that it is an activity functioning in the supposed
subconscious realms of human intellect; rather does it signify creative
activities in the superconscious levels of mortal mind. The experience of the
realization of the reality of unconscious religious growth is the one positive
proof of the functional existence of the superconsciousness.
2. SPIRITUAL GROWTH
100:2.1 Spiritual development depends, first, on the
maintenance of a living spiritual connection with true spiritual forces and,
second, on the continuous bearing of spiritual fruit: yielding the ministry to
one's fellows of that which has been received from one's spiritual
benefactors. Spiritual progress is predicated on intellectual recognition of
spiritual poverty coupled with the self-consciousness of perfection-hunger,
the desire to know God and be like him, the wholehearted purpose to do the
will of the Father in heaven.
100:2.2 Spiritual growth is first an awakening to
needs, next a discernment of meanings, and then a discovery of values. The
evidence of true spiritual development consists in the exhibition of a human
personality motivated by love, activated by unselfish ministry, and dominated
by the wholehearted worship of the perfection ideals of divinity. And this
entire experience constitutes the reality of religion as contrasted with mere
theological beliefs.
100:2.3 Religion can progress to that level of
experience whereon it becomes an enlightened and wise technique of spiritual
reaction to the universe. Such a glorified religion can function on three
levels of human personality: the intellectual, the morontial, and the
spiritual; upon the mind, in the evolving soul, and with the indwelling
spirit.
100:2.4 Spirituality becomes at once the indicator
of one's nearness to God and the measure of one's usefulness to fellow beings.
Spirituality enhances the ability to discover beauty in things, recognize
truth in meanings, and discover goodness in values. Spiritual development is
determined by capacity therefor and is directly proportional to the
elimination of the selfish qualities of love.
100:2.5 Actual spiritual status is the measure of
Deity attainment, Adjuster attunement. The achievement of finality of
spirituality is equivalent to the attainment of the maximum of reality, the
maximum of Godlikeness. Eternal life is the endless quest for infinite values.
100:2.6 The goal of human self-realization should be
spiritual, not material. The only realities worth striving for are divine,
spiritual, and eternal. Mortal man is entitled to the enjoyment of physical
pleasures and to the satisfaction of human affections; he is benefited by
loyalty to human associations and temporal institutions; but these are not the
eternal foundations upon which to build the immortal personality which must
transcend space, vanquish time, and achieve the eternal destiny of divine
perfection and finaliter service.
100:2.7 Jesus portrayed the profound surety of the
God-knowing mortal when he said: "To a God-knowing kingdom believer, what does
it matter if all things earthly crash?" Temporal securities are vulnerable,
but spiritual sureties are impregnable. When the flood tides of human
adversity, selfishness, cruelty, hate, malice, and jealousy beat about the
mortal soul, you may rest in the assurance that there is one inner bastion,
the citadel of the spirit, which is absolutely unassailable; at least this is
true of every human being who has dedicated the keeping of his soul to the
indwelling spirit of the eternal God.
100:2.8 After such spiritual attainment, whether
secured by gradual growth or specific crisis, there occurs a new orientation
of personality as well as the development of a new standard of values. Such
spirit-born individuals are so remotivated in life that they can calmly stand
by while their fondest ambitions perish and their keenest hopes crash; they
positively know that such catastrophes are but the redirecting cataclysms
which wreck one's temporal creations preliminary to the rearing of the more
noble and enduring realities of a new and more sublime level of universe
attainment.
3. CONCEPTS OF SUPREME VALUE
100:3.1 Religion is not a technique for attaining a
static and blissful peace of mind; it is an impulse for organizing the soul
for dynamic service. It is the enlistment of the totality of selfhood in the
loyal service of loving God and serving man. Religion pays any price essential
to the attainment of the supreme goal, the eternal prize. There is a
consecrated completeness in religious loyalty which is superbly sublime. And
these loyalties are socially effective and spiritually progressive.
100:3.2 To the religionist the word God becomes a
symbol signifying the approach to supreme reality and the recognition of
divine value. Human likes and dislikes do not determine good and evil; moral
values do not grow out of wish fulfillment or emotional
frustration.
100:3.3 In the contemplation of values you must
distinguish between that which is value and that which has
value. You must recognize the relation between pleasurable activities and
their meaningful integration and enhanced realization on ever progressively
higher and higher levels of human experience.
100:3.4 Meaning is something which experience adds
to value; it is the appreciative consciousness of values. An isolated and
purely selfish pleasure may connote a virtual devaluation of meanings, a
meaningless enjoyment bordering on relative evil. Values are experiential when
realities are meaningful and mentally associated, when such relationships are
recognized and appreciated by mind.
100:3.5 Values can never be static; reality
signifies change, growth. Change without growth, expansion of meaning and
exaltation of value, is valueless -- is potential evil. The greater the
quality of cosmic adaptation, the more of meaning any experience possesses.
Values are not conceptual illusions; they are real, but always they depend on
the fact of relationships. Values are always both actual and potential -- not
what was, but what is and is to be.
100:3.6 The association of actuals and potentials
equals growth, the experiential realization of values. But growth is not mere
progress. Progress is always meaningful, but it is relatively valueless
without growth. The supreme value of human life consists in growth of values,
progress in meanings, and realization of the cosmic interrelatedness of both
of these experiences. And such an experience is the equivalent of
God-consciousness. Such a mortal, while not supernatural, is truly becoming
superhuman; an immortal soul is evolving.
100:3.7 Man cannot cause growth, but he can supply
favorable conditions. Growth is always unconscious, be it physical,
intellectual, or spiritual. Love thus grows; it cannot be created,
manufactured, or purchased; it must grow. Evolution is a cosmic technique of
growth. Social growth cannot be secured by legislation, and moral growth is
not had by improved administration. Man may manufacture a machine, but its
real value must be derived from human culture and personal appreciation. Man's
sole contribution to growth is the mobilization of the total powers of his
personality -- living faith.
4. PROBLEMS OF GROWTH
100:4.1 Religious living is devoted living, and
devoted living is creative living, original and spontaneous. New religious
insights arise out of conflicts which initiate the choosing of new and better
reaction habits in the place of older and inferior reaction patterns. New
meanings only emerge amid conflict; and conflict persists only in the face of
refusal to espouse the higher values connoted in superior meanings.
100:4.2 Religious perplexities are inevitable; there
can be no growth without psychic conflict and spiritual agitation. The
organization of a philosophic standard of living entails considerable
commotion in the philosophic realms of the mind. Loyalties are not exercised
in behalf of the great, the good, the true, and the noble without a struggle.
Effort is attendant upon clarification of spiritual vision and enhancement of
cosmic insight. And the human intellect protests against being weaned from
subsisting upon the nonspiritual energies of temporal existence. The slothful
animal mind rebels at the effort required to wrestle with cosmic problem
solving.
100:4.3 But the great problem of religious living
consists in the task of unifying the soul powers of the personality by the
dominance of LOVE. Health, mental efficiency, and happiness arise from the
unification of physical systems, mind systems, and spirit systems. Of health
and sanity man understands much, but of happiness he has truly realized very
little. The highest happiness is indissolubly linked with spiritual progress.
Spiritual growth yields lasting joy, peace which passes all understanding.
100:4.4 In physical life the senses tell of the
existence of things; mind discovers the reality of meanings; but the spiritual
experience reveals to the individual the true values of life. These high
levels of human living are attained in the supreme love of God and in the
unselfish love of man. If you love your fellow men, you must have discovered
their values. Jesus loved men so much because he placed such a high value upon
them. You can best discover values in your associates by discovering their
motivation. If some one irritates you, causes feelings of resentment, you
should sympathetically seek to discern his viewpoint, his reasons for such
objectionable conduct. If once you understand your neighbor, you will become
tolerant, and this tolerance will grow into friendship and ripen into
love.
100:4.5 In the mind's eye conjure up a picture of
one of your primitive ancestors of cave-dwelling times -- a short, misshapen,
filthy, snarling hulk of a man standing, legs spread, club upraised, breathing
hate and animosity as he looks fiercely just ahead. Such a picture hardly
depicts the divine dignity of man. But allow us to enlarge the picture. In
front of this animated human crouches a saber-toothed tiger. Behind him, a
woman and two children. Immediately you recognize that such a picture stands
for the beginnings of much that is fine and noble in the human race, but the
man is the same in both pictures. Only in the second sketch you are favored
with a widened horizon. You therein discern the motivation of this evolving
mortal. His attitude becomes praiseworthy because you understand him. If you
could only fathom the motives of your associates, how much better you would
understand them. If you could only know your fellows, you would eventually
fall in love with them.
100:4.6 You cannot truly love your fellows by a mere
act of the will. Love is only born of thoroughgoing understanding of your
neighbor's motives and sentiments. It is not so important to love all men
today as it is that each day you learn to love one more human being. If each
day or each week you achieve an understanding of one more of your fellows, and
if this is the limit of your ability, then you are certainly socializing and
truly spiritualizing your personality. Love is infectious, and when human
devotion is intelligent and wise, love is more catching than hate. But only
genuine and unselfish love is truly contagious. If each mortal could only
become a focus of dynamic affection, this benign virus of love would soon
pervade the sentimental emotion-stream of humanity to such an extent that all
civilization would be encompassed by love, and that would be the realization
of the brotherhood of man.
5. CONVERSION AND MYSTICISM
100:5.1 The world is filled with lost souls, not
lost in the theologic sense but lost in the directional meaning, wandering
about in confusion among the isms and cults of a frustrated philosophic era.
Too few have learned how to install a philosophy of living in the place of
religious authority. (The symbols of socialized religion are not to be
despised as channels of growth, albeit the river bed is not the river.)
100:5.2 The progression of religious growth leads
from stagnation through conflict to co-ordination, from insecurity to
undoubting faith, from confusion of cosmic consciousness to unification of
personality, from the temporal objective to the eternal, from the bondage of
fear to the liberty of divine sonship.
100:5.3 It should be made clear that professions of
loyalty to the supreme ideals -- the psychic, emotional, and spiritual
awareness of God-consciousness -- may be a natural and gradual growth or may
sometimes be experienced at certain junctures, as in a crisis. The Apostle
Paul experienced just such a sudden and spectacular conversion that eventful
day on the Damascus road. Gautama Siddhartha had a similar experience the
night he sat alone and sought to penetrate the mystery of final truth. Many
others have had like experiences, and many true believers have progressed in
the spirit without sudden conversion.
100:5.4 Most of the spectacular phenomena associated
with so-called religious conversions are entirely psychologic in nature, but
now and then there do occur experiences which are also spiritual in origin.
When the mental mobilization is absolutely total on any level of the psychic
upreach toward spirit attainment, when there exists perfection of the human
motivation of loyalties to the divine idea, then there very often occurs a
sudden down-grasp of the indwelling spirit to synchronize with the
concentrated and consecrated purpose of the superconscious mind of the
believing mortal. And it is such experiences of unified intellectual and
spiritual phenomena that constitute the conversion which consists in factors
over and above purely psychologic involvement.
100:5.5 But emotion alone is a false conversion; one
must have faith as well as feeling. To the extent that such psychic
mobilization is partial, and in so far as such human-loyalty motivation is
incomplete, to that extent will the experience of conversion be a blended
intellectual, emotional, and spiritual reality.
100:5.6 If one is disposed to recognize a
theoretical subconscious mind as a practical working hypothesis in the
otherwise unified intellectual life, then, to be consistent, one should
postulate a similar and corresponding realm of ascending intellectual activity
as the superconscious level, the zone of immediate contact with the indwelling
spirit entity, the Thought Adjuster. The great danger in all these psychic
speculations is that visions and other so-called mystic experiences, along
with extraordinary dreams, may be regarded as divine communications to the
human mind. In times past, divine beings have revealed themselves to certain
God-knowing persons, not because of their mystic trances or morbid visions,
but in spite of all these phenomena.
100:5.7 In contrast with conversion-seeking, the
better approach to the morontia zones of possible contact with the Thought
Adjuster would be through living faith and sincere worship, wholehearted and
unselfish prayer. Altogether too much of the uprush of the memories of the
unconscious levels of the human mind has been mistaken for divine revelations
and spirit leadings.
100:5.8 There is great danger associated with the
habitual practice of religious daydreaming; mysticism may become a technique
of reality avoidance, albeit it has sometimes been a means of genuine
spiritual communion. Short seasons of retreat from the busy scenes of life may
not be seriously dangerous, but prolonged isolation of personality is most
undesirable. Under no circumstances should the trancelike state of visionary
consciousness be cultivated as a religious experience.
100:5.9 The characteristics of the mystical state
are diffusion of consciousness with vivid islands of focal attention operating
on a comparatively passive intellect. All of this gravitates consciousness
toward the subconscious rather than in the direction of the zone of spiritual
contact, the superconscious. Many mystics have carried their mental
dissociation to the level of abnormal mental manifestations.
100:5.10 The more healthful attitude of spiritual
meditation is to be found in reflective worship and in the prayer of
thanksgiving. The direct communion with one's Thought Adjuster, such as
occurred in the later years of Jesus' life in the flesh, should not be
confused with these so-called mystical experiences. The factors which
contribute to the initiation of mystic communion are indicative of the danger
of such psychic states. The mystic status is favored by such things as:
physical fatigue, fasting, psychic dissociation, profound aesthetic
experiences, vivid sex impulses, fear, anxiety, rage, and wild dancing. Much
of the material arising as a result of such preliminary preparation has its
origin in the subconscious mind.
100:5.11 However favorable may have been the
conditions for mystic phenomena, it should be clearly understood that Jesus of
Nazareth never resorted to such methods for communion with the Paradise
Father. Jesus had no subconscious delusions or superconscious illusions.
6. MARKS OF RELIGIOUS LIVING
100:6.1 Evolutionary religions and revelatory
religions may differ markedly in method, but in motive there is great
similarity. Religion is not a specific function of life; rather is it a mode
of living. True religion is a wholehearted devotion to some reality which the
religionist deems to be of supreme value to himself and for all mankind. And
the outstanding characteristics of all religions are: unquestioning loyalty
and wholehearted devotion to supreme values. This religious devotion to
supreme values is shown in the relation of the supposedly irreligious mother
to her child and in the fervent loyalty of nonreligionists to an espoused
cause.
100:6.2 The accepted supreme value of the
religionist may be base or even false, but it is nevertheless religious. A
religion is genuine to just the extent that the value which is held to be
supreme is truly a cosmic reality of genuine spiritual worth.
100:6.3 The marks of human response to the religious
impulse embrace the qualities of nobility and grandeur. The sincere
religionist is conscious of universe citizenship and is aware of making
contact with sources of superhuman power. He is thrilled and energized with
the assurance of belonging to a superior and ennobled fellowship of the sons
of God. The consciousness of self-worth has become augmented by the stimulus
of the quest for the highest universe objectives -- supreme goals.
100:6.4 The self has surrendered to the intriguing
drive of an all-encompassing motivation which imposes heightened
self-discipline, lessens emotional conflict, and makes mortal life truly worth
living. The morbid recognition of human limitations is changed to the natural
consciousness of mortal shortcomings, associated with moral determination and
spiritual aspiration to attain the highest universe and superuniverse goals.
And this intense striving for the attainment of supermortal ideals is always
characterized by increasing patience, forbearance, fortitude, and
tolerance.
100:6.5 But true religion is a living love, a life
of service. The religionist's detachment from much that is purely temporal and
trivial never leads to social isolation, and it should not destroy the sense
of humor. Genuine religion takes nothing away from human existence, but it
does add new meanings to all of life; it generates new types of enthusiasm,
zeal, and courage. It may even engender the spirit of the crusader, which is
more than dangerous if not controlled by spiritual insight and loyal devotion
to the commonplace social obligations of human loyalties.
100:6.6 One of the most amazing earmarks of
religious living is that dynamic and sublime peace, that peace which passes
all human understanding, that cosmic poise which betokens the absence of all
doubt and turmoil. Such levels of spiritual stability are immune to
disappointment. Such religionists are like the Apostle Paul, who said: "I am
persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor
powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor
anything else shall be able to separate us from the love of God."
100:6.7 There is a sense of security, associated
with the realization of triumphing glory, resident in the consciousness of the
religionist who has grasped the reality of the Supreme, and who pursues the
goal of the Ultimate.
100:6.8 Even evolutionary religion is all of this in
loyalty and grandeur because it is a genuine experience. But revelatory
religion is excellent as well as genuine. The new loyalties of enlarged
spiritual vision create new levels of love and devotion, of service and
fellowship; and all this enhanced social outlook produces an enlarged
consciousness of the Fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man.
100:6.9 The characteristic difference between
evolved and revealed religion is a new quality of divine wisdom which is added
to purely experiential human wisdom. But it is experience in and with the
human religions that develops the capacity for subsequent reception of
increased bestowals of divine wisdom and cosmic insight.
7. THE ACME OF RELIGIOUS LIVING
100:7.1 Although the average mortal of Urantia
cannot hope to attain the high perfection of character which Jesus of Nazareth
acquired while sojourning in the flesh, it is altogether possible for every
mortal believer to develop a strong and unified personality along the
perfected lines of the Jesus personality. The unique feature of the Master's
personality was not so much its perfection as its symmetry, its exquisite and
balanced unification. The most effective presentation of Jesus consists in
following the example of the one who said, as he gestured toward the Master
standing before his accusers, "Behold the man!"
100:7.2 The unfailing kindness of Jesus touched the
hearts of men, but his stalwart strength of character amazed his followers. He
was truly sincere; there was nothing of the hypocrite in him. He was free from
affectation; he was always so refreshingly genuine. He never stooped to
pretense, and he never resorted to shamming. He lived the truth, even as he
taught it. He was the truth. He was constrained to proclaim saving truth to
his generation, even though such sincerity sometimes caused pain. He was
unquestioningly loyal to all truth.
100:7.3 But the Master was so reasonable, so
approachable. He was so practical in all his ministry, while all his plans
were characterized by such sanctified common sense. He was so free from all
freakish, erratic, and eccentric tendencies. He was never capricious,
whimsical, or hysterical. In all his teaching and in everything he did there
was always an exquisite discrimination associated with an extraordinary sense
of propriety.
100:7.4 The Son of Man was always a well-poised
personality. Even his enemies maintained a wholesome respect for him; they
even feared his presence. Jesus was unafraid. He was surcharged with divine
enthusiasm, but he never became fanatical. He was emotionally active but never
flighty. He was imaginative but always practical. He frankly faced the
realities of life, but he was never dull or prosaic. He was courageous but
never reckless; prudent but never cowardly. He was sympathetic but not
sentimental; unique but not eccentric. He was pious but not sanctimonious. And
he was so well-poised because he was so perfectly unified.
100:7.5 Jesus' originality was unstifled. He was not
bound by tradition or handicapped by enslavement to narrow conventionality. He
spoke with undoubted confidence and taught with absolute authority. But his
superb originality did not cause him to overlook the gems of truth in the
teachings of his predecessors and contemporaries. And the most original of his
teachings was the emphasis of love and mercy in the place of fear and
sacrifice.
100:7.6 Jesus was very broad in his outlook. He
exhorted his followers to preach the gospel to all peoples. He was free from
all narrow-mindedness. His sympathetic heart embraced all mankind, even a
universe. Always his invitation was, "Whosoever will, let him
come."
100:7.7 Of Jesus it was truly said, "He trusted
God." As a man among men he most sublimely trusted the Father in heaven. He
trusted his Father as a little child trusts his earthly parent. His faith was
perfect but never presumptuous. No matter how cruel nature might appear to be
or how indifferent to man's welfare on earth, Jesus never faltered in his
faith. He was immune to disappointment and impervious to persecution. He was
untouched by apparent failure.
100:7.8 He loved men as brothers, at the same time
recognizing how they differed in innate endowments and acquired qualities. "He
went about doing good."
100:7.9 Jesus was an unusually cheerful person, but
he was not a blind and unreasoning optimist. His constant word of exhortation
was, "Be of good cheer." He could maintain this confident attitude because of
his unswerving trust in God and his unshakable confidence in man. He was
always touchingly considerate of all men because he loved them and believed in
them. Still he was always true to his convictions and magnificently firm in
his devotion to the doing of his Father's will.
100:7.10 The Master was always generous. He never
grew weary of saying, "It is more blessed to give than to receive." Said he,
"Freely you have received, freely give." And yet, with all of his unbounded
generosity, he was never wasteful or extravagant. He taught that you must
believe to receive salvation. "For every one who seeks shall
receive."
100:7.11 He was candid, but always kind. Said he,
"If it were not so, I would have told you." He was frank, but always friendly.
He was outspoken in his love for the sinner and in his hatred for sin. But
throughout all this amazing frankness he was unerringly fair.
100:7.12 Jesus was consistently cheerful,
notwithstanding he sometimes drank deeply of the cup of human sorrow. He
fearlessly faced the realities of existence, yet was he filled with enthusiasm
for the gospel of the kingdom. But he controlled his enthusiasm; it never
controlled him. He was unreservedly dedicated to "the Father's business." This
divine enthusiasm led his unspiritual brethren to think he was beside himself,
but the onlooking universe appraised him as the model of sanity and the
pattern of supreme mortal devotion to the high standards of spiritual living.
And his controlled enthusiasm was contagious; his associates were constrained
to share his divine optimism.
100:7.13 This man of Galilee was not a man of
sorrows; he was a soul of gladness. Always was he saying, "Rejoice and be
exceedingly glad." But when duty required, he was willing to walk courageously
through the "valley of the shadow of death." He was gladsome but at the same
time humble.
100:7.14 His courage was equaled only by his
patience. When pressed to act prematurely, he would only reply, "My hour has
not yet come." He was never in a hurry; his composure was sublime. But he was
often indignant at evil, intolerant of sin. He was often mightily moved to
resist that which was inimical to the welfare of his children on earth. But
his indignation against sin never led to anger at the sinner.
100:7.15 His courage was magnificent, but he was
never foolhardy. His watchword was, "Fear not." His bravery was lofty and his
courage often heroic. But his courage was linked with discretion and
controlled by reason. It was courage born of faith, not the recklessness of
blind presumption. He was truly brave but never audacious.
100:7.16 The Master was a pattern of reverence. The
prayer of even his youth began, "Our Father who is in heaven, hallowed be your
name." He was even respectful of the faulty worship of his fellows. But this
did not deter him from making attacks on religious traditions or assaulting
errors of human belief. He was reverential of true holiness, and yet he could
justly appeal to his fellows, saying, "Who among you convicts me of
sin?"
100:7.17 Jesus was great because he was good, and
yet he fraternized with the little children. He was gentle and unassuming in
his personal life, and yet he was the perfected man of a universe. His
associates called him Master unbidden.
100:7.18 Jesus was the perfectly unified human
personality. And today, as in Galilee, he continues to unify mortal experience
and to co-ordinate human endeavors. He unifies life, ennobles character, and
simplifies experience. He enters the human mind to elevate, transform, and
transfigure it. It is literally true: "If any man has Christ Jesus within him,
he is a new creature; old things are passing away; behold, all things are
becoming new."
100:7.19 Presented
by a Melchizedek of Nebadon.
