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Agondonters

420 posts · 13 participants · started Mar 23, 2017, 2:39 PM

MaraParticipant
Mar 29, 2017, 3:28 PM
Nice discussion

59:3.8[Part IV]

The world is filled with hungry souls who famish in the very presence of the bread of life; men die searching for the very God who lives within them. Men seek for the treasures of the kingdom with yearning hearts and weary feet when they are all within the immediate grasp of living faith. Faith is to religion what sails are to a ship; it is an addition of power, not an added burden of life. There is but one struggle for those who enter the kingdom, and that is to fight the good fight of faith. The believer has only one battle, and that is against doubt — unbelief

It is interesting to me that the *believer* has only one battle – the battle against doubt, unbelief. This indicates to me the role of mind in the process – which I think is multilayered and dynamic, rather than A + B + C + D = the treasures of the kingdom. Living faith is an addition of power not a drag in navigation. Mind is the arena of choice where one can set the sails or furl them. Even when one’s sails are set, one can always change one’s mind, doubt. Maybe that’s why they tell us so many grow weary in progression (32:3.6).

109:5.4[Part III]

The great problem of life is the adjustment of the ancestral tendencies of living to the demands of the spiritual urges initiated by the divine presence of the Mystery Monitor. While in the universe and superuniverse careers no man can serve two masters, in the life you now live on Urantia every man must perforce serve two masters. He must become adept in the art of a continuous human temporal compromise while he yields spiritual allegiance to but one master; and this is why so many falter and fail, grow weary and succumb to the stress of the evolutionary struggle.

Jesus said to Thomas, “. . .Thomas, you must cease doubting; you must grow in faith and the knowledge of truth. Believe in God like a child but cease to act so childishly. Have courage; be strong in faith and mighty in the kingdom of God.” (192:2.9) Doubt seems to be a big stumbling block.
BonitaParticipant
Mar 29, 2017, 4:17 PM

George Park wrote:

My questions were really directed at the difficulties involved in realizing the difference between belief in the intellectual idea of God and faith in our spiritual insight into the reality of God, because they are so inter-associated in personal experience.

Only if beliefs motivate and shape all manner of one’s life:

101:8.1 Belief has attained the level of faith when it motivates life and shapes the mode of living. The acceptance of a teaching as true is not faith; that is mere belief. Neither is certainty nor conviction faith. A state of mind attains to faith levels only when it actually dominates the mode of living. Faith is a living attribute of genuine personal religious experience. One believes truth, admires beauty, and reverences goodness, but does not worship them; such an attitude of saving faith is centered on God alone, who is all of these personified and infinitely more.

101:8.2 Belief is always limiting and binding; faith is expanding and releasing. Belief fixates, faith liberates. But living religious faith is more than the association of noble beliefs; it is more than an exalted system of philosophy; it is a living experience concerned with spiritual meanings, divine ideals, and supreme values; it is God-knowing and man-serving. Beliefs may become group possessions, but faith must be personal. Theologic beliefs can be suggested to a group, but faith can rise up only in the heart of the individual religionist.
MaraParticipant
Mar 29, 2017, 7:23 PM
I was going to pull out only the inevitability of faith, but I so much enjoyed reading all of them, I wanted you to get a chance to read or reread them too.

3:5.5 The uncertainties of life and the vicissitudes of existence do not in any manner contradict the concept of the universal sovereignty of God. All evolutionary creature life is beset by certain inevitabilities. Consider the following:

^(51.5)^3:5.6 1. Is courage — strength of character — desirable? Then must man be reared in an environment which necessitates grappling with hardships and reacting to disappointments.

^(51.6)^3:5.7 2. Is altruism — service of one’s fellows — desirable? Then must life experience provide for encountering situations of social inequality.

^(51.7)^3:5.8 3. Is hope — the grandeur of trust — desirable? Then human existence must constantly be confronted with insecurities and recurrent uncertainties.

^(51.8)^3:5.94. Is faith — the supreme assertion of human thought — desirable? Then must the mind of man find itself in that troublesome predicament where it ever knows less than it can believe.

^(51.9)^3:5.10 5. Is the love of truth and the willingness to go wherever it leads, desirable? Then must man grow up in a world where error is present and falsehood always possible.

^(51.10)^3:5.11 6. Is idealism — the approaching concept of the divine — desirable? Then must man struggle in an environment of relative goodness and beauty, surroundings stimulative of the irrepressible reach for better things.

^(51.11)^3:5.12 7. Is loyalty — devotion to highest duty — desirable? Then must man carry on amid the possibilities of betrayal and desertion. The valor of devotion to duty consists in the implied danger of default.

^(51.12)^3:5.13 8. Is unselfishness — the spirit of self-forgetfulness — desirable? Then must mortal man live face to face with the incessant clamoring of an inescapable self for recognition and honor. Man could not dynamically choose the divine life if there were no self-life to forsake. Man could never lay saving hold on righteousness if there were no potential evil to exalt and differentiate the good by contrast.

^(51.13)^3:5.14 9. Is pleasure — the satisfaction of happiness — desirable? Then must man live in a world where the alternative of pain and the likelihood of suffering are ever-present experiential possibilities.

Why are they inevitable?
Nigel NunnParticipant
Mar 30, 2017, 7:14 AM
Hi Bonita — your description of the process (in post 24417 above) is the best I’ve seen!

If ever you get “that book” to the publisher, a condensate of those thoughts would make a fine blurb for the back cover.

with thanks,
Nigel
BonitaParticipant
Mar 30, 2017, 2:21 PM
Hey Nigel! Thanks. But I doubt any publisher would ever want to publish such a book . . . Just sayin’

I wanted to add something to my last paragraph in that post. I described the mind phenomenon and then added the bit about personality in that last paragraph. Personality is a critical participant in faith and should not be minimized. I think this is where many people fail to grasp the reality of living faith. Many people deny the existence of God as a personality, yet they are willing to accept the idea that there is a little voice in their head that tries to illuminate the difference between right or wrong. Most of those people attribute that voice to their own conscience and think it’s their own mind, thereby giving all credit to themselves for coming up with humane solutions to moral problems. Now, we know that the moral conscience is one’s own mind talking to itself, but occasionally the moral solutions arrived at in a sincerely seeking mind get spiritized with soul content. So, in a sense, these people are indeed talking to themselves inside their own heads, but sometimes it is their “higher self” they’re talking to without realizing it. We know that true altruism comes from only one source.

This is why I think TUB is such a huge break-through in that it introduces the concept of mind ministry and the spiritual forces at play within our own minds. I haven’t discovered a way to introduce this to people who deny the personality of God, but I’m given hope in that the authors of TUB provided us with two whole papers on how the apostles convinced Rodan that God is a person. Somewhere in those chapters is the secret to the success of the philosophical approach to this problem.

But I often wonder, is it really necessary to correct these people who deny the existence of God as a person inside their heads? I know from personal experience that embracing this reality is transforming and transfiguring, something I wish every person could or would experience. But is it best to allow this awareness to grow on its own, or should it be nudged along by those who have had the experience? I personally have chosen to allow people to grow on their own unless they seek me out on the subject. I testify to the reality of God the Father, a person, in my own experience whenever I think there might be a “listening ear” . . . and then do my best to otherwise walk the talk.
BradlyParticipant
Mar 30, 2017, 4:24 PM
I have noticed that Jesus always seemed to find ways to engage other minds by finding those ideals held in common more than concepts of contrast and he often did this in asking questions in a form of comfort and sincerity that almost forces the mind’s upward thrust beyond concepts. He truly seemed more interested in the discovery of someone’s highest thoughts and feelings and hopes and values rather than convincing anyone of anything.

His questions could be gently leading, or compelling and perplexing, or quickly expose insincerity and hypocrisy. All sincerity was uplifted and all insincerity was exposed….and with charm, wit, and soft touch that was experienced very personally by all and each.

Just re-read the Rodan Papers. He decided eventually that God could never be less than creation and reality but must be all of that and more. So since mortals have mind and personality, the creator of mind and personality had to have both or could create neither.

I am beginning to appreciate the relationship between love and faith and the power of our inherent dual nature to reveal the inner light which naturally leads the mind to a basic recognition of THAT which is greater and may deliver us to the WHO that is greatest. The study of Andon and Fonta and how they had faith, a faith which could not derive from any knowledge but did arrive from the inner experience which occurs no matter the context or the concepts related to that experience within. I would think then that the love-response which leads us to love others over self is a natural urge that arises from this internal/mindal recognition of our other and spirit nature.

Indeed, the most pagan and primitive religions and beliefs are transferring this other nature of ourselves onto the natural, material world which is already well known and physically experiential. The mind appears to always and naturally overlay the material with the spiritual nature to explain the experience with the material world. From the first inhabitant of our world, the mind is perfectly aware of the dual-fold realities and attempts to unify and harmonize those.

It is unfortunate that material distractions and escapes and other forms of attachment so often dims this inner light of our dual natures and that ideals, values, hopes, and faith suffer from simple inattention. A voluntary form of a fading effect.

I think Jesus always looked for and most often found the light or even the flicker of light within others and found some way to fuel and fan that flame from inside the mind of others without imposing anything from outside and without inserting beliefs or contradictions to beliefs directly or oppositionally. He only added that which was sought after with the personal idealism of the seeker.

Nothing can be given to those who do not seek. And nothing true or real or of value and meaning in mind is truly found by any seeker which does not then change our motivation to live, our intentions at the intersections of time, the priorities which drive our very choices….faith changes choice and the destiny determined by those choices. And as the fruits of the spirit arise and grow, faith strengthens our source of resolve and future choices to come. We are designed and built to recognize our dual nature and to yearn for an understanding and unifying of ALL of reality into a singular experience which harmonizes ALL experience. Even the most primitive minds are not primitive at all in this function of mind and personality to seek meaning and value in our experience….which delivers faith regardless of the error and accuracies of knowledge and belief.

We can prevent this natural function or diminish its power…but it does take an effort to silence the voice within and cloak the light of the spirit nature.

"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."
BonitaParticipant
Mar 30, 2017, 9:27 PM
Quote 100:7.18 says that Jesus coordinated the faith in his soul with the wisdom of his mind. This is how it’s done . . . gateway and bridge.

100:7.18 The Son of Man was a splendidly unified human personality; he was a perfectly endowed divine being; he was also magnificently co-ordinated as a combined human and divine being functioning on earth as a single personality. Always did the Master co-ordinate the faith of the soul with the wisdom-appraisals of seasoned experience. Personal faith, spiritual hope, and moral devotion were always correlated in a matchless religious unity of harmonious association with the keen realization of the reality and sacredness of all human loyalties–personal honor, family love, religious obligation, social duty, and economic necessity.
George ParkParticipant
Mar 31, 2017, 11:49 AM

Bonita wrote:

Quote 100:7.18 says that Jesus coordinated the faith in his soul with the wisdom of his mind. This is how it’s done . . . gateway and bridge.

I wonder how this coordination of faith and wisdom might differ for agondonters? Meredith Sprunger relayed to me many years ago that Dr. Sadler told him that the revelatory commission said that Urantia is the only world in Nebadon where an epochal revelation has appeared in the form of a book; on every other planet, such tasks are always entrusted to superhuman personalities. This is third-hand information from what I personally consider a sincere source, but there is no way to verify or validate it. Faith inclined me to immediately believe it, but wisdom raised many questions and concerns which took a long time to address.

The Urantia Book is just a material thing, like anything else we might pick up and hold in our hands. But Meredith’s comment made me wonder if this visible thing has actually been sent as a stand-in, an actual replacement, for the visible superhuman teachers on normal worlds. If this is so, how might this change wisdom’s appraisal of this Book in which we have faith?
Van AmadonParticipant
Mar 31, 2017, 12:47 PM
Those are some very interesting comments George. I’d like to add that Urantia is also the only world in all of Nebadon to have hosted its incarnated Creator Son, where he was rejected and put to death instead of being honored, getting behind and following him. Perhaps as a move of diplomatic caution of sorts, there may be a temporary hold on entrusting us with superhuman teachers.

I once heard from what is likely a dubious source back in the nineties, that during one of those “communications” someone was told that the celestials thought this way about us. It went something like this, that if the people of Urantia would be regarded as pets, they wouldn’t think to put their hands in our mouths.

Enno
BonitaParticipant
Mar 31, 2017, 1:15 PM

George Park wrote: The Urantia Book is just a material thing, like anything else we might pick up and hold in our hands. But Meredith’s comment made me wonder if this visible thing has actually been sent as a stand-in, an actual replacement, for the visible superhuman teachers on normal worlds. If this is so, how might this change wisdom’s appraisal of this Book in which we have faith?

First of all, there’s no such thing as faith in a book. That’s not possible as I understand it. Faith is something you have in another personality, human or divine. Faith is personal. Incidentally, I also don’t think you can have faith in the brakes of your car. You can have intellectual knowledge of the facts of how brakes work and believe that they will work unless they give you warning signs that they are beginning to wear out. But I digress.

Faith comes from being connected to the Source (a person), the living vine, the living truth. But the stuff in TUB is not living. What TUB does is stimulate the mind and steer it towards what is living, the living truth within the soul. This is where faith-trust comes in. Meanings and values are explored in the soul, not in the book. The book is not a person, as you say yourself. The book guides the seeking mind toward the soul where other persons live besides yourself. (And no, I’m not talking about schizophrenia . . . ) TUB has arrived to remind us how to think in line with mind ministry. I believe it is an assistant to mind ministry, an adjunct to the adjutants who must be having difficulty with their work in the modern mind.

I think that what TUB does is redirect minds and souls wandering in the wilderness, directionless due to the lack of material teachers of truth. It is designed to bring the truth-seeking reader to utilize mind ministry as it is meant to be utilized. It’s nothing more than a pointer, a direction-corrector. The words in TUB are meaningless without the help of the Holy Spirit, Spirit of Truth and Adjuster. Spiritual insight is the only way to glean the truth from its words, and spiritual insight is a combined gift of the cosmic mind and the Adjuster. TUB is for those tired of wandering in the wilderness of ‘isms. It’s a real road map to the wisdom gateway and faith-bridge.

And by the way, prayer is the only way I know to keep the bridge open at all times. Keep communication constant and it stays open so wisdom is always seeking new meanings and values from the Meaning Maker (Spirit of Truth) and the Value Sorter (Thought Adjuster). The faith-bridge is the Holy Spirit, and when the bridge is open we are praying in the Spirit, born of the Spirit and living in the Spirit. TUB’s goal is to direct us toward that faith-bridge and help us to keep it open . . . to keep living truth alive.

Melchizedek arrived because the flame of living truth was dying out on this planet. I don’t think that is the case in this generation because most folks have the living truth (Spirit of Truth) working hard within their own heads. It is the case however, that many people are confused and frustrated, the gateway of wisdom is not always functioning. I think it needs help. And isn’t it odd how often confused and frustrated sincere truth-seekers mysteriously have the book find them? Isn’t it also odd how many falter over its words due to doubt, the stumbling block to the faith-bridge? They never cross over into the soul, so true meanings escape them. It’s sad to see it happen. It’s sad to see the gateway slam shut.

0:12.13 We are fully cognizant of the difficulties of our assignment; we recognize the impossibility of fully translating the language of the concepts of divinity and eternity into the symbols of the language of the finite concepts of the mortal mind. But we know that there dwells within the human mind a fragment of God, and that there sojourns with the human soul the Spirit of Truth; and we further know that these spirit forces conspire to enable material man to grasp the reality of spiritual values and to comprehend the philosophy of universe meanings. But even more certainly we know that these spirits of the Divine Presence are able to assist man in the spiritual appropriation of all truth contributory to the enhancement of the ever-progressing reality of personal religious experience — God-consciousness.

This is how it works. Without these spiritual forces, we could not assimilate the meanings and values suggested to us by the words in TUB. Words are powerful, but only when they have meaning, and true meanings are spiritual in nature. They require faith which provides personal interpretation by the personal presence of Michael himself, the Spirit of Truth. Personal revelation is a personal thing, faith is personal, which is how it becomes love-saturated.

Eh, again I ramble and I ramble . . .
Van AmadonParticipant
Mar 31, 2017, 1:28 PM
Leaves are falling all around
It’s time I was on my way
Thanks to you I’m much obliged
For such a pleasant stay
But now it’s time for me to go
The autumn moon lights my way
For now I smell the rain
And with it pain
And it’s headed my way

Ah, sometimes I grow so tired
But I know I’ve got one thing I got to do

Ramble on
Van AmadonParticipant
Mar 31, 2017, 1:37 PM
This one’s for you Bonita.
George ParkParticipant
Mar 31, 2017, 1:55 PM

Bonita wrote:

First of all, there’s no such thing as faith in a book. That’s not possible as I understand it. Faith is something you have in another personality, human or divine.

This is literally true. On the other hand, it is possible to believe in the truth expressed in words written down in a physical Book. If it is possible to believe in the truth of these words, isn’t it also possible to trust the personality who authored these words? to have faith in their truthfulness? Since we have no access to any knowledge which might conclusively validate the content of this Book, what reason do we have for believing in its truth except the insight of faith?
BonitaParticipant
Mar 31, 2017, 2:57 PM

George Park wrote: If it is possible to believe in the truth of these words, isn’t it also possible to trust the personality who authored these words?

It’s all about meanings and values. Are the words true or the meanings of the words true? I say it’s the meanings and meanings are something found in the higher mind. As for trusting a personality you don’t know and cannot interact with, I suppose you can choose to do that, but isn’t it better to trust a personality you do know and can interact with . . . Michael/Jesus/Spirit of Truth? A personality who is willing to exchange his mind with yours?

Have you met any of the personalities who authored the book? I haven’t. I have met the Spirit of Truth who sojourns with my soul. And I know all about his earth life which means I am much closer to him than any personality who authored the book. I tend to trust him to help my mind recognize and interpret the meanings presented in TUB then make them real. True meanings are only realized on supermaterial levels. Let me ask you this . . . are any of the TUB authors, whom you trust, living in the supermaterial level of your mind (aka soul)?

6:0.3 The perfect personality of the Son discloses that the Father is actually the eternal and universal source of all the meanings and values of the spiritual, the volitional, the purposeful, and the personal.

111:3.5 The mortal career, the soul’s evolution, is not so much a probation as an education. Faith in the survival of supreme values is the core of religion; genuine religious experience consists in the union of supreme values and cosmic meanings as a realization of universal reality.

111:3.6 Mind knows quantity, reality, meanings. But quality—values—is felt. That which feels is the mutual creation of mind, which knows, and the associated spirit, which reality-izes.

111:4.1 Recognition is the intellectual process of fitting the sensory impressions received from the external world into the memory patterns of the individual. Understanding connotes that these recognized sensory impressions and their associated memory patterns have become integrated or organized into a dynamic network of principles.

111:4.2 Meanings are derived from a combination of recognition and understanding. Meanings are nonexistent in a wholly sensory or material world. Meanings and values are only perceived in the inner or supermaterial spheres of human experience.
George ParkParticipant
Mar 31, 2017, 4:18 PM

Bonita wrote:

As for trusting a personality you don’t know and cannot interact with, I suppose you can choose to do that, but isn’t it better to trust a personality you do know and can interact with . . . Michael/Jesus/Spirit of Truth?

Certainly it is better, friend. Wherefore do you quibble? In response to your insinuations, I have not met or communicated with any of the authors and do not personally know them. I have only the words they have written, like everyone else. Are you suggesting we shouldn’t trust the authors? Do you suppose they came here with or without the knowledge of the Sovereign Master Son of Nebadon? I don’t think theirs was a mission undertaken without the authorization and approval of the head of the local universe government. I think Michael must have known about their advent and charged them to enlighten us with the truth. I think he must have trusted them to do this, which encourages me to trust them as well.
BonitaParticipant
Mar 31, 2017, 4:39 PM
George, I think you misunderstand me. I am not quibbling with you or insinuating anything, let alone something nefarious. It’s sad that you don’t trust me, but then again, you don’t know me so it’s easy to be suspicious of my motives. That’s okay, but know that I’ll now be super careful answering your questions. I know you are not in contact with the authors of TUB. I brought that up for strictly rhetorical reasons. Don’t take offense. And of course Michael knows everything. It is his universe.
Mark KurtzParticipant
Mar 31, 2017, 5:00 PM
George wrote in 24438: I think Michael must have known about their advent and charged them to enlighten us with the truth. I think he must have trusted them to do this, which encourages me to trust them as well.

This is what I’ve been thinking for several years. Recall the Midwayers reported Jesus spent time (fraternized) with Morontia beings while still here; likely he talked to all personalities. He certainly could have expressed desire for them to help us! His love would have spread over all of them and they may have expressed their deep love for him, even perhaps extolled lavish praise for his brilliance and marvelous modeling. He may have given them clues or instruction about future revelation.

We do know the Midwayers were able to induce approval from planetary management for the FER. What influence on them would he have expressed while here in Morontia form? Its a great thought!
AnonymousInactive
Mar 31, 2017, 5:49 PM

Bonita wrote:

I think that what TUB does is redirect minds and souls wandering in the wilderness, directionless due to the lack of material teachers of truth. It is designed to bring the truth-seeking reader to utilize mind ministry as it is meant to be utilized. It’s nothing more than a pointer, a direction-corrector. The words in TUB are meaningless without the help of the Holy Spirit, Spirit of Truth and Adjuster. Spiritual insight is the only way to glean the truth from its words, and spiritual insight is a combined gift of the cosmic mind and the Adjuster. TUB is for those tired of wandering in the wilderness of ‘isms. It’s a real road map to the wisdom gateway and faith-bridge.

Bonita, I understand what you are attempting to present above, but it would seem that which I have highlighted in bold, would be true, however, would not these entities function differently, in regards to the individual whom they interact with? By this, I relate to the understanding and experience of that individual, whereby each person presents a different aspect to the “pointing” by which each “truth-seeking reader” may comprehend what might be points retained as a “direction-corrector”? If the “Holy Spirit, Spirit of Truth and Adjuster”, were to interact with every individual the same way, with the same points, then each individual would need to be the same, in order to obtain the same results but, since they are not, one could not hope to think that all individuals would understand the same way or believe and have faith, the same way.
GeneParticipant
Mar 31, 2017, 6:51 PM
Ramble= going from one place or subject to another with no clear direction or purpose.

i think you need to find a better word.
AndréParticipant
Mar 31, 2017, 8:55 PM
G’day all,

I am standing lately among the listener audience. Breaking my vows of silence to step in regarding post #24441 / MidiChlorian.

Dear brother, … why by heaven’s sake are you allowing yourself to stir down Bonita’s comment? Wouldn’t be more + uplifting as your eldest brother/Father show you, point out to enhance, praise your sister comment. May I need to remind you how « delicate » may be your relation specially when encounter on same thread? Why sadden her soul !!!

MidiChlorian regarding her post … Bonita expressed a sane, logic, not attempting or give a whirl out of proper context.

MidiChlorian excepting your pretending first line in your post … what you said was right and adequate.

146:02.13 Set watch on mouth Psalms 141:03 (Reference) “Set a watch, O Lord, before my mouth; keep the door of my lips.”

Brotherly concerns,

Lovingly concerns,

André

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