Suffering

99 posts · 4 participants · started May 30, 2023, 4:53 PM

1. B

   BradlyParticipant
   Jul 30, 2025, 4:12 AM

   Thanks Mara…lots to think about.  I think our faith for our personal destiny and the end of our personal suffering must be extended to include all others who suffer too.  I wonder how my wife and my 93 year old mother and children and grandchildren will fare without me, I work so hard to bring them light and comfort and hope in this life, as well as material support, while facing life’s uncertainties and calamities.

   My own mortality is far less uncertain, more likely sooner than not, and I worry for those I leave behind.  Which seems somehow misplaced and lacking faith in faith’s absolute destiny.  I mean, I feel confident that I can face loss and crisis and face the adventures of uncertainty with my faith.  I have lived with nothing and started over many times, but work so hard that others do not have to do so.

   I know God will take care of me.  Shouldn’t I know God will care for them as well?  And everyone else too?

   Confusing.

   I do have such confidence in the outcomes of my fellow tadpoles.  I cannot save everyone from the troubles and tribulation in this life no matter how much or how well I may share and care in this life.  But I know all human suffering is temporary and stays in the grave of this world and so am not consumed by empathy and anxiety.

   I am happy.  But how do I dare to be so with so much and so many suffering?  How did Jesus master happiness and joy and contentment surrounded by angst and misery?  I don’t remember if Jesus was ever anxious for himself, but I know he grieved at the suffering and pain of others and I know he mourned our world’s collective misery.  Yet he was cheerful and at ease, knowing that eternity will erase all suffering by the mercy ministry of God’s love in this friendly universe.

   I know those with faith who are overwhelmed by the uncertainties and vicissitudes of life and the  suffering of others.  Some who find happiness difficult and feel somehow guilty about the suffering around them they did not cause but work to ease.

   The business of caring and sharing is confusing.  I know those who share so much they have too little to share, and care so much about the suffering of others that happiness and contentment eludes them.  Evidently it takes wisdom to “let go and let God”, to trust that all will be right in the end, and if its not alright now then it is not yet the end.

   I cannot be a fatalist and thusly justify indifference to the suffering of others but I do have to trust God’s love and affection for the children of time.  It’s complicated,  or it is for me anyway.

   I loved your story Mara.  Causing much thought and prayer.  Thank you.

   Bradly

   "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."

2. B

   BradlyParticipant
   Jul 30, 2025, 9:25 PM

   filsascendant wrote:

   “I just want us to be honestly told that we have no say and that we must do this and not that, and stop making us wear a hat that is too big for us.”

   We have no say?  We must do this or that?

   We are experiential freewill personalities in evolutionary time.  Of course we have a say.  We do as we choose to do.  But what we choose to do has far less repercussions than WHY we choose that which we choose.

   If there are not cause and effect or choices and repercussions then from whence and how can there be progress or wisdom?

   The universe of universes has the perfect, the perfected, and the perfecting.  The process of perfecting is vital to perfection.

   The “hat” of perfecting is not too big for tadpoles, but progress and perfecting requires growth and experience.  The hat fits but must grow with the cranium or will get too tight soon enough.

   But certainly is karma and wisdom both driven far more by our motives and priorities than by material outcomes.  Why we choose to feel or respond as we do determines the true suffering within.  And the suffering within can only be lessened by our spiritual connections and Divine Assurance from the Spirit within.

   Our suffering within primarily results from feelings of isolation and loneliness and disappointment and blame and fear and anxiety – mind and spirit poisons with only a spiritual cure.

   Only by the eternal perspective can uncertainty be transformed into adventure.

   16:7.2 (193.1)The selective response of an animal is limited to the motor level of behavior. The supposed insight of the higher animals is on a motor level and usually appears only after the experience of motor trial and error. Man is able to exercise scientific, moral, and spiritual insight prior to all exploration or experimentation.

   16:7.3 (193.2)Only a personality can know what it is doing before it does it; only personalities possess insight in advance of experience. A personality can look before it leaps and can therefore learn from looking as well as from leaping. A nonpersonal animal ordinarily learns only by leaping.

   16:7.4 (193.3) As a result of experience an animal becomes able to examine the different ways of attaining a goal and to select an approach based on accumulated experience. But a personality can also examine the goal itself and pass judgment on its worth-whileness, its value. Intelligence alone can discriminate as to the best means of attaining indiscriminate ends, but a moral being possesses an insight which enables him to discriminate between ends as well as between means. And a moral being in choosing virtue is nonetheless intelligent. He knows what he is doing, why he is doing it, where he is going, and how he will get there.

   16:7.5 (193.4)When man fails to discriminate the ends of his mortal striving, he finds himself functioning on the animal level of existence. He has failed to avail himself of the superior advantages of that material acumen, moral discrimination, and spiritual insight which are an integral part of his cosmic-mind endowment as a personal being.

   16:7.6 (193.5)Virtue is righteousness—conformity with the cosmos. To name virtues is not to define them, but to live them is to know them. Virtue is not mere knowledge nor yet wisdom but rather the reality of progressive experience in the attainment of ascending levels of cosmic achievement. In the day-by-day life of mortal man, virtue is realized by the consistent choosing of good rather than evil, and such choosing ability is evidence of the possession of a moral nature.

   16:7.7 (193.6) Man’s choosing between good and evil is influenced, not only by the keenness of his moral nature, but also by such influences as ignorance, immaturity, and delusion. A sense of proportion is also concerned in the exercise of virtue because evil may be perpetrated when the lesser is chosen in the place of the greater as a result of distortion or deception. The art of relative estimation or comparative measurement enters into the practice of the virtues of the moral realm.

   Me here:
   Consider…a little mota:

   48:7.14 (556.14)12. The greatest affliction of the cosmos is never to have been afflicted. Mortals only learn wisdom by experiencing tribulation.

   Me here:  Luciferianism is an interesting concept to introduce here, as suffering is primarily a result of false liberty (the motive and priorities of self importance and self indulgence and “self-assertion and liberty.”) rather than inexperience and immaturity.

   Inexperience and immaturity are unavoidable and easily overcome simply by paying attention to causes and effects.  But not so the evil of asserting self over others or indifference to the wisdom of the Golden Rule.

   More mota:

   48:7.8 (556.8)6. To enjoy privilege without abuse, to have liberty without license, to possess power and steadfastly refuse to use it for self-aggrandizement—these are the marks of high civilization.

   And:

   54:1.8 (614.3)There is no error greater than that species of self-deception which leads intelligent beings to crave the exercise of power over other beings for the purpose of depriving these persons of their natural liberties. The golden rule of human fairness cries out against all such fraud, unfairness, selfishness, and unrighteousness. Only true and genuine liberty is compatible with the reign of love and the ministry of mercy.

   54:1.9 (614.4)How dare the self-willed creature encroach upon the rights of his fellows in the name of personal liberty when the Supreme Rulers of the universe stand back in merciful respect for these prerogatives of will and potentials of personality! No being, in the exercise of his supposed personal liberty, has a right to deprive any other being of those privileges of existence conferred by the Creators and duly respected by all their loyal associates, subordinates, and subjects.

   54:1.10 (614.5)Evolutionary man may have to contend for his material liberties with tyrants and oppressors on a world of sin and iniquity or during the early times of a primitive evolving sphere, but not so on the morontia worlds or on the spirit spheres. War is the heritage of early evolutionary man, but on worlds of normal advancing civilization physical combat as a technique of adjusting racial misunderstandings has long since fallen into disrepute.

   "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."

3. F

   filsascendantParticipant
   Aug 1, 2025, 1:34 PM

   Bradly wrote:

   filsascendant a écrit :

   « Je veux juste qu’on nous dise honnêtement que nous n’avons pas notre mot à dire et que nous devons faire ceci et pas cela, et qu’on arrête de nous faire porter un chapeau trop grand pour nous. »

   Nous n’avons pas notre mot à dire ? Nous devons faire ceci ou cela ? Nous sommes des personnalités expérientielles et libres de notre volonté au cours de l’évolution. Bien sûr, nous avons notre mot à dire. Nous faisons ce que nous choisissons de faire. Mais ce que nous choisissons de faire a bien moins de répercussions que les raisons pour lesquelles nous choisissons ce que nous choisissons. S’il n’y a pas de cause à effet, ni de choix ni de répercussions, d’où et comment peut-il y avoir progrès ou sagesse ? L’univers des univers comprend le parfait, le perfectionné et le perfectionnement. Le processus de perfectionnement est essentiel à la perfection. Le « chapeau » du perfectionnement n’est pas trop grand pour les têtards, mais le progrès et le perfectionnement exigent croissance et expérience. Le chapeau est ajusté, mais doit grandir avec le crâne, sinon il deviendra vite trop serré. Mais le karma et la sagesse sont certainement bien plus motivés par nos motivations et nos priorités que par les résultats matériels. Nos choix de ressentir ou de réagir déterminent notre véritable souffrance intérieure. Et cette souffrance intérieure ne peut être atténuée que par nos connexions spirituelles et l’assurance divine de l’Esprit intérieur. Notre souffrance intérieure résulte principalement de sentiments d’isolement, de solitude, de déception, de blâme, de peur et d’anxiété – des poisons de l’esprit et de l’âme qui ne peuvent être guéris que par des moyens spirituels. Seule une perspective éternelle peut transformer l’incertitude en aventure. 16:7.2 (193.1) La réponse sélective d’un animal se limite au niveau moteur du comportement. La perspicacité supposée des animaux supérieurs se situe au niveau moteur et n’apparaît généralement qu’après l’expérience motrice par tâtonnements. L’homme est capable d’exercer sa perspicacité scientifique, morale et spirituelle avant toute exploration ou expérimentation. 16:7.3 (193.2) Seule une personnalité peut savoir ce qu’elle fait avant de le faire ; seules les personnalités possèdent une perspicacité avant l’expérience . Une personnalité peut regarder avant de sauter et peut donc apprendre en regardant aussi bien qu’en sautant. Un animal non personnel n’apprend généralement qu’en sautant. 16:7.4 (193.3) Grâce à l’expérience, un animal devient capable d’examiner les différentes manières d’atteindre un but et de choisir une approche fondée sur l’expérience accumulée. Mais une personnalité peut aussi examiner le but lui-même et juger de sa pertinence, de sa valeur . Seule l’intelligence peut discerner les meilleurs moyens d’atteindre des fins indifférenciées, mais un être moral possède une perspicacité qui lui permet de distinguer les fins aussi bien que les moyens. Et un être moral, en choisissant la vertu, n’en est pas moins intelligent. Il sait ce qu’il fait, pourquoi il le fait, où il va et comment il y parviendra . 16:7.5 (193.4) Lorsque l’homme ne parvient pas à discerner les fins de son effort mortel, il se retrouve à fonctionner sur le plan animal de l’existence. Il n’a pas su tirer parti des avantages supérieurs de la perspicacité matérielle, du discernement moral et de la perspicacité spirituelle qui font partie intégrante de son don mental cosmique en tant qu’être personnel. 16:7.6 (193.5) La vertu est droiture – conformité au cosmos. Nommer les vertus ne signifie pas les définir, mais les vivre signifie les connaître. La vertu n’est pas une simple connaissance ni une sagesse, mais plutôt la réalité d’une expérience progressive dans l’atteinte de niveaux ascendants d’accomplissement cosmique. Dans la vie quotidienne de l’homme mortel, la vertu se réalise par le choix constant du bien plutôt que du mal, et cette capacité de choix est la preuve d’une nature morale. 16:7.7 (193.6) Le choix de l’homme entre le bien et le mal est influencé non seulement par la perspicacité de sa nature morale, mais aussi par des influences telles que l’ignorance, l’immaturité et l’illusion. Le sens des proportions est également impliqué dans l’exercice de la vertu, car le mal peut être perpétré lorsque le moindre est choisi à la place du plus grand par suite d’une déformation ou d’une tromperie. L’art de l’estimation relative ou de la mesure comparative fait partie de la pratique des vertus du domaine moral. Moi ici : Pensez à… un peu de mota : 48:7.14 (556.14)12. La plus grande affliction du cosmos est de n’avoir jamais été affligé. Les mortels n’apprennent la sagesse qu’en traversant les tribulations. Moi ici : Le luciférianisme est un concept intéressant à introduire ici, car la souffrance est principalement le résultat d’une fausse liberté (le motif et les priorités de l’importance personnelle et de l’indulgence envers soi-même et de « l’affirmation de soi et de la liberté ») plutôt que de l’inexpérience et de l’immaturité. L’inexpérience et l’immaturité sont inévitables et peuvent être facilement surmontées en prêtant simplement attention aux causes et aux effets. Mais il n’en va pas de même pour le mal de vouloir s’imposer aux autres ou de rester indifférent à la sagesse de la Règle d’or. Plus de mota : 48:7.8 (556.8)6. Jouir de privilèges sans abus, jouir de la liberté sans licence, posséder le pouvoir et refuser résolument de l’utiliser à des fins d’enrichissement personnel, tels sont les signes d’une haute civilisation. Et: 54:1.8 (614.3) Il n’y a pas d’erreur plus grave que cette espèce d’aveuglement qui conduit des êtres intelligents à aspirer à exercer le pouvoir sur d’autres êtres afin de les priver de leurs libertés naturelles. La règle d’or de l’équité humaine dénonce toute fraude, injustice, égoïsme et iniquité de ce genre. Seule la liberté véritable et authentique est compatible avec le règne de l’amour et le ministère de la miséricorde. 54:1.9 (614.4) Comment une créature obstinée ose-t-elle empiéter sur les droits de ses semblables au nom de la liberté personnelle, alors que les Maîtres suprêmes de l’univers se tiennent à l’écart, avec un respect miséricordieux, pour ces prérogatives de la volonté et ces potentialités de la personnalité ! Nul être, dans l’exercice de sa prétendue liberté personnelle, n’a le droit de priver un autre être des privilèges d’existence conférés par les Créateurs et dûment respectés par tous leurs loyaux associés, subordonnés et sujets. 54:1.10 (614.5) L’homme évolutionnaire peut avoir à lutter pour ses libertés matérielles contre des tyrans et des oppresseurs sur un monde de péché et d’iniquité ou aux premiers temps d’une sphère primitive en évolution, mais il n’en est pas de même sur les mondes morontiels ou sur les sphères spirituelles. La guerre est l’héritage de l’homme évolutionnaire primitif, mais sur les mondes de civilisation normale en progrès, le combat physique comme technique de règlement des incompréhensions raciales est depuis longtemps tombé en discrédit.

   Cela est juste et bon. 🙏

   Pulchrum nimis ut sit falsus

4. B

   BradlyParticipant
   Aug 1, 2025, 5:31 PM
   Bradly wrote:

   filsascendant wrote:

   “I just want us to be honestly told that we have no say and that we must do this and not that, and stop making us wear a hat that is too big for us.”

   We have no say? We must do this or that?

   We are experiential freewill personalities in evolutionary time.

   Of course we have a say. We do as we choose to do. But what we choose to do has far less repercussions than WHY we choose that which we choose.

   If there are not cause and effect or choices and repercussions then from whence and how can there be progress or wisdom?

   The universe of universes has the perfect, the perfected, and the perfecting. The process of perfecting is vital to perfection.

   The “hat” of perfecting is not too big for tadpoles, but progress and perfecting requires growth and experience. The hat fits but must grow with the cranium or will get too tight soon enough.

   But certainly is karma and wisdom both driven far more by our motives and priorities than by material outcomes. Why we choose to feel or respond as we do determines the true suffering within. And the suffering within can only be lessened by our spiritual connections and Divine Assurance from the Spirit within. Our suffering within primarily results from feelings of isolation and loneliness and disappointment and blame and fear and anxiety – mind and spirit poisons with only a spiritual cure.

   Only by the eternal perspective can uncertainty be transformed into adventure.

   16:7.2 (193.1)The selective response of an animal is limited to the motor level of behavior. The supposed insight of the higher animals is on a motor level and usually appears only after the experience of motor trial and error. Man is able to exercise scientific, moral, and spiritual insight prior to all exploration or experimentation.

   16:7.3 (193.2)Only a personality can know what it is doing before it does it; only personalities possess insight in advance of experience. A personality can look before it leaps and can therefore learn from looking as well as from leaping. A nonpersonal animal ordinarily learns only by leaping.

   16:7.4 (193.3) As a result of experience an animal becomes able to examine the different ways of attaining a goal and to select an approach based on accumulated experience. But a personality can also examine the goal itself and pass judgment on its worth-whileness, its value. Intelligence alone can discriminate as to the best means of attaining indiscriminate ends, but a moral being possesses an insight which enables him to discriminate between ends as well as between means. And a moral being in choosing virtue is nonetheless intelligent. He knows what he is doing, why he is doing it, where he is going, and how he will get there.

   16:7.5 (193.4)When man fails to discriminate the ends of his mortal striving, he finds himself functioning on the animal level of existence. He has failed to avail himself of the superior advantages of that material acumen, moral discrimination, and spiritual insight which are an integral part of his cosmic-mind endowment as a personal being.

   16:7.6 (193.5)Virtue is righteousness—conformity with the cosmos. To name virtues is not to define them, but to live them is to know them. Virtue is not mere knowledge nor yet wisdom but rather the reality of progressive experience in the attainment of ascending levels of cosmic achievement. In the day-by-day life of mortal man, virtue is realized by the consistent choosing of good rather than evil, and such choosing ability is evidence of the possession of a moral nature.

   16:7.7 (193.6) Man’s choosing between good and evil is influenced, not only by the keenness of his moral nature, but also by such influences as ignorance, immaturity, and delusion. A sense of proportion is also concerned in the exercise of virtue because evil may be perpetrated when the lesser is chosen in the place of the greater as a result of distortion or deception. The art of relative estimation or comparative measurement enters into the practice of the virtues of the moral realm.

   Me here:

   Consider…a little mota:

   48:7.14 (556.14)12. The greatest affliction of the cosmos is never to have been afflicted. Mortals only learn wisdom by experiencing tribulation.

   Me here: Luciferianism is an interesting concept to introduce here, as suffering is primarily a result of false liberty (the motive and priorities of self importance and self indulgence and “self-assertion and liberty.”), rather than inexperience and immaturity. Inexperience and immaturity are unavoidable and easily overcome simply by paying attention to causes and effects. But not so the evil of asserting self over others or indifference to the wisdom of the Golden Rule. More mota:

   48:7.8 (556.8)6. To enjoy privilege without abuse, to have liberty without license, to possess power and steadfastly refuse to use it for self-aggrandizement—these are the marks of high civilization.

   And:

   54:1.8 (614.3)There is no error greater than that species of self-deception which leads intelligent beings to crave the exercise of power over other beings for the purpose of depriving these persons of their natural liberties. The golden rule of human fairness cries out against all such fraud, unfairness, selfishness, and unrighteousness. Only true and genuine liberty is compatible with the reign of love and the ministry of mercy.

   54:1.9 (614.4) How dare the self-willed creature encroach upon the rights of his fellows in the name of personal liberty when the Supreme Rulers of the universe stand back in merciful respect for these prerogatives of will and potentials of personality! No being, in the exercise of his supposed personal liberty, has a right to deprive any other being of those privileges of existence conferred by the Creators and duly respected by all their loyal associates, subordinates, and subjects.

   54:1.10 (614.5)Evolutionary man may have to contend for his material liberties with tyrants and oppressors on a world of sin and iniquity or during the early times of a primitive evolving sphere, but not so on the morontia worlds or on the spirit spheres. War is the heritage of early evolutionary man, but on worlds of normal advancing civilization physical combat as a technique of adjusting racial misunderstandings has long since fallen into disrepute.

   filsascendant wrote:

   “Cela est juste et bon.”

   Translator app:

   “This is just and good.”

   "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."

5. B

   BradlyParticipant
   Aug 2, 2025, 9:47 PM

   So….as error is inherent to freewill immaturity and inexperience, thereby is there suffering by the children of time.  Evolutionary progress causes suffering and is likewise the eventual cure for suffering too.  For evolutionary progress inevitably delivers experience and wisdom and growing spiritualization.

   (56.5) 4:2.1 Nature is in a limited sense the physical habit of God. The conduct, or action, of God is qualified and provisionally modified by the experimental plans and the evolutionary patterns of a local universe, a constellation, a system, or a planet. God acts in accordance with a well-defined, unchanging, immutable law throughout the wide-spreading master universe; but he modifies the patterns of his action so as to contribute to the co-ordinate and balanced conduct of each universe, constellation, system, planet, and personality in accordance with the local objects, aims, and plans of the finite projects of evolutionary unfolding.

   (56.6) 4:2.2 Therefore, nature, as mortal man understands it, presents the underlying foundation and fundamental background of a changeless Deity and his immutable laws, modified by, fluctuating because of, and experiencing upheavals through, the working of the local plans, purposes, patterns, and conditions which have been inaugurated and are being carried out by the local universe, constellation, system, and planetary forces and personalities. For example: As God’s laws have been ordained in Nebadon, they are modified by the plans established by the Creator Son and Creative Spirit of this local universe; and in addition to all this the operation of these laws has been further influenced by the errors, defaults, and insurrections of certain beings resident upon your planet and belonging to your immediate planetary system of Satania.

   (56.7) 4:2.3 Nature is a time-space resultant of two cosmic factors: first, the immutability, perfection, and rectitude of Paradise Deity, and second, the experimental plans, executive blunders, insurrectionary errors, incompleteness of development, and imperfection of wisdom of the extra-Paradise creatures, from the highest to the lowest. Nature therefore carries a uniform, unchanging, majestic, and marvelous thread of perfection from the circle of eternity; but in each universe, on each planet, and in each individual life, this nature is modified, qualified, and perchance marred by the acts, the mistakes, and the disloyalties of the creatures of the evolutionary systems and universes; and therefore must nature ever be of a changing mood, whimsical withal, though stable underneath, and varied in accordance with the operating procedures of a local universe.

   (57.1) 4:2.4 Nature is the perfection of Paradise divided by the incompletion, evil, and sin of the unfinished universes. This quotient is thus expressive of both the perfect and the partial, of both the eternal and the temporal. Continuing evolution modifies nature by augmenting the content of Paradise perfection and by diminishing the content of the evil, error, and disharmony of relative reality.

   Me here: Please consider that last statement and reality calculus!! Remember that it is only the “evil, error, and disharmony”, caused by inexperience and immaturity and lack of wisdom expressed by the children of time, and in time, that causes ALL suffering. The “content” of imperfection includes the suffering from and by imperfection. But, the universes of time are perfecting in time, slowly evolving and progressing by Deity and Spirit ministries and connection to those Creators in time and the created ones in time.

   Part of plan. And purpose.

   We must also remember that those and that in Paradise/Havona created perfect somehow also benefit from the imperfect evolutionary perfecting by the children of time. We are not an experiment or entertainment or some arbitrary chain of unintentional chaos and unpredictable results of irrelevancy.

   We are the beloved children of God and we make invaluable contributions to eternal perfection by our spiritization and experiential wisdom and we, thereby, are part of God’s purpose and plan too.

   "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."

6. B

   BradlyParticipant
   Aug 2, 2025, 10:14 PM

   Those who suffer and who overcome their suffering by their connections to the Spirit are uniquely rewarded in time and eternity.   But such personalities are also of great benefit and reward to all other beings in both time and eternity.

   32:3.9 (361.4) The perfection of the creatures of time, when finally achieved, is wholly an acquirement, a bona fide personality possession. While the elements of grace are freely admixed, nevertheless, the creature attainments are the result of individual effort and actual living, personality reaction to the existing environment.

   32:3.10 (361.5)The fact of animal evolutionary origin does not attach stigma to any personality in the sight of the universe as that is the exclusive method of producing one of the two basic types of finite intelligent will creatures. When the heights of perfection and eternity are attained, all the more honor to those who began at the bottom and joyfully climbed the ladder of life, round by round, and who, when they do reach the heights of glory, will have gained a personal experience which embodies an actual knowledge of every phase of life from the bottom to the top.

   32:3.11 (361.6)In all this is shown the wisdom of the Creators. It would be just as easy for the Universal Father to make all mortals perfect beings, to impart perfection by his divine word. But that would deprive them of the wonderful experience of the adventure and training associated with the long and gradual inward climb, an experience to be had only by those who are so fortunate as to begin at the very bottom of living existence.

   "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."

7. B

   BradlyParticipant
   Aug 3, 2025, 1:19 PM

   How long are the eternal adventures?  Certainly long enough for the suffering experienced in this life to fade and lose its sting compared to its experience while in the flesh.

   Somehow, I have fond memories of wilderness camping and float trips, even scout camp-outs.  Despite the freezing and mosquitoes and dehydrated or undercooked or burnt food and sunburn and leg cramps and smoke in the face and rain and wet bedding and flash floods, etc., etc.

   Likewise, I believe we will eventually come to fondly remember this life, despite our suffering here.  Perhaps soon after our wondrous and miraculous awakening on the Mansion Worlds or sometime later upon fusion perhaps, and become quite grateful eventually for our mortal origins as the eternal children of time.

   Pain, regrets, frustrations, failures, betrayals, and all sources and forms of human suffering will fade.

    

   26:10.5 (296.1)For the successful pilgrims on the second circuit the stimulus of evolutionary uncertainty is over, but the adventure of the eternal assignment has not yet begun; and while the sojourn on this circle is wholly pleasurable and highly profitable, it lacks some of the anticipative enthusiasm of the former circles. Many are the pilgrims who, at such a time, look back upon the long, long struggle with a joyous envy, really wishing they might somehow go back to the worlds of time and begin it all over again, just as you mortals, in approaching advanced age, sometimes look back over the struggles of youth and early life and truly wish you might live your lives over once again.

   "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."

8. M

   MaraParticipant
   Aug 4, 2025, 4:52 PM

   filsascendant wrote:

   Cela est juste et bon. 🙏

   Thank you Yannick for posting 🙏 . I love this image. To me it means faith. Two hands together like this communicates prayer to me, and prayer is personal and a very private matter. When I see two hands together like this, it I think of Jesus. I get excited when someone posts it on a message. It is a powerful reminder to me that the person who used it reaches out for help from above and is communicating that to me.  I feel connected to that person, to you, in a special way by virtue of the emoji, even though no words are spoken on the subject.

    

   A picture is worth a thousand words.

    

9. B

   BradlyParticipant
   Aug 17, 2025, 7:25 PM

   Bradly wrote:

   So….as error is inherent to freewill immaturity and inexperience, thereby is there suffering by the children of time.

   Evolutionary progress causes suffering and is likewise the eventual cure for suffering too. For evolutionary progress inevitably delivers experience and wisdom and growing spiritualization.

   (56.5) 4:2.1 Nature is in a limited sense the physical habit of God. The conduct, or action, of God is qualified and provisionally modified by the experimental plans and the evolutionary patterns of a local universe, a constellation, a system, or a planet. God acts in accordance with a well-defined, unchanging, immutable law throughout the wide-spreading master universe; but he modifies the patterns of his action so as to contribute to the co-ordinate and balanced conduct of each universe, constellation, system, planet, and personality in accordance with the local objects, aims, and plans of the finite projects of evolutionary unfolding.

   (56.6) 4:2.2 Therefore, nature, as mortal man understands it, presents the underlying foundation and fundamental background of a changeless Deity and his immutable laws, modified by, fluctuating because of, and experiencing upheavals through, the working of the local plans, purposes, patterns, and conditions which have been inaugurated and are being carried out by the local universe, constellation, system, and planetary forces and personalities. For example: As God’s laws have been ordained in Nebadon, they are modified by the plans established by the Creator Son and Creative Spirit of this local universe; and in addition to all this the operation of these laws has been further influenced by the errors, defaults, and insurrections of certain beings resident upon your planet and belonging to your immediate planetary system of Satania. (56.7)

   4:2.3 Nature is a time-space resultant of two cosmic factors: first, the immutability, perfection, and rectitude of Paradise Deity, and second, the experimental plans, executive blunders, insurrectionary errors, incompleteness of development, and imperfection of wisdom of the extra-Paradise creatures, from the highest to the lowest. Nature therefore carries a uniform, unchanging, majestic, and marvelous thread of perfection from the circle of eternity; but in each universe, on each planet, and in each individual life, this nature is modified, qualified, and perchance marred by the acts, the mistakes, and the disloyalties of the creatures of the evolutionary systems and universes; and therefore must nature ever be of a changing mood, whimsical withal, though stable underneath, and varied in accordance with the operating procedures of a local universe.

   (57.1) 4:2.4 Nature is the perfection of Paradise divided by the incompletion, evil, and sin of the unfinished universes. This quotient is thus expressive of both the perfect and the partial, of both the eternal and the temporal. Continuing evolution modifies nature by augmenting the content of Paradise perfection and by diminishing the content of the evil, error, and disharmony of relative reality.

   Me here: Please consider that last statement and reality calculus!! Remember that it is only the “evil, error, and disharmony”, caused by inexperience and immaturity and lack of wisdom expressed by the children of time, and in time, that causes ALL suffering.

   The “content” of imperfection includes the suffering from and by imperfection. But, the universes of time are perfecting in time, slowly evolving and progressing by Deity and Spirit ministries and connection to those Creators in time and the created ones in time. Part of plan. And purpose.

   We must also remember that those and that in Paradise/Havona created perfect somehow also benefit from the imperfect evolutionary perfecting by the children of time. We are not an experiment or entertainment or some arbitrary chain of unintentional chaos and unpredictable results of irrelevancy.

   We are the beloved children of God and we make invaluable contributions to eternal perfection by our spiritization and experiential wisdom and we, thereby, are part of God’s purpose and plan too.

   The suffering by the children of time of the temporal repercussions and imperfections of evolutionary progress (perfecting) lead to the end of all such suffering in the circle of eternity!!  We will not so suffer or carry our suffering forward much beyond the brief time of the temporal suffering itself.  But we will learn eternal lessons and become a blessing to others by all that we suffer, endure, and overcome by hope, trust, and faith.

   (364.3) 32:5.1 There is a great and glorious purpose in the march of the universes through space. All of your mortal struggling is not in vain. We are all part of an immense plan, a gigantic enterprise, and it is the vastness of the undertaking that renders it impossible to see very much of it at any one time and during any one life. We are all a part of an eternal project which the Gods are supervising and outworking. The whole marvelous and universal mechanism moves on majestically through space to the music of the meter of the infinite thought and the eternal purpose of the First Great Source and Center.

   (364.4) 32:5.2 The eternal purpose of the eternal God is a high spiritual ideal. The events of time and the struggles of material existence are but the transient scaffolding which bridges over to the other side, to the promised land of spiritual reality and supernal existence. Of course, you mortals find it difficult to grasp the idea of an eternal purpose; you are virtually unable to comprehend the thought of eternity, something never beginning and never ending. Everything familiar to you has an end.

   (364.5) 32:5.3 As regards an individual life, the duration of a realm, or the chronology of any connected series of events, it would seem that we are dealing with an isolated stretch of time; everything seems to have a beginning and an end. And it would appear that a series of such experiences, lives, ages, or epochs, when successively arranged, constitutes a straightaway drive, an isolated event of time flashing momentarily across the infinite face of eternity. But when we look at all this from behind the scenes, a more comprehensive view and a more complete understanding suggest that such an explanation is inadequate, disconnected, and wholly unsuited properly to account for, and otherwise to correlate, the transactions of time with the underlying purposes and basic reactions of eternity.

   (364.6) 32:5.4 To me it seems more fitting, for purposes of explanation to the mortal mind, to conceive of eternity as a cycle and the eternal purpose as an endless circle, a cycle of eternity in some way synchronized with the transient material cycles of time. As regards the sectors of time connected with, and forming a part of, the cycle of eternity, we are forced to recognize that such temporary epochs are born, live, and die just as the temporary beings of time are born, live, and die. Most human beings die because, having failed to achieve the spirit level of Adjuster fusion, the metamorphosis of death constitutes the only possible procedure whereby they may escape the fetters of time and the bonds of material creation, thereby being enabled to strike spiritual step with the progressive procession of eternity. Having survived the trial life of time and material existence, it becomes possible for you to continue on in touch with, even as a part of, eternity, swinging on forever with the worlds of space around the circle of the eternal ages.

   (365.1) 32:5.5 The sectors of time are like the flashes of personality in temporal form; they appear for a season, and then they are lost to human sight, only to reappear as new actors and continuing factors in the higher life of the endless swing around the eternal circle. Eternity can hardly be conceived as a straightaway drive, in view of our belief in a delimited universe moving over a vast, elongated circle around the central dwelling place of the Universal Father.

   (365.2) 32:5.6 Frankly, eternity is incomprehensible to the finite mind of time. You simply cannot grasp it; you cannot comprehend it. I do not completely visualize it, and even if I did, it would be impossible for me to convey my concept to the human mind. Nevertheless, I have done my best to portray something of our viewpoint, to tell you somewhat of our understanding of things eternal. I am endeavoring to aid you in the crystallization of your thoughts about these values which are of infinite nature and eternal import.

   (365.3) 32:5.7 There is in the mind of God a plan which embraces every creature of all his vast domains, and this plan is an eternal purpose of boundless opportunity, unlimited progress, and endless life. And the infinite treasures of such a matchless career are yours for the striving!

   (365.4) 32:5.8 The goal of eternity is ahead! The adventure of divinity attainment lies before you! The race for perfection is on! whosoever will may enter, and certain victory will crown the efforts of every human being who will run the race of faith and trust, depending every step of the way on the leading of the indwelling Adjuster and on the guidance of that good spirit of the Universe Son, which so freely has been poured out upon all flesh.

   "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."

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    BradlyParticipant
    Aug 30, 2025, 11:57 AM

    While all mortals suffer by the imperfections of evolutionary progress in some way or another and some degree or another, even many of those who suffer horribly, still do such tadpoles in time demonstrate goodness and kindness and generosity and mercy and patience and love for their fellows.

    How so??

    101:3.4 (1108.3) Through religious faith the soul of man reveals itself and demonstrates the potential divinity of its emerging nature by the characteristic manner in which it induces the mortal personality to react to certain trying intellectual and testing social situations. Genuine spiritual faith (true moral consciousness) is revealed in that it:

    101:3.5 (1108.4)1. Causes ethics and morals to progress despite inherent and adverse animalistic tendencies.

    101:3.6 (1108.5)2. Produces a sublime trust in the goodness of God even in the face of bitter disappointment and crushing defeat.

    101:3.7 (1108.6)3. Generates profound courage and confidence despite natural adversity and physical calamity.

    101:3.8 (1108.7)4. Exhibits inexplicable poise and sustaining tranquillity notwithstanding baffling diseases and even acute physical suffering.

    101:3.9 (1108.8)5. Maintains a mysterious poise and composure of personality in the face of maltreatment and the rankest injustice.

    101:3.10 (1108.9)6. Maintains a divine trust in ultimate victory in spite of the cruelties of seemingly blind fate and the apparent utter indifference of natural forces to human welfare.

    101:3.11 (1108.10)7. Persists in the unswerving belief in God despite all contrary demonstrations of logic and successfully withstands all other intellectual sophistries.

    101:3.12 (1108.11)8. Continues to exhibit undaunted faith in the soul’s survival regardless of the deceptive teachings of false science and the persuasive delusions of unsound philosophy.

    101:3.13 (1108.12)9. Lives and triumphs irrespective of the crushing overload of the complex and partial civilizations of modern times.

    101:3.14 (1108.13)10. Contributes to the continued survival of altruism in spite of human selfishness, social antagonisms, industrial greeds, and political maladjustments.

    101:3.15 (1108.14)11. Steadfastly adheres to a sublime belief in universe unity and divine guidance regardless of the perplexing presence of evil and sin.

    101:3.16 (1108.15)12. Goes right on worshiping God in spite of anything and everything. Dares to declare, “Even though he slay me, yet will I serve him.”

    101:3.17 (1108.16)We know, then, by three phenomena, that man has a divine spirit or spirits dwelling within him: first, by personal experience—religious faith; second, by revelation—personal and racial; and third, by the amazing exhibition of such extraordinary and unnatural reactions to his material environment as are illustrated by the foregoing recital of twelve spiritlike performances in the presence of the actual and trying situations of real human existence. And there are still others.

    101:3.18 (1109.1) And it is just such a vital and vigorous performance of faith in the domain of religion that entitles mortal man to affirm the personal possession and spiritual reality of that crowning endowment of human nature, religious experience.

    "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."

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    BradlyParticipant
    Aug 30, 2025, 12:06 PM

    IMO, it is not our beliefs and creeds or doctrines and social agreements which deliver morality, ethics, and the Golden Rule, but rather, it is our personal religious faith experience in knowing and expressing truth, beauty, and goodness in accordance to and our response to our Deity Connections.

    The Deity Connections are manifest by being human.  We are not considered human without the Adjutants of Wisdom and Worship activated and present in mind.  It is our Deity Connections whereby soul is born and our personal religious faith experience begins and progresses through the 7 psychic circles.

    Or so I understand the Papers to teach….

    (380.6) 34:6.5 The divine Spirit is the source of continual ministry and encouragement to the children of men. Your power and achievement is “according to his mercy, through the renewing of the Spirit.” Spiritual life, like physical energy, is consumed. Spiritual effort results in relative spiritual exhaustion. The whole ascendant experience is real as well as spiritual; therefore, it is truly written, “It is the Spirit that quickens.” “The Spirit gives life.”

    (380.7) 34:6.6 The dead theory of even the highest religious doctrines is powerless to transform human character or to control mortal behavior. What the world of today needs is the truth which your teacher of old declared: “Not in word only but also in power and in the Holy Spirit.” The seed of theoretical truth is dead, the highest moral concepts without effect, unless and until the divine Spirit breathes upon the forms of truth and quickens the formulas of righteousness.

    (381.1) 34:6.7 Those who have received and recognized the indwelling of God have been born of the Spirit. “You are the temple of God, and the spirit of God dwells in you.” It is not enough that this spirit be poured out upon you; the divine Spirit must dominate and control every phase of human experience.

    (381.2) 34:6.8 It is the presence of the divine Spirit, the water of life, that prevents the consuming thirst of mortal discontent and that indescribable hunger of the unspiritualized human mind. Spirit-motivated beings “never thirst, for this spiritual water shall be in them a well of satisfaction springing up into life everlasting.” Such divinely watered souls are all but independent of material environment as regards the joys of living and the satisfactions of earthly existence. They are spiritually illuminated and refreshed, morally strengthened and endowed.

    (381.3) 34:6.9 In every mortal there exists a dual nature: the inheritance of animal tendencies and the high urge of spirit endowment. During the short life you live on Urantia, these two diverse and opposing urges can seldom be fully reconciled; they can hardly be harmonized and unified; but throughout your lifetime the combined Spirit ever ministers to assist you in subjecting the flesh more and more to the leading of the Spirit. Even though you must live your material life through, even though you cannot escape the body and its necessities, nonetheless, in purpose and ideals you are empowered increasingly to subject the animal nature to the mastery of the Spirit. There truly exists within you a conspiracy of spiritual forces, a confederation of divine powers, whose exclusive purpose is to effect your final deliverance from material bondage and finite handicaps.

    "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."

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    BradlyParticipant
    Sep 1, 2025, 3:23 AM

    So…suffering is not pointless, it has causes and solutions and purpose too, it is not God’s punishment, or personal (the sun and the rain fall on all of us), but it is(or should be and can be) a means to experiential wisdom, and altruism and kindness, and forgiveness and generosity, and perfecting by the freewill choices of the children of time in time.

    Time is one solution to suffering.  So are hope and faith, and duty and loyalty, and love of God and one another, all solutions to mortal suffering.  The suffering is temporal, but the lessons and solutions to our suffering are eternal…for the each and for the all of us.

    (1134.6) 103:5.8 It is fatal to man’s idealism when he is taught that all of his altruistic impulses are merely the development of his natural herd instincts. But he is ennobled and mightily energized when he learns that these higher urges of his soul emanate from the spiritual forces that indwell his mortal mind.

    (1134.7) 103:5.9 It lifts man out of himself and beyond himself when he once fully realizes that there lives and strives within him something which is eternal and divine. And so it is that a living faith in the superhuman origin of our ideals validates our belief that we are the sons of God and makes real our altruistic convictions, the feelings of the brotherhood of man.

    "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."

13. M

    MaraParticipant
    Sep 1, 2025, 5:00 PM

    Bradly wrote:

    (1134.7) 103:5.9 It lifts man out of himself and beyond himself when he once fully realizes that there lives and strives within him something which is eternal and divine.

    It says a person has to lift herself out and beyond herself. This is not easy to do, but it is doable. What did Jesus do? For example:

    187:5.2 [Part IV]

    Shortly after one o’clock, amidst the increasing darkness of the fierce sandstorm, Jesus began to fail in human consciousness. His last words of mercy, forgiveness, and admonition had been spoken. His last wish — concerning the care of his mother — had been expressed. During this hour of approaching death the human mind of Jesus resorted to the repetition of many passages in the Hebrew scriptures, particularly the Psalms. The last conscious thought of the human Jesus was concerned with the repetition in his mind of a portion of the Book of Psalms now known as the twentieth, twenty-first, and twenty-second Psalms. While his lips would often move, he was too weak to utter the words as these passages, which he so well knew by heart, would pass through his mind. Only a few times did those standing by catch some utterance, such as, “I know the Lord will save his anointed,” “Your hand shall find out all my enemies,” and “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Jesus did not for one moment entertain the slightest doubt that he had lived in accordance with the Father’s will; and he never doubted that he was now laying down his life in the flesh in accordance with his Father’s will. He did not feel that the Father had forsaken him; he was merely reciting in his vanishing consciousness many Scriptures, among them this twenty-second Psalm, which begins with “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” And this happened to be one of the three passages which were spoken with sufficient clearness to be heard by those standing by.

    I always thought this was a solution to suffering – keep your mind on God. Exchange your mind for the mind of Jesus. Do something you can do to alleviate the problem. This takes training. Put your mind to work FOR you, not against you. Don’t let it run rampant on useless worry. Pray.

    91:6.2 [Part III]

    Prayer is not a technique for curing real and organic diseases, but it has contributed enormously to the enjoyment of abundant health and to the cure of numerous mental, emotional, and nervous ailments. And even in actual bacterial disease, prayer has many times added to the efficacy of other remedial procedures. Prayer has turned many an irritable and complaining invalid into a paragon of patience and made him an inspiration to all other human sufferers.

    Memorize the twentieth, twenty-first, and twenty-second Psalms.
14. B

    BradlyParticipant
    Sep 10, 2025, 3:31 AM

    Yes indeed Mara…yes indeed!

    Universe reality orientation and eternal horizons unleash new personal priorities and responses to all obstacles and conflicts and the uncertainties we all must face and overcome.  ” …I shall fear no evil…” is a certainty that only spiritual assurance might deliver.

    100:2.4 (1096.1)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 (1096.2)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 (1096.3)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 (1096.4)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 (1096.5) 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.

    "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."

15. B

    BradlyParticipant
    Sep 12, 2025, 3:21 AM

    Thanks to Mara for leading us to the inevitable truth regarding human suffering.  A sublime and unshakable faith is the only true relief from and release of all suffering, no matter how cruel the suffering may be.

    Human suffering is, personally and collectively and universally, reduced by experiential wisdom and spiritization.   Better motives and priorities and strategies and tactics and timing do indeed combine to lessen human suffering by evolutionary progress.

    However, when in the grasp and grip of personal suffering, only pure faith in the eternal realities of God’s love and grace can truly deliver us from evil and to those “green pastures” and “still waters” of the Kingdom.

    (1954.4) 181:1.7 Jesus gives peace to his fellow doers of the will of God but not on the order of the joys and satisfactions of this material world. Unbelieving materialists and fatalists can hope to enjoy only two kinds of peace and soul comfort: Either they must be stoics, with steadfast resolution determined to face the inevitable and to endure the worst; or they must be optimists, ever indulging that hope which springs eternal in the human breast, vainly longing for a peace which never really comes.

    (1954.5) 181:1.8 A certain amount of both stoicism and optimism are serviceable in living a life on earth, but neither has aught to do with that superb peace which the Son of God bestows upon his brethren in the flesh. The peace which Michael gives his children on earth is that very peace which filled his own soul when he himself lived the mortal life in the flesh and on this very world. The peace of Jesus is the joy and satisfaction of a God-knowing individual who has achieved the triumph of learning fully how to do the will of God while living the mortal life in the flesh. The peace of Jesus’ mind was founded on an absolute human faith in the actuality of the divine Father’s wise and sympathetic overcare. Jesus had trouble on earth, he has even been falsely called the “man of sorrows,” but in and through all of these experiences he enjoyed the comfort of that confidence which ever empowered him to proceed with his life purpose in the full assurance that he was achieving the Father’s will.

    (1954.6) 181:1.9 Jesus was determined, persistent, and thoroughly devoted to the accomplishment of his mission, but he was not an unfeeling and calloused stoic; he ever sought for the cheerful aspects of his life experiences, but he was not a blind and self-deceived optimist. The Master knew all that was to befall him, and he was unafraid. After he had bestowed this peace upon each of his followers, he could consistently say, “Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.”

    (1955.1) 181:1.10 The peace of Jesus is, then, the peace and assurance of a son who fully believes that his career for time and eternity is safely and wholly in the care and keeping of an all-wise, all-loving, and all-powerful spirit Father. And this is, indeed, a peace which passes the understanding of mortal mind, but which can be enjoyed to the full by the believing human heart.

    (1096.4) 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.

    "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."

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    BradlyParticipant
    Oct 12, 2025, 12:50 PM

    My last post and related text about how faith and our Deity Connections combine to deliver the greatest soothing salve of all when in the grip and grasp of human suffering has brought great reflection and some insight to my mind.

    I am reminded of my earlier claim that we all suffer, some more and some less, some in this way and others in that way, some occasionally and some more frequently and some must even endure suffering without end while some endure the most gruesome and relentless forms of suffering.  Many of us cause some or most of our personal suffering but certainly does much of humanity suffer at the hands of others and the accidents of time and the consequences of imperfection in the evolutionary perfecting by freewill and experiential progress of trial and error.

    My quote of the day from the Foundation this morning was about the suffering of The Son of Man in the Garden.  Jesus suffered too.  In many ways.  At many times.  For lots of reasons.  So human.  Indeed so.

    The cross was not his greatest suffering I do not think.  Not the least either.  It might be interesting and valuable to consider and explore the text for examples of those moments of such suffering and examine the causes of Jesus’ human suffering to better reflect upon our own.

    Let’s begin with today’s quoted text:

    182:3.5 (1968.6)During the years that Jesus lived among his followers, they did, indeed, have much proof of his divine nature, but just now are they about to witness new evidences of his humanity. Just before the greatest of all the revelations of his divinity, his resurrection, must now come the greatest proofs of his mortal nature, his humiliation and crucifixion.

    182:3.6 (1969.1) Each time he prayed in the garden, his humanity laid a firmer faith-hold upon his divinity; his human will more completely became one with the divine will of his Father. Among other words spoken to him by the mighty angel was the message that the Father desired his Son to finish his earth bestowal by passing through the creature experience of death just as all mortal creatures must experience material dissolution in passing from the existence of time into the progression of eternity.

    182:3.7 (1969.2)Earlier in the evening it had not seemed so difficult to drink the cup, but as the human Jesus bade farewell to his apostles and sent them to their rest, the trial grew more appalling. Jesus experienced that natural ebb and flow of feeling which is common to all human experience, and just now he was weary from work, exhausted from the long hours of strenuous labor and painful anxiety concerning the safety of his apostles. While no mortal can presume to understand the thoughts and feelings of the incarnate Son of God at such a time as this, we know that he endured great anguish and suffered untold sorrow, for the perspiration rolled off his face in great drops. He was at last convinced that the Father intended to allow natural events to take their course; he was fully determined to employ none of his sovereign power as the supreme head of a universe to save himself.

    182:3.8 (1969.3)The assembled hosts of a vast creation are now hovered over this scene under the transient joint command of Gabriel and the Personalized Adjuster of Jesus. The division commanders of these armies of heaven have repeatedly been warned not to interfere with these transactions on earth unless Jesus himself should order them to intervene.

    182:3.9 (1969.4) The experience of parting with the apostles was a great strain on the human heart of Jesus; this sorrow of love bore down on him and made it more difficult to face such a death as he well knew awaited him. He realized how weak and how ignorant his apostles were, and he dreaded to leave them. He well knew that the time of his departure had come, but his human heart longed to find out whether there might not possibly be some legitimate avenue of escape from this terrible plight of suffering and sorrow. And when it had thus sought escape, and failed, it was willing to drink the cup. The divine mind of Michael knew he had done his best for the twelve apostles; but the human heart of Jesus wished that more might have been done for them before they should be left alone in the world. Jesus’ heart was being crushed; he truly loved his brethren. He was isolated from his family in the flesh; one of his chosen associates was betraying him. His father Joseph’s people had rejected him and thereby sealed their doom as a people with a special mission on earth. His soul was tortured by baffled love and rejected mercy. It was just one of those awful human moments when everything seems to bear down with crushing cruelty and terrible agony.

    182:3.10 (1969.5) Jesus’ humanity was not insensible to this situation of private loneliness, public shame, and the appearance of the failure of his cause. All these sentiments bore down on him with indescribable heaviness. In this great sorrow his mind went back to the days of his childhood in Nazareth and to his early work in Galilee. At the time of this great trial there came up in his mind many of those pleasant scenes of his earthly ministry. And it was from these old memories of Nazareth, Capernaum, Mount Hermon, and of the sunrise and sunset on the shimmering Sea of Galilee, that he soothed himself as he made his human heart strong and ready to encounter the traitor who should so soon betray him.

    182:3.11 (1970.1)Before Judas and the soldiers arrived, the Master had fully regained his customary poise; the spirit had triumphed over the flesh; faith had asserted itself over all human tendencies to fear or entertain doubt. The supreme test of the full realization of the human nature had been met and acceptably passed. Once more the Son of Man was prepared to face his enemies with equanimity and in the full assurance of his invincibility as a mortal man unreservedly dedicated to the doing of his Father’s will.

    "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."

17. B

    BradlyParticipant
    Oct 12, 2025, 1:13 PM

    From wiki:  Equanimity is a state of psychological stability and composure which is undisturbed by the experience of or exposure to emotions, pain, or other phenomena that may otherwise cause a loss of mental balance. The virtue and value of equanimity is extolled and advocated by a number of major religions and ancient philosophies.

    Me here:  Stability.  Composure. Balance.

    How do we gain such perspective in the midst of our suffering?

    Well, we are told, a certain amount of stoicism and optimism are helpful, but neither delivers the same peace of mind and spirit as does faith and the Divine Assurance of our Deity Connections.

    These are the natural and normal legacy of our humanity. To be human (or not animal) is to be connected to the Spirit, first by the 6th and 7th Adjutants (worship and wisdom), then by soul and our God Fragment, and our Deity gravity circuits of spirit, mind, and personality.  Our Deity Connections deliver Divine Assurance to our mind and our soul.

    "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."

18. B

    BradlyParticipant
    Oct 13, 2025, 3:45 AM

    128:1.2 (1407.7)Joshua ben Joseph knew full well that he was a man, a mortal man, born of woman. This is shown in the selection of his first title, the Son of Man. He was truly a partaker of flesh and blood, and even now, as he presides in sovereign authority over the destinies of a universe, he still bears among his numerous well-earned titles that of Son of Man. It is literally true that the creative Word—the Creator Son—of the Universal Father was “made flesh and dwelt as a man of the realm on Urantia.” He labored, grew weary, rested, and slept. He hungered and satisfied such cravings with food; he thirsted and quenched his thirst with water. He experienced the full gamut of human feelings and emotions; he was “in all things tested, even as you are,” and he suffered and died.

     

    "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."

19. B

    BradlyParticipant
    Oct 14, 2025, 3:13 AM

    It may not be an actual purpose of suffering (although, perhaps it is so), but a universal result of suffering by those with faith assurance is becoming “sympathetic”.

    Keyword search:

    https://urassoc.arko.nyc/search/?zoom_sort=2&zoom_query=Sympathetic+&x=5&y=19

    One outcome/purpose of the Creator Sons’ 7 bestowal missions is experiential sympathy.

    119:0.4 (1308.4) The purpose of these creature incarnations is to enable such Creators to become wise, sympathetic, just, and understanding sovereigns. These divine Sons are innately just, but they become understandingly merciful as a result of these successive bestowal experiences; they are naturally merciful, but these experiences make them merciful in new and additional ways. These bestowals are the last steps in their education and training for the sublime tasks of ruling the local universes in divine righteousness and by just judgment.

    119:0.5 (1308.5) Though numerous incidental benefits accrue to the various worlds, systems, and constellations, as well as to the different orders of universe intelligences affected and benefited by these bestowals, still they are primarily designed to complete the personal training and universe education of a Creator Son himself. These bestowals are not essential to the wise, just, and efficient management of a local universe, but they are absolutely necessary to a fair, merciful, and understanding administration of such a creation, teeming with its varied forms of life and its myriads of intelligent but imperfect creatures.

    119:0.6 (1308.6) The Michael Sons begin their work of universe organization with a full and just sympathy for the various orders of beings whom they have created. They have vast stores of mercy for all these differing creatures, even pity for those who err and flounder in the selfish mire of their own production. But such endowments of justice and righteousness will not suffice in the estimate of the Ancients of Days. These triune rulers of the superuniverses will never certify a Creator Son as Universe Sovereign until he has really acquired the viewpoint of his own creatures by actual experience in the environment of their existence and as these very creatures themselves. In this way such Sons become intelligent and understanding rulers; they come to know the various groups over which they rule and exercise universe authority. By living experience they possess themselves of practical mercy, fair judgment, and the patience born of experiential creature existence.

    "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."

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