What Is Goodness? Why Is Only God Good? Is It Really "All Good"?

106 posts · 6 participants · started Mar 9, 2016, 12:19 PM

1. B

   BonitaParticipant
   Mar 22, 2016, 2:45 PM

   Bradly wrote:

   God created time and space…but not anything within those I do not think.  Time for some research!!

   I thought the Creator Sons are concerned with time and the Creative Spirits are concerned with space as described in 34:3.  I would think that God the Father, has nothing at all to do with time or space because he is infinite and eternal.  The universes of time and space don’t actually exist to him.  There’s a quote for that . . .  looking.   I think, except for personality, God the Father doesn’t even recognize time and space.  Uh! found it.  I’m guessing that time and space is entirely the purview of the Paradise Master Spirits.

   15:0.1 As far as the Universal Father is concerned — as a Father — the universes are virtually nonexistent; he deals with personalities; he is the Father of personalities.

    

2. RE

   Richard E WarrenParticipant
   Mar 22, 2016, 3:13 PM

   Bonita wrote:

   Rick Warren wrote: Understood, and well articulated, but you lost me saying God doesn’t create anything. I don’t think you can find support for that.

   Well of course I can find support for that. I wouldn’t have written it if there wasn’t support for that. And I didn’t say that God doesn’t create ANYTHING. I said he is not a CREATOR. My words were: “That is why God is not a Creator; he is not omnificient. Creation must become perfected, which is why we have Master Michaels and the evolution of the Supreme, which is simply the process of perfecting creation.”

   What I’m trying to explain is that God is not the creator of the experiential superuniverses of time and space. The First Source and Center, God the Father, is the Creator of the perfect Central Universe. The rest of creation was delegated because God the Father can only create perfection. He did not create humans and their emotions.

   We think of God as our Creator, but it is only a theoretical title. He did not directly create us. If he did, we’d be perfect, but were not, we’re imperfect. We’re in the process of becoming perfected in the universes of time and space by the Sons of God, hence the obvious potential of imperfection (evil). Imperfection (evil) does not exist in God’s perfect creation of the Central Universe. Get it?

   Here are the quotes:

   1:2.9 In theory you may think of God as the Creator, and he is the personal creator of Paradise and the central universe of perfection, but the universes of time and space are all created and organized by the Paradise corps of the Creator Sons. The Universal Father is not the personal creator of the local universe of Nebadon; the universe in which you live is the creation of his Son Michael. Though the Father does not personally create the evolutionary universes, he does control them in many of their universal relationships and in certain of their manifestations of physical, mindal, and spiritual energies. God the Father is the personal creator of the Paradise universe and, in association with the Eternal Son, the creator of all other personal universe Creators.

   32:4.10 God is not a self-centered personality; the Father freely distributes himself to his creation and to his creatures. He lives and acts, not only in the Deities, but also in his Sons, whom he intrusts with the doing of everything that it is divinely possible for them to do. The Universal Father has truly divested himself of every function which it is possible for another being to perform.

   54:2.1 With the Son and in the Spirit did God project eternal Havona, and ever since has there obtained the eternal pattern of co-ordinate participation in creation — sharing. This pattern of sharing is the master design for every one of the Sons and Daughters of God who go out into space to engage in the attempt to duplicate in time the central universe of eternal perfection.

   118:6.1 God is truly omnipotent, but he is not omnificent – he does not personally do all that is done.

   118:6.2 To advocate the omnificence of primal Deity would be equal to disenfranchising well-nigh a million Creator Sons of Paradise, not to mention the innumerable hosts of various other orders of concurring creative assistants.

   And here’s another great quote to explain the reason for the difference between God’s perfect creation and his Son’s imperfect creation.

   105:6.4 3. The creature repercussion to finite-reality promulgation resulted in the appearance of perfect beings on the order of the eternal inhabitants of Havona and of perfected evolutionary ascenders from the seven superuniverses. But to attain perfection as an evolutionary (time-creative) experience implies something other-than-perfection as a point of departure. Thus arises imperfection in the evolutionary creations. And this is the origin of potential evil. Misadaptation, disharmony, and conflict, all these things are inherent in evolutionary growth, from physical universes to personal creatures.

   God the Father is not responsible for our suffering. Suffering is the tragedy that can accompany imperfection. However, God the Father gladly shares in our suffering as a loving companion (through the personality circuit). That doesn’t say that he suffers too, but that he shares in the experience of it. Even the revelators don’t know for sure if he suffers. My guess is that his sharing is one of support, guidance and enlightenment, leading us out of suffering imperfection into a more perfected state, more like himself. And he’s not a whining crybaby who blames other people for suffering, I can tell you that.

   110:0.1 The endowment of imperfect beings with freedom entails inevitable tragedy, and it is the nature of the perfect ancestral Deity to universally and affectionately share these sufferings in loving companionship.

   Hmmm…the Divine Counselor said this Bonita:

   …God created the universes of his own free and sovereign will, and he created them in accordance with his all-wise and eternal purpose…. ^{(54.1) 4:0.1}

    

   .

   Richard E Warren

3. RE

   Richard E WarrenParticipant
   Mar 22, 2016, 3:24 PM

   The authors do say that time and space are the domain of the Michaels and their mates, but God had to create the domain, the ground of being. No?

   Richard E Warren

4. B

   BonitaParticipant
   Mar 22, 2016, 3:26 PM

   Rick, you can probably find a hundred quotes in TUB that say God created this or that.  But, it also says such a notion is only in theory.  He created the Central Universe and delegated everything else.  God INDIRECTLY created the universes.  By INDIRECTLY (and I’m not shouting, I just have a hell of a time highlighting), I mean God the Father and the Eternal Son created the Creator Sons, who created the universes.  God the Father did NOT personally create the universes of time and space.  I think I supplied plenty of evidence for that, actually a direct quote from the first paper of the book.  Sorry, I have to run or I’d also reproduce a hundred quotes that say God created this and that.

   1:2.9 Though the Father does not personally create the evolutionary universes, he does control them in many of their universal relationships and in certain of their manifestations of physical, mindal, and spiritual energies. God the Father is the personal creator of the Paradise universe and, in association with the Eternal Son, the creator of all other personal universe Creators.

5. B

   BonitaParticipant
   Mar 22, 2016, 7:49 PM

   Rick Warren wrote:

   The authors do say that time and space are the domain of the Michaels and their mates, but God had to create the domain, the ground of being. No?

   Yes and No.  You have to be careful when you use the word God.  The word God means all personalities of Deity.  So in a broad sense, God is the origin of everything, the beginning and the end.  But since we have this terrific cosmology revealed to us, I think it behooves us to use it, don’t you?

   God the Father, simultaneously became the father of the Eternal Son and the Isle of Paradise, and coexistent with that differentiation came the Infinite Spirit and the Central Universe.  All of that creation occurred at one theoretical point.  Then that’s it for the origin of existential reality.  God the Father stopped creating and began delegating.  As you recall, on Paradise time and space are non-existent.

   0:3.22 In this original transaction the theoretical I AM achieved the realization of personality by becoming the Eternal Father of the Original Son simultaneously with becoming the Eternal Source of the Isle of Paradise. Coexistent with the differentiation of the Son from the Father, and in the presence of Paradise, there appeared the person of the Infinite Spirit and the central universe of Havona. With the appearance of coexistent personal Deity, the Eternal Son and the Infinite Spirit, the Father escaped, as a personality, from otherwise inevitable diffusion throughout the potential of Total Deity. Thenceforth it is only in Trinity association with his two Deity equals that the Father fills all Deity potential, while increasingly experiential Deity is being actualized on the divinity levels of Supremacy, Ultimacy, and Absoluteness.

   0:1.13 The absolute level is beginningless, endless, timeless, and spaceless. For example: On Paradise, time and space are nonexistent; the time-space status of Paradise is absolute.

   However, it is true that the potential for all reality (time and space included) is contained in Paradise.

   11:2.10 It appears to us that the First Source and Center has concentrated all absolute potential for cosmic reality in Paradise as a part of his technique of self-liberation from infinity limitations, as a means of making possible subinfinite, even time–space, creation. But it does not follow that Paradise is time–space limited just because the universe of universes discloses these qualities. Paradise exists without timeand has no location in space.

   Paradise is of Trinity origin, but the universes of time and space are sevenfold in manifestation.  The source of sevenfold creation  is the Infinite Spirit who personalized the Seven Master Spirits of Paradise. And this is where it starts to get tricky because it involves the Supreme Being, the Almighty Supreme and the Supreme Mind.  Mind coordinates the evolution of the seven superuniverses and also the Supreme, which is why the Infinite Spirit is involved.

   9:8.2 The first Deity-creating act of the Infinite Spirit, functioning apart from the Trinity but in some unrevealed association with the Father and the Son, personalized in the existence of the Seven Master Spirits of Paradise, the distributors of the Infinite Spirit to the universes.

   56:6.2 The personality realities of the Supreme Being come forth from the Paradise Deities and on the pilot world of the outer Havona circuit unify with the power prerogatives of the Almighty Supreme coming up from the Creator divinities of the grand universe. God the Supreme as a person existed in Havona before the creation of the seven superuniverses, but he functioned only on spiritual levels. The evolution of the Almighty power of Supremacy by diverse divinity synthesis in the evolving universes eventuated in a new power presence of Deity which co-ordinated with the spiritual person of the Supreme in Havona by means of the Supreme Mind, which concomitantly translated from the potential resident in the infinite mind of the Infinite Spirit to the active functional mind of the Supreme Being.

   That doesn’t really explain it all, and not very well, but it’s a start.  The potential lies with God the Father, but the actualization of the potential is delegated.  That about sums up what I’m trying to say in as few words as possible, I guess.

6. RE

   Richard E WarrenParticipant
   Mar 22, 2016, 8:43 PM

   Bonita wrote:

   Rick Warren wrote:

   The authors do say that time and space are the domain of the Michaels and their mates, but God had to create the domain, the ground of being. No?

   Yes and No. You have to be careful when you use the word God. The word God means all personalities of Deity. So in a broad sense, God is the origin of everything, the beginning and the end. But since we have this terrific cosmology revealed to us, I think it behooves us to use it, don’t you? God the Father, simultaneously became the father of the Eternal Son and the Isle of Paradise, and coexistent with that differentiation came the Infinite Spirit and the Central Universe. All of that creation occurred at one theoretical point. Then that’s it for the origin of existential reality. God the Father stopped creating and began delegating. As you recall, on Paradise time and space are non-existent.

   0:3.22 In this original transaction the theoretical I AM achieved the realization of personality by becoming the Eternal Father of the Original Son simultaneously with becoming the Eternal Source of the Isle of Paradise. Coexistent with the differentiation of the Son from the Father, and in the presence of Paradise, there appeared the person of the Infinite Spirit and the central universe of Havona. With the appearance of coexistent personal Deity, the Eternal Son and the Infinite Spirit, the Father escaped, as a personality, from otherwise inevitable diffusion throughout the potential of Total Deity. Thenceforth it is only in Trinity association with his two Deity equals that the Father fills all Deity potential, while increasingly experiential Deity is being actualized on the divinity levels of Supremacy, Ultimacy, and Absoluteness. 0:1.13 The absolute level is beginningless, endless, timeless, and spaceless. For example: On Paradise, time and space are nonexistent; the time-space status of Paradise is absolute.

   However, it is true that the potential for all reality (time and space included) is contained in Paradise.

   11:2.10 It appears to us that the First Source and Center has concentrated all absolute potential for cosmic reality in Paradise as a part of his technique of self-liberation from infinity limitations, as a means of making possible subinfinite, even time–space, creation. But it does not follow that Paradise is time–space limited just because the universe of universes discloses these qualities. Paradise exists without timeand has no location in space.

   Paradise is of Trinity origin, but the universes of time and space are sevenfold in manifestation. The source of sevenfold creation is the Infinite Spirit who personalized the Seven Master Spirits of Paradise. And this is where it starts to get tricky because it involves the Supreme Being, the Almighty Supreme and the Supreme Mind. Mind coordinates the evolution of the seven superuniverses and also the Supreme, which is why the Infinite Spirit is involved.

   9:8.2 The first Deity-creating act of the Infinite Spirit, functioning apart from the Trinity but in some unrevealed association with the Father and the Son, personalized in the existence of the Seven Master Spirits of Paradise, the distributors of the Infinite Spirit to the universes. 56:6.2 The personality realities of the Supreme Being come forth from the Paradise Deities and on the pilot world of the outer Havona circuit unify with the power prerogatives of the Almighty Supreme coming up from the Creator divinities of the grand universe. God the Supreme as a person existed in Havona before the creation of the seven superuniverses, but he functioned only on spiritual levels. The evolution of the Almighty power of Supremacy by diverse divinity synthesis in the evolving universes eventuated in a new power presence of Deity which co-ordinated with the spiritual person of the Supreme in Havona by means of the Supreme Mind, which concomitantly translated from the potential resident in the infinite mind of the Infinite Spirit to the active functional mind of the Supreme Being.

   That doesn’t really explain it all, and not very well, but it’s a start. The potential lies with God the Father, but the actualization of the potential is delegated. That about sums up what I’m trying to say in as few words as possible, I guess.

   Your insights are much appreciated, and I arrived at about the same as you, after thinking on it.

   Seems to me like “God” created just two things as the basis of the firmament of time and space: Gravity and ultimatons. The rest was delegated.

   When I use the word God as the original creator, I think of whatever and wherever the will of God resides/is centered, and I assume his true, beautiful and good personality.  I can’t help thinking of God as The Person.

   .

   Richard E Warren

7. B

   BradlyParticipant
   Mar 22, 2016, 9:00 PM
   Bradly wrote:

   God created time and space…but not anything within those I do not think. Time for some research!!

   Thanks Bonita for clearing up my misinformation posted above – or perhaps, incomplete information.  I went to the Foreward for further illumination and what you say is so very true….we must be careful to whom we are referring when we think or say “God”.  As to the “creation” of time and space, I cannot find definitively who or when….yet!  I’m still thinking it’s all good!  That which is not good is a wasted opportunity for good…for there is always a potential response to every evil and sin and suffering which IS good.  Time and eternity takes care of all who suffer to thereby benefit from that suffering – sooner or later.

   I would suggest that it takes the proper and mature time unit perspective to gain any understanding and appreciation for this claim that it really is “all good”.

   0:2.6 (3.19) GOD is a word symbol designating all personalizations of Deity. The term requires a different definition on each personal level of Deity function and must be still further redefined within each of these levels, as this term may be used to designate the diverse co-ordinate and subordinate personalizations of Deity; for example: the Paradise Creator Sons — the local universe fathers.

   12:5.1 (134.6) Like space, time is a bestowal of Paradise, but not in the same sense, only indirectly. Time comes by virtue of motion and because mind is inherently aware of sequentiality. From a practical viewpoint, motion is essential to time, but there is no universal time unit based on motion except in so far as the Paradise-Havona standard day is arbitrarily so recognized. The totality of space respiration destroys its local value as a time source.

   12:5.2 (135.1) Space is not infinite, even though it takes origin from Paradise; not absolute, for it is pervaded by the Unqualified Absolute. We do not know the absolute limits of space, but we do know that the absolute of time is eternity.

   12:5.3 (135.2) Time and space are inseparable only in the time-space creations, the seven superuniverses. Nontemporal space (space without time) theoretically exists, but the only truly nontemporal place is Paradise area. Nonspatial time (time without space) exists in mind of the Paradise level of function.

   14:0.1 (152.1) THE perfect and divine universe occupies the center of all creation; it is the eternal core around which the vast creations of time and space revolve. Paradise is the gigantic nuclear Isle of absolute stability which rests motionless at the very heart of the magnificent eternal universe. This central planetary family is called Havona and is far-distant from the local universe of Nebadon. It is of enormous dimensions and almost unbelievable mass and consists of one billion spheres of unimagined beauty and superb grandeur, but the true magnitude of this vast creation is really beyond the understanding grasp of the human mind. *

   14:0.2 (152.2) This is the one and only settled, perfect, and established aggregation of worlds. This is a wholly created and perfect universe; it is not an evolutionary development. This is the eternal core of perfection, about which swirls that endless procession of universes which constitute the tremendous evolutionary experiment, the audacious adventure of the Creator Sons of God, who aspire to duplicate in time and to reproduce in space the pattern universe, the ideal of divine completeness, supreme finality, ultimate reality, and eternal perfection.

   14:2.5 (154.7) There are numerous physical phenomena and spiritual reactions transpiring in the central creation which are unknown on worlds such as Urantia. The basic organization of a threefold creation is wholly unlike that of the twofold constitution of the created universes of time and space.

   "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. RE

   Richard E WarrenParticipant
   Mar 23, 2016, 11:48 AM

   Bradly wrote:

   God created time and space…but not anything within those I do not think. Time for some research!!

   Thanks Bonita for clearing up my misinformation posted above – or perhaps, incomplete information. I went to the Foreward for further illumination and what you say is so very true….we must be careful to whom we are referring when we think or say “God”. As to the “creation” of time and space, I cannot find definitively who or when….yet! I’m still thinking it’s all good! That which is not good is a wasted opportunity for good…for there is always a potential response to every evil and sin and suffering which IS good. Time and eternity takes care of all who suffer to thereby benefit from that suffering – sooner or later. I would suggest that it takes the proper and mature time unit perspective to gain any understanding and appreciation for this claim that it really is “all good”. 0:2.6 (3.19) GOD is a word symbol designating all personalizations of Deity. The term requires a different definition on each personal level of Deity function and must be still further redefined within each of these levels, as this term may be used to designate the diverse co-ordinate and subordinate personalizations of Deity; for example: the Paradise Creator Sons — the local universe fathers. 12:5.1 (134.6) Like space, time is a bestowal of Paradise, but not in the same sense, only indirectly. Time comes by virtue of motion and because mind is inherently aware of sequentiality. From a practical viewpoint, motion is essential to time, but there is no universal time unit based on motion except in so far as the Paradise-Havona standard day is arbitrarily so recognized. The totality of space respiration destroys its local value as a time source. 12:5.2 (135.1) Space is not infinite, even though it takes origin from Paradise; not absolute, for it is pervaded by the Unqualified Absolute. We do not know the absolute limits of space, but we do know that the absolute of time is eternity. 12:5.3 (135.2) Time and space are inseparable only in the time-space creations, the seven superuniverses. Nontemporal space (space without time) theoretically exists, but the only truly nontemporal place is Paradise area. Nonspatial time (time without space) exists in mind of the Paradise level of function. 14:0.1 (152.1) THE perfect and divine universe occupies the center of all creation; it is the eternal core around which the vast creations of time and space revolve. Paradise is the gigantic nuclear Isle of absolute stability which rests motionless at the very heart of the magnificent eternal universe. This central planetary family is called Havona and is far-distant from the local universe of Nebadon. It is of enormous dimensions and almost unbelievable mass and consists of one billion spheres of unimagined beauty and superb grandeur, but the true magnitude of this vast creation is really beyond the understanding grasp of the human mind. * 14:0.2 (152.2) This is the one and only settled, perfect, and established aggregation of worlds. This is a wholly created and perfect universe; it is not an evolutionary development. This is the eternal core of perfection, about which swirls that endless procession of universes which constitute the tremendous evolutionary experiment, the audacious adventure of the Creator Sons of God, who aspire to duplicate in time and to reproduce in space the pattern universe, the ideal of divine completeness, supreme finality, ultimate reality, and eternal perfection. 14:2.5 (154.7) There are numerous physical phenomena and spiritual reactions transpiring in the central creation which are unknown on worlds such as Urantia. The basic organization of a threefold creation is wholly unlike that of the twofold constitution of the created universes of time and space.

   Thanks for the research and highlights, Bradly. I think we have at least tickled, if not scratched, the surface of goodness in this thread. And I will have to admit, after all that’s been posted, that ‘it IS all good’, with the qualification that: It’s all good–in the end. Evil can’t be inherently good, but good can overcome evil in time.

   .

   There is another quote that should be cited here, about how fortunate and enriched we are to have the experience of discerning goodness, even while dealing with and overcoming evil, and how the Havonites are missing out:

    .

   …The inhabitants of the Havona worlds do not require the potential of relative value levels as a choice stimulus; such perfect beings are able to identify and choose the good in the absence of all contrastive and thought-compelling moral situations. But all such perfect beings are, in moral nature and spiritual status, what they are by virtue of the fact of existence. They have experientially earned advancement only within their inherent status. Mortal man earns even his status as an ascension candidate by his own faith and hope. Everything divine which the human mind grasps and the human soul acquires is an experiential attainment; it is a reality of personal experience and is therefore a unique possession in contrast to the inherent goodness and righteousness of the inerrant personalities of Havona…. 3:5:16

    .

   Hard to imagine what life would be like with only goodness, isn’t it?

    .

   And it would be an oversight if family was not recognized and emphasized in connection with goodness. The family is the seat of goodness on Earth. The seat of goodness in the Universe is the First Family, the Trinity. This must be an absolute Goodness, the dimensions of which may be unknown to everyone except God–although it is easy to believe goodness is inherent in the Son and the Spirit, but perhaps not an absolute goodness like that of God the Father (in light of Jesus’ declaration that only God is good).

   .

   …a true family — a good family — reveals to the parental procreators the attitude of the Creator to his children, while at the same time such true parents portray to their children the first of a long series of ascending disclosures of the love of the Paradise parent of all universe children…. ^{(942.1) 84:7.30}

   .

   Richard E Warren

9. RE

   Richard E WarrenParticipant
   Mar 25, 2016, 11:55 AM
   .

   It seems somehow appropriate to bow out of this thread on “Good” Friday. But it always seemed more like bad Friday in light of what happened on that gruesome day, April 7, 30 AD. 

    .

   I do admire the way the Master endured awful Friday, he had a body in prime condition that might have hung there suffering for days. But the flogging, the many wounds over that bleak 15 hours from midnight to 3 PM, the profuse bleeding caused him to die only six hours after the nails pierced his limbs. With one stray thought he might have wiped out Urantia and the entire human race. But he never wavered in doing good, even to the last thought, the last breath. Though he deny it, he was a good man!

    .

   So how did the oxymoronic Good Friday label come about?

   Etymology

   The etymology of the term “good” in the context of Good Friday is contested. Some sources claim “good” to simply mean pious or holy,[10] while others contend that it is a corruption of “God Friday”.[11] The Oxford English Dictionary supports the first etymology, giving “of a day or season observed as holy by the church” as an archaic sense of good (good, adj. 8c), and providing examples of good tide meaning “Christmas” or “Shrove Tuesday”, and Good Wednesday meaning the Wednesday in Holy Week.[12]

   In German-speaking countries, Good Friday is generally referred to as Karfreitag (Kar from Old High German kara‚ “bewail”, “grieve”‚ “mourn”, Freitag for “Friday”): Mourning Friday. The Kar prefix is an ancestor of the English word care in the sense of cares and woes; it meant mourning. The day is also known as Stiller Freitag (“Silent Friday”) and Hoher Freitag (“High Friday, Holy Friday”).

   .Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_Friday#Etymology

    .

   This thread will remain open indefinitely, for your perusal and/or comments. Good Friday all!

   .

   Richard E Warren

10. B

    BonitaParticipant
    Mar 25, 2016, 1:50 PM

    188:5.9  The cross is not the symbol of the sacrifice of the innocent Son of God in the place of guilty sinners and in order to appease the wrath of an offended God, but it does stand forever, on earth and throughout a vast universe, as a sacred symbol of the good bestowing themselves upon the evil and thereby saving them by this very devotion of love. The cross does stand as the token of the highest form of unselfish service, the supreme devotion of the full bestowal of a righteous life in the service of wholehearted ministry, even in death, the death of the cross. And the very sight of this great symbol of the bestowal life of Jesus truly inspires all of us to want to go and do likewise.

    I think the cross is ultimately a good thing.  It inspired me from a very young age.  I remember even as a 4 and 5 year old being stunned by the odd combination of horror and beauty.  It’s not something you can easily shake from your psyche.  It leaves a lasting impression on all of us.

    Thanks Rick for hosting such wonderful topics.  You do a fantastic job of leading the discussion, the best.  I hope you’ll find more topics to study.  There’s so much material, I’m sure you will.

11. B

    BonitaParticipant
    Mar 30, 2016, 9:29 PM

    I just ran into this quote and had to laugh.  Perhaps the reason why some folks cannot wrap their minds around the idea that “it’s really all good,” is because of the lack of appreciation for humor.  Or, I guess it could also be a lack of faith in loving over care and divine stability.  But if you can laugh at your own insecurities, then you have to have faith.  So, it’s humor, I think.

    48:4.7 3. Prophetic joy. It will perhaps be difficult for mortals to envisage this phase of humor, but we do get a peculiar satisfaction out of the assurance “that all things work together for good” – for spirits and morontians as well as for mortals. This aspect of celestial humor grows out of our faith in the loving overcare of our superiors and in the divine stability of our Supreme Directors.

     

12. RE

    Richard E WarrenParticipant
    Mar 31, 2016, 11:04 AM

    Thanks Bonita, for the encouragement and the reflection on humor. But still, I can’t see joy or humor in God having to execute one of his own children.

    Richard E Warren

13. B

    BradlyParticipant
    Mar 31, 2016, 12:54 PM

    I think the term “execute” is erroneous and misleading.  As I understand it, the functional reality is self erasure by personal choice with self annihilation as its terminus – there is no reality or real person left by the persistent embrace of iniquity and falsehood and self importance and denial of reality and love and God.

    I’m sure this does bring some sense of loss to Deity at some level, perhaps even regret and sympathy….I don’t know.  But the only alternatives are the end of free will or the protection of sin as an ongoing influence upon reality….sin would become real.

    False sympathy is immature and unwise….to sympathize with those who suffer only by their own free will and choices.  All are provided adequate mercy, patience, and love for the repentant child who comes to embrace reality but justice requires, in the final evaluation that reality prevails and unreality terminates….self terminates….execution is far more like pulling the plug on the brain dead we know of here; there simply is nobody home and no circuits to sustain AND recover that life form to function any longer.  Or so I see it.

    54:3.2 (615.4) Although conscious and wholehearted identification with evil (sin) is the equivalent of nonexistence (annihilation), there must always intervene between the time of such personal identification with sin and the execution of the penalty — the automatic result of such a willful embrace of evil — a period of time of sufficient length to allow for such an adjudication of such an individual’s universe status as will prove entirely satisfactory to all related universe personalities, and which will be so fair and just as to win the approval of the sinner himself.

    54:3.3 (615.5) But if this universe rebel against the reality of truth and goodness refuses to approve the verdict, and if the guilty one knows in his heart the justice of his condemnation but refuses to make such confession, then must the execution of sentence be delayed in accordance with the discretion of the Ancients of Days. And the Ancients of Days refuse to annihilate any being until all moral values and all spiritual realities are extinct, both in the evildoer and in all related supporters and possible sympathizers.

    "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."

14. B

    BonitaParticipant
    Mar 31, 2016, 5:09 PM

    Bradly’s absolutely right.  God doesn’t execute anyone. That is assigning human activity to God, a theological error.  All that is real, including personality, persists even if identity ceases to exist.  All that is good about a personality, with or without identity, persists for all eternity.  Why would that cause suffering?  Loss of identity means loss of free will.  Without free will the unifying power of personality cannot keep the elements of the self together.  Those parts of the self that are unreal cannot exist in a real universe.  That which is real, will exist.  And that’s all good.  There’s no “bad” left, it doesn’t exist.

15. RE

    Richard E WarrenParticipant
    Apr 1, 2016, 11:28 AM

    Bonita wrote:

    Bradly’s absolutely right. God doesn’t execute anyone. That is assigning human activity to God, a theological error. All that is real, including personality, persists even if identity ceases to exist. All that is good about a personality, with or without identity, persists for all eternity. Why would that cause suffering? Loss of identity means loss of free will. Without free will the unifying power of personality cannot keep the elements of the self together. Those parts of the self that are unreal cannot exist in a real universe. That which is real, will exist. And that’s all good. There’s no “bad” left, it doesn’t exist.

    We know God Our Father necessarily has to delegate execution to his highest sons in time and space, but still God must give consent, the Ancients of Days don’t do other than the divine will. So what if you or I were in Our Father’s place, would we philosophically declare: It’s good that I slay my son? No, it’s bad, but necessary. In that sense, God has the toughest job in the universe.

     

    Richard E Warren

16. B

    BonitaParticipant
    Apr 1, 2016, 12:11 PM

    I think I already commented on this.  Here’s what I said a few pages ago:

    If there is nothing there, there is nothing to annihilate; all that is real is already extinct.  You can’t execute or annihilate non-reality.  Yes, the personality is denied identity, but it remains as part of the Supreme.  All that is good remains.  All that is not good is not real and therefore is already gone before the Ancients of Days ever make a decision. Truly, it’s all good.

    54:3.3 And the Ancients of Days refuse to annihilate any being until all moral values and all spiritual realities are extinct, both in the evildoer and in all related supporters and possible sympathizers.

    The Ancients of Days don’t slay anyone.  It looks to me like they merely declare that annihilation has taken place after the individual has made himself extinct.   Is there a quote that says the Ancients of Days ask God before they make any such decisions?  Share it if you have it.

    Do you recall the quote about the difference between the personality of God and the justice of God when it comes to sin?  Here it is:

    2:6.8 God loves the sinner and hates the sin: such a statement is true philosophically, but God is a transcendent personality, and persons can only love and hate other persons.  sin is not a person.  God loves the sinner because he is a personality reality (potentially eternal), while towards sin God strikes no personal attitude, for sin is not a spiritual reality; it is not personal; therefore does only the justice of God take cognizance of its existence.  The love of God saves the sinner; the law of God destroys the sin.  This attitude of the divine nature would apparently change if the sinner finally identified himself wholly with sin just as the same mortal mind may also fully identify itself with the indwelling spirit Adjuster. Such a sin-identified mortal would then become wholly unspiritual in nature (and therefore personally unreal) and would experience eventual extinction of being.  Unreality, even incompleteness of creature nature, cannot exist forever in a progressively real and increasingly spiritual universe.

    God has no attitude toward a totally sin-identified person because the person is completely unreal.  If God strikes no attitude, that would include the attitudes of suffering or sadness, wouldn’t it? Only the justice of God is aware (cognizant) of that person; the laws of the universe do the annihilating, not God himself, a person.  God does not have to give his individual permission for such a thing. My guess is that the Ancients of Days only determine whether or not a person has become entirely unreal, whether there’s anything left to salvage, any mercy coupons unspent that can be scrounged up.  The way I understand it is that the Ancients of Days merely issue a decree of dissolution, which means that they deem the individual dissolved or totally unreal.  I’m sure there’s specific “paperwork” to be done after a person disappears him/herself which cannot be done without such a decree.  I think it’s mostly administrative work in that the judgment required is only to determine that there is nothing left of the individual that is real, then the Ancients slam down the gavel and stamp the papers (metaphorically speaking).

    Not even during Michael’s bestowal did the Ancients of Days actually plan on exterminating rebels, they merely allowed the investment of the “automatic seed of its own annihilation”.  People annihilate themselves, and they don’t need God’s permission to do it.  In a way, God gave his permission the moment he gave them free will, the opportunity to do whatever they want.  Shouldn’t you be happy when people get what they want?

    120:1.6 For the period of the Urantia bestowal the Ancients of Days have decreed that rebellion in Nebadon shall be invested with the automatic seed of its own annihilation.

17. RE

    Richard E WarrenParticipant
    Apr 1, 2016, 12:34 PM

    Bonita wrote:

    I think I already commented on this. Here’s what I said a few pages ago:

    If there is nothing there, there is nothing to annihilate; all that is real is already extinct. You can’t execute or annihilate non-reality. Yes, the personality is denied identity, but it remains as part of the Supreme. All that is good remains. All that is not good is not real and therefore is already gone before the Ancients of Days ever make a decision. Truly, it’s all good. 54:3.3 And the Ancients of Days refuse to annihilate any being until all moral values and all spiritual realities are extinct, both in the evildoer and in all related supporters and possible sympathizers.

    The Ancients of Days don’t slay anyone. It looks to me like they merely declare that annihilation has taken place after the individual has made himself extinct. Is there a quote that says the Ancients of Days ask God before they make any such decisions? Share it if you have it. Do you recall the quote about the difference between the personality of God and the justice of God when it comes to sin? Here it is:

    2:6.8 God loves the sinner and hates the sin: such a statement is true philosophically, but God is a transcendent personality, and persons can only love and hate other persons. sin is not a person. God loves the sinner because he is a personality reality (potentially eternal), while towards sin God strikes no personal attitude, for sin is not a spiritual reality; it is not personal; therefore does only the justice of God take cognizance of its existence. The love of God saves the sinner; the law of God destroys the sin. This attitude of the divine nature would apparently change if the sinner finally identified himself wholly with sin just as the same mortal mind may also fully identify itself with the indwelling spirit Adjuster. Such a sin-identified mortal would then become wholly unspiritual in nature (and therefore personally unreal) and would experience eventual extinction of being. Unreality, even incompleteness of creature nature, cannot exist forever in a progressively real and increasingly spiritual universe.

    God has no attitude toward a totally sin-identified person because the person is completely unreal. If God strikes no attitude, that would include the attitudes of suffering or sadness, wouldn’t it? Only the justice of God is aware (cognizant) of that person; the laws of the universe do the annihilating, not God himself, a person. God does not have to give his individual permission for such a thing. My guess is that the Ancients of Days only determine whether or not a person has become entirely unreal, whether there’s anything left to salvage, any mercy coupons unspent that can be scrounged up. The way I understand it is that the Ancients of Days merely issue a decree of dissolution, which means that they deem the individual dissolved or totally unreal. I’m sure there’s specific “paperwork” to be done after a person disappears him/herself which cannot be done without such a decree. I think it’s mostly administrative work in that the judgment required is only to determine that there is nothing left of the individual that is real, then the Ancients slam down the gavel and stamp the papers (metaphorically speaking). Not even during Michael’s bestowal did the Ancients of Days actually plan on exterminating rebels, they merely allowed the investment of the “automatic seed of its own annihilation”. People annihilate themselves, and they don’t need God’s permission to do it. In a way, God gave his permission the moment he gave them free will, the opportunity to do whatever they want. Shouldn’t you be happy when people get what they want?

    120:1.6 For the period of the Urantia bestowal the Ancients of Days have decreed that rebellion in Nebadon shall be invested with the automatic seed of its own annihilation.

    Sophistry Bonita. You are attempting to prove the Ancients of Days act without God’s backing. I submit they are perfect representatives of God’s will in time and space. You will recall God does participate in time/space decisions, Our Father withheld approval of Jesus letting the cup pass when the Son and the Spirit gave it.

    .

    Richard E Warren

18. B

    BonitaParticipant
    Apr 1, 2016, 1:08 PM

    Geez.  That’s the first time I’ve been accused of sophistry.  No wait!  That’s been a constant problem here on this forum, the reason I don’t like coming here. Let’s see, who else wrote that I’m a deceiver who presents fallacious arguments? I can recall a handful or so.  Thankfully, they’re all gone.  I sure didn’t expect it from you though.  That’s a blow.

    Listen, I never said that God doesn’t back what the Ancients of Days do.  I said that they don’t ask him for permission to pass judgment on any given personality.  Don’t put words in my mouth Rick.  It really peeves me when people do that.  If you have the quote which says that the Ancients of Days ask for permission before issuing a decree of dissolution, then produce it. I can’t find it.  Doesn’t mean that it’s not there.  It means I can’t find it.  If you have it, share it.

    Let me try to say this again. Have you heard that the love of God saves the sinner and that the law of God destroys the sin.  Yes, the law of God is his will, but he has delegated it apart from his person.  The Ancients of Days are administrators of the law of God.  Why does God delegate his laws?  Because justice must be a group decision, even when it comes to God the Father.  The Ancients of Days are plural.  It’s a group decision. If God had to give his permission first, it wouldn’t be a group decision.  It would be a dictatorial decree.  Criminy!

    10:6.18 Justice is the collective thought of righteousness; mercy is its personal expression. Mercy is the attitude of love; precision characterizes the operation of law; divine judgment is the soul of fairness, ever conforming to the justice of the Trinity, ever fulfilling the divine love of God. When fully perceived and completely understood, the righteous justice of the Trinity and the merciful love of the Universal Father are coincident. But man has no such full understanding of divine justice. Thus in the Trinity, as man would view it, the personalities of Father, Son, and Spirit are adjusted to co-ordinate ministry of love and law in the experiential universes of time.

    104:2.3 Through the recognition of the Trinity concept the mind of man can hope to grasp something of the interrelationship of love and law in the time-space creations. Through spiritual faith man gains insight into the love of God but soon discovers that this spiritual faith has no influence on the ordained laws of the material universe.

    146:2.5 There is a basic law of justice in the universe which mercy is powerless to circumvent. The unselfish glories of Paradise are not possible of reception by a thoroughly selfish creature of the realms of time and space. Even the infinite love of God cannot force the salvation of eternal survival upon any mortal creature who does not choose to survive. Mercy has great latitude of bestowal, but, after all, there are mandates of justice which even love combined with mercy cannot effectively abrogate.

19. RE

    Richard E WarrenParticipant
    Apr 1, 2016, 1:27 PM

    Bonita wrote:

    Geez. That’s the first time I’ve been accused of sophistry. No wait! That’s been a constant problem here on this forum, the reason I don’t like coming here. Let’s see, who else wrote that I’m a deceiver who presents fallacious arguments? I can recall a handful or so. Thankfully, they’re all gone. I sure didn’t expect it from you though. That’s a blow. Listen, I never said that God doesn’t back what the Ancients of Days do. I said that they don’t ask him for permission to pass judgment on any given personality. Don’t put words in my mouth Rick. It really peeves me when people do that. If you have the quote which says that the Ancients of Days ask for permission before issuing a decree of dissolution, then produce it. I can’t find it. Doesn’t mean that it’s not there. It means I can’t find it. If you have it, share it. Let me try to say this again. Have you heard that the love of God saves the sinner and that the law of God destroys the sin. Yes, the law of God is his will, but he has delegated it apart from his person. The Ancients of Days are administrators of the law of God. Why does God delegate his laws? Because justice must be a group decision, even when it comes to God the Father. The Ancients of Days are plural. It’s a group decision. If God had to give his permission first, it wouldn’t be a group decision. It would be a dictatorial decree. Criminy!

    10:6.18 Justice is the collective thought of righteousness; mercy is its personal expression. Mercy is the attitude of love; precision characterizes the operation of law; divine judgment is the soul of fairness, ever conforming to the justice of the Trinity, ever fulfilling the divine love of God. When fully perceived and completely understood, the righteous justice of the Trinity and the merciful love of the Universal Father are coincident. But man has no such full understanding of divine justice. Thus in the Trinity, as man would view it, the personalities of Father, Son, and Spirit are adjusted to co-ordinate ministry of love and law in the experiential universes of time. 104:2.3 Through the recognition of the Trinity concept the mind of man can hope to grasp something of the interrelationship of love and law in the time-space creations. Through spiritual faith man gains insight into the love of God but soon discovers that this spiritual faith has no influence on the ordained laws of the material universe. 146:2.5 There is a basic law of justice in the universe which mercy is powerless to circumvent. The unselfish glories of Paradise are not possible of reception by a thoroughly selfish creature of the realms of time and space. Even the infinite love of God cannot force the salvation of eternal survival upon any mortal creature who does not choose to survive. Mercy has great latitude of bestowal, but, after all, there are mandates of justice which even love combined with mercy cannot effectively abrogate.

    Please don’t get offended, old friend and sister. No offense intended. And note a crucial detail, I did NOT say you were a sophist, rather that your argument was sophistry.

    Seems to me God is the lawgiver, by which we are all admonished to abide. The Ancients of Days do what God wills I submit. They would not remove anyone unless God approved, no?

    3:2:2
    

    …There is only one lawgiver. He upholds the worlds in space and swings the universes around the endless circle of the eternal circuit.

    .

    196:3:26
    

    …The evolutionary mind is able to discover law, morals, and ethics; but the bestowed spirit, the indwelling Adjuster, reveals to the evolving human mind the lawgiver, the Father-source of all that is true, beautiful, and good; and such an illuminated man has a religion and is spiritually equipped to begin the long and adventurous search for God.

    .

    .

     

    Richard E Warren

20. B

    BonitaParticipant
    Apr 1, 2016, 1:33 PM

    Rick Warren wrote:

    And note a crucial detail, I did NOT say you were a sophist, rather that your argument was sophistry.

    One who delivers sophistry is a sophist.  I am offended.

    Rick Warren wrote:

    They would not remove anyone unless God approved, no?

    No. But I’m not going to explain it again.  I think I’m done here.

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