Who Knows "The Truth"? What is Truth? Where is Truth Found?

203 posts · 11 participants · started Mar 27, 2016, 11:58 AM

1. B

   BradlyParticipant
   May 20, 2016, 9:26 PM

   MidiChlorian wrote:

   Bonita wrote:

   Below is what the Spirit of Truth considers to be the gospel:

   170:4.8-13 The Master on this occasion placed emphasis on the following five points as representing the cardinal features of the gospel of the kingdom:

   1. The pre-eminence of the individual. 2. The will as the determining factor in man’s experience. 3. Spiritual fellowship with God the Father. 4. The supreme satisfactions of the loving service of man. 5. The transcendency of the spiritual over the material in human personality.

   I question that which has been presented above as being “what the Spirit of Truth considers to be the gospel:” where these points are as proposed by the master, Jesus. Yet it was just previously mentioned in the same section, the following:

   (1862.9) 170:4.1 Jesus never gave a precise definition of the kingdom. At one time he would discourse on one phase of the kingdom, and at another time he would discuss a different aspect of the brotherhood of God’s reign in the hearts of men. In the course of this Sabbath afternoon’s sermon Jesus noted no less than five phases, or epochs, of the kingdom, and they were:

   However, based on the following UB quote from Jesus, it indicates that the “Spirit of Truth” can “transform” the thinking of an individual for a new way of understanding.

   (1609.5) 143:2.4 “By the old way you seek to suppress, obey, and conform to the rules of living; by the new way you are first transformed by the Spirit of Truth and thereby strengthened in your inner soul by the constant spiritual renewing of your mind, and so are you endowed with the power of the certain and joyous performance of the gracious, acceptable, and perfect will of God. Forget not — it is your personal faith in the exceedingly great and precious promises of God that ensures your becoming partakers of the divine nature. Thus by your faith and the spirit’s transformation, you become in reality the temples of God, and his spirit actually dwells within you. If, then, the spirit dwells within you, you are no longer bondslaves of the flesh but free and liberated sons of the spirit. The new law of the spirit endows you with the liberty of self-mastery in place of the old law of the fear of self-bondage and the slavery of self-denial.

   Therefore, the Spirit of Truth works with an individual to transform them self, through “constant spiritual renewing of your mind,” so that you can truly be “in reality the temple of God,” whereby one might consider this as knowing the Spirit which indwells in you.

   Me here:  Your post reminded me that the Spirit of Truth IS the presence and the voice of Jesus to our world now.  So, to Bonita’s point that which is the gospel of Jesus is also the gospel of his spirit.  But the Spirit of the Son is not “known” “by” us exactly I do not think – the Spirit brings knowledge of truth and knowledge of the Son and more than a knowledge…a relationship which is real to fill us so as to no more be “lonely”.  To Gene’s point, I think the departure of this Spirit would be wrenching and the vacuum enormous, even to those who may not consider themselves to be “religious”.  This presence within is a powerful spirit indeed.

    
   194:2.1 (2060.6) Jesus lived on earth and taught a gospel which redeemed man from the superstition that he was a child of the devil and elevated him to the dignity of a faith son of God. Jesus’ message, as he preached it and lived it in his day, was an effective solvent for man’s spiritual difficulties in that day of its statement. And now that he has personally left the world, he sends in his place his Spirit of Truth, who is designed to live in man and, for each new generation, to restate the Jesus message so that every new group of mortals to appear upon the face of the earth shall have a new and up-to-date version of the gospel, just such personal enlightenment and group guidance as will prove to be an effective solvent for man’s ever-new and varied spiritual difficulties.

   194:2.2 (2060.7) The first mission of this spirit is, of course, to foster and personalize truth, for it is the comprehension of truth that constitutes the highest form of human liberty. Next, it is the purpose of this spirit to destroy the believer’s feeling of orphanhood. Jesus having been among men, all believers would experience a sense of loneliness had not the Spirit of Truth come to dwell in men’s hearts.

   194:2.3 (2061.1) This bestowal of the Son’s spirit effectively prepared all normal men’s minds for the subsequent universal bestowal of the Father’s spirit (the Adjuster) upon all mankind. In a certain sense, this Spirit of Truth is the spirit of both the Universal Father and the Creator Son.

   194:2.4 (2061.2) Do not make the mistake of expecting to become strongly intellectually conscious of the outpoured Spirit of Truth. The spirit never creates a consciousness of himself, only a consciousness of Michael, the Son. From the beginning Jesus taught that the spirit would not speak of himself. The proof, therefore, of your fellowship with the Spirit of Truth is not to be found in your consciousness of this spirit but rather in your experience of enhanced fellowship with Michael.

   194:2.5 (2061.3) The spirit also came to help men recall and understand the words of the Master as well as to illuminate and reinterpret his life on earth.

   194:2.6 (2061.4) Next, the Spirit of Truth came to help the believer to witness to the realities of Jesus’ teachings and his life as he lived it in the flesh, and as he now again lives it anew and afresh in the individual believer of each passing generation of the spirit-filled sons of God.

   194:2.7 (2061.5) Thus it appears that the Spirit of Truth comes really to lead all believers into all truth, into the expanding knowledge of the experience of the living and growing spiritual consciousness of the reality of eternal and ascending sonship with 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."

2. A

   AnonymousInactive
   May 20, 2016, 11:13 PM

   Bradly wrote:

   Me here: Your post reminded me that the Spirit of Truth IS the presence and the voice of Jesus to our world now. So, to Bonita’s point that which is the gospel of Jesus is also the gospel of his spirit. But the Spirit of the Son is not “known” “by” us exactly I do not think – the Spirit brings knowledge of truth and knowledge of the Son and more than a knowledge…a relationship which is real to fill us so as to no more be “lonely”. To Gene’s point, I think the departure of this Spirit would be wrenching and the vacuum enormous, even to those who may not consider themselves to be “religious”. This presence within is a powerful spirit indeed.

   Bradly: As I stated in my post, my disagreement has nothing to do with who or what is the Spirit of Truth but only that the purpose of the Spirit of Truth is not necessarily to project the specifics of “the gospel of the kingdom”, whereby as time and space advances “the kingdom” stays present but “the gospel” may require a more diverse proclamation.  Therefore the use of the UB quote emphasizing the “old” verses the “new” way.  Whether, one believes that Jesus is the Spirit of Truth, is subjective but make note that He indicated that he would send another, which would indicate that, that spirit is not Himself.  Nevertheless, there is a section in the UB which has been paraphrased to indicate what Jesus proclaimed to be “the gospel of the kingdom.”

   3. Truth and Faith

   (1459.1) 132:3.1 Nabon was a Greek Jew and foremost among the leaders of the chief mystery cult in Rome, the Mithraic. While this high priest of Mithraism held many conferences with the Damascus scribe, he was most permanently influenced by their discussion of truth and faith one evening. Nabon had thought to make a convert of Jesus and had even suggested that he return to Palestine as a Mithraic teacher. He little realized that Jesus was preparing him to become one of the early converts to the gospel of the kingdom. Restated in modern phraseology, the substance of Jesus’ teaching was:

   (1459.2) 132:3.2 Truth cannot be defined with words, only by living. Truth is always more than knowledge. Knowledge pertains to things observed, but truth transcends such purely material levels in that it consorts with wisdom and embraces such imponderables as human experience, even spiritual and living realities. Knowledge originates in science; wisdom, in true philosophy; truth, in the religious experience of spiritual living. Knowledge deals with facts; wisdom, with relationships; truth, with reality values.

   (1459.3) 132:3.3 Man tends to crystallize science, formulate philosophy, and dogmatize truth because he is mentally lazy in adjusting to the progressive struggles of living, while he is also terribly afraid of the unknown. Natural man is slow to initiate changes in his habits of thinking and in his techniques of living.

   (1459.4) 132:3.4 Revealed truth, personally discovered truth, is the supreme delight of the human soul; it is the joint creation of the material mind and the indwelling spirit. The eternal salvation of this truth-discerning and beauty-loving soul is assured by that hunger and thirst for goodness which leads this mortal to develop a singleness of purpose to do the Father’s will, to find God and to become like him. There is never conflict between true knowledge and truth. There may be conflict between knowledge and human beliefs, beliefs colored with prejudice, distorted by fear, and dominated by the dread of facing new facts of material discovery or spiritual progress.

   (1459.5) 132:3.5 But truth can never become man’s possession without the exercise of faith. This is true because man’s thoughts, wisdom, ethics, and ideals will never rise higher than his faith, his sublime hope. And all such true faith is predicated on profound reflection, sincere self-criticism, and uncompromising moral consciousness. Faith is the inspiration of the spiritized creative imagination.

   (1459.6) 132:3.6 Faith acts to release the superhuman activities of the divine spark, the immortal germ, that lives within the mind of man, and which is the potential of eternal survival. Plants and animals survive in time by the technique of passing on from one generation to another identical particles of themselves. The human soul (personality) of man survives mortal death by identity association with this indwelling spark of divinity, which is immortal, and which functions to perpetuate the human personality upon a continuing and higher level of progressive universe existence. The concealed seed of the human soul is an immortal spirit. The second generation of the soul is the first of a succession of personality manifestations of spiritual and progressing existences, terminating only when this divine entity attains the source of its existence, the personal source of all existence, God, the Universal Father.

   (1459.7) 132:3.7 Human life continues — survives — because it has a universe function, the task of finding God. The faith-activated soul of man cannot stop short of the attainment of this goal of destiny; and when it does once achieve this divine goal, it can never end because it has become like God — eternal.

   (1460.1) 132:3.8 Spiritual evolution is an experience of the increasing and voluntary choice of goodness attended by an equal and progressive diminution of the possibility of evil. With the attainment of finality of choice for goodness and of completed capacity for truth appreciation, there comes into existence a perfection of beauty and holiness whose righteousness eternally inhibits the possibility of the emergence of even the concept of potential evil. Such a God-knowing soul casts no shadow of doubting evil when functioning on such a high spirit level of divine goodness.

   (1460.2) 132:3.9 The presence of the Paradise spirit in the mind of man constitutes the revelation promise and the faith pledge of an eternal existence of divine progression for every soul seeking to achieve identity with this immortal and indwelling spirit fragment of the Universal Father.

   (1460.3) 132:3.10 Universe progress is characterized by increasing personality freedom because it is associated with the progressive attainment of higher and higher levels of self-understanding and consequent voluntary self-restraint. The attainment of perfection of spiritual self-restraint equals completeness of universe freedom and personal liberty. Faith fosters and maintains man’s soul in the midst of the confusion of his early orientation in such a vast universe, whereas prayer becomes the great unifier of the various inspirations of the creative imagination and the faith urges of a soul trying to identify itself with the spirit ideals of the indwelling and associated divine presence.

   (1460.4) 132:3.11 Nabon was greatly impressed by these words, as he was by each of his talks with Jesus. These truths continued to burn within his heart, and he was of great assistance to the later arriving preachers of Jesus’ gospel.

   One must consider that Jesus taught in person but the Spirit of Truth is unseen and comes to one from within and their understanding as prompted by the Spirit through one’s religious experience, where the gospel may be understood in different ways.  Therefore, to state that the Spirit of Truth projects one way or another, one’s understanding of what Jesus presented as the gospel of the kingdom is fine but, also may have changed over time, although what has been presented above was presented with this time in mind.

   In addition, I can understand why one considers the Spirit of Truth as being Jesus, because in the following narrations Jesus indicates that the Spirit of Truth will be His spirit but, one must consider the difference between Spirit and Mortal?  Yet when He indicates that He will be in Spirit and indwell your hearts one must keep in mind that He and the Father are One, and that after Pentecost all would receive freely a Though Adjuster, which would indicate that the Thought Adjuster would represent both Father and Son.  So, consider the Spirit of Truth the full enhancement of your TA.

   (1951.3) 180:6.2 “Now that I am leaving you, seeing that the hour has come when I am about to go to the Father, I am surprised that none of you have asked me, Why do you leave us? Nevertheless, I know that you ask such questions in your hearts. I will speak to you plainly, as one friend to another. It is really profitable for you that I go away. If I go not away, the new teacher cannot come into your hearts. I must be divested of this mortal body and be restored to my place on high before I can send this spirit teacher to live in your souls and lead your spirits into the truth. And when my spirit comes to indwell you, he will illuminate the difference between sin and righteousness and will enable you to judge wisely in your hearts concerning them.

   (1951.4) 180:6.3 “I have yet much to say to you, but you cannot stand any more just now. Albeit, when he, the Spirit of Truth, comes, he shall eventually guide you into all truth as you pass through the many abodes in my Father’s universe.

   (1951.5) 180:6.4 “This spirit will not speak of himself, but he will declare to you that which the Father has revealed to the Son, and he will even show you things to come; he will glorify me even as I have glorified my Father. This spirit comes forth from me, and he will reveal my truth to you. Everything which the Father has in this domain is now mine; wherefore did I say that this new teacher would take of that which is mine and reveal it to you.

   (1952.1) 180:6.5 “In just a little while I will leave you for a short time. Afterward, when you again see me, I shall already be on my way to the Father so that even then you will not see me for long.”

   (1952.2) 180:6.6 While he paused for a moment, the apostles began to talk with each other: “What is this that he tells us? ‘In just a little while I will leave you,’ and ‘When you see me again it will not be for long, for I will be on my way to the Father.’ What can he mean by this ‘little while’ and ‘not for long’? We cannot understand what he is telling us.”

   (1952.3) 180:6.7 And since Jesus knew they asked these questions, he said: “Do you inquire among yourselves about what I meant when I said that in a little while I would not be with you, and that, when you would see me again, I would be on my way to the Father? I have plainly told you that the Son of Man must die, but that he will rise again. Can you not then discern the meaning of my words? You will first be made sorrowful, but later on will you rejoice with many who will understand these things after they have come to pass. A woman is indeed sorrowful in the hour of her travail, but when she is once delivered of her child, she immediately forgets her anguish in the joy of the knowledge that a man has been born into the world. And so are you about to sorrow over my departure, but I will soon see you again, and then will your sorrow be turned into rejoicing, and there shall come to you a new revelation of the salvation of God which no man can ever take away from you. And all the worlds will be blessed in this same revelation of life in effecting the overthrow of death. Hitherto have you made all your requests in my Father’s name. After you see me again, you may also ask in my name, and I will hear you.

   (1952.4) 180:6.8 “Down here I have taught you in proverbs and spoken to you in parables. I did so because you were only children in the spirit; but the time is coming when I will talk to you plainly concerning the Father and his kingdom. And I shall do this because the Father himself loves you and desires to be more fully revealed to you. Mortal man cannot see the spirit Father; therefore have I come into the world to show the Father to your creature eyes. But when you have become perfected in spirit growth, you shall then see the Father himself.”

    

3. G

   GeneParticipant
   May 22, 2016, 9:09 PM

   “When a great truth seeker and a great truth giver meet, the result is a great and liberating enlightenment born of the experience of new truth.”

   found this when reading about getting swallowed by a big fish.

   it impressed me that Jesus and Gadiah grew in truth from their relationship?

   the statement referred to both, no??

   Don’t tell me, somewhere way back in this thread this was mentioned already – I’m ok with repeating it.

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