THE NEW CREATION is near, nearer than the air we breathe
The manifestation of THE NEW CREATION waits upon the action of man, or to be more specific, humanity. Its appearance began with one individual and its unfolding continues one person at a time. And so THE NEW CREATION has already started; it was first made manifest in one individual, namely, Jesus, 2000 years ago.
"I was not God and never claimed to be," Jesus wrote early in 1914. "The worship of me as a God is blasphemous and I did not teach it. I am a son of God as you are. Do not let the teachings of men lead you to worship me as a God; I am not."
Jesus, writing through James Padgett in 1915, said: "I do not want men to look upon me as anything more than an elder brother who is filled with the Divine Love of the Father, and very close to Him in the qualities of love and faith.
"I am a spirit who is possessed of a knowledge of the attributes of the Father, that no other spirit is, and yet am only one of His children as you and the rest of mankind are, and for my own brothers to worship me as “god” makes me very unhappy, seeing that they can have such a little knowledge of the truths of the Father."
And again in 1915, Jesus wrote the following: "I am only a son of my Father as you are, and while I was always free from sin and error, as regards the true conception of my Father’s true relationship to mankind, yet you are His son also. And if you will seek earnestly and pray to the Father with faith, you may become as free from sin and error as I was then, and am now. The Father is Himself, alone. There is no other God besides Him, and no other God to be worshiped. I am His teacher of truth, and am the way, the truth and the life, because in me are those qualities of good and knowledge which fit me to show the way and lead men to eternal life in the Father, and to teach them that God has prepared a kingdom in which they may live forever, if they so desire."
The manifestation of THE NEW CREATION waits upon the action of man, or to be more specific, humanity. Its appearance began with one individual and its unfolding continues one person at a time. And so THE NEW CREATION has already started; it was first made manifest in one individual, namely, Jesus, 2000 years ago.
"I was not God and never claimed to be," Jesus wrote early in 1914. "The worship of me as a God is blasphemous and I did not teach it. I am a son of God as you are. Do not let the teachings of men lead you to worship me as a God; I am not."
Jesus, writing through James Padgett in 1915, said: "I do not want men to look upon me as anything more than an elder brother who is filled with the Divine Love of the Father, and very close to Him in the qualities of love and faith.
"I am a spirit who is possessed of a knowledge of the attributes of the Father, that no other spirit is, and yet am only one of His children as you and the rest of mankind are, and for my own brothers to worship me as “god” makes me very unhappy, seeing that they can have such a little knowledge of the truths of the Father."
And again in 1915, Jesus wrote the following: "I am only a son of my Father as you are, and while I was always free from sin and error, as regards the true conception of my Father’s true relationship to mankind, yet you are His son also. And if you will seek earnestly and pray to the Father with faith, you may become as free from sin and error as I was then, and am now. The Father is Himself, alone. There is no other God besides Him, and no other God to be worshiped. I am His teacher of truth, and am the way, the truth and the life, because in me are those qualities of good and knowledge which fit me to show the way and lead men to eternal life in the Father, and to teach them that God has prepared a kingdom in which they may live forever, if they so desire."
If we so Desire .. and Decide
If we so desire ... We are so close to THE NEW CREATION and yet so very far.
The Apostle John, from the place of the Celestial Heaven, on August 5th, 1916, wrote the following words through James Padget:
"All men have, as a part of their possessions, the natural love, and they need not pray for a bestowal of that (although since it has become defiled by sin, it needs to be purified and freed from this blight, and the Father is ever willing and ready to help men obtain this purification).
"But this Divine Love is not a part of man’s nature, nor can he obtain or possess it except he seek for it. Divine Love comes from without and is not developed from within. It is the result of individual acquirement, and not the object of universal possession.
"It may be possessed by all; it can be possessed by only a few; and each man must determine for himself whether it shall be his.
"With God there is no respect of persons; neither is there any royal road to the obtaining of this love. All must pursue the same way, and that way is the one that Jesus taught – the opening up of the soul to this love finding a lodgment therein, which can be brought about only by sincere prayer and longing for its inflowing.
"This love is the life of the Celestial heavens, and the only key that will unlock the gates; and when the mortal enters therein, all other love is absorbed by it. It has no substitute, and is, of itself, a thing apart. It is of the essence of the divine; and the spirit which possesses it is divine itself.
"It may be yours; it may be all men’s – and it may not. You must decide that question for yourself … Not even the Father can make the decision for you."
In an early message given to James Padgett by his grandmother, Ann Rollins, she adds this thought about man's free will to accept or to reject God's Great Love:
"Man has a will to either accept or reject the love of God, and until he exercises his will in a way to show that he wants that love, it will not be given him."
"No man is ever forced to love God or to let God’s love come into his heart …"
If we so desire ... We are so close to THE NEW CREATION and yet so very far.
The Apostle John, from the place of the Celestial Heaven, on August 5th, 1916, wrote the following words through James Padget:
"All men have, as a part of their possessions, the natural love, and they need not pray for a bestowal of that (although since it has become defiled by sin, it needs to be purified and freed from this blight, and the Father is ever willing and ready to help men obtain this purification).
"But this Divine Love is not a part of man’s nature, nor can he obtain or possess it except he seek for it. Divine Love comes from without and is not developed from within. It is the result of individual acquirement, and not the object of universal possession.
"It may be possessed by all; it can be possessed by only a few; and each man must determine for himself whether it shall be his.
"With God there is no respect of persons; neither is there any royal road to the obtaining of this love. All must pursue the same way, and that way is the one that Jesus taught – the opening up of the soul to this love finding a lodgment therein, which can be brought about only by sincere prayer and longing for its inflowing.
"This love is the life of the Celestial heavens, and the only key that will unlock the gates; and when the mortal enters therein, all other love is absorbed by it. It has no substitute, and is, of itself, a thing apart. It is of the essence of the divine; and the spirit which possesses it is divine itself.
"It may be yours; it may be all men’s – and it may not. You must decide that question for yourself … Not even the Father can make the decision for you."
In an early message given to James Padgett by his grandmother, Ann Rollins, she adds this thought about man's free will to accept or to reject God's Great Love:
"Man has a will to either accept or reject the love of God, and until he exercises his will in a way to show that he wants that love, it will not be given him."
"No man is ever forced to love God or to let God’s love come into his heart …"
Soul Transformation - Leaven in the Dough ...
When a person makes the choice to obtain the Great Love of the Father the change toward THE NEW CREATION begins. Jesus teaches about this transformation in a message that he gave to James Padgett on June 27, 1916; he describes the change from a man to an angel as being like leaven in a lump of dough.
"When man takes on the divine nature and becomes absorbed in the essence of the Father, he then becomes like the Father, and whatever his image to the Father may have been when he was mere man, now he becomes the real substance, and limitations of possibilities become removed, love sees no ending, and intellectual development no boundaries, happiness no limitations, and immortality becomes a thing of knowledge, and the soul a new creature having the divine essence of the Father; and until this new creation has taken place, and the transformation becomes a thing of reality, and the soul be made at-one with the Father, man cannot enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Then, no longer man but now an angel.
"Now, all this can be accomplished only by the operation of the new birth – that is, the inflowing into the soul of man of the Divine Love of the Father. This love contains the essence of God’s divinity, and when man obtains it he is then of the same essence as the Father, and for the first time becomes a part of the divine, and fitted to inhabit the Celestial heavens.
"In no other way can man partake of this nature; and it does not require much reasoning to show the logical truth of this statement, for man in his earthly affairs, and in his material experiments in producing compounds from elements, applies the same principle that I assert in my statement, 'The dough cannot be leavened unless leaven is placed in the batch.'
"So you see that without this Divine Love entering into the soul it will be impossible for the natural man to become the divine angel.
"Beliefs and creeds and doctrines and sacrifices cannot work this transformation, and even though the beliefs may be without doubt, and the creeds and doctrines satisfactory, and the sacrifices without end, yet they will all be futile to change the soul of the mere man into the soul of the divine angel."
A similar thought is expressed by Jesus in a message through James Padgett dated November 10th, 1916. Instead of continuing with the image of leaven in the dough Jesus makes the analogy of an ingredient in water that changes the qualities of the water, as a way of picturing the flow of Divine Love into the soul. The following are the words of Jesus:
"The inflowing of love is caused by its bestowal by the Holy Spirit in response to sincere prayer and longings. I mean prayer and longings for the love itself, and not prayers in general (the material benefits that men more often and more naturally, as they believe, ask for and desire). The prayers of mortals for these things that may tend to make them successful and happy in their natural love, are answered also, but these are not the prayers that bring the Divine Love or cause the Holy Spirit to work with men.
"As the prayers of the sincere earnest soul ascend to the Father that soul becomes opened up to the inflowing of this love, and the soul’s perceptions enlarge and come more in rapport with the conditions or influence that always accompanies the presence of this love; and consequently, its entrance into the soul becomes easier, and its reception more perceptible to the soul sense. The more earnest the prayer, and sincere the longings, the sooner faith comes, and with this faith, the realization that the Divine Love is permeating the soul.
"When once the Divine Love finds a lodgment in the soul, it becomes as it were a changed substance, partaking of the essence of the love. And as water may become colored by an ingredient foreign to itself, and which changes not only its appearance but its qualities, so this Divine Love changes the appearance and qualities of the soul, and this change of qualities continues ever thereafter. The natural qualities of the soul and the essence of the love become one and united, and the soul is made altogether different in its constituency from what it was before the inflowing of the love – but this only to the extent of the love received. As this love increases in quantity, the change and transformation becomes correspondingly greater, until at last the transformation may and will become so great that the whole soul becomes a thing of this divine essence, and partakes of its very nature and substance – a being of divinity."
_________________________
For a deeper discussion of this subject, see the article with the title An Ingredient in the Soul. Click HERE .
When a person makes the choice to obtain the Great Love of the Father the change toward THE NEW CREATION begins. Jesus teaches about this transformation in a message that he gave to James Padgett on June 27, 1916; he describes the change from a man to an angel as being like leaven in a lump of dough.
"When man takes on the divine nature and becomes absorbed in the essence of the Father, he then becomes like the Father, and whatever his image to the Father may have been when he was mere man, now he becomes the real substance, and limitations of possibilities become removed, love sees no ending, and intellectual development no boundaries, happiness no limitations, and immortality becomes a thing of knowledge, and the soul a new creature having the divine essence of the Father; and until this new creation has taken place, and the transformation becomes a thing of reality, and the soul be made at-one with the Father, man cannot enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Then, no longer man but now an angel.
"Now, all this can be accomplished only by the operation of the new birth – that is, the inflowing into the soul of man of the Divine Love of the Father. This love contains the essence of God’s divinity, and when man obtains it he is then of the same essence as the Father, and for the first time becomes a part of the divine, and fitted to inhabit the Celestial heavens.
"In no other way can man partake of this nature; and it does not require much reasoning to show the logical truth of this statement, for man in his earthly affairs, and in his material experiments in producing compounds from elements, applies the same principle that I assert in my statement, 'The dough cannot be leavened unless leaven is placed in the batch.'
"So you see that without this Divine Love entering into the soul it will be impossible for the natural man to become the divine angel.
"Beliefs and creeds and doctrines and sacrifices cannot work this transformation, and even though the beliefs may be without doubt, and the creeds and doctrines satisfactory, and the sacrifices without end, yet they will all be futile to change the soul of the mere man into the soul of the divine angel."
A similar thought is expressed by Jesus in a message through James Padgett dated November 10th, 1916. Instead of continuing with the image of leaven in the dough Jesus makes the analogy of an ingredient in water that changes the qualities of the water, as a way of picturing the flow of Divine Love into the soul. The following are the words of Jesus:
"The inflowing of love is caused by its bestowal by the Holy Spirit in response to sincere prayer and longings. I mean prayer and longings for the love itself, and not prayers in general (the material benefits that men more often and more naturally, as they believe, ask for and desire). The prayers of mortals for these things that may tend to make them successful and happy in their natural love, are answered also, but these are not the prayers that bring the Divine Love or cause the Holy Spirit to work with men.
"As the prayers of the sincere earnest soul ascend to the Father that soul becomes opened up to the inflowing of this love, and the soul’s perceptions enlarge and come more in rapport with the conditions or influence that always accompanies the presence of this love; and consequently, its entrance into the soul becomes easier, and its reception more perceptible to the soul sense. The more earnest the prayer, and sincere the longings, the sooner faith comes, and with this faith, the realization that the Divine Love is permeating the soul.
"When once the Divine Love finds a lodgment in the soul, it becomes as it were a changed substance, partaking of the essence of the love. And as water may become colored by an ingredient foreign to itself, and which changes not only its appearance but its qualities, so this Divine Love changes the appearance and qualities of the soul, and this change of qualities continues ever thereafter. The natural qualities of the soul and the essence of the love become one and united, and the soul is made altogether different in its constituency from what it was before the inflowing of the love – but this only to the extent of the love received. As this love increases in quantity, the change and transformation becomes correspondingly greater, until at last the transformation may and will become so great that the whole soul becomes a thing of this divine essence, and partakes of its very nature and substance – a being of divinity."
_________________________
For a deeper discussion of this subject, see the article with the title An Ingredient in the Soul. Click HERE .
To Be Continued ...