Religious Experience through Communion, Meditation, and Worship
H. N. Wieman

How to Get the Benefit of Private Worship

The method of worship best adapted to one person is not always best for another. And the same person in different moods and circumstances will modify his method of worship to suit his need. Hence the suggestions we are about to make must not be taken as rigid rules. We can help one another by making these suggestions. But each must work out his own method. No study of rules and instructions ever enabled a man to swim the first time he jumped into deep water. He had to learn by practice. The same is true of worshipful meditation and communion.

Let us mention first three general conditions or preconditions which are helpful to worship.

The first of these we mentioned earlier. One must be living earnestly. One must not shirk the heavy responsibilities. One cannot swim in shallow water. One must venture out to depths where wading is difficult. If one is to worship successfully he must venture out into the depths. That does not mean that one must do something conspicuous before the world, or seek trouble. It merely means that one shall assume the tremendous responsibilities that await everyone who takes life seriously. It means, for example, if one is a parent, that he shall not treat his child merely as a plaything, but shall assume the enormous responsibility of that child's highest development. No matter how apparently circumscribed one's life may be, the great responsibilities are there for him to bear if he will shoulder them.

The first precondition of effectual worship is, then, that you take life seriously.

The second is sincerity. That means you will not take into your worship any beliefs concerning which you have any doubts. For example, suppose you doubt there is a God. Then do not try to believe there is a God. You can worship better without that belief if you are not absolutely sure of it. Discard any belief and every belief which you cannot hold with complete sincerity. Whenever any belief puts you under a sense of constraint, or gives you a feeling of unreality in your worship, pitch it out. Absolute sincerity, complete honesty with yourself, is indispensable to helpful worship.

A third precondition to worship is seclusion. Even a worshiping group should seclude itself. That is what a church building is for. But in private worship the individual should be alone. Of course one may achieve this required solitude of mind in physical association with others.

But it is best to go to some place where you can be completely alone, preferably at night just before retiring or soon after arising in the morning, or both. The ideal place would be a mountain top at night. That was where Jesus went for his private worship. But for most of us most of the time that is impossible. Some room will serve, especially if you can so shut yourself in that you need not fear others will hear you even when you speak aloud.

This need for solitude for worship arises out of the nature of private communion and meditation. To worship in this fashion means to cease the conduct of ordinary affairs in order to give your whole attention to that feature of your total environment which is supremely important for all human living. It means to turn from the lesser things in order to give the whole attention to God. If one does not believe in God one can call him by another name. I have a little son whom others call Robert, but whom I call Bobby. If you prefer to call God by another name, no harm is done. If the word God brings up doubts, then think of that behavior of the universe, whatever it may be, whether known or unknown, which is most helpful to human kind when we make right adjustment of our own activities to it. God is the supremely important object for all human living, whether or not you call him by that name. To worship is to give your whole attention to this supreme thing. To do this it is necessary to isolate yourself in order not to be distracted by lesser things.

What we have mentioned thus far-earnestness, sincerity, isolation -are the preconditions of worship. Let us now enter into the act of worship itself.

1. The first step in the act of worship is to relax and become aware of the all-encompassing presence. It is difficult to describe just what we mean, as difficult as to describe the acts by which you swim or walk or breathe. Another way of saying it is that we empty the mind and cease to think about anything in particular, yet are not in a state of stupor. It is a state of awareness. Awareness of what? Of that total encompassing presence which sustains you and shapes you and in adaptation to which all your life is lived in so far as it is lived well, and in so far as the greatest goods of life are attained by you. This presence is God; but if you have doubts about God, call it a certain behavior of the universe, or ozone, or electricity, or ether, or innumerable atoms, or any other misconception of God you may prefer. (We are trying to explain how one can worship and at the same time cast out every belief concerning which he has doubts.) Better let belief in God force itself into your mind against your will than try to hold it when it seems to be slipping away. Whatever you do, be honest.

This first step in the act of worship, then, is relaxed and empty-minded awareness of the all-encompassing presence.

2. The second step is to think of how this total process of atoms or electricity or ether (of course it is God) is working upon you and in you and through you to shape the cells of your body and the impulses of your mind into the likeness of Jesus Christ when you make right adjustment to it. If this thought about Jesus gives rise to any doubts, then think of that noblest kind of personality, that highest degree of health, that clearness of mind and greatness of purpose which may be yours when you make right adjustment to this total process of God. No matter how you may doubt your own possibilities, at least there is a maximum of nobility, a maximum of health and mentality and purpose of which you are capable, however small that maximum may be.

When we say one thinks about it, we do not mean one must know what that maximum is nor what shape it will assume. In fact one does not know except as he can see the maximum realization of these possibilities in some historic form as in Jesus. But you do not need to know what your highest possibilities are to think of them in the sense here indicated. You need merely to hold in mind that there are such possibilities for you, however, undefined and unexplored, and that they are to be attained through the working of this all-encompassing Reality.

This second step in the act of worship is, then, to call to mind the fact that you have a total maximum of possibility for good which God will accomplish in you and for you in so far as you make right adaptation to him.

3. The third step is to face the chief problem with which you are struggling. If you live earnestly you are always struggling with a problem which taxes your powers. You are in deep water where wading is difficult. So, in this third stage, after you have become aware of God (called by another name if you prefer) and of your own maximum but undefined possibilities through God, then face your major problem. Survey it as comprehensively and acutely as possible to find what most needs to be done.

4. The fourth step is to analyze yourself and find what mental attitude or habit of any kind needs to be corrected and readjusted in yourself in order that your activities may so fit into the behavior of things that the problem can be solved. What habits, not only of word and overt deed, but of inner attitude and secret impulse, must be changed in yourself in order to fit yourself into the working of the all-encompassing Presence. Your task is to adapt your activities and total personality in such a way that you can "mesh in" with that behavior of the universe through which the greatest good can be attained.

But one must face the fact that this survey and analysis of self in face of his major problem may lead to radical change, or even total abandonment, of that program which he has been following. One may find that he is seeking the wrong things or has mistaken his problem. To make such a discovery is one of the great goods achieved through the worship we are describing. As a result of such worship one may turn right about and go in another direction. However, this is by no means the necessary result. The more common result, perhaps, is to find a way to carry through the task one has undertaken.

5. When you have discovered what readjustment is needed in yourself in order to make right connection with the behavior which is God, you must formulate this personal readjustment in positive terms. You must never stop with a merely negative attitude. The overcoming of a fault is always a positive constructive operation. It always consists of making some right adjustment in order to correct the wrong adjustment. This right adjustment must be formulated in mind as clearly, concisely, and accurately as possible. Put it into words. For example: "I am sensitive and sympathetic to the thought and feeling of others." Or: "I remember every detail when it is needed." Or: "I am calm and winsome and adaptable." Or whatever your need may be.

Some one may say: But the chief problem that engages me in worship has nothing to do with myself. I am praying for some one in Africa or otherwise far removed from anything that I can say or do or feel. No adjustment in myself can be of any avail whatsoever. My answer is: Anything which deeply interests you does have something to do with yourself. It has everything to do with yourself. If you pray about it, then it is through wh'at you do, i.e., through your prayer, that any good is accomplished. Either your prayer is effective or it is not. If it is effective then it is because you pra I yed. That means it is effective because of the personal adjustment which you make to the potent working of your total environment. Let no one think genuine prayer is merely a mouthing of words with no adjustment of the total personality to the total environmental working of God.

So we say the fifth step in worship is positive statement to yourself of the required adjustment of your personality in light of the major problem which concerns you, so that God can work his good.

Some will wish to take a sixth step, that of verbal repetition, preferably spoken aloud to yourself, of this required adjustment of your
personality. "I am quick to see and feel the need of another." "I am simple and honest in all my dealings." "I think profoundly, comprehensively, and accurately." I am this or that, or I feel some way or another toward certain things or persons. What it is you repeat and the numb--r of times you repeat it will, of course, depend on what you have found to be the required adjustment of your total thinking, feeling, willing, doing personality.

The words repeated are not necessarily prayers to God, although one may so apply them to God if he chooses. The communion with God has already been accomplished in the earlier stages of the worship as previously described. What one is now doing by this repetition is to reap the benefits of that worship and enter into a realization of the possibilities which it has opened up. Through this repetition of words you are simply establishing as an enduring habitual attitude of the total personality that adjustment to God which you have attained through worship. You are sealing, conserving, "nailing down" the benefits of that worship.

This repetition of words by which a personal attitude is established is the last stage in the complete act of worship. It should not be done with any sense of strain or anxiety, but in the spirit which the preceding worship has engendered.

We suggest the foregoing program as an experiment in personal religion. If you will try it every night just before retiring for three or four weeks we believe you will note some very marked results.

Religious Experience through the Outer World of Nature
H. N. Wieman

The Method of Religious Experience

In this study we want to do two things. We want to learn how to prepare for religious experience and profit by it, and we want to pool our experiences so that we can learn from one another. The art of how to prepare for religious experience and profit by it is one of the great practical arts of human living. Like every other art it must be developed. The only way to develop any art is for people to tell one another what they have learned through their experiences and efforts. Cannot we all, who have a share in this course, co operate in the enterprise of improving the art of entering into and profiting by the religious experience? Wonderful possibilities for increasing joy and mastery in living are attainable through proper use of religious experience. Indeed, its proper use is the master art in life, for through it all the other arts of living can be improved.

We crudely talk about air and water and food and social group as the factors upon which we must depend for our welfare and improvement. But these are mere fragments in that vast, mysterious, mighty Working which operates in us and upon us and around us throughout all nature. In religious experience there is some conscious awareness of this mighty and blessed Working. When we come into the presence of some great manifestation of nature we may suddenly become aware of this all-sustaining Working. We may feel ourselves borne up by it, or see it gazing up at us in the face of a flower, or towering over us in the mountains, or feel it encompassing us with the greenery of the wood.

But this sense of the mighty Working does not always come to us in the presence of nature. There may be some to whom it never comes. Others it may visit very rarely.

Here we are face to face with a subtle and loathsome temptation. It is the temptation to make ourselves think that we have this exalted experience when we do not have it. Our minds run something like this: It is the proper thing to have this experience in the presence of nature. Poets and prophets and many great souls have had it. I guess I can too. Then we go through all the motions of having the experience and really make ourselves think that we have it.

Can, then, one cultivate this experience? No, not directly. But one can prepare himself for it. One may put himself in the way of having it. It is like love. One cannot make himself love his brother. But the great contagion is likely to infect him if he is receptive to it and puts himself in situations where it is likely to befall him. So religious experience must come of itself, often quite unexpectedly; but one can conduct his life in such a way that it is likely to befall him. That is part of what we mean by the art of preparing for religious experience.
But when the experience comes it may have no value save to provide the luxury of a pleasant or stirring emotion. To have conscious awareness of this all-sustaining Working does not bring one any closer to it, for one is always as close to it as he can get. There are some natures who can enter frequently and deeply into genuine and vivid awareness of God and yet live weak, futile, slovenly lives. To have conscious experience of God does not necessarily help a man at all. To conduct ourselves in such a way that religious experience not only may befall us but that it may have beneficial results for us is the whole of what we mean by the art of preparing for religious experience and profiting by it.

Great living depends on making proper adaptation to that Working upon which all life is dependent. If conscious experience of that Working helps one to make better adaptation to it, his life will be better. But merely to have a vivid and exalted consciousness of that Working will not help him if the experience does not enable him to make better adaptation. On the other hand, a man who does adapt himself to the working of God, even though he may have no conscious experience of God, will live a great life. Through the teaching of others, and through results of careful experimentation, a man can learn how to adapt to many things of which he has never had any conscious experience. This applies to the working of God as well as to other matters. But religious experience may be of great help to a man in making better adaptation to that Working upon which human life is dependent for its greatest goods. In fact, this is the only enduring and practical value religious experience can have. If it does not do this its value is purely sentimental. It is quite easy to be unduly sentimental and rapturous about religious experience for its own sake.

There are, then, two very urgent and very practical questions pertaining to religious experience: (i) how to put one's self in the way of having the experience; (2) how to use the experience in such a way as to attain better adaptation to the working of God as he operates throughout space and time. Let us reduce these two questions to one: how to prepare for religious experience in such a way that it will bring us into better adjustment to God.

We answer this question under four points.

1. One must face the chief difficulties and perplexities of his life and wrestle with them. He must take life seriously. He must draw on his every resource of physical endurance and mental agility and nervous energy and dogged determination to master circumstance and make human life more satisfactory for himself and others. This strain and burden-bearing, this taking of life seriously, is necessary preparation for profitable religious experience. The frivolous and superficial generally do not have great religious experiences. Some of them, however, do; but when they do, their experience is only the luxury of a sweet and exalted emotion such as we described above.

2. But earnest wrestling with the serious problems of life is only preparation for profitable religious experience. Such wrestling does not ordinarily in itself yield the experience. Rather the experience is likely to come when one stops the fight for a breathing spell and a short period of relaxation. One goes off, let us say, where he can be alone with nature, in a scene quite different from that in which he has been trying to solve his difficult problems.

This, then, is the second requirement for entering into a profitable religious experience. One must leave the struggle of life, occasionally, for a little spiritual relaxation. In this month's study we suggest turning to nature. Further suggestions for the use of this time of relaxation will be made in later lessons. In this period of relaxation, if rightly conducted, the religious experience is most likely to come.

3. The experience that comes in the interval of relaxation should provide some insight toward the solution of the problems which have been engaging one's attention in the struggle of living. Here we have the chief function of religious experience. It is an experience through which discoveries are made concerning how to live more effectively and more abundantly; how to achieve mastery over difficulties and mount to higher levels; in a word, how to live in better adaptation to the working of God. Religious experience should be the moment of profound insight and new adjustment to the total environment. Great conversions occur in such experiences. All the famous conversions, from Paul's down, have occurred through such experiences. A conversion is simply the discovery and adoption of some new way of living in better adaptation to the Working which is God. But conversion is not the only form of moral and spiritual discovery and initiation that may occur through religious experience. After "conversion" one may make further discoveries. Often the new insight is of such a nature that you cannot word it. You simply have found out how to live with peace and power you never had before.

4. The fourth requirement is that this new way of living which has come to one in the religious experience must be carefully, observantly, and patiently tested by living it. A new way of living is not necessarily successful at the very start. Generally it is not. And often its success is not apparent to any save those of deepest insight. But one must be teachable in the conduct of his new way of life. He must modify and adapt and reshape it to fit the conditions with which he has to deal. No one is worse than the hair-brained fanatic who will not learn from the results of trial and error, but insists that his way is unalterably right because he got it from God.

It is even possible that one's new way of life, discovered through religious experience, may be a mistake. The human mind is always fallible, and it does not cease to be human even when it undergoes religious experience. He who must have an iron-clad guaranty that he will make no mistakes can have no share in great living whether through religious experience or otherwise. But the great insights, the great transformation of personality and human history, have been initiated in such experiences.

The whole value of religious experience, we repeat, aside from the luxury of emotion, is that through it we discover how better to adapt our human lives to the Working upon which we are dependent for the greatest good. It should enable us to make better adjustment to God.

Two final points must be clear. The experience need not be highly emotional. The important thing is the insight that is attained concerning how better to live with God. There may or may not be a thrill and sense of exaltation. Secondly, the insight may not be something that will revolutionize human history. Generally it is not. It may be a discovery of how better to deal with your child; or how ro win the good will of your neighbor; or how to make better use of your time; or how to get over some nagging perplexity which is important to you personally, although it may never be known to any other.

And we must remember that anything which truly and in the long run benefits human life is, ultimately, a better adaptation to the vast and mighty Working which lifts us to the highest when we find how to yield ourselves to its lifting power.

Keeping in mind, therefore, the nature of religious experience, the possibility of placing one's self in the way of it and the resultant effect upon the art of practical living, can we, after our observations of the experience of historical characters, turn our eyes upon our own immediate environment, and learn to recognize the results of religious experience in others, and to recall some data regarding our own religious experience.

It will be a good plan to keep a notebook with this course, jotting down observations, memories and new experiences which seem to you to have some bearing upon the question, this month especially observing the extent to which contact with the world of external nature may foster and suggest a religious experience, always distinguishing those experiences which will stand the test of the points raised in this portion of our study. Students of the course are invited in addition to answering the review questions to report sach observations and experiences. On the following page will be found an outline of work for those who desire to have criticism by correspondence.

"My Father is no respecter of races or generations in that the word of truth is vouchsafed one age and withheld from another. Commit not the folly of calling that divine which is wholly human, and fail not to discern the words of truth which come not through the traditional oracles of supposed inspiration."

1679 Prophecy to the Sons of God By Jane Leade

Therefore let it be known with truth and assurance that the sons of God belong in all things to a higher realm. Unto this high realm many are now proceeding, and from it the world will be filled with the knowledge and government of the Lord.

"Now that you are ambassadors of my Father's kingdom, you have thereby become a class of men separate and distinct from all other men on earth. You are not now as men among men but as the enlightened citizens of another and heavenly country among the ignorant creatures of this dark world. It is not enough that you live as you were before this hour, but henceforth must you live as those who have tasted the glories of a better life and have been sent back to earth as ambassadors of the Sovereign of that new and better world. Of the teacher more is expected than of the pupil; of the master more is exacted than of the servant. Of the citizens of the heavenly kingdom more is required than of the citizens of the earthly rule. Some of the things which I am about to say to you may seem hard, but you have elected to represent me in the world even as I now represent the Father; and as my agents on earth you will be obligated to abide by those teachings and practices which are reflective of my ideals of mortal living on the worlds of space, and which I exemplify in my earth life of revealing the Father who is in heaven. From the teachings of the Urantia Revelations (1955)

The following remarkable prophecy, given in the year 1679, forcefully confirms the truths written above. We quote it in its entirety for your benefit and blessing. Please read and re-read it for its truths are profound:

01 "There shall be a total and full redemption by Christ. This is a hidden mystery not to be understood without the revelation of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is at hand to reveal the same unto all holy seekers and loving enquirers. The completion of such a redemption is withheld and abstracted by the seals of Revelation. Wherefore as the Spirit of God shall open seal after seal, (Paper after Paper) so shall this redemption come to be revealed, both particularly and universally. In the gradual opening of the mystery of redemption in Christ doth consist the unsearchable wisdom of God which may continually reveal new and fresh things to the worthy seeker. In order to which the Ark of the Testimony in Heaven shall be opened before the end of this age, and the living testimony herein contained shall be unsealed."

02 "The presence of the Divine Ark (Christ) will constitute the life of this Virgin Church, and wherever this body is, there must the Ark of necessity be. The unsealing of the living testimony within the Ark of God must begin the promulgation of the everlasting gospel of the Kingdom. The proclamation of the testimony will be as the sounding of a trumpet of alarm to the nations of professed Christendom. Authority shall be given by Christ to the putting an end to all controversies concerning the true church that is born of the New Jerusalem mother. This decision will be the actual sealing of the body of Christ with the name (or authority) of God, giving them a commission to act by the same. This new name (or authority) will distinguish them from the seven thousand names of Babylon.

03 "The election and preparation of this Virgin Church is to be after a secret and hidden manner. As David in his ministry was chosen and anointed by the prophet of the Lord, yet was not admitted to the outward profession of the kingdom for a considerable time afterward, of the stem of David a Virgin Church, which hath known nothing of a man or human constitution, is to be born, and it will require some time for it to get out of the minority and arrive at full and mature age."

04 "The birth of this Virgin Church was typified by St. John's vision where the great wonder appeared in heaven, bringing forth her first born, that was caught up to the throne of God (or identified with the authority of God). For as a woman brought forth Christ after the flesh, so shall a Sonship Family bring forth the first born after the Spirit, who shall be endowed with the seven spirits of God. This spiritual family so brought forth and sealed with the mark of divine authority will have no bonds or impositions; but the holy unction among these new born spirits will be " I AM all in all a new revelation of the Supreme Being.

05 "There is not at this day (1679) visible upon the earth such a church; all profession being found light when weighed in the balances. Therefore they are rejected by the Supreme Judge, which rejection will be for this cause, that out of them may come a new and glorious church. (Comprising a single human family) Then shall the glory of God and the Lamb so rest upon this typical tabernacle, so that it shall be called the Tabernacle of Wisdom, and though it is not now known in visibility, yet it shall be seen as coming out of the wilderness within a short time. Then will it go on to multiply and propogate itself universally, not only to the number of the first born (144,000) but also to the remnant of the seed, against whom the dragon will make war continually."

06 "Wherefore the spirit of David shall revive in this church and most especially in some elect members of it as the blossoming root. These will have might given them to overcome the dragon and his angels even as David overcame Goliath and the Philistine army. This will be the standing up of the great Prince Michael, and it will be as the appearing of Moses against Pharaoh in order that the chosen seed may be brought out of hard servitude." Eph. 6:12 For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of darkness of this world…(the Power Elite)

157:4.5 Jesus, still standing, then said to the twelve: "You are my chosen ambassadors, but I know that, in the circumstances, you could not entertain this belief as a result of mere human knowledge. This is a revelation of the spirit of my Father to your inmost souls. And when, therefore, you make this confession by the insight of the spirit of my Father which dwells within you, I am led to declare that upon this foundation will I build the brotherhood of the kingdom of heaven. Upon this rock of spiritual reality will I build the living temple of spiritual fellowship in the eternal realities of my Father's kingdom. All the forces of evil and the hosts of sin shall not prevail against this human fraternity of the divine spirit. And while my Father's spirit shall ever be the divine guide and mentor of all who enter the bonds of this spirit fellowship, to you and your successors I now deliver the keys of the outward kingdom -- the authority over things temporal -- the social and economic features of this association of men and women as fellows of the kingdom." And again he charged them, for the time being, that they should tell no man that he was the Son of God. From the teachings of the Urantia Revelations(1955)

Eph. 6:13 Wherefore take unto you the full armour of God, that ye may withstand the evil day.
Eph. 6:14 Girt your loins about with truth, and have on the breast plate of righteousness…
Eph. 6:15 And your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace.
Eph. 6:16 and above all, take the Shield of Faith…
Eph. 6:17 the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit.

07 "Egypt doth figure this servile creation under which Abraham's seed groans, but a prophet, and the most prophetical generation, will the Most High raise up who shall deliver His people by the force of spiritual arms; for which there must be raised up certain head powers to bear the first office, who are to be persons in favor with God whose dread and fear shall fall on all nations visible and invisible, because of the mighty acting power of the Holy Spirit which shall rest upon them. For Christ will appear in some chosen vessels to bring into the Promised Land the New Creation state."

08 "Thus Moses, Joshua, and Aaron may be considered types of some upon whom the same Spirit will come, yet in greater proportion. Whereby they shall make way for the ransomed of the Lord to return to Mt. Zion; but none shall stand under God but those who have become "tried" stones after the pattern and similitude of Christ. This will be fiery trial through which a very few will be able to pass or bear up in it. Whereby the waiters for this visible breaking forth are strictly charged to hold fast, and wait together in the unity of Pure Love. This trial will be of absolute necessity to all for the clearing away of all remaining infirmities of the natural mind, and the burning of all wood, hay, and stubble. For nothing must remain in the fire, for as a refiner shall He purify the sons of the Kingdom."

09 "There will be some who will be fully redeemed, being clothed upon with a priestly garment after the Melchizedek order. This will qualify them for governing Authority. Therefore it is required on their part to suffer the Spirit of burning and fanning of the fiery breath searching every part within them until they arrive at a Fixed Body from whence the wonders are to flow out."

10 "Upon this body will be the fixation of the Urim and Thummim that are the portion of the Melchizedek priesthood whose descent is not counted in the genealogy of that creation which is under the fall, but in another genealogy which is a New Creation. Hence these priests will have a deep inward search and divine sight into secret things of Deity; will be able to prophesy in a clear ground; not darkly and enigmatically, for they will know what is couched in the first originality of all beings, in the eternal anti-type of nature, and will be able to bring them forth according to the divine counsel and ordination.

11 "The Lord sweareth in truth and righteousness that from Abraham's line, according to the Spirit, there shall arise a holy seed, produced and manifested in the last age. The mighty spirit of Cyrus is appointed to lay the foundation of this Third Temple and support it in building."

12 "There are characteristics and marks whereby the pure Virgin Church shall be known and distinguished from all others that are low, false, and counterfeit. There must be a manifestation of the Spirit whereby to edify and raise up this church, bringing heaven down upon the earth and representing here the New Jerusalem state, in order to which spirits are thus begotten and born of God, ascended to New Jerusalem above where their Head in majesty doth reign."

13 "None but those who have so ascended and received His glory can condescend and communicate the same, being thereby His representatives upon the earth and subordinate priests under Him now. He that has ascended and glorified has made Himself, as it were, our Debtor. Consequently, He will not be wanting in qualifying and furnishing certain high and principal instruments who shall be most humble and as little regarded as David was, whom He will dignify with honour and priestly sovereignty for drawing to them the scattered flocks, and gathering them into one fold out of all nations."

14 "Therefore, there should be a holy emulation and ambition stirred up among the bands of believers that they may be of the first-fruits unto Him that is risen from the dead, and so be made principal agents for Him and with Him, that they may be, if possible, of the number of the First-born of the New Jerusalem mother. All true waiters of His Kingdom in Spirit, under whatsoever profession they may be, ought to be numbered among the virgin spirits to whom this message appertains. Be watchful and quicken your pace."

155:6.2 You have come out from among those of your fellows who choose to remain satisfied with a religion of mind, who crave security and prefer conformity. You have elected to exchange your feelings of authoritative certainty for the assurances of the spirit of adventurous and progressive faith. You have dared to protest against the grueling bondage of institutional religion and to reject the authority of the traditions of record which are now regarded as the word of God. Our Father did indeed speak through Moses, Elijah, Isaiah, Amos, and Hosea, but he did not cease to minister words of truth to the world when these prophets of old made an end of their utterances. My Father is no respecter of races or generations in that the word of truth is vouchsafed one age and withheld from another. Commit not the folly of calling that divine which is wholly human, and fail not to discern the words of truth which come not through the traditional oracles of supposed inspiration. From the teachings of the Urantia Revelations (1955)

155:6.2 You have come out from among those of your fellows who choose to remain satisfied with a religion of mind, who crave security and prefer conformity. You have elected to exchange your feelings of authoritative certainty for the assurances of the spirit of adventurous and progressive faith. You have dared to protest against the grueling bondage of institutional religion and to reject the authority of the traditions of record which are now regarded as the word of God. Our Father did indeed speak through Moses, Elijah, Isaiah, Amos, and Hosea, but he did not cease to minister words of truth to the world when these prophets of old made an end of their utterances. My Father is no respecter of races or generations in that the word of truth is vouchsafed one age and withheld from another. Commit not the folly of calling that divine which is wholly human, and fail not to discern the words of truth which come not through the traditional oracles of supposed inspiration. From the teachings of the Urantia Revelations (1955)

SECOND MILER - CAROLINE MUSAGALA

"Mama Africa" - Spreading the Revelation Amid Conflict and Strife

“The new revelation will help create awareness for these people and give them hope amidst the troubles and chaos in Congo.”

As Pastor Caroline Musagala reached Goma in December of 2021, she recalls that the city on the eastern border of the Democratic Republic of Congo was rife with “violence and live bullets."

Caroline was in Goma on a mission to hold a Urantia Book conference for women, partly funded by the Second Miler Grant Program. But the challenges she faced, as documented in her report on the project, were monumental.

Congo is the scene of one of the world’s longest-running conflicts. Decades of fighting have resulted in six million deaths and more than six million people displaced in a humanitarian crisis that has engulfed the country’s eastern region. Whole communities of women and young girls have been left without husbands and fathers. 

A few years ago Caroline, a women’s leader and counselor, formed a women’s corps - the African Urantia Women Disciple-Making Movement - whose members provide one another with both financial and spiritual support.

Caroline has become known as “Mama Africa” because of her determination to travel to women in need through the continent, even when her health is poor and she is weak.

Delivering the Full Gospel of Jesus

The movement's mission is to reach out to people, especially women, with the full gospel of Jesus from the Urantia Book revelation. They establish study groups while providing social and economic services, and training the women to be productive in society.

Many of those they help are victims of rape, now raising fatherless children and lacking basic needs like water, food, clothing and education. 

The church in which she is a leader, the Siloam Altar Revival Ministries International, had started "compassion ministries", which help build good relationships with the women of different families. 

"We have been able to distribute food and mosquito nets to the needy especially during the lockdown period. As a result, many households have opened up to The Urantia Book," Caroline says.

People in Congo live a fear-filled life, she adds. “Therefore there is a need for more spiritual awareness to raise their morale, hope and strength, and for them to listen to the good news.

“The new revelation will help create awareness for these people and give them hope amidst the troubles and chaos in Congo.”

Revelation in a Dangerous Environment

It was in this dangerous and strife-torn environment that Caroline was trying to spread the new revelation in Goma at the end of 2021 with the help of Second Miler funds.

On the way there she and the women who accompanied her faced several challenges. They had to do two Covid tests and pay more than expected for transport over the Christmas period. They experienced transport delays and as a result had to go over budget on accommodation. 

But that was the least of it. She describes a scene of shooting and panic on their arrival in the city. And then Caroline fell ill to a severe disease which made it difficult for her to perform her duties. 

On the day of the conference, unexpected heavy rainfall soaked many women and their children who could not be accommodated in the conference venue. There were problems encountered in translating English into Swahili and French, as well as too few Urantia Books to go around.

Yet, the conference bore fruit: 25 Urantia reader groups were formed and five leaders were identified who could read English and help the rest understand the revelation. 

One of the leaders of the women’s corps gifted them a house for their Urantia Book office – “a miracle worth celebrating,” says Caroline. She was the principal of a big theological school who testifies to the goodness and beauty of The Urantia Book and who believes it will help all students in their spiritual lives.

As many students of the book around the world attempt to disseminate its teachings, they would do well to look to Caroline Musagala’s heroic example of making progress in the face of tremendous odds.

The Urantia Book Fellowship would like to thank supporters of the Second Miler Grant Program for helping make possible Caroline Musagala's project and all the other projects the program has funded since 2020.

Happiness and joy take origin in the inner life. 111.4.7

The Spiritual Family Network, Africa

Over six years ago, Paul and Monica Kemp and David Onche created an online community, Spiritual Family Network Community, dedicated to outreach for the revelation in Africa and the family of God worldwide.

SpiritualFamily.Net is more than a website. Paul and David, the webmasters, have engineered it to have several features that resemble social media, all devoted to spiritual work.

“The Spiritual Family Community website provides a platform that connects citizens living in this day and generation to the human teachers of truth with thousands of posts and many groups centered on the Epochal Revelations.”

Paul and David needed a care plan for their website and were granted a year’s funding from the Second Miler Grant Program for technical services, software upgrades and web hosting support. 

Paul says the website has seen increasing traffic. He puts it at around 30,000 visitors every month, apart from the 790 members who perform outreach and study the revelation with the Spiritual Family Network, where The Urantia Book can be read online.

Recently, one user wrote: “It is profoundly inspiring to see how a surging Urantia movement is brewing in Uganda, right in the heart of Africa.” (where the apostle Simon took the gospel of Jesus)

The Spiritual Family Network is looking for well-studied revelation workers to assist in the work of teaching new readers and bringing the revelation to Africa.

The Urantia Book Fellowship would like to thank supporters of the Second Miler Grant Program for helping make possible the Spiritual Family Network's project and all the others the program has funded since 2020.

INTERNET SOURCE

NOTE by Paul Kemp: Many of the revelation activities are on the SG Map Menu below the Banner

On Thu, Nov 16, 2023, 9:20 p.m. Lindianne Sappington <lindisarno@gmail.com> wrote:
Dearest Monica,

Make your statement of mission and goals clear and brief. Send around
Mission and Goals until all of Eden International are satisfied with
the wording.

After Mission and Goals, append a Spiritual Rule, such as the rule of
St. Benedict, Rule of Saint Francis, Rule of Saint Brigid:
All residents, (farmers, WWOOFers, spiritual ambassadors) contribute
physical activity on the property, share meals, and take daily
solitude time with our Father, praying for and receiving guidance on
how and where best to serve Eden.

Winter 2023-2024:  Plan crops, acquire seeds, plan animals and
poultry.  Evolve permaculture design on map of property with vector
overlays of sunlight, wind, water, animals, humans, buildings,
fencing.   Design principles are shared on spiritual family.net as
edenic properties in every nation adapt permaculture principles to
their watershed.

Spring and Summer, 2024: fencing and water system including ponds.
Wood and stone fencing for pulsed grazing, poultry runs, chicken
tractors, gardens, orchards, no till pastures, compost zone.  Build
rabbitry, WWOOFer bungalows, compost zone, greenhouses.  Commence
horse logging and haying.  Initiate Herbarium of perennial medicinals.

We of Eden International are readers of the Urantia Papers, living in
the Fifth Epochal Revelation.  We are farmers, foresters, WWOOFers,
and spiritual ambassadors. Everyone on the property engages in
physical activity, we share meals, we engage in daily solitude, time
with God, praying for and receiving guidance to do God's will, how
best we may serve, how best to tend forest and garden, where to direct
our service.

I love your statement:  this is a property for inquiring minds who are
seeking solace!  Work, pray, travel or stay!

Blessings,
Lindianne

PS Please pass this on to Eden International.

When The Urantia Book was given to this planet about a hundred years ago, the writers spoke of the need for “world-wide social reconstruction and economic reorganization.” That’s no surprise, considering what the book reveals about the disastrous Rebellion and Default. The crisis in Urantian civilization has only become more obvious since the book arrived.

Our civilization is beginning to change. It is beginning to be uplifted, restructured, and redirected. It feels like chaos and uncertainty!  But we need to see it in a different light. This is the beginning of one of Urantia’s “most amazing and enthralling epochs of social readjustment, moral quickening, and spiritual enlightenment.” (195:9.2 [2082.7]) 

You may recognize that quote from the Urantia Book. It is a promise. The book said in 1935, Urantia is on the brink of this epoch of change for the better. This Fifth Epochal Revelation is initiating that enthralling epoch. We feel like we are living in chaos and change. But we who have the Urantia Book are called to a whole new way of seeing ourselves and our world. We need to focus on what is truly important and let the lesser things of life drop away. We have the opportunity, if we choose it, to contribute to this spiritual renaissance!

How do we contribute to the coming spiritual renaissance? Our book says, “Only the real religion of personal spiritual experience can function helpfully and creatively in the present crisis of civilization.” (99:2.1 [1087.4]) In the midst of such change, we all need the support of real religion—a genuine connection with spirit and a love for our sisters and brothers here on earth.

Real religion opens us to the love of God. We are beloved children. Experiencing God’s love changes us inside. We feel accepted, encouraged, strengthened, and hopeful.

Loving and appreciating God as a nurturing, supporting, caring parent causes us to want to be like God. And we seek the beautiful values we see in deity. Those values draw us into growing. Developing higher and higher values in ourselves is the very definition of growing!

Our love expands. We see our brothers and sisters with new eyes. Instead of judgment, we see their need for the loving parent we have found. And when we open the door and allow our love to flow to them, joy blooms…and we love them more. We become even more connected as divine love flows to us and through us to our human family in service.

Let’s live our religion. Let’s share the real religion of personal spiritual experience with everyone we can. Let’s become the new teachers who are exclusively devoted to the spiritual regeneration of our sisters and brothers. We can give hope to the world in this present crisis. 

Sisters in Spirit—Sharon Porter, Kaye Cooper, Nancy Votrain, and Cecelia Lampley— will be leading a Urantia University Institute course in the spring of 2024:

[player url="https://spiritualfamily.net/file/view/62692/christianities-problem-deacon-calvin-robinson-of-the-anglican-church" title="Christianities Problem Deacon Calvin Robinson of the Anglican Church :: SpiritualFamily.Net" summary="Social Networking For The World Wide Spiritual Fellowship Of All Mankind"]

[embed title="The Power of God and the Holy Spirit are sweeping the world's Nations" url="https://spiritualfamily.net/videos/view/58860/the-power-of-god-and-the-holy-spirit-are-sweeping-the-worlds-nations" summary="The Power of God and the Holy Spirit are sweeping the world's Nations   52:7.15 All the worlds of Satania can join in the hope of the one who wrote: "Nevertheless we, according to His promise, look for a new heaven and a new earth, wherein..." guid="58860"]

A debate about some of the most controversial issues is happening in the Christian faith and it is causing some to question the future of the Church. Scottie Nell Hughes speaks to Deacon Calvin Robinson of the Anglican Church on this episode of 360 View. We are going to look at the divide happening within the Christian Church and what effect the Church’s demise could have globally.

  ^195:9.1 Do not overlook the value of your spiritual heritage, the river of truth running down through the centuries, even to the barren times of a materialistic and secular age. In all your worthy efforts to rid yourselves of the superstitious creeds of past ages, make sure that you hold fast the eternal truth. But be patient! when the present superstition revolt is over, the truths of Jesus' gospel will persist gloriously to illuminate a new and better way.

  ^195:9.2 But paganized and socialized Christianity stands in need of new contact with the uncompromised teachings of Jesus; it languishes for lack of a new vision of the Master's life on earth. A new and fuller revelation of the religion of Jesus is destined to conquer an empire of materialistic secularism and to overthrow a world sway of mechanistic naturalism. Urantia is now quivering on the very brink of one of its most amazing and enthralling epochs of social readjustment, moral quickening, and spiritual enlightenment.

  ^195:9.3 The teachings of Jesus, even though greatly modified, survived the mystery cults of their birthtime, the ignorance and superstition of the dark ages, and are even now slowly triumphing over the materialism, mechanism, and secularism of the twentieth century. And such times of great testing and threatened defeat are always times of great revelation.

 

  ^195:9.4 Religion does need new leaders, spiritual men and women who will dare to depend solely on Jesus and his incomparable teachings. If Christianity persists in neglecting its spiritual mission while it continues to busy itself with social and material problems, the spiritual renaissance must await the coming of these new teachers of Jesus' religion who will be exclusively devoted to the spiritual regeneration of men. And then will these spirit-born souls quickly supply the leadership and inspiration requisite for the social, moral, economic, and political reorganization of the world.

  ^195:9.5 The modern age will refuse to accept a religion which is inconsistent with facts and out of harmony with its highest conceptions of truth, beauty, and goodness. The hour is striking for a rediscovery of the true and original foundations of present-day distorted and compromised Christianity -- the real life and teachings of Jesus.

 

  ^195:9.6 Primitive man lived a life of superstitious bondage to religious fear. Modern, civilized men dread the thought of falling under the dominance of strong religious convictions. Thinking man has always feared to be held by a religion. When a strong and moving religion threatens to dominate him, he invariably tries to rationalize, traditionalize, and institutionalize it, thereby hoping to gain control of it. By such procedure, even a revealed religion becomes man-made and man-dominated. Modern men and women of intelligence evade the religion of Jesus because of their fears of what it will do to them -- and with them. And all such fears are well founded. The religion of Jesus does, indeed, dominate and transform its believers, demanding that men dedicate their lives to seeking for a knowledge of the will of the Father in heaven and requiring that the energies of living be consecrated to the unselfish service of the brotherhood of man.

  ^195:9.7 Selfish men and women simply will not pay such a price for even the greatest spiritual treasure ever offered mortal man. Only when man has become sufficiently disillusioned by the sorrowful disappointments attendant upon the foolish and deceptive pursuits of selfishness, and subsequent to the discovery of the barrenness of formalized religion, will he be disposed to turn wholeheartedly to the gospel of the kingdom, the religion of Jesus of Nazareth.

  ^195:9.8 The world needs more firsthand religion. Even Christianity -- the best of the religions of the twentieth century -- is not only a religion about Jesus, but it is so largely one which men experience secondhand. They take their religion wholly as handed down by their accepted religious teachers. What an awakening the world would experience if it could only see Jesus as he really lived on earth and know, firsthand, his life-giving teachings! Descriptive words of things beautiful cannot thrill like the sight thereof, neither can creedal words inspire men's souls like the experience of knowing the presence of God. But expectant faith will ever keep the hope-door of man's soul open for the entrance of the eternal spiritual realities of the divine values of the worlds beyond.

 

  ^195:9.9 Christianity has dared to lower its ideals before the challenge of human greed, war-madness, and the lust for power; but the religion of Jesus stands as the unsullied and transcendent spiritual summons, calling to the best there is in man to rise above all these legacies of animal evolution and, by grace, attain the moral heights of true human destiny.

  ^195:9.10 Christianity is threatened by slow death from formalism, overorganization, intellectualism, and other nonspiritual trends. The modern Christian church is not such a brotherhood of dynamic believers as Jesus commissioned continuously to effect the spiritual transformation of successive generations of mankind.

  ^195:9.11 So-called Christianity has become a social and cultural movement as well as a religious belief and practice. The stream of modern Christianity drains many an ancient pagan swamp and many a barbarian morass; many olden cultural watersheds drain into this present-day cultural stream as well as the high Galilean tablelands which are supposed to be its exclusive source.

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