"I am He, who writes all the sins into the sand, who neither curses nor hates or is vengeful, but who has always been, and still is, ready to pour balm on gaping wounds. I have never been an unjust God, no more than a strict Father towards My children!" (Secrets of life, chap. 26) Can anybody offend God?... Who is the true and righteous Doctor? „I am not like a weak person who is afflicted with all kinds of passions, but I have come into this world to help all people who will believe in Me and will live and act according to My teaching. And so I am now as I was before, even before this Earth was created. I love also those people who still do not know Me and have never known Me. And also to them the gospel will be preached at the right moment. Whoever will take that at heart will receive eternal life, but whoever will not accept the gospel, will remain in the ancient judgment and the ancient death. So take care in future times that also the many dead who come to you, seeking for all kinds of help with you, will receive My teaching and will wake up in the spirit and may become alive, then by that you will really help them. I want everyone to be happy, and because I want that and have also come into this world to open the gate to eternal life for all men, I am not today like this and tomorrow different, but always the same as the Father in Heaven, who is in Me, lives, works, directs and maintains. Since I want in full earnest the best for all men, without restricting their free will, I cannot play and joke with them, but always go along with them in seriousness, showing them the ways faithfully and truthfully through teaching and deeds by which they can come to the eternal and true life of their soul, if they want it. Now if I have come with such intentions to the people in this world, then how could I ever be just like a man be in a bad mood, and who can offend Me? He who has recognized Me and believes in Me and acts according to My teaching will certainly not offend Me, and he who did not recognize Me or who does not want to recognize Me, even if he could recognize Me, cannot offend Me. He only offends himself, since he becomes an enemy of his own life. But I only seek those who are sick in soul and body, to help them, and not the healthy who do not need help. For of what kind of love, wisdom and justice could a doctor be accused if he would hate the sick, would persecute and chastise them, only because they are sick? So change your opinion about Me and remember that He, who speaks to you now, is a true and righteous Doctor for the soul and spirit and in case of emergency also for the body.” (The Great Gospel of John, Book 20, chap. 41:5-9) God doesn't condemn the sinner, the sinner condemns himself "Truly, in the whole of eternity there is not a single case where even one spirit had been condemned by God! But I can show you countless cases where spirits, owing to their freedom of will, scorn and blaspheme the Deity, not for all the world wanting to be dependent on Its endless love, since they fancy themselves to be lords even over Deity! However, as the Deity can only bestow the abundance of Its endless love on those who wish to enjoy it, it becomes clear that those who hate and scorn the Deity and Its endless love above all and blaspheme It, cannot partake in this love because they stubbornly refuse to do so. Such beings love only themselves and hate everything that does not whole-heartedly appeal to their selfish ego. For them, the love for God and the fellowman is a destructive abomination, a curse within their heart, and God merely the insipid fancy of a spoilt zealous eart, a folly of an utterly stupefied intellect, and the fellowman not worthy of any consideration. If free spirits obdurately clinging to these ideas cannot be healed of their pernicious delusion by any means afforded to their freedom and prefer to suffer forever all their self-created bitterness and misery rather than submit to the most gentle commandment on the part of the Deity - say, can in this case the Deity be denounced for such a self-condemnation? And if through Its omnipotence, love and wisdom the Deity lovingly segregates such apostates from their blessed friends, yet leaves them in their segregation the fullest freedom, can It be called hard-hearten and unloving?" ("From Hell to Heaven" I/24, 5-9, through Jakob Lorber) "If the Deity were to judge the spirits who must become absolutely free, with Its omnipotence, this would mean an end to all freedom forever. Instead of free spirits, the Almighty would merely create puppets under judgement, but not ever self-determining spirits who are free and independent from the Deity and destined to become gods themselves once they reach perfection. Therefore, divine wisdom decreed such conditions for depraved human beings so that they can be brought back onto the right road. Although this is also a judgement and, as it were, a coercion, it concerns only the outer man, allowing the inner man to awaken more speedily and easily and thus return to his true destiny. " ("From Hell to Heaven" I/25, 4 on, through Jakob Lorber) Reasons of God permitting violent events between nations "[4]In like manner, different people need a different up-bringing, according to the disposition of their hearts and souls at the time. What applies to individual people as children of oftentimes one and the same father, applies likewise to whole communities and whole great nations. Take a nation which needs a gentle, thus more lenient treatment, and it thrives, thereby proving a great blessing to the other nations of the earth. Another nation needs harsh treatment, or it would soon degenerate and become stunted, - a curse to the neighbouring nations. And, again, there is a nation with a decided tendency toward the ruling and tyrannizing over its fellowmen. Nothing is better for the souls of such people than falling into slavery for many years, as they will be thereby thoroughly humbled. If their humiliation has taught them a lesson and they do, finally, bear their fate with all patience and without grumbling, they will once again become free citizens of the earth and will then certainly within a short time thrive exceedingly well, a noble fruit cultivated in the best and richest soil. [5] Behold, this is now a picture you should all comprehend quite easily, seeing that you have comprehended many a thing. [6] In order to illustrate this very important matter still better, I now demonstrate to you the parts of the human body, each of which has a different form and, therefore, requires a different treatment and, if it should be ill, of course also a different medicine to be healed. [7] From this it can be seen that the various problems in a I person's mental-moral sphere need as variable a treatment as do his individual parts to which these problems in his mental-moral sphere correspond. A very bad tooth in the mouth must, all else failing, be finally extracted and cast aside to prevent the sound teeth from becoming infected. Likewise an incorrigibly evil person must be removed from a community, lest the whole community be corrupted through him. In like manner often a whole nation has to be destroyed, if not physically, yet morally, lest all nations of the earth be finally corrupted through the same." (GGJ II, Ch.205) The Law of Wisdom and the Law of Love "3. You have to keep in mind that in former times the Lord allowed Satan to act in this or that way, for the first-created spirit (Lucifer) had to be allowed a long time for his freedom-test, because he was not only the first, but also the greatest of the created spirits. 4. However, this time has come to an end and the prince of darkness will now be considerably restrained and no longer be able to move as freely as before. 5. Therefore, if the right love for God is dwelling within us, we shall find it easier to walk one earth than was the case formerly under the hard yoke of the law. 6. From Adam until our time the law of wisdom was reigning and such wisdom and a strong and unconditional will was required to fulfill such a law within oneself. 7. But God saw that men would never fulfill the law of wisdom and so came into the world himself in order to give them a new law of love which they will easily be able to fulfill. For in the law of wisdom Jehovah let only His light radiate among men. The light was not He Himself, it only flowed from Him to men just as men have gone forth from Him, but nevertheless are not Jehovah Himself. However Jehovah Himself does come to men through and within love, takes spiritual residence in man in the fullness of truth and thereby makes created man similar to Himself in everything. Then Satan is no longer able to harm, by his cunning, a man thus armed, for Jehovah’s spirit within man sees always through Satan’s ever so concealed tricks and has at all times plenty of power to disperse Satan’s total helplessness. 8. The Prophet Elias described the present situation of mankind, when Jehovah comes to men directly in love, as a gentle rustling passing the cave, but Jehovah was not in the great storm and in the fire. 9. Thus the gently rustling is people’s love for God and their brothers wherein Jehovah Himself is dwelling, whereas He does not dwell in the storm of wisdom and the flaming sword of the law." (GGJ 1, chp. 67) Causes of catastrophes. God doesn’t punish people, but people punish themselves “[6] If I with My almightiness wanted it to be, that no person ever commits any sin, no person would ever sin again; for he would not be able to dare transgress one hairbreadth beyond My will, just as nobody can shape his body differently, as he is created by the will of God, and can also not extend his bodily life at his own discretion, since all this depends on the almighty will of God. If God would allow it that no person would ever commit a sin, who would have the gain completely for himself regarding the totally sin-free life of a person, who was guided by the almightiness of God, just as it guides the growth of the trees and all other fruit and guides the worlds through endless space? Surely nobody else than God Himself, since man would be nothing else than a play-doll in the hands of God! It also would be a lot more comfortable for God, as it is also more comfortable for Him to create the different animals with their most diverse and most strangest properties and then to guide them and let each in its own way become active. [7] However, the people of this earth are destined to become free and totally independent children of God, and as such they must be guided in such a way that their necessary most free will does not experience the slightest coercion from any more powerful side of a spirit, but be guided only through revelations and teachings and by external laws, to seize with their free will the truth and good which they have been taught, and become active accordingly out of their own self-determination. [8] See, the deference of the free will of the people of this earth goes by God even so far that He not even considers what one or also several people think, want and do. Only if deviated too far from God, only then does God look at them and awakens seers, teachers and prophets, who can announce to the people anew the will of God and His intentions. If the people take note of it, things will improve again; however if they do not take note of it, and mock and pursue the awakened seers, teachers and prophets of God, then God must allow a necessary external punishment to come over the people and often over a whole nation. But even such a judgment is never directly activated by the almighty will of God, but such a judgment comes always from blind and willful wrongdoings of the people. [9] The mighty Hanochites have been warned for more than a hundred years, that they should not for the sake of gold and precious stones destroy whole mountain ranges and should also not level them to the base to more easily conduct their wars, because thereby they would open up large underground water sluices and drown everybody. But all this was to no avail; they did what they wanted, dug even deeper into the mountains and opened up the water sluices. See, this was not carried out by the almightiness of God directly, but took place only through His admission, which was the necessary result of people who did not wanted to listen to His timely admonitions! [10] Through His almightiness God could have captivated the people, so that they would not continue to destroy the mountains any further! Yes, this would be very easy for God to do; but the people would then have ceased to be people, and it would also afterwards in the kingdom of the spirits not be possible to put them back on free human feet. God rather allowed it to happen, so that the whole of mankind through its willful actions perish in the flesh, than allowing their souls to be harmed only in the slightest manner with regard to their free will and fullest independence. [11] Equally so has a tribe been warned several times by the king of Salem, not to live near the vicinity of Sodom and Gomorrah, because there were many underground sulfur deposits and partly contained bitumen. It was also clearly and comprehensively indicated to the people how continuously impure nature- spirits wrench themselves from such deposits and provoke flesh-people to commit sodomy; since just as there are spirits of bawdiness in the wine and provoke the flesh to it if enjoyed excessively, equally so they are also at home in sulfur and bitumen. The people were also told that in such areas quite often earthquakes, mountain fires and many evil storms occur and quite often cause great destruction, whereupon easily famine and pestilence originate; however all such good advice out of the mouth of Jehovah was to no avail. Because the country was otherwise quite lush and fertile, the people nevertheless settled there, and before two-hundred years passed, next to Sodom and Gomorrah ten other cities were built. The people became completely sensuous and committed all kinds of indescribable acts of sodomy and the most hideous fornication even with animals. [12] They again were warned during the times of Nahors and Tharahs and they were advised to leave the evil country; however nobody took any note of it. The sons of Tharahs were Abraham, Nahor – who had the same name of his grandfather – and Haran, who fathered Lot. Haran himself went there and preached on instructions of God but did not achieved anything. Lot, his son, did the same for several years and alternately stayed in the various cities and nearly became himself a victim of the spirit of sodomy. [13] Then came visible angels who first visited Abraham, and Jehovah was among them and loyally informed Abraham what would happen to Sodom and the other cities. And the two angels were sent in the form of two strong youth to the city to still save Lot. The people did not at all listen to the youth but wanted to commit the most unnatural sodomy with them. Then Lot got away upon the warning of the two youth. Only his wife became a victim of her tardy curiosity; she turned into a salt column according to her body as predicted by the two youth. Since they said: ‘We must flee quickly and not even take the time to look back; for the underground fires spread very quickly and its everywhere erupting vapors quickly suffocate all physical life and turn everything very quickly into stony salt!’ Lot’s wife nevertheless stood still for a few moments and was caught by the vapors and became a victim. [14] See, again the almighty will of God did not directly caused the full destruction of the evil countryside; because this would happen to this unripe place anyway, which in fact took place later under Abraham. But that at the same time so many people perished, nobody else carries the guilt than the disobedience of their free will. [15] God could have of course pulled the people out of there with His almighty will and place them in another, healthy country; but this would be obviously against their will. Since this is considered the highest priority by God and must be considered, and He rather let it happen that all these people perished bodily, than let it happen that only one atom of the freedom of the will of their souls is damaged. Since even for God it is the greatest masterpiece of His love, wisdom and power, to create people who can fully resemble Him in everything. [16] In order to effectuate this, man must be born into this world nearly without power and in greatest desolation and obtains his lessons in time from the outer world. If he in such a way has gathered a little knowledge and abilities, only then does the surrounding good and also bad spirits influence him unnoticed – the good his soul and the bad his physical nature – so that the soul always remains in the most perfect free floating state. [17] If man voluntarily adheres to the good outer teachings and admonitions against some challenges of his senses and has adapted his life accordingly, the quiet influence of the good spirits become continuously stronger, which however no person can and also must feel differently, other than as if it is his own free work. Once the influence of the good from heaven through man’s own will is strengthened to such an extent, that the soul has completely submitted to it, the true, divine spirit of love will awaken in her, penetrates the whole soul and only then has the soul stepped on to the first level of her completion, is then already indestructible free and can, even in the flesh, receive visions and revelations from spirits and even from the highest angels. [18] And then it happens quite often that such people have visions, speak with souls in the beyond and allow to be personally taught by them and give also to other, still naturally living people, a true account of it. Who believes them, does well, he only should not demand to immediately experience the same; for this cannot take place earlier, until he has attained the same prescribed spiritual soul ripeness.” (THE GREAT GOSPEL OF JOHN Book 15, chap. 96) Lord’s Justice different than that of Moses “[7] Moses ordered stoning and death by fire for such crimes (sexual type); but the like should only be applied in extraordinary situations to the most obdurate sinners for the sake of dissuading others. I do not refute Moses, however, but I recommend to you only to proceed in all things in mildness until a too great turpitude demands extreme strictness. [8] As judges be gentle and just through true love for others, and you will one day find a tender and gentle court also; for with whichever means you measure, with the same means will you also be measured in return. [9] If you are merciful, you will also find mercy; but if you are strict and unforgiving in your courts and judgments, you will also find the strictest and most unmerciful judge one day. [10] Consider in such courts that the soul and the spirit of a person are very willing and obedient; but the flesh is and remains weak, and there is no one who can boast of the strength of his flesh.” (THE GREAT GOSPEL OF JOHN Book 5, chap. 55) God doesn't condemn the sinner, the sinner condemns himself "Truly, in the whole of eternity there is not a single case where even one spirit had been condemned by God! But I can show you countless cases where spirits, owing to their freedom of will, scorn and blaspheme the Deity, not for all the world wanting to be dependent on Its endless love, since they fancy themselves to be lords even over Deity! However, as the Deity can only bestow the abundance of Its endless love on those who wish to enjoy it, it becomes clear that those who hate and scorn the Deity and Its endless love above all and blaspheme It, cannot partake in this love because they stubbornly refuse to do so. Such beings love only themselves and hate everything that does not whole-heartedly appeal to their selfish ego. For them, the love for God and the fellowman is a destructive abomination, a curse within their heart, and God merely the insipid fancy of a spoilt zealous heart, a folly of an utterly stupefied intellect, and the fellowman not worthy of any consideration. If free spirits obdurately clinging to these ideas cannot be healed of their pernicious delusion by any means afforded to their freedom and prefer to suffer forever all their self-created bitterness and misery rather than submit to the most gentle commandment on the part of the Deity - say, can in this case the Deity be denounced for such a self-condemnation? And if through Its omnipotence, love and wisdom the Deity lovingly segregates such apostates from their blessed friends, yet leaves them in their segregation the fullest freedom, can It be called hard-hearted and unloving?" ("From Hell to Heaven" I/24, 5-9, through Jakob Lorber) "If the Deity were to judge the spirits who must become absolutely free, with Its omnipotence, this would mean an end to all freedom forever. Instead of free spirits, the Almighty would merely create puppets under judgment, but not ever self-determining spirits who are free and independent from the Deity and destined to become gods themselves once they reach perfection. Therefore, divine wisdom decreed such conditions for depraved human beings so that they can be brought back onto the right road. Although this is also a judgment and, as it were, a coercion, it concerns only the outer man, allowing the inner man to awaken more speedily and easily and thus return to his true destiny. " ("From Hell to Heaven" I/25, 4 on, through Jakob Lorber) God wants to be loved, not feared „[1] Then I stood up from My chair and went to the table of the Samaritans who also quickly stood up from their chairs and said with deep awe to Me (the Samaritans): “O Lord, Lord, we are sinners and are not worthy that You Yourself come to our table, but speak only one word over us, so that we may become strong in Your light.” [2] I said: “You can leave out this too great awe for Me, and grow instead of that, into the right and true love for Me, for it means much more and it is greater to love God above all than to fear Him above all. An exaggerated fear for God drives man ever further away from God and is finally the bad seed out of which in due time will grow paganism with the whole pagan service of idols, superstition and finally complete disbelief. [3] But with full love, man comes ever closer to God, he trusts Him more and more and longs for Him, and thus he is more and more filled with the Spirit of God, because the constantly increasing and trusting love for God is the true and living Spirit of God in man and the spirit of the eternal life in the soul. Therefore, a sinner who repents out of love for God is closer to Him and is more dear to Him than 99 very God-fearing persons who never sinned against a law, and thus, being righteous, never needed to do penance. [4] Just consider a child who has a great fear for his parents because they may have punished him a few times too severely because of his childish naughtiness. Such a child will indeed obey his parents, but not so much out of love, but rather out of fear for the punishment that he can expect if he would sin again against the will of the parents. The presence of his parents will after some time also be unpleasant to such a child, and he will try to free himself out of the situation that is unpleasant to him by leaving the parental house and search his luck, his rest and his comfort in the faraway foreign regions. And he only will come back in remorse to his parents with fear and trembling if he found the opposite of what he though to find in the foreign regions. [5] The same parents have another child who is not so afraid for them, but instead of that, he loves them more and more, does not bother so much about a few admonishments, and will do away with his faults and do their will, thus not out of an ever increasing fear for the severity of his parents, but out of his own ever increasing love for them. [6] Who of the 2 children do you think will be the most beloved one of the parents?” [7] The spokesman said: “Of course the child who has less fear for his parents, but who instead of that has more love and a childish trust in them.” [8] I said: “Your opinion is correct and you have given Me a right answer. So you also should be as a child who has more love than fear for his parents. And so love God as the eternal Father of all men, more than that you fear Him as a relentless judge, then you also will not have so much fear or feel shyness for My presence with you as was the case until now. [9] You can believe Me that God loves also the very fearful children, but what concerns the childish, fearless trust towards Him, there are often very crooked ways that have to be walked upon. Without that trust, a soul can never become completely equal to God and be happy and independently free in God, and along those mentioned crooked ways a soul can hardly attain to that. Only great need can bring such children on the right way back to the house of love of his parents. [10] Since the children only become worse instead of better by the chastisements that come from above, those chastisements happen only seldom, and only when all loving attempts have failed on the blind stubbornness of men. That is why God has always such a great patience with the arrogance of men, so that by constant punishments they would not be driven even more away from Him than what they are already doing themselves. [11] And once God had to visit men with the chastising rod in His hand, then He presents in His other hand – although somewhat veiled – His heart to them, so that they would see that God the Father, even if He already has the chastising rod in His hand, still comes to meet them with all love, as this is now also the case before your eyes. [12] But I still add something to this, and all of you remember this well: he who is too fearful in a certain work that he probably will make a mistake by which the work will suffer damage regarding the goal that has to be reached, will also not seldom make great mistakes. But he who works with pleasure and love, without a too great fear to possibly make a mistake, will make good progress in his work, and probably not many meaningful mistakes will be discovered, because the right love with the right trust is not blind as the pagan worldly wise men think, but it sees much sharper than the sharpest worldly reason with its too fearful conscious. [13] Although love has made a mistake here and there, then it quickly and easily can correct it by itself, but when the reason with its fear has made a mistake, then it loses all trust in itself and often does not find any means by which the mistake can be completely corrected. [14] By that I do not want to tell you that a man should put his reason and his conscience completely aside – far from it. But he who let himself be completely mastered by the reason and an exaggerated fearful fright to make mistakes, and to straightly doubt in the much better work of love and its trust, is certainly blind and foolish to a high degree. [15] If you have well understood this now, you will also easily be able to bear My presence, and then you will not want to have the wish in yourself to leave this place as fast as possible out of sheer fear and shyness for Me.” [16] After My friendly lesson the Samaritans changed completely. They thanked Me for this teaching and became very trusting. [17] And the chief spokesman said: “O Lord and Master of all things and all life. Only a great love for You has brought us here, because we heard that here or in Nazareth reliable information could be received about where You were staying, and so we traveled to this place with great confidence. Well now, instead of the information that we expected, namely where You are staying, we have met You directly, to our great surprise, and this surprise filled us with a very great fear for Your endless glory. But now You have changed our certainly not unreasonable and also not unjustified fear at once into a trusting love. And therefore we will stay here as long as You will stay here, and we will follow You – if You want – wherever You will go, for we also would gladly like to be Your disciples and spreaders of Your living word.” [18] I said: “That is also why I wanted you to search for Me, for I know you very well and also your spirit. But now, continue to eat and drink. After that we will go on with our discussion.” [19] They all were satisfied with that, and they now continued to eat and drink without any shyness, and I returned to My place.” (THE GREAT GOSPEL OF JOHN, Book 21, chap. 97)
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Answers to Faith-Related Issues
confirming the Christian Scriptures, clarifying and expanding them with still unknown spiritual knowledge Categories
All
Archives
March 2019
|