© 2024 Enrique Traver
© 2024 International Urantia Association (IUA)
Enrique Traver, Brésil
Dear Brothers and Sisters
Reading about Jesus’ journey back from Rome with Gonod and Ganid, papers UB 133:4.1 up to UB 133:4.12, Jesus meets several people, professionals in different areas of human activity or work and advises them on how they should carry out their daily work to reveal God and do his will. Perhaps, in these papers what Jesus is telling us is that always, in whatever activity or occupation we have, we can minister God to the people around us, revealing truth, goodness, beauty, justice and righteousness.
One passage caught my attention and caused me deep reflection, and that was precisely Jesus’ conversation with the owner of a Greek inn to whom he said:
To the mistress of the Greek inn he said: “Minister your hospitality as one who entertains the children of the Most High. Elevate the drudgery of your daily toil to the high levels of a fine art through the increasing realization that you minister to God in the persons whom he indwells by his spirit which has descended to live within the hearts of men, thereby seeking to transform their minds and lead their souls to the knowledge of the Paradise Father of all these bestowed gifts of the divine spirit. UB 133:4.8 [emphasis added]
Each one of us is an inn. We host God himself within us. Could we have a more illustrious or important guest? Some Most High guest?
He is a permanent guest in our inn and while being there, we are constantly receiving the spiritual nourishment we need to ensure our survival. Imagine if you had an inn and didn’t receive guests. How long would your business survive? We must serve this guest with all honor, with all love, with the desire to always do his will, in the certainty that by doing so we will keep him with us infinitely.
On the other hand, how do we welcome our fellow human beings into our hearts? The Father, just as he inhabits me, does so with each of my fellow human beings, my brothers and sisters. Should we be selective in how we treat and welcome each of them? How does the Father who inhabits me welcome my brothers and sisters, his children? Does the Father who inhabits me fraternize with the Father who inhabits each of my brothers and sisters, perhaps sharing their experiences? How would my Father like me to receive each of these brothers of mine?
It seems obvious that the way we welcome our brothers should be as high as the way we welcome the Most High. After all, in one way or another, the Father who inhabits my brother accompanies him on his visit. That’s why we should welcome him with contentment, joy, acceptance, love and a desire to serve.
This desire to welcome and serve is what inspires us to spread the Gospel of Jesus to all our brothers and sisters. We are living through an important moment in the history of human civilization, perhaps approaching the moment when atheistic materialism and the secularism movement are close to being defeated, as our revelators say. Today a multitude of hungry and spiritually thirsty people surround us, deluded by the domination and slavery of the material and futile things of our transitory life in this physical world. Perhaps we are not far away from the moment when people will rid themselves of ancient errors and pagan superstitions about the nature of the Universal Father.
That will be the day when men will be willing to seek truth and righteousness. When the chaos of the current confusion has passed, it will be easier to formulate the cosmos of a new and improved era of human relations. And it is for this better order of things on Earth that this book has been prepared. — The Publication Mandate
These brothers and sisters, who are now lost, need to find a safe harbor that will help them to connect to God. They need welcome, guidance, love and service, and only those who have found our Father can provide this welcome. Are we prepared for this endeavor?
We need to organize, gather and coordinate our efforts to transmit security and confidence to all seekers. All individual spirit-led efforts are of fundamental importance, after all, who but each one of us can share our lives daily with the people who surround us and are closest to us? However, when we expand our activities beyond our surroundings, it is important to have unity of effort and resources, coordinated actions that can be unifying and not competing, to offer confidence and security to all seekers.
What we’re saying is that no one can take better care of their own inn but you yourself, but when your inn becomes too small to accommodate so many guests, we may have to find other inns that are willing and able to do so. But these inns can’t and shouldn’t be competitors, because in the spiritual realm, competition isn’t desirable, it’s not unifying, it doesn’t bring peace. Lack of peace generates insecurity, fear and mistrust.
The appearance, design, color and model of each inn may be different, including its food, furniture and other things, but the way of welcoming, caring for, loving and serving all guests must always be similar. In this case, teamwork makes all the difference. Come and join us.