© 1994 Meredith Sprunger
© 1994 The Christian Fellowship of Students of The Urantia Book
_“…this church is only the larval stage of the thwarted spiritual kingdom”… UB 170:5.21
Human institutions advance and thrive as the result of new and enlarged visions of spiritual reality. History is replete with examples of such transformations. Cycles of culture start with such new visions of reality. They develop with the flowering of all social institutions and decline when the spiritual dynamic of their empowerment is lost or depleted. These historical events are closely associated with revelation — a significant breakthrough in the conceptualization of truth and a broadening actualization of beauty and goodness.
For decades the philosophers of history in Western Civilization have pointed to signs of decline in our culture. In the July-August 1993 issue of The Futurist, Richard D. Lamm, director of the Center for Public Policy and Contemporary Issues at the University of Denver, and former governor of Colorado, discusses the indicators of decline in our culture. “Decline, like fog,” he says, “creeps up on civilizations on little cat’s feet, and America’s decline began in the recent past. Tomorrow’s futurist will wonder how we were so myopic.”
Prophetic voices in the church during recent years have expressed similar concerns. Professor Leander E. Keck and the Rev. James L. Killen, Jr., in the April issue of Circuit Rider, speak of the critical need for theological renewal and reform. The church, they assert, needs a new era of theological creativity.
Some day historians will look back and see that this concern over cultural decline and hunger for new spiritual creativity was a part of a larger picture. Our planet is being prepared for a new vision of reality. A growing number of people are recognizing the revelatory authenticity of the message of The Urantia Book. Our ministerial network seeks to bring this enlarged vision of truth to the church.
The time is coming when theologians and church administrators will seriously examine the book’s message and recognize its mission of upstepping our comprehension of reality and deepening our awareness of spiritual ministry. In that day, the larval stage of the church will begin its thrilling metamorphosis toward the beautiful, dynamic, caring, and empowering creation of the spiritual kingdom it is destined to become, and brilliantly mirror, the universe reality that Christ is Lord!