© 2002 Merlyn Cox
© 2002 The Christian Fellowship of Students of The Urantia Book
Part of our desire in creating a new Urantia religious organization is to make more visible what has been up to now largely hidden. It stems from the passion to bring the Fifth Epochal Revelation to the larger community of mankind: the liberating, joyful message of the Father’s love and his plan for all of his children.
How we would like to see people shorn of superstition and unworthy ideas of the Divine Creator! I’m reminded of Jesus’ feelings as he looked sadly at the meaningless and childish rituals of his people. He passionately wanted to give vent to his anger at the distorted understanding of the Father in Heaven. But he held his peace; the time was not right.
He lived in a time that was ripe for the planting of seeds, but not a time when the majority were ready to accept his message. But it was a time of great spiritual hunger, and enough souls were ready that a movement was started that would continue to grow until it encompassed the earth.
We live in a time when spiritual hunger is again becoming the great thirst of mankind. The next age, as some have pointed out, appears to be an age of religious quest and not one of political ideas and ideology.
Christianity is growing rapidly around the world, especially in Africa and South America, and soon Christians in the Western world will be in a clear minority. But the growth there is more in a Pentecostal vein, rather than that of mainline Christianity. This may be both a judgment against the aridity of mainline Christianity as well as a more natural path for most people at this time. The growth of rigid fundamentalism in all parts of the world may be no less a sign of the same hunger.
Is the harvest then ripe for an enlarged receptivity of the Fifth Epochal Revelation? To some degree perhaps, but I suspect we are a long way from a time of widespread natural receptivity. For the foreseeable future it will likely remain a path for the few, rather than the many.
So where does that leave us in our own efforts? Rather than be discouraged, we should rejoice that we have the opportunity to be a part of the long-term process of preparing to communicate the message of the Fifth Epochal Revelation to the world in new ways, or at least in ways more familiar to the culture we are in.
However, we need to be aware of what a long, slow process it will be. More than this, we will ever need to be cognizant that building an institution is not the same as growing a faith community. It will ever be a temptation to let the business of the institution substitute for the deeper issues of the Spirit, the kingdom/family of God. We can build institutions, but only the Spirit can grow the community of faith.
We need to be about laying groundwork and setting goals regarding things over which we have control, and be prepared to learn and adapt as we go along. But the real work is not ours to do. That should free us to invest our efforts with joy and hope, as we pray that those in higher realms will use our efforts for the greater good and glory of the Father’s work.
Merlyn Cox is a pastor serving in the North Indiana Conference of the United Methodist Church. He has been a Urantia Book reader for 18 years, and worked with Meredith Sprunger in initiating The Spiritual Fellowship Journal in 1991, and served for ten years as associate editor. He is currently chairman of the Education Team for The Spiritual Fellowship.