© 2019 Olga López
© 2019 Urantia Association of Spain
Presentation for the 18th Urantia Book Readers’ Meeting in Spain, Benalmádena (Málaga), April 25-28, 2019
A rich inner life involves spiritualizing ourselves, distancing ourselves from the material and animal tendencies of the mind. And what better way to do this than by drawing closer to the source of all that is spiritual? Although, as with so many things in life, this is easier said than done.
How do we, flesh-and-blood mortals, elevate ourselves spiritually? How do we go from being rational animals to being as perfect as we can be on the finite level of reality? Unlike the natives of Havona, we weren’t born perfect; then we have to learn to be perfect. And how do we learn?
The famous inevitabilities of section 5 of Paper 3 (The Attributes of God) give us the key to this question. We need to learn by contrast: courage, altruism, hope, faith, love of truth, idealism, loyalty, unselfishness, pleasure… to experience all these things, we must live in a world where it is possible to face situations where they are conspicuous by their absence. Since we lack that innate gift of Havona natives to detect truth, beauty, and goodness instantly without margin of error, we must learn what they are by comparing them with their opposite. In the part of creation in which we live, there is no other way to learn than by experiencing in an environment where potential evil can become actual at any moment.
Personally, this has been for me the definitive answer to the eternal question that many people have asked themselves throughout human history, and still ask today: If God exists, why does he allow injustice? Why do bad things happen to good people?
There’s a phrase from the aforementioned section that I think is key to this matter: “If there were an evolutionary world without errors (without the possibility of imprudent judgments), it would be a world without free intelligence.” The answer, therefore, lies in our free will: as personal beings endowed with free will, we are free to be right and to be wrong. And by exercising that freedom to do the Father’s will is how we draw a little closer to God.
The Universal Father has a purpose for us, a plan formulated from eternity. He wants us to be perfect as he is perfect. To serve as a model and to satisfy his divine nature, the Father created the perfect creation of Havona, which will be for us the school where we can see the inherent personified perfection that we cannot experience because of our own nature as perfectible beings.
The Father’s plans for the perfection of imperfect creation advance thanks to providence, which we humans have constantly misinterpreted. Providence is always aligned with human progress and helps us all progress toward fulfilling God’s mandate to be perfect. Although it may not often seem so, everything that happens is progressing for the good. We may not see it because we are only considering a part of the whole or because we are thinking in too narrow a timeframe, but the truth is that the trend of the times is toward progress.
In this part of creation, the key word is progress. We cannot remain as we are, because stagnating is equivalent to dying, to ceasing to exist. We are in perpetual change and movement. Let us remember the parable of the talents: we cannot bury our talents and then hand over what we were given when the time comes to give an account, because what the Father expects of us is that we perfect ourselves along the way, that our talents yield results, that we become better than we were at any given moment.
“There are no limits to the forces and personalities the Father can utilize to accomplish his purpose and sustain his creatures” (UB 4:1.4). God sustains all physical creation and all spirit beings. Although we often witness instability, we can see stability if we focus on the whole picture. Contrary to the perception of many unbelievers, God is present in his creation and attentive to his creatures. God did not simply wind up the universe like a clock and then walk away. If God were to withdraw from his creation, we would be headed for an instant universal catastrophe. God is the source of reality, and therefore persistent denial of his existence would ultimately render us unreal.
It is true that, from our limited perspective, we may find it difficult to see the underlying harmony of Creation, and this is where we must draw on the faith-trust that gives us the conviction that everything works for the good, even if we do not understand it at the time. Furthermore, in the universe there is always room for the unexpected, even for the highest personalities in the celestial hierarchy. Let us remember that the Absolutes sometimes act in ways that the revealers themselves do not fully understand. The universe therefore teaches us to expect the unexpected, which is never arbitrary or capricious but rather serves a good purpose. Furthermore, in our “little piece” of the universe, we must bear in mind that there is a God of the finite level evolving with us, the Supreme Being, who is the cause of many seemingly fortuitous reactions to events.
Ultimately, providence is on our side and always works for the progress of the whole, even if it sometimes seems to work against the part. The seemingly confusing mix of physical, mental, moral, and spiritual phenomena works infallibly “for the glory of God and for the good of men and angels.”
As human beings of flesh and blood, we are endowed with a mind that has the capacity to know God, and precisely because of this capacity, it has the ability to generate a reality beyond the material level of existence: the soul. Together with the Thought Adjuster, the mind creates a morontia reality that will become our self when we leave the body that now serves as our “suit.”
We often tend to think that morontial life begins on the mansion worlds, but it actually begins here. Our soul belongs to that intermediate plane located between the physical and spiritual planes, so it is here in our material world where that soul is born and develops, and thus our morontial life begins.
Our soul develops through our decisions and the lessons our experiences provide. We must not underestimate the capacity of the mind that has been given to us to ascend from the purely material and reach higher meanings and values. As certain seraphim on the mansion worlds teach, “If your own mind does not serve you well, you can exchange it for the mind of Jesus of Nazareth, which always serves you well.” Jesus of Nazareth is our example of a fully developed human being, both on the physical level and on the mental and spiritual levels.
Part of the inner life that brings us closer to God consists of integrating meanings and unifying values. That is precisely the function of human philosophy in this world, and one doesn’t have to be a philosopher to practice it. Just as important as perceiving the details is seeing the whole and the role its components play. In this world, we need to practice the art of “the intelligent assembly and coordination of related data.” An example of this would be the study of human history. It has not been said for nothing that he who does not know history is doomed to repeat it. And to paraphrase Mark Twain, history may not repeat itself, but it certainly rhymes.
The search for truth and facts is so important that it is carried out not only here but in the worlds that await us beyond. In Document 48, we are told: “Even now you should learn to water the garden of your heart as well as to search the arid sands of knowledge. Forms are worthless when the lessons have been learned. You cannot get a chick without a shell, and no shell is worth anything after the chick has hatched.” On many occasions, in our growth process, we will rely on bodies of knowledge that will help us advance but to which we should not cling because we have already learned what is necessary from them. The revelators further add in this same document: “When children have their ideals, do not suppress them, let them grow. And while you learn to think like men, you should also learn to pray like children.”
The construction of our soul involves many scaffolding elements that help it grow healthily. But once they’ve fulfilled their function, the scaffolding must be removed so the structure can continue to grow, and if necessary, new and larger ones must be added. If we insist on abandoning the initial scaffolding, we are suffocating the soul and ceasing to live in the truth, which by definition is alive and dynamic.
In Paper 48 we are told that “The fetish of truth-as-fact, of fossilized truth, the iron chain of so-called unchanging truth, keeps you blindly in a closed circle of dead facts. One may be technically right about the facts and eternally wrong about the truth.” UB 48:6.33
And how should we carry out this vital learning process? With fidelity and seriousness, but at the same time with joy, accepting challenges without complaint and facing difficulties and uncertainties without fear. There may be falls, but not without getting back up afterward. And if we are successful in our endeavors, it is important to maintain a balanced poise to avoid giving ourselves excessive importance, which leads us to excessive pride. Nothing drains our energy more than conceit.
How many times have we experienced that our greatest disappointments have turned out to be our greatest blessings? As the revelators say, “When a seed is planted, it sometimes needs to die, your most cherished hopes, before it can be reborn to bear the fruits of a new life and new opportunities” UB 48:6.36. As is commonly said, when you are in the deepest hole, the only way out is up. One of the ways to avoid disappointments is to lower our expectations of others. They have a path and their free will, and they don’t have to do what we want them to do. No, what is truly important is to do what we believe we have to do, to work on our spiritual progress here and now without exalting our egos unduly, because that, not work, is what drains our energies. And above all, it’s essential to avoid monotony and seek variety, as it relaxes us and gives us the energy to continue.
To progress toward God, we have a helper who works 24 hours a day and never fails: our Thought Adjuster. Nothing like a fragment of God to pull us toward Him. The Adjusters are the ones who help us spiritualize, as long as we let them, for they will do nothing against our will. Within them lies the potential for eternity that we have as human beings, for the human mind is perishable and does not survive physical death. The joint creation of the mind and the Adjuster, the soul, is potentially immortal, thanks precisely to the Adjuster. It is He who creates a new mind for our future career, the eternal adventure.
But we shouldn’t think that the Adjusters are going to make our lives easier. Quite the contrary! As I said at the beginning, we learn by contrast (remember the inevitabilities), so they will take it upon themselves to make our lives “reasonably difficult and hard” to stimulate our decisions. But in return, we will obtain “a sublime peace of mind and a magnificent tranquility of spirit.”
One of the obstacles to our spiritual progress is fear. It is precisely when we make courageous decisions that we offer a foothold to the Adjuster, who can enlighten us and push us a little closer to the Father.
Our unstable and constantly changing mental attitudes often lead us to sabotage the Adjuster’s work. Our animal nature also works against it, as do preconceived ideas, unchanging dogmas, and prejudices. Therefore, if we truly want to advance toward God, we must facilitate the work of our divine spark by balancing the demands of material life with the work designed to secure our future career. The evolutionary struggle is exhausting, but it should not make us lose sight of the long-distance race that is our upward path to Paradise.
As diverse as human beings may be in genetic endowment, social standing, and other material circumstances, we are all equally equipped to reach the Father. The speed may vary, but the goal is accessible to every human being, as we all have free will and the potential to develop an immortal morontia soul.
But what happens when free will is given to imperfect beings? The possibility of error, evil, sin, and iniquity exists. But if we allow ourselves to be guided by the loving guidance of the Adjuster, if we allow our divine spark to pilot the ship of our mind, He will see to it that He steers us away from evil and gracefully navigates the pitfalls that arise as we navigate the turbulent seas of mortal life. He will educate us to propel us forward along the paths of progressive perfection and will safeguard the sublime values of our character.
Although the Adjuster is most concerned with our future career, that does not mean that he is not interested in our temporal well-being and our actual achievements in this world, for he is interested in everything that later has survival value and represents the progress of our soul.
Although the Adjuster is not housed in our brain but in our mind, we must guard our bodies against physical poisons, for these “considerably retard the Adjuster’s efforts to elevate the material mind.” And not only physical poisons, but also mental poisons (fear, anger, envy, jealousy, distrust, and intolerance) greatly hinder the spiritual progress of our souls.
In the adventure that leads us to Paradise and to God, the general tone is always uncertainty within certainty. On the one hand, we have uncertainty in time and in the mind, regarding how events will unfold (for we live in time and will remain in it until we reach the shores of Paradise), but we also have security in spirit and in eternity, and confidence in the infinite love of God our Father. The Adjuster is a most valuable ally in times of uncertainty, for he is the one who presents to us “the images of the true motive, the final goal, and the eternal objective” of all our struggles in this world.
If it is already difficult for the Adjusters to deal with human beings because of the great spiritual distance that separates them from us, that difficulty is increased by the intermixing of human races, for biology greatly influences our capacity to receive divine guidance. But we have such a valuable ally who is capable of helping us overcome all these limitations and thus elevate us to greater spiritual heights, bringing us a little closer to the Father.
Finally, I would like to recall the story that a Gospel whispered to a shepherd boy, and which appears in document 48, for it expresses all the trust that human beings should have in the Father and in the help that he so generously offers us:
«The Gods are my guardians; I will not stray;
Together they lead me along the beautiful paths and into the glorious rest of eternal life. In this Divine Presence, I will have no need for food or thirst for water.
Even if I descend into the valley of uncertainty or ascend to the worlds of doubt,
Whether I walk alone or with my fellow men,
Though I triumph in the choirs of light or falter in the solitary places of the spheres, Your good spirit will help me and your glorious angel will comfort me.
Even if I descend into the depths of darkness and death itself, I will not doubt you nor fear you,
For I know that in the fullness of time and in the glory of your name
You will raise me up to sit with you on the battlements of the heights.» UB 48:6.9-19