“The first mission of this spirit [of Truth] is, of course, to foster and personalize truth, for it is the comprehension of truth that constitutes the highest form of human liberty. Next, it is the purpose of this spirit to destroy the believer's feeling of orphanhood.” (194:2.2, pg. 2061)

   We may first experience the desire for God when overwhelmed by feelings of being alone in the universe. I encounter many fellow humans suffering from loneliness and isolation, described in The Urantia Book (The UB) as a “feeling of orphanhood.” If in discovering God, we experience being comforted, I believe it is the result of the ministry of the Spirit of Truth “which … shall guide and comfort you,” (180:4.2, pg. 1948) also known as the Comforter in both The UB and the Bible (John 14:26, 15:26, 16:7).

   The feeling of being comforted may be the initial experience that leads us to accept God as a friend. The UB clarifies that “the Comforter” of John’s gospel is the Spirit of Truth bestowed on earth at the end of Jesus’ life, Michael’s bestowal.

   Just because one has found The UB, or a spiritual self-help book, and absorbed its information, does not mean he or she won’t still experience emotions that can overwhelm one even in situations where there are solutions. Exhaustion and hopelessness, a profound sense of sin and unworthiness, or the paranoia of not being loved can dog our footsteps.  Understanding the feelings of loneliness and hopelessness in ourselves, we can recognize the same in friends and loved ones, knowing there are times we can’t seem to derive comfort in the message of God’s love.

   One of our famous local SF Bay Area characters, Ken Kesey (author of One Flew Over the Cuckoo Nest) once talked with the Paris Review about people who struggle in the valley of the shadow of death. He described the stratagem of self-medicating to deal with pain. “It’s the same old wilderness, just no longer up on that hill or around that bend or in the gully. It’s the fact that there is no more hill or gully, that the hollow is there and you’ve got to explore the hollow with faith. If you don’t have faith that there is something down there, pretty soon when you’re in the hollow, you begin to get scared and start shaking. That’s when you stop taking acid and start taking coke and drinking booze and start trying to fill the hollow with depressants and Valium.”

   Kesey went on to say in this interview:  “Real warriors like William Burroughs or Leonard Cohen or Wallace Stevens examine the hollow as well as anybody; they get in there, look far into the dark, and yet come out with poetry.”

   “The spirit which my Father and I shall send into the world is not only the Spirit of Truth but also the spirit of idealistic beauty. (155:6.11, pg. 1732)

   I recently read Darkness Visible by William Styron, a book I resisted reading for years (it came out in 1990). His experience of depression is illuminating for someone like myself who suffers comparatively mild symptoms when evaluated next to his, though I was still able to recognize features he described with such vividness. Styron’s depression was so severe he sought a cure through a hospitalization that lasted about seven weeks. 

   Unfortunately, I think, his book shows no experience of, or recognition of the Spirit of Truth, or any other spiritual assistance or helpers, for that matter. His one mention of religion is to condemn the ineffectiveness of Christian platitudes. I concluded that his complete indifference to the influence of spiritual life was a reason he suffered depression to such an extreme. However there is more to say on the unconscious experiences leading to his rescue that is beyond the range of this article. I came away from that book with a stronger faith in having our minds centered on "God." Anchoring oneself in the love of the Spirit helps me recharge, restore, regain balance, and continue to make progress in life. 

   The Apostle Paul wrote about the Comforter as the Spirit of Adoption: "For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, 'Abba, Father.'" (Romans 8:12-17)

   "The Supreme Spirit shall bear witness with your spirits that you are truly the children of God. And if you are the sons of God, then have you been born of the spirit of God; and whosoever has been born of the spirit has in himself the power to overcome all doubt, and this is the victory that overcomes all uncertainty, even your faith. (Discourse on Assurance, UB pg. 1601, 142:5.3)

   Styron wrote that “self-hatred … a failure of self esteem and… a feeling of worthlessness,” were key causes of his depression. Jesus taught a new insight into Job’s self hatred in his private conference with the apostle John. He perceived another meaning to Job’s suffering, how Job used it as a fulcrum to turn it around.

   “Even in the very face of the breakdown of his theological defenses he ascended to those spiritual heights where he could sincerely say, ‘I abhor myself’; then was there granted him the salvation of a vision of God. So even through misunderstood suffering, Job ascended to the superhuman plane of moral understanding and spiritual insight. When the suffering servant obtains a vision of God, there follows a soul peace which passes all human understanding.” (148:6.3)

   Jesus taught believers, “Ask and you will receive, that your joy may be full.” (John 16:24) “I have come that my brethren in the flesh may have joy, gladness, and life more abundantly.” (John 10:10, and 15:11, UB pg. 1558) “I have come into the world to put love in the place of fear, joy in the place of sorrow, confidence in the place of dread, loving service and appreciative worship in the place of slavish bondage and meaningless ceremonies.” (UB 149:6.5, pg. 1675)

   With his gift of the Spirit of Truth to the planet, this access to joy obtained, the door was opened. We can in our meditations and prayers ask for guidance and comfort from this Spirit and expect with confidence to receive it.

   “Intellectual self-consciousness can discover the beauty of truth, its spiritual quality, not only by the philosophic consistency of its concepts, but more certainly and surely by the unerring response of the ever-present Spirit of Truth. Happiness ensues from the recognition of truth because it can be acted out; it can be lived. Disappointment and sorrow attend upon error because, not being a reality, it cannot be realized in experience.” (2:7.6, pg. 42)