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Spiritual Growth: Issues and Challenges in The Urantia Book

Doing the Will of God

By Bob Ghen Sr.

The Urantia Book unequivocally declares: "The doing of the will of God is nothing more or less than an exhibition of creature willingness to share the inner life with God . . ." (1221.2) 111:5.1

What? Seriously? That's it?

When I began The Urantia Book journey so many years ago, that was my initial reaction. At that time, my search for spiritual meaning among various groups of well-intentioned seekers often presented a particular “spiritual path” through a more or less convoluted series of spiritual hoops and progressive “states of consciousness.” Each with an inviting promise of future mystical rewards, yet each a necessary prerequisite before one could experience God directly. Doing God’s will for me personally would require a level of divinity recognition only available to those who had at last arrived at the very pinnacle, the greatly coveted, “Enlightenment.” And from which vantage one finally became faultless, pure, holy, and perfected, a literal saint. Not to mention of course, becoming so much more “highly evolved” than mere unEnlightened mortals. Yes, if I could somehow get to that ultimate state, my search would be fulfilled. For the moment, alas, such enlightenment remained an elusive, spiritual carrot.

Ah yes, those early years . . . (sigh)

As a Urantia Book novice I believed in God (in His existence), yet I was still seeking to intellectually discern His will for me in terms of each individual decision, but without actually knowing Him. What did He want me to do about this, or about that? What should I do next? Should I take this job? Should I rent this house? Should I end my troubled marriage? Should I . . . should I . . . the list never ended. However absurdly impossible, my fanciful spiritual wish was to wake each morning with an explicit to-do list directly from God at my bedside. How else would I ever know for certain what His will was on every occasion? Truth be told, it was frustrating and stressful. Yet for a time, I continued to falsely believe that doing the will of God was somehow about figuring it out at each and every turn, every fork in the road. After all, aren’t we also taught that we advance spiritually, decision by decision? But uh-oh, what if I make the wrong one? Sheesh!

Gradually of course, I did come to recognize that doing God’s will did not mean foisting a quandary of psycho-spiritual struggle on myself over every choice that life presented. With that simple, authoritative declaration in The Urantia Book, I progressively realized that doing God’s will was not at all what I thought. Increasingly I found my personal experience aligning with this profoundly elegant quote. I was realizing that “doing God’s will” is more of a place to come from, than it is a place to get to.

To be clear, none of this should be taken as an “official” representation of Urantia Book teachings; there are no such official representations. I merely represent here my best effort to share the essence of my own experience that it might provide a little clarity to some from a purely personal perspective.

Let’s Take a Closer Look:

“The doing of the will of God is nothing more or less than an exhibition of creature willingness to share the inner life with God . . .”

What then does this actually mean? Let’s dissect it a bit:

“The doing of the will of God” This clearly states that what we are talking about is performing action with respect to the will of God; that’s what “doing” means. The will of God is something we do.

“is nothing more or less” This phrase is specifically definitive, narrowly and purposely defining the scope of its intent. It unambiguously means: It is this, and only this, and nothing but this.

“than an exhibition of creature willingness”  An exhibition is not simply a wish or a desire on the part of the creature. It is a showing, a demonstration of willingness by way of action. Again, it means doing something.

“to share the inner life with God” This refers to the highly intimate, subjective, and progressive spiritual experience of one’s intentionally active personal relationship with the indwelling spiritual presence of God, i.e., by actually communicating and communing, personally, with what The Urantia Book calls our divine Thought Adjuster.

The Solitary Messenger presenting this sublime truth makes it crystal clear that, sharing the inner life with God involves explicit action on the part of the individual. He thereby also implies that a purely passive attitude is flatly ineffective.

But Do What Exactly, and How?

The Urantia Book specifically teaches that, spiritual growth depends first upon maintaining a living spiritual connection with the ever present, inner spirit nucleus, our divine God fragment. THAT is the action we must DO! We must actively engage, personally, with our Adjuster who, so near to us, patiently awaits our personal attention. And we must keep on engaging. Personal relationships only mature and ripen with the ongoing sincerity of mutual commitment to the trust of intimacy.

When we are thus actively sharing this inner life with God, we are in truth doing His will. Maintaining this active relationship is the “exhibition” of our willingness to share the inner life, and that exhibition, that inner spiritual sharing is, “The doing of the will of God.” Nothing more, nothing less.

As the growing value of this inner personal relationship extrapolates into the outer social arena, our naturally self-centered decision making is incrementally imbued and superseded with increasingly higher motives, with God’s motives. Thus, doing the will of God in each particular life situation naturally becomes less perplexing, progressively self-evident, and makes it easier to habitually “do the right thing.”

Doing the Will of God as a Living Spiritual Experience

Now that we have intellectually analyzed our Urantia Book quote as a statement, and mentally grasped something of its meaning, let us shift our attention to its equally intended value level, i.e., its active application as a living spiritual experience.

With this shift we move into a whole new realm, not so easy of explanation. Here we must continue to use the language of words to portray what is essentially an ineffable, subjective, spiritual experience; a living, fluid, multi-faceted, profoundly intimate, personal relationship. One that ebbs and flows with the resilience of our courage, and the ever fluctuating depth and sincerity of our commitment. We can understand the meaning of the words, but the Truth of it must be lived to be comprehended. Thus, any attempts to intellectually elucidate such a living experience will necessarily be reductive on its face. Still, words are what we have, so we press ahead trusting our inner Partner to reinforce our intention to grasp, as well as convey, such an intellectually illusive, experiential, spiritual value level.

Establishing a Habitual Spiritual Pulse:

Experientially then, by what means do we establish and maintain such an active spiritual relationship with the inner spirit of God?

Consistently sharingthe inner life with our divine Partner is both a subjective, highly personal, private experience, as well as an objective, socially expressed experience. These are complementary aspects of the same living experience, wherein the private, spiritual sharing in the subjective inner life is “lived out” in the objective social arena, most effectively through unselfish service to others. Such an established practice effects a living spiritual pulse that nourishes the progress of our highest motives, decisions and goals, and thereby contributes directly to the growth of our souls.

With few exceptions, all life pulsates between these periods of rest (energy intake), and activity (energy output). Natural sleep we know for example, replenishes the natural energies we exhaust during the day and reinvigorates us for tomorrow’s activities. The cycle is foreordained; it is programmed into our mammalian DNA.

But spiritual renewal is neither automatic, nor biological. Restoring spiritual energy must be chosen. It must be a deliberate, personal choice, a free will decision -- each and every time! And those frequent decisions, made sincerely and persistently as the months and years unfold become a spiritual habit. And it is this purposive habit that establishes the living spiritual pulse that freely replenishes our depleted spiritual energies as we come and go about our busy days in the outer social arena.

Consciously attending to this habit of input and output, to our personal spiritual pulse, nourishes and sustains a life of increasing spiritual intimacy. Such a persistent practice is the very essence of an active and progressive, “exhibition of creature willingness to share the inner life with God.”

Sincere daily practice yields lifelong results -- eternal results!

Intelligent Prayer and Sincere Worship:

These are the personal practices most closely associated in The Urantia Book with the maintenance of this living spiritual connection of increasing personal intimacy with true and genuine Deity, with our Thought Adjusters.

To be clear, I am not referring here to any mystical experience of “oneness” or “nothingness” or “the Absolute” nor any other experience in which there is no sense of Other. All external and internal input has been silenced and I am alone with myself in the inner sanctum of my own awareness. A discussion of the pluses and/or minuses of this experience is beyond the scope of this discourse. Suffice to say that such mystical experiences, in and of themselves, are neither spiritual nor religious.

Contrasting sharply, both Intelligent Prayer and Sincere Worship are specifically spiritual-religious practices. They are predicated on an intentional personal relationship with the inner spirit of God, i.e., on the actual spiritual content of genuine religion. And The Urantia Book presents much to enhance our comprehension of these two highly subjective, spiritual-religious experiences.

Intelligent Prayer (Spiritual Communication)

Intelligent Prayer is distinguished from all other forms in that Intelligent Prayer is that prayer which is consistent with the divine principles that govern such spiritual communications. Prayer inconsistent with these principles will be unavailing. It will not rise with the spiritual currents, and will simply fall flat. Selfish, materialistic praying is neither intelligent, nor spiritual. The Urantia Book revelators offer some pretty strong language on the subject:

“That prayer which is inconsistent with the known and established laws of God is an abomination to the Paradise Deities. . .” (1638.3) 146:2.3

Intelligent Prayer is both an intellectual and a spiritual-religious communication. It seeks to intelligently communicate one’s finite self with infinite deity, with God. It is the sincere expression of all that we would communicate to Him were He sitting directly in front of us, at the kitchen table so to speak. There is no formula for such a private conference. Intelligent Prayer is the spontaneous and wholehearted effort to reach out to the universal Parent as He spiritually resides in the superconscious (consciousness of consciousness) region of our own personal minds. Here, in mutual regard, sincere expressions of gratitude, and all spiritual supplications for ourselves and others are offered in trust and faith. Increasingly as our souls mature, an intellectually inexplicable experience of spiritual assurance begins to permeate such sincere and heartfelt efforts.

I experience it this way:

With Intelligent Prayer, my purposeful intent is to communicate with God, my inner spirit Partner; to talk things over in all sincerity, to bare my soul and share my innermost self with nothing held back, to express gratitude for His many blessings (most of which I am surely unaware), to petition only for those worthy spiritual needs and desires for myself and others, to increase our intimacy, to seek counsel, and wisdom, and courage, and a fuller measure of faith. I also pray that I might be led into life circumstances that will temper my immature will into the level of consecration that He intends for me. I do all I can to muster my whole self to the present purpose, ever returning my wandering attention gently to being together with Him.

I recognize and acknowledge with sincere gratitude that, despite how harshly I may judge myself, and I do, the very person who I actually am is precisely the personality who my inner spirit is laboring 24/7 to become. This is profoundly humbling to me.

Daily Intelligent Prayer keeps me sane. It keeps me from straying too far afield from my overarching spiritual beacon, the Jesusonian ideal of unbroken communion.

Sincere Worship (Spiritual Communion)

The Urantia Book> teaches that Sincere Worship is entirely distinct from all formal, ritual, ceremonial, and every other material form of worship. Neither is the urge to worship an intellectual construct. It is an action of the soul. The call to Sincere Worship is a call from the soul as the urge to be personally immersed in divinity; to give one’s whole self completely, without reservation, to the plan and will and presence of God. It is a spiritual invitation to cease resisting and allow Deity to fully embrace us.

When we recognize and submit to this craving of the soul, when we mentally choose to allow it, only then does the soul initiate the worship experience. And now, with the divine inner Adjuster thus engaged, it is He who actually conducts the worship on our behalf, directly relaying our personal devotion to the Universal Father at the center of all things. The Urantia Book> teaches that >this is the >natural, subjective, experiential sequence that leads the personally praying mind up through Intelligent Prayer into the Sincere Worship experience.

“Such a creature choice is not a surrender of will. It is a consecration of will, an expansion of will, a glorification of will, a perfecting of will; and such choosing raises the creature will from the level of temporal significance to that higher estate wherein the personality of the creature son communes with the personality of the spirit Father.” 111:5.5 (1221.6)

I experience it this way:

While deep in prayer, I usually become conscious of my option to engage in Sincere Worship as the culmination of my devotions. Absorbed in the prayerful depth of my supplications, I begin to sense an increasing urge to “let go”, to relinquish ALL self interest and allow myself to simply be with my inner Partner. And I recognize that this urge is the feeling soul part of me as distinct from the thinking mind part of me. My higher morontia self, my soul, is craving to be fully immersed in the divine presence, and it’s making me conscious of that. I now realize that I have an option: Shall I resist this urge and redirect my attention -- or shall I cease all resistance and allow my soul-self to initiate a true worship experience? With the growth of my soul over decades, my own stubborn resistance has thankfully waned, and I am increasingly eager to say “yes” to such a generously offered, soul-felt invitation.

True worship validates my faith and ameliorates my natural human tendency to be self-centered and self-important. I am gradually becoming fit to be -- forever, i.e., to fuse with my divine Adjuster. God is having His way with me, and together we are co-creating our singular, new, eternal self. Together, we are becoming one.

Faith as a Mode of Living:

Doing the will of God produces profound, creative changes in life perspective as the intimacy of relationship grows. While the unifying propensity of mind increasingly coordinates the inner and outer aspects of progressive spiritual experience, such a living faith matures into the predominate motivation, and one’s principal mode of living. We begin to recognize and appreciate the spiritual content and counterpart behind ALL of our worldly experience, including all of the really hard stuff.

Witness:

Your anxieties and sorrows, your trials and disappointments, are just as much a part of the divine plan on your sphere as are the exquisite perfection and infinite adaptation of all things to their supreme purpose on the worlds of the central and perfect universe. (258.11)23:2.12

Our whole life, and everything in it becomes a testament to our genuine religious experience, to our sincere effort to know God and to live according to His will. Even when our personal world collapses around us, in our darkest hours, we can know for sure that there are better days ahead. If not possible in the time left on this world, then most certainly on the next.

Such an intimate, living faith catalyzes all other available Spirit influences to function fully in our lives, e.g., the Spirit of Truth, the Holy spirit, and even the Seraphim and Cherubim. When we open the spirit channel from our side, we allow the vast store of spirit blessings to begin flowing freely into our lives. Best of all, an increased opportunity for soul-satisfying service.  

There is nothing in life more satisfying, more gratifying, more profoundly rewarding for me, than when I become aware that I am being allowed to personally play a role in the larger plan to uplift, better, or further the true well-being of other fellow humans. I like lots of other stuff, but that tops the list for me. This is how doing the will of God increasingly manifests itself in my experience.

Unbroken Communion: The Overarching Spiritual Ideal:

Doing the will of God has led me to my overarching spiritual beacon, the Jesusonian ideal of “Unbroken Communion.” My spiritual North Star is ever an inspiring guide as I sort my way through the earthly travail of current planetary conditions. I am repeatedly uplifted when I pause to reflect on this someday attainable goal. With our personal spiritual progress evaluated on high by our persistent spiritual strivings, and (thankfully) not by our actual, current status, I am tremendously grateful for such a divine ideal upon which to set the course of my strivings.

When all is said and done, Truereligion is the personal, conscientious maintenance of a living spiritual connection with the ever present, inner spirit of God.

Or stated otherwise, true religion is “Doing the will of God.”

Being Human: A New Paradigm

By Bob Ghen, Sr.

The Urantia Book presents a helpful, new conceptual paradigm of the composition of a human being. New meanings describe our basic components, how they function together, and why.

It offers an alternative conceptual framework for thinking about our experience in new ways, and in the process, enhances our comprehension and appreciation of who we are. 

Five basic components comprise the makeup of a human being in our new paradigm. They are: Body, Mind, Soul, Spirit, and Personality.

Let’s Start With Personality

I have not, nor have I met anyone who has encountered this concept of personality anywhere in the wisdom literature (East or West) except in The Urantia Book. This new concept provides a fresh perspective and clarifies much of the intellectual and metaphysical muddle associated with self-realization, self-actualization, self-mastery, and the like. With this concept of personality, our new model takes the greatest detour from its usual, conventional meanings, such as,

The combination of characteristics or qualities that form an individual's distinctive character or,

The charming pizzazz of charisma

It is neither of these.

As the meaning applies here, “personality” is a complete, whole and unique something, in and of itself. It is that distinct aspect of us that remains the same no matter what changes we may have experienced in every other part of ourselves. It is permanence in the very presence of change. We don’t develop a personality, it is bestowed upon us directly, as is and already whole, by the infinite, personal creator, God. It separates us from our mammalian cousins and makes possible the potential for eternal life. It elevates us to a cosmic status wherein we may in truth be called, “the children of God.” But as much as we can and do say about personality, it defies definition and remains one of the great mysteries of life. Still, we forge ahead.

Personality is that part of an individual whom we know. The constant feature that allows us to recognize our friend as the same one we have always known, regardless of the passage of time, or the changes in form, or the advances of progress, or any other transformation of body, mind or character. It is wholly unique and distinct, it is the one and only you. The same one you remain throughout, despite the ever changing nature of all four of the other components of one’s self, the Body, Mind, Soul, and Spirit. Again, it is that singularly qualitative attribute of us that always stays the same. It is who we are, who we have been, and who we will always be.

Central to personality is our inherent, but limited, free will, the God given creative ability to choose between good and evil, the freedom to select among moral and ethical alternatives; and the power to co-create our lives in partnership with God. Personality endows us with the capacity to experience self-consciousness, other-consciousness, and God-consciousness.

Personality is not the identity, but it is the unifying element of the human identity. Personality is a strictly qualitative reality, completely lacking in any quantitative measure. It is therefore not a form of universe energy. This qualitative element that is personality imbues, invests and unifies the other four human components, the Body, Mind, Spirit, and Soul. These components are composed of universe energies; the physical, intellectual, spiritual, and morontial.

Morontia is an amalgamation of spiritual and physical energies and represents a vast level of life that lies between the material and the spiritual. We currently physical, mortal beings are to ascend step by step through the morontia levels of increasing spirituality on to the following stage, a wholly spiritual plane of life. The ascent through these morontia levels constitutes our immediate universe career following physical death here on earth.

Again, do not conflate personality with identity. Personality currently has identity in the body-mind-ego identified self. The process of one’s personal, spiritual maturity involves the gradual transfer of the seat of personal identity from this transient body-mind-ego self to the growing, potentially eternal, inner, soul consciousness. This is the soul-self that will transcend death and be invested with your personality, with you, when you awaken on a new and better world, the first of the transition morontia worlds.

The Body We Know Best

The Body is our living, material energy system, a temporary life vehicle specifying our location in time and space. It is our physical presence-mechanism within the material environment, and our means of transit through it. It literally connects us as an integral part of the physical world through our senses and through our biological processes of environmental exchange. In our new paradigm, we humans have an evolutionary origin, mammalian body that has developed over time a highly evolved, human central nervous system. A brain capable of synchronizing with the highest levels of the local, spirit mind circuits, thus enabling us to transcend our strictly mammalian nature.

Now we are capable of choosing our actions. On a scale of ascending universe life, we have now joined the lowest rung of free-will endowed beings who can personally choose to co-create (with God) an endless life of ascending growth and transformation. We are now personally enrolled in the universe ascension career, up through the morontia levels and beyond, becoming increasingly spiritual through a long and rewarding series of progressive steps and stages.

The Urantia Book Paradigm Describes Personal Mind

It is the mechanism of consciousness that connects the material and spiritual, the outer and inner, levels of life in personality experience. In the unifying mind, we simultaneously experience physical things, intellectual meanings, and spiritual values. It is the aware, feeling, perceiving, thinking, evaluating component of our makeup, wherein personality exercises its precious, creative power of choice, the power of free will.

Human mind as we know it becomes functional when the higher, faster rhythmic pulsations in the physical, central nervous system sync up, or resonate, with the lower, slower rhythmic vibrations produced by the seven local, spirit mind circuits. The human recipient of such spirit ministry is thereby encircuited into the cosmic arena of consciousness. The lower five of these seven, spirit mind circuits we share with the minds of the higher animals. Since our more evolved human brains also sync up with the next two highest circuits, we intellectually transcend these same animals and are enabled to grasp the meanings of spiritual reality, and to experience self-awareness.

Mind is unifying and it ever seeks to coordinate all experience into a meaningful whole. Mind organizes, arranges, and harmonizes the physical data from the senses, the heart-felt values of the soul, and the intellectual meanings of mind into a progressing personal comprehension of true Reality.

The Inner Spirit In Humans is the Mysterious God Fragment

It is that spark of divinity that indwells the human mind in its highest region, the superconscious level (consciousness of consciousness). It unceremoniously takes up residence in the personal mind when a child arrives at his very first moral decision. This occurs when the young personality first chooses to override his natural, selfish impulse on behalf of another, typically prior to the sixth birthday. This unselfish act marks the very moment that it becomes spiritually possible for the mind of the child to host the divine God fragment.

This literal, individual parcel of God’s spirit is an active, conscious, purposeful entity of the purest spirit essence. It is your divine and unerring navigator in the journey of life, ever pointing your inner compass Godward, while you personally remain captain of the voyage. You have free will. You may choose to be guided by this inner spirit navigator, or not. And it is important to know that one’s progress toward eternal life depends entirely upon this very choosing. Sincerely seeking, encouraging, and responding positively to the leading of the inner, divine presence is the very essence of the religion of personal, spiritual experience portrayed in The Urantia Book.

God’s spirit is seeking union with you, to incrementally become one with your personality. And with your full cooperation, you are becoming divine in the process. No one can advance spiritually against their will. Spiritual growth is never automatic; always it must be chosen with a full heart.

The Process of Spiritualization is a Mutual Venture

It is a relationship between you and the God fragment that makes your eternal life possible. God is in a continuous effort to spiritualize your thinking and expand your soul, decision by decision. The Inner Spirit seeks to gain, to actually become, your personality, even as you seek to become divine, thereby evolving a new, and higher, order of being. One embracing both the human and the divine. You are becoming divine, and the inner, divine spirit is becoming personal. And one day, relatively soon in the universe ascension plan, you are to actually fuse with this spirit of God. Together, you are becoming one.

We Are Not Born with a Soul

In our new paradigm, the soul is born with the arrival of the Spirit and it starts to grow, to mature, as the personality of the child begins to yield to the divine promptings of the newly arrived Spirit. Continuing growth of the soul is wholly dependent on the willing participation of the personality with the plans and purposes of the indwelling God fragment. Over time, this soul consciousness grows as it gradually displaces the temporary, body-mind-ego centered, human identity.

The growing soul constitutes the morontia embryo of the life phase that follows our time here on earth. It is the soul that transcends death and provides the living entity wherein the personality (and the inner spirit) may again function, only now as a morontia being with a new morontia life vehicle, and a new morontia mind in the new environment of the first morontia transition world. We have left the mammalian body behind on the planet of our nativity.

What Has Survival Value?

That experience which is devoid of spiritual value, having only served temporal and worldly purposes does not survive the transition. Only that which is of spiritual worth has survival value and will thus be remembered of our earth life. Even as now, we normally only remember specific incidents in our history, the greater mass of our mundane, detailed, moment to moment experience ignored by memory as it serves no pertinent value.

But all of the spiritually worthwhile experience of our lives, including our personal relationships, will be translated with us. We will continue to know others and be known, personally, just as we now do. All of the truly valuable intellectual and spiritual comprehension of Reality we have gained here on earth is recorded in our souls, and this too remains our possession when we awaken from the sleep of death. We begin our new morontia life at the exact level of growth and development we acquired during our earth lives.

The New Human Paradigm

These five concepts, Personality, Body, Mind, Spirit, and Soul, form the basic components of our newly described human paradigm. This little primer, however, can only outline a paltry sketch of the rich, in-depth portrayal of these concepts found in The Urantia Book. Here for example, I have written a mere four paragraphs on the indwelling God fragment, while The Urantia Book devotes a full 48 pages exclusively to an exhaustive discussion of this particular subject.

Each of these concepts and their functional relationships is brilliantly woven into an enlightened portrait of who and what we are; a fascinating story of why we are here, how we got here, where we are going, how things got so screwed up here, and what we can do about it as individual persons, and as the people of earth.

The Urantia Book teaches that, as personalities, each of us, and all of us, currently have all of everything we need, materially, intellectually, and spiritually to advance, to grow and evolve. The whole vast creation of time and space and everything and everybody in it is evolving, is a part of the grand, cosmic sweep forward from a lesser state of development, to a higher level of development. Evolution is Creation in slow motion. And we humans, because we are personalities, get to participate as a living, self-aware part of the colossal undertaking. Eternal life means being fully engaged, personally, in God’s eternal plan, in the unfolding and actualizing of all of divinity that is as yet unexpressed potential.

What a plan! What an opportunity! It’s all available to us in a measure beyond our ability to conceive. The Urantia Book reveals the whole stupendous enterprise and our place in it, in an authoritative and creatively engrossing integration of science, philosophy, and religion.

And all we have to do is choose it!

The Religion of Personal Spiritual Experience

By Bob Ghen, Sr.

The Urantia Book teaches the universal, "Religion of Personal Spiritual Experience". An authentic, enlightened religion easily and readily accessible by every single human being on our planet who is willing, notwithstanding any and all other previous allegiances and affiliations. This is a planetary religion of God conscious human beings now living in the 21st century in spiritual and religious freedom from all man-made spiritual and religious authority.

This paper presents a brief overview for fully committed religionists of all stripes; for those who only pursue religion half-heartedly; for those who think of themselves as, “spiritual but not religious”; for the many agnostics who are simply not sure about religion; and perhaps especially, for committed Atheists who are absolutely positive that the whole religious proposition is pure hogwash.

A Nascent Worldwide Spiritual Migration is Underway

Given the current global, geo-political climate, so fraught with religious strife and its attendant rise in extreme fundamentalism, such a "Religion of Personal Spiritual Experience" is not immediately appealing. Religious ideologues and spiritually timid individuals who crave the transient security of group-think, or a fossilized belief system, or who prefer the perceived safety of the herd are slow to embrace the liberty and adventure of realizing in ones own personal experience ever deeper layers of true spiritual meanings and values. It does take courage.

Nevertheless, our "Religion of Personal Spiritual Experience" is slowly emerging among the people of earth. It is gradually finding its way into the hearts of intelligent, progressive, and open-minded individuals all around the globe. Already, there are many across the broad, cultural-social-political-spiritual-religious landscape who are either among our numbers, or spiritually migrating in this direction.

Presently, I will address more fully what it means to personally practice our religion. But first, it will be helpful if you will allow me to steer you away from what it categorically does NOT entail.

Our Religion

Since our religion is validated by personal experience, we do not require an authoritative stamp of approval by any other intermediating person, institution, agency, or body of work on earth for its authenticity. Each of us holds authority over our own, personal spiritual experience. Organized, institutional religion plays no role.

We practice a religion without dogma, freeing the creative flow of mind to follow Truth wherever it may lead. We are without impotent rituals and binding superstitions. There exists no hierarchy of power among us; no priests, no bishops, no infallible popes. There is no chain of command, nor gradations of rank - absolutely no pecking order. A particular dress code does not identify us. All individuals are respected as religious equals, as indeed we are.

No Rules, No Dogma, No Religious Conflict

Neither will you find “enlightened” gurus who have arrived, ascended masters, people with special powers, nor “anointed” ones among us. Our religion does not insult the intelligence with preposterous claims of superhuman capabilities that can never be empirically demonstrable. Nor do we have designated places of worship. Candles, incense, bells, crystals, and mysterious incantations play no part. Absent are the chanting, the secret mantras, the hypnotic repetition of meaningless formulas, all forms of prayer wheels, amulets, fetishes, sacred relics, and every other form of childish, spiritual gadgetry. We have no list(s) of rules. And we claim no sacred places of spiritual power, nor so-called holy vortices (whatever they are). Also, we do not perform miracles, and neither do we expect them. Sound, rational science frames our understanding of the natural, material environment.

Yet we are, each one, personally and intimately in an authentic, experiential relationship with the inner spirit of God, the conscious, intentional maintenance of which is the very essence of our religion. For many of us, The Urantia Book provides a common language and frame of reference with which to discuss and thereby socially share these highly intimate, personal experiences. But it is certainly not a prerequisite to the "Religion of Personal Spiritual Experience".

Even though we all share in this same, ongoing spiritual experience, at the same time, our beliefs and opinions are as varied as our personal histories. But we are not attached to our beliefs and opinions. We know they merely serve as transient, intellectual scaffolding upon which our understanding of true spiritual meanings and values is growing (and therefore changing), and we experience them as such. We relish the opportunity to share our diverse understandings, and its rich potential for mutual, spiritual edification. Being open to a variety of intellectual and philosophical interpretations provides fertile soil for enhanced creative thinking. Every single personality is a wholly unique, finite expression of the infinite Personality. Each of us is living out a unique life and identity in the world. Therefore must the interpretation and description of our experience be thus conditioned and personally expressed. This kaleidoscopic array of human expression when sincerely shared with others nourishes the truth hungry soul.

Emphasis here on individual, personal spiritual experience and sharing should not, however, be interpreted to preclude, usurp, or in any way discourage participation in any group of our choosing, religious or otherwise. We are not reclusive, mystical hermits. Most of us, whether formally or informally, do embrace the camaraderie and social benefit of belonging to a particular group with whom we share fellowship. We are in fact, strongly encouraged by The Urantia Book to participate fully with others, all kinds of others.

Despite our interpretive differences, there can be no religious conflict among us. This is because it is so highly personal, with each of us immersed in our own personal, subjective, spiritual-religious process, progressing at our own rate, in our own way, and within the context of our own personal relations with the divine, inner Spirit. One can only honor and respect the actual, living content of religious experience in the lives of others. ALL religious sovereignty is invested in God.

The Religion of Jesus

This "Religion of Personal Spiritual Experience", The Urantia Book teaches us, is the religion of Jesus. It is the religion he personally practiced, and the religion he taught his Apostles, disciples, and all other followers who could comprehend his simple message. It should not be conflated with Christianity, the institutional, multifaceted, organized religions about Jesus, and created by men. Neither is it in conflict with Christianity, nor any other religious group.

Specifically, the practice of our religion initially involves adopting a sincere attitude of spiritual receptivity, a desire and willingness to share the inner life with God as He is present in the inner, spiritual fragment of His bestowal. This is the actual “presence of God” that literally resides within the most refined level of our human minds, in the superconsciousness (consciousness of consciousness).

Personal Experience Transcends All Interpretation

Genuine, living FAITH is that ineffable, personal, spiritual experience by which we maintain our relationship with this inner spirit of God. Whomever is thus spiritually engaged is in truth (and in fact) actively practicing the "Religion of Personal Spiritual Experience", quite irrespective of one’s religious beliefs and affiliations. Authentic, spiritual faith has no organic connection with the interpretive beliefs we may attach to this experience. Let this be abundantly clear: The spiritual experience of living faith is NOT a matter of subscribing to, or even wholeheartedly believing in, some arbitrary list of dogmatic assertions that some group (ANY group) of religionists has been able to agree upon. One may or may not agree with specific doctrine, but personal experience transcends all interpretation.

We have found that the inner spirit nucleus never rests. Always it seeks to register its divine influence within our meager and naturally resistant human minds. We therefore know that, it is up to us, from our side, to remain open to its unerring guidance and direction.

We know from personal experience that persistent sincerity in the honest pursuit of Truth always yields increased comprehension of Reality. It is only limited by our inherent, personal spiritual capacity, and up to the fullness of our present, individual, spiritual receptivity — our willingness to cease resisting.

We Ascend Step by Step by Faith

Thus we persist in our efforts, personally ascending (spiritually growing) increment by increment, as our commitment, courage, stamina, and will to stop resisting ebbs and flows. And we don’t expect to finally “arrive” in some euphoric state of perpetual ease and bliss. But we do enjoy the satisfaction of intermittent goal attainment as we ascend the steps and stages of intellectual-spiritual growth and personality unification. We humans become more “real”, more authentic and genuine, as we progress in personality unification, as we actualize more of who we are intended to be, by God.

Regarding goal attainment: Generally, we modern humans are conditioned to spend most of our time, energy, effort, and creative purpose accomplishing our material needs and desires. But why not apply a portion of that life investment toward actualizing spiritual potential? Why not intentionally advance spiritually, along with a rewarding material career? Both are achieved by similar means, i.e., by investing time, energy, effort, and one’s creative purpose toward achievable goals. Nothing is achieved materially, or spiritually, without persistent, intentional effort. As is true of all relationships, if we will not give the time and attention it takes to become familiar with this inner, spiritual relationship we can not expect, or even hope, to progress in spiritual intimacy.

While the means of accomplishing both our material and spiritual goals is similar, beyond that, they completely diverge. Material goals are known, and we accomplish them by formulating an actionable plan that is adapted to unfolding conditions until the goal is achieved. Material goals are motivated by the desire for more, or bigger, or better. And we decide what they will be.

The central ideal motivating The "Religion of Personal Spiritual Experience" is the overarching spiritual purpose to live ones life in unbroken communion with God’s inner spirit, even as we are fully engaged in the work and play of the material world. Also unlike material goals, there is but a single, primary spiritual goal, and it is not specifically foreknown. It is to actualize whatever spiritual potential is up next for us personally. And that is decided by God, not us. Thus, we are wholly and completely willing to trust the safekeeping of our personal souls to the unerring spiritual guidance so generously provided by our divine Creator.

Genuine living faith is the technique that moves us incrementally through the steps and stages of our primary spiritual goal of actualizing whatever is next. Thus it is, we approach ever closer to the central ideal of unbroken communion. All of which is accomplished (with true faith) by the continuous maintenance of a living, spiritual connection with the ever present, inner spirit of God. Absolutely nothing separates us from experiencing this direct relationship except our unwillingness to participate - by choosing to resist.

What is Enlightenment?

The Urantia Book teaches that “intelligent prayer” and “sincere worship” are the most potent things we can choose to do to stimulate our spiritual growth and enhance our personal enlightenment.

And for us, “enlightenment” is simply the ongoing process of living a truly progressive spiritual life, each day recommitting our ordinary, incomplete, human selves to our highest spiritual values and ideals. It does not take place later, at the end of a given set of spiritual procedures or tests. This enlightenment is available now.

Intelligent prayer, we are taught, is that prayer which is consistent with the divine principles that govern such spiritual communications. It is NOT about getting God to do stuff for us, or give us stuff, or perform miracles, or disappear the consequences of our foolish actions. It is not magic. Among other things, intelligent prayer is about offering sincere gratitude; petitioning for the spiritual blessings that will enable us to carry on nobly in the face of present difficulty; seeking to know more of the divine plan for us; and for the will, clarity, and courage to carry out whatever is next on the spiritual journey.

Sincere worship is about offering oneself completely to the inner presence of God. It can be summed up affirmatively in the phrase, “My will is that Your will be done.” It is about being intentionally available for whatever God intends, and with absolutely no personal agenda. It is time spent in effortless attention with the inner spirit. It is the wholehearted willingness to be in the divine embrace. And it is the single most effective choice we can make to “know God”.

Social Concomitants

There is a profound, and inevitable, social corollary in the "Religion of Personal Spiritual Experience". While the subjective aspect of the experience we have been discussing is so highly personal, its social concomitants are expressed as the natural response to an ever increasing urge to serve other people. The sincere desire to be useful to others intensifies as one progresses in spiritual intimacy. This truth is demonstrably observable when one self-imposes positive modifications in one’s personal and social behavior. People do actually become more ethical, it is true. But more than that, we become more loving in our relations with others. We increasingly come to experience our fellow humans as family, as brothers and sisters.

Although all are respected as religious equals in the family of God, we are not blind to the reality that there is a differential of spiritual progress and personality unification among us. This is a positive development in that it provides all with the opportunity to serve, even mentor, those who may be a little behind one in the process.

We do well to seek the sensible council and guidance of those who have preceded us in the spiritualization process. But we err greatly when we confer them with divine authority. We are not ourselves separate from divinity, and therefore we require no intermediaries of any kind. Nor do such intermediaries even actually exist except in the wishful minds of those who have projected such divine authority upon another; and in the self-deluded minds of those who have deified themselves.

Service contact with others does not involve sacrifice. Duty may, but sacrifice is never an element of true service. One serves others with a full heart, with no sense of forfeiture and no desire for recompense. Service is its own reward. Profound satisfaction permeates the lives of those who serve freely. The more willing we are to share the inner life with God and incorporate divinity into our daily awareness, the more insistent is this urge to serve. And this in turn eventuates increased opportunity for service, the natural concomitant to a life of devotion.

Summary

At the core of all true religion there is a subjective, genuine personal, spiritual experience, as undeniable as a toothache. The only thing blocking one from this experience is the unwillingness to cease resisting. To claim otherwise, for whatever reason, is only to admit that one is, in fact, unwilling to participate. For all who are sincerely willing are included. None are turned away.

Living faith is not the product of being intellectually convinced of anything. It can not be substantiated by scientific method (the valid means by which we explore the material facts of our physical environment) because it is not a material phenomenon. Science can not, and will never, reveal spiritual reality. Only spiritual methods can disclose spiritual truth. Our "Religion of Personal Spiritual Experience" presents the most direct and immediate action one can take to gain entrance into the spiritual realm, irrespective of what it is called. If anyone is in a direct, experiential relationship with the inner spirit of God, then that person is practicing our religion, whether they know it as such, or not. The "Religion of Personal Spiritual Experience" warmly welcomes all, and every human being on the planet is invited to participate.

Afterword

I would be remiss if I did not fully credit The Urantia Book as the source of the descriptive insights I have presented here, albeit in my own words. I am not an “official” representative of The Urantia Book, and in my 50 year association with it I have not been aware that anyone is. Any other reader could very well describe these same insights through their own personal lens.

But let me here declare: This Urantia Book is unlike any other among the wisdom literature of our world, bar none. As a divine Revelation, it is the most current presentation available on the planet exquisitely elucidating the most intelligent answers to the most profound questions of humankind. The vast, cosmic creation of things and living beings, and their functional interrelationships, is portrayed with stunning clarity and detail. It weaves a fascinating and comprehensible synthesis of science, philosophy, and religion. And it reveals a brilliantly compelling new paradigm of what a human being is, and what it means to be a human being.

If these are matters of more than passing interest to you, please, allow me to encourage you to spend a little time pawing through The Urantia Book’s 2000 plus pages, and see what happens.

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