February 6, 1916
Received by James Padgett
Washington, D.C.
I am here, Jesus.
I come tonight to resume my discourse of several nights ago. As I was saying, man is the creature of God made in perfection and - instantaneously - as it were - not having a slow growth as other creations. And when he was created, he needed no evolution or additional attributes to make him the perfect man. His physical body was perfect and also his spiritual body and his soul.
He had, in addition to these three constituents a "Gift," which by his disobedience he forfeited, and which was never restored to him until my coming and, which when possessed by him, made him more than mere man. As to those things which were made constituent and absolute parts of him, they were perfect, and no evolution was necessary to give them any increased perfection. Man then was a more perfect being than he is now, or ever has been since his fall from his condition of perfection.
After his disobedience and the consequent death of the potentiality of partaking of the Divine Nature of the Father, which is the "Gift" above mentioned, man was left in a state where he depended exclusively upon the qualities, which he then possessed for his future happiness and freedom from those things which would cause him to lose the harmony that then existed between him and the Laws governing his being.
The greatest of all the qualities bestowed upon him was that of the will power, which was wholly unrestricted in its operations. Although, when exercised in a manner which brought this will in conflict with the Laws controlling this harmony, man had to suffer and pay the penalties of such violations. But notwithstanding that these perversions of the exercise of the will brought the sins and errors, which now exist on earth, God did not place any limitations on this exercise.
Man, in his creation, had bestowed upon him appetites and desire pertaining to his physical nature, as well as desires of his higher or spiritual nature, and they were all intended to work in harmony and not in antagonism; and in such workings, man was kept pure and free from sin - which is merely the violation of God's Laws of Harmony. But after the first disobedience, which is the greatest demonstration of the power of man to exercise that will, even when God had forbade him to do so, and after man lost this great potentiality that I speak of, succeeding disobediences became easier; and as these disobediences occurred, man lost to a great extent the desires for the spiritual things, and the animal or physical part of his nature asserted itself, and then, instead of exercising these appetites which belonged to the physical nature in such a wise way that no in-harmony would ensue - and here let me say that even after the fall it was possible and even expected that man would exercise these appetites in the way mentioned, he indulged them beyond their proper functions, and increased such indulgence, until he commenced to find, as he thought, more pleasure in such indulgence than in the thoughts and exercise of his higher nature and the aspirations which belonged to it.
This deterioration of man was not sudden, but gradual until, at one time, he became in a state or condition of being - bordering on that of the lower animals and, in fact, because of this increased indulgence of these appetites, he seemed to be transformed into the lower animal; but yet he remained man, a being created in the image of his Maker.
And from this position of low degradation or degeneracy, man slowly commenced to progress towards the attainment of his original condition before the fall. Never, in all this time, was his freedom of will taken from him, nor attempted to be controlled by God - but always the Laws of Compensation worked, and man suffered as he continued to create sin and evil.
But as man on earth continued to degenerate and to permit, what is sometimes called his animal nature to dominate his spiritual nature, many men died and continued to die, and their physical bodies went back to the dust of which they were created, and their spiritual selves became inhabitants of the spirit world, where they were freed, in a longer or shorter time, from the desire to exercise these animal appetites and the spiritual part of man again asserted itself, until many of these spirits became free from sin and evil and in harmony with the Laws of God controlling their natures and conditions as they existed before their degeneracy and before the disobedience commenced.
And these spirits, thus, made free and in their spiritual dominance commenced to try to assist men while living on earth to direct his will in such ways as to rid himself of submission to these appetites, and to become again a true man as in his creation state, minus the potentiality that I have mentioned. But these efforts on the part of spirits have been slow in their effects, and while men in individual cases, have been almost regenerated, yet as whole the progress has not been as rapid as is desirable - sin and evil still exist in the world, and men's perverted appetites and desires still control them to a large extent.
Of course, this progress from the bottom of degeneracy has taken place in some parts of the earth, faster than in others and, hence, you have your distinction between the civilized and the uncivilized races or nations; but this does not necessarily mean that the civilized people, as individuals, have made greater progress in the manner indicated, than have the individuals of some of the so-called uncivilized nations, for it is a fact that among some men of the former nations are perversions and manifestations of perversions of these appetites that do not exist in the latter nations.
Advancement in the intellectual qualities do not necessarily mean progress in the spiritual asserting itself over the perversions of these appetites, for will is not a thing entirely of the mind, and neither are these appetites and desires, because back of the mind are the affections usually called the heart's desires, which is the seat of these appetites, and from which these desires arise; and as they arise, the will is influenced by them and as the will is influenced come positive thoughts and deeds.
It is not surprising that your scientists believe and preach the doctrine of the evolution of man from a lower species of animal, or from an atom or from something that they cannot just understand or give a name to, because in their studies of the history of mankind, and of the created world, they find that man has developed and progressed amazingly from what appeared to have been his condition in some ages past.
But history does not extend to the time when man was in this lowest condition of degeneracy and, hence, all the conclusions that these scientists reach are based upon facts, sufficient unto themselves, which show the progress of man only after the turning point of his degeneracy. They have no facts and, of course, when the word "facts" is here used, it refers exclusively to the material things of nature showing them the gradual decline of man from his state of being a perfect man to that when his retrogression or degeneracy ceased, and his progress of return to his former estate commenced.
So, if the scientists will believe and teach that man, instead of evolving from an atom or some other infinitesimal something, or from a lower species of animal than man, evolved from his state or condition when he was at the bottom of his degeneracy, to which he had descended from the perfect man, then they will believe and teach the truth, and their theory of evolution will then have as its foundation or basis, a fact, which now it has not - only a speculation.
This in short, is the history and truth of the creation of the universe of man - of man's fall and degeneracy, and evolution and progress. And through all this creation and subsequent existence runs life, permeating it and always with it, and the origin of Life is God.
I have finished and I hope that you will find some instruction as well as entertainment in what I have written. I will come again soon and write you another truth.The fact that you waited for sentences to be formulated to express my thoughts, merely means that I was manipulating your brain so that the proper expression or idea could be conveyed to your hand as I wrote it.
You have my love and blessings, and I am more interested as time passes in you and your work. Keep up your courage and your desires will be fulfilled.
Your friend and brother,
Jesus
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