December 8, 1916
Received by James Padgett
Washington, D.C.
I am here, St. John, Apostle of Jesus.
I desire to finish my comments on the preacher's (Dr. Ratcliff) sermon on Heaven.
As I said, these apocalyptic writings (Book of Revelation) were made for the purpose of encouraging the people of those days to believe that God would intervene in their behalf and save them from their sufferings and persecutions, and in the one case establish a Messiah's kingdom on earth that would cause the Jews to become the ruling nation of the universe and, in the other, to establish a Kingdom in Heaven where the Christians would find rest and happiness in becoming inhabitants of that Kingdom and children of the Father, and participants in the glories of Christ's reign as king and priest. Well, as the subject of the sermon was that Kingdom or Heaven and the preacher endeavored to tell his people what that Heaven is, I will consider that subject.
In the first place, as I have said, that Heaven is not one universal place where all the Christians, irrespective of their soul development go, but in that Heaven are many Heavens or spheres in which the spirit of mortals will find homes and also happiness according to their soul development or their spiritual development. And in order that there may be no misunderstanding, I must say that the soul development comes only through and by the operation of the Holy Spirit. The spiritual development involves only the result of the correct workings of the moral faculties of a man and the purification of his natural love which, of course, comprehends the development of his soul so far as the same may be developed by this purifying process. The results of each operation is very different and lead to a perfection and relationship to the Father, which is in harmony with the laws controlling the respective Heavens - for the place of final habitation of each may be called Heaven.
But my object tonight is to describe to you the appearance and condition of one of these Heavens, and as mortals have heard more about the "Third Heaven," which we in our information to you have called the "Third Sphere," than of any of the other Heavens, I will confine my description to that place.
Well, it is occupied by the spirits of mortals who have received considerable of the Divine Love, as well as by those who have progressed to a great extent in the purification of their Natural Love and the expansion of their minds and intellects, though the latter do not remain very long in this Heaven, but progress to the Fourth where there are more opportunities and more instructions in those things which have to do with the mind's advancement. While those who have made progress in the soul development and those in the intellectual are all in the Third Heavens, yet they occupy different and distinct planes in that Heaven, for those things that attract the one class do not attract the other, and there is very little intermingling of these spirits except that those who know that the Divine Love is real sometimes attempt to show those who do not the desirability of obtaining it and the happiness that it brings to spirits.
As we have already told you, the condition of the soul - not of the mind - to a large degree makes the Heaven of the spirit, and in the providence of the Father, He has made the surroundings and the appearances of the environment suitable to the condition of the soul and fitted to increase the happiness of those spirits who may, because of their soul progress, be attracted to the particular places in which they find themselves - their homes.
The appearance of this Heaven to those who have this Divine Love in their souls is far excelling the capacity of your mortal language to explain, even if I had the ability to describe the same. But in one general statement I may say that for these spirits there is everything to make them happy to the extent of their capacity to receive and enjoy. There are trees and flowers, and hills and dales, and rivers and lakes, and beautiful landscapes, and above all the wonderful atmosphere, as I may express it that is created by this wonderful Love of the Father, and a glorious light that illuminates and gives life to all who live in it, which comes from this Love of the Father. It is the sun, moon and stars, and sunrise and sunset, and summer clouds, and evening shadows and morning glories. Your material sun and moon and stars do not appear in this Heaven for the effulgence of the light from the Father's Love eclipses and eliminates the light of these material creations of the mortal world.
And then there are homes of the grandest splendor and beauty suited to the conditions of the various spirits, which have in them everything that will tend to cause happiness and joy to their occupants and visiting friends: musical instruments and books, and paintings, and furniture of every kind fitted to bring to the spirits contentment and joy, and a realization of peace and rest from the cares that you mortals have with you all through your earth life. And above and more important than all, a wonderful atmosphere of Love which makes all these spirits realize that they are the children of the Father and brothers of one another and lovers of all humanity.
And, in addition, the social life is beyond all conception. The spirits have their times of visiting as well as those of staying in their homes; and many pleasures as well as of work and helping spirits and mortals; of singing and music and laughter as of prayer and contemplation of deep spiritual truths. Yes, in the lighter social pleasures as well as in the solitary meditations and aspirations of the soul's progress, there is happiness and enjoyment and freedom from those things which defile or make inharmonious the thoughts and heart's desire of these spirits. All is gladness and there are none who have solemn downcast countenances, that many of earth imagine portrays the truly righteous and redeemed of mortals. No, Love knows no sadness, and as the soul speaks, its condition by the appearance of the spirit body's countenance, the soul being so full of gladness and joy, the countenance can express only those emotions of the soul. This is the result of the law which declares nothing can be hidden, and every spirit must show forth the truth of its condition.
There are no walled cities or streets of gold or pearly gates or other of the material things, which the book ascribes to me sets forth, so that man can get some conception of what Heaven is. These things in Heaven would not be gold or pearls or diamonds or jasper, for when they are compared to the real beauties of the things which it contains, they are as the faint light of the candle compared to the light of your noon day sun. Truly the mind of man cannot conceive of the glories that await the lovelit soul when it comes to its Heavenly home.
There is another misconception that the preacher had following the teachings of Revelation, and that is that the Kingdom of Heaven is a walled city, the New Jerusalem, in which all the spirits of the redeemed live, singing their loud hosannas to God. There are cities of which your earth cities may be called correspondences, but there are also villages and hamlets and homes in the country, as you would say, surrounded by green fields and shady vales through which run rivers and streams of silvery hue and clear as crystal, and also placid lakes, which afford the pleasures of boating and sailing and other amusements. For each spirit is provided the place that is most attractive to him and it is optional with him where his home shall be. But all love and worship the Father and endeavor to make their neighbors happy and help the development of the soul towards a progression to the Heavens, which are higher yet. All spirits are controlled by law, but that law is the Law of Love, and that love is the Love Divine: the essence of the Father's Divinity.
I have written enough for tonight, and I hope from what I have said that you may catch some faint conception of what the glories of this Third Heaven is for those who have found, to some extent, this Love and possess it; and then, when as you must know there are many Heavens above this, each successively possessing increased glories and happiness and beauties of place as well as beauty of spirit, you may imagine what the Master meant when he said, "In my Father's house are many mansions."
I know that my attempted description may be unsatisfactory to some mortals, but it is the best that I can do, because mortal words cannot convey and mortal thoughts cannot conceive the realities; and man in his imaginings may better get a spiritual view of these things. I will not write more tonight.
I am with you quite often, throwing around you the influence of my love, and endeavoring to help and encourage you. Let your faith in us and in our communications increase, and believe above all that the Master wrote you the prayer, which you received a few nights ago. Study it deeply and grasp its spiritual meaning, and let your longings and aspirations go out to the Father as suggested by the prayer, and you will find a wonderful and satisfactory response to them. We are praying for you and your friends, and you must believe that the Love is coming into your souls. So with my love and blessings, I will say good night.
Your brother in Christ,
John
Showing posts with label mansions. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mansions. Show all posts
Monday, November 18, 2013
Thursday, August 8, 2013
Helen Writes About the Wonders, Benefits and Blessings Wrought by the Divine Love of God
June 8, 1916
Received by James Padgett
Washington, D.C.
I am here, your own Helen.
Tonight everything seems favorable to my writing you my promised message, and I will try. Of course, you must expect to find some expressions of love in it, for I could not write you if I did not tell you how much I love you, and how happy I am when you love me and want me to be with you.
Well, sweetheart, I am now in the Celestial Sphere with your grandmother, though not in as high a plane as she and have not so much of the Divine Love as has she; yet my happiness is so great that I can hardly realize myself what it means, and it is impossible to tell you of the beauties of my home and surroundings. I have tried when I was in a lower sphere to describe to you my home, and I did it very inadequately, giving you only a glimpse of what it really was. And now, if you could increase that description a hundredfold, you would have no conception of the beauty and glory of my present home and the wonders that surround it.
I so often wish that you had words in your language that could be used to fully describe what this new home means to me, or even the one that I just left; but as you have not, you will have to be content with knowing that if you should take all the imagery of the Revelation and add to it the sum total of all the beautiful descriptions of places and homes and scenery that the whole range of your English literature contains, you would have but a faint idea of what really exists. And besides, the great increase in the Love that I possess and enjoy and the beautiful and loving and holy spirits whom I have for my companions make this home of mine truly one of the mansions of the Kingdom of Heaven that Jesus referred to in the Bible; only the mansions that he there spoke of were not necessarily like the one that I have, for the mansions in the Celestial Heavens vary according to the soul development of their occupants.
I sometimes think that a very few years ago, I was on earth without much soul development and very little knowledge of the things of God; and now I have that development and knowledge of those things that fit me for these glorious mansions of the Celestial Spheres. How wonderful it all is, and how I thank the Father for His goodness and mercy and for having given to mankind such a loving and glorious saviour as Jesus.
And I do not forget that you had something to do with my starting on this great journey of progress, for I remember that when I first came to you, things of the material were very attractive to me, and my appetites of earth had not left me, and how when I displayed some of these desires for the material things, you rebuked me and tried to point the way to the higher things; although I know now that your advice came from your merely mental conceptions of what I should strive for, as at that time you had very little knowledge of the things of the soul and scarcely any soul development.
But your Christian training as a child, and the conceptions that had come to you from these instructions taught you that in the Spirit World there must be something higher and beyond the mere earthly conditions of men, where purer joy and happier lives might be found and lived; and your love for me was such that you desired that I should find and possess these things, if possible. I have never forgotten what you then said to me, although at the time I thought you were unkind and not so anxious for my happiness. But long ago I had come to me the knowledge of the motive that actuated your advice and much happiness has come to me from that knowledge and recollection. Only a little thought of love and an earnest desire on the part of the mortal for the spirit, when it is directed in the way of the soul's progress, sometimes work a greater result than the conquering of a city, for it means the salvation of a soul, which is of more value than all the cities of the earth combined.
And while I am writing in this strain, I wish to say that one of the greatest benefits or possessions that can come to a mortal is to have a mother or husband or wife in whose bosom glows the Divine Love of the Father, even though very faintly, for that little spark of Love, to its own degree, makes that soul a part of the Divine Essence of the Father's Love, and its influence upon the possessor causes an atmosphere of love and help to be felt by all who have the relationship to such possessor of a child or wife or husband. Christian instructions, though mixed with dogmas and creeds that may all be wrong, yet will benefit, as in them are some thoughts that may awaken the soul to a condition that will let in some portion of the higher Love, which will remain, though dormant, until the time comes when something will arouse the dormant Love to action and life.
And this benefit passes with the mortal to the spirit life, and the influence of the teachings, or rather the accompanying impressions of the Christian mother, etc., to help such a spirit to realize its true condition and to start on its progress to the attainment of the higher things of the soul. No wealth or riches or position that a mortal may inherit can possibly equal the influence of that one little spark in the Christian mother who possesses some portion of the Divine Love; and there is none so poor as the spirit who comes into the spirit world without any recollection of having, at some time in its earth life, received in its soul the influence of that little spark.
So I say the man who has a Christian mother or wife who has, at some time in his earth career, taught him to turn his thoughts to God and to pray, even though that man in afterlife forsakes such thoughts and prayers, is a very fortunate being; for in the spirit life, he has with him the memories of his earth life and nothing is lost; and among these memories will be the influence of his mother's teachings and his own prayers. And while he will have to satisfy the Laws of Compensation, yet these recollections of these thoughts and prayers will come to him sooner or later and will help him in his progress to higher conditions. And you must remember, as has been often told you, that all souls will ultimately reach the planes of purification of their natural loves, or the glories of the spheres where only the Divine Love exists.
After I commenced to receive into my soul this Divine Love, I became very anxious to increase its possession and my progress was very rapid, as they tell me, and as I progressed from sphere to sphere, ever were there coming to me new wonders and great happiness and the disappearance of those things which belonged to my mortal life. No one, who has not experienced this progress, can understand what it means and how the happiness increases and also the longings for more; and yet the astonishing fact is that notwithstanding these longings, the contentment of the spirit is perfect and no unhappiness, because of longings yet to be fulfilled, exists.
As you know when I entered the spirit world, I was met by your mother and others and all fear or confusion that usually arises from the change which so-called death brings to the spirit left me and, in fact, never came to me, and I was as tenderly cared for as you can conceive of; and ever thereafter, while I could not go to the home of your mother, yet she and others were with me often enough to keep me from much darkness and suffering, though I did experience some darkness and suffering. But the influence of their love was with me, and they earnestly and lovingly told me of the Great Love of the Father, and how I might get it and become happy and start on my upward progression. And your father came to me also, with his cheer and help and showed me that upon myself, to a certain extent, depended my being able to get into the light. He was so good and kind to me that I loved him at once, although I had never seen him in earth life.
And from all this, can you wonder that I did not remain very long in the lower planes? I tell you that the love and tenderness and influence of the beautiful and loving spirits who have some of God's Love in their souls are things that can take away the terror of death and make a spirit who has just left his mortal home almost happy. And if men could only realize the fact that by attempting to get into their hearts good thoughts and longings of love so that these beautiful spirits could be attracted to them, their entrance and reception in the world of spirits would become one, even if not of happiness, yet of freedom from fear and loneliness. So I advise all mortals to so live as to attract friends on the spirit side of life that can come to them in the times of the great change and comfort and help them. Now, I do not mean by this that such spirits of mortals will not have to endure the darkness and suffering, which the conditions of their souls demand they should endure, but their entrance into the Spirit World will be as I say.
Well, sweetheart, I have written quite a long letter and you must be a little tired, but I must further write and tell you that all this happiness that I have spoken of may be yours and, as your soulmate, I believe and almost know that it will be; for while you are a mortal, no matter how long the years may be, you will have with you my love and longings for your coming, and my prayers to the Father for a great bestowal upon you of His Divine Love. And besides all this, you know that you have surrounding you the loves of those who are higher than I, and who possess so much more of this Divine Love. Oh, it will be a happy day for me when you do come, and I know that you will be happy, also. Just think, that as your eyes close in what the preachers call the last sleep, I will be with you, and when you awake, I will be with you, and the only thing that will greet your newly-awakened vision will be my eyes, so filled with love and joy that you will almost want to die over again just for the sake of having the awakening.
I remember that when on earth, you thought my arms were very beautiful, and loved to have them around you, and thought yourself happy; but when you come to me again, you will find arms so much more beautiful clasping you to a bosom that you cannot dream of, and eyes looking into your eyes with so much love and happiness that you will, for the first time in all your life, know what happiness means; and then when I tell you that I am all yours and that never again will cruel death, as it is called, separate us, and that only love, pure and unselfish and never-dying, will be ours without any lessening or disturbing by jealousy or tiresomeness, you will wonder if you have really awakened from that last sleep or are only dreaming. But then I will give you a long, sweet kiss of love that you will know that it is all real.
Oh, my Ned, I do love you and want you to love me with all your heart! The time will not be long now, until we shall be together in our spirit life, when your cares and worries of life will no longer trouble you. But, sweetheart, you must pray to the Father for a greater inflowing of His Divine Love and blessings, for upon the development of your soul depends our continuous living together, and progress.
I will be with you tonight while you sleep, and I am so filled with love that I know I shall call your spirit from your body and carry it with me to purer planes, where we can, for a few moments, enjoy the bliss of living together without the encumbrance of your body. You may not remember it when you awake, but I will know and will tell you of it when next I write. So, sweetheart, give me my good night kiss.
Your own true and loving,
Helen
Received by James Padgett
Washington, D.C.
I am here, your own Helen.
Tonight everything seems favorable to my writing you my promised message, and I will try. Of course, you must expect to find some expressions of love in it, for I could not write you if I did not tell you how much I love you, and how happy I am when you love me and want me to be with you.
Well, sweetheart, I am now in the Celestial Sphere with your grandmother, though not in as high a plane as she and have not so much of the Divine Love as has she; yet my happiness is so great that I can hardly realize myself what it means, and it is impossible to tell you of the beauties of my home and surroundings. I have tried when I was in a lower sphere to describe to you my home, and I did it very inadequately, giving you only a glimpse of what it really was. And now, if you could increase that description a hundredfold, you would have no conception of the beauty and glory of my present home and the wonders that surround it.
I so often wish that you had words in your language that could be used to fully describe what this new home means to me, or even the one that I just left; but as you have not, you will have to be content with knowing that if you should take all the imagery of the Revelation and add to it the sum total of all the beautiful descriptions of places and homes and scenery that the whole range of your English literature contains, you would have but a faint idea of what really exists. And besides, the great increase in the Love that I possess and enjoy and the beautiful and loving and holy spirits whom I have for my companions make this home of mine truly one of the mansions of the Kingdom of Heaven that Jesus referred to in the Bible; only the mansions that he there spoke of were not necessarily like the one that I have, for the mansions in the Celestial Heavens vary according to the soul development of their occupants.
I sometimes think that a very few years ago, I was on earth without much soul development and very little knowledge of the things of God; and now I have that development and knowledge of those things that fit me for these glorious mansions of the Celestial Spheres. How wonderful it all is, and how I thank the Father for His goodness and mercy and for having given to mankind such a loving and glorious saviour as Jesus.
And I do not forget that you had something to do with my starting on this great journey of progress, for I remember that when I first came to you, things of the material were very attractive to me, and my appetites of earth had not left me, and how when I displayed some of these desires for the material things, you rebuked me and tried to point the way to the higher things; although I know now that your advice came from your merely mental conceptions of what I should strive for, as at that time you had very little knowledge of the things of the soul and scarcely any soul development.
But your Christian training as a child, and the conceptions that had come to you from these instructions taught you that in the Spirit World there must be something higher and beyond the mere earthly conditions of men, where purer joy and happier lives might be found and lived; and your love for me was such that you desired that I should find and possess these things, if possible. I have never forgotten what you then said to me, although at the time I thought you were unkind and not so anxious for my happiness. But long ago I had come to me the knowledge of the motive that actuated your advice and much happiness has come to me from that knowledge and recollection. Only a little thought of love and an earnest desire on the part of the mortal for the spirit, when it is directed in the way of the soul's progress, sometimes work a greater result than the conquering of a city, for it means the salvation of a soul, which is of more value than all the cities of the earth combined.
And while I am writing in this strain, I wish to say that one of the greatest benefits or possessions that can come to a mortal is to have a mother or husband or wife in whose bosom glows the Divine Love of the Father, even though very faintly, for that little spark of Love, to its own degree, makes that soul a part of the Divine Essence of the Father's Love, and its influence upon the possessor causes an atmosphere of love and help to be felt by all who have the relationship to such possessor of a child or wife or husband. Christian instructions, though mixed with dogmas and creeds that may all be wrong, yet will benefit, as in them are some thoughts that may awaken the soul to a condition that will let in some portion of the higher Love, which will remain, though dormant, until the time comes when something will arouse the dormant Love to action and life.
And this benefit passes with the mortal to the spirit life, and the influence of the teachings, or rather the accompanying impressions of the Christian mother, etc., to help such a spirit to realize its true condition and to start on its progress to the attainment of the higher things of the soul. No wealth or riches or position that a mortal may inherit can possibly equal the influence of that one little spark in the Christian mother who possesses some portion of the Divine Love; and there is none so poor as the spirit who comes into the spirit world without any recollection of having, at some time in its earth life, received in its soul the influence of that little spark.
So I say the man who has a Christian mother or wife who has, at some time in his earth career, taught him to turn his thoughts to God and to pray, even though that man in afterlife forsakes such thoughts and prayers, is a very fortunate being; for in the spirit life, he has with him the memories of his earth life and nothing is lost; and among these memories will be the influence of his mother's teachings and his own prayers. And while he will have to satisfy the Laws of Compensation, yet these recollections of these thoughts and prayers will come to him sooner or later and will help him in his progress to higher conditions. And you must remember, as has been often told you, that all souls will ultimately reach the planes of purification of their natural loves, or the glories of the spheres where only the Divine Love exists.
After I commenced to receive into my soul this Divine Love, I became very anxious to increase its possession and my progress was very rapid, as they tell me, and as I progressed from sphere to sphere, ever were there coming to me new wonders and great happiness and the disappearance of those things which belonged to my mortal life. No one, who has not experienced this progress, can understand what it means and how the happiness increases and also the longings for more; and yet the astonishing fact is that notwithstanding these longings, the contentment of the spirit is perfect and no unhappiness, because of longings yet to be fulfilled, exists.
As you know when I entered the spirit world, I was met by your mother and others and all fear or confusion that usually arises from the change which so-called death brings to the spirit left me and, in fact, never came to me, and I was as tenderly cared for as you can conceive of; and ever thereafter, while I could not go to the home of your mother, yet she and others were with me often enough to keep me from much darkness and suffering, though I did experience some darkness and suffering. But the influence of their love was with me, and they earnestly and lovingly told me of the Great Love of the Father, and how I might get it and become happy and start on my upward progression. And your father came to me also, with his cheer and help and showed me that upon myself, to a certain extent, depended my being able to get into the light. He was so good and kind to me that I loved him at once, although I had never seen him in earth life.
And from all this, can you wonder that I did not remain very long in the lower planes? I tell you that the love and tenderness and influence of the beautiful and loving spirits who have some of God's Love in their souls are things that can take away the terror of death and make a spirit who has just left his mortal home almost happy. And if men could only realize the fact that by attempting to get into their hearts good thoughts and longings of love so that these beautiful spirits could be attracted to them, their entrance and reception in the world of spirits would become one, even if not of happiness, yet of freedom from fear and loneliness. So I advise all mortals to so live as to attract friends on the spirit side of life that can come to them in the times of the great change and comfort and help them. Now, I do not mean by this that such spirits of mortals will not have to endure the darkness and suffering, which the conditions of their souls demand they should endure, but their entrance into the Spirit World will be as I say.
Well, sweetheart, I have written quite a long letter and you must be a little tired, but I must further write and tell you that all this happiness that I have spoken of may be yours and, as your soulmate, I believe and almost know that it will be; for while you are a mortal, no matter how long the years may be, you will have with you my love and longings for your coming, and my prayers to the Father for a great bestowal upon you of His Divine Love. And besides all this, you know that you have surrounding you the loves of those who are higher than I, and who possess so much more of this Divine Love. Oh, it will be a happy day for me when you do come, and I know that you will be happy, also. Just think, that as your eyes close in what the preachers call the last sleep, I will be with you, and when you awake, I will be with you, and the only thing that will greet your newly-awakened vision will be my eyes, so filled with love and joy that you will almost want to die over again just for the sake of having the awakening.
I remember that when on earth, you thought my arms were very beautiful, and loved to have them around you, and thought yourself happy; but when you come to me again, you will find arms so much more beautiful clasping you to a bosom that you cannot dream of, and eyes looking into your eyes with so much love and happiness that you will, for the first time in all your life, know what happiness means; and then when I tell you that I am all yours and that never again will cruel death, as it is called, separate us, and that only love, pure and unselfish and never-dying, will be ours without any lessening or disturbing by jealousy or tiresomeness, you will wonder if you have really awakened from that last sleep or are only dreaming. But then I will give you a long, sweet kiss of love that you will know that it is all real.
Oh, my Ned, I do love you and want you to love me with all your heart! The time will not be long now, until we shall be together in our spirit life, when your cares and worries of life will no longer trouble you. But, sweetheart, you must pray to the Father for a greater inflowing of His Divine Love and blessings, for upon the development of your soul depends our continuous living together, and progress.
I will be with you tonight while you sleep, and I am so filled with love that I know I shall call your spirit from your body and carry it with me to purer planes, where we can, for a few moments, enjoy the bliss of living together without the encumbrance of your body. You may not remember it when you awake, but I will know and will tell you of it when next I write. So, sweetheart, give me my good night kiss.
Your own true and loving,
Helen
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