I AM HERE. Luke.
I wish to continue my discourse on “The Atonement.”
As I was saying, unless a man gets into harmony with
God in the natural love which God bestowed upon him,
and thereby becomes free from sin and error, there
can be no redemption for him; and the death of Jesus
and the shedding of his blood cannot cause that
harmony.
Now what I have heretofore said relates exclusively
to man and his salvation with respect to his
condition of becoming perfect in this natural love,
which all men have.
But this is not the Great Atonement which Jesus came
to earth to teach men, and the Way in which it could
be obtained and the effect of its attainment.
As has been told to you, in the beginning, God
conferred upon our first parents not only the
natural love but also the potentiality of obtaining,
by the observance of certain laws and obedience, the
Divine Love of the Father, which, when obtained,
would make a man a part of Divinity, Itself. And
while It would not make him a god or the equal of
the Father, yet, It would give him a divinity that
would cause him to receive the Substance of God's
Great Love and not remain the mere image of his
Creator. And, as a result, man would become
immortal.
GOD, ALONE, IS IMMORTAL. AND EVERY PART OF HIM IS
IMMORTAL. AND WHEN MEN SHALL OBTAIN IN THEIR SOULS
THAT PART OF HIM WHICH IS HIS GREATEST ATTRIBUTE—HIS
DIVINE LOVE—THEY WILL ALSO BECOME IMMORTAL AND,
THEREAFTER, NOT SUBJECT TO DEATH.
THE NATURAL LOVE, WHICH WAS IMPLANTED IN THE SOULS
OF ALL MANKIND, IS NOT A PART OF THE DIVINE LOVE. IT
IS NOT THIS LOVE IN A LESSER DEGREE, EVEN, BUT IS A
DISTINCT AND SEPARATE QUALITY OF LOVE, AND ALL MEN
POSSESS IT. BUT, IN MANY PERSONS, IT HAS BECOME
CONTAMINATED BY THE SINS THAT FLOW FROM THE
VIOLATION OF GOD'S LAWS, SO THAT REDEMPTION, OF
WHICH I HAVE SPOKEN, IS NECESSARY FOR MAN, EVEN AS
THE POSSESSOR OF THE NATURAL LOVE ONLY.
BUT THE DIVINE LOVE OF THE FATHER IS A LOVE THAT HAS
IN IT, AND IS WHOLLY COMPOSED OF, THE DIVINITY WHICH
THE FATHER POSSESSES. AND NO MAN CAN EVER BECOME A
PART OF THAT DIVINITY UNTIL HE POSSESSES THIS GREAT
LOVE. I KNOW IT IS SAID THAT MAN IS DIVINE BECAUSE
HE WAS CREATED IN THE IMAGE OF GOD. BUT NOTHING
WHICH IS A MERE IMAGE IS EVER A PART OF THE
SUBSTANCE OF WHICH IT IS THE IMAGE, AND IT CANNOT
POSSIBLY HAVE THE QUALITIES OF THAT SUBSTANCE.
COMMONLY SPEAKING, THE IMAGE MAY HAVE THE APPEARANCE
AND, FOR THE ORDINARY AFFAIRS OF THE MORTAL LIFE,
MAY SERVE THE PURPOSE OF THE REAL UNTIL SOMETHING
ARISES THAT DEMANDS THE PRODUCTION OF THE REAL; AND,
THEN, THE IMAGE WILL NO LONGER SERVE THE PURPOSE.
Now, in the case of the creation of man, he was made
in the image of God in one particular only, and that
in the matter of soul appearance. His physical or
spiritual body was not in the image of God, for God
has no such bodies. Only the soul of man is in the
image of God, the Great Oversoul. And so long as man
remains a mere image of the Father, he will never be
more than the mere man that he was at the time of
his creation: the Substance of the Father will never
become a part of him. And while the Substance is
Divine, the image can never become divine until it
becomes transformed into the Substance.
At man's creation, a Plan was formed by which that
image might become a thing of Substance. There was
given to man, the possessor of the image, the
potentiality of obtaining the Substance. But man,
through his disobedience, or failure to comply with
or follow out the requirements of the Plan provided,
forfeited this potentiality which had been conferred
upon him. He thereby lost the possibility of having
the image transformed into the Substance, which was
absolutely necessary in order for him to ever become
the possessor of any part of the Father's Divinity.
And when men call themselves divine, they assert
that which is not true, but which, since the coming
of Jesus to earth, may become true.
I will not recite what this disobedience of our
first parents was, or in what way they lost the
great potentiality of becoming divine. I will only
say that, when they forfeited this potentiality by
their disobedience, it was taken from them by God.
And His Decree—that in the day they should commit
the act of disobedience they should surely die—was
carried out, and they died; not the material bodies
died, nor their spiritual bodies, nor their souls,
for men continued to live in their physical bodies
for many years after the day of disobedience. Their
spirit bodies and souls never died, for they still
live. But what died, and what the sentence passed
upon them affected, was the potentiality of
receiving the Substance which would make them divine
and immortal. This potentiality was taken from them
and never restored during the long centuries from
the time of its death until the coming of Jesus.
That part of the Divine Nature, or that Divine
Attribute, which was the object of this
potentiality, and which would make man a part of the
Divine Nature and immortal, was the Divine Love of
the Father and nothing else. And if our first
parents, through their obedience, had received this
Divine Love, never would mortality as to the soul
have existed on earth, and neither sin nor a want of
at-onement with the Father. But disobedience came,
and death of the possibility of becoming immortal
ensued. And man remained mere man—only an image of
the Father and nothing more.
No man, in all the long ages that I have mentioned,
ever had anything more or greater in his nature than
the natural love of which I have spoken. And, even
as to that, man so abused and defiled it that he
became eventually an outcast from the Father as to
this love. In other words, he, man, buried it so
deeply under his acts of sin and the violation of
those Laws of God which control this natural love
that he appeared to be forsaken by the Father, even
as a mere human being.
In the history of what is called “God's chosen
people,” the Jews, it appears that time and time
again these people became such aliens from God in
this natural love that men, possessed of this love
in a purer state than were the common people, were
used by the forces of the spirit world to call these
people to a realization of their obligations to God
arising out of the gift of the natural love. None of
the prophets—neither Moses nor Elijah, nor any of
the others—possessed this Divine Love, but merely
the natural love in a purer state than that
possessed by the people to whom they delivered their
messages.
BUT, IN GOD'S OWN TIME, AND IN ACCORDANCE WITH HIS
MERCY AND PLAN, HE REBESTOWED UPON MAN THIS GREAT
POTENTIALITY, OF WHICH I SPEAK, SO THAT MEN SHOULD
AGAIN HAVE THE PRIVILEGE OF BECOMING AT-ONE WITH
HIM. AND TO DECLARE THE REBESTOWAL OF THIS GREAT
GIFT, JESUS WAS SENT TO EARTH IN THE FORM OF MAN,
CONCEIVED AND BORN AS OTHER MEN BUT WITHOUT SIN.
IT WAS AT THE TIME OF JESUS' COMING THAT THE GREAT
GIFT WAS REBESTOWED UPON BOTH MORTALS AND SPIRITS OF
MORTALS THEN LIVING IN THE SPIRIT WORLD. AND THEY
ALL, SPIRITS AND MORTALS, RECEIVED THE PRIVILEGE OF
BECOMING AT-ONE WITH THE FATHER THROUGH THE PLAN OF
SALVATION THAT HE HAD REVEALED TO JESUS, WHICH JESUS
TAUGHT IN HIS MINISTRY DURING THE SHORT YEARS OF HIS
EARTHLY LIFE, AND WHICH HE IS STILL TEACHING.
THERE IS NO OTHER WAY IN WHICH MAN CAN BECOME AT-ONE
WITH THE FATHER—IN WHICH THE IMAGE CAN BE
TRANSFORMED INTO THE SUBSTANCE—THAN THE WAY THAT
JESUS TAUGHT, BUT WHICH SEEMS NOT TO HAVE BEEN
UNDERSTOOD BY MEN AFTER THE CHURCH BECAME A CHURCH
OF TEMPORAL POWER, AND AFTER THE WRITINGS OF THE
APOSTLES WERE EMASCULATED AND THE THOUGHTS AND
DESIRES OF MEN WERE INTERPOLATED IN THE PLACE OF THE
GOSPEL OF PEACE AND SALVATION. YET, THERE IS IN THE
GOSPEL OF JOHN ONE DECLARATION OF THE TRUE PLAN OF
SALVATION, THOUGH IT IS LITTLE UNDERSTOOD AND ALMOST
IGNORED IN PRACTICAL TEACHINGS AND OBSERVANCES OF
THE CHURCHES AND THEIR MEMBERS. AND THAT IS: “EXCEPT
A MAN BE BORN AGAIN, HE CANNOT ENTER INTO THE
KINGDOM OF GOD.”
THESE WORDS OF THE NEW BIRTH ARE THE ONLY WORDS THAT
DECLARE THE TRUE DOCTRINE OF THE ATONEMENT. NO DEATH
OF JESUS ON THE CROSS, NO SHEDDING OF BLOOD OR
WASHING AWAY OF SINS BY THE BLOOD, NO PAYING OF ANY
DEBT, AND NO BELIEVING IN THE NAME OF THE LORD,
JESUS CHRIST, WILL BRING MEN INTO AT-ONEMENT WITH
THE FATHER OR FIT THEM TO BECOME INHABITANTS OF HIS
KINGDOM. ONLY THE NEW BIRTH IS EFFICACIOUS FOR THIS
PURPOSE, AND NO OTHER PLAN DID JESUS EVER TEACH, AND
IS NOT NOW TEACHING.
Then, what is meant by the New Birth?
Men in their understanding and interpretation of it
differ. And it will do no good for me to recite
these different interpretations or what the New
Birth is not. But the important thing is what it is!
As I have said, the potentiality that was conferred
upon our first parents was the privilege of
obtaining the Divine Nature and Immortality of the
Father by becoming possessed of His Great Attribute
of Divinity—the Divine Love. And had our first
parents, by their obedience, received the benefits
of this great privilege, they would have been born
again, just as you and all other mortals, and
spirits as well, may now be born again.
THEN, THE NEW BIRTH IS SIMPLY THE EFFECT OF THE
FLOWING OF THIS DIVINE LOVE OF THE FATHER INTO THE
SOUL OF A MAN AND THE DISAPPEARING OF EVERYTHING
THAT TENDS TO SIN AND ERROR. AS THE DIVINE LOVE
TAKES POSSESSION OF THE SOUL, SIN AND ERROR
DISAPPEAR. IT, THE SOUL, BECOMES OF A QUALITY LIKE
THE GREAT SOUL OF THE FATHER. AND WITH THE SOUL OF
THE FATHER BEING DIVINE AND IMMORTAL IN ITS QUALITY
OF LOVE, SO, WHEN THE SOUL OF MAN BECOMES POSSESSED
OF THIS QUALITY OF LOVE, THE SOUL BEING THE MAN,
THIS SOUL BECOMES DIVINE ALSO. THEN, THE IMAGE
BECOMES THE SUBSTANCE; THE MORTAL BECOMES THE
IMMORTAL; AND THE SOUL OF MAN, AS TO LOVE AND HOPE,
BECOMES A PART OF THE FATHER'S DIVINITY.
NOW, TO DECLARE THIS PLAN OF SALVATION, AND ALSO THE
REBESTOWAL OF THE GREAT GIFT OF THE POTENTIALITY OF
THE SOUL, JESUS CAME TO EARTH. THIS WAS HIS MISSION,
AND NONE OTHER. AS READERS OF THE BIBLE WILL
REMEMBER, AND IT IS A TRUTH, WHEN JESUS WAS BAPTIZED
AND ANOINTED, AND ALSO WHILE ON THE MOUNT OF
TRANSFIGURATION, THE VOICE OF GOD, AS IT IS WRITTEN,
DECLARED THAT JESUS WAS HIS WELL-BELOVED SON AND
DEMANDED OF THE PEOPLE, “HEAR YE HIM!” NOT TO
BELIEVE THAT HE CAME TO DIE ON THE CROSS, NOT TO
BELIEVE THAT HIS BLOOD WOULD BRING ABOUT THE
ATONEMENT, NOT TO BELIEVE IN ANY VICARIOUS ATONEMENT
OR THAT GOD IN “WRATH” “DEMANDED” A SACRIFICE, BUT
ONLY “HEAR YE HIM!” AND, IN ALL HIS TEACHINGS, JESUS
NEVER TAUGHT ONE OF THESE THINGS, BUT ONLY THE NEW
BIRTH AS I HAVE EXPLAINED IT. THIS IS THE ONLY THING
NECESSARY FOR THE TRUE ATONEMENT, AND JESUS IS STILL
TEACHING IT.
He also taught moral truths affecting the conduct
and relation of man to man, and man in his natural
state to God. But none of these moral teachings were
sufficient to bring about the Great At-onement.
There is no doubt that the observance of many of
these teachings of morality, and of man's conduct
towards God, will have a tendency to lead men to
seek the higher Love of the Father and help their
souls get in the condition that will make it easier
for this Great Love to flow into them. But these
moral teachings of prescribed conduct will not, of
themselves, be sufficient to bring the New Birth
and, hence, the At-onement.
NOW, JESUS NOT ONLY TAUGHT THE NECESSITY FOR THE NEW
BIRTH, BUT HE ALSO TAUGHT THE WAY IN WHICH IT COULD
BE OBTAINED. AND THAT WAY IS JUST AS SIMPLE AND
EASILY UNDERSTOOD AS THE NEW BIRTH, ITSELF. HE
TAUGHT, AND IS NOW TEACHING THAT, THROUGH EARNEST
PRAYER TO THE FATHER, AND FAITH, WHICH MAKES ALL
ASPIRATIONS AND SOUL LONGINGS THINGS OF REAL
EXISTENCE, AND BY THE HOLY SPIRIT, WHICH IS THE
FATHER'S MESSENGER OF LOVE—OR THAT WHICH CARRIES HIS
DIVINE LOVE—THIS LOVE WILL FLOW INTO THE SOULS OF
MEN IN RESPONSE TO SUCH PRAYERS. AND, BY SUCH FAITH,
MEN WILL REALIZE ITS PRESENCE; AND, IN THIS WAY, AND
THIS WAY ONLY, MEN WILL RECEIVE THE NEW BIRTH.
THIS IS WHOLLY AN INDIVIDUAL MATTER. WITHOUT THE
PERSONAL, EARNEST PRAYER OF THE SUPPLICANT, AND
FAITH THAT COMES WITH THE LOVE, A MAN CANNOT RECEIVE
THE NEW BIRTH. NO CEREMONY OF CHURCH, NO LAYING ON
OF HANDS OR MASSES FOR THE SOULS OF THE DEAD, WILL
BE EFFICACIOUS TO MAKE THE MAN OR SPIRIT A NEW
CREATURE OF GOD.
What I have written is the meaning of the True
Atonement as taught by the Master and as understood
by all the redeemed of the Father who are now living
in His Celestial Heavens. And there is no other
atonement possible.
I have written enough and hope I have made the true
explanation of the Divine Atonement plain to all
men. We who are inhabitants of the Celestial Heavens
know the Truth of my explanation, both from personal
experience and from the other fact, which no spirit
in all the universe can deny: that only those who
have received this Divine Love of the Father in
their souls in sufficient abundance can or do
inhabit the Celestial Heavens. All other spirits, no
matter what their several beliefs may be, live in
the lower Spiritual Spheres and cannot enter the
Celestial Heavens unless they seek for and obtain
the New Birth that Jesus taught and is still
teaching.
So, my dear brother, without writing more, I will
say goodnight.
Your brother in Christ,
LUKE.