Episode:Jesus Culminates His Ministry—Final Preaching and Teaching (Part 9)
As a truth-loving soul, you must not allow yourself to be deceived by those who appear to likewise believe. Many may listen to the truth and believe it superficially with their minds, but few will permit the word of truth to strike down into the heart with living roots. Those who know only in the mind, having not experienced truth in the heart, cannot be depended upon for support when real trouble comes.
Keywords: Urantia, Jesus, Supreme Desire, Judas and the Chief Priests, Last Social Hour
Opening thought: As a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear him; for he knows our frame; he remembers that we are dust…From everlasting to everlasting the Lord’s love is with those who fear him, and his righteousness with their children’s children–with those who keep his covenant and remember to obey his precepts. Psalms 103
Summary by Andrea
After the review
We discussed the truth that we are all the Father’s children. When considering parenting, we read the quote from paper 167 about “the reception and training of children.” We are reminded that when we bring children into this world we are taking on a sacred trust. Because we are just the recipients of God’s children. The exhibition of loyalty is one of the most fundamental gifts we can give our children. That loyalty anchors them in eternity, eventually leading them to our Heavenly Father in Paradise.
In present times we are all a bit foggy about this truth. But we must hold fast to these eternal truths for they are at the core of an ongoing civilization. Families are those atoms, those fundamental building blocks, of civilization. There cannot be truth in our mind without this sense of loyalty. Additionally, wisdom is outside our grasp without loyalty.
177:3 The Day at Camp
We discussed the part in [194:2.2] where they say that the apostles felt inexpressibly lonely without Jesus after he was crucified. They felt the same way when Jesus left to go up into the hills with John Mark on this particular day. After the crucifixion, and even today, if it were not for the Spirit of Truth we would all experience a terrible sense of orphanhood.
Later in the afternoon, after Jesus left the camp with John Mark, Nathanial spoke to his fellow apostles telling them “What is wrong with most of us is that we are only halfhearted. We fail to love the Master as he loves us. If we had all wanted to go with him as much as John Mark did, he would surely have taken us all.” Nathanial had gotten to the heart of what is wrong with most of us and understood it was a Supreme matter. We are reminded that “halfhearted, partial devotion, is unavailing.”
Nathaniel continued by saying: “We fail to love the Master as he loves us.” How does the Master love us? Well, he was not even tempted to love the glory of man more than the glory of God. In paper 195:8 it says that if we love the glory of man, more than the glory of God, politics and power will become our secular modality. But how does this translate to our real life? Well, we can use, as our frame of reference, God’s reality, not ours. Take every situation and base it on God. Do this with every life circumstance. If we look to the glory of man in a given situation we can be assured that no true reality will lie within.
If there is even a small part of our inner life that is not consecrated to God, our desire for Him will be unavailing. Our consecration must be pure. However, we are a long way from being inducted into the corps of the Finality so we can remain calm and know that all is well as we mature in our inner lives as well as our outer lives. We must simply remember not to spiritualize some of our base, outer life desires, into the upper domain.
There is no need for perfection in the inner life at this point. But there can be a truth to our inner life that is the starting point for that eventuality. If we discover that we have put the glory of man above the glory of God in our inner life we must sincerely repent. Halfhearted repentance will be unavailing. The purity of our inner life must be restored.
David Zebedee realized that the chief priests and rulers were going to kill Jesus and knew Jesus would not do anything to stop them. Consequently, he dispatched runners to get Mary and the entirety of Jesus’ family to Jerusalem as soon as they could arrive. David could manage all of these things quickly because he did not need a consensus from any committee to make these decisions.
Mention was made in our reading about how the Greeks who were on the scene were there because of Rodan of Alexandria. This clears up questions that occur when reading the New Testament about how these Greeks were a part of Jesus’ ministry. Jesus would have been inclined to ordain these 20 Greeks had it not disturbed his disciples and apostles. In addition, Jesus shows patience and humility by not ordaining them. He always puts himself into cooperative subordination to the evolutionary process.
The chief priests were confused about why Jesus did not come into Jerusalem to preach to the vast numbers of believers. But Jesus ‘takes the measure’ of things framed in the will of God. He approaches every circumstance and meditates on the law of God. The love of God is there but always within the framework of the law. Otherwise, it’s false love and evil results.
The revelators don’t repeat what is already been given in the New Testament. The Urantia Book provides the coordinated essential knowledge that allows for a fuller understanding of what was really going on. It is up to us to know what is in the New Testament regarding these details so that we develop this understanding. Truth requires a frictionless frame of mind.
177:4 Judas and The Chief Priests
Judas’ friends and relatives flatteringly assured Judas that “he would, at last, be in a position to erase the stigma of his well-meant but "unfortunate association with untaught Galileans." We sort of laughed at their biases about all of this.
We went on to discuss how flattery is part of the incessant clamoring of our inescapable self for recognition and honor. It is an Achilles heel for all of us and we need to beware not to spiritualize these things that can come upon us.
Judas could not endure the humiliating thought of being identified with a movement of apparent defeat. His ego would not allow it. He also knew that Jesus would not do anything to avoid being destroyed by the Jewish rulers. It was Judas’ character flaws and not something he saw in the Master that was driving this betrayal.
The Midwayers give us an inside look into Judas’ rumination of confusion, pride, desperation, and determination. And we notice they are also helping us understand this betrayal had nothing to do with money and it wasn’t even directly about Jesus. All of the apostles had, at one time or another, shared the ambition of having personal honor and glory in a temporal kingdom. But they had all grown to admire truth and to love Jesus, at least more than did Judas. Again, we are reminded that half-hearted devotion will open all of us to the same temptation that Judas was facing. We should not stall out in our upward reach.
It was actually a cousin of Judas who made the statement to the Jewish rulers, on his behalf, that Judas had been misled by the subtle teaching of Jesus and had arrived at the place where he wished to make public and formal renunciation of his association with the Galilean and at the same time to ask for reinstatement in the confidence and fellowship of his Judean brethren. We see clarification the Midwayers are providing that clears up 2,000 years of vilifying Judas and allows us to understand what was really going on in his mind. He was not a thief the way the New Testament sets him out to be.
Judas did not see the look of disdain and even disgust that came over the face of the hardhearted and vainglorious Caiaphas after Judas asked what his reward was going to be. His heart was too much set on self-glory and the craving for the satisfaction of self-exaltation.
We read: “In its last motive of conscious intention, Judas's betrayal of Jesus was the cowardly act of a selfish deserter whose only thought was his own safety and glorification, no matter what might be the results of his conduct upon his Master and upon his former associates.” This underscores that it was not the rejection of Jesus but the exaltation of self that was Judas’ undoing. He failed to develop loyal trust and experience wholehearted love in return. While there is a wholeness to his consecration which is resulting in sin, it is not, however, to the point of iniquity.
Judas did not realize it, but he was a coward. He always inclined to assign to Jesus cowardice as the motive which led him so often to refuse to grasp for power or glory when they were apparently within his easy reach. We all know how love, even when once genuine, can, through disappointment, jealousy, and long-continued resentment, be eventually turned into actual hate. He was also so bitter about the fact that Jesus did not save John the Baptist. This constellation of resentments created Judas’s state of mind.
We commented on how the chief priests and elders felt at peace with what they were up to. If they only knew that it was they, not Judas, who held their own demise in their hands in making the decision to reject the Son of Man.
As Jesus speaks with the apostles on this evening they cannot be cheered. They know what is upon them. He reminds them not to be deceived by the crowds who may be fickle and foolish but perhaps even wicked. If any group is so desperate for quantity, meaning an increase in the number of followers, instead of the quality of the believers they have, then they can be led astray. Jesus reminds them that they will be tested and will be found to either have roots deep enough to withstand the sophistries in front of them or they will be led astray.
As the evening wore on they all realized what was about to descend upon them with crashing suddenness and inescapable terror. The followers of Jesus are realizing that they must now lean on those roots which they have allowed to strike deep into their heart. They must remember, as we must also, that there is a fragment of God within us that sustains us when real trouble arrives.
