Episode:Jesus Goes Public—Precursor and Prelude (Part 9)
Above and beyond selfish satisfaction and sensuous gratification, there are higher values in mortal existence—intellectual mastery and spiritual achievement—which far transcend the necessary gratification of man’s purely physical appetites and urges. Man’s natural endowment of talent and ability should be chiefly devoted to the development and ennoblement of his higher powers of mind and spirit.
Keywords: Urantia, Jesus, The Great Decisions, Self-Preservation, Power and Glory
Opening thought: The Lord said to Moses, "What is that in your hand?" "A staff," he replied. The Lord said, "Throw it on the ground." Moses threw it on the ground and it became a snake. Then the Lord said, "Put your hand inside your cloak.” So Moses put his hand into his cloak, and when he took it out, the skin was leprous. Then the Lord said, "Take some water from the Nile and pour it on the dry ground. It will become blood on the ground." [Exodus 4]
Closing thought: The Urantia Book is a system of ideas, and claims to be the cosmic system of ideas. Let's be able and willing students. Spend some time reflecting on these details.
Summary by Kermit
Commentary after Review
SoS revisited the importance of Jesus’ references to “the Father”, a facet of Deity rather than “the Universal Father” a reality object. Failure to understand this distinction leads to erroneous ideas of the creature’s methods of approach to God and understanding of what it means to do God’s will. The creature’s contact with the Father is in the inner life of prayer and worship. During the two millennia since Jesus walked on Urantia in the flesh, the idea of the Father regularly intervening in outer life human affairs has become firmly entrenched in the religious concept frames of the great majority of the believers in Jesus’ divinity.
With the march of planetary dispensational epochs, those erroneous beliefs and maladaptive behaviors found in earlier ages are less consequential to the individual and the collective than when they are embraced in more advanced times (like ours) and thus animated with more spiritualized thinking and acting. Remember, with each advancing dispensation, the nature of human mindal selves is significantly different. Succeeding-dispensation humans are able consciousize higher levels of divine law, and are held to higher standards of conformity to the cosmos. Although the 5th ER is not a dispensational revelation, having it, believing it, and claiming to understand it, carry greater cosmic responsibilities. From those to whom much has been given, much will be required. A divine reckoning (judgement) awaits all who choose to advance along the path to Paradise. But all such judgement takes place in the context of the infinite love of God, which itself is not secondary to anything in the divine nature. And this love of God is made tangible in the life of Jesus.
Much of what we discover in the 5th ER is not easily grasped or is even opaque to our correct understanding, but as mentioned the dispensation subsequent to the one in which we currently live will be inhabited by humans with a consciousness enhanced by the Magisterial Son. Such humans likely will grasp and understand much in the 5th ER we are not presently able to penetrate.
136:6 The Second Decision
As previously mentioned these forty days found garbled expression in the Bible, mixed up with fragments of Jesus’ so-called temptations on Mt. Hermon in Matthew’s gospel. Even so, there is a parallel with this second decision having to do with his physical needs and personal necessities, and the second temptation having to do with turning stones into bread.
Another parallel is to be found with this decision and the evolutionary planetary developmental periods, the first of which is the nutrition epoch. This parallel, and many others like it, should begin to spark a recognition in the student, of the revelation as a precise and highly correlated and unified system, notwithstanding its multiple authorship. Human thinkers and writers down through the ages have devised many systems for understanding reality. But all fall far short of the 5th ER of truth, a true metaphysics.
In this decision, Jesus chose to live normally as far as his personal needs were concerned, all the while recalling the warning of his Personalized Thought Adjuster that the feature of accelerated time associated with his desires could not wholly be ruled out. He thus decided against employing his superhuman powers for miracles and wonders.
Jesus was fully aware of the Messianic expectations into which he stepped as the Jewish Deliverer. He was always mindful that his bestowal mission included all the creatures and worlds of Nebadon. With this decision Jesus portrayed to his onlooking universe the folly and sin of prostituting divine talents and God-given abilities for personal aggrandizement or for purely selfish gain and glorification. He, therefore, sought to avoid anything which would reinforce the primitive notions of magic predating the Jews. Likewise did he seek to disabuse the Jews of using prayerful petitions as a technique to favorably influence material affairs.
In light of these decisions disavowing supernatural acts, we must take care to scrutinize the more renowned episodes of Jesus’ public ministry (e.g. feeding the five thousand, the healing at sundown, resurrection of Lazarus) for details which would explain how these extraordinary events did not represent a violation of these decisions.
136:7 The Third Decision
Jesus’ third decision had to do with confronting circumstances of personal danger. Aside from normal human attention to issues of personal safety and ensuring that his career was not prematurely terminated he decided to refrain from superhuman intervention when the crisis of his life in the flesh should come.
Note the alignment of this decision with the second evolutionary planetary developmental period, the security age. Note his decision to absolutely refrain from anything which would abrogate the natural laws was made with the disclaimer that since these issues were put under the jurisdiction of his Personalized Thought Adjuster, accelerated time was an ever-present possibility.
The midwayer account of these decisions consistently emphasize Jesus’ steadfast adherence to these decisions, it remains for us to examine events again carefully in his public ministry which might appear to contradict this point.
Notes by Brad
- Jesus always refers to the Father, never the Universal Father
- This is part of seek first the kingdom of heaven.
- The Universal Father is a reality object, in theory approachable in the outer life.
- The only place the Father (a facet of Deity) can be accessed is in the inner life.
- Only one's spiritualized mind can strike step with the functioning of Deity.
- Much given, much expected.
- When you know better, do better.
- The Father requires that you grow up, says Jesus.
- So you've been exposed to the 5th ER in your reading and studies. Where does that leave you in today's spiritual economy?
- But don't fear. God loves you absolutely.
- Yet you have a personal responsibility you cannot avoid. Mercy doesn't negate this.
- Be about the Father's business!
- Without a system there is no understanding.
- Only a system produces understanding. Whether you consciously recognize it or not.
- Where did this system come from?
- Some very smart people have devised systems (philosophers). Kant, Hegel, Hume, etc.
- But we grow weary of these system builders. Hegel was the last straw
- Here's the 5th ER: not just a system (a metaphysics), but THE SYSTEM (THE metaphysics)
