Wednesday, September 18, 2019
6:05 a.m. Gentlemen? I think we were going somewhere before we had to consider good and evil. I hope you are keeping track.
We are; we are also responsive to the moment. It doesn’t matter to us how an argument develops. As we have said, there are many routes to get there – wherever “there” may be defined at.
Let us go back to considering good and evil. Now that we have agreed upon the desirability of being whole rather than good – that is, of recognizing that you are whole rather than however you define yourself as good – we still have to consider what that means.
It occurs to me, writing that, that Jesus somewhere said don’t call me good, there isn’t anybody good but the father. If I’m remembering that rightly, this would shed light on what he meant; no 3D person can be made up of good only.
A word on process. Can you see that who we deal with on the 3D end of the scale helps determine what can come through, and what its flavor will be? If you were still the Christian you had been raised to be, or if you had rejected the essence with the trappings, you could not make such associations and speculations. Similarly, if you had had no religious upbringing at all, or had never read the gospels of your own volition, would you have had the data? So, as we say, it makes each potential conduit unique. In some cases that uniqueness may not add anything particularly valuable; in others, it may.
Interesting you mention that. I was thinking I should re-read the gospels again, then was thinking how little interest I have in the other books of the New Testament, or of the old. In fact, I am pretty much ignorant of the Old Testament and I have forgotten whatever I knew about the various epistles of the early church leaders. What I listen to is the recorded words of Jesus. They speak to me. The rest of it is no doubt of great value, given that religions and civilizations have been built on it, but for whatever reason it is not alive for me. Only the words of Jesus, and what they suggest.
Hence our work with the Gospel of Tomas, relatively uncontaminated by later editing, and unconcerned with narrative.
It occurs to me, too – not for the first time – that pretty nearly everybody ought to have non-3D connections with various kinds of Christians by now. It may be that this is how the thoughts and even the presence of Jesus are to spread to every part of the world, not in mere geographic evangelization, as the Victorians believed.
Let it occur to you, then, as well, that spreading influence by resonance in the non-3D is the only way to avoid all the inevitable distortion and politics that would accompany expansion through physical contact and persuasion and conversion and, often enough, coercion.
A sort of subterranean process continuing through history while the surface currents concern themselves with other things.
Yes, only don’t assume that the non-3D has as its purpose to make everyone Christian.
God forbid!
Yes, we smile. But after all, Jesus was not a Christian, any more than the Buddha was a Buddhist.
No, and I don’t imagine for a moment that the end-result described would be anything so oriented on people being “good” – that is, obeying external rules and waging internal warfare – rather than whole.
However, that doesn’t mean that religions were failures or detours or conspiracies. But neither can they or any of them be a panacea, and this is of course the temptation for the religious.
The joke has been welling up within me for three paragraphs’ worth, so I suppose there’s a reason for me to express it. The guy said, “I’m an atheist, thank God.”
Well, there is a point to it. There is a whimsical illustration of a couple of related facts. (1) Atheism itself can be a form of religion; (2) even in a vigorous intellectual rejection of religious attitudes, the same attitude may inhere, unsuspected. Now, it is only a joke, so there’s no reason to put too much weight on it, but still, there you are.
In paying attention to the words and the underlying attitude of Jesus, you are doing what you did when you read that book, so many decades ago.
Yes, I loved that book. I had forgotten about it. I forget what the title was, but it compared the world’s higher religions not by analysis or argument but by citing their scriptures. I can still remember it, a purple dust jacket, if I’m not mistaken. Perhaps I can find it in my library upstairs; I am unlikely to have discarded it. If I do, I’ll cite it. I imagine it is long out of print, though. [I was unable to find it.]
Our point here is that that is an intelligent approach to religion when you are no longer contained within one. Seek the truth where you can find it, and the truth will not inhere in rules and regulations, nor in prohibitions. It will inhere in certain statements that your inner self will recognize as truth.
And how – we might ask – do you suppose your inner self does that?
You know I know.
Yes, but this is not primarily for you. It is partly rhetorical, partly directed at whomever it spears.
The answer is logically contradictory, not that that matters.
That’s why we love working with you!
You’re welcome. But it is. The non-3D part of us recognizes truth when it sees it – and it ought to, given that it steered us to it in the first place.
Precisely. But let’s look at that just a bit more analytically. What you just said amounts to this:
1) Your non-3D component knows vastly more than you can know consciously, of course.
2) It would be self-defeating for your non-3D to coerce your 3D mind, given that the whole point of 3D existence is conscious willing choice.
3) Nonetheless there are more and there are less productive paths to take; some are more desirable than others, at least from our point of view. Yet, we cannot constrain.
4) Given cooperation from the 3D self, we can gently steer you toward truth, toward growth, toward fulfillment. We can’t force you to accept the gifts, but we can show you where they are. But how much we can do this depends upon your internal makeup. If the 3D personality we are dealing with is rigid, how much can we do? If it is frivolous, how can we put its attention to great but subtle opportunities?
5) What we can do is point you to whatever opportunity best harmonizes with your nature, so that you will be most likely to see and appreciate the opportunity.
6) Once the 3D consciousness seizes the good – that is, once its attention focuses on it – then it is a matter of the 3D personality choosing to accept or reject, but at least the opportunity has been presented.
And one of the lures you use is our resonance to past-life (so-called) personalities.
Of course: 3D calls to 3D in a very specific way, as you learned while doing retrievals in Lifeline at TMI.
I think I side-tracked us a bit, but that’s our time for the morning.
We’ve never met a side-track we didn’t like.
Thank you Will Rogers. Okay, till next time.