What is the Urantia Book? Why have you never heard of it before? Find out from real students of this life changing book, and hear how its teachings are changing the world we know.

In November of 2008, the Lead Trustee for the soon to be established Aevia Charitable Trust (The ACT), gave a talk wherein he stressed the importance of understanding how all that is implicit to being born again, is seen through the context of the parent/child relationship and the larger family to which we are born. The talk included the following statement:

“While we gain entrance to the Kingdom of Heaven by means of a child-like faith, we are expected to grow spiritually. We must each bear appropriate fruits of the Spirit. And we can look forward to an expansion of intellect, factual enlargement, and increased social service. As we awaken to individual and societal needs, as we begin to discern enhanced meanings and discover supreme values, we become highly active personalities. But it all really begins with a child-like response to the wonder lure.”

This brief sermon was delivered by Bob Kalk during a music service at Bell Church in Leicester, North Carolina on July 6, 2014. The guest pianist is Gerald Ball from nearby Mars Hill University. Bell Church was organized immediately after the civil war in 1866. At that time, the circuits in and about the Blue Ridge were largely served by native preachers, either ordained or local. Leicester was a center for “Northern Methodism,” with a great emphasis on education and connectional ministries. Today Bell is wired for, and focused upon, a set of challenges that include new educational initiatives and outreach.

Consider the Source

 Consider the First Source!

When we align our objectives with the Divine will, when we strive for the attainment of a worthy goal, when we begin our work with a well defined plan, and when we have ability to work together with others effectively, we have already achieved the trajectory for success. For we know that “all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.”

Learn how to enjoy boundless opportunity and unlimited progress!

When you simply don’t have the drive or if you feel you’re on a dead end road, it just may be time for a change. One of the best ways to get motivated is to understand our innermost desires. Some call it taking pride in a job well done. Others think of it as perfection hunger. Whatever you call it, it may be useful to consider how others have chosen to share their thoughts on the matter.

• Be not afraid of greatness. Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon ‘em. — William Shakespeare
• You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream. — C. S. Lewis
• Having a dream, living that dream, losing that dream, dreaming again and then having that dream come true again is one of the greatest feelings ever because I`m stronger. — Aaron Carter
• Nothing in the universe can stop you from letting go and starting over. — Guy Finley
• I know for sure that what we dwell on is who we become. — Oprah Winfrey
• That which doesn’t kill us makes us stronger. — Friedrich Nietzsche
• It is never too late to be what you might have been. — George Eliot
• What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us. — Henry Stanley Haskins
• All our dreams can come true – if we have the courage to pursue them. — Walt Disney
• Life is 10% what happens to me and 90% how I react to it. — Charles R. Swindoll
• There are two primary choices in life: to accept conditions as they exist, or accept the responsibility for changing them. — Denis Waitley
• An obstacle is often a stepping stone. — Prescott
• The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step. — Lao Tzu
• The man who has confidence in himself gains the confidence of others. — Hasidic proverb
• Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail. — Anonymous
• Be kind whenever possible. It is always possible. — Dalai Lama
• After a storm comes a calm. — Matthew Henry
• A creative man is motivated by the desire to achieve, not by the desire to beat others. — Ayn Rand
• If you’re going through hell, keep going. — Winston Churchill
• With the new day comes new strength and new thoughts. — Eleanor Roosevelt
• Be miserable. Or motivate yourself. Whatever has to be done, it’s always your choice. — Wayne Dyer
• The will to win, the desire to succeed, the urge to reach your full potential… these are the keys that will unlock the door to personal excellence. — Confucius
• Always continue the climb. It is possible for you to do whatever you choose, if you first get to know who you are and are willing to work with a power that is greater than ourselves to do it. — Ella Wheeler Wilcox
• As a man sow, shall he reap. and I know that talk is cheap. But the heat of the battle is as sweet as the victory. — Bob Marley
• I don’t believe you have to be better than everybody else. I believe you have to be better than you ever thought you could be. — Ken Venturi
• Our greatest weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time. — Thomas A. Edison
• If you can dream it, you can do it. — Walt Disney
• Learn from the past, set vivid, detailed goals for the future, and live in the only moment of time over which you have any control: now. — Denis Waitley
• Even if you fall on your face, you’re still moving forward. — Victor Kiam
• Do you want to know who you are? Don’t ask. Act! Action will delineate and define you. — Thomas Jefferson
• When you reach the end of your rope, tie a knot in it and hang on. — Thomas Jefferson
• Expect problems and eat them for breakfast. — Alfred A. Montapert
• By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail. — Benjamin Franklin
• Act as if what you do makes a difference. It does. — William James
• Either you run the day or the day runs you. — Jim Rohn
• Always desire to learn something useful. — Sophocles
• If you want to succeed you should strike out on new paths, rather than travel the worn paths of accepted success. — John D. Rockefeller
• Determine never to be idle. No person will have occasion to complain of the want of time who never loses any. It is wonderful how much may be done if we are always doing. — Thomas Jefferson
• Be gentle to all and stern with yourself. — Saint Teresa of Avila
• What you get by achieving your goals is not as important as what you become by achieving your goals. — Henry David Thoreau
• I’ve worked too hard and too long to let anything stand in the way of my goals. I will not let my teammates down and I will not let myself down. — Mia Hamm
• Opportunity does not knock, it presents itself when you beat down the door. — Kyle Chandler
• Things do not happen. Things are made to happen. — John F. Kennedy
• Problems are not stop signs, they are guidelines. — Robert H. Schuller
• Well done is better than well said. — Benjamin Franklin
• Quality is not an act, it is a habit. — Aristotle
• The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. — Thomas Paine
• What you do today can improve all your tomorrows. — Ralph Marston
• Never complain and never explain. — Benjamin Disraeli
• Set your goals high, and don’t stop till you get there. — Bo Jackson
• You can’t build a reputation on what you are going to do. — Henry Ford
• Leap, and the net will appear. — John Burroughs
• The first step toward success is taken when you refuse to be a captive of the environment in which you first find yourself. — Mark Caine
• It’s always too early to quit. — Norman Vincent Peale
• Begin to be now what you will be hereafter. — William James
• Crave for a thing, you will get it. Renounce the craving, the object will follow you by itself. — Swami Sivananda
• Who seeks shall find. — Sophocles
• The hardships that I encountered in the past will help me succeed in the future. — Philip Emeagwali
• Setting goals is the first step in turning the invisible into the visible. — Tony Robbins
• When you fail you learn from the mistakes you made and it motivates you to work even harder. — Natalie Gulbis
• You can never quit. Winners never quit, and quitters never win. — Ted Turner
• The most effective way to do it, is to do it. — Amelia Earhart
• The secret of getting ahead is getting started. — Mark Twain
• Perseverance is not a long race; it is many short races one after the other. — Walter Elliot
• Perseverance is failing 19 times and succeeding the 20th. — Julie Andrews
• Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you. — Jesus

When you’re searching your soul for new resolutions, consult your enthusiasm. And, while you’re at it, think about the origin of of that particular term. Enthusiasm is rooted in the Greek en Theos which means God within!

“They prefer a life caged in their precepts, in their compromises, in their revolutionary plans or in their [disembodied] spirituality.”
So said Pope Francis in his remarks following the readings last Friday, he focused on the day’s Gospel, drawn from that according to St Matthew (11:16-19). There, Jesus compares the generation of his time to always unhappy children, explaining that they were, “not open to the Word of God.” Their refusal, he explained, was not of the message, but of the messenger. “They reject John the Baptist,” he said, who came, “neither eating nor drinking ,” saying of him that he was “a man possessed.” They reject Jesus because they say, “He is a glutton, a drunkard, a friend of publicans and sinners.” They always have a reason to criticize the preacher:
“The people of that time preferred to take refuge in a more elaborate religion: in the moral precepts, such as the group of Pharisees; in political compromise, as the Sadducees; in social revolution, as the zealots; in gnostic spirituality, such as Essenes. They were [happy] with their clean, well-polished system. The preacher, however, was not [so pleased]. Jesus reminded them: ‘Your fathers did the same with the prophets.’ The people of God have a certain allergy to the preachers of the Word: they persecuted the prophets, [even] killed them.”
Then the Pontiff turned his attention to the Chritians of our day saying: “Seeing these children who are afraid to dance, to cry, [who are] afraid of everything, who ask for certainty in all things, I think of these sad Christians, who always criticize the preachers of the Truth, because they are afraid to open the door to the Holy Spirit. Let us pray for them, and pray also for ourselves, that we do not become sad Christians, cutting off the freedom of the Holy Spirit to come to us through the scandal of preaching.”
Consider the Source

 Consider the First Source!

When we align our objectives with the Divine will, when we strive for the attainment of a worthy goal, when we begin our work with a well defined plan, and when we have ability to work together with others effectively, we have already achieved the trajectory for success. For we know that “all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.”

Learn how to enjoy boundless opportunity and unlimited progress!

Jesus is the light of the world! And this particular proclamation is one of the best examples of how the mission of Jesus resonates with sincere truth seekers everywhere and every when, for as the poet said: “We all warm ourselves before one hearth.”
In the Gospel of John we are told: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.” In essence Jesus, as Creator-Son, exercised certain Creator prerogatives. Here we will focus specifically on the Divine Right of Subrogation. In its most basic form, subrogation means “to put in the place of another.” Jesus did not displace actual persons during his sojourn on earth, but rather the mythic gods of the ancient world. The life of Jesus fit the mosaic of the times in ways we are now just beginning to understand.
Although the polytheistic mysteries were, at best, hazy reflections of monotheism’s intensifying concept of God, these ancient myths endured because they touched upon the Divine attributes. During the dark days of the planetary insurrection, they helped to keep alive the heavenly inspiration that would eventually lead to humanity’s most intimate encounter with Divinity. Polytheism is, after all, evolving monotheism. And the object of worship, for those who venerate the sun, is at the heart of a serviceable metaphor.
Human kind lived and died by the seasons and by, what we might describe as, the whims of nature. The hunter’s take, the fisherman’s catch, and the grower’s harvest all required that certain conditions be met. And many of those conditions were beyond the control of man, unless of course, he could somehow persuade the powers that be. In the mind of early human kind, the price for securing nature’s bounty was to appease nature’s gods. And, the one thing that all of the most revered gods had in common was their ability to grant fertility.
In the days of Jesus, our ancestors were not only slaves to tradition, they could not escape the cyclical nature of, well, nature. There is a reason we celebrate Easter within days of the vernal equinox and Christmas within days of the winter solstice. These were days of celebration, throughout the world of agriculture, and all of the mystery religions are deeply rooted in this particular culture.
When Jesus was born in Bethlehem, the ancient world took note. Bethlehem was an agricultural community. Its main commercial activity was the production of sacrificial lambs. The birth of our Lord and Savior is itself an act of divine syncretism addressing the “shepherd god” legends of Dumuzi in Mesopotamia, Tammuz in Babylon, and Adonis in Greece.

The first two mythical characters shared the role of a lamb that was sacrificed for the sake of the people. In Dumuzi’s case, the opening of the final act was described this way: The “lamb” is sacrificed and his sheepfold is “given to the winds.” Sound familiar? Now consider this prophetic element: From ancient China and to this day, the indelible symbol for earth is a cross on the horizon.
The mother of Jesus was named in accordance with a long standing Hebrew tradition. And yet this particular way of honoring the Semitic God-Mother and Queen of Heaven bears a remarkable similarity to the traditions surrounding Aphrodite-Mari, Mari-Anath, and even Isis as Stella Maris. They all refer, some more directly than others, to the Great Goddess. The name that Mary was instructed by Gabriel to give to her son was “Joshua,” which means savior. And, although Jesus didn’t precisely fit the worldly rabbinical mold of a nationalistic deliver, for those with ears to hear, throughout Palestine and beyond, he is truly The Savior. The whole world was longing for a savior.
In his scholarly video series The Secrets of Jesus Christ, producer, Robert Behzad Sarmast, methodically traces these, and many of the other individual threads Our Sovereign Lord has seen fit to use, as he has woven the tapestry of our time. Mr. Sarmast made this observation:

The pagans believed that the savior would sacrifice his heavenly life in order to live among and teach men. He would have a miraculous conception (by a divine father and a virgin mother) and be born in a rock cave, during Winter Solstice on December 25th. His arrival was supposed to be signaled by unusual astronomical phenomena, and he was supposed to be visited by wise shepherds bearing gifts at the time of his birth. From the very beginning of his life, powerful forces sought to stop his mission by killing the child, but miraculously he survived.
He was of a dual nature, both god and man, and was extremely wise, with a mission to help suffering humanity. He had the power to cure diseases, to heal the blind, cast out devils and even bring the dead back to life. His followers, both men and women, had to prove themselves through rigorous testing, at times even dying for his sake. As a fertility god, the pagan savior hero was expected to multiply food and wine, while teaching humanity about heaven and its laws, and revealing the secrets of salvation.
This Messiah figure was supposed to be at war with demons of the underworld throughout his life as they sought to stop his divine mission, but he was ultimately triumphant, destroying the devils on a sacred mountain. Before ending his mission and voluntarily going to his bloody death, he held a communal meal or last supper with his associates, complete with a bread and wine or blood ritual to commemorate him. After his arrest, the pagan fertility god was beaten, tortured and pierced, dying in order to redeem humanity through his sacred blood. His execution always happened during the spring equinox, on Black Friday, around the third week of March, causing the skies to darken.
His gruesome death was mourned by women, including the Mother Goddess who found him gored and bleeding to death. After the death of the sun god, he was wrapped in cloth and placed in a rock tomb which was later found to be empty because he had triumphantly resurrected on the third day, which was always on Sun-day, causing light and fertility to return to the world. After the resurrection, he ascended to heaven and was deified by the highest god, crowned with total authority as the intercessor between man and God. And of course, he was expected to return to earth on a periodical basis until the day of final judgment.

When Jesus rode into Jerusalem on a donkey, so the “words of the prophets may be fulfilled,” he was clearly satisfying one Hebrew expectation. But he was also drawing from deep within the Dionysian Mysteries to reach other flocks. Jesus said: “Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” With this statement he was inspiring future generations while also reaching out to worshipers of Osiris who, thousands of years before Jesus was born, said that a dying man is like a grain of “wheat which falls into the earth in order to draw from its bosom a new life.”
The Parables of the Sower, The Vine and the Branches, The Wheat and the Tares, The Fig Tree, and The Mustard Seed all resonated with a far flung humanity. These people had much more than a fleeting familiarity with what was at the heart of the growth parables. They survived by means of experiential learning, and now Jesus was raising the stakes. He was using the lessons, derived from certain traditions associated with nature, to illuminate the way of spiritual salvation for all who would follow. For those responsive to Divine leading, it was clearly time for the ancient sun gods to bow towards the Son of Man — The Way, the Truth, and the Life.
The Author and Finisher of our faith was inspiring the masses long before he walked the earth in physical form. He was exposing the sophistries of the arch deceiver. He was highlighting certain gems of Truth within any evolving, though serviceable, religion that had existed prior to his sojourn. And, he was conditioning the soil upon which his abiding seeds of Truth would fall. By the time of the incarnation, the world was tee’d up to receive the new Gospel that proclaims “The Kingdom of Heaven is within you.” — Robert H. Kalk

(This post is an except from the Ascension University course titled Challenging Your World View)

Consider the Source

 Consider the First Source!

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word choreographed an assembly of amino acids into an exquisite array of specific proteins. Then God said, “I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food.” In so doing God demonstrated a penchant for genomic writing, preceeded by an amazing series of prebiotic events, in a highly orchestrated presentation of evolutionary overcontrol.

More about God’s Handiwork!

It’s what you do that makes your soul. — Animal Dreams, Barbara Kingsolver (1955-) Author
Adding a Risible quality to your repertoire greatly increases the depth and breadth of your soul creation. Your unique Soulful nature is a key ingredient in your attraction to others.
Peace,
Jim
            RISIBLE
Definitions: (1) able or inclined to laugh; (2) causing laughter; sunny; amusing
Saying: Laughter is the music of grace.
Quotes:

At the height of laughter, the universe is flung into a kaleidoscope of new possibilities. — Jean Houston (1937 – ) American Spiritual Teacher

If you’re going to be able to look back on something and laugh about it, you might as well laugh about it now. — Marie Osmond (1959 – ) American Singer

A smile costs nothing but its value is priceless. It enriches the one who gives it, yet does not impoverish them. It happens in a flash but the memories may last for days. No one is so rich that they can get along without it. A smile generates happiness in the home and goodwill in the business. . . . If you meet an acquaintance or a friend who is too busy to give you a smile leave one of yours. No one needs a smile so much as the person who has none to give. — Anonymous

             SOULFUL
Definitions: (1) full of or expressive of emotion or deep feeling <All were moved by the artist’s soulful rendition.>; (2) possessing positive qualities; the embodiment of a quality <Brevity is the soul of wit.>; (3) having spiritual or emotional warmth, power, or understanding
Quotes:

If the head and the body are to be well, you must begin by curing the soul. — Plato (c. 4^th Century bc) Greek Philosopher

What shall it profit you if you gain the whole world and lose your own soul? — Jesus of Nazareth (7 bc-30 ad) The Bible, Matthew 16:26

If the soul could have known God without the world, the world would never have been created. — Meister Eckhart [born Eckhart von Hochheim] (c.1260-1328) German Theologian

The soul is the self‑reflective, truth‑discerning, and spirit‑perceiving part of man which forever elevates the human being above the level of the animal world. — Jesus of Nazareth (7 bc-30 ad) The Urantia Book (133:6.5)

If you would have the message of the gods to direct your life, look for that which repeats. . . . It comes again and again until you have made it part of your soul and your enduring spirit. — Marion Zimmer Bradley (1930-1999) The Mists of Avalon

Comments:
• Remember your belongings are just stuff; material possessions belong to Mother Earth. You are really made of your spiritual qualities, your soul.
• The tools used to build your soul are:
1. Event – may be external or internal
2. Evaluation/reaction – based on your mind frame and soul characteristics to date
3. Choice
4. Action
5. Experience
6. Assimilation
7. Growth
Observation: Human beings, in a structural sense, are made up of five components: body, mind, spirit, personality, and soul. Enlightenment is a balanced integration of positive qualities into each of these aspects.
Advice: If a person is considered the embodiment of a quality or attribute, i.e., “the soul of generosity,” emulate him or her.
Symbols: 1) birds; 2) a well; 3) the foot; 4) a garden; 5) the tunic; 6) the gazelle; 7) the number six; 8) the hawk (Egyptian); 9) a butterfly [attraction to light]
Mythological Figure: Psyche is the Personification of the Soul. Psyche was so lovely that the jealous Venus asked Cupid to destroy her; but Cupid fell in love with her instead. — Lucius Apuleius (c. 125 -180) Latin Writer
Consider the Source