Salient Details of Jesus' First Journey to Jerusalem from Nazareth As a Boy of Twelve Years!

One of the greatest memorable events in the childhood of Jesus was his journey from his Nazareth village to Jerusalem together with his parents, Joseph and Mary. He had just completed his school education in the Synagogue school at Nazareth. He was 12 years and eight months when he traveled to Jerusalem for celebrating the Passover festival of the Jewish people.

Map of the Land of the Jewish Peoples 

during the times of Jesus. Courtsey CCEL.Org (Click to enlarge)

The Passover feast of this year fell on Saturday, April 9, A.D. 7. A considerable company of 103 people made ready to depart from Nazareth early Monday morning, April 4, for Jerusalem. 

They journeyed south toward Samaria, but on reaching Jezreel, they turned east, going around Mount Gilboa into the Jordan valley in order to avoid passing through Samaria. Joseph and his family would have enjoyed going down through Samaria by way of Jacob’s Well and Bethel, but since the Jews disliked to deal with the Samaritans, they decided to go with their neighbors by way of the Jordan valley.

The much-dreaded Archelaus (the king of Jews who wanted to destroy babe Jesus) had been deposed, and Jesus' parents now had little to fear in taking Jesus to Jerusalem. Twelve years had passed since the first Herod had sought to destroy the babe of Bethlehem, and no one would now think of associating that affair with this much unknown boy of Nazareth.

Before reaching the Jezreel junction, and as they journeyed on, very soon, on the left, they passed the ancient village of Shunem, and Jesus heard again (from his fellow travelers) about the most beautiful maiden of all Israel who once lived there and also about the wonderful works Elisha performed there. In passing by Jezreel, Jesus’ parents recounted the doings of Ahab and Jezebel and the exploits of Jehu. In passing around Mount Gilboa, they talked much about Saul, who took his life on the slopes of this mountain, King David, and the associations of this historic spot. It was an opportunity for young Jesus to learn much about the past history of his peoples while they walked through those places.

On their second day’s journey they passed by where the Jabbok, from the east, flows into the Jordan, and looking east up this river valley, they recounted the days of Gideon, when the Midianites poured into this region to overrun the land. Toward the end of the second day’s journey they camped near the base of the highest mountain overlooking the Jordan valley, Mount Sartaba, whose summit was occupied by the Alexandrian fortress where Herod had imprisoned one of his wives and buried his two strangled sons.

The third day they passed by two villages which had been recently built by Herod and noted their superior architecture and their beautiful palm gardens. By nightfall they reached Jericho, where they remained until the next morning. That evening Joseph, Mary, and Jesus walked a mile and a half to the site of the ancient Jericho, where Joshua, for whom Jesus was named, had performed his renowned exploits, according to Jewish tradition.

By the fourth and last day’s journey the road was a continuous procession of pilgrims. They now began to climb the hills leading up to Jerusalem. As they neared the top, they could look across the Jordan to the mountains beyond and south over the sluggish waters of the Dead Sea. About halfway up to Jerusalem, Jesus gained his first view of the Mount of Olives (the region to be so much a part of his subsequent life), and Joseph pointed out to him that the Holy City lay just beyond this ridge, and the lad’s heart beat fast with joyous anticipation.

On the eastern slopes of Olivet they paused for rest in the borders of a little village called Bethany. The hospitable villagers poured forth to minister to the pilgrims, and it happened that Joseph and his family had stopped near the house of one Simon, who had three children about the same age as Jesus— Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. They invited the Nazareth family in for refreshment, and a lifelong friendship sprang up between the two families. Many times afterward, in his eventful life, Jesus stopped in this home.

They moved on, soon standing on the brink of Olivet, and Jesus saw for the first time (in his memory) the Holy City, the pretentious palaces, and the inspiring temple of his heavenly Father (God). At no time in his life did Jesus ever experience such a purely human thrill as that which at this time so completely enthralled him as he stood there on this April afternoon on the Mount of Olives, enjoying in his first view of Jerusalem. And in the later years, on this same spot he stood and wept over the city which was about to reject another prophet, the last and the greatest of her heavenly teachers!

Soon Jesus' family reached Jerusalem and they moved in to a house of one of the relatives of Mary.

While all Jerusalem was astir in preparation for the Passover, Joseph found time to take his son around to visit the academy where it had been arranged for him to resume his education two years later, as soon as he reached the required age of fifteen. Joseph was truly puzzled when he observed how little interest Jesus evinced in all these carefully laid plans.

Jesus was profoundly impressed by the temple and all the associated services and other activities. For the first time since he was four years old, he was too much preoccupied with his own meditations to ask many questions. 

He did, however, ask his father several embarrassing questions (as he had on previous occasions) as to why the heavenly Father required the slaughter of so many innocent and helpless animals. 

And his earthly father well knew from the expression on the lad’s face that his answers and attempts at explanation were unsatisfactory to his deep-thinking and keen-reasoning son.

On the day before the Passover Sabbath, flood tides of spiritual illumination swept through the mortal mind of Jesus and filled his human heart to overflowing with affectionate pity for the spiritually blind and morally ignorant multitudes assembled for the celebration of the ancient Passover commemoration. 

This was one of the most extraordinary days that the Son of God spent in the flesh of an ordinary human being; and during the night, for the first time in his earth career, there appeared to him an assigned messenger from his heavenly headquarters who reminded him: 

“The hour has come. It is time that you began to be about your Heavenly Father’s business.”

And so, even before the heavy responsibilities of the Nazareth family descended upon his youthful shoulders, there now arrived the celestial messenger to remind this lad, not quite thirteen years of age, that the hour had come to begin the resumption of the responsibilities of a universe. 

He was the Divine Creator of a large material universe which consisted of millions of planetary worlds similar or much advanced than earth. And the creator was experiencing the lowly human life as part of his own decision in accordance with the mandate of his heavenly Father. Once he experienced that life he was going to be elevated to the position of the Sovereign Ruler of the Universe that he had created and would be nurturing henceforth.

And what happened in Jerusalem on that day was the first act of a long succession of events which finally culminated in the completion of the Son of God's bestowal on earth and in a way replacing of “the (care-taker) government of a universe on his human-divine shoulders.”

From now on, the most powerful divine care taker government of his universe would wait for their Creator's  approvals proceed from the human-divine personality who moved on earth as a seemingly ordinary human boy who hardly displayed any of his divine powers to his fellow human beings!

As time passed, the mystery of the incarnation became, to all of us (celestial beings), more and more unfathomable. 

We could hardly comprehend that this lad of Nazareth was the creator of a vast universe occupied by trillions of intelligent life of various orders and types both mortals and immortals. 

Neither do we nowadays understand how the spirit of this same Creator Son and the spirit of his Divine Heavenly Father are associated with the souls of mankind. 

With the passing of time, we could see that his human mind was increasingly discerning that, while he lived his life in the flesh, in spirit on his shoulders rested the responsibility of a universe.

From this time on, Jesus became increasingly self conscious of his dual nature - his divine-human nature. 

From now on, he had to take the responsibilities of his earthly family as a human and also take the responsibilities of a vast universe as its divine Creator. The human Jesus was increasingly getting aware of his divine status. 

Whatever he wished would become a reality, but this beloved Son of God was not one who would use his power and authority the way humans or even some of his subordinate celestial beings of imperfect mind status would have wished to use with such powers!

From the Mount of Olives and from the outside, on closer inspection, the temple had been all and more than Jesus had expected; but when he once entered its sacred portals, the great disillusionment began.

But the first great shock of the day came when his mother took leave of them on her way to the women’s gallery. It had never occurred to Jesus that his mother was not to accompany him to the consecration ceremonies, and he was thoroughly indignant that she was made to suffer from such unjust discrimination. While he strongly resented this, aside from a few remarks of protest to his father, he said nothing. But he thought, and thought deeply, as his questions to the scribes and teachers a week later disclosed.

Though many of the temple rituals very touchingly impressed his sense of the beautiful and the symbolic, he was always disappointed by the explanation of the real meanings of these ceremonies which his parents would offer in answer to his many searching inquiries. Jesus simply would not accept explanations of worship and religious devotion which involved belief in the wrath of God or the anger of the Almighty.

In further discussion of these questions, after the conclusion of the temple visit, when his father became mildly insistent that he acknowledge acceptance of the orthodox Jewish beliefs, Jesus turned suddenly upon his parents and, looking appealingly into the eyes of his father, said:

“My father, it cannot be true—the Father in heaven cannot so regard his erring children on earth. The heavenly Father cannot love his children less than you love me. And I well know, no matter what unwise thing I might do, you would never pour out wrath upon me nor vent anger against me. If you, my earthly father, possess such human reflections of the Divine, how much more must the heavenly Father be filled with goodness and overflowing with mercy. I refuse to believe that my Father in heaven loves me less than my father on earth.”

When Joseph and Mary heard these words of their first-born son, they held their peace. 

And never again did they seek to change his mind about the love of God and the mercifulness of the Father in heaven.

Early next day Jesus was up and on his way to the temple. On the brow of Olivet he paused and wept over the sight his eyes beheld—a spiritually impoverished people, tradition bound and living under the surveillance of the Roman legions. 

Early forenoon found him in the temple with his mind made up to take part in the discussions. Meanwhile, Joseph and Mary also had arisen with the early dawn with the intention of retracing their steps to Jerusalem. First, they hastened to the house of their relatives, where they had lodged as a family during the Passover week, but inquiry elicited the fact that no one had seen Jesus. After searching all day and finding no trace of him, they returned to their relatives for the night.

At the second conference Jesus had made bold to ask questions, and in a very amazing way he participated in the temple discussions but always in a manner consistent with his youth. 

Sometimes his pointed questions were somewhat embarrassing to the learned teachers of the Jewish law, but he evinced such a spirit of candid fairness, coupled with an evident hunger for knowledge, that the majority of the temple teachers were disposed to treat him with every consideration. 

But when he presumed to question the justice of putting to death a drunken gentile who had wandered outside the court of the gentiles and unwittingly entered the forbidden and reputedly sacred precincts of the temple, one of the more intolerant teachers grew impatient with the lad’s implied criticisms and, glowering down upon him, asked how old he was. 

Jesus replied, “thirteen years lacking a trifle more than four months.” 

“Then,” rejoined the now irate teacher, “why are you here, since you are not of age as a son of the law?” 

And when Jesus explained that he had received consecration during the Passover, and that he was a finished student of the Nazareth schools, the teachers with one accord derisively replied, 

“We might have known; he is from Nazareth.” 

But the leader insisted that Jesus was not to be blamed if the rulers of the synagogue at Nazareth had graduated him, technically, when he was twelve instead of thirteen; and notwithstanding that several of his detractors got up and left, it was ruled that the lad might continue undisturbed as a pupil of the temple discussions.

Jesus’ third day with the scribes and teachers in the temple witnessed the gathering of many spectators who, having heard of this youth from Galilee, came to enjoy the experience of seeing a lad confuse the wise men of the law. 

Simon also came down from Bethany to see what the boy was up to. Throughout this day Joseph and Mary continued their anxious search for Jesus, even going several times into the temple but never thinking to scrutinize the several discussion groups, although they once came almost within hearing distance of his fascinating voice.

Before the day had ended, the entire attention of the chief discussion group of the temple had become focused upon the questions being asked by Jesus.

Among his many questions were:

1. What really exists in the holy of holies, behind the veil?

2. Why should mothers in Israel be segregated from the male temple worshipers?

3. If God is a father who loves his children, why all this slaughter of animals to gain divine favor—has the teaching of Moses been misunderstood?

4. Since the temple is dedicated to the worship of the Father in heaven, is it consistent to permit the presence of those who engage in secular barter and trade?

5. Is the expected Messiah to become a temporal prince to sit on the throne of David, or is he to function as the light of life in the establishment of a spiritual kingdom?

And all the day through, those who listened marveled at these questions, and none was more astonished than Simon. 

For more than four hours this Nazareth youth plied these Jewish teachers with thought-provoking and heart-searching questions. He made few comments on the remarks of his elders. He conveyed his teaching by the questions he would ask. By the deft and subtle phrasing of a question he would at one and the same time challenge their teaching and suggest his own. 

In the manner of his asking a question there was an appealing combination of sagacity and humor which endeared him even to those who more or less resented his youthfulness. He was always eminently fair and considerate in the asking of these penetrating questions.

As a youth, and later on as a man, he seemed to be utterly free from all egoistic desire to win an argument merely to experience logical triumph over his fellows, being interested supremely in just one thing: to proclaim everlasting truth and thus effect a fuller revelation of the eternal God.

After the evening meal at Bethany he again declined to join the merry circle but instead went to the garden, where he lingered long into the night, vainly endeavoring to think out some definite plan of approach to the problem of his lifework and to decide how best he might labor to reveal to his spiritually blinded countrymen a more beautiful concept of the heavenly Father and so set them free from their terrible bondage to law, ritual, ceremonial, and musty tradition.

[Reproduced in part from the celestial revelation given to humans of 20th century and later: Paper-124 and 125 of the Urantia Book. It would be a wonderful experience to all those desirous and curious of knowing more about the life and teachings of Jesus and much more regarding God, humans and the purpose of life! Click the flower on the right panel to know more!]

The Sea of Glass that was Revealed to the Author of the Revelations of the Bible: Know More About It !

The last book of the Bible is the mysterious book of the Revelations. This book was written by the youngest disciple of Jesus Christ. What he describes in the book is about the visions that he had while he spent his time as a lonely prisoner in one of the islands called Patmos. The book is perhaps considered as the most mysterious books of the Bible about which Christian scholars have been debating for centuries.

I too have read this book many times and was laboring hard to know more about many of those visions about which St.John had written.

I was too puzzled to know more about the 'Sea of Glass' about which John wrote twice in his book:

" Also in front of the throne there was what looked like a sea of glass, clear as crystal.

In the center, around the throne, were four living creatures, and they were covered with eyes, in front and in back." [Revelations 4:6]

"And I saw what looked like a sea of glass glowing with fire and, standing beside the sea, those who had been victorious over the beast and its image and over the number of its name. They held harps given them by God" [Revelation 15:2]

And what is this, this sea of glass ?

I searched the internet to know what knowledgeable scholars say about it. And I got some answers like this:

[Click this link to read one such opinion here!] But the author obviously does not have a clear answer!

But fortunately, I have found the answer.

Again through a Book of Revelation now known as the Fifth Epochal Revelation (FER) to mankind. Just as some celestial beings were responsible for showing the visions to St.John some 2000 years ago, this time too, some celestial beings had been responsible to make us understand these things.

The new book of revealed knowledge is my favorite book of life guidance now, about which I had written many times in my earlier blogs. 

Now let us see, what my favorite book tells us about the sea of glass. Let me reproduce some of the quotations from this book for you:

" John the Revelator saw a vision of the arrival of a class of advancing mortals from the seventh mansion world to their first heaven, the glories of Jerusem. He recorded: “And I saw as it were a sea of glass mingled with fire; and those who had gained the victory over the beast that was originally in them and over the image that persisted through the mansion worlds and finally over the last mark and trace, standing on the sea of glass, having the harps of God, and singing the song of deliverance from mortal fear and death.” (Perfected space communication is to be had on all these worlds; and your anywhere reception of such communications is made possible by carrying the “harp of God,” a morontia contrivance compensating for the inability to directly adjust the immature morontia sensory mechanism to the reception of space communications.) [The Urantia Book 47:10.2] 

" The Edentia sea of glass is one enormous circular crystal about one hundred miles in circumference and about thirty miles in depth. This magnificent crystal serves as the receiving field for all transport seraphim and other beings arriving from points outside the sphere; such a sea of glass greatly facilitates the landing of transport seraphim. 

A crystal field on this order is found on almost all architectural worlds; and it serves many purposes aside from its decorative value, being utilized for portraying superuniverse reflectivity to assembled groups and as a factor in the energy-transformation technique for modifying the currents of space and for adapting other incoming physical-energy streams." [ The Urantia Book 43:1.10-11 ]

" As you ascend the mansion worlds one by one, they become more crowded with the morontia activities of advancing survivors. As you go forward, you will recognize more and more of the Jerusem features added to the mansion worlds. The sea of glass makes its appearance on the second mansonia." [The Urantia Book 47:4.3]

Perhaps you felt some difficulty in understanding some new words in the above quoted passages. Of course, they are new revelations and one can know and understand those new revealed names and words by learning and reading this great book of revelation that mankind has ever got.

And my attempt is to make this book known to those who are desirous of knowing those knowledge. 

Does such a desire got initiated in your mind ? 

You may visit my Urantia-India Website for more information. 

What is Morontia Material and Morontia Life ?

The word 'morontia' is not to be found in the English dictionary that we have today. But if you use any of the search engines of internet such as the Google, there are chances that you come across thousands of references to this word.[ It is done for you to see- just click this !]

Infact this word and its definitions are not of human origin. It is a new word defined in the Urantia Book. Now, there is a chance that you might not have even heard of this book either. Anyway, as far as I am concerned, I am a very serious reader and student of this mysterious, but fascinating book. To know more about this book please visit my urantia-india website that I have created to introduce this book to those who have not heard of it earlier.

So, the word morontia is a term explained in detail in the Urantia Book. The details of that in the book is too elaborate that one might get lost in reading and understanding that directly from the Urantia Book. Ofcourse that is the best method, provided you are a curious one to know the secrets of our vast universe and the varied life forms that it might contain. Unfortunately, many of you have got no time, patience and curiosity in such abundance !

The Urantia Book explains energy and existence in three different realms or phases. Just as water exist in three phases, namely gaseous (water vapour), liquid (water) and solid (ice) energy and its variations also exist in three phases or realms. Water in gaseous form is not normally visible to us. But that does not mean that it is non existent. There are now ways in which we can prove its existence, though many of our ancestors didnot have that scientific mind to give such proofs.

So, according to the Urantia Book (the contents of the book are intellectually a bit above the present grasping power of many of the present day humans as the source of authorship of the subject papers of the book comes from a higher level of intellectual existence !) the three realms of existence are:

1. Material ( Both energy and material that are visible and perceivable by us ) : So, all elements and all material formed of those elements, the energy that we derive from these materials or the energy that we get from visible celestial bodies such as the sun all come under this realm. Here too, there are many things which are invisible to us. For example, we cannot see light and radiations having wavelengths lower or higher than the visible spectrum.

2. Spiritual ( Both spiritual energy and material that are totally incomprehensible to our normal senses). This realm is the original source of all energy and matter according to the Urantia Book. The fundamental particle that make up the electron is an ultimaton and the ultimaton is a conglomeration of primordial spiritual forces or energy. 100 ultimatons constitute one electron and perhaps this is the so-called 'God's Particle' that our scientists are searching to discover ! [To know more about it you may read my blog titled: God's Particle Discovery : What Caused Our Scientists To Be So Jubilant ?]

3. Morontial (Both energy and matter that exist in a realm that is between the visible material and invisible spiritual realms) So, morontia matter and morontia energy is a type of existence between spiritual and material realms or phases. But this existence also gains its source of energy from the spiritual realm. That means, morontia matter is also made up of fundamental particles that are made up of ultimatons made from spiritual energy or forces. Morontia elements are 200 in all as compared to our natural elements that are about 100 in all. The morontia matter has an electronic configuration that operates at a different, perhaps lower, energy level orbits as compared to the elements of our earth and sun.

Now just as life can exist in material bodies, just as in us humans , life can exist in morontia bodies and spiritual bodies. Intelligent life forms exist in all the three realms. The highest forms exist in the spiritual realms.

Just as there are various types or orders of material life, there are various orders of morontial and spiritual lives. The highest and the original intelligent life which caused all other lives to take shape later is that incomprehensible and infinite source of universe power that we identify as the Universal Father God.

Personality is a unique and special feature of intelligent life and this comes from God. Personality of intelligent living beings in the lowest material realm can survive even after their material bodies are lost during material death under certain conditions of survival as set forth by the universal laws of God.

A material personality who survives material death migrates first to morontia realm and then to spiritual realm. In this case the personality remains intact, though the existence may be in different form of body made of either morontia matter or spiritual matter.

Such personality survivals are managed and administered by innumerable orders of intelligent beings who exist in morontia and spiritual realms and work according to the laws of God.

The lowly material being who survives and migrates to higher levels is given various responsibilities and works according to his ability and experience in later times. During this process he or she might get different kinds of bodies in morontia or spiritual materials and his personality improves in experience, calibre and perfection.

So an intelligent material being like the human being has the potential to live infinitely retaining his original personality but gaining in experience and perfection even after lose of the material body during the first physical death. In later times too his bodies might change from time to time during the process of translations for improvement of life.

Lower forms of material life and those intelligent material beings who willingly adopt to lead a life equivalent to a low and unworthy life may not be found suitable for personality survival in which case such lives cease to exist after physical death.

The simple rule for personality survival is the desire to lead a life willingly according to the will of God which simply means leading a life desirous of doing good and achieving progressive perfection just as God is perfect.

Death is a temporary transition period for all such intelligent material beings such as human beings. While they are dead, their personality essence is preserved and kept in the safe custody of superior beings whose job is just that. They get new morontial bodies in a morontia world some time later and they continue their life further in stage wise progression to ages upon ages ultimately getting spiritual material bodies which are practically indistructible and capable of being in the presence of the ultimate power of God.

Normal material does not offer any resistance to morontia material and hence morontia material can easily pass through normal materials. But they may be made to be like normal materials with some energy adaptations. Similarly they are  invisible to the short range vision of human beings. However, by certain energy adaptations they could be made visible to human eyes. However, spiritual materials or bodies are much more difficult to be brought into the vision of humans.

The Urantia Book explains that the resurrected body of Jesus Christ was not his original human body, but a look-alike body made of morontia material. That was the reason why resurrected Jesus was both visible and invisible to humans and also was able to pass through material enclosures and walls while some could actually feel him as a genuine person in fleshy body. Jesus remained in his morontia form for some time on earth and in the morontia worlds later to adopt his original spiritual body.

My dear friend, our universe is a treasure house of wonders for not only we human beings of earth, but also for thousands of other material beings living in many other worlds far away from our earth.

It is not possible for us to ever visit to those far away worlds in our material bodies because of the limitations of time taken for travel. We have to be dematerialised and projected to far away spheres if at all we have to be in such places.

Death is part of such a dematerialization process planned by God, the universal creator. Death also makes it possible for God to test the ability of those who could be passed for the dematerialized projection to other worlds.

Even NASA would not be selecting astronauts with out intensive testing for space travel !


[Please also take some time to come back and read my previous  blogs and blogs on other topics as well. You can reach to those by clicking the links in this page. I would be happy if you take some time to express your views using the comments facility down below. Please  use the same comment facility to interact with me for any doubts or clarifications that you might have. Here is the page link which gives the   list of all my blogs  where you can open all my blog titles.]

Did Jesus Die on the Cross for the Redemption of Our Sins ? Its Time to Think Differently !

The following statements are observations made by the non-human celestial authors of my favorite book of life guidance as quoted from the relevant pages of that book. These statements explain the meanings of the death of Jesus Christ on the cross at Golgotha in the present day Israel on the after noon of Friday, the 7th April 0030 and the lessons that should be understood in a different perspective altogether.

Nevertheless, these meanings and lessons can only be appreciated  by open-minded and spiritually enlightened human beings of earth. It would be non-palatable to a good majority of human beings, including even the Christians. The Christians who follow a religion that came into existence in the name of Jesus Christ, are taught differently about the meaning and purpose of the death of Jesus Christ and it would pose much difficulty for them to accept the following which apparently look as contradictory to their faith based on biblical teachings written by the apostles.

I know that there are millions of such people for whom it is extremely difficult to digest any thing which is not based on the texts they consider as sacred, even when such information are intellectually and spiritually superior and good. That makes their minds closed to such an extent that they are reluctant to listen to the voice of God himself. They are too scared to open their eyes and ears lest they might be entrapped by Satan, even when God calls them.

It is indeed a dilemma for simple human beings. They are somehow not capable of using their God given wisdom and intelligence to differentiate evil from good, bad from good and Satanic verses from God's words. In such a scenario, they prefer to close their mind to any thing new. They are content with the traditions and the legacy of their old teachings. Adding to their complexity and confusion are the willful twists and clever manipulations of ideas and texts that are aimed at them day in and day out by forces with vested interests in doing so.

I leave it to the wisdom of the readers to judge, if at all they dare to read these !

You may perhaps also like to read the earlier parts of this series of blogs by clicking the 'Older Post' link at the bottom of this page

Now you may read what the celestial authors of my favorite book had observed about the death of Jesus Christ in the following passages (Pl note, it is their words and not mine ! I have only changed the para breaks, the italicized words in brackets and a few highlighting in bold print or underlining):

Although Jesus did not die this death on the cross to atone for the racial guilt of mortal man nor to provide some sort of effective approach to an otherwise offended and unforgiving God; even though the Son of Man did not offer himself as a sacrifice to appease the wrath of God and to open the way for sinful man to obtain salvation; notwithstanding that these ideas of atonement and propitiation are erroneous, nonetheless, there are significances attached to this death of Jesus on the cross which should not be overlooked.

It is a fact that Urantia (earth) has become known among other neighboring inhabited planets as the “World of the Cross.”

Jesus desired to live a full mortal life in the flesh on Urantia.

Death is, ordinarily, a part of life.

Death is the last act in the mortal drama.

In your well-meant efforts to escape the superstitious errors of the false interpretation of the meaning of the death on the cross, you should be careful not to make the great mistake of failing to perceive the true significance and the genuine import of the Master’s death.

Mortal man was never the property of the archdeceivers (such as Satan or Lucifer).

Jesus did not die to ransom man from the clutch of the apostate rulers and fallen princes (like Lucifer) of the spheres (other worlds in the universe).

The Father in heaven (Universal Father God)  never conceived of such crass injustice as damning a mortal soul because of the evil-doing of his ancestors.

Neither was the Master’s death on the cross a sacrifice which consisted in an effort to pay God a debt which the race of mankind had come to owe him.

Before Jesus lived on earth, you might possibly have been justified in believing in such a God, but not since the Master lived and died among your fellow mortals.

Moses taught the dignity and justice of a Creator God; but Jesus portrayed the love and mercy of a heavenly Father.

The animal nature—the tendency toward evil-doing—may be hereditary, but sin is not transmitted from parent to child.

Sin is the act of conscious and deliberate rebellion against the Father’s will and the Sons’ laws by an individual will creature.

Jesus lived and died for a whole universe, not just for the races of this one world (earth).

While the mortals of the realms (the worlds) had salvation even before Jesus lived and died on Urantia (earth), it is nevertheless a fact that his bestowal on this world greatly illuminated the way of salvation; his death did much to make forever plain the certainty of mortal survival after death in the flesh.

Though it is hardly proper to speak of Jesus as a sacrificer, a ransomer, or a redeemer, it is wholly correct to refer to him as a savior. He forever made the way of salvation (survival) more clear and certain; he did better and more surely show the way of salvation for all the mortals of all the worlds of the universe of Nebadon.

When once you grasp the idea of God as a true and loving Father, the only concept which Jesus ever taught, you must forthwith, in all consistency, utterly abandon all those primitive notions about God as an offended monarch, a stern and all-powerful ruler whose chief delight is to detect his subjects in wrongdoing and to see that they are adequately punished, unless some being almost equal to himself should volunteer to suffer for them, to die as a substitute and in their stead.

The whole idea of ransom and atonement is incompatible with the concept of God as it was taught and exemplified by Jesus of Nazareth.

The infinite love of God is not secondary to anything in the divine nature.

All this concept of atonement and sacrificial salvation is rooted and grounded in selfishness.

Jesus taught that service to one’s fellows is the highest concept of the brotherhood of spirit believers. Salvation should be taken for granted by those who believe in the fatherhood of God.

The believer’s chief concern should not be the selfish desire for personal salvation but rather the unselfish urge to love and, therefore, serve one’s fellows even as Jesus loved and served mortal men.

Neither do genuine believers trouble themselves so much about the future punishment of sin.

The real believer is only concerned about present separation from God.

True, wise fathers may chasten their sons, but they do all this in love and for corrective purposes. They do not punish in anger, neither do they chastise in retribution.

Even if God were the stern and legal monarch of a universe in which justice ruled supreme, he certainly would not be satisfied with the childish scheme of substituting an innocent sufferer for a guilty offender.

The great thing about the death of Jesus, as it is related to the enrichment of human experience and the enlargement of the way of salvation, is not the fact of his death but rather the superb manner and the matchless spirit in which he met death.

This entire idea of the ransom of the atonement places salvation upon a plane of unreality; such a concept is purely philosophic.

Human salvation is real; it is based on two realities which may be grasped by the creature’s faith and thereby become incorporated into individual human experience: the fact of the fatherhood of God and its correlated truth, the brotherhood of man.

It is true, after all, that you are to be “forgiven your debts, even as you forgive your debtors.”

The cross of Jesus portrays the full measure of the supreme devotion of the true shepherd for even the unworthy members of his flock.

It forever places all relations between God and man upon the family basis.

God is the Father; man is his son.

Love, the love of a father for his son, becomes the central truth in the universe relations of Creator and creature—not the justice of a king which seeks satisfaction in the sufferings and punishment of the evil-doing subject.

The cross forever shows that the attitude of Jesus toward sinners was neither condemnation nor condonation, but rather eternal and loving salvation.

Jesus is truly a savior in the sense that his life and death do win men over to goodness and righteous survival.

Jesus loves men so much that his love awakens the response of love in the human heart.

Love is truly contagious and eternally creative.

Jesus’ death on the cross exemplifies a love which is sufficiently strong and divine to forgive sin and swallow up all evil-doing.

Jesus disclosed to this world a higher quality of righteousness than justice—mere technical right and wrong.

Divine love does not merely forgive wrongs; it absorbs and actually destroys them.

The forgiveness of love utterly transcends the forgiveness of mercy.

Mercy sets the guilt of evil-doing to one side; but love destroys forever the sin and all weakness resulting therefrom.

Jesus brought a new method of living to Urantia (earth). He taught us not to resist evil but to find through him a goodness which effectually destroys evil.

The forgiveness of Jesus is not condonation; it is salvation from condemnation.

Salvation does not slight wrongs; it makes them right.

True love does not compromise nor condone hate; it destroys it.

The love of Jesus is never satisfied with mere forgiveness.

The Master’s love implies rehabilitation, eternal survival.

It is altogether proper to speak of salvation as redemption if you mean this eternal rehabilitation.

Jesus, by the power of his personal love for men, could break the hold of sin and evil.

He thereby set men free to choose better ways of living.

Jesus portrayed a deliverance from the past which in itself promised a triumph for the future.

Forgiveness thus provided salvation.

The beauty of divine love, once fully admitted to the human heart, forever destroys the charm of sin and the power of evil.

The sufferings of Jesus were not confined to the crucifixion.

In reality, Jesus of Nazareth spent upward of twenty-five years on the cross of a real and intense mortal existence. The real value of the cross consists in the fact that it was the supreme and final expression of his love, the completed revelation of his mercy.

On millions of inhabited worlds, tens of trillions of evolving creatures who may have been tempted to give up the moral struggle and abandon the good fight of faith, have taken one more look at Jesus on the cross and then have forged on ahead, inspired by the sight of God’s laying down his incarnate life in devotion to the unselfish service of man.

The triumph of the death on the cross is all summed up in the spirit of Jesus’ attitude toward those who assailed him.

He made the cross an eternal symbol of the triumph of love over hate and the victory of truth over evil when he prayed,

“Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

That devotion of love was contagious throughout a vast universe; the disciples caught it from their Master.

The very first teacher of his gospel who was called upon to lay down his life in this service, said, as they stoned him to death,

“Lay not this sin to their charge.”

The cross makes a supreme appeal to the best in man because it discloses one who was willing to lay down his life in the service of his fellow men.

Greater love no man can have than this: that he would be willing to lay down his life for his friends—and Jesus had such a love that he was willing to lay down his life for his enemies, a love greater than any which had hitherto been known on earth.

On other worlds, as well as on Urantia (earth), this sublime spectacle of the death of the human Jesus on the cross of Golgotha has stirred the emotions of mortals, while it has aroused the highest devotion of the angels.

When thinking men and women look upon Jesus as he offers up his life on the cross, they will hardly again permit themselves to complain at even the severest hardships of life, much less at petty harassments and their many purely fictitious grievances.

His life was so glorious and his death so triumphant that we are all enticed to a willingness to share both. There is true drawing power in the whole bestowal of Michael, from the days of his youth to this overwhelming spectacle of his death on the cross.

Make sure, then, that when you view the cross as a revelation of God, you do not look with the eyes of the primitive man nor with the viewpoint of the later barbarian, both of whom regarded God as a relentless Sovereign of stern justice and rigid law-enforcement.

Rather, make sure that you see in the cross the final manifestation of the love and devotion of Jesus to his life mission of bestowal upon the mortal races of his vast universe.

See in the death of the Son of Man the climax of the unfolding of the Father’s divine love for his sons of the mortal spheres.

The cross thus portrays the devotion of willing affection and the bestowal of voluntary salvation upon those who are willing to receive such gifts and devotion.

There was nothing in the cross which the Father required—only that which Jesus so willingly gave, and which he refused to avoid.

If man cannot otherwise appreciate Jesus and understand the meaning of his bestowal on earth, he can at least comprehend the fellowship of his mortal sufferings. No man can ever fear that the Creator does not know the nature or extent of his temporal afflictions.

We know that the death on the cross was not to effect man’s reconciliation to God but to stimulate man’s realization of the Father’s eternal love and his Son’s unending mercy, and to broadcast these universal truths to a whole universe.

[As told by the invisible authors of the Urantia Book and quoted from it. To know more about this wonderful book of non human origin, visit my  urantia-India website. Reproduced for those interested in knowing the  meaning of the mortal death of Jesus Christ on the cross on earth while the Christians observe the lent season of fasting and prayers in this year, 2013 in commemoration of his death on the cross and subsequent resurrection ]

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