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The
Higher Truths of the Father Can Only Be
Transmitted by the Celestial Spirits Through
a Mortal Who Has Been Prepared by the
Father's Divine Love.
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I AM HERE. John, the Apostle.
I desire to write for a short time tonight upon a subject that I
consider important and you may consider interesting.
As you may know, it has been some time since I wrote anything of a
formal character, and I regret very much that so much time has gone
by without my being able to communicate some of the spiritual
Truths. I also regret that your condition has been such that I was
unable to make the rapport with you that is necessary in order that
I may deliver these messages to you of the nature mentioned.
Well, you have not been in that condition of mind that has enabled
me to make the necessary rapport with you. We must have a mind that
is filled with thoughts of the higher things of Truth, even though
we do not use those thoughts. Our thoughts are all spiritual, and
our Truths can be received only by a mind in a spiritual condition.
And, lately, you have not had so much of this spiritual mind as
formerly. Our contact has not been so close, and the rapport
necessary to enable us to express these spiritual Truths through
your mind has not been so perfect. And when I say “mind,” I merely
mean the organs of the brain as influenced by the thoughts of the
mind. For I will tell you what you may not know: that these
component organs of the brain are not always and under all
conditions receptive of the same control by the minds of spirits.
You may receive a long and profound message of things pertaining to
what you may call the material through your brain; yet, under
similar conditions of these organs, you will not be able to receive
messages of the higher Truths. The conditions of these brain organs
are caused by the condition of the soul in possession of spiritual
things.
It is difficult for me to express just what I intend to convey, but
this you will understand: that the capacity of the human brain to
receive various kinds of messages depends upon the soul's
development and possession of spiritual things. A medium who is
merely intellectual and morally good cannot receive those messages
of the higher Truths, because there can be no rapport between the
brain of such a medium and the mind of the higher spirit who may
desire to communicate. And, thus, you will understand why it is that
the messages from the earthbound spirits, or from those who have
merely the intellectual development, are so vastly and more
frequently received by mediums than messages from spirits of the
soul development.
A spiritual thought—I mean a thought which can come only from a
spirit who has the development of the soul that makes the soul
divine—cannot possibly pass through a human brain which has never
been developed by a soul in which the Divine Love has entered and
worked Its regenerating powers. Material thoughts may be conveyed
through a brain that is purely material, moral thoughts through a
brain which has been influenced by moral truths, and spiritual
thoughts through a brain which has assimilated those Truths that
come only with the development of the soul by the Divine Love. This
is the Law of Rapport and Communication.
And this Law of Rapport and Communication, if you will try to
understand it, will enable you to comprehend the reason why we have
not been able to communicate these higher Truths.
It may seem to you that if we control your brain and not use or
transmit your thoughts, but only the thoughts which come from our
minds, it would be immaterial what the nature of our thoughts might
be; and that, as your brain is used by us as a mere instrument, we,
having possession of your brain, would have the power to write
anything we might desire. And, upon a mere superficial glance at the
assertion, this could be reasonably supposed to be true.
But, as we have told you before, rapport and our ability to use your
brain are governed by laws. And one of these laws is that a high
thought cannot be transmitted through a human brain which is not in
the condition that qualifies it to receive the thought—just as the
brain, in matters pertaining to mere material knowledge, cannot
receive a conception or comprehension of some intellectual truth
with which it has not had acquaintance and transmit it. A brain
cannot be used by the mind of a human to make known a problem in
geometry when the brain has never been used by that mind to acquire
an acquaintance with, or knowledge of, the principles of geometry.
This is an incomplete analogy, but it may serve to illustrate what I
mean.
In the conception by the human mind of a truth, material or
spiritual, the brain must be used in order to manifest or make known
that conception. This is absolutely true where the idea or thought
originates in the mind of the man who is using his own brain to
formulate or manifest that idea or thought. The mind may have the
thought or knowledge of some branch of learning; yet, when it has
never used the brain to put that thought or knowledge into concrete
form, the brain cannot manifest or transmit it. This law applies
specifically to the capabilities of the brain where the man's own
mind attempts to use or control it. And you will see from this that
it is possible for the human mind to have thought and knowledge of
things which the brain cannot express—at least not immediately.
In many of your material things of life, such as with great
inventions, the knowledge of these inventions is dormant in the
mind. And it may be a long time before this knowledge is formulated
and expressed by the brain. Sometimes, it never gets through the
brain at all. The mind and the brain are not one and equivalent
things. The one is the operator, and the other is the thing used to
operate with so that the possessions of the operator may become
manifested to others.
But this law, applying to and controlling the relationship of the
mind and brain possessed by the same man, does not so absolutely
apply to and control the relationship of mind and brain where the
mind is that of a spirit and the brain is that of a mortal. For, in
such case, the spirit mind may take such complete control of the
mortal brain that the former's manifestations are not governed or
limited by the special experiences or want of experiences which the
mortal brain may have had in its use by the mortal mind along
specific lines of expression or manifestation. Thus, as you may
know, and as it has been demonstrated by the work and experience of
many human mediums, the minds of spirits have controlled the brains
of these mediums so that such brains have transmitted the spirits'
expressions of various kinds of languages and mathematical truths
with which such mortal brains have never had any acquaintance, or
have never assimilated and expressed on their own before.
But, in these instances, the brain is used merely in the sphere of
intellect. And the spirit who takes possession of a mortal brain,
and uses it to express and make known the knowledge of his own
spirit mind, is doing no different thing, in essentials, than what
the human mind, controlling its own brain, could have done had the
brain been exercised in those directions. The capacity of the brain,
whether exercised or not by the human mind, limits the power of the
spirit to control it in the manner and for the intellectual purposes
mentioned.
But this law has a further phase, and that is: The greater the
general experience of the brain in its exercise by the human mind,
the more perfectly can the spirit mind control it. All this is
dependent upon facts which I cannot linger here to explain, such as
the mediumistic qualities and susceptibilities of the human whose
brain the spirit is attempting to control.
And the same laws apply to the disclosure of truth and principles
along the moral planes. A spirit cannot possibly use the brain of a
mortal to convey, or transmit through it, moral precepts or truths
that that brain is not capable of receiving. And I do not mean by
this that the brain must have had acquaintance with any or many
particular moral truths, or must have been used by the human for the
purpose of receiving or imparting these precepts. But, in its
essential capacity, the brain must be potentially able to transmit
and receive these truths. And, so, the relative capacity of the
brain to receive and transmit these moral truths necessarily limits
the control of the spirit to express such truths through it.
The rapport of the spirit with the human is determined by the
development of the brain and the moral qualities of the human at the
time the rapport is attempted. And this means the actual development
of these conditions, and not what they may appear to be to other
humans, or even to the individual, himself. And, to a large extent,
this development determines the power of the spirit to use the
mortal brain to disclose the truths, either intellectual or moral.
A medium can receive only such truths as his inner development
permits. And a spirit can form a rapport with a medium only
according to the extent and nature of the truths the medium
possesses. The possibility of rapport, and the kind thereof, lie at
the foundation of mediumship. And these stated variables are what
determine and limit both the power of the spirit to convey its
thoughts and the capacity of the mortal to receive them.
The spirit who attempts to write through a medium can form a rapport
when the medium's condition harmonizes with his own. Unless this
harmony exists, it is impossible for the spirit to write those
things which require a greater degree of development than the medium
possesses at that time. Hence, you will understand in a way why so
few of the higher spiritual Truths have ever been delivered to the
world through the mediumship of any mortal who has been possessed of
gifts of either automatic writing, as it is called, or clairvoyance
or inspirational powers.
As to those truths which did not require a higher degree of
development than was possessed by the medium, there arose no
difficulty in transmitting the same. And many mediums have been very
successful in receiving the truth suited to their condition. And
this fact, and law also, will explain to you why the same spirit may
communicate through several mediums and, yet, the communications are
of a dissimilar character. That is, the communications through one
medium contain a higher or lower character of truth than those
transmitted through some other medium, with the result that those
mortals who have heard or read these different communications,
especially when critical, have been prone to believe that the same
spirit was not making both communications. But this is not a just
conclusion. For while the spirit was in the same
condition—possessing the same knowledge—at the time of both
communications, yet, the mediums, because of their difference in
development, were unable to receive the same character of messages.
YOU MAY SEARCH THE WHOLE HISTORY OF SPIRIT COMMUNICATION AND OF
MEDIUMSHIP, AND YOU WILL NOT FIND ANY MESSAGES OF THE CHARACTER OF
THOSE THAT HAVE BEEN TRANSMITTED THROUGH YOU, AND FOR THE REASONS
THAT I HAVE STATED.
Swedenborg was the last and nearer perfect instrument for receiving
these higher Truths. And, yet, he, because of his want of soul
development and his being bound more or less by his orthodox beliefs
and scientific knowledge (that caused him to coordinate and fit in
these Truths with his ideas of correspondence and such like
conceptions) was a failure. And he could not be used successfully to
transmit these Truths which we have been communicating through you.
And, after him, other gifted and, in some respects, successful
mediums were used by spirits of the higher knowledge and progression
to convey Truths. But their conditions were such that, under the
workings of the laws governing rapport, these mediums could receive
only those truths which their conditions of development permitted
them to receive. The workings of this limitation were not dependent
upon the condition and ability of the spirits to impart these higher
Truths, but upon the capacity of the mediums to receive them.
You, yourself, have had experience as to how this law works and
controls spirit communication and rapport. For, as you know, it has
been a long time since you were able to receive any spirit messages
of these higher Truths, although the spirits have been present with
you many times, ready and anxious to make the rapport and deliver
their messages. And you have been willing, intellectually, to
receive them. But because of your condition, or want of condition,
the spirits could not deliver them, and were compelled to wait until
you got into the necessary condition.
From all this, you will comprehend why so very few messages
containing high spiritual Truths, or even moral truths, come through
mediums. The mediums, mostly, are so developed that they can receive
only messages dealing with the material affairs of life. These kinds
of messages, I am compelled to (and can truthfully) say, are those
that are largely desired by mortals seeking information from the
spirit world.
Again, in your reading of spiritual literature, you may have
observed the great diversity of opinions of spirits upon the same
subject, and sometimes contradictory opinions, thus causing doubt on
the part of mortals as to what are the facts existing in the spirit
world regarding the subject of inquiry. Well, this is due very
largely to the conditions of the mediums, and also to the knowledge
of the spirits who attempt to communicate. For the knowledge of
spirits is limited by the extent of their progress and development.
Many spirits believe that what they have learned is true, and so
give authoritative expression to the facts of this knowledge. And
they often believe that what they know is all that may be known
about the subject upon which they communicate. And these spirits are
mostly honest in their beliefs, and truthful, as they think, in
their messages. And, thus, it is well for mortals to understand that
everything written or spoken by spirits is not to be accepted as the
finality of truth at all times. On the other hand, apparently
contradictory statements should not be taken as fraudulent merely
because they are contradictory. A spirit with greater knowledge,
using a medium in harmony with itself, can convey to men the more
exact and greater extent of truth than can a spirit with less
knowledge and development who uses a medium in harmony with itself.
Now, from what I have written, it is apparent that, in order to get
the greater Truth and more extended knowledge of the spirit world,
mediums should make the effort to obtain larger and more intensive
development of their spiritual natures, as well as of their
intellectual capacities. This acquirement is absolutely necessary to
the reception of the higher Truths which are so vital to mankind.
So, you see, communication and rapport depend upon the condition of
both spirits and mortals working in unison, though more, I may say,
upon the condition of the mortal. For if the medium is in the proper
state of development, there always being many spirits present with
that medium in condition and readiness, a rapport can be made.
The Master is here tonight and has heard my communication and unites
with me in saying: “Have faith and seek with all your soul for this
Love!” Believe that I am your special angel friend.
Your brother in Christ,
JOHN.
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