Friendly Epochal Revelation Management

Beloved friends, I give thanks to be able to share with you a fresh treatment of one of my specialty topics in The Urantia Book: epochal revelation management. On this many-sided and debated topic, I’ve been active for over fifty years. Since the early 1970s, the positions in the debate might be summarized this simply. Shall we introduce the book judiciously to others in a quiet and gradual way? Or shall we now courageously and creatively publicize the book, full of truths that the planet so urgently needs? I have recently reviewed my writings on this topic, pruned the list online, and created this new statement.

When I speak of “friendly epochal management,” what I have in mind is this. Those who largely agree with me deserve my best current effort on the topic. And I smile as I think of friends whom I know and love who are my opponents on this topic. Those who disagree with me might still find this essay worthwhile. We live in a friendly universe, and we can make it friendlier if we choose. The authors of the papers have given us abundant information that helps us cooperate with higher wisdom. We can befriend them by doing our best in study and following truth wherever it leads. Finally, we can befriend God by seeking divine wisdom in accord with the conditions of effective prayer (91:9/1002).

After formally launching his public career as a teacher by going to John’s baptism, Jesus went into the wilderness for forty days. But before making his great decisions about how to manage his epochal revelation, he first reviewed the history of our planet. 

Jesus thought over the whole span of human life on Urantia, from the days of Andon and Fonta, down through Adam’s default, and on to the ministry of the Melchizedek of Salem (136:4/1514-16).

We, too, can allow our study of world history to revise our decisions on how we make use of The Urantia Book.

 

Helpful and sobering lessons from the first two epochal revelations

Every epochal revelation goes through phases of preparing for their full functioning. In the first epochal revelation on our world, the Planetary Prince’s staff gathered their human partners, organized their headquarters, and established ten councils to foster the development of planetary civilization. They made progress on food, animal domestication, the conquest of predatory animals, the dissemination and conservation of knowledge, industry and trade, health, art and science, advanced tribal relations, and revealed religion.

I’m inspired by their 300,000 years of success in following the patient, slow, natural, gradual, evolutionary path of wisdom that was theirs to follow (68:0.3/763.3). Here’s the great, helpful lesson that is found in the context of the first epochal revelation. I will put in bold the passages that I believe best orient our approach to epochal revelation management.

The evolution of the religious capacity of receptivity in the inhabitants of a world largely determines their rate of spiritual advancement and the extent of religious revelation. (52:2.3/591.3)

In this essay, we will see this receptivity principle acquire more and more meaning.

 

The second epochal revelation, the Adamic mission, established schools for the offspring of Adam and Eve and their descendants. There was education and training in socialization, horticulture, agriculture, health and care of the body, the golden rule, the relation of individual rights and group rights plus community obligations, the history and culture of the various earth races, methods of advancing and improving world trade, co-ordination of conflicting duties and emotions, and the cultivation of play, humor, and competitive substitutes for physical fighting.

Adam and Eve defaulted when they set aside the wisdom of evolution before they had accomplished the main early phase of their mission. How natural it is for us to become impatient and want to see some results in our own lifetime (75:1.6/840.2)! This next lesson is addressed to every one of us.

Never, in all your ascent to Paradise, will you gain anything by impatiently attempting to circumvent the established and divine plan by short cuts, personal inventions, or other devices for improving on the way of perfection, to perfection, and for eternal perfection (75:8.5/846.4).

This lesson is sobering and universal. Another lesson of the default of Adam and Eve is that the sophistries of personal liberty and planetary freedom of action can infect even those who believe in the Universal Father and intend to contribute to a high planetary destiny.

 

Inspiring and challenging lessons from

the next two epochal revelations

The third epochal revelation was a new type—an exclusively spiritual mission.

Like Jesus, Melchizedek attended strictly to the fulfillment of the mission of his bestowal. He did not attempt to reform the mores, to change the habits of the world, nor to promulgate even advanced sanitary practices or scientific truths. He came to achieve two tasks: to keep alive on earth the truth of the one God and to prepare the way for the subsequent mortal bestowal of a Paradise Son of that Universal Father. (1018.4)

This fascinating comment on planetary history enables us to draw a distinction between two different types of epochal revelation. The first two epochal revelations were spiritual-and-cultural revelations. They came to uplift many aspects of civilization. By contrast, the missions of Melchizedek and Jesus were exclusively spiritual epochal revelations.

The receptivity principle applies to both types of epochal revelation.

Melchizedek taught his followers all they had capacity to receive and assimilate (93.3.6//1016.8).

Melchizedek’s wisdom paved the way for progress by his loyal missionaries.

The early teachers of the Salem religion penetrated to the remotest tribes of Africa and Eurasia, ever preaching Machiventa’s gospel of man’s faith and trust in the one universal God as the only price of obtaining divine favor. Melchizedek’s covenant with Abraham was the pattern for all the early propaganda that went out from Salem and other centers. Urantia has never had more enthusiastic and aggressive missionaries of any religion than these noble men and women who carried the teachings of Melchizedek over the entire Eastern Hemisphere. (94.0.1/1027.1)

Inspired by Melchizedek, these missionaries were progressing well with the Salem gospel in Mesopotamia until one of their leaders decided to undertake a social reform by attacking temple harlotry. In this way, they began functioning in the manner of a spiritual-and-cultural revelation. In the wake of the failure of this effort, the missionaries’ higher spiritual and philosophical teachings went down in defeat (95:1.6-9/1043.1-4).

 

Before Jesus was conscious of having an epochal revelation to manage, as an adolescent becoming an adult, he was naturally discovering insights that were leading him into his mission.

[Jesus was] becoming expert in the divine art of revealing his Paradise Father to all ages and stages of mortal creatures (127:6.15/1405.7).

Jesus was beginning to intuit the many-sided truth of the receptivity principle.

On his tour of the Mediterranean, he had occasion to state this principle explicitly.

The miller he taught about grinding up the grains of truth in the mill of living experience so as to render the difficult things of divine life readily receivable by even the weak and feeble among one’s fellow mortals. Said Jesus: “Give the milk of truth to those who are babes in spiritual perception. In your living and loving ministry serve spiritual food in attractive form and suited to the capacity of receptivity of each of your inquirers.” (133:4.2/1474.2)

After his review of planetary history, Jesus began making his great decisions that would guide the remainder of his epochal revelation. The leading theme of these decisions was his carefully articulated resolve not to use the full powers at his disposal. In particular, his fourth decision expressed his refusal to attract followers by the cheap thrill of fascinating them with an overdose of supernatural power. He would follow “the natural, slow, and sure way of accomplishing the divine purpose” (136:8.5/1521.0). Jesus renounced compromise with the influence of riches and the methods of worldly wisdom used in politics and commerce. Note: this does not imply that all methods used in politics and business are bad.

When Jesus was training his apostles, he added helpful specifics to the receptivity principle.

When you have a man safely and securely within the kingdom, then is the time, when such a one shall come to you with inquiries, to impart instruction having to do with the progressive advancement of the soul within the divine kingdom. . . . When you enter the kingdom, you are reborn. You cannot teach the deep things of the spirit to those who have been born only of the flesh; first see that men are born of the spirit before you seek to instruct them in the advanced ways of the spirit. Do not undertake to show men the beauties of the temple until you have first taken them into the temple. (141:6.2-3/1592.4,6).

Jesus presented this requirement without qualification, not as a lofty ideal to be gradually approached, nor as a high standard for apostles as distinct from disciples. This simple principle about the beauties of the temple challenges our heart, soul, mind, and strength.

After his resurrection, Jesus continued to emphasize the importance of his original gospel, while adding still more specifics to the receptivity principle.

Go, then, into all the world proclaiming this gospel of the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of men to all nations and races and ever be wise in your choice of methods for presenting the good news to the different races and tribes of mankind (191:4.4 / 2042.1).

This and other resurrection appearances makes it abundantly clear that proclaiming the gospel is an imperative for us all (190:4.1/2033.1; 191:6.2/2044.3; 193.0.4/2052.4; 193:1.2/2053.4; 193:2.2/2054.3).

It is abundantly clear that Jesus’ epochal revelation was exclusively spiritual. During the week after Jesus ordained the apostles,

Jesus many times repeated the two great motives of his postbaptismal mission on earth:

1. to reveal the Father to man:
2. to lead men to become son-conscious—to faith-realize that they are the children of the Most High. (140:7.4-6/1578.5-7)

Jesus made many statements of his mission, but they all express the same broad concept.

 

The fifth epochal revelation

The Urantia Book has a large proportion of spiritual content; but it, too, is a spiritual-and-cultural epochal revelation like the first two epochal revelations. This book has papers or sections on physical aspects of the universe, Life Carriers, celestial artisans, planetary mortal epochs, races and eugenics, mind, civilization, human government and the development of the state, marriage and family life, our seraphic planetary government, and paper 195 on the history of the West.

The principle of receptivity is not an absolute guide for us today. If we were to apply it mindlessly, we would cease discussing the book on websites or placing it in bookstores and libraries (though presumably the purpose of making the book publicly available is not to grab the attention of passers-by, but to enable those who are receptive to find it). And when I publish as a scholar and draw on The Urantia Book in a major way, I have an ethical obligation to acknowledge my debt in a footnote.

Despite the fact that the bestowal mission of Jesus is a different kind of epochal revelation than The Urantia Book, we do well to seek instructive analogies between the two. The Master’s public career unfolded in an unforced rhythm of phases. In training his messengers, Jesus combined the new gospel with the study of the existing scriptures of the people with whom they were primarily working. The apostles gained experience in personal ministry before undertaking public efforts (think social media). Then Jesus made every effort to salvage the pre-existing religion—quietly and gradually to take over the work of John the Baptist (144:7.1/1626.2). Then came a phase of more aggressive, public work, oriented primarily, but not exclusively, to the Jews, with persistent efforts to win over the religious leaders. Until the epochal sermon in the last year of his earth career, the epochal fact of Jesus’ combined nature was concealed from the crowds.

Now we are in a position to be receptive to the primary, overall answer to the most important question on the topic of this essay. How does the exclusively spiritual epochal revelation of Jesus connect with The Urantia Book as a spiritual-and-cultural revelation?

Religion does need new leaders, spiritual men and women who will dare to depend solely on Jesus and his incomparable teachings. If Christianity persists in neglecting its spiritual mission while it continues to busy itself with social and material problems, the spiritual renaissance must await the coming of these new teachers of Jesus’ religion who will be exclusively devoted to the spiritual regeneration of men. And then will these spirit-born souls quickly supply the leadership and inspiration requisite for the social, moral, economic, and political reorganization of the world. (195:9.4/2082.9; 154:4.6/1720.3)

In other words, we are to transform planetary civilization—on the basis of Jesus and his teachings.

 

Goals and methods in reading some passages with extra care

Poor reading was partly responsible for the religious leaders’ failure to recognize Jesus’ combined human and divine nature.

The Jews entertained many ideas about the expected deliverer, and each of these different schools of Messianic teaching was able to point to statements in the Hebrew scriptures as proof of their contentions. . . . Many of their reputed Messianic predictions, had they but viewed these prophetic utterances in a different light, would have very naturally prepared their minds for a recognition of Jesus . . .”  (136:1.1,3/1509.3,5).

Some passages that call for extra care are about inspiring goals to strive for now. But we need to distinguish goals from methods. To pursue goals wisely, we do well to interpret them in the light of relevant lessons on method in Parts I and II, relevant statements and stories in Part III, and the earlier lessons of Part IV.

If we take these statements of goals out of context of the book as a whole, they might seem to justify unwise policies of sharing The Urantia Book. But so long as we distinguish enthusiasm about goals from wisdom about methods, we can be inspired by these statements without becoming confused. Our care for wise methods should channel, not block, our enthusiasm. “Jesus was never in a hurry” (171:7.5/1874.8).

We’ll consider a couple inspiring goals beginning with this.

The great hope of Urantia lies in the possibility of a new revelation of Jesus with a new and enlarged presentation of his saving message which would spiritually unite in loving service the numerous families of his present-day professed followers (195:10.16)/2082.2).

This is a goal for now—“present-day” professed followers. The hoped for spiritual unity and loving service are linked to “a new revelation” and “a new and enlarged presentation.” To some degree, these phrases refer to Part IV. But we should also interpret this great hope in the light of a call for volunteers who will devote themselves to the following method—which is also a goal.

The world needs to see Jesus living again on earth in the experience of spirit-born mortals who effectively reveal the Master to all men (195:10.1/2084.1).

 If we are enthusiastic about the great hope and then neglect this method, our enthusiasm might possibly end up like a fruitless branch that has lost its living connection with the vine. It is a lot easier to hand someone a book than to learn to reveal the Master effectively.

In general, Jesus wanted us to learn to live the truth and to love and serve others so that people will be attracted to learn from us (155:1.5/1726.2; 191:5.3/2043.1; 191:6.2/2044.3; 193:2.2/2054.3).

Another inspiring goal is proclaimed here.

The time is ripe to witness the figurative resurrection of the human Jesus from his burial tomb amidst the theological traditions and the religious dogmas of nineteen centuries. . . . What a transcendent service if, through this revelation, the Son of Man should be recovered from the tomb of traditional theology and be presented as the living Jesus to the church that bears his name, and to all other religions! (196:1.2/2090.3; 94:12.7/1041.5)

The time is ripe—now—and the goal is vast in scope. It is inspiring and should also inspire our respect for relevant lessons on method.

And here is the book’s most intriguing statement about what might possibly be coming in our short-term future.

A new and fuller revelation of the religion of Jesus is destined to conquer an empire of materialistic secularism and to overthrow a world sway of mechanistic naturalism. Urantia is now quivering on the very brink of one of its most amazing and enthralling epochs of social readjustment, moral quickening, and spiritual enlightenment. (195:9.2/2082.7)

What is destined will come about sooner or later. But we may also be quivering on a very different brink. There are surprises for which reservists are made ready, plus this warning from a Mighty Messenger.

When culture advances overfast, when material achievement outruns the evolution of worship-wisdom, then does civilization contain within itself the seeds of retrogression; and unless buttressed by the swift augmentation of experiential wisdom, such human societies will recede from high but premature levels of attainment, and the “dark ages” of the interregnum of wisdom will bear witness to the inexorable restoration of the imbalance between self-liberty and self-control (118:8.6/1302.3).

Unfortunately, there is significant evidence that the planet is accelerating its descent into the confusion and chaos of an interregnum. This tendency can hinder receptivity to epochal revelations, making our work more complex. We can join persons or groups who are making genuine progress. But if we find our situation going downhill, we can labor to slow that decline. In either case, we can work to keep the torch of truth shining brightly until global conditions improve.

No matter the circumstances which surround us, we hope to avoid repeating past errors of epochal revelation mismanagement. Peter, Paul, and their successors proclaimed a gospel of belief in the risen Christ. Their religion about Jesus upstaged the religion of Jesus. Today it is common for our beloved influential leaders and others to publicize The Urantia Book as part of their message to the world. To my way of thinking, this is a problematic mixing of gospel and book. It invites unwelcome epochal consequences just as unconsciously, and with intentions just as good as those of Peter and Paul. I would love to be wrong, but what if I am right?

In conclusion, I believe that the time is also ripe to soak in the conditions of effective prayer in 91:9/1002. This practice will nourish our wisdom and friendliness to God, our supervisors, and one another. I assume that this practice is primarily intended for individuals. But in this section, I also think that we can read the word “you” in the plural—and pray in the plural with others everywhere who are also praying with these conditions in mind. Finally, I know that we can pray for someone else’s prayer process.

I pray with you and for you.

9. Conditions of Effective Prayer

If you would engage in effective praying, you should bear in mind the laws of prevailing petitions: