Mediumship
On Mediumship, and James Padgett.
While James Padgett was the first1 and primary developed “psychic instrument” used by Jesus to re-deliver his teachings to mankind, there have been and will continue to be others who receive communication from him and his followers in the spirit world. As explained in the messages, the accuracy of these communications depends upon a number of factors, most important of which is the soul development of the psychic instrument. We understand that because of these various factors, Padgett was an exceptionally transparent channel for these Celestial communications. We also understand that there was a rigorous “quality control” active with Padgett, the angels stating that it was their intent not to allow any untruth to be introduced into his writing. If a concept was not stated clearly enough in one message, they would continue to write more messages on the same subject until their thoughts were adequately expressed.
We have learned from experience though, that even highly gifted channels will have “blind spots” where their mind is not able to accurately transmit the thoughts of the spirits; so in reading these messages, understand that there will be occasional errors or inaccurate statements.
To this date we have not discovered any serious errors in Padgett’s mediumship. The information contained in them is internally consistent, as well as being consistent with many passages in the Bible. And of course most importantly, it is consistent with our own experiences and perceptions. But this is not to say that we consider these messages to be “perfect”, and we most definitely do not consider them to be a definitive compendium of all knowledge possessed by the Celestial Angels. In the Angels’ own words, we on earth now possess but a “smattering” of what in the universe remains to be learned.
The growing body of “supplemental messages” received through mediums other than Padgett have not necessarily been delivered with the “zero error” strategy which was used with him, and so it is important to understand that they will more probably contain errors. These errors and inaccuracies are an almost inevitable part of trance mediumship, since the mind of the mortal is still “present” during the channeling, and so is always capable of introducing a word or thought into the writings of the spirit. It apparently is not easy for the spirits to correct a single word or thought during a mediumship session, since such “editing” would tend to break the rapport between moral and spirit, and so it becomes a question of whether the error introduced is serious enough to warrant the cancellation of the entire session. In the supplemental messages it is understood that any errors introduced are not of a critical nature, and so it seems to be a general policy that the Angels allow the errors to stand, trusting that they will be weeded out in the course of time.
In a real sense, the primary purpose of these supplementary messages is the development of a connection of friendship and trust between the angel writers and the mortal readers. While the Angels would of course like all information conveyed through mediums to be free of error, they do not become “perfectionist” about this, their greater concern being the establishment of a loving connection with their brothers and sisters in the flesh.
A prayerful reading of any channeled message will always help one to identify the pearls of truth contained therein. If in your reading you encounter a statement that does not strike you as truth, then perhaps it is not. You are encouraged to voice your concerns in these matters, because it is through such discussion that we are able to identify passages which are “suspect”, and to pool our collective soul’s perceptions to better discern truth from falsehood.
We are constantly submitting questions to the Angels, through the mediums presently working in our church, regarding these areas of confusion, and we continue to receive enlightenment from them. And as time goes on, there undoubtedly will be many more soul-developed mediums working to expand and refine our understanding of the spiritual realms. In truth, the era of verbal communication between the Celestial heavens and mortal earth has only just begun, and patience will be necessary as this new field of endeavor becomes adequately staffed with gifted, dedicated, prayerful mediums.
Ultimately, it must be understood that we each are capable of (and responsible for) developing our own spiritual discernment, and our own relationship with God. The purpose of these messages is simply to offer assistance and encouragement along the way….
1 We acknowledge that in fact Swedenborg was the very first, but by his own acknowledgement he did not communicate that which Jesus had intended.