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August 10th, 1915
Received: by James Padgett.
Washington D.C.
Lot, of the Old Testament.
I come because I now am a follower of the Master, and want to add
my testimony to that of others of olden times who have written you
that Jesus is alive and the ruler in the Celestial Heavens, and
is now working among men and spirits to show them the way to eternal
life, and the Divine Love of the Father.
I am not a Hebrew who would have denied him had I lived when he
came to the earth for in my thoughts and belief, I expected the
coming of the Messiah and to me Jesus was that Messiah in all the
qualities and spiritual possessions that I expected him to have.
Of course, when I lived we had not the privilege of knowing what
the Divine Love of the Father means, - we only knew that there was
a God and that God loved us as we thought, as His chosen people
and wanted us to live correct lives on earth, and thereby receive
His blessings as mortals, and all the rewards that an obedient life
might bring to us. But as to this Greater Love which makes angels
of us all who possesses it, we had no knowledge, nor had we ever
been taught by our seers or prophets that such a Love existed and
as I now know the privilege of obtaining it did not then exist.
Only with the coming of Jesus came that Love again to man and spirits.
But God had for us a natural love in contradistinction to the Divine
Love and we had for Him a love which when fully purified makes us
spirits with a happiness that is beyond all conception of human
happiness. But even of that happiness we were not taught, and only
did we have glimpses in the teachings of our prophets that such
happiness might exist in the future life.
I was a lover of God as I then understood what God was; but such
love was not that which arose from my conception of Him as a tender
loving Father, but more as a stern wrathful God - one of jealousy
and always watchful and ready to punish for disobedience to His
commands. And yet we also learned that when we obeyed Him and did
His will He would reward us.
So you see the God of my days and the God of the present, as we
now conceive Him to be, are not similar. And all men should now
understand and believe that Jesus Christ brought to light, and by
that I mean to the knowledge of men, the possibility of their knowing
the True God of Love and Mercy; and also, that because of that Love
and His Great Mercy in the re-bestowal upon mankind of the possibility
of men becoming possessed of the Divine Love of the Father which
would make them one with Him and with certainty of Immortality.
It was long years after Jesus came before I received this Divine
Love or believed the great truths which Jesus taught. I was so satisfied
in my happiness as a spirit possessing merely this natural love
which had been purified and freed from sin and error, that I thought
there could be no greater love or no greater happiness. But in the
course of time I had reasons to think that there might be another
if not greater love in operation in the spirit world, because of
the wonderful beauty and brightness of some of the spirits that
I at times met. And I started to make investigation of the matter,
and as a result, I learned of this Divine Love, and at last sought
for and found it. And what a treasure I found!
I am now so filled with it, that my happiness is beyond all conception
of not only man, but of spirits who live in lower spheres than I
do.
I must not write more tonight, but I will tell you that I am one
of the many Celestial Spirits who are interested in and now are
engaged in doing the great work for the redemption of mankind.
Jesus is our leader and we are all following him in the effort
to redeem the world, and by that I mean the individuals who comprise
the world. For you must know that redemption is an individual matter
and not one that can be accomplished in the way of redeeming a nation
or a race as a whole.
So you see back of this work is the great power of the Celestial
as well as of the spiritual heavens. I have written enough for tonight.
Well, the incident of my wife turning into a pillar of salt is
like a great many others related in the Old Testament - these incidents
are mere figures of speech used to illustrate some moral or spiritual
truth. My wife was never turned into salt, but died a natural death
and her remains were buried where mine were buried. She is now in
the Celestial Heavens also.
So my dear brother, I must say good night.
Lot
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