Divine Revelation
My beloved sons and daughters, many of you are accustomed to receiving instruction from the Spirit that on the one hand increases your knowledge, while on the other it also helps you put into practice what I tell My children. There is nothing wrong with that, for I teach you with the desire and intention that you apply My words in your daily lives.
But it would be even more important if—because you yourselves have recognized this necessity—you grow more and more into a spiritual independence that makes you self-reliant beings, My creatures who have become conscious of the strength and greatness I placed within them. For basically the development of a human soul is subject to the same principles as outward development, which includes manners, conduct, expression, and much more. At some point the influence of the parents ends, and in the reality of the adult world it finally becomes apparent what has been learned and increasingly “developed”—or not.
It is a little different with your spiritual and soul growth, but not very much. You make something of what I convey to you or of what you acquire by other paths—or you do not. If you have truly understood that you are here to learn something, to develop, then there should no longer be any question that you want to contribute your part. And you succeed all the more readily the more willing you are to think along for yourselves and thus gradually grow into a—your—spiritual freedom and independence.
With My revelation today I want to give you an opportunity to practice this a little.
You all know—or more accurately: you say it, for truly knowing it belongs to another “class”—that heaven is love. Feel for a moment what that means: heaven is love! For I am love! This means that your real home—the place you come from and to which you will return—is love. And because like finds like, which is an unshakably valid law, you too are love. In the depths of your nature you are and remain love forever and ever, even though in the course of your immortal life you experience phases that seem to “make you believe” something else.
Have you ever thought about the insights that follow from this fact? I do not exaggerate when I say that if you approach the matter with appropriately trained thinking, all the answers will gradually open to you by themselves. Nor is that surprising, for all of you carry My wisdom within you to a great extent as well. Like so many other divine qualities, it waits to “come to light” and then be able to express itself through you, through your human self, in daily life.
You—every one of you without exception—are much, much more than what is presently expressed on the surface. Many of you have known this too. Whom has it moved to want to become better acquainted with the still unknown spiritual being within? Among other things this includes questioning many things, being critical as well; and where necessary and appropriate, sometimes drawing a consequence even if your brothers and sisters perhaps comment on it with wrinkled noses.
How, for example, could it be possible that I—infinite love without equal—send even a single one of My children into eternal damnation, as some of your religions teach? Consider what that would mean if it were true:
My desire is for My child to return to Me; the child sets his will against Mine and says, explicitly or implicitly through corresponding conduct: “No, I will not.” Then I would have to banish him to hell for all time, even though that is not My will at all. Whose will would then have won?
Now answer for yourselves whether, through your own thinking, you could not also have realized that this teaching is false. And truly, it is not the only false teaching the opposing side has introduced over the course of two thousand years into the simple guide I gave human beings as Jesus of Nazareth to help them return to their true home.
My commandment was and still is: You shall love God, your Father, and your neighbor as yourself!
A human being needs nothing more in order to find again the path I walked before you. I want to awaken more strongly within you the consciousness that love alone is the key to eternity. Those among you who recognize the truth in My words and want to strive to walk even more firmly at My hand than before will rejoice, for little by little they will feel within themselves the freedom for which they have longed for so long, often without knowing it. And in this way, frequently without noticing or knowing it, they will become teachers by whom others orient themselves.
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Or begin with another thought: I am the Source of all life. Everything has come forth from Me, without exception. All are loved infinitely by Me in the same way, regardless of where they live and how they live. And all who—for whatever reasons—presently live outside the pure heavens I will bring back to Me. Why? Because I am love, and because I have the power to do so.
It must therefore be possible for all to observe a rule that leads them back to Me. There cannot be different commandments, regulations, or laws that some perhaps know and others perhaps do not because, for example, they live at another time or in another country or were born into another society.
Use your intellect, My beloved! I am justice!
So there must be one path that all can walk! One commandment that all can fulfill! Always provided that they freely decide to do so—for I force no one. Even when he decides against Me, whether as a soul in the subtle worlds or as a human being in matter, he retains his free will. In that case, however, he lives more strongly in his own law.
Only one commandment? This commandment exists. It is: Love—and nothing else.
Naturally, this went and still goes against the grain for the opposing forces. Such a simple commandment? One that everyone of good will can fulfill? That would mean we would lose our little sheep in droves, or that we would no longer be able to bind people to us so that after their so-called “death” we could receive and hold them in our realm.
So what to do?
Do you believe in My justice, My sons and daughters? Are you prepared to draw the logical conclusions that arise from these considerations? You ask: “Which ones?” I already gave them to you as Jesus of Nazareth when I proclaimed the commandment of love for God and neighbor. This commandment, so often merely spoken without thought, contains not only the call to love but also considerable “explosive force.” It is hidden in the words “… as yourself.” But before I come to that, one other consideration.
When heaven reveals itself to its children, this does not happen “just like that.” What I had and have to say to you was, is, and will always be adapted to the inner development of human beings. You do no differently when raising your children. That is why, as can also be seen in your Old Testament, in earlier times I could not say what became possible for Me at a later time.
The scope of My revelations, their content, and their inner substance should—ideally—have shown an ever greater depth. Things turned out differently because human consciousness—think only of the Middle Ages—became restricted through the intense influence of My opponent and yours. Thus I too had to remain silent or “minimize” My word so that it was just barely understood. More divine wisdom would not have been appropriate and, in your sense of the word, would also have been “deadly” for many of My faithful ones who held unbreakably to Me. Only in recent years and a few decades has heaven been able once again to reach human beings more strongly. You can recognize this also in the multitude of bearers of the word whom I have called.
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Through Jesus I taught love. For the people of that time this was something completely new. That is why they found it difficult. The early Christians, as you call the movement of My first followers, strove to live selfless love, and over the years and decades they succeeded better and better. The goal was to “refine” this way of feeling inwardly, thinking, speaking, and living, among other things by making not only practice in daily life but also My companionship through My revealed word something natural.
You all know that this endeavor did not succeed. Have you ever thought about why things turned out differently? Where the causes lay and still lie today? It can sometimes be very helpful—carefully and under My protection—to place yourselves mentally in the position of the forces of darkness and ask how you yourselves would have proceeded, had you been in their place, to change the new way of thinking and prevent the teaching of love from spreading. Have you ever tried? The answers reveal much to you about human beings, and naturally also much about yourselves.
The new teaching of Jesus was in the world. Nothing could change that anymore. From the perspective of the opposing side there was only one possibility: We cannot prevent the teaching, but we can try to alter it so that it becomes “powerless.” We will succeed little step by little step by making use of respected authorities to whom we give power and whom people believe because they are, or seem to be, cleverer than the common people.
And that is what was done.
Who had any possibility of checking whether this was still the original? Whether I had actually said it that way? And because the changes were carried out over a period of many centuries and, not least, fear was used as well, My simple teaching of love was robbed of its true core and that core replaced by countless prohibitions and regulations. The few of My faithful ones who recognized what had happened and was happening and tried to point out these abuses had no chance of making their word heard. Not infrequently they were silenced.
Thus the teaching of Jesus of Nazareth still officially existed, but it was without its original energy; without the enthusiasm and without the power it would have needed to change the world. Superficially and in the short term, darkness had gained an advantage.
The question still remains as to how the forces of darkness proceeded. The answer is quickly found, because anyone would act this way: they made use of human weaknesses! There is no point in attacking the strong places of an opponent. The clever seducer makes use of weaknesses! Does he know them? Indeed he does. He knows them exactly, and much better than you yourselves know them.
But you do not know him; you do not know how he works. Nor is that a coincidence, for the existence of evil, which is real and often much closer to you than you believe, is very often portrayed falsely; or evil is banished somewhere to “hell,” though no one knows where or what it is.
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I said that the words “… as yourself” in the commandment of love for God and neighbor carry considerable “explosive force.” Have you ever thought about it? Do you want to? Then follow My considerations and let us do so together.
My child, you can give only what you have!
A simple truth that every one of you knows, that everyone accepts, and that also works in your daily life and in living together with your neighbor. How often have you spoken these words without thinking about the deep meaning they contain?
If you live with Me or strive to do so, then you will also want to love your neighbor. But you will succeed only to the degree that you love yourself! “Logical,” you may say, but stop for a moment—do you truly love yourself?
There will surely still be traits of character in you that you yourself do not entirely like. That is completely normal and is not judged by Me, much less condemned. But how could it be possible to accept in your neighbor a trait of character, a pattern of behavior, or conduct that you do not find so good in yourself? Are there not then unconscious judgments or devaluations connected with it, without your knowing it? How can one like something in one’s neighbor that one does not like in oneself?
These are merely considerations intended to make you think a little. They have no other purpose: to think, including about yourself. And then, if it is your will, to decide whether—with My help—you would like to change something.
My commandment of love, as simple as it sounds in principle and as simple as it is in principle compared with your commandments and prohibitions, nevertheless has so many “corners and edges” that it is impossible to present it so comprehensively that even the last question is answered. Hence also this form of revelation:
It is intended to encourage you to grow more and more into your spiritual independence. Sons and daughters who strive for this—even if here and there they sometimes go astray, which is part of it—bring greater joy to My heart than those who take care to fulfill regulations to the letter when it is not even certain that these have their roots in My love.
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Meaningful enlightenment cannot avoid also illuminating the difficulties, the obstacles placed in the way of all who set out to follow the light; especially when enlightenment and the imparting of knowledge are intended to foster independent thinking.
Therefore, My sons and daughters, make yourselves aware again and again that it is not enough to live as a “good person.” Desirable as that is, for a disciple this is too little. So do not be surprised or even frightened by My open words: it is about love, and in a way and with a seriousness that cannot be compared with what was required in earlier times as admonition or appeal.
It is about more. It is about being an example and a help to others in this and the coming time. But that is possible only if you gain another, deeper understanding of My commandment of love.
For I did not say that the key to heaven is found in doing nothing evil. My commandment, to put it in the present short formula, was: Love—and nothing else. And striving for this requires movement, inner movement. For the one who is ready for it, what I call inner work follows inevitably.
It is work—and there is no talking around it—that calls for the whole human being. And it must be done voluntarily and out of love for Me, for your neighbor, and for yourself. Otherwise it is without life and no more than fulfillment of a duty in which the individual points are gradually checked off as completed.
That, My beloved, is not the way to My heart. The way to My heart means: Love! If it were otherwise, My law that like attracts like and unlike repels unlike would not be true. If you cultivate order or prefer patience or seriousness, you do indeed prepare your way to Me, but My heaven, and thus your goal and your home, is called neither order nor patience nor seriousness—even though these qualities are contained in My love. It is called: Love!
We will deepen the subject of “love” more often, for many who are of good will still have many questions:
I am willing; I would like to follow the Lord, but despite all my efforts I often fail. Old programs come up, I feel temptation, and eventually I notice that I have fallen back into earlier faults. How do I get out of them? And in what way do I receive help? How can I recognize myself better and better?
First of all: the strongest power in the universe lies within you! It is My love, anchored forever within every one of My creatures. Here the help is waiting! It waits because it respects your free will. If you turn toward it, then in that very moment it is ready to do far more for you than you believe.
So even when good will is present, it is not enough to praise and glorify Me. In many of your songs, for example, beautiful as they are, this attitude is expressed. Why, to “provoke” you a little (smiles), do you not sing:
“Great God, we love You” instead of “Great God, we praise You”?
I draw you even closer to My heart. Allow it.
Amen
A Song from Long Ago
When—long searching—I found You,
my heart, my life without end,
the house, until then built on sand,
received through You a firm foundation.
What was unfulfilled, only seemingly glad,
began to ask, still hesitantly,
and likewise began to grow
with all Your calling: Live!
You came as light into my world,
You were still small; yet gone was
the darkness that You now made bright,
so that I became seeing and free.
I cannot sing You a lofty song;
it is I who today feels small,
yet I want to bring You the little
that my longing plays for You.
It is a song from long ago,
valid for all eternity;
may it prepare Your way for You,
beloved, holy glory.
I want to give You my small heart,
and more, Beloved: myself for You.
And if You wish, then let it be,
as I am able, also: You through me.
from the poetry collection “Trust the Quiet Sound of Your Heart” (Hans Dienstknecht)