Angelic Revelations—the Gospel of God’s Love
Chapter 16
Truths of the
Spirit World—
The Hells
Probation Does Exist Among Spirits in the Hells (Jesus)
Hell and the Duration of Punishment (Paul)
There Are No Devils and No Satan, Considered as Real Persons and Fallen Angels (Jesus)
Luke Comments on the Spirit Writing: "It Is Hard to Learn of Heavenly Things in Hell"
Truths of the
Spirit World—
The Hells
The Spirits Who Have Little Development of Soul Can Help Those Who Have Less Development than Themselves
I am here, John the Apostle
I want to tell you tonight about the things that spirits who have not received the Divine Love of the Father do, or have done to them, as you may say, in order to get out of their darkness and suffering, and progress to a happier condition.
Well, when these spirits of evil or sinful life first come into the spirit world, they enter what is called the earth plane; and when I say "earth plane," I mean those spheres which are nearest the earth, and partake very largely of the material. They are received by their friends who may have been with them at the time of their passing, and to a certain extent are comforted and made familiar with their surroundings. This may last for a shorter or longer time, depending upon the spirit's capacity to understand his changed condition from mortal to spirit. After this condition of consciousness is assumed by the spirit, these friends leave him. Some guiding spirit, whose duty it is to perform the task, then shows or conducts him to the place, or plane, which he is fitted to occupy, and which, by the workings of the Law of Equalization, he must occupy. In this place, he is surrounded by, and must associate with spirits of a similar condition of development as his own, until some change comes to him which fits him for a higher place.
Of course, this change may come in a short time or it may require a longer time to bring it about - all this depending upon the realization by the spirit as to what his condition is, and the fact that there is a possibility of progressing. He cannot bring about this change of himself, for the law which fixes his place or condition does not cease to operate until another law is called into operation which permits and helps the change.
The only way in which this changed condition can be brought about is by the influences of other spirits of a more enlightened and higher position than that of the spirit whose position I have spoken of. These influences do not necessarily come from spirits who have received the New Birth, but may come from spirits who know nothing about it, and who have only the natural love. And they may not even necessarily be of a high order of development of either intellect or soul, but they must be in such condition that they know, and are able to tell the lower spirit of the possibility of progress and the way in which it can be made.
Many spirits who are in a dark position or condition, themselves, can help others who are in a darker condition, just as a student of a lower class in school on earth may not be able to teach all that is taught or may be learned at that school, yet he can teach those in a lower class than his own the things that he has learned in progressing to his own class.
All spirits have a work to do. And these spirits of little development are engaged in teaching those of lesser development the way to get in the same condition as those who teach are in. But, of course, these latter cannot teach anything that belongs to a higher condition than the one in which they are. In such cases, the progress is very slow for many reasons, and it sometimes takes centuries for a spirit to progress from this very low plane to a higher one where only the lowest grade of happiness exists.
So you see, in order to help these dark spirits, it is not necessary for the helping spirit to be one who has the Divine Love in his soul. But all this means that the spirit who is helped in this way cannot possibly progress higher than his natural love and moral conscience and intellectual endowments will permit. No progression of the soul to a realization of the Divine Love of the Father or to the Celestial Spheres will occur.
This is important for you and all mankind to know, for the reason that you and others may learn what the true soul development means, and how effectively spirits possessing this soul development may help all other spirits, good or bad.
Aside from this, you may suppose that the spirits who you hear talk at the seances, where all kinds and conditions of spirits congregate and promise to help both mortals and spirits, may not be able to help because some are in a dark and low condition themselves. Yet, to some extent, all spirits may help other spirits who are in a lower condition; and sometimes, in the beginning of the progression, more satisfactorily than can the higher spirits. This is so because these dark spirits who try to help the darker spirits are more in harmony with them, and the darker spirits will listen to them with more interest and belief in the possibility that they can help them.
But this is a help that does not work in such a way as to cause the spirits who are so helped to lose their desires and recollections very rapidly, and to progress into the higher planes without the great suffering that you have been told of.
I thought I would write this to you for the reason that, in your investigations and teachings of the spirit life, you might not give due importance to the possibility of one dark spirit helping another. All the phases of mediumship, when honestly conducted, have their proper places and work in God's plan of redemption; and none of them must be considered as useless or without special design.
Of course, the phase of assistance to spirits mentioned above is of the lowest form, and is merely preliminary to the great work which the higher spirits do in carrying out the Great Plan of redemption, which has been explained to you. The important work is that of the spirits who know what the Divine Love of the Father is, and what fits spirits and mortals for the enjoyment of the great happiness which obtains only in the Celestial Spheres (and also in the soul spheres to a lesser extent).
When a spirit who is dark learns of this Great Love, and strives to obtain It, and earnestly prays for the help of the Holy Spirit (which is God's messenger of Love), he will progress much more rapidly, and his sufferings and darkness will leave him sooner, and greater happiness will come to him.
But still I say, the work of these lower spirits that I have spoken of is a great work, and must not be underestimated. So remember what I have written and give due credit to this work.
I will not write more, but with all my love and blessings, will say good night.
Your
brother in Christ,
John
Probation Does Exist Among Spirits in the Hells
I am here, Jesus
You were right in your surmise that I was with you tonight and, as you imagined, I was standing close to you at the time the preacher was delivering his discourse. You felt the influence of my love and sympathy, and you also received the thoughts that I was superimposing on your brain.
The preacher's sermon was an advance upon the beliefs of the orthodox in many particulars. But in the most important particular, and in the one that will affect mortals most vitally in their progress in the spirit life, he was wrong, very wrong. I refer to his declaration that he saw or knew of no statement in the Bible that would justify him in asserting that there would be an opportunity for the spirits of mortals to receive pardon, or to progress from the condition of hell to that of light and heaven in the spirit world when they had not started on that journey in the mortal life. This, as I have told you, is a damnable doctrine, and one, from the time of my living on earth, that has done more harm all down the centuries than most any other teaching of the church that claims to be representative of me and my teachings.
Many poor souls have come into the spirit world with this belief firmly fixed in their minds and conscience. And the difficulties have been great and the years long before they could awaken from this belief and realize that the Love of the Father is waiting for them in spirit life just as in the earth life, that probation is never closed for men or spirits, and that it never will be until the time of the withdrawal of the great opportunity for men to become inhabitants of the Celestial Heavens. Even then, the opportunity to purify their natural love will not cease, and never will, until all who have the opportunity shall become perfect men in their natural loves.
Had he searched the Scriptures, in which he so implicitly believes, he would have found an authorization for him to declare that, even in the spirit world, the spirits of the unsaved sinners on earth who died without having become reconciled to God had the gospel of salvation preached to them (First Epistle of Peter 3:19,20: "...being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit: By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison; Which sometime were disobedient, when once the long suffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water..").
Furthermore, when he declared that the Bible says that I said, "He that sinneth against the son of man it shall be forgiven him; but he that sinneth against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world nor in the world to come," had the preacher placed the natural and only implied construction on this declaration, he would have found that the sinner who neglected the opportunity on earth would yet have another chance for salvation in the "world to come," as the spirit world is referred to.
So, even according to his own source of belief and foundation of his knowledge of these things of the future, as an honest preacher of the Scriptures, he would be justified, and even required, to declare that probation did not end with the physical death of the mortal.
There is a hell, or rather hells, just as there is a heaven, or heavens. And when all men become spirits, they will be compelled to occupy one or the other of these places - not because God had decreed that, because of his earth belief or condition, any particular spirit shall occupy that place, but because the condition of his soul development (or want of development) fits and fixes him for that place and no other.
God has made His Laws of Harmony, and these laws are never changed. And when any particular soul gets into a condition of agreement with these laws, then that soul becomes at-one with the Father and an inhabitant of His Heavens. And so long as that soul remains out of such condition, it is in hell - which is the condition of being out of agreement with the harmony of God's Laws. This is hell, and there is no other comprehensive definition of it - every thing or place that is not heaven is hell.
Of course, there are many gradations of hell, and these gradations are made by the condition of the inhabitants' soul development, which is determined by the quantity and quality of the defilement and sin that exists in these souls. The soul is developed as the love becomes purified and sin is eradicated. And just as this process progresses, the soul starts to develop.
God has decreed that His Universe, both of men and things, shall be harmonious. Only the creature, man, has fallen out of that harmony. And as the universe shall continue, the only destiny for man is that he shall return to that harmony from which he fell by reason of his own misdirected will. Had God decreed that the sinner who dies in his sins shall forever remain in his sins and in a state of antagonism to such harmony, as the preacher by necessary implication declared, then God Himself would necessarily become the cause and power of defeating His Own Laws of Harmony, which no sane mortal would or could believe, whether he believes in the Scriptures or not.
God's laws are fixed, unchangeable, and always in harmony with one another and with His Will. Knowing this, every thinking man will know, and should know, that whenever a proposition or opinion is put forth by preacher or layman or philosopher or scientist that shows that, in order for a certain condition or truth to exist, God's laws will have to work in conflict with, or in opposition to one another, then that proposition or opinion is false and has no foundation in fact.
And so, to accept this declaration of the preacher that there is no probation after death, or as he said, no chance to progress out of the hell which the mortal carries with him to the spirit world, men would have to believe that in order to satisfy His "wrath" and meet the "demands" of His supposed justice, the loving Father will set His laws in conflict with one another and destroy the harmony of His universe.
The preacher spoke, as he said, as a scientist and not as a religious teacher. And yet, when he declared the eternal existence of the hells, the deduction that he made violated one of the fundamental laws of science; that is, that two conflicting laws in the workings of God's Universe cannot both be accepted as true. Only one of these two that is in harmony with all the other known laws must be accepted as true. Then I say that, founded on the Scriptures or founded on science, the preacher had no basis for making the untrue and deplorable statement that physical death ends man's possibility of progressing from a condition or state of hell existence into that of purity and freedom from sin, and into harmony with God's perfect laws, and the requirements of His Will.
The preacher spoke from his intellect - mental beliefs of long years' standing, and the memory echoes of what he had heard said by other preachers and teachers who left upon his consciousness beliefs in their false doctrines. But deep down in his soul, where the Love of the Father is burning, and the soul sense is growing, he does not believe this doctrine. For he realizes that this Love of the Father is so much greater and purer and holier than any other love that exists in heaven or on earth, and that the Father, from Whom It comes, must be holier and more merciful and forgiving and thoughtful of His children than any mortal father of his children.
Also, as a mortal father, having in his soul the Divine Love, he knows that his child could not commit any sin or offense that could possibly become unpardonable, or that he would not gladly permit the child to repent of at any time. And so he should see that, if he denies to the Father, from whom this Divine Love comes, a Love and Sympathy that would be as forgiving to His children as is he, the earthly parent, then the greatest attribute of God, who is all Love, would not be equal to the love of His creature! The derivative would be greater and grander and purer, and more Divine, than the fountainhead from which it is derived!
No, in his soul, the preacher does not believe this unnatural teaching. And at times, he travails in his soul at the conflict that takes place between the mental bondage of his intellectual beliefs and the freedom of his soul sense - the creature of the Divine Love that is in him, and the only part of Divinity that he possesses.
And thus is demonstrated the great and real paradox of the existence, in the same mortal at the same time, of an intellectual belief and a soul knowledge as far apart as the antipodes. And also is demonstrated the Truth, a great Truth, that the mind of man and the soul of man are not one and the same thing, but are as distinct from each other as the creature of a special creation (the mind) and the creation of that which is the only part of man made in the image of his Maker (the soul) must necessarily be.
But someday, the soul knowledge will overcome the mental belief. Then the preacher will know that harmony and inharmony cannot co-exist for all time, that sin and error must disappear, and purity and righteousness must exist alone; and that every man and spirit must become at-one with the Father, either as an inhabitant of the Celestial Heavens, or as the perfect man that first appeared at the call of God, and by Him was pronounced "very good."
I have written enough for tonight and must stop. But before doing so, I want to say that I have been with you today, and saw that you were very happy in your thoughts and in your soul experience. Other spirits were also with you, throwing around you their love and influence.
Persevere in your efforts to obtain this Divine Love - pray to the Father, and It will come to you in increased abundance, and with It, a wonderful happiness.
I will come soon and write you another message. So, with my love and blessings, I will say good night, and God bless you.
Your
brother and friend,
Jesus
Hell and the Duration of Punishment
I am here, Paul
I merely want to say that I was present at the church tonight and listened to
the preacher tell his congregation what he didn't know about hell. What he
said, in many particulars, was untrue; however, it was pleasing to hear him
tell his people that there was no physical suffering, although he didn't
explain to them why there could be no such suffering. I mean that no spirit,
when he goes into hell, carries with him his physical body, or any other body
that has such substance that would be affected by fire and brimstone and the
other unreasonable things that the churches have for so many years taught and
terrified their members with, and as a consequence, caused them to believe that
the Father is such a "cruel" and "wrathful" Father,
demanding that His "cravings for satisfaction" be supplied by the
sizzling of the bodies of His children in fire. No, this damnable doctrine is
not true, and I am glad to see that the churches are ceasing to believe it or
teach it!
But the doctrine that the preacher taught is quite as bad, and as useless as the former, for the reason that punishment of sinners and those who are out of harmony with God is a fact which they all will realize when they come to the spirit world. With that being so, to teach that this punishment is everlasting is as harmful as the one that I first mentioned.
How strange that preachers and teachers will try to cause their people and listeners to believe that God is such a wrathful and vindictive being, having less love and mercy than the most wicked earthly father has for his children! It is so very deplorable that these supposed instructors of what God is should make such attempts to blaspheme Him, completely disregarding His Great Qualities of love and tenderness, and His desire that all His children become happy.
Oh, I tell you that these preachers will have a woeful sin to answer for when they come to an accounting! And this will not be at the "great judgment day," as they teach, but will be just as soon as they enter spirit life and realize the great harm that they have done to many who have followed them in their teachings. And they will realize that awful result very soon after their entrance into the spirit world. For they will have come to them, as clouds of witnesses, the spirits of those who were under their instructions on earth, bringing with them all the evidence of the results of their erroneous beliefs and the stains of this great sin of blasphemy.
I, Paul, write this, for I have suffered from this very cause myself. When on earth, I taught some doctrine like unto the one that these preachers are now teaching, and even now I realize that I am responsible to some extent for many false beliefs. But I thank God that I am not responsible for all that is ascribed to me in the Bible, and that if my true teachings were known and taught, the blind and erroneous beliefs that are now so prevalent among Christians would not exist. I tell you that mortals do not conceive of the great harmful and deplorable results that flow from their beliefs in the Bible in many particulars. This book is one of falsehoods and forgery and imputations that have no resemblance to what the Master or any of his apostles taught. And you can readily realize how anxious we all are that these errors and untruths be removed from the minds and souls of men.
The hell of the orthodox preachers, as formerly taught - that is, a hell of brimstone and fires - is not the true hell, and has no existence save in the minds of these orthodox believers.
The true hell is a place and a condition, and one is not separated from the other. And while the condition of the soul and the beliefs of men create the hells to a very large extent, yet hell is a fixed abiding place, made and established, and of such a character as to suit the inhabiting of it by the soul according to the condition of that soul. To illustrate, a soul that is less vile and less filled with evil thoughts and the recollection of evil deeds and false beliefs is in a very different place from the soul that has more of this evil in it. The former soul would not find its habitation in the same place as the latter soul, any more than the highly developed soul would find its home in the same place as the soul that is less developed.
Heaven is a place, or many places, suited to the development of the soul. At the other extreme, hell is a place suited to the souls that are in a condition of degradation and evil. I mean to be understood as saying that place and condition of soul are correlative terms - the home of the soul depending on the condition of the soul. As these different hells vary, so they are suited for the souls of spirits according to the defilement of soul.
As I said before, hell is a place as well as a condition. And the man who believes that it is nothing more than a condition of his mind or soul will be wonderfully surprised as well as disappointed. I know the condition of mind and soul creates a man's hell to a very large extent, and that it is the chief source of his suffering and the darkness that surrounds and envelops him. Yet this condition is not the only source of that suffering or of the darkness in which he finds himself. Hell is also a place. It is a place that has all the appearances and ingredients that are in exact agreement with a person's state as produced or caused by the condition of his mind or soul.
It is not a place of universal character, fitted for the habitation of all souls irrespective of conditions of degrees of defilement and sin and darkness. It is not a single place,forming a common home for all fallen souls, but is composed of many and different places. And as has been said, there are many hells, having gradations of appearance and surroundings that are suitable for causing the additional sufferings which souls may have to endure. The expression, "the lowest depths of hell," is not a meaningless one, but portrays a truth - a real, existing fact that many spirits are now experiencing the reality of.
In its broadest sense, hell is every place outside of heaven; and heaven is that place where everything entering into it - its appearance and qualities and its inhabitants - is in perfect harmony with the respective laws of God and His Will concerning the same.
And this statement involves the fact that there are several heavens. The heaven of the redeemed, or those who have received the Divine Essence in their souls and have become of the Divine Nature of the Father, is a distinct heaven from that wherein those live who have been restored to the perfect condition of their natural love that the first parents possessed before the fall - the condition of the restitution to mankind of that perfection which was lost by the disobedience of the first man and woman.
Mortals usually believe that heaven is a condition. And the Bible, in which so many believe, attempts to describe this heaven with its streets of gold, and pearly gates, etc.; and, as a fact, it is a real, substantial place, having all the elements and appearances of a home of bliss which help to bring happiness and joy to its inhabitants, in addition to the happiness which their soul perfection and development cause them to have.
Then, as heaven is a place, having real substance that is perceptible to the spirits who inhabit it, why should not hell be a place of real substance also, with those qualities and appearances exactly suited to add to the unhappiness of those who are fitted for it?
The spirit world, both heaven and hell, are places of substance, having their planes and divisions and limitations of occupancy. They are not mythical, invisible conceptions of mind, as you mortals ordinarily conceive ghosts to be. The spirits of mortals are real, and more substantial than are the physical bodies of mortals; further, these planes and divisions, whether of heaven or hell, have a more real existence than mortals have in their places of habitations or confinement in the earth life.
The hells are places of darkness and sufferings, but in them are no fires or brimstone, etc., as have been so commonly represented by the preachers and teachers of the orthodox churches, because there is nothing therein that would feed fires or that fires could affect. And there are no devils or Satan, though there are evil spirits of men who are more wicked and vicious and horrifying than have ever been pictured of the devil and his angels.
In your communications, you have had some very realistic descriptions of hell from those who are actually living therein, and who are realizing its tortures and realities, and I will not take the time here to attempt to describe it in detail. I will only say that, as it has not entered into the minds of men to conceive of the wonders and beauties of heaven, neither have they ever conceived of the horrors and sufferings of hell.
But from all this, men must not understand that the punishment and darkness which the spirits of evil endure in the hells are specifically inflicted by the Father because of any "wrath" that He may have towards these spirits, or to gratify any "feelings of revenge," or even to satisfy any "outraged justice," for it is not true.
Man, when he becomes a spirit, is his own judge and executioner, submitting to and receiving the inexorable results of the law that whatsoever a man sows that shall he also reap. This is a law that is necessary to preserve or bring about the harmony of God's universe, which, of course, is absolutely necessary. And while it may appear to man, at first sight, to be a harsh and cruel law, yet, in its workings and results, even to the individual spirit who may suffer in the reaping, it is a most benign and beneficial law, because the darkness and sufferings of a few years, as you mortals say, bring about an eternity of light and happiness.
The law must rule. But in all the apparent harshness and suffering and want of mercy, the great love of the Father overshadows the sufferer and finally makes the defiled and wicked soul become one of purity and goodness.
Men may never have thought of this fact: that if it were possible for these evil spirits to live in heaven, their sufferings and unhappiness would be greater than what they endure by living in a place that is more in agreement, in its surroundings and appearances, with their own distorted conditions of soul. So, even in their hells, the Father is merciful and good to them.
Regarding the second proposition by the preacher in his sermon - namely, the duration of suffering or of the life of the spirit in hell - his conclusion was that this duration of the spirit in hell is eternal, everlasting, and without end. How it must have hurt and violated the teachings of his soul and his conception of the Loving Father to have come to such a conclusion! But yet, being bound by his creeds, and the domination of his belief that the Bible is the sole authority upon hell as well as heaven, in the conviction of his mind (and here I want to emphasize mind, for his heart was not in agreement), he declared that the duration of the sufferings and life of the hells is eternal; and that the saying of Jesus proved it to be, not only because it was in the Bible but also because the true meaning of the original Greek word can have no other translation. He said this not knowing, or if knowing, not recalling that Jesus, even if he used such expression, did not speak in Greek, and that in order to obtain the true meaning of the word used by Jesus in back of the Greek word, he (the preacher) must go to the word as it was uttered by Jesus for its true meaning.
So many preachers and commentators on the Bible attempt to determine a most vital truth by a shade of meaning that they conceive a particular word in its original may have had. But they are not justified in concluding that such word had, at the time used, such shade of meaning, or that the original, as they conceive it to be, was the original word actually spoken or written. They seem to lose sight of the fact that the writings of the Bible - I mean the manuscripts to which they make reference to prove the correctness of their conclusions - are far removed from the original writings, and that, by reason of the copying and recopying of the word upon which they rely, the shade of meaning that they give it in their interpretations may not be an exact translation of the word originally used. Of course, they have no way of learning this fact; and consequently, they have to resort to the best authority that they can have access to. But under such circumstances, it is not a justifiable thing to have a vital question of man's future and destiny determined by the shade of meaning that may be given to one or more words, without reference to other declarations of the same book that have relation to the subject matter of the inquiry.
The preacher said that in his conclusion as to the question, he must be governed by the Bible alone, that he had no right to indulge in speculation concerning the philosophies of other men; and that he could find nothing in the Bible that would justify him in coming to any other conclusion than that the duration of punishment in hell is eternal. Well, he was not honest with himself; for if he had searched a little more deeply and had given as much credence to other parts of the Bible as to the passage that he quoted, he would have found a strong statement to the effect that the evil spirits in hell have the possibility of leaving it; and not only that, but also that a part of the great mission of Jesus, upon whose supposed declaration the preacher based his conclusion, was to show the Way and induce these spirits of evil to leave their hells. This was the Master's first work after he became a spirit, and he would not have attempted to preach to these wicked spirits in hell if there had been no possibility of their ever leaving it (First Epistle of Peter 3:19,20. "...being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit: By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison; Which sometime were disobedient, when once the long suffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water..").
Also, the preacher might well have considered more deeply the contradiction presented in the Bible that, at the time of Noah, because of their great sins when mortals, God "punished" His children as He never punished any other of His children for their disobedience, utterly destroying them by one great catastrophe, removing His only living human creatures from the face of the earth, and thus leaving only Noah and his family to serve as a reminder of the great failure of God Himself in His Creation of the most perfect and the "Very Good."
No, in addition to recognizing this obvious contradiction, if the preacher had searched the Bible, he would have found that the hell that contained the spirits of all the human race that were living at the time of the flood (except Noah and his family) was not eternal in its duration.
And again, had the preacher searched even further, he would have found that the Master himself declared by necessary implication that, at least for some of the wicked who became inhabitants of hell, there was the possibility of release upon certain conditions. I refer to the declaration attributed to him where he said, "He that sinneth against the son of man, it shall be forgiven him; but he that sinneth against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world nor in the world to come." (Matthew 12:32.)
Now, to any reasonable man, there is only one interpretation of this declaration, and that is: that for any and all sins, except that against the Holy Ghost, there is forgiveness in the next world as well as in the mortal world. And that being a fact, it is an irresistible conclusion that the Father would not compel a spirit to remain in hell after He had forgiven that spirit's sins.
No, the preacher had not searched the Scriptures, as he was duty bound to do. Could he have rid his mind of the beliefs that the creeds of his church had driven into his intellect, and of the teachings of the ancient Fathers, as well as of the churches that had taught such false and damnable doctrines for so many years, his conclusion would have been very different.
The preacher repudiated the old teachings that there would be physical suffering in hell, or fire or brimstone, etc., and expressed his commiseration for those preachers and others who had taught such doctrine, and for their awful responsibility and accounting. And his commiseration was needed and appropriate. But I want to say here that he needs as much commiseration, if not more, for the preaching of his false doctrines, as did those preachers to whom he refers. He has more light, or may have, and his accounting will be correspondingly greater.
I have written a long letter and you are tired, and I must stop. But before doing so, let me declare the truth to be that hell is not a place of eternal punishment, that all the hells, as well as other parts of the spirit world, are places of progression, and that the privilege of probation is not taken from any spirit, no matter how wicked; for all are God's children. And in his plans for the perfecting of the harmony of the universe and man's salvation, all the hells will be emptied and the hells themselves destroyed.
But men must not think from this that the duration of suffering in these hells is necessarily short, for that is not true. Some of the evil inhabitants of these places have been in such darkness and suffering for centuries, as mortals count time, and may be for centuries more. But the time will come when they will have the awakening to the fact that they may become children of light; then, when they make the effort to progress, they will succeed.
The sooner that mankind learns that hell is not a place of punishment to satisfy the "wrath" of an "angry" God, but merely the natural and necessary living place of the spirit whose condition of soul and mind demands that location, the better off they will be. Further, that that condition changes, and it will change. The hell of a spirit's habitation will change until, finally, for that spirit, all the hells will disappear.
You are tired and I must stop. So, thanking you, and leaving you my love and blessing, I am
Your
brother in Christ,
Paul
There Are No Devils and No Satan, Considered as Real Persons, and Fallen Angels
I am here, Jesus.
I am with you tonight to warn you against letting any doubt enter your mind or heart as to our actually writing to you, for we, and none other, are actually in communication with you.
The book that you read is a snare and a lie, for there are no angels who have become devils, as the author of that book declares. Never were there any angels who, through ambition or any other reason, revolted against the power of government of God, and thereby lost their estate as angels. Never was there any Lucifer, and never were there any angels who were thrown from the battlements of heaven into hell, as it has been written. And as I told you before, there are no devils and no Satan, considered as real persons and fallen angels.
The only spirits in the spirit world are those who at one time were mortals and who lived lives on earth, shorter or longer. And whenever angels are mentioned in the Bible - or rather, in the New Testament, in places which contain my sayings or those of the apostles (and I mean those sayings which were actually said) - the word "angel" always refers to the spirit of some mortal who had passed the line between life and death as commonly understood.
I desire to tell you of these things at large very soon, and to instruct you as to who were the angels of God that are supposed to have had an existence prior to the creation of man and of the world, and who the inhabitants of heaven were before the Spirit of God entered into man and caused him to become a living soul, as the Bible says. But the time is not yet ripe for me to instruct you in these matters because there are so many more important Truths to be taught to you first - Truths which are vital to man's salvation and happiness on earth and in the spirit world.
But this you must believe: that no "devils" ever write to you or in any manner manifest to or through any of the numerous mediums who are used to show the existence of spirits of men in the spirit world, no matter whether these mediums be good or evil.
There are spirits of all kinds, just as there are mortals of all kinds, having all the traits and characteristics of mortals. And some of these spirits may be justly called wicked or evil spirits, and even devils. But they are nothing more or less than spirits such as I have described.
I know that the belief of the majority of mankind is that there are such things as devils, and that they are independent creations of God, and made by Him to tempt and inflict all kinds of trouble and unhappiness on mortals. And because of the great number of years that these beliefs have existed, and the fact that many of the churches still teach that such devils do exist and that they are at all times trying to tempt and injure men, it is hard and will be difficult to induce men to believe that there are no such things as devils, which is the truth.
I know that the Bible, in many places, speaks of my casting devils out of men, and of men being possessed of devils, and of the apostles casting out devils, and of their not being able to cast out some of these devils. But I tell you now that the Bible is all wrong in this regard. The writers and translators of the Bible never understood what the word "devil" meant, or was intended to mean, as used in these various instances. As I have told you, there was never any devil or devils in the sense mentioned and taught by the churches. Consequently, they never could have possessed mortals or have been cast out of them.
It is true that, by the workings of the Law of Attraction, and the susceptibility of mortals to the influence of spirit powers, mortals may become obsessed by the spirits of evil - that is, evil spirits of men who once lived on earth - and this obsession may become so complete and powerful that the living mortal may lose all power to resist this influence of the evil spirits, and may be compelled to do things that he will not desire to do, or may show all the evidence of a distorted mind, and even may present appearances of a lost will power as well as of the lost ability to exercise the ordinary powers given him by his natural creation. And in these instances referred to of casting out devils, wherever they occurred (and they did occur in some of the instances mentioned), the only devils that existed were the evil spirits who had possessed these mortals.
And this obsession obtains today, just as it did then, for the same laws are in operation now as were in existence then. Many a man is in a condition of evil life and disturbed mind from the obsession of these evil spirits. And if there were any men of today in that condition of soul development and belief that my disciples were in, they could cast out these so-called "devils" just as the disciples cast them out in the Bible days.
But men have not this faith, though there are many who have been blessed with the inflowing of the Holy Spirit. But they have not the belief that such work as the disciples performed can be performed by them now. And in fact, the most of them believe that it would be contrary to God's Will to attempt to exercise such powers; hence they never attempt to do such work.
But when men learn that God is the same in all ages - that His laws work the same way; that mankind is the same, so far as the soul's possibilities are concerned; and that the faith which God made possible for man to attain may be possessed by him now, just as it was possessed by my disciples - then they will attempt this work of beneficence, and will succeed. The sick will be healed and the devils cast out, the blind made to see and the deaf to hear, and the so called "miracles" will be performed as they were in my days on earth.
There is not and never was such a thing as a miracle in the sense of having an effect produced by a cause which was not the result of the ordinary workings of God's laws; for these laws, in their workings, never vary. And when the same law is called into operation upon the same condition of facts, the same results will always be produced.
So, let a mortal have in his soul the same amount of God's Divine love which the Bible writers meant, or should have meant, when they spoke of being endowed by the Holy Ghost; and let him have the necessary faith that, when he prays to God, He will give him the power to exercise this Love in a sufficient degree to produce the desired results; and then let him try to exercise the power of casting out devils or healing, etc., and he will find that success will attend his efforts. God is the same at all times and under all circumstances, and only mortals vary in their conceptions and conditions.
So I say, there are no devils as independent creatures of God, in contradistinction to the spirits of men who once lived on earth, and you must believe that there are not. I tell you now that the teachers of such false doctrines will have to pay the penalties for their false teachings when they come to the spirit world and see the result of these false teachings. And no relief will be granted until they have paid the last farthing. To believe such doctrines entails results that are bad enough for any spirit to endure. But for a teacher to teach others these beliefs and convince them of their truth, whether he actually believes them or not, causes sufferings and duration of sufferings for that teacher of which men have no conception.
I will not write more tonight, but in closing, will say that you have my love and blessings, and I will fulfill my promises so that you will realize your expectations, and be in condition to perform the work that you have been selected to do.
(Mr. Padgett asked a question.)
Well, you let doubt come into your mind, and as a consequence, your soul does not respond, although, strange as it may seem, the Divine Love is there. But when this mental doubt exists, it is as if it were a covering which prevents the existence of the Love in the soul to shine forth and produce the great feeling of happiness and joy which otherwise you might experience. The mental condition of the mortal undoubtedly has a great influence on the consciousness of the man as to his possession of this soul development and the Divine Love. Consequently, there will have to be this continuous fight between the mental conditions and the soul's consciousness as long as life lasts on earth. But as the mental beliefs are brought into harmony with the soul's condition, more and more the fight will grow weaker and less frequent. And it is possible that the mental beliefs will cease altogether and become entirely and absolutely subordinated, or rather, absorbed in the soul's consciousness of its being possessed of this Divine Love of the Father.
So, my dear brother, I will say good night.
Your
brother and friend,
Jesus
A Spirit Writes of His Experience in the Hells: "It Is Hard to Learn of Heavenly Things in Hell"
I am here, B_____, and I want to say a
word. The Indian tried to stop me, but your wife said, "Let him write,"
and I am doing so.
Well, I am still in hell and suffering. I wish that I could die again, but I cannot and will have to stand it. I can't even be deaf so that I might escape some of my torments, for I am surrounded by the most hellish beings you can imagine, and I have to listen to them. It is no use trying to fight, for I can't hurt anybody. They became even more annoying when I did try to punch one of them.
It is awful here. I regret that I did not listen and try to understand what the doctor told me so often when on earth, but now it is too late. I often hear what he says to you now in your conversations, but for some reason I can't quite understand; besides, if I did, these damned ugly spirits would knock all the understanding out of me. It is hard to learn what you call heavenly things in hell, and I am so unhappy and see no way to relief.
The doctor's father talked to me and told me some things that were like what the doctor told me. I felt better when he was telling me and some hope came to me. But when I got back into my hell and saw all the horrors and the shrieking, ugly spirits, I forgot, and the hell feelings came to me again, and I suffered. Oh, if I could only find some relief from these torments!
Well, I will try again, for I know that Mr. Stone is kind and wants to help me. But my trouble is that I doubt if he can. But I will go, as you advise, and try to believe that he can. I am very thankful to you and the doctor, and will try to hope. Anything to get out of this place and away from the devils!
Your wife says I must stop. So, good night.
B______
(I, L. R. Stone, was present when the above spirit, B__ wrote. I was well acquainted with him for several years before he died, and I often talked to him on the importance of getting the Divine Love in his soul. He was very deaf before entering the spirit world. After he wrote through Mr. Padgett, I told him to look around for my father who is a bright spirit of the Celestial Heavens. The spirit went with my father to receive help and instruction, and he has now made his progress to the Celestial Heavens.)
Luke Comments on the Spirit Writing:" It Is Hard to Learn of Heavenly Things in Hell"
I am here, Luke
I want to write a few lines upon a subject that may be of interest to you both. You have remarked upon the expression obtained in the letter that you have just received - that it is hard to learn of heavenly things in hell. In a succinct way, it is a statement of a great truth. If it were known and fully appreciated by mortals, it would cause them to realize the necessity of thinking and learning of these heavenly things while on earth.
I know many say that they will not believe in the orthodox hell, or in the necessity of troubling themselves about the future, and that they will take their chance in the hereafter, if there be one. If these persons could realize the meaning of such a course of life, they would not leave their future to chance. Instead, they would seek for these heavenly things while on earth, make a start for the realization of these things now, and not wait until they had left the form of flesh.
They say that a just God will not punish them by condemning them to eternal torment, and they are correct in this. But while this just God does not condemn them at all, yet they are condemned by a law that is just as invariable as is the Love of that God. And that law brings its certain punishment, even though it may not be eternal. However, its duration depends very largely upon the spirit. If the spirit finds itself in that condition where it cannot make a start towards its redemption until a long time after its coming into the spirit world, then that punishment will continue longer. And if the start depends upon the ability and capacity of the spirit to receive and understand those things that will start it upon its progress, as it does very frequently, then many spirits will remain for years and years in the condition in which they find themselves when they first come to their homes in the hells.
There is nothing in these places to induce or help the understanding of these heavenly things. On the contrary, there is everything to prevent and obstruct such understanding. There are even feelings of hopelessness, and beliefs in an eternity of punishment. And frequently there is a want of knowledge that there is any other or better place than where they find themselves.
And I want to say here that, within the spirit, there is nothing that has the qualities or powers to start it on a progression. In this sense, the old Bible expression, "As a tree falleth so shall it lie," is true. Even as to the natural love, these spirits in the hells cannot initiate a start towards higher thoughts and beliefs; only when some influence comes to them from without can they have an awakening of their dormant, better and true natures, so that their progress may commence. I don't mean by this that it is necessary for some high spiritual helper to come to them, but only that some influence from outside of themselves must come in order for them to have an awakening. This influence may be from a spirit (and when I use the term "spirit," I mean the soul clothed in a spiritual body) in an apparently similar condition to their own, but one who has received some glimpse of uplifting truth that may be conveyed to the dark brother spirit.
All spirits can help others who are in a lower or more stagnant condition than themselves, and sometimes they do. But the great trouble here is that, unless the possibly helping spirits have some desire to benefit their fellow spirits of darkness, they do not try to help. And so, as your friend says, "It is hard to learn of heavenly things in hell." He realizes that fact fully. And even with the help that has been offered and will be given to him, he will find it difficult to make a start.
The mortal life is not the only place of probation, but it is the most important place. It is also the easiest place for man to make his start, and to understand the beginning of these heavenly things.
I will not write more now, but will come again soon and write a formal message.
So, with my love to you and your friend, I will say to you both: Have faith, and let not doubt come to you as to the heavenly things that we have written you about.
Good night,
Your
brother in Christ,
Luke
