Suffering

nnunn wrote:

Komposer wrote:

"[...]. I have never been in the habit of blaming the divine for my suffering, but I used to feel as being treated unfairly by the universe for my 'misfortunes'. I have come to the realization that suffering can truly be a blessing in disguise, a motivating force that fuels the mind and urges it to act and it is perhaps one of the most effective teachers of the importance of dignity amidst chaos, pain and uncertainty which when coupled with a humble disposition, really beautifies the individual."

Thanks Alexandros! Your thought about being "treated unfairly" got me thinking about how impossible it must be for a Creator Son (like Jesus/Michael) to experience real "injustice". So the unimaginable unfairness and injustice Jesus personally suffered (experienced) at the end of his human career may have been... crucial?

Nigel

Evidently, it is not so unusual for a bestowal Son to be unfairly and most cruelly treated by the natives of an evolutionary world. See below...."When Bestowal Sons are not put to death....". This treatment is not a requirement and does not always happen and our Michael Son was most horribly abused and suffered in so many ways. Besides betrayal, torture, false accusations, public humiliation, and execution by a most gruesome means, Jesus also suffered from parents who misunderstood and restrained him, the tragic death of his dad leaving him to assume burdens and responsibilities no teen should suffer, that leaving him suddenly jilted and disappointed from his youthful prime and expectations, and he suffered from misplaced expectations of his mother and his Apostles regarding his ministry and mission no matter how clearly and redundantly he worked to set and manage those misguided material kingly expectations.

And yet at every disappointment and confusion and confoundment and obstacle and suffering he encountered, he did not merely endure but emerged victorious and strengthened by his ever growing faith experience and maturing wisdom acquired by his ability to cheerfully face every challenge with full confidence in ultimate and eternal outcomes, even long before he understood his origin and destiny as Michael. There are those who do suffer in ways The Master did not but no one has suffered more or more acutely, either emotionally or physically, I do not think.

The Creator Sons are the givers of mercy and they are most merciful because of their living and suffering as mortals of time combined with their own Paradise natures. The Divine and the experiential. We mortals are though, I think, the most sympathetic of all universe beings and are important arbiters of justice and mercy in the universes of time. (More on that next.)

20:6.6 (229.5) When the bestowal Sons, Creator or Magisterial, enter the portals of death, they reappear on the third day. But you should not entertain the idea that they always meet with the tragic end encountered by the Creator Son who sojourned on your world nineteen hundred years ago. The extraordinary and unusually cruel experience through which Jesus of Nazareth passed has caused Urantia to become locally known as “the world of the cross.” It is not necessary that such inhuman treatment be accorded a Son of God, and the vast majority of planets have afforded them a more considerate reception, allowing them to finish their mortal careers, terminate the age, adjudicate the sleeping survivors, and inaugurate a new dispensation, without imposing a violent death. A bestowal Son must encounter death, must pass through the whole of the actual experience of mortals of the realms, but it is not a requirement of the divine plan that this death be either violent or unusual.

20:6.7 (229.6) When bestowal Sons are not put to death by violence, they voluntarily relinquish their lives and pass through the portals of death, not to satisfy the demands of “stern justice” or “divine wrath,” but rather to complete the bestowal, “to drink the cup” of the career of incarnation and personal experience in all that constitutes a creature’s life as it is lived on the planets of mortal existence. Bestowal is a planetary and a universe necessity, and physical death is nothing more than a necessary part of a bestowal mission.

20:10.3 (232.6) In the Creator Sons the love of the Universal Father is blended with the mercy of the Eternal Son and is disclosed to the local universes in the creative power, loving ministry, and understanding sovereignty of the Michaels. In the Magisterial Sons the mercy of the Eternal Son, united with the ministry of the Infinite Spirit, is revealed to the evolutionary domains in the careers of these Avonals of judgment, service, and bestowal. In the Trinity Teacher Sons the love, mercy, and ministry of the three Paradise Deities are co-ordinated on the highest time-space value-levels and are presented to the universes as living truth, divine goodness, and true spiritual beauty.

20:10.4 (233.1) In the local universes these orders of sonship collaborate to effect the revelation of the Deities of Paradise to the creatures of space: As the Father of a local universe, a Creator Son portrays the infinite character of the Universal Father. As the bestowal Sons of mercy, the Avonals reveal the matchless nature of the Eternal Son of infinite compassion.....

21:3.15 (238.9) Before the completion of the bestowal career a Creator Son rules with certain self-imposed limitations of sovereignty, but subsequent to his finished bestowal service he rules by virtue of his actual experience in the form and likeness of his manifold creatures. When a Creator has seven times sojourned among his creatures, when the bestowal career is finished, then is he supremely settled in universe authority; he has become a Master Son, a sovereign and supreme ruler.

21:4.2 (239.

Avonal bestowals are always in the likeness of mortal flesh, but the seven bestowals of a Creator Son involve his appearing on seven creature levels of being and pertain to the revelation of the seven primary expressions of the will and nature of Deity. Without exception, all Creator Sons pass through this seven times giving of themselves to their created children before they assume settled and supreme jurisdiction over the universes of their own creation.

21:4.3 (239.9) Though these seven bestowals vary in the different sectors and universes, they always embrace the mortal-bestowal adventure. In the final bestowal a Creator Son appears as a member of one of the higher mortal races on some inhabited world, usually as a member of that racial group which contains the largest hereditary legacy of the Adamic stock which has previously been imported to upstep the physical status of the animal-origin peoples. Only once in his sevenfold career as a bestowal Son is a Paradise Michael born of woman as you have the record of the babe of Bethlehem. Only once does he live and die as a member of the lowest order of evolutionary will creatures.

21:4.4 (239.10) After each of his bestowals a Creator Son proceeds to the “right hand of the Father,” there to gain the Father’s acceptance of the bestowal and to receive instruction preparatory to the next episode of universe service. Following the seventh and final bestowal a Creator Son receives from the Universal Father supreme authority and jurisdiction over his universe.

21:4.6 (240.2) Creator Sons, subsequent to the completion of their bestowal careers, are reckoned as a separate order, sevenfold Master Sons. In person the Master Sons are identical with the Creator Sons, but they have undergone such a unique bestowal experience that they are commonly regarded as a different order. When a Creator deigns to effect a bestowal, a real and permanent change is destined to take place. True, the bestowal Son is still and none the less a Creator, but he has added to his nature the experience of a creature, which forever removes him from the divine level of a Creator Son and elevates him to the experiential plane of a Master Son, one who has fully earned the right to rule a universe and administer its worlds. Such beings embody all that can be secured from divine parentage and embrace everything to be derived from perfected-creature experience. Why should man bemoan his lowly origin and enforced evolutionary career when the very Gods must pass through an equivalent experience before they are accounted experientially worthy and competent finally and fully to rule over their universe domains!

Still to be considered: When does suffering end? How does it end? When? Is there suffering in heaven? Does anyone ever suffer forever? What is the cure for suffering?

How is the suffering of innocents fair? Or how does it become fair and equitable over time? Or how does it benefit us? Is there reward ultimately for suffering? Are there actual advantages and meaning and value which result from our suffering? How is wisdom and enlightenment and perfecting affected by suffering? How is the world and the universe affected by suffering?

Some of these questions have been addressed to some degree. All have multiple angles of approach and consideration.

When does suffering end? I think most suffering in most forms, as we consider it, ends upon awakening on the Mansion Worlds. That will be the end, for example, of physical pain and sickness and hunger and infirmaries caused by old age, arthritis, bacteria, and virus. No blindness or deafness or diabetes or related debilities. No sick beds or hospitals. No diseases. No genetic or chronic maladies.

There will still be disappointment and failure and frustration and confusion and uncertainty. When we become fused, I think, most of those forms and sources of suffering will also disappear, although those sources will not! In other words, the suffering ends but not the uncertainties and confusions and disappointments and failures in the adventures of time!

Uncertainty will attend all freewill evolutionary and experiential beings indefinitely I think. We are to learn eventually to feast and fatten on that which now causes anxiety and fear and other forms of suffering.

26:5.3 (291.3) That, then, is the primary or elementary course which confronts the faith-tested and much-traveled pilgrims of space. But long before reaching Havona, these ascendant children of time have learned to feast upon uncertainty, to fatten upon disappointment, to enthuse over apparent defeat, to invigorate in the presence of difficulties, to exhibit indomitable courage in the face of immensity, and to exercise unconquerable faith when confronted with the challenge of the inexplicable. Long since, the battle cry of these pilgrims became: “In liaison with God, nothing—absolutely nothing—is impossible.”

How does suffering end? Simple. Experience. Knowledge. Faith and truth. Assurance. Trust. Progress in the Spirit. By the fruits of the Spirit does all suffering end....sooner or later. That depends upon our individual journey and choices and progress.

Is there suffering in heaven? See above. Not much. Some perhaps but not physical in source or nature. We begin in heaven right where we leave off here so far as spirituality and animal nature legacy goes. So anxiety and self importance will still affect us I think. There are still consequences for our motives and intentions and priorities and choices. We will not awaken as perfected and sainted beings who are magically enlightened somehow. There is still work to do and progress to make by our choices. We will still reap what we sow. So...yes, suffering will still attend us in some ways.

Does anyone ever suffer forever? NO!! There is no punishment for choices per se. God is not angry or wrathful and wishes no harm or suffering on any being in time or eternity.

What is the cure for suffering? Love!! Spiritization! Closeness to God! Fusion. The closer to God we get, the less will we suffer. Many, I think, get that close by faith in this brief life. They find the cure for suffering in their faith and relationship with God.

Full disclosure: Personally, I still suffer a great deal. The above belief is based on others I have met and read about and the teachings in the UB that mortal souls can achieve great faith and spirituality in this short life. I claim no such great faith to myself. But I have experienced relief from suffering caused by that which no longer troubles me or vexes me and have tasted some of those sweet fruits of the Spirit promised to the faith children of God. God does not disappoint to those who believe and act in faith. Sincere faith is a seed that when sown reaps a wonderful harvest!!

How is the suffering of innocents fair? I think it is the eventual and certain relief from suffering as well as the personal triumph over suffering combined with the strength of character achieved by suffering which results in a sublime character of grand nobility that gives great reward in the harvest of the suffering experience that makes suffering "fair". Suffering can never be fair while one is suffering. But we know that those who do not suffer are not as vital and useful to the universe of universes and the collective experiential wisdom of time.

48:7.14 (556.14) 12. The greatest affliction of the cosmos is never to have been afflicted. Mortals only learn wisdom by experiencing tribulation.

5. The Purpose of Affliction

148:5.1 (1661.3) At another of these private interviews in the garden Nathaniel asked Jesus: “Master, though I am beginning to understand why you refuse to practice healing indiscriminately, I am still at a loss to understand why the loving Father in heaven permits so many of his children on earth to suffer so many afflictions.” The Master answered Nathaniel, saying:

148:5.2 (1661.4) “Nathaniel, you and many others are thus perplexed because you do not comprehend how the natural order of this world has been so many times upset by the sinful adventures of certain rebellious traitors to the Father’s will. And I have come to make a beginning of setting these things in order. But many ages will be required to restore this part of the universe to former paths and thus release the children of men from the extra burdens of sin and rebellion. The presence of evil alone is sufficient test for the ascension of man—sin is not essential to survival.

148:5.3 (1661.5) “But, my son, you should know that the Father does not purposely afflict his children. Man brings down upon himself unnecessary affliction as a result of his persistent refusal to walk in the better ways of the divine will. Affliction is potential in evil, but much of it has been produced by sin and iniquity. Many unusual events have transpired on this world, and it is not strange that all thinking men should be perplexed by the scenes of suffering and affliction which they witness. But of one thing you may be sure: The Father does not send affliction as an arbitrary punishment for wrongdoing. The imperfections and handicaps of evil are inherent; the penalties of sin are inevitable; the destroying consequences of iniquity are inexorable. Man should not blame God for those afflictions which are the natural result of the life which he chooses to live; neither should man complain of those experiences which are a part of life as it is lived on this world. It is the Father’s will that mortal man should work persistently and consistently toward the betterment of his estate on earth. Intelligent application would enable man to overcome much of his earthly misery.

148:5.4 (1662.1) “Nathaniel, it is our mission to help men solve their spiritual problems and in this way to quicken their minds so that they may be the better prepared and inspired to go about solving their manifold material problems. I know of your confusion as you have read the Scriptures. All too often there has prevailed a tendency to ascribe to God the responsibility for everything which ignorant man fails to understand. The Father is not personally responsible for all you may fail to comprehend. Do not doubt the love of the Father just because some just and wise law of his ordaining chances to afflict you because you have innocently or deliberately transgressed such a divine ordinance.

148:5.5 (1662.2) “But, Nathaniel, there is much in the Scriptures which would have instructed you if you had only read with discernment. Do you not remember that it is written: ‘My son, despise not the chastening of the Lord; neither be weary of his correction, for whom the Lord loves he corrects, even as the father corrects the son in whom he takes delight.’ ‘The Lord does not afflict willingly.’ ‘Before I was afflicted, I went astray, but now do I keep the law. Affliction was good for me that I might thereby learn the divine statutes.’ ‘I know your sorrows. The eternal God is your refuge, while underneath are the everlasting arms.’ ‘The Lord also is a refuge for the oppressed, a haven of rest in times of trouble.’ ‘The Lord will strengthen him upon the bed of affliction; the Lord will not forget the sick.’ ‘As a father shows compassion for his children, so is the Lord compassionate to those who fear him. He knows your body; he remembers that you are dust.’ ‘He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.’ ‘He is the hope of the poor, the strength of the needy in his distress, a refuge from the storm, and a shadow from the devastating heat.’ ‘He gives power to the faint, and to them who have no might he increases strength.’ ‘A bruised reed shall he not break, and the smoking flax he will not quench.’ ‘When you pass through the waters of affliction, I will be with you, and when the rivers of adversity overflow you, I will not forsake you.’ ‘He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and to comfort all who mourn.’ ‘There is correction in suffering; affliction does not spring forth from the dust.’”

:idea:

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