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Opening comments by Dr. William S. Sadler

It is a solemn and supernal fact that such lowly and material creatures as Urantia human beings are the sons of God. "Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed upon us that we should be called the sons of God." 40:6.2 (448)

Tonight we do honor to five of our departed friends -- longtime members of the Urantia movement. Caroline Brown joined the Forum in 1926; her sister, Lulu Steinbeck, in 1928; Lee Miller Jones in 1932; Edmond F. J. Kulieke, Senior, in 1937; and Minnie Kulieke in 1939.

Caroline Brown, Minnie Kulieke, and Lulu Steinbeck were among the 34 founders of the First Urantia Society and Lee Miller Jones and Edmond Kulieke were charter members.

Lee Miller Jones and Edmond Kulieke had the honor of being numbered among the 36 founders of the Urantia Brotherhood, and served the Brotherhood as General Councilors from its establishment in 1955. Our five friends were all active and dedicated Forum members.

Mr. Jones, Mr. Kulieke, and Mrs. Stein beck enrolled int he Seventy class in April 1939 when we started these meetings. In 1940 Mr. Jones was elected Chairman of the Seventy group, serving during 1940 and 1941. He was the first so to act. Mr. Kulieke served as Chairman in 1941-42 and Mrs. Steinbeck in 1942-43.

Edmond Kulieke during his active participation in our work conducted our communion service in an inspirational manner. He was assisted many years by Lee Miller Jones. He also served as Chairman of the Fraternal Relations Committee of the Urantia Brotherhood for nine years and Lee Miller Jones served as a member of the same committee for eight years.

We are here not to voice despair over the death of the physical bodies of our friends, but to express our wholehearted faith and rejoice that these human souls have embarked on the career of eternal life in the progressive service of the heavenly Father. Jesus has said:

"I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me though he die, yet shall he live, because:

"I am the bread of life.

"I am the living water.

"I am the light of the world.

"I am the open door to eternal salvation.

"I am the way, the truth and the life.

"I am the living bridge from one world to another.

"I am the living link between time and eternity." 182:1.10 (1965)

"There is something real, something of human evolution, something additional to the Mystery Monitor, which survives death. This newly appearing entity is the soul, and it survives the death of both your physical body and your material mind. This entity is the conjoint child of the combined life and efforts of the human you in liaison with the divine you, the Adjuster. This child of human and divine parentage constitutes the surviving element of terrestrial origin; it is the morontia self, the immortal soul. This child of persisting meaning and surviving value is wholly unconscious during the period from death to repersonalization and is in the keeping of the seraphic destiny guardian throughout this season of waiting. You will not function as a conscious being, following death, until you attain the new consciousness of morontia on the mansion worlds of Satania." 112:5.12 (1234)

"There is in the mind of God a plan which embraces every creature of all his vast domains, and this plan is an eternal purpose of boundless opportunity, unlimited progress, and endless life. And the infinite treasures of such a matchless career are yours for the striving! The goal of eternity is ahead! The adventure of divinity attainment lies before you! The race for perfection is on! whosoever will may enter, and certain victory will crown the efforts of every human being who will run the race of faith and trust, depending every step of the way on the leading of the indwelling Adjuster and on the guidance of that good spirit of the Universe Son, which so freely has been poured out upon all flesh." 32:5.7 (365)

Presentation by Anna Rawson -- A Glimpse of the Ascension Career

"We leave our mortal world of Urantia and awaken first on the mansion worlds, those spheres to which Jesus alluded when he said: "In my Father's house are many mansions." 30:4.10 (341)

"It is indeed an epoch in the career of an ascending mortal, this first awakening on the shores of the mansion world; there, for the first time, actually to see your long-loved and ever-present angelic companions of earth days; there also to become truly conscious of the identity and presence of the divine Monitor who so long indwelt your mind on earth. Such an experience constitutes a glorious awakening, a real resurrection." 113:7.1 (1248)

"Regardless of the technique which may be employed on the individual worlds of time in connection with special or dispensational resurrections, the real and conscious reassembly of actual and complete personality takes place in the resurrection halls of mansonia number one. Throughout all eternity you will recall the profound memory impressions of your first witnessing of these resurrection mornings." 47:3.5 (533)

"A Morontia Companion will certainly be on hand to welcome you when you awaken on the initial mansion world from the first transit sleep of time, when you experience the resurrection from the death of the flesh into the morontia life. And from the time you are thus formally welcomed on awakening to that day when you leave the local universe as a first-stage spirit, these Morontia Companions are ever with you." 48:3.8 (546)

"From the resurrection halls you proceed to the Melchizedek sector, where you are assigned permanent residence. Then you enter upon ten days of personal liberty. You are free to explore the immediate vicinity of your new home and to familiarize yourself with the program which lies immediately ahead. You also have time to gratify your desire to consult the registry and call upon your loved ones and other earth friends who may have preceded you to these worlds." 47:3.6 (532)

"As an ascendant being, you are in possession of personal memories of all former and lower existences." 48:4.20 (550)

"But personality and the relationships between personalities are never scaffolding; mortal memory of personality relationships has cosmic value and will persist. On the mansion worlds you will know and be known, and more, you will remember, and be remembered by, your onetime associates in the short but intriguing life on Urantia." 112:5.22 (1235)

"There is also here with me a Mighty Messenger from Uversa, an ascendant Adjuster-fused, onetime mortal being, and he perceives you as you are, and at the same time he visualizes the Solitary Messenger, the supernaphim, and other celestial beings present. Never in your long ascendancy will you lose the power to recognize your associates of former existences. Always, as you ascend inward in the scale of life, will you retain the ability to recognize and fraternize with the fellow beings of your previous and lower levels of experience. Each new translation or resurrection will add one more group of spirit beings to your vision range without in the least depriving you of the ability to recognize your friends and fellows of former estates. All this is made possible in the experience of ascending mortals by the action of the indwelling Thought Adjusters. Through their retention of the duplicates of your entire life's experiences, you are assured of never losing any true attribute you once had; and these Adjusters are going through with you, as a part of you, in reality, as you." 44:0.11 (498)

After completion of the mansion world experience, you go to Jerusem, the system capital.

Jerusem

The reception of a new class of mansion world graduates is the signal for all Jerusem to assemble as a committee of welcome.

"Once a week, every ten days on Jerusem, the Sovereign holds a conclave with some one group of the various orders of personalities domiciled on the headquarters world. These are the charmingly informal hours of Jerusem, and they are never-to-be-forgotten occasions. On Jerusem there exists the utmost fraternity between all the various orders of beings and between each of these groups and the System Sovereign. These unique assemblages occur on the sea of glass, the great gathering field of the system capital. They are purely social and spiritual occasions; nothing pertaining to the planetary administration or even to the ascendant plan is ever discussed. Ascending mortals come together at these times merely to enjoy themselves and to meet their fellow Jerusemites. Those groups which are not being entertained by the Sovereign at these weekly relaxations meet at their own headquarters." 45:2.5 (511)

Norlatiadek - Constellation

On the mansion worlds you completed the unification of the evolving mortal personality; on the system capital you attained Jerusem citizenship and achieved the willingness to submit the self to the disciplines of group activities and co-ordinated undertakings; but on the constellation training worlds you are to achieve the real socialization of your evolving morontia personality.

Nebadon - Local Universe

From the constellation experience you move onto Nebadon and the local universe experience.

"From the time of graduation from the mansion worlds to the attainment of spirit status in the superuniverse career, ascending mortals are denominated morontia progressors. Your passage through this wonderful borderland life will be an unforgettable experience, a charming memory. It is the evolutionary portal to spirit life and the eventual attainment of creature perfection by which ascenders achieve the goal of time -- the finding of God on Paradise." 48:8.1 (557)

"Universe Orientators are the true friends and postgraduate counselors of all those ascending creatures who are pausing for the last time on Salvington, in their universe of origin, as they stand on the brink of the spirit adventure stretching out before them in the vast superuniverse of Orvonton. And at such a time many an ascender has a feeling which mortals could understand only by comparison with the human emotion of nostalgia. Behind lie the realms of achievement, realms grown familiar by long service and morontia attainment; ahead lies the challenging mystery of a greater and vaster universe." 9:1.10 (428)

"Having passed the tribunals of the local universe from the lowest to the highest you will finally be taken to Salvington where you will stand face to face with the Sovereign of Nebadon (our own Jesus), the local universe Father. And there, at the hand of the very being whose creative fatherhood in this universe of time has made possible the fact of your life, you will be granted those credentials which entitle you eventually to proceed upon your superuniverse career in quest of the Universal Father." (1238 and 1248)

"When mortals of time graduate from the training worlds surrounding the headquarters of a local universe and are advanced to the educational spheres of their superuniverse, they have progressed in spiritual development to that point where they are able to recognize and communicate with the high spiritual rulers and directors of these advanced realms, including the Ancients of Days." 18:3.1 (209)

Your seraphic guides will follow you through the minor and major sectors of the superuniverse and on to the receiving worlds of Uversa, remaining with you until you finally enseconaphim for the long Havona flight.

"Havona The pilgrim lands on the receiving planet of Havona, the pilot world of the seventh circuit, with only one endowment of perfection, perfection of purpose. Your purpose has been thoroughly proved; your faith has been tested. You are known to be disappointment proof. Not even the failure to discern the Universal Father can shake the faith or seriously disturb the trust of an ascendant mortal who has passed through the experience that all must traverse in order to attain the perfect spheres of Havona. By the time you reach Havona, your sincerity has become sublime. Perfection of purpose and divinity of desire, with steadfastness of faith, have secured your entrance to the settled abodes of eternity; your deliverance from the uncertainties of time is full and complete; and now must you come face to face with the problems of Havona and the immensities of Paradise, to meet which you have so long been in training in the experiential epochs of time on the world schools of space. Faith has won for the ascendant pilgrim a perfection of purpose which admits the children of time to the portals of eternity. Now must the pilgrim helpers begin the work of developing that perfection of understanding and that technique of comprehension which are so indispensable to Paradise perfection of personality." 26:4.6 (290)

"Ability to comprehend is the mortal passport to Paradise. Willingness to believe is the key to Havona. The acceptance of sonship, co-operation with the indwelling Adjuster, is the price of evolutionary survival." 26:4.8 (290)

"The first act of your Havona career will be to recognize and thank your transport seconaphim for the long and safe journey. Then you are presented to those beings who will sponsor your early Havona activities. Next you go to register your arrival and prepare your message of thanksgiving and adoration for dispatch to the Creator Son of your local universe, the universe Father who made possible your sonship career. After this, you are accorded a long period of leisure for free observation, and this affords opportunity for looking up your friends, fellows, and associates of the long ascension experience." 30:4.21 (343)

"The Graduate Guide who greets you upon your arrival on the receiving world of the outer Havona circuit will remain with you throughout your entire career on the heavenly circuits." 24:6.3 (270)

"The test of time is almost over; the race for eternity has been all but run. The days of uncertainty are ending; the temptation to doubt is vanishing; the injunction to be perfect has been obeyed. From the very bottom of intelligent existence the creature of time and material personality has ascended the evolutionary spheres of space, thus proving the feasibility of the ascension plan while forever demonstrating the justice and righteousness of the command of the Universal Father to his lowly creatures of the worlds: "Be you perfect, even as I am perfect." 26:9.3 (294)

"The broadcasts of Havona flash forth the space reports of glory, the good news that in very truth the conscientious creatures of animal nature and material origin have, through evolutionary ascension, become in reality and eternally the perfected sons of God." 26:9.4 (295)

"And now, at the culmination of the Havona career, as you mortals go to sleep on the pilot world of the inner circuit, you go not alone to your rest as you did on the worlds of your origin when you closed your eyes in the natural sleep of mortal death, nor as you did when you entered the long transit trance preparatory for the journey to Havona. Now, as you prepare for the attainment rest, there moves over by your side your long-time associate of the first circle, the majestic complement of rest, who prepares to enter the rest as one with you, as the pledge of Havona that your transition is complete, and that you await only the final touches of perfection. Your first transition was indeed death, the second an ideal sleep, and now the third metamorphosis is the true rest, the relaxation of the ages." 26:11.7 (297)

Paradise

The one essential to the enjoyment of Paradise is rest, divine rest. The Instigators of Rest are the final instructors who make ready the pilgrims of time for their introduction to eternity.

"You enter the rest on the final Havona circuit and are eternally resurrected on Paradise. And as you there spiritually repersonalize, you will immediately recognize the instigator of rest who welcomes you to the eternal shores as the very primary supernaphim who produced the final sleep on the innermost circuit of Havona; and you will recall the last grand stretch of faith as you once again made ready to commend the keeping of your identity into the hands of the Universal Father. The last rest of time has been enjoyed; the last transition sleep has been experienced; now you awake to life everlasting on the shores of the eternal abode. "And there shall be no more sleep. The presence of God and his Son are before you, and you are eternally his servants; you have seen his face, and his name is your spirit. There shall be no night there; and they need no light of the sun, for the Great Source and Center gives them light; they shall live forever and ever. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; there shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain, for the former things have passed away." 27:1.4 (299)

Your residence on Paradise signifies that you have found God, and that you are to be mustered into the Mortal Corps of the Finality. 30:4.24 (343)

Finaliters are the accumulating tried and true souls of time and space, the evolutionary salt of the universe. They have complied with the injunction of the ages: "Be you perfect"; they have found God.

Remarks by Alvin Kulieke

We feel it is appropriate to read several selections from the Urantia Book, which are among our favorites.

"One of the most amazing earmarks of religious living is that dynamic and sublime peace, that peace which passes all human understanding, that cosmic poise which betokens the absence of all doubt and turmoil. Such levels of spiritual stability are immune to disappointment. Such religionists are like the Apostle Paul, who said: "I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else shall be able to separate us from the love of God." 100:6.6 (1101)

"The consciousness of the spirit domination of a human life is presently attended by an increasing exhibition of the characteristics of the Spirit in the life reactions of such a spirit-led mortal, "for the fruits of the spirit are love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, and temperance." Such spirit-guided and divinely illuminated mortals, while they yet tread the lowly paths of toil and in human faithfulness perform the duties of their earthly assignments, have already begun to discern the lights of eternal life as they glimmer on the faraway shores of another world; already have they begun to comprehend the reality of that inspiring and comforting truth, "The kingdom of God is not meat and drink but righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit." And throughout every trial and in the presence of every hardship, spirit-born souls are sustained by that hope which transcends all fear because the love of God is shed abroad in all hearts by the presence of the divine Spirit." 34:6.13 (381)

"Having started out on the way of life everlasting, having accepted the assignment and received your orders to advance, do not fear the dangers of human forgetfulness and mortal inconstancy, do not be troubled with doubts of failure or by perplexing confusion, do not falter and question your status and standing, for in every dark hour, at every crossroad in the forward struggle, the Spirit of Truth will always speak, saying, "This is the way." 34:7.8 (383)

"There is a great and glorious purpose in the march of the universes through space. All of your mortal struggling is not in vain. We are all part of an immense plan, a gigantic enterprise, and it is the vastness of the undertaking that renders it impossible to see very much of it at any one time and during any one life. We are all a part of an eternal project which the Gods are supervising and outworking. The whole marvelous and universal mechanism moves on majestically through space to the music of the meter of the infinite thought and the eternal purpose of the First Great Source and Center." 32:5.1 (364)

"But no God-knowing mortal can ever be lonely in his journey through the cosmos, for he knows that the Father walks beside him each step of the way, while the very way that he is traversing is the presence of the Supreme." 117:6.27 (1291)

"You humans have begun an endless unfolding of an almost infinite panorama, a limitless expanding of never-ending, ever-widening spheres of opportunity for exhilarating service, matchless adventure, sublime uncertainty, and boundless attainment. When the clouds gather overhead, your faith should accept the fact of the presence of the indwelling Adjuster, and thus you should be able to look beyond the mists of mortal uncertainty into the clear shining of the sun of eternal righteousness on the beckoning heights of the mansion worlds of Satania." 108:6.8 (1194)

And finally, the words of Jesus: "What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul?" 140:8.17 (1581)

"Let not your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; continue to believe also in me. Even though I must leave you, I will not be far from you. I have already told you that in my Father's universe there are many tarrying-places. If this were not true, I would not have repeatedly told you about them. I am going to return to these worlds of light, stations in the Father's heaven to which you shall sometime ascend. From these places I came into this world, and the hour is now at hand when I must return to my Father's work in the spheres on high." 180:3.4 (1947)

"And now, as I am about to leave you, I would speak words of comfort. Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I make these gifts not as the world gives -- by measure -- I give each of you all you will receive. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be fearful. I have overcome the world, and in me you shall all triumph through faith. ...And all of these things have I told you that you might have peace and have it more abundantly." 81:1.5 (1954)

Reading from the Apostle John, Chapter 10:27,28: "My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me; and I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand."

It is in this faith that our friends have fallen asleep, with a firm conviction that they will some day see their Master. And it is with a similar faith that we look forward to the day when we will all be reunited in the mansions that have been prepared for us.

Closing comments by Dr. William S. Sadler

So for the present we say farewell to our friends with full assurance, as Alvin has said, in the Master's promise that we shall rejoin them in the mansion worlds of Satania.

"Evolutionary mortals are born on the planets of space, pass through the morontia worlds, ascend the spirit universes, traverse the Havona spheres, find God, attain Paradise, and are mustered into the primary Corps of the Finality, therein to await the next assignment of universe service. There are six other assembling finality corps, but Grandfanda, the first mortal ascender, presides as Paradise chief of all orders of finaliters. And as we view this sublime spectacle, we all exclaim: What a glorious destiny for the animal-origin children of time, the material sons of space!" 31:10.13 (354)

In closing this memorial service, let us rise and pray:

"Our Father who is in heaven,
"Hallowed be your name.
"Your kingdom come; your will be done
"On earth as it is in heaven.
"Give us this day our bread for tomorrow;
"Refresh our souls with the water of life.
"And forgive us every one our debts
"As we also have forgiven our debtors.
"Save us in temptation, deliver us from evil,
"And increasingly make us perfect like yourself." 144:3.3 (1620)