Spiritual Lessons
from
Worms and Kids
by Sara Blackstock

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Urantia Book
Historical Society
Being Formed

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Urantian
US Postage
Stamp Issued

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Annual Oregon
Urantian Campout
Coming Up

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The Pipeline of Light
Needs your
Favorite Recipes

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Are You Ready for
an Interesting,
Challenging, Stimulating Service Opportunity?

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Fellowship Summer Conference Update

Urantian US Postage Stamp Issued!

These can be used on letters to friends, bills you might be paying -- anything going through the US mail that you might want to use as a vehicle for spreading awareness of The Urantia Book. 

OK -- These stamps weren't issued by the US Government -- they were created at a website which lets you create postage stamps from your own artwork.

If you are interested in creating your own stamps or ordering some with the picture shown here, click here and follow the directions.

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Are you ready for an interesting, challenging,
stimulating service opportunity? 

Are you ready to serve on the Fellowship's General Council?

Every three years representatives from the various Fellowship Societies meet in a Triennial Delegate Assembly and elect individuals to the General Council of The Fellowship.  This meeting will occur beginning July 5 in River Forest, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago. 

Some sixteen positions on the General Council are open.  If you have any interest in helping to manage the rapidly growing work of the revelation as it spreads in the world, please fill out and send in a copy of the "Application for Organizational Service".

"As faith-enlightened and spirit-liberated sons of the kingdom of heaven, you face a double responsibility of duty to man and duty to God while you voluntarily assume a third and sacred obligation: service to the brotherhood of God-knowing believers." [178:1.5;  1930,2]

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The Pipeline of Light Needs Your Recipes!

Michelle, the Pipeline Coordinator, says:

We have officially opened the call for recipes for the Pipeline of Light Cookbook project.The proceeds from the sales of this unique cookbook will help us fund next year's Pipeline expenses.  It is our intention to create a cosmic recipe collection from readers of The Urantia Book; recipes that are special not only because they are favorites from our community of readers (much like a church cookbook that many of us have in our collections), but because the instructions will be sprinkled with bits of universe wisdom or references to Urantia Book stories.

Your recipe can be as simple or as elaborate as you wish, as long as it's a real recipe and you can think of some bit of universe wisdom or a Urantia Book story that can be integrated into it. 

We would like for the final cookbook to be available for purchase early this Fall.

Here's how to help us with this fun project:

We will have feedback sessions after the day's workshops in which a volunteer from each workshop will report to the entire group the highlights of what was done and learned.

If so, you can make a contribution to The Fellowship every time you purchase something -- Amazon.com will pay The Fellowship a sales commission.  If you reach Amazon.com by going through the Fellowship, the Fellowship gets a commission on everything you subsequently purchase. 

Go to http://urantia-book.org/amazon.htm and click on the Amazon.com logo to get to the Amazon site and make your purchase.  You'll be helping The Fellowship in its effort to spread the revelation. 

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Pipeline Cookbook Sample Recipe  (continued from above)

Cranberry Sauce a la Salvington

Like the journey to Salvington, this cranberry sauce takes a little
time but is well worth the effort.

  Ingredients:
  2 cups orange juice
  2 cups granulated white sugar
  3 tablespoons of Grand Marnier
  2 cinnamon sticks
  2 whole cloves (do not use ground cloves because they will cloud the sauce)
  zest only of 1 clementine
  zest only of 1 orange
  zest only of 1 lime
  zest only of 1 lemon
  6 to 8 finely sliced cumquats (if you can find them)
  24 ounces of fresh cranberries.

  Directions:

Wash the cranberries and pick through them, removing any debris or over-ripened cranberries, much in the manner of traversing the morontia worlds and removing the debris from the mortal life.

Make a seasoned simple syrup: Place the first 5 ingredients into a 4 quart pot and bring to a boil.  Lower heat and simmer, stirring, until all the sugar has dissolved. (The adventurous can try substituting 100% pure maple syrup for the sugar -- just as the journey to Salvington will require many experiences of adjustment and adaptation on the part of the adventurous pilgrim to bring out the full flavor of Supremacy.)

Using a citrus zester, remove the zest from the citrus being careful not to get any of the white pith, which can be quite bitter -- similar to the quest for wisdom which enables a productive harvest of experience purified of the contamination of illusion.

Add the zest to the hot syrup, stir, and cook at a slow boil until the syrup has reduced by one-half and the zest is soft and candied, about 10 to 15  minutes.  Remove the zest with a fork and spread out onto waxed paper to cool.  Remove cloves now.  They will be impossible to find later until your guests are eating your sauce.  During the ascent to Salvington, purposes must become free of any tendencies that might cause difficulty for other ascenders in more complex situations.

Add the cleaned cranberries and cook over low heat, stirring, until they pop.  Remove from the heat, stir in the zest, and cool to room temperature.  Stir well and store, refrigerated, in a plastic container until served.  Even the ascent to Salvington provides periods of rest for the blending of experience and insight.

Remove from refrigerator about 1 hour before serving for best flavor.  May be prepared several days in advance.  The sauce may be enhanced, although made somewhat heavier, by the addition of 1 cup of chopped, glazed pecans.  We will have many opportunities to add to our experience  enabling us to attain more meaningful levels of service. 

Serve the Supreme by serving this cranberry sauce to some of your friends here on Urantia with whom you are beginning your journey to Salvington.

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     Spiritual Lessons from Worms and Kids  (continued from above)

As we began this process it looked as if we may have lost our whole worm population, for we began to pull comatose bodies out one by one.  But we said to each other, "If the dirt was stirred and wetted, maybe the little critters might come alive.  Maybe we can save the lives of our worms."

There was a great stir of energy as these kids saw what to them was a critical situation in which they could make a difference.  They got some squirt bottles and we got into a rythm as the energy intensified in the effort to save our worms.  I would reach down to the bottom of the bin, bringing up the drier dirt and along with it a few listless worms in my hands.  I would hold them in my hands while the kids aimed their squirt bottles at the unmoving worm bodies, trying to revive them with the water.

The joy that was present in that small space when a comatose worm would stir after being squirted was indescribable.  I doubt that this had much of the attention of the supreme personalities of the universe, but for these few minutes, these kids were giving everything they had to revive these worms.They were actually fighting over who got to save the worms!  Such joy -- and to top it all off, one rather serious kindergarten boy said, with a perfectly straight face, "That smells like champagne!"  And of course the fermenting fruit did have a hint of such an aroma.

So what do worms have to do with spiritual service?  After some stirring of the ground of my own being, I came up with no less than 16 principles of spiritual service from this experience.

I doubt that this falls into the category mentioned on page 1452, "All good works of true service come from the Supreme", but I also think that our celestial friends have a wonderful, playful sense of humor and have keen "joy sensors".

On page 555 I found an interesting phrase talking about what the ministering reserves can do for ascending mortals:  They can kindle ". . . a divine fire of the will-to-service."  This phrase really caught my soul's eye because the energy to save the worms became a metaphor for this "divine fire of the will-to-service."

We can feel this "divine fire of the will-to-service" in our very souls.  The Adjusters are dispatched for mortal service from Divinigton carrying the embers of this "divine fire of the will-to-service".

So here is a list of sixteen principles of service which I dug up from the worm bin experience, and I think that all of them apply to us as individuals, and most are applicable to us as a group of religionists dedicated to the work of the fifth epochal revelation.

1.  Stay grounded.

2. Do what is right in front of you -- serve where you are first.  It is somtimes so enticing to look for service in distant places that we miss golden opportunities in our own back yard.

3.  Don't be afraid to roll up your sleeves and get dirty.  Too many of us are becoming armchair
servers -- seeking high philosophical places, thinking that we can serve our revelation with just our thoughts, while the Mother Teresas of the world are doing the real work with their hands and their sweat.  Our families and the world need our hands as well as our revelation.  Plus, getting dirty is humbling, and it keeps us grounded in the reality of this planet.  There is a lot of dirt on our world.

4.  Every little thing counts.  Look how many times Jesus went about doing good -- little things -- he smiled at people as he passed by.

5.  Involve those around you in participation with you in serving.  You don't have to do it alone.  Give others a chance to experience the joy and exhilaration of service.

6.  Water the dry ground with the true water of life and love -- wherever you go.

7.  Know and understand why you are serving -- to meet your own needs?  To look good?  For others to see?  Because we are supposed to?  Is our purpose simply to tell the whole world about the Urantia Book without making an effort to live its truths day by day?

8.  Be diligent and check conditions around you often to see if there is something needing to be done.

9.  Do not take yourself too seriously as you serve.

10.  Know when to stop serving.  Some kids got so caught up in the process of squirting the worms that they nearly drowned the ones they had revived.

11.  Keep the priority of relationship always in mind.  Was the really important thing in the worm bin the worms? No, it was the relationship between the kids and between the kids and me that was the essential thing happening there.  This is where perhaps Supremacy was also becoming a little more real.  Is the important thing to bang people over the head with a book to the detriment of your personal relationship with them?

12.  Do things joyfully -- with a sense of humor.  At one point I and the kids were almost rolling on the floor with laughter.  And the ones who were standing on the sidelines watching had unplugged their noses and moved closer when they saw how much fun we were having.

13.  Respect diversity in service.  Some of the kids did not want to come within eight feet of the worm bin, but they watched and were caught up in the enthusiasm.  Fifteen kids could not have been doing the same thing anyway.

14.  Keep perspective.  We could stay at the worm bin stirring and squirting just so long, and then the rest of life called us on to school.  The Urantia Book admonishes us to engage in life in a variety of modes -- work, progress, play, service, study, relaxation.

15.  Acknowledge that it is personally good for us to engage in service.  The book also admonishes us to "Seek perfection through service."  We get closer to God through worship and service.  Service stimulates the growth of our souls.

16.  Be spontaneous, allowing the "divine fire of the will-to-service" to burn brightly, without fear and without concern for what others might think.

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