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He was trying, but failing, to introduce a panic stations frame of mind into his trainees if two incoming commercial airliners, laden with passengers, were inadvertently put upon a collision course. Then one day it happened, everyone went about their duties quietly and efficiently with no signs of panic or unusual hurry. The collision was avoided, though it may not have been so if it had not been noticed until about 30 seconds later.
Discussing this situation with his trainees he discovered that its foundation was a deep trust in whatever happens does so because it is the will of Allah. Hence if Allah willed the crash, they could not prevent it, and if Allah did not will a crash, it would not happen.
For me, Jesus' complete trust in God, as illustrated by his statement to the Indian boy, "Ganid, I have absolute confidence in my heavenly Father's overcare; I am consecrated to doing the will of my Father in heaven. I do not believe that real harm can befall me...," was of a totally different order of certainty. Jesus had faith in God's overcare but not on the basis of whether whatever happens is predetermined by God's will. On the contrary, The Urantia Papers are quite adamant that it is our free will decisions that are essential for the spiritualization of our being.
Given a celestial revelation, at our present state of evolutionary advancement it is inevitable that a high proportion of Urantian mortals will turn it into a set of hard and fast rules and regulations to obey. By doing so, the book tells us we become obedient servants, and not freewill sons of God.
So, if in our minds we are certain that God exists and we are also certain that the doing of God's will is essential for our survival, then our choice is likely to be to comply to the letter, or to reject, a set of rules that substitute as God's will for us. And our compliance will be made in the shadow of the threat of punishment or the hope of reward.
It is my conclusion that we can be truly free of the reward or punishment incentive, and so in a position to choose the will of the God unconditionally, only if there is room for uncertainty both about God's existence and the consequences thereof.
If this suggestion is correct, then the revelators could not provide us with a totally self-authenticating revelation. They had to leave room for doubt or else they would violate God's decree regarding the absolute sovereignty of the mortal free will. So is this the reason that The Urantia Book is fraught with difficulties and "strangeness"?
Quotations from the book that are in accord with these thoughts are:
"But for you, my children, and for all others who would follow you into this kingdom, there is set a severe test. Faith alone will pass you through its portals...." (1569)
Here a reminder of Brian Appleyard's telling remark is warranted, "If we had reason for faith, it would not be faith at all, it would be logic. Faith can only be unreasonable."
So if the Urantia Papers were errorless, as well as containing prophetic materials, we would be forced to accept it as having divine authority--thus leaving no room for faith. But only faith can pass us through the portals!
Then we have:
"The existence of God can never be proved by scientific experiment or by pure reason...." (24)
"Revelation is validated only by human experience..." (1106)
"The proof of revelation is this same fact of human experience..." (1105)
"The fact of religion consists wholly in the religious experience of the rational and average human being." (1105)
My last supporting quote says:
"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." (291)
It certainly seems that mortal life is meant to be charged with uncertainty. Thus am I able to say:
"Thank you Father, for the errors and the 'funny' stuff in The Urantia Book, thank you for those hilarious bits about Adamson and Ratta and their invisible children; thank you for those incredible, impossible, long-ranging passenger birds that carry two people 500 miles non-stop--and talk; thank you for the forty days to Pentecost conundrum; and thank you for the beauty and the grandeur of those Urantia Papers that reflect a level of genius that is light
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