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modern man to solve his new and increasingly complex problems.
The time is ripe to witness the figurative resurrection of the human Jesus from his burial tomb amidst the theological traditions and the religious dogmas of nineteen centuries. Jesus of Nazareth must not be longer sacrificed to even the splendid concept of the glorified Christ.
What a transcendent service if, through this revelation, the Son of Man should be recovered from the tomb of traditional theology and be presented as the living Jesus to the church that bears his name, and to all other religions!
Indeed, the social readjustments, the economic transformations, the moral rejuvenations, and the religious revisions of Christian civilization would be drastic and revolutionary if the living religion of Jesus should suddenly supplant the theologic religion about Jesus.
Some day a reformation in the Christian church may strike deep enough to get back to the unadulterated religious teachings of Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. You may preach a religion about Jesus, but, perforce, you must live the religion of Jesus.
Revolution with patience and toleration
You should learn that the expression of even a good thought must be modulated in accordance with the intellectual status and spiritual development of the hearer.
Melchizedek had warned his followers to teach about the one God, the Father and Maker of all, and to preach only the gospel of divine favor through faith alone. But it has often been the error of the teachers of new truth to attempt too much, to attempt to supplant slow evolution by sudden revolution.
The teachers of the religion of Jesus should approach other religions with the recognition of the truths which are held in common (many of which come directly or indirectly from Jesus' message) while they refrain from placing so much emphasis on the differences.
So what comes first?
The graduation from religion of authority to religion of the spirit must begin at the level of the individual seeking to establish a genuine personal spiritual relationship with the God-Spirit-within--one that will be wholly validated by personal experience. Completion of this step requires a fundamental change--the God-Spirit-within becomes our primary authority, our personal friend, and intimate spiritual guide. Attestation to the factuality of that indwelling Spirit is found in more than twenty New Testament verses:
"Know you not that you are the temple of God, that the Spirit of God dwells in you. (1. Cor. 3:16)
"God's spirit joins himself to our spirits to declare we are God's children." (Romans 8:16)
"God is love. He that dwells in love dwells in God and God in him. (1 John 4:16)
"For it is not you who speaks but the Spirit of the Father who speaks in you. (Matthew 10:20)
This one step, involving individual development of God-consciousness, is absolutely basic to any upgrading of Urantian religion. It must come first.
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