2005 Sun Valley Gathering, Part 2

2009-8-11 04:06:00

True Salvation

JJ:

When you're training a kid, you'll tell them not to do something but they'll go ahead and do it, they live through the experience and regret it. After they suffer a little pain then they finally learn. The parents say, "I've taught you this all along. Why didn't you just listen to me? If you wouldn't listened to me you could've saved yourself all this pain.

Why do you think experience is such a great teacher? If I tell you, for instance, "You can obtain soul contact if you do A, B, C and soul contact is a really wonderful thing to have." You might think, "Well, that sounds good." But maybe there is no motivation there to get soul contact. You've never experienced soul contact so you don't know what it is. But then one day you go through something and have an experience and you obtain a taste of a higher life or a higher energy. Once you obtain that experience, does that change you? How many here have gone through an experience where you've encountered a vibration or sensation that you have heard of but never felt before that certain moment? Let's pick on somebody here. Tell us about your experience.

Audience:

"Well, my experience was actually a dream. It was like a dream I never had before. I just saw seven moons above me and they all lit up, one by one by one. As soon as the last one lit up the entire sky lit up and I knew right at that moment that something special was going to happen. Suddenly I was being ascended up. I looked around and there were a lot of people around me. I had this very peaceful feeling, almost a feeling that I had to convince people that everything was going to be okay. Something was going on. My whole entire body heated up like I was on fire. I woke up not knowing what the heck happened but I know something special did happen."

JJ:

After you had this experience can you relate it to people?

Audience:

"Yea, I talked to Artie about it. One way of looking at it was like my energy centers opened up, my eyesight opened up and I had so much more clarity than I had before. I'm just more aware."

JJ:

They say one reason we came to this mortal sphere is to experience joy and pain and sorrow. By experiencing the dualities and really going through them, is a lot different than sitting back in some static state and talking about the theory of dualities. Here we're experiencing dualities. By going through the experience it produces an enrichment.

It is said that as the soul gathers back to the source he gathers back fruit of experience. Think of that statement. The fruit of experience. In other words, experience produces the fruit that we take with us to other worlds and that produces a livingness and a joy and an enrichment that we will have in our possession. It's a fruit that we take with us that we can then partake of and relive if we want to and enjoy it again and again. This is why it's so important to live our lives so the end of the experience is good and joyous. If the end of our experience is a negative situation then the fruit that we have will not be good fruit. If our memories on the incident are that you end up hurting a lot of people then you reflect upon it from a higher state it will not be something very useful for enhancing your livingness.

People often ask and this is usually the question that's called the ultimate question and that is why we are here or why God made anything to begin with. Every time I look up at the stars at night I'm filled with wonderment and I ask myself if the greatest miracle isn't that anything is here at all. That's a miracle. Talk about not being able to see the forest for the trees. The greatest miracle of all is that anything exists, even a rock or a planet. The fact that the universe exists teaming with life and we can see it out there is a tremendous miracle. It's a miracle that we're here to begin with. So what's it all about? Why are we even here? Do you think it has something to do with experience?

We've all heard the expression that God is one. Let's go back to when God was one and was in a static condition and just a condition of being. Visualize yourself being the one life and you're only one and nothing is really happening except maybe in your universal mind you're imagining some things happening. That's not really good enough, is it? You daydream about stuff. Then God reaches a point where he thinks, "I'm really getting bored with this imagining what creation would be like. I'm going to make a creation that's really real then I'm going to jump into it myself. I'm going to reflect myself and create divine reflections all over a universe and I'm going to jump in with my being and my life and I'm going to experience, in reality, in a state of duality and I'm actually going to go through it - not just imagine it but I'm going to go through it and work my way out of it. It's going to be tough.

People feel the need to give God the benefit of the doubt about his power. Our belief system here is that God is perfect. That way we'll be safe. If he's not perfect he won't be that mad. We're giving him the benefit of the doubt. If he's perfect and we say he's not he'd be really angry with us so let's give him the benefit of the doubt then our doctrine is perfect.

Is God all powerful? Well, yea, we better make him all powerful too. Does God know every little thing that's going to happen? Is he omniscient? Yep, we better put that in there too. We don't want to make him mad for believing incorrectly. This fear of making God mad or angry with us causes the designers of every religion of the earth to give the most positive aspect and description of God that they can possibly come up with. If you read some of the Catholic Catechisms, "Oh most holy wonderful Divine being..." They say the same type thing in the east, "Most holy exalted divine being, we adore you." All these statements of adoration originated from the point of fear because they didn't want to offend anybody up there. They always say the most positive thing possible.

Does God know everything or does he not know everything? We better say he knows everything and burn anybody at the stake who says otherwise. Let's make sure we don't offend the divine being. The scriptures don't say he knows everything and they don't say he is perfect. But they do say this. You and I are created in the image of God. Are you perfect? Do you know everything that's going to happen? You don't, do you? Do you know everything in the universe? Are you all-knowing? No, you're not.

Audience:

Inaudible.

JJ:

Well, we do. When we set a goal for ourselves we know how it will end and if we don't give up on that goal, it does end that way. You only don't reach your goal if you give up. Think about it. Any goal that you can set for yourself, a goal that is at least possible, you can accomplish if you don't give up.

You have the ability to know the end from the beginning. This is the way of every life in the universe. Everyone can know the end from the beginning, just like DaVinci painting the Mona Lisa. He knew the image of how the Mona Lisa was going to look but in between he made a lot of bad strokes that he had to paint over to get it exactly the way he wanted. Leonardo was not prefect in the process of painting but by the time he finished the painting was just about as perfect as perfection could be. But in between it wasn't. He made a lot of unnecessary bad strokes he had to compensate for. That's the way we are and that's even the way God is.

Look at this planet. The physical is really just the tip of the iceberg. There are seven spheres. We are the forth sphere down. The creation of the earth started four spheres up from us. We're the lowest point then the earth will go to the astral then to the higher mental then to the spiritual. We're at a point in this earth life where the earth is far from perfect. God made this earth that isn't perfect and you and I aren't perfect. Perfection is an illusion.

In the Bible where it talks about Jesus being perfect as the author of our salvation. Being perfect came from the Greek word TELEIOO, meaning he fulfilled the job he came to do. In other words where it says, "He being made perfect", it really says in the Greek that he fulfilled the job he came to do. Where it says, "Be ye therefore perfect even as your father in heaven is perfect" it basically reads, 'Do your job even as God does his job. God makes the sun shine every day and gets his job done so you get your job done every day too and you'll be perfect even as your father in heaven is perfect.

There is another word for perfect which is AKRIBELA in the Greek. This is the word for perfect that we use. It means flawless. This is what we think when we say perfect. We're thinking the Greek AKRIBELA. Where does this word show up in the scriptures? Where this word shows up is among the people who crucified Jesus. They were trying to be AKRIBELA. They crucified Jesus because he was not AKRIBELA. He violated a lot of laws so they were always accusing him of not being AKRIBELA or flawless. This was far from a flawless man in their minds.

The true meaning of perfection, as it is used in the New Testament, is to merely set a goal for yourself and get it accomplished. Leonardo De Vinci had a goal to produce an almost perfect painting and he reached his goal so he achieved the type of perfection that Jesus achieved when he became the author of our salvation.

Salvation is an interesting word. The word in the Greek actually means deliverance. It means to be delivered from something. If we study these ancient words we'll find how misused they are. They're so misused today that a lot of intelligent people don't even want to associate with these ancient words like sin, repentance, righteousness. A lot of people want to distance themselves away from these words unless they're really strong religious people. They feel there is something wrong with these words and something is wrong because we've distorted them from the way they were in the beginning.

When people commit what they call a sin, what do they feel afterwards? Guilt. What is guilt? Let's take the true meaning of sin which it to "miss the mark." Have you ever shot an arrow at a target or a gun where you're shooting at a bulls-eye? When you're shooting and you miss the bulls-eye do you ever feel guilty because you miss? Why don't you feel guilty?

Audience:

"I haven't been taught to feel guilty about that. I may be mad."

Audience:

"I feel disappointed."

JJ:

Do you hit yourself and think, "I'm not ready to try another arrow? I must do penance and wait thirty days at least. I'm not worthy! I must wait sixty days and purge myself. I must cleanse myself!" We don't think that way, do we? Why not?

Why do people think that way about sin? Why do they think, when they commit what they call a sin, why do they experience this guilt? And this guilt makes them think, "I'm not worthy of even trying any more."

Audience:

"I have a question or maybe a comment. If I were just shooting an arrow at a target, nobody gets hurt. If I make a mistake and a lot of people are hurt, then I'd feel pretty guilty about that. Why shouldn't I feel guilty?"

JJ:

With a lot of sins no one gets hurt. Let's say you were taught that drinking coffee is a sin. If you're taught that and you drink coffee nobody gets hurt much but if you're under that religious system, you'll feel guilty about it.

Audience:

"How about if it angers God? If you're taught it is the wrath of God and you make Him mad, he'll get you."

JJ:

Does drinking coffee make him mad? What produces guilt? Fear? That's part of it. Fear is a big part of it.

Audience:

"How about a lack of understanding?"

JJ:

That's part of it. You're not understanding something and that makes guilt. That's true. What is it that we don't understand?

Audience:

"I think just buying into society's expectations and trying to live up to those produces guilt. We're concerned about what other people will think if we do something bad or hurt people. That's part of it, I think."

JJ:

Let's pick something that produces guilt. Let's say Robin does something she knows will irritate Larry so Larry asks her about it and she lies to him. Then she thinks, "Oh no, I lied to him and God says not to lie." So, she starts to feel really guilty about lying to him. Now, let's apply the true meaning of sin which is to miss the mark and realize you're wrong. If you realize you're wrong you can tell him, "I told you a lie. I'm sorry. I'll do better." There is no guilt involved. You corrected the situation and are ready to shoot another arrow at the target.

What produces guilt is this. The commandment or the law that you feel you have gone against was given by God, but not by God himself but by a representative. A man in the flesh is representing God and he's telling you that you have done something terribly wrong and you need to feel bad. This produces guilt. Instead of God being inside yourself, when God is outside yourself and a human agent gives you a law and you break that law you feel guilty because God is out there.

Let's suppose God is in here and not out there anymore. If he is within and you are doing your best and you make a mistake then you check in here and you think, "I made a mistake. I'll do better next time." You follow that and there is no guilt. You're in communication. You have no individual that's a mediator between you and God. Your soul is the mediator between you and God so your soul tells you what God thinks.

God reveals his thoughts to you and when this happens you don't feel guilt any more. When you make a mistake, instead of thinking, "Oh no, I'm not worthy of trying again" you try again immediately. Even if you hurt someone you think, "It's really bad that I hurt somebody. I didn't mean to make them angry or hurt their feelings. I'll do better next time and be more sensitive." You shoot another arrow at the target and there is no guilt. You may feel disappointed in yourself just as if you were shooting an arrow at the target and you miss but you won't sit around for a month doing nothing until you shoot at the target again.

This is the true meaning of what salvation is. Christ came and delivered us from guilt. That was his main mission. That deliverance has been lost. Even the people who say they have been saved are still suffering from guilt so they really have not been saved. You're only saved when you're delivered from guilt but the regular religious person thinks it's evil to be delivered from guilt. They think that if you're delivered from guilt you have no conscience.

I've been free from guilt for many years but I still have a conscience but if I make a mistake I don't think I'm not worthy to do this or that or I'm not worthy to enter the door of a church or that I have to fast. If I make a mistake I feel absolutely no guilt about it. I may feel bad about it. Like shooting an arrow at the target I may think I screwed up. I just vow to do better next time. This is the way of progress. You can make about ten to a hundred times more progress on the spiritual path when guilt is eliminated.

  

Quote Of The Day

"Barack Obama will require you to work... Barack will never allow you to go back to your lives as usual, uninvolved, uninformed."

  -- Michelle Obama speaking at UCLA, Feb 18, 2008

  

-- End Of Part Two --

  

Go to:

2005 Sun Valley Gathering, Part Three  (Transcription)
2005 Sun Valley Gathering, Part One  (Transcription)

  

Listen to:

Podcasts of Parts 1 - 8 from the 2005 Sun Valley Gathering