Articles from the Religious Research Journal
Thy Kingdom Come, Thy Will Be Done…
Although I am not now a fundamentalist Christian, I was raised in a Southern Methodist church steeped in dogma, with a literal interpretation of the Bible, and a constant preaching of hell, fire, and damnation. Like many others, I turned totally away from these teachings to New Age principles that bore no apparent resemblance to the Christianity that was taught in my church. However, as I studied more and more about reincarnation, particularly those teachings from Dr. John, I began to see that much of what was taught in the New Age churches was very similar to what Jesus actually said. In the 1950s I was the leader of our women’s Methodist bible study group; in the 1960s I attended a Baptist college that required bible courses. Therefore, I feel qualified to state that Christianity – as it is practiced today - often deviates from the spirit of Jesus’ teachings. However, there is also much that is good there.
Franklin Loehr – one of Dr. John’s channels and the founder of Religious Research – attended Christian churches wherever he was and joined a Florida Presbyterian Church with fundamental ideas. I often attended church with him, but I didn’t share his fervor for these churches because their ideas of God were different from mine. However, I admired the way Franklin could focus on the common points of their messages and those of Dr. John, while barely noticing the differences. I assumed it was because he had once been a protestant minister. Gradually, I began to feel what he actually saw and what Dr. John has expressed many times: that God is much more than what any one church encompasses. No one church or philosophy has all truth, and this includes Religious Research and the Dr. John teachings.
Dr. John: Every religion, to the extent that it has spiritual insight and content, was and is a part of the ‘bringing in of the Kingdom’ wherein ‘Thy Will be done on Earth as It is in Heaven’ is the prayer and the goal and the working accomplishment in ever greater degree of the incarnate souls of that generation. (7506)
Daily, for most of my life, I have prayed the Lord’s prayer (Matthew 6), but Dr. John showed me the deeper significance in “Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven.” This short phrase is the essence of why each of us exists, for our very purpose on Earth is to help bring this about. According to Dr. John, the soul was brought into being through the efforts of Jesus the Christ. Souls are a particular type of Godchild, specifically designed to come to Earth and to help decrease the evil on Earth.
I have often been frustrated at how New Agers deny the existence of evil. I believe this represents the pendulum swing away from the very negative outlook found in many fundamental churches. Many people in the New Age movement grew up with a sense of worthlessness because they were constantly told they were sinners. Anything short of perfection meant we were evil. I remember – as many of you may – crying as a small child because I just could not be “good.”
When the New Age movement came in, the pendulum swung so far away from this notion that people are evil that many groups began to deny that anything could be evil at all. New Agers speaking on Oneness observe correctly that all life is of God. Therefore, they argue, there can be no evil because all-that-is is an expression of God. However, Dr. John’s definition of evil states that God gives His children the option of free will and choice. We are not puppets. We are godlings, learning, making mistakes, and sometimes completely getting off track. The collection of wrong choices, errors and deliberately defying God’s will and purpose is collectively called evil.
I believe that Dr. John’s definition of evil can help us all to accept that evil is real without condemning mankind as its source. Evil is simply anything that is created against the God-way. The word “evil” is “live” spelled backwards. To live is to stay within the limits set by our Creator. Evil is going against those limits.
When God gave His God-children free will and individuation, He knew that mistakes would be made. These mistakes might be accidental or might be intentional. In the process of learning and growing, the godling will make errors in judgment even when trying to do the right thing. However, the real danger of free will and individuation comes as the God-child grows older. The mistakes can become more than just errors in judgment. The godling that gains enough confidence in its own abilities may decide to strike out on its own and rebel against God’s system, trying to set up its own cosmos.
Many people have wanted to know why God permits bad things to happen. The answer is that he loves His children enough to even allow them to create against His way – for a time – so that they can learn by their mistakes. Sometimes these mistakes can hurt others – innocent bystanders - but God has also decreed a Law of Compensation to take care of guiltless victims.
In time, however, the mistakes of the young godling and the rebellion of the older ones must be handled because a residue of evil builds up. Dr. John has said that every eon or so there is a cosmic cleansing of this residuum. The legend of the mythical Hercules cleaning the Aegean stables is a sensing on Earth of this cosmic housekeeping.
But what about the God-child who is “feeling his oats” and rebelling against his Father/Mother/Creator? Dirty trash accumulated from mistakes can be swept away but God does not want His child swept away. Since the godling has free will, some way to nudge him back in alignment with God must be found.
We are told that the story of the prodigal son, narrated by Jesus and recorded in the Christian Bible (Luke 15), is a parable about the true purpose of life on Earth. You may be familiar with this parable, but briefly it is as follows: The son of a rich man took his inheritance, left his father’s home, went to a far country, and spent his money foolishly in wild pursuit of pleasure. After the money was spent, the son was forced to make his living by taking care of swine. He realized that even pigs ate better than he did, so he returned home, ready to beg his father’s forgiveness. The father met him on the road and joyously accepted him back.
Fundamental Christians have interpreted this parable to show the soul (the prodigal son) as leaving God’s church (the father’s home), living as a heathen and finally returning to the church.
We are told that Jesus had a larger meaning to this parable. The father represents the Creator/God, the source of all that is in the spiritual and physical world. The prodigal son represents all of the evil that has accumulated, including mistakes and negative forces, but also godlings who have reached high stages of God-beingness and tried to set up their own worlds apart from God – evil that pre-existed our development. While humanity has certainly committed its share of errors and wrong choices through the millennia, the totality of evil to be addressed, and as much as possible redeemed, is far greater than what humanity has done. (Later we will see how Dr. John describes humankind as providing an essential and much-appreciated service to God and to all Creation.) Earth is the far country that was provided for the prodigal to exist until he was ready to return home to God’s way and will.
There is another passage in The Christian Bible that speaks of warfare in the heavens and of the Archangel Michael casting Lucifer down from heaven into Earth. (Revelation 12:7-9) Lucifer refers to those high spiritual beings that would go their own way rather than follow God’s way - prodigals. Again Earth is shown to be the far country – the place for the prodigal (evil) who would not stay at home.
God’s spiritual Universe is fully as structured as His material one – each with its own parameters. God-children who revolted against God have an exaggerated sense of their own importance and would destroy God’s world and set up their own - that is, if God would let them. God is patient and loving but will not permit even His own children to destroy His world.
These high God-beings were forced to take their God-given powers (inheritance) and go to the far country of the physical universe. As prodigal sons of God they can return to the spiritual universe that is their home, but only when they are ready to live within God’s structuring. We are told that evil is only permitted to exist in the material realm and spiritual planes that are close to earth. If it leaves and goes to higher planes it is enveloped in God’s love and can only function in alignment with God.
God is the source of all being, including the energy source; we are sustained by His love. Since He is the source of all energy, the godling who accepts His love is nourished, but the God-child who will not accept His love loses its energy source and will wither and die. God does not want this, so an alternate source of energy must be supplied for the prodigal. The alternate source of energy is found within Earth. This is why the material world was chosen as the far country until the prodigal chose to be nourished at his Father’s table.
An explanation is in order about how the Earth is an alternate source of energy for those spiritual beings from other planes and realms who would not follow God’s way and will. God is the source of all that is, so everything in the physical world contains God’s beingness and God’s energy: the plants, the animals, and even the minerals. We need only look at what happens when we split the atom to see how energy is contained in physical matter.
However, plants, animals, and minerals are a physical source of energy, but the prodigal is spiritual. How could these spiritual beings - the prodigal sons of God - partake of material energy? There had to be a way of transmuting the material energy into a spiritual form in order for it to be used by those prodigals who were sent to the far country. The way was found with the living plants and animals on earth. Studies have shown that even plants have consciousness and can feel emotions to a limited degree. Both plants and animals can experience the negative emotions of pain, fear, anger, and death. These negative emotions are spiritual, so they can nourish the prodigal who would not feed on God’s feast of love and goodness.
Many of the prodigal God-children who were forced to Earth had grown to the extent that some were co-creators. This meant that they could take part in the evolution of plants and animals, along with others that were still aligned with God. These prodigals could help the plants and animals on earth to become the food crop for evil. Evil could feast on the death of plants and animals. The prodigal could even guide the evolution of forms such as the predators of the world. What a feast was provided by the lion that hunted, ripped to shreds, and devoured the antelope! Dr. John expresses the relationship of plants and animals to evil:
Incarnate life, animal and to a lesser extent plant, produces energies upon which evil can progressively feed…Not that animals are to be condemned. It is not of their wish, it is not of their will, it is not of their consciousness, it is not of their doing, that they have been and still are the food crop of evil, you see. Animals can be acted upon in their limited consciousness in such ways as feed the arrogance, the hurt, the humiliation, the cruelty, the grief, the sorrow, of evil. And the death experience of evil, for evil can feed on the death experience because evil, much of evil, wishes to die. God will not let it die until there is no hope of its redemption, but in the death experience of plants and animals, evil experiences death…Life on the spirit level does not die. Life on the incarnate level does die. This is the working of evil, and evil feeds upon it. Some evil that feeds upon cruelty, feeds upon the cruel nature of some deaths. (7078)
This definition of evil as being an outside force that feeds upon plants and animals drastically changes our understanding of evil. But there is more to the story:
God is infinitely patient and is willing to wait for its wayward God-children, but not forever. In time, it became apparent that evil was prospering as it ravished Earth life. It was not being persuaded to return home, and God was unhappy at the way innocent, helpless, living things were being treated. Something needed to be done to convince Lucifer and his followers to return to their Father/Mother. The Co-Creator that we now know as Jesus Christ volunteered to lead a plan to redeem evil and bring it back home, thus alleviating the suffering of the innocent. He called together a group of about 12 – 20 advanced beings to help devise the method to submit to God.
These spiritual beings were friends from the level of the Elohim who had not yet attained the development of the Jesus One, but who had shown themselves to be completely trustworthy, competent, and dedicated to God. They knew that the great “demandment” of God is that His children grow in alignment with Him, and they were happy to be recruited by Jesus to help in the redemption of Lucifer. This team was linked to Earth at that time and is still active in her affairs, but some members of the team have changed. There have been some who have left for other responsibilities and new ones that have been brought in, but the core group has remained, with Jesus as the leader.
The original plan devised by the Jesus team took place in Atlantis. The thought was to use an elitist group with very high intelligence, some in material form and others in spirit form. Only a small percentage of the inhabitants of Atlantis were privileged, for the larger portion was ignorant and powerless. The science in Atlantis was not so widespread as now, but there were great powers that have not yet been discovered by modern science. These included certain methods of interplane travel and interplane communication, a knowledge and use of antimatter, and the ability to manipulate time. These powers are scientific abilities that man has yet to discover. But this plan failed and Atlantis was destroyed. Of this failure, Dr. John tells us:
Dr. John: There were methods we tried that did not work. So, having been mistaken, we were moved back, not to square one, but we had to evolve a different plan to be tried. You see, the approval that comes from trying a plan is not necessarily God saying, yes, you are absolutely correct. It is God saying, all right, this is a plan that is a pretty good plan for you right now. It will not render irredeemable damage to My plan, My universe, My purposes as God. It is within the limits of lawfulness. It may introduce some discord into the causal realm, but We permit the discord of those who are earnestly and honestly endeavoring to learn – a little discord. So the plan had been approved. It failed. (4130)
When it was known that the plan in Atlantis was to fail, a new plan was drawn up and this plan brought the soul into existence and ushered in a new era on earth. The Christ team recognized that a few elite advanced beings could not successfully win over the prodigal. Evil was too firmly entrenched in earth to let go of its food crop. It fought to keep earth for its own, apart from God’s way and will. It scrambled to prevent the Jesus Team from reaching its goal of: “Thy Kingdom come, Thy Will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven.”
So it was back to the drawing boards for the team. Jesus received from God permission to start a new line of spirit beingness that we know as the soul. The soul was to incarnate in homo sapiens, the animal prepared over years of evolution, and become man – an instrument for God. Before the soul inhabited it, this earth animal operated much the same as other earth animals – with a group mind. It had a sense of being part of a group, but had little sense of itself as an individual.
When the soul brought individuality to the human animal, mankind as we know it had its beginning. Instead of the labor of an elitest few in Atlantis, there began a grassroots effort to win evil back to God. As a food crop of evil, man was not helpless like plants and animals, but had the ability to choose between God’s way and that of the prodigal. The more man chose the good, the less food would be provided the prodigal. As in the bible story, the prodigal in time should realize that the Father’s house was far better than the far country.
It was known that the process would be very slow, and it has spanned probably 15 to 18 thousand years. During that time the Jesus Team has not been idle. Many of the events of that time have been recorded in the Bible: Abraham and the children of Israel; Moses and the Exodus; the history of the Jewish people and their covenant with God; the birth, life, crucifixion, resurrection and ascension of Jesus the Christ - the beginning of the early Church to preach the Gospel of love and judgment to all mankind.
I list these events because that is my background, but other religions are a part of this project to help mankind choose for the good: Buddha and his teachings of love, Confucius with his laws for the people, Lord Krishna with his wisdom, Mohammed with his teachings, various New Age movements, and others. In addition, there have been members of the Elohim who have incarnated to bring us knowledge: Socrates, Emerson, Newton, Aristotle, du Chardin, and many more. When it was known that Atlantis would be destroyed, colonies were sent out to Egypt and other places. Help from higher beings has been with Earth in both physical and spiritual forms - including the landing of UFOs.
However, we need only look at a newspaper to see that mankind needs more help. Although much progress has been made over the centuries, evil has been gaining ground in many ways. Some souls have been agents of evil rather than of God. Dr. John has told us that divine intervention will come again. He believes the timing is imminent, but admits that “imminent may mean two days, two years, or 200 years. Of this intervention he says:
Dr. John: The next attempt after Atlantis is to be undertaken. In popular history, it has been called the Second Coming of Jesus, and this has been a very excellent public relations way of bringing the event to human consciousness. Also, in the ‘mythology,’ really the history, of almost all races and cultures, there are the records of times, when beings not of this Earth visited Earth from space and the promise that they will come again. Now that promise has been cruelly misused at times, as when the white men from Spain plundered and destroyed Central and South America, in one of the most evil episodes of human history. Evil used a few hundred white men with their superior weapons, and with their place of expectation in the race history of the cultures to which they came, for evil…Now when does this redemption come? None of us know. Not even the Son, our Leader, knows. That signal will come from higher channels, from God Himself – probably through channels, maybe directly. The processes then that have been in preparation for millennia, ever since we knew we were failing in Atlantis, will be set into activity. (7072)
What have we been told will occur when the Great Event begins?
Dr. John: There has been a great deal of speculation, much of it quite foolish, about the Second Coming. People who do not know very much about it have gotten hold of a little bit of an understanding of it and have insisted that their understanding is the correct and the only correct under-standing of it, and only those who believe as they do will be welcomed by the Christ and possibly taken to God when Jesus comes again.
The prevalent belief of Fundamental Christians is that when Jesus comes again, those who believe in Him will be caught up in ‘rapture’ and taken immediately to God. Those who do not believe in Jesus as the Son of God and their personal Savior will stand in judgment of eternal hell. (Matthew 24:40-41)
The purpose of the Second Coming is to help establish a society in which only good is rewarded by experience. To accomplish this, human society must be reorganized along the lines that will encourage right thinking and actions – a massive project. This is a grass roots effort, so it will require the help of all good men and women. However, if the ones who are taken are those who would interfere with the work of creating this “utopia,” then the project becomes more feasible.
One of the great powers that were known by a select few in Atlantis was that of manipulating time. Dr. John has told us – and Franklin Loehr did some experiments with this in the 1960s – that mass is simply energy expressing in space and time. We are locked into this consensus moment in time, and if anything exists one second before or after us we would not be aware of its existence. According to Dr. John, this will be taken advantage of when the Great Event occurs.
“Judgment day” is also part of the Second Coming, but this will not be the simple judgment that anyone who does not believe a certain way will be sent to Hell (the fundamentalist belief). It will, however exist of two phases:
First, those souls (and other spiritual beings) who have consistently refused to follow the God way will be given one last chance and will lose their existence and individuality if they still persist. This judgment will be handled for God by the Elohim who have proved to be worthy and able to make such a decision.
Second, millions who are a burden to society will be put into another dimension of time – limbo – until the world can be improved. They will not be punished. It will be much like Rip Van Winkle who slept for 20 years and awoke to a different world. When they are brought back into our time frame they will see quite a different world – one in which they can better function according to God’s laws.
Dr. John: Those who do not carry their own weight and cannot, in this incarnate personality in the society in which they are, will mostly be taken. There will be enough work for humanity to do without carrying upon the back of those who are able a too-great load of those who are unable or incompetent or lazy or in some other way non-productive members of the human society.
Humanity will be somewhat stripped lean – not clean but lean – for this early work. These who are removed are taken into another dimension of time where the linear progression of time does not take place. Some time later they will be restored to the linear progression of time at that future consensus moment of the present, and their progression through time, as they and you know it, will continue for them in their consciousness as though there had been no hiatus – until they learn what happened to them, and why, which should be quite educational, we think. (7174)
Who will be put in another dimension of time? Those who cannot carry their own weight and are a “burden” on society may be taken out for a while – not as a punishment – but so that they can come back to a world that is better able to help them. Others may be addicts who need help that they are not getting in this world. Another group could be the criminal element of our population who will find when they return that they can no longer get by with their crimes. Misguided terrorists will come back to a world of peace and brotherhood. Some with physical or emotional or mental disabilities could be among those who will be allowed to move forward in time to a world that can better heal their disabilities.
Atomic warheads will be “zapped” into another dimension of time and Earth will be under the control of our Elder Brothers. A vast armada of godlings are ready for this Great Event. There are several reasons why we believe the Second Coming is not far away:
Science has now been brought to humankind. Through science man has made rapid progress and will be better able to understand what is happening, for it will not be supernatural but will be “super science.” Science will also be an aide in making the Earth a place that rewards only the good – medicine, psychology, etc. According to Dr. John, the science of today has given man a control over his environment comparable to that in Atlantis. It has also given man the tools to destroy itself, which would be a defeat for good. Souls are not dependent on a physical body for their existence, but the Jesus Team would fail again. Dr. John is confident that will not happen.
Public Education is an important part of the plan. With widespread public education, the masses are expectant of change. The past is not good enough for them now. They expect more and will more readily accept change for the good. Widespread education makes the grass roots effort possible.
Television and computers are an important part of both man’s education and his communication. Prophecies of Jesus’ return have said that all the world together would see Him return in the same manner that He left. Television and computers would make this possible. They would also spread information about changes. Computers will keep the records of those who are zapped so that the transition will be smooth.
Space Travel and UFO sightings are a preliminary step, for along with the Second Coming of Jesus will be the return of our “Elder Brothers from Space.” The earth has felt that we are not alone. Dr. John has said that UFOs are the method of interplane travel – not interplanetary travel. They come from other spiritual planes into our physical plane. The awareness in Earth of UFOs is a first step in the return of these Avatars. It will not be Jesus alone who comes. Many others will reenter Earth to help in the project of establishing a society on Earth in which only good is rewarded by experience.
Humane concern for animals and plants is another sign that the time is near because after mankind establishes a truly “human era” on earth, we will work to free animals and plants from the dominance of evil. Through training, love, and other ways that include biogenetic engineering, we will help them uplift their beingness to the point that they too have consciousness and intelligence.
Global Oneness is essential to accomplish the goals. No longer is any nation isolated. We are kept aware of news in all parts of the world, and there is a limited cooperation between nations now. All will be part of the project and the world will think less in terms of nations and more in terms of mankind.
Are we saying that this will occur in our lifetime? Possibly. Dr. John sometimes stated in a life reading that the person receiving the reading should be prepared for this in his/her lifetime. But when or how this happens, the most important thing for us to remember is that there is purpose in our lives and that:
Dr. John: We of the Elohim have a continuing concern. We would not let our younger brothers and sisters face the dangers and the battles and do the job alone. They couldn’t. We have more at stake in this than they have, and we are with them, and we expect there will be another visitation rather soon…You need us and we will not desert you. (4130)