The Great Gospel of John
Volume 7
Jesus' Precepts and Deeds through His Three Years of Teaching
The Lord on the Mount of Olives. (cont.) Gospel of John, Chapter 8
- Chapter 52 -
Destiny or free will?
1
(The Lord:) "However, do not think that this is something which certain wise of the world call 'destiny', as if God had decided for every person what should happen in his shorter or longer lifespan! To think and believe this, can bring death to a soul, because this is a teaching, which is a secret product of hell, since it represents the direct opposite to the true principles of life out of God for men. People determine their own destiny by the wrongness of their free will and by the fact that they do not want to awaken the seven spirits in themselves, which is why they do not reach the contemplation of their inner, true and imperishable treasure of life. Thereby they go astray, wanting to seek for the true inner light of life in the light of the world and with joyous courage walk and act along that road.
2
Once, however, a human soul has properly established itself in the darkest night of its created worldly arrogance, by allowing it to keep its inner freedom of will, no angel of heaven will be capable to give it another direction, and nobody can say: 'See, this was the destiny for this person!' Yes, it was very much a destiny, but not originating from God, but from the person itself.
3
God only allowed it according to the perfectly free will of man. And what I say now about a single person, is also applicable to a whole nation. It is and stays the creator of its own temporal and eternal destiny.
4
And thus it would very wrong to assume that God has from eternity determined that all this which I have shown to you by the phenomenon and predicted with the words out of My mouth, must take place. O no, absolutely not! Nevertheless everything will happen as shown, because the people want it like that, since by far the greatest and most powerful part of them live comfortably and most stubbornly willingly in the very night of hell, and even now upon My mighty call, do not want to leave this night of death.
5
Because I can do no more than what I have done now, have done in the past and still will do, if they are to keep their complete freedom of will, and he does not comprehend it, and who does not take note of it, his blindness and the great stubbornness of his heart cannot be healed by any means that one could say is true, good and gentle. As a last effective measure, a judgement must come. But for the judgement to break loose, the cup must be full, which will, as I have said, soon be the case with this nation. And as such do not think about it too much in fear; because not I, but the people who do refuse to change want it like this!"
6
Said Nicodemus: "But Lord and Master, then it looks extremely bad for mankind! If even God cannot help such people against their own stupid will and stubbornness, then who else could help them?"
7
Said I: "Yes, friend, there are many earthly things which you can see and touch but do not understand, so how do you want to understand and comprehend purely spiritual things which you do not see and in anyway sense?! I have explained that God, because of His eternal order, may not influence man in his inner spiritual development by guiding and directing him with His omnipotence. Since, if God would do this, man in himself would become a dead machine and could never reach the freest independence of life.
8
Bring Me the worst cut-throat, and I will instantly change him into an angel of light; but at the same time his individuality would be as good as dead! But as I withdraw the spirit of My omnipotent will, his individuality becomes active again, and the old cut-throat will stand before you. His love is to rob and to murder and it is therefore his life; if you take this away from him, he is completely dead and has totally ceased to exist.
9
But such a man can still be bettered, and this through the extremely bad state into which he has placed himself through his evil love. Because the soul of a person only then starts to think about the reason of its evil and miserable state, if it finds itself in hard, self-inflicted judgement; and once the soul has started to recognize the reason, then it will soon perceive the inner desire to rid itself from its miserable state, and will start to think about the ways and means of how it can free itself from the hard judgement.
10
And once the soul has such a wish and will, then it is also able to absorb a light which was given it from above by any suitable means.
11
If the soul seizes the means offered, its previously evil love starts to change into a good and better love within and out of itself. It will become increasingly lighter in it, and it will step by step go to a higher perfection of life, and this is only possible by allowing the severest judgement. And therefore, a most severe judgement will be permitted to come also over the Jews, when their cup of atrocities is full, and this here and in the beyond, and this will humiliate them for all times of times, since they will never gain domination over a people."