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I’ve been curious about the term “face to face” lately. Online we have facebook which is the social phenomenon where people can connect with each other any time. Web interactivity opens up interpersonal sharing as never before. A means of overcoming the tyranny of distance and enabling people to meet a greater number of individuals beyond the realm of the land they inhabit.
A search for “face to face” in The Urantia Book yields 35 results. Shall we share a few?
Angels know us better than we know ourselves
The angels know us better than we know ourselves at this initial mortal stage of existence. The “Morontia World Seraphim—Transition Ministers” will assess each ascender and assist in showing each soul their true selves, how others see them. They are true friends who help you “to see yourself as others see you” and “to know yourself as angels know you.”
It is the task of the mind planners to study the nature, experience, and status of the Adjuster souls in transit through the mansion worlds and to facilitate their grouping for assignment and advancement. But these mind planners do not scheme, manipulate, or otherwise take advantage of the ignorance or other limitations of mansion world students. They are wholly fair and eminently just. They respect your newborn morontia will; they regard you as independent volitional beings, and they seek to encourage your speedy development and advancement. Here you are face to face with true friends and understanding counselors, angels who are really able to help you “to see yourself as others see you” and “to know yourself as angels know you.” [Paper48:6.25, page 553:6]
Incessant clamoring of an inescapable self
In life we are “face to face” with the incessant clamoring of an inescapable self for recognition and honor. However, we can choose to forsake self if we so desire.
Is unselfishness — the spirit of self-forgetfulness — desirable? Then must mortal man live face to face with the incessant clamoring of an inescapable self for recognition and honor. Man could not dynamically choose the divine life if there were no self-life to forsake. Man could never lay saving hold on righteousness if there were no potential evil to exalt and differentiate the good by contrast. [Paper 3:5.13, page 51:12]
Stand in the divine and central presence and see him
Doubt not, the Father is attainable, one day you will be “face to face” if that be your heart’s desire.
The fact that vast time is involved in the attainment of God makes the presence and personality of the Infinite none the less real. Your ascension is a part of the circuit of the seven superuniverses, and though you swing around it countless times, you may expect, in spirit and in status, to be ever swinging inward. You can depend upon being translated from sphere to sphere, from the outer circuits ever nearer the inner center, and some day, doubt not, you shall stand in the divine and central presence and see him, figuratively speaking, face to face. It is a question of the attainment of actual and literal spiritual levels; and these spiritual levels are attainable by any being who has been indwelt by a Mystery Monitor, and who has subsequently eternally fused with that Thought Adjuster. [Paper 5:1.9, page 63:7]
face to face with divine relationships of the persons of the Trinity
In the dawn of eternity both the Father and the Son become infinitely cognizant of their mutual interdependence, their eternal and absolute oneness; and therefore do they enter into an infinite and everlasting covenant of divine partnership. This never-ending compact is made for the execution of their united concepts throughout all of the circle of eternity; and ever since this eternity event the Father and the Son continue in this divine union. [Paper8:0.2, page 90:2]
The instant that God the father and God the Son conjointly conceive an identical and infinite action, the Infinite Spirit springs full-fledgedly into existence.
We are now face to face with the eternity origin of the Infinite Spirit, the Third Person of Deity. The very instant that God the Father and God the Son conjointly conceive an identical and infinite action — the execution of an absolute thought-plan — that very moment, the Infinite Spirit springs full-fledgedly into existence. [Paper 8:0.3, page 90:3]
face to face with The Deliberative Assembly of the Rulers of the Superuniverses
Where beings representative of the autocracy of perfection and the democracy of evolution meet. The pattern is reflective of executive and legislative functions of governance, two already existent in the democracies of Urantia, the separation of powers into executive, legislative and judiciary.
It is on such worlds as Uversa that the beings representative of the autocracy of perfection and the democracy of evolution meet face to face. The executive branch of the supergovernment originates in the realms of perfection; the legislative branch springs from the flowering of the evolutionary universes. [Paper15:11.1, page 179:11]
Its possible that someone originating from Urantia as part of their ascension career will have the opportunity to serve on Uversa as a native representative on the legislative council of Superuniverse government.
The deliberative assembly of the superuniverse is confined to the headquarters world. This legislative or advisory council consists of seven houses, to each of which every local universe admitted to the superuniverse councils elects a native representative. These representatives are chosen by the high councils of such local universes from among the ascending-pilgrim graduates of Orvonton who are tarrying on Uversa, accredited for transport to Havona. The average term of service is about one hundred years of superuniverse standard time. [Paper 15:11.2, page 179:12]
I’m sure along the ascension path there will be ample opportunities for a whole variety of experiences in universe functions face to face with diverse groups of universe personalities.
Attributes and Functions of the Master Spirits involve spirit energies productive of morontia substance and morontia mind
Unquestionably, when we encounter the functional activities of the various Morontia Power Supervisors, we are face to face with certain of the unrevealed activities of the Master Spirits. Who, aside from these ancestors of both physical controllers and spirit ministers, could have contrived so to combine and associate material and spiritual energies as to produce a hitherto nonexistent phase of universe reality — morontia substance and morontia mind? [Paper 16:4.5, page 189:6]
The goal of personality existence is spiritual, the morontia phase of universe reality is the bridging means by which the material realm can connect with the spiritual realm. The ascending personality can incrementally experience advancing spiritual status. What an awesome undertaking, having conceived of an evolutionary creature as far removed from spirit as conceivably possible, a whole previously nonexistent universe reality needed to be devised and established for that creature to progress to spirit status and thereby, eventually to the origin of personality in Paradise, a journey from outer space-time to inner eternity.
Much of the reality of the spiritual worlds is of the morontia order, a phase of universe reality wholly unknown on Urantia. The goal of personality existence is spiritual, but the morontia creations always intervene, bridging the gulf between the material realms of mortal origin and the superuniverse spheres of advancing spiritual status. It is in this realm that the Master Spirits make their great contribution to the plan of man’s Paradise ascension. [Paper 16:4.6, page 189:7]
The Master Spirits are directly involved with the following phenomena which have direct bearing on evolutionary mortal life and ongoing spiritual progress:
- Life-initiation procedures of the local universe Life Carriers.
- Life activations of the adjutant mind-spirits…
- Fluctuations in energy manifestations exhibited by the linear-gravity-responding units of organized matter.
- Behavior of emergent energy when fully liberated from the grasp of the Unqualified Absolute…
- Bestowal of the ministry spirit of a local universe Creative Spirit…
- Bestowal of the spirit of the bestowal Sons, on Urantia called the Comforter or the Spirit of Truth.
- Reflectivity mechanism of the local universes and the superuniverse. Many features connected with this extraordinary phenomenon can hardly be reasonably explained or rationally understood without postulating the activity of the Master Spirits in association with the Conjoint Actor and the Supreme Being.
This information is Sponsored by a Universal Censor from Uversa.
Solitary Messengers wrote the Thought Adjuster Papers, we only meet them face to face in Havona
Messengers of the Havona Circuits. Throughout the ascendant career you will be vaguely, but increasingly, able to detect the presence of the Solitary Messengers, but not until you reach Havona will you recognize them unmistakably. The first of the messengers you will see face to face will be those of the Havona circuits. [Paper 23:2.13, page 258:12]
Solitary Messengers enjoy special relations with the natives of the Havona worlds. These messengers, who are so functionally handicapped when associating with one another, can and do have a very close and personal communion with the Havona natives. But it is quite impossible to convey to human minds the supreme satisfactions consequent upon the contact of the minds of these divinely perfect beings with the spirits of such near-transcendent personalities. [Paper 23:2.14, page 258:13]
Here is a reminder of who Solitary Messengers are.
SOLITARY Messengers are the personal and universal corps of the Conjoint Creator; they are the first and senior order of the Higher Personalities of the Infinite Spirit. They represent the initial creative action of the Infinite Spirit in solitary function for the purpose of bringing into existence solitary personality spirits. Neither the Father nor the Son directly participated in this stupendous spiritualization. [Paper 23:0.1, page 256:1]
Ability to comprehend is the mortal passport to Paradise
The only endowment a pilgrim landing on the receiving planet of Havona has is “perfection of purpose,” the creature response to the invitation-command to perfection.
The pilgrim lands on the receiving planet of Havona, the pilot world of the seventh circuit, with only one endowment of perfection, perfection of purpose. The Universal Father has decreed: “Be you perfect, even as I am perfect.” That is the astounding invitation-command broadcast to the finite children of the worlds of space. The promulgation of that injunction has set all creation astir in the co-operative effort of the celestial beings to assist in bringing about the fulfillment and realization of that tremendous command of the First Great Source and Center. [Paper26:4.12 page 290:2]
Faith has been tested it is disappointment proof, now you must come “face-to-face” with the problems of Havona, culmination of experiential space-time training.
When, through and by the ministry of all the helper hosts of the universal scheme of survival, you are finally deposited on the receiving world of Havona, you arrive with only one sort of perfection — perfection of purpose. Your purpose has been thoroughly proved; your faith has been tested. You are known to be disappointment proof. Not even the failure to discern the Universal Father can shake the faith or seriously disturb the trust of an ascendant mortal who has passed through the experience that all must traverse in order to attain the perfect spheres of Havona. By the time you reach Havona, your sincerity has become sublime. Perfection of purpose and divinity of desire, with steadfastness of faith, have secured your entrance to the settled abodes of eternity; your deliverance from the uncertainties of time is full and complete; and now must you come face to face with the problems of Havona and the immensities of Paradise, to meet which you have so long been in training in the experiential epochs of time on the world schools of space. [Paper26:4.13 page 290:3]
To perfection of purpose must be wedded perfection of understanding.
Faith has won for the ascendant pilgrim a perfection of purpose which admits the children of time to the portals of eternity. Now must the pilgrim helpers begin the work of developing that perfection of understanding and that technique of comprehension which are so indispensable to Paradise perfection of personality. [Paper26:4.14 page 290:4]
Willingness to believe is the key to Havona.
Ability to comprehend is the mortal passport to Paradise. Willingness to believe is the key to Havona. The acceptance of sonship, co-operation with the indwelling Adjuster, is the price of evolutionary survival. [Paper 26:4.15 page 290:5]
We are only beginning to become ethically aware, however, on Havona higher spiritual ethics needs to be successfully interpreted
The higher you ascend in the scale of life, the more attention must be paid to universe ethics. Ethical awareness is simply the recognition by any individual of the rights inherent in the existence of any and all other individuals. But spiritual ethics far transcends the mortal and even the morontia concept of personal and group relations. [Paper 27:3.1, page 300.4]
We grow in recognition of the rights inherent in the existence of any and all other individuals. Every new group of colleagues met with adds one more level of ethics to be recognized.
Ethics has been duly taught and adequately learned by the pilgrims of time in their long ascent to the glories of Paradise. As this inward-ascending career has unfolded from the nativity worlds of space, the ascenders have continued to add group after group to their ever-widening circle of universe associates. Every new group of colleagues met with adds one more level of ethics to be recognized and complied with until, by the time the mortals of ascent reach Paradise, they really need someone to provide helpful and friendly counsel regarding ethical interpretations. They do not need to be taught ethics, but they do need to have what they have so laboriously learned properly interpreted to them as they are brought face to face with the extraordinary task of contacting with so much that is new. [Paper 27:3.2, page 300:5]
Custodians of Knowledge are Paradise Supernaphim who are living “books of life”
The superaphic custodians of knowledge are the higher “living epistles” known and read by all who dwell on Paradise. They are the divine records of truth, the living books of real knowledge. You have heard about records in the “book of life.” The custodians of knowledge are just such living books, records of perfection imprinted upon the eternal tablets of divine life and supreme surety. They are in reality living, automatic libraries. The facts of the universes are inherent in these primary supernaphim, actually recorded in these angels; and it is also inherently impossible for an untruth to gain lodgment in the minds of these perfect and replete repositories of the truth of eternity and the intelligence of time. [Paper 27:5.1, page 301.6]
Supreme knowledge is gained by communing “face-to face” with brilliant beings who are the very thing you wish to know.
These custodians conduct informal courses of instruction for the residents of the eternal Isle, but their chief function is that of reference and verification. Any sojourner on Paradise may at will have by his side the living repository of the particular fact or truth he may wish to know. At the northern extremity of the Isle there are available the living finders of knowledge, who will designate the director of the group holding the information sought, and forthwith will appear the brilliant beings who are the very thing you wish to know. No longer must you seek enlightenment from engrossed pages; you now commune with living intelligence face to face. Supreme knowledge you thus obtain from the living beings who are its final custodians. [Paper 27:5.2, page 302.1]
When you locate that supernaphim who is exactly what you desire to verify, you will find available all the known facts of all universes, for these custodians of knowledge are the final and living summaries of the vast network of the recording angels, ranging from the seraphim and seconaphim of the local and superuniverses to the chief recorders of the tertiary supernaphim in Havona. And this living accumulation of knowledge is distinct from the formal records of Paradise, the cumulative summary of universal history. [Paper 27:5.3, page 302.2]
Wisdom of truth originates in the central universe, but experiential knowledge has its beginnings in the domains of time and space.
The wisdom of truth takes origin in the divinity of the central universe, but knowledge, experiential knowledge, largely has its beginnings in the domains of time and space — therefore the necessity for the maintenance of the far-flung superuniverse organizations of the recording seraphim and supernaphim sponsored by the Celestial Recorders. [Paper 27:5.4, page 302.3]
Only after attaining the supreme satisfaction of the fullness of worship is an ascending pilgrim of time ready to meet face to face the challenge of God the Ultimate
After the attainment of the supreme satisfaction of the fullness of worship, you are qualified for admission to the Corps of the Finality. The ascendant career is well-nigh finished, and the seventh jubilee prepares for celebration. The first jubilee marked the mortal agreement with the Thought Adjuster when the purpose to survive was sealed; the second was the awakening in the morontia life; the third was the fusion with the Thought Adjuster; the fourth was the awakening in Havona; the fifth celebrated the finding of the Universal Father; and the sixth jubilee was the occasion of the Paradise awakening from the final transit slumber of time. The seventh jubilee marks entrance into the mortal finaliter corps and the beginning of the eternity service. The attainment of the seventh stage of spirit realization by a finaliter will probably signalize the celebration of the first of the jubilees of eternity. [Paper27:7.8, page 305.1]
It’s good to know right here and now, as we begin our own Paradise journey, the milestones of achievement along the way as designated “jubilees.” They are an inspiring incentive.
And thus ends the story of the Paradise supernaphim, the highest order of all the ministering spirits, those beings who, as a universal class, ever attend you from the world of your origin until you are finally bidden farewell by the conductors of worship as you take the Trinity oath of eternity and are mustered into the Mortal Corps of the Finality. [Paper 27:7.9, page 305.2]
The seraphim are with us all the way. The seventh stage of spirit realization by a finaliter will probably signalize the celebration of the first of the jubilees of eternity.
The endless service of the Paradise Trinity is about to begin; and now the finaliter is face to face with the challenge of God the Ultimate. [Paper 27:7.10, page 305.3]
The Discerners of Spirits are reflective angels—Seconophim— who unerringly reflect the actual moral and spiritual character of any individual concerned in a focal exposure
The Discerner of Spirits. A special liaison exists between the counselors and advisers of the second Havona circle and these reflective angels. They are the only seconaphim attached to the Universal Censors but are probably the most uniquely specialized of all their fellows. Regardless of the source or channel of information, no matter how meager the evidence at hand, when it is subjected to their reflective scrutiny, these discerners will forthwith inform us as to the true motive, the actual purpose, and the real nature of its origin. I marvel at the superb functioning of these angels, who so unerringly reflect the actual moral and spiritual character of any individual concerned in a focal exposure. [Paper28:5.19, page 313:1]
Seeing each of us is so thoroughly known I guess it’s worth being comfortable as your true self, self-forgetful in service as Jesus teaches.
The Discerners of Spirits carry on these intricate services by virtue of inherent “spiritual insight,” if I may use such words in an endeavor to convey to the human mind the thought that these reflective angels thus function intuitively, inherently, and unerringly. When the Universal Censors behold these presentations, they are face to face with the naked soul of the reflected individual; and this very certainty and perfection of portraiture in part explains why the Censors can always function so justly as righteous judges. The discerners always accompany the Censors on any mission away from Uversa, and they are just as effective out in the universes as at their Uversa headquarters. [Paper28:5.20, page 313:2]
The spirits of mortal fusion always ascend to the level of origin; such spirit entities unfailingly return to the sphere of primal source
Spirit-fused mortals are of the local universe; they do not, ordinarily, ascend beyond the confines of their native realm, beyond the boundaries of the space range of the spirit that pervades them. Son-fused ascenders likewise rise to the source of spirit endowment, for much as the Truth Spirit of a Creator Son focalizes in the associated Divine Minister, so is his “fusion spirit” implemented in the Reflective Spirits of the higher universes. Such spirit relationship between the local and the superuniverse levels of God the Sevenfold may be difficult of explanation but not of discernment, being unmistakably revealed in those children of the Reflective Spirits — the secoraphic Voices of the Creator Sons. The Thought Adjuster, hailing from the Father on Paradise, never stops until the mortal son stands face to face with the eternal God. [Paper 40:10.2, page 452:2]
Nature confers no human rights, only a life and a planet to live it
Nature confers no rights on man, only life and a world in which to live it. Nature does not even confer the right to live, as might be deduced by considering what would likely happen if an unarmed man met a hungry tiger face to face in the primitive forest. Society’s prime gift to man is security. [Paper 70:9.1, page 793:11]
They went to sleep on Jerusem and woke up on Urantia
Adam and Eve fell asleep on Jerusem, and when they awakened in the Father’s temple on Urantia in the presence of the mighty throng assembled to welcome them, they were face to face with two beings of whom they had heard much, Van and his faithful associate Amadon. These two heroes of the Caligastia secession were the first to welcome them in their new garden home. [Paper 74:2.1, page 829:3]
face to face with pressing problems, such as the establishment of law and order in a world of savages
For ages Adam and Eve had been instructed in the technique of improving a world in readiness for their specialized contributions to the advancement of evolutionary civilization; but now they were face to face with pressing problems, such as the establishment of law and order in a world of savages, barbarians, and semicivilized human beings. Aside from the cream of the earth’s population, assembled in the Garden, only a few groups, here and there, were at all ready for the reception of the Adamic culture. [Paper 74:5.4, page 833:4]
The doctrine of original sin, or racial guilt, started every person out in serious debt to the spirit powers
The earliest idea of the sacrifice was that of a neutrality assessment levied by ancestral spirits; only later did the idea of atonement develop. As man got away from the notion of the evolutionary origin of the race, as the traditions of the days of the Planetary Prince and the sojourn of Adam filtered down through time, the concept of sin and of original sin became widespread, so that sacrifice for accidental and personal sin evolved into the doctrine of sacrifice for the atonement of racial sin. The atonement of the sacrifice was a blanket insurance device which covered even the resentment and jealousy of an unknown god. [Paper 89:4.5, page 978:2]
Atonement is a man-made, fear-motivated, blanket spiritual insurance policy.
Surrounded by so many sensitive spirits and grasping gods, primitive man was face to face with such a host of creditor deities that it required all the priests, ritual, and sacrifices throughout an entire lifetime to get him out of spiritual debt. The doctrine of original sin, or racial guilt, started every person out in serious debt to the spirit powers. [Paper 89:4.6, page 978:3]
The imaginary friend of childhood has become the all-wise, loving spirit counsellor of the soul
Prayer ever has been and ever will be a twofold human experience: a psychologic procedure interassociated with a spiritual technique. And these two functions of prayer can never be fully separated. [Paper 91:3.6, page 997:4]
Enlightened prayer must recognize not only an external and personal God but also an internal and impersonal Divinity, the indwelling Adjuster. It is altogether fitting that man, when he prays, should strive to grasp the concept of the Universal Father on Paradise; but the more effective technique for most practical purposes will be to revert to the concept of a near-by alter ego, just as the primitive mind was wont to do, and then to recognize that the idea of this alter ego has evolved from a mere fiction to the truth of God’s indwelling mortal man in the factual presence of the Adjuster so that man can talk face to face, as it were, with a real and genuine and divine alter ego that indwells him and is the very presence and essence of the living God, the Universal Father. [Paper 91:3.7, page 997:5]
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