Cern

It seems we are still drilling down into this thing called "self". And i enjoy the conversation, though i still dont feel like i have a deep understanding of the matter.
So here is an interseting question:
If im not supposed to have a self at all, then how is it that i can love my neighbor as myself, implying that i must love myself but oops i dont have one, therefore,.......
See the problem?

Amen to that!

Thanks for your hard work and your insights ND.
I have a question, an idea really, and i think you are the perfect person to address with the matter, although it is not necessarily pertinent to our previous conversations.
Some time ago, i was given an insight, almost a vision, but only in my mind, it wasnt a vision in the classical sense of the word. So im going to describe the vision for you, and then share my suspicions of what it might mean.
Imagine that you are living in the old days, in biblical times, and that you are on your way to the temple to worship. Along your route, you notice an old beggar sitting on the side of the road. Most people just pass him by without a glance, but every so often, one of the passersby takes pity on him and drops a coin into his cup.
Of course we are taught that the Lord resides in His temple, in fact inside the Holiest of Holies, which only the high priest can enter.
But where is God in this scenario ive described?
Most people would say that He is in His holy temple, but i dont think this is correct.
Suppose that the old beggar that most of the churchgoers stepped over without a second thought was in fact Him?
In His own words, "God has always been a poor man."
Please dont ask who told me that.
So the idea, the suspicion i have, is that it is not entirely correct to think of Him as residing in the heavens, at least not exclusively.
Given how much He loves us, which i know for a fact is more that any one of us can possibly imagine, more that can be described by words, ive been led to a rather extraordinary idea.
What if He has been here with us, His children, this entire time? By that i mean literally walking around and talking with us, interacting with us, laughing and drinking with us?
It is my belief, or suspicion rather, based on personal experience, that each and every one of us has met Him. By that i mean we have all spoken with Him face to face. Of course, you would never have known it was Him unless He allowed you to see that.
This reminds me of the old song "one of us" by Joan Osborne. What if it is really true?

Thank-you @Georgeh for your kind words of appreciation. That is thoughtful of you.

I would say you are onto something with what you have shared, but to say that I am in total agreement would not be true. From my perspective, I will explain what I mean. Is Father in Heaven right now? I would say yes! His Home is in Heaven. Can He be seen in His creations? I would say yes! That does not mean that Father has never come here to Planet Earth. It is known that He did because in Deuteronomy 5:4 it says He did and apparently His mode of travel is a Space Ship. If I understand correctly, He will be here again with The New Jerusalem Space Ship. Moses was a rarity in that he talked with Father face to face. That is not any common occurrence and in the following verse it says a Mediator was necessary with a reason explained.

Interesting re: the old beggar you referred to and how a stranger that can be seen physically could be more than meets the eye. I've had such an experience. He was not Father Himself, but He was very, very close. :slight_smile:

Yes. In my case, it was the words He spoke to me because physically He took on the appearance of a regular person and at first glance I thought he was homeless, but was soon to realise that something totally different was happening. My lack of Spiritual growth at the time was not what it later became, so, I failed to understand "why" it was happening at the time, but I did recognise the "what" of the encounter.

Thank-you @Georgeh for your interesting message. Your thoughts are appreciated.

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"That's Not Human" - Crazy Supernatural Sighting & CERN 2025 | Jwtv

A friend told me an interesting story a couple years ago. The question came up as to why God was so strict, and actually was very intimidating and scary to many of the people in the old testament. Many people today still struggle to understand this.
It was explained to me that the entire story of the bible is analagous to the raising of a child.
When we were very young it was necessary for our parents to be very strict with us, and we needed a few spankings to set us on the right path.
Then as we grew older we had more knowledge and were given more freedom and began to have a more personal, more friendly relationship with our parents.
As a child, our parents were quite terrifying and we were afraid to do wrong lest we face severe punishment. As adults we aquired a greater understanding and while negative consequences of course still apply, the relationship is based more on understanding and respect. Love in a more mature sense of the word.
Compare this with how the Lord has slowly been revealing Himself to us over the past six millenia.

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Well said.

Yes, they do. I did too before being taught The Truth. But, there is a sad feeling that arises (others may feel differently) with the Old Testament because it demonstrates the loss of unconditional Love as a result of the sins and reminds me of that saying related to punishment: "this is going to hurt me more than you" (Ezekiel 18:32). Solace can be found (below) in an excerpt from THIS IS A GREAT MYSTERY:

The Covenant "they brake" rested on obedience. "If ye will . . . then ye shall be". (Ex. 19:5) Under this New Covenant there is no "if": it rests entirely on Divine "I will". "I will allure . . . betroth . . . write in their hearts . . . be their God and they shall be My people". Unconditional promises made by the "I AM" God.

Amen. :pray:

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Hello ND. Going back to the idea of Him, The Father, down here walking around with us, I suppose this is part of the mystery of God, and is very possibly, well lets just say certainly, beyond my ability to grasp without His help.
You know you cant pour the ocean into a thimble. Its impossible.
But, if you recognize that the universe, known reality, has a fractal structure, then you can imagine that the whole ocean really is contained within the thimble.
As above, so below. We are made in His image.
And we must remember that the Lord can do anything, ANYTHING HE WANTS, and this of course extends to things that to us might seem mutually exclusive or even paradoxical, but are to Him as nothing.
So He can be here, or thousands of Him, and He can also be on the throne, and also inside of and permeating all things, and also within us and this would be for Him no obstacle. Just my opinion, I dont want Him angry at me if im wrong. Actually I think thats only the tip of the iceberg if even nearly correct.
But there is an unpleasant corollary to this idea, and that is that something else is possibly walking around here with us as well. lets pray to avoid that one.
I think God is closer to us than we can possibly know,
and in ways that we cannot know or guess.
Or we could take this as another way of saying that there are angels and demons among us, but the two viewpoints need not be mutually exclusive. More like interwover threads in a tapestry, with the true picture likely beyond our, or my, comprehension. Such is the mystery of God, who can know it?
If He wanted to just walk up and tap you on the shoulder and say Hello, you dont think He could? Im pretty sure He can.

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You see, He being all powerful means that we cannot possibly anticipate nor even imagine what He can do. He works in mysterious ways, but what does this really mean? And how deep does it go?
So if He wanted He could approach you as a stranger, or He could be your best friend of many years. He could be the spider crawling across your table, if He wished. He could hide Himself right in front of us, right in our faces if He wanted to.
I think that in the end im going to discover that He was something like a best friend but i betrayed Him somehow, for some reason. Its excruciatingly sad, but glorious, at the same time, that He loves us as much as He does. So in this sense i can see the great significance of forgiveness, most especially those who betray us.

Me too. Years ago, I went to a lecture (I say lecture for lack of a better word); it was more like an open discussion. The topic was reincarnation. Interestingly, it led primarily to forgiveness and kept leading back to forgiveness. So much to be thankful for today. If it were not for forgiveness, we would not be here talking to one another and doing what we do each day.

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