Paper 4 Overview: God's Relation to the Universe

The Universal Father executes an eternal purpose throughout the universe of universes, creating all reality according to his sovereign will and inscrutable wisdom. This eternal purpose, while partially glimpsed by even the exalted citizens of Paradise, remains fully comprehensible only to the Paradise Deities themselves, with diverse interpretations among celestial beings about its ultimate nature. The central and perfect universe of Havona exists primarily for the satisfaction of the divine nature, serving both as an archetypal pattern for all subsequent creation and as the culminating educational sphere for ascending pilgrims of time on their journey to Paradise.

The remarkable system for perfecting evolutionary mortals and subsequently providing further training for some undisclosed future cosmic service constitutes one of the chief preoccupations of the seven superuniverses and their numerous subdivisions. However, this ascension scheme represents only one aspect of divine purpose, as the universe intelligences engage in many other fascinating pursuits beyond the spiritualization and training of mortal beings. The Universal Father maintains an active and dynamic relationship with his creation, continuously upholding, energizing, and renewing all reality while simultaneously allowing for evolutionary growth, experiential development, and even the possibility of error and rebellion within the parameters of his overarching will and wisdom.

The Universal Father has an eternal purpose that encompasses the material, intellectual, and spiritual phenomena of the universe of universes, which he executes throughout all time. This cosmos-spanning intention emerges from God's free and sovereign will, as he created the universes in accordance with his all-wise and eternal purpose. The precise nature of this eternal purpose remains largely enigmatic, as it is doubtful whether any beings except the Paradise Deities and their highest associates comprehend its full scope and significance, with even the exalted citizens of Paradise holding divergent perspectives regarding the Deities' ultimate intentions.

One can readily deduce that the purpose behind creating the perfect central universe of Havona was fundamentally to satisfy the divine nature, providing an expression of divine creative perfection. Havona functions as both an archetypal pattern for all subsequent universes and as the culminating educational sphere for time pilgrims journeying toward Paradise, yet this supernal creation exists primarily for the pleasure and satisfaction of the perfect and infinite Creators. Beyond this, the remarkable plan for perfecting evolutionary mortals and, after their attainment of Paradise and the Corps of the Finality, providing additional training for some undisclosed future service, appears to be one of the chief concerns occupying the seven superuniverses and their numerous subdivisions. However, this ascension scheme for spiritualizing and training mortals of time and space represents merely one facet of universe activity, as numerous other fascinating pursuits simultaneously engage the energies and attention of the celestial hosts.

For ages, the inhabitants of Urantia have profoundly misunderstood the providence of God, misconceiving it as a childish, arbitrary, and material intervention in worldly affairs. The genuine providence of God consists in the meticulously orchestrated and interlocking activities of celestial beings and divine spirits who, in accordance with cosmic law, labor unceasingly for the honor of God and the spiritual advancement of his universe children. This divine providence operates through established patterns and principles rather than through capricious or unpredictable divine interventions, maintaining cosmic order while simultaneously facilitating spiritual growth.

The overarching principle of the universe is progressive evolution, a truth that humanity has struggled to reconcile with traditional concepts of divine providence. Throughout the millennia of human development, Providence has been steadily implementing the grand plan of progressive evolution, guiding the human race through successive stages of advancement. Divine providence never stands in opposition to authentic human progress, whether temporal or spiritual, as it remains perfectly aligned with the immutable and perfect nature of the supreme Lawmaker. The stability of the universe, upheld by God's faithful and unwavering sustenance, provides the secure foundation upon which all evolutionary development proceeds. As the scripture affirms, "He is a faithful Creator," and "Forever, O Lord, your word is settled in heaven," illustrating the dependable cosmic order that undergirds all reality.

The Father employs limitless forces and personalities to uphold his purpose and sustain his creatures, ensuring that "all things work together for good to those who love God." The Universal Father has not withdrawn from the management of the universes but remains actively engaged as their present upholder. Without God's continuous sustaining presence, universal collapse would immediately ensue, as reality itself is contingent upon divine support. The Father unceasingly pours forth energy, light, and life, renewing all things in a perpetual act of creative maintenance that encompasses both the literal and spiritual dimensions of existence, stretching "out the north over the empty space and hangs the earth upon nothing."

Nature represents, in a limited sense, the physical habit of God, where his conduct and action are qualified and provisionally modified by the experimental plans and evolutionary patterns specific to each local universe, constellation, system, and planet. While God acts in accordance with well-defined, unchanging, and immutable law throughout the vast expanse of the master universe, he simultaneously modifies his patterns of action to harmonize with the coordinated and balanced conduct of each universe, constellation, system, planet, and personality. This modification aligns with the local objectives, aims, and plans of the finite projects of evolutionary unfoldment, creating a framework within which both divine law and evolutionary development can coexist and complement each other.

Nature, as comprehended by mortal understanding, presents the underlying foundation and fundamental background of a changeless Deity and his immutable laws, yet these are modified by, fluctuating because of, and experiencing upheavals through the implementation of local plans, purposes, patterns, and conditions. These local variations have been inaugurated and are being executed by the forces and personalities of the local universe, constellation, system, and planetary levels of reality. For example, God's laws as ordained in Nebadon undergo modification through the plans established by the Creator Son and Creative Spirit of this local universe. Furthermore, the operation of these laws has been additionally influenced by the errors, defaults, and insurrections of certain beings residing on Urantia and belonging to the planetary system of Satania, creating the complex interplay between perfect divine law and imperfect evolutionary implementation that characterizes nature as experienced on evolutionary worlds.

Nature emerges as a time-space resultant of two cosmic factors: first, the immutability, perfection, and rectitude of Paradise Deity, and second, the experimental plans, executive blunders, insurrectionary errors, incompleteness of development, and imperfection of wisdom characterizing the extra-Paradise creatures from the highest to the lowest. Consequently, nature carries a uniform, unchanging, majestic, and marvelous thread of perfection originating from the circle of eternity, yet in each universe, on each planet, and in each individual life, this nature is modified, qualified, and potentially marred by the acts, mistakes, and disloyalties of evolutionary creatures. This dual foundation produces nature's characteristically changing mood and whimsical appearance, though it remains fundamentally stable underneath, varied in accordance with the operating procedures of a local universe and the contingencies of evolutionary development.

Throughout human history, mortals have persistently anthropomorphized God, conceptualizing the divine in human terms and attributing human emotions and reactions to the Universal Father. God is not, never has been, and never will be jealous of humans or any other beings in the universe of universes in the sense of petty human emotions. When the Creator Son designed humans to be the masterpiece of planetary creation and the rightful rulers of earth, the spectacle of their subjugation to baser passions and their worship of idols made of wood, stone, gold, and selfish ambition elicits in God and his Sons a jealousy for humanity rather than of humanity. This distinction represents a fundamental difference between divine concern for creature welfare and the self-centered emotions often misconstrued as divine attributes.

The eternal God is inherently incapable of experiencing wrath and anger as these emotions are understood in human terms, for such sentiments are characterized as mean and despicable, barely worthy of being considered human qualities, much less divine attributes. These attitudes stand utterly foreign to the perfect nature and gracious character that defines the Universal Father. Much of the difficulty encountered by Urantia mortals in comprehending God stems from the far-reaching consequences of the Lucifer rebellion and the Caligastia betrayal, events that introduced profound confusion, distortion, and perversion into human concepts of divinity. On worlds untouched by the segregating influence of sin, evolutionary races develop significantly clearer conceptions of the Universal Father, free from the philosophical and spiritual contamination resulting from planetary rebellion.

God never experiences regret in the human sense, for his wise and eternal acts leave no cause for sorrow or revision. Unlike human wisdom, which develops through trials and errors of experience, God's wisdom consists in the unqualified perfection of his infinite universe insight, a divine foreknowledge that effectively directs his creative free will. While the Universal Father never engages in actions that cause subsequent sorrow or regret, the free will decisions of his created personalities in the outlying universes occasionally evoke emotions of divine sorrow in their Creator parents. Though God neither makes mistakes, harbors regrets, nor experiences sorrow in the human sense, he possesses a father's affection, and his heart is undoubtedly grieved when his children fail to attain the spiritual levels they are capable of reaching with the assistance so freely provided through spiritual-attainment plans and mortal-ascension policies.

God stands as the singular stationary, self-contained, and changeless being throughout the entire universe of universes, transcending time and existing beyond the limitations of past, present, or future as mortals perceive them. The Universal Father constitutes purposive energy (creative spirit) and absolute will, qualities that are both self-existent and universal in their scope and application. Being self-existent, God maintains absolute independence, with his very identity fundamentally inimical to change. The divine declaration "I, the Lord, change not" affirms this immutability, yet paradoxically, only upon attaining Paradise status can finite beings begin to comprehend how God transitions between seemingly contradictory states—from simplicity to complexity, from identity to variation, from quiescence to motion, from infinity to finitude, from the divine to the human, and from unity to duality and triunity.

God possesses the capacity to modify the manifestations of his absoluteness precisely because divine immutability does not necessitate immobility; fundamentally, God is will—the quintessential personification of volitional consciousness. As the being of absolute self-determination, God encounters no limitations to his universe reactions beyond those that are self-imposed, with his freewill acts conditioned exclusively by the divine qualities and perfect attributes inherently characterizing his eternal nature. The Father-Absolute, creator of the central and perfect universe and progenitor of all other Creators, shares numerous characteristics with humans and other beings, including personality and goodness. However, the infinity of will remains uniquely his, with his creative acts limited only by the sentiments of his eternal nature and the dictates of his infinite wisdom, consistently choosing only that which aligns with infinite perfection.

In science, God is recognized as the First Cause; in religion, he manifests as the universal and loving Father; and in philosophy, he represents the one being existing by himself, independent of any external source for existence while beneficently bestowing reality upon all things and beings. However, it requires revelation to demonstrate that the First Cause of scientific inquiry, the self-existent Unity of philosophical contemplation, and the God of religious devotion—full of mercy and goodness, committed to ensuring the eternal survival of his earthly children—are one and the same being. Human consciousness of a victorious life on earth emerges from creature faith that confronts each recurring episode of existence, when faced with the limitations of human capacity, by affirming: Even if I cannot accomplish this, there lives within me one who can and will do it, a fragment of the Father-Absolute of the universe of universes, representing "the victory which overcomes the world, even your faith."

Religious tradition constitutes the imperfectly preserved record of experiences from God-knowing individuals of past ages, yet these accounts prove unreliable as either guides for authentic religious living or as sources of accurate information concerning the Universal Father. Ancient theological formulations have invariably undergone alteration through the mythmaking tendencies of primitive human consciousness, which filtered divine reality through the limitations of undeveloped conceptual frameworks and cultural constraints. These distortions, while understandable as developmental stages in religious evolution, nevertheless obscure rather than illuminate the true nature of God and his relationship to the created realms.

One of the most significant sources of confusion on Urantia regarding the nature of God stems from the failure of sacred texts to clearly differentiate between the personalities comprising the Paradise Trinity and between Paradise Deity and the creators and administrators of local universes. Throughout past dispensations characterized by partial understanding, priests and prophets consistently failed to distinguish between various orders of celestial authority: Planetary Princes, System Sovereigns, Constellation Fathers, Creator Sons, Superuniverse Rulers, the Supreme Being, and the Universal Father. This confusion extends to the mistaken attribution of messages from subordinate personalities, such as Life Carriers and various angelic orders, as direct communications from God himself. Urantian religious thought continues to conflate these distinct divine and semi-divine personalities under a single appellation, perpetuating theological confusion and cosmic misunderstanding.

The primitive religious concepts that portray gods as vengeful forces that manifest through natural disasters—deities who shake the earth in wrath, strike down humans in anger, and inflict judgments through famine and flood—have no place in enlightened spiritual understanding. These archaic notions represent relics from an era when humanity believed the universe operated under the capricious whims of imaginary gods rather than through the administrative policies and conduct of the Supreme Creators and Controllers. Similarly, the barbarous concept of appeasing an angry God, propitiating an offended Lord, or winning divine favor through sacrifices, penance, or blood atonement represents a puerile and primitive religious philosophy utterly unworthy of an enlightened age of scientific and spiritual advancement. Such beliefs prove repugnant to celestial beings and divine rulers, constituting an affront to the true nature of God and misrepresenting his relationship with his created children.