Paper 2 Overview: The Nature of God

This narrative explores the nature and character of God, revealing how his divine attributes manifest in relation to his universe of creatures. The Divine Counselor explains that God's nature is best understood through the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth, who personally demonstrated the Father's character. Despite the limitations of human understanding, we can comprehend certain aspects of God's nature through the assistance of the indwelling Thought Adjuster and the Spirit of Truth.

The paper systematically examines God's key attributes: his infinity that transcends comprehension yet allows for personal connection with creatures; his eternal perfection that establishes unchanging divine standards; his justice and righteousness that operate with mercy; his divine mercy that tempers justice; his love that forms the foundation of his relationship with all beings; his goodness that can be truly known through personal religious experience; and the divine truth and beauty that integrate with goodness in the divine nature. Throughout these revelations, God is portrayed as both an infinite sovereign and a loving parent who seeks a relationship with his creation.

The highest possible human concept of God embraces the idea of a primal and infinite personality. This paper explores specific characteristics of the divine nature that constitute God's character, which can be most clearly understood through the revelation of the Father provided by Michael of Nebadon in his teachings and his mortal life on earth. The divine nature can also be better comprehended when humans view themselves as God's children looking to their spiritual Father.

Our attempts to enlarge and spiritualize the human concept of God are severely limited by the capacity of mortal minds and the inadequacy of language to describe divine realities. These limitations would make our efforts nearly futile if not for two divine aids: the indwelling Thought Adjuster of the Universal Father and the pervading Spirit of Truth of the Creator Son. With the assistance of these divine presences, the Divine Counselor undertakes the task of portraying God's nature to human understanding, despite the inherent challenges in doing so.

The infinity of God places him beyond complete comprehension by finite creatures. Sacred writings describe him as dwelling in "thick darkness" because his blinding presence is inaccessible to lowly creatures. His thoughts and plans are unsearchable, and he performs countless marvelous works beyond numbering. The Universal Father is described as the Supreme Soul, the Primal Mind, and the Unlimited Spirit of all creation—the beginning and end of every good purpose.

Unlike his creatures, God is fully self-conscious of his infinity and eternity, and perfectly aware of his perfection and power. He constantly meets the varying demands for himself throughout his vast universe, knowing and understanding all his attributes of perfection. God is not a cosmic accident or experimenter; he sees the end from the beginning, with his divine plan encompassing all experiments and adventures of his subordinates. To God, all time exists in the present moment as "the great and only I AM." His absolute infinity necessarily prevents direct personal communication with finite material beings, which is why he reaches his creatures through the Paradise Sons, the personalities of the Infinite Spirit, and the indwelling Thought Adjusters.

The eternal perfection of God is manifested in his unchanging, never-beginning, never-ending circular nature. He inhabits the present moment with all his majesty and greatness, giving life to all things throughout the eternal ages. God is described as "the Lord who changes not," whose counsel stands firm and whose purposes remain immutable. His actions are divine and infallible, and his plans are steadfast and unchanging.

God's primal perfection consists not in an assumed righteousness but in the inherent perfection of the goodness of his divine nature. He is complete and final, lacking nothing in the beauty and perfection of his righteous character. The divine purpose centers on elevating all willing creatures to share in the Father's Paradise perfection. Though God cannot personally experience imperfection, he shares in the consciousness of all imperfect creatures' experiences. Through this sharing and the contacts of his divine presence, God participates in the evolutionary journey of every moral being in the universe, though human limitations and potential evil are not part of his divine nature.

God's righteousness ensures that he is perfectly just in all his ways. Scripture affirms that "the Lord is righteous in all his ways" and his judgments are "true and righteous altogether." The divine justice cannot be influenced by the acts of his creatures, as there is no unfairness or partiality with God. It is futile to attempt to persuade God to change his unchangeable decrees to avoid the consequences of violating his natural laws and spiritual directives.

The most severe consequence for deliberate rebellion against God's government is the loss of existence as an individual subject of that government. This extinction represents the inevitable result of wholehearted sin, as such individuals essentially destroy themselves by becoming "wholly unreal" through embracing iniquity. This cessation of existence is determined at dispensational adjudications by coordinate action of all jurisdictional tribunals, from planetary councils up to the judgment tribunals of the Ancients of Days. When finalized, the sin-identified being ceases to exist as if they had never been, with no possibility of resurrection. For Adjuster-indwelt personalities, however, the experiential spirit values survive in the reality of the continuing Adjuster.

Divine mercy represents justice tempered by the wisdom that comes from perfect knowledge and complete understanding of the natural weaknesses and environmental limitations of finite creatures. Scripture describes God as "full of compassion, gracious, long-suffering, and plenteous in mercy," whose mercy "endures forever." God does not afflict willingly but is described as "the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort."

God is inherently kind, naturally compassionate, and eternally merciful, with no external influence needed to evoke his loving-kindness. A creature's need alone is sufficient to ensure the full flow of God's tender mercies and saving grace. The better we understand others, the easier it becomes to forgive and love them. Divine mercy represents a fairness technique that bridges the gap between universe levels of perfection and imperfection. Rather than contradicting justice, mercy offers an understanding interpretation of supreme justice as it applies to evolving spiritual beings and material creatures of time and space.

God's only personal attitude toward the affairs of the universe is always a reaction of divine affection. Scripture affirms that "God is love," and his love extends to all, as he "makes his sun to rise on the evil and on the good and sends rain on the just and on the unjust." It is incorrect to believe that God must be persuaded to love his children through sacrifices or intercession, for "the Father himself loves you" without condition or limitation.

The indwelling Thought Adjuster represents the greatest evidence of God's goodness and the supreme reason for loving him. Though physical space separates us from God's Paradise presence, he dwells within us through his spirit. The Divine Counselor finds it easy to worship one so great yet so devoted to uplifting his creatures. God's love follows us throughout the endless circle of eternal ages, naturally evoking an increasing love for our Maker. Divine love functions in unified association with divine wisdom and all the infinite characteristics of God's perfect nature, individualized for each human soul through the indwelling Adjuster.

The goodness of God can only be truly discovered in the spiritual world of personal religious experience. In its essence, religion is faith-trust in God's goodness. While humans might fear a great God, they trust and love only a good God. This goodness constitutes an essential part of God's personality and is fully revealed only through the personal religious experience of God's believing children.

Jesus elevated the concept of God from a Deity dominated by kingly morality to the affectionately touching level of intimate family morality in the parent-child relationship. This transition from viewing God as a king-judge to seeing him as a Father transformed the believer's position from insecurity to the understanding that God is the Father of each human being. Selflessness is inherent in parental love, and God loves not like a father but as a father. While righteousness reveals God as the source of moral law and truth reveals him as a teacher, love gives and seeks affectionate understanding fellowship as exists between parent and child.

All finite knowledge and creature understanding are relative and limited. Physical facts may be fairly uniform, but truth functions as a living and flexible factor in universe philosophy. Divine truth, while uniform and universal, may sometimes vary in its telling due to the relativity of knowledge completeness and the extent of personal experience among different beings across the universes.

The wise philosopher always looks for the creative design behind all universe phenomena, recognizing that creator thought invariably precedes creative action. The eternal quest of all beings is for unification and divine coherence. While the physical universe coheres in Paradise, the intellectual universe in the God of mind, and the spiritual universe in the Eternal Son, mortal humans cohere in the Universal Father through the relationship between the indwelling Thought Adjuster and the Father. The discernment of supreme beauty involves discovering and integrating reality. As humans ascend the scale of spiritual living, the supreme qualities of truth, beauty, and goodness become increasingly coordinated and unified in God, who is love. These divine realities, when integrated in personal experience, result in a high order of love conditioned by wisdom and qualified by loyalty.