Tag: spirituality

Is The Divine Love Movement A Religion?

The divine love path is all about developing soul consciousness through receiving divine love and letting go of mindful ideas. With that in mind, I’m reticent about getting embroiled in philosophical questions such as whether it constitutes a religion or not. For all practical purposes, it doesn’t matter – at least to me. But for what it’s worth, here’s my take on it.

Discussing religion in detail would fill a book and be boring beyond words. Nor is there any hope of widespread consensus on the matter, so I’ll keep my comments brief and to the point.

A religion is most often defined as a belief in a non-human supreme being, divinity, the power of prayer, and the like. By this definition then divine love practitioners are following a religion since all of these things are intrinsically involved in the core divine teachings given to us by James Padgett.

It’s true that traditional religions tend to include ritual and dogma, which isn’t the case with the divine love movement. Nor does seeking divine love require an intermediary in the form of a religious institution between the practitioner and God. So following the divine path isn’t the same as following a traditional religion.

There are lots of spiritual movements that believe they are special and want to distinguish themselves from what’s gone before and so claim not to be a religion. But it seems to me no one outside those groups really buys that argument.

However, those beings who inhabit the celestial realms and whose souls have been transformed to be wholly divine emphatically do not see themselves as belonging to a religion. They live in a divine reality that is beyond the need for religious ideas and can actually see the form of God clearly. So these things are no longer a matter of faith for them. When you experience God’s reality then the role of religion disappears. Yes, they ‘follow’ Jesus but only in the way we might look to the head of an organisation for leadership.

Christian concepts and terminology formed the backdrop to James Padgett’s original writings. Some followers are happy to accept the Padgett Messages as essentially an extension or clarification of the bible. Others want to distance themselves from traditional religions, seeing themselves as ‘spiritual’ rather than religious. One way of doing this is to use universal language in place of overtly religious terms. For example, gender-neutral terminology might be used when referring to God. This may make the divine teachings more palatable to those who are looking for something beyond mainstream religion. Of course, the truth can be presented in diverse ways for the benefit of different audiences without diluting its power. However, it’s a tenuous argument to say that the use of universal language elevates the divine love path above being a religion.

Personally, I’m not too fussed about definitions or the terminology that’s used. I like both the clinical clarity of scientific language and the somewhat romantic imagery of the bible. But I accept that for others, the way the truth is presented could make the difference between them stepping onto the divine path or not. So I favour a diverse approach where advocates of divine love use a variety of paradigms and language styles when presenting the truth to others. There’s no one way of doing so that is perfect in all circumstances. Even Jesus switched between talking in parables and talking more plainly depending on his audience.

So, as a divine love practitioner, are you any clearer on how you would reply if someone were to ask you if you are religious? Me too!

What’s Truly Worth Having Is Free.

There’s a saying that nothing that’s worth having in life is free. Yet, God’s divine love, as explained to us in the Padgett Messages, is freely available just for the asking – the only thing in existence that can transform us beyond our imagination. Not to mention all the other blessings that God freely showers on us when we ask for them.

Could some reject divine love on these grounds alone, wary of anything that is free, believing it can’t have any value? If so, then it’s a stark lesson in how human conditioning and lack of awareness can stand in the way of true fulfilment.

No doubt many more reject divine love on the grounds that the simple premise behind it doesn’t include dazzling conceptual ideas that satisfy the mind.

All in all, it’s a sad predicament. So much unnecessary suffering where people struggle through life relying on their own efforts and where they make uninformed choices that bring suffering into their lives.

I’ve even heard people say that they envy those who have faith in God because of the comfort it seemingly gives in the face of adversity. And yet they seem unwilling to step onto any spiritual path, believing science can explain everything without the need for a supreme being to exist.

How much regret there must be when non-believers in life after death get to the spirit world. That’s why those of us who are on the divine path need to make sure that knowledge of the highest truth is readily available to those who are searching for meaning in their lives.

The one silver lining in all this is that there’s often a disconnect between our minds and souls. Sometimes, what the mind dismisses, the soul accepts. So when the seed of an idea is planted, even when rejected by the mind, it can spring into life at a later stage when the conditions are right. That’s why shining a divine light is so important. People sense you’re different and may be intrigued. It could be the soul-to-soul spark they need that will eventually ignite their conscious search for, and acceptance of, the truth.

One final point. I’ve heard it said that some spirits reject the notion of divine love on the grounds that they never heard anything about it while on earth and are therefore inclined to dismiss it. Apparently, our divine friends will bring these spirits to the earth to visit those of us who are active believers thereby confirming that there are indeed some on earth who walk this glorious path. This demonstrates how we can help others in ways we may never have imagined.

Making The Soul More Real.

How can you distinguish between your mind and your soul? How do you make the soul feel more real?

Much has been written elsewhere (such as in the Padgett Messages) about the different functions of the soul and mind, so I will settle for giving my own experience of soul awareness.

What I’m about to describe is subtle but real. Because of the subtleties involved, I will first describe things from my perspective and then I’ve asked my divine guides to give their input on the subject.

At some point after becoming acquainted with the Padgett Messages, I noticed that just filing ideas away and having an intellectual knowledge of supposed new spiritual truths wasn’t very satisfying. For one thing, I wasn’t sure that I really ‘owned’ the truth. Nor did anything change inside me just by reading a book. In short, I felt my soul was being changed by divine love but, as far as I could tell, my mind wasn’t. I knew I was missing something and had to find a way of bridging the disconnect between mind and soul.

I decided to reread all the Padgett-inspired spiritual writings I could find. I reasoned that the truth isn’t so much thoughts in my mind as a living energy in my soul. So I tried to switch my attention from the words themselves to how they made me feel, on the basis that the soul senses and acknowledges truth in a very different way to the mind.

When doing this, I would sometimes find myself reacting strongly to certain words or ideas and would often feel a flow of divine love into my soul and a change in my awareness. This subtle change was my soul starting to overshadow the mind. On reflection, I believe that contemplating the words on a deeper level was helping to open my soul to experience brief glimpses of God’s reality.

This is a practice that I’ve continued with ever since, alongside seeking God’s divine love. Yes, all of us on this path would like a momentous spiritual awakening but I’m comfortable with taking lots of little steps like those I experience.

This is my guides input on the subject:

‘When you read divinely inspired material then you are connecting with the truth. This strengthens your appreciation of the truth both on a soul level and in your mind. As a whole, you become more anchored in the truth. The recognition of this increases your faith and, as you experienced, can cause a welling up of emotions and a flow of divine love into your soul. It can also cause a download of information that helps you to a more profound recognition of the truth.

‘As you have discovered, not all of the truth is revealed at once. Different aspects become clearer as one progresses. The truth itself never changes but our perspective changes as our awareness expands.

‘When you read with an open mind and willingness to learn then changes in awareness may take place as you connect with your soul. Barriers will still remain in the mind but the rapport between mind and soul strengthens. As you now recognise, your strong focus while reading helped your normal mindful reality to fall away, making room for your soul aspirations to rise up and trigger changes in awareness.

‘There’s always the possibility that the mind will misinterpret the truth that resides in your soul and will go off at a tangent. The distinction between mind and soul in terms of the boundary between one and the other is not usually clear to you but the interaction between them can be. Becoming aware of this interaction is achievable. New thoughts can arise in your mind that you’ve never had before. When this happens on a regular basis then you would be right to conclude that this is the influence of the soul. The quality of consciousness itself may also change to something new and unexpected. This experience can be profound, depending on your willingness to step into it.

‘God has decreed that the truth be known on earth and we in the celestial realms are working to bring the truth to all of you.’

The message then finished on a more personal note that I’ve not included. Connecting to the soul is what I value most, as this is the gateway to everything I aspire to be on the divine path. If I don’t experience some change in awareness on a regular basis then I view that as evidence of slipping into complacency whereby the mind is regaining the upper hand. All of us on the divine path need to develop a strategy that makes room in our lives for our soul to flourish. Prayer must be at the heart of our efforts, but not slipping back into our normal frame of mind the rest of the time is also an important pursuit. Consciously and gently exercising our developing soul awareness when reading, or during other activities, is one way of doing this.

The Mystery Of Mysteries.

Divine love, brought by God’s Comforter into our soul in response to our prayerful desires, remains a mystery until it’s personally experienced. After that, it’s known indirectly through its effects but remains utterly mysterious in itself. It changes us profoundly, but its own pristine and incorruptible nature never changes in all eternity. As it builds in quantity inside us, this love eventually becomes who we are, yet never impinges on our personality or sense of individuality. These apparent contradictions only add to its elusive nature.

No one who experiences divine love can find adequate words to describe the sublime and overwhelming feeling of being directly touched by God. It’s a feeling that changes everything. We remain finite individuals but develop a divine sense of oneness with God.

Divine love acts as a catalyst, lodging permanently in our soul and imparting its immortal, unchanging nature to us. This causes us to become immortal. We’re told that only those who become divine are immortal. Being created in the image of God does not in itself confer either divinity or immortality since the image is not the same thing as the substance. Perhaps surprisingly, even after our soul has been completely transformed into a divine soul by this love, which is the essence of God’s own soul, we still retain the ability to change and can receive more love forever.

It helps our understanding to recognise that divine love is not just love. It’s a life force that embodies countless facets, including divine truth, knowledge, light, life and consciousness. It also germinates various seeds embedded in our soul that represent gifts that God implanted in us when we were created. These blossom  in the form of new skills and abilities as we progress, adding to our individual uniqueness.

It’s known that the divine love resides within one’s soul, but the internal structure of the soul is not well understood, at least in terms that our celestial teachers can convey readily to us in words. We’re told that a divine soul develops new senses that cause a range of new perceptions to arise, which allow us to explore higher dimensions of reality. Those without these perceptions remain totally unaware of these higher realms.

Of course, it’s not necessary for us to understand the interactions between divine love and specific parts of our being in order for us to benefit from the effects it has on us. In the end, it doesn’t matter. As possessers of divine love, we experience a wholeness and wholesomeness that is the most satisfying journey we can ever undertake.

Choose God’s Reality Over Human Reality.

Each day we invest in the human reality all around us and each day we’re disappointed. Failure and strife abound in society and affect how we live our lives. Discontent, depression, anxiety, suffering and anger are rife.

Meanwhile, God’s reality is enduring and is built on peace and love. When we enter this reality then we see clearly the futility of normal human thought patterns and activities. Human reality, which has always ignored God’s laws of creation, was always built on sand.

Don’t you want to be bathed in God’s love? To discover God’s laws and the way to supreme happiness? It’s not something dreamt up by weird religious people long ago. It’s real and was always real. Scepticism is fine, but cynicism, if it’s unwarranted, could destroy one’s chances of a better life. If you’re waiting for science to discover God then you’ll wait a long time. But you can discover God for yourself. Few choose to do so. Most are drawn to human reality, which carries with it the real risk to each individual of being damaged or broken by their experiences. Even a human life that is well lived pales by comparison with one spent walking hand in hand with God.

When you experience divine love coming into your soul, it changes everything. You will know from personal experience that God exists. This love changes you at a fundamental level and brings knowledge at a soul level that goes beyond our mindful reality. The experiences it brings are priceless and are based on a new awareness that arises as a result of the divine love opening up new perceptions in our souls. It doesn’t prevent you from leading a normal life, but your perspective will change.

The only possible reason not to choose divine love is because you don’t believe it to be true. Then why not try praying earnestly to God for it to come into your soul and see for yourself? So long as you invest your emotions in your prayers then they will always invoke a response.

It’s been predicted that when society breaks down in a fundamental way, which is quite close now, many will turn to God for help. Much of the suffering from feelings of being lost and fearful in those coming dark times can be avoided by anchoring yourself in God’s reality now. Along with guidance and protection comes peace and joy, allowing us to thrive even in difficult circumstances.

Why Is The Soul Still A Mystery?

The truth of the soul’s existence has been made plain in the Padgett Messages. The soul is the spiritual powerhouse and essence of our being and is capable of connecting us to God. The material mind was supposed to be more of an adjunct, useful for interacting with the material world.

So why do we struggle to relate to the soul? Our surface consciousness has beguiled mankind for millennia and we’re the product of that long-held fascination. As a result, we suffer from a serious imbalance between mindful and soul consciousness. Consequently, the wisdom available in our souls is often neglected when making decisions. This explains much of the dysfunctionality that surrounds us and why human endeavours often end in failure. This imbalance has largely blocked access to our soul wisdom and God. This is a considerable handicap to live with and has serious repercussions for us individually and collectively.

To know the soul requires us to have a spiritual awakening. The most powerful form of this comes with receiving divine love, which opens up new perceptions in our souls that provide us with all we need to be joyful and thrive spiritually. This is the only way we can progress to the highest realms of the afterlife known as the celestial kingdom. In most people, this path is contrary to what our surface consciousness wants and so few venture along it. In the Padgett Messages, Ann Rollins (James Padgett’s grandmother) had a long life but after she died and eventually got to the celestial kingdom, she found it sobering to see how few of the people she knew on earth had made it there in all the intervening time. It seems that few on earth find ‘the narrow path and gate’ whereby we can experience the glory of God’s celestial kingdom within a short time frame after we pass over.

The almost universal ignorance of the availability of divine love coupled with widespread disbelief in God and the spirit world explains why the soul largely remains a mystery to most of us. Furthermore, our normal consciousness feels comfortable and natural, so many people feel no incentive to explore further. Even when in possession of the truth, getting to know one’s soul is an ongoing journey for all eternity.

Only The Soul Can Become Immortal.

Our soul is the only part of us that can become immortal. The spirit body that we take to the spirit world with us when we pass over is a covering for the soul and is subject to change over time.

Like our material mind, the mind of our spirit body becomes redundant at the point we become fully divine, which is when our immortal soul mind is fully formed. Until then, the spirit mind will continue to exist. Over time, the spirit mind will become purified but unless the soul changes from the image of God to being divine then we will never become a divine angel and can progress no further than perfecting the natural love that we were born with.

Beyond the first few planes of the celestial kingdom, showing ourselves in the likeness of our old human form is no longer considered necessary, as we will have developed other ways of perceiving the identity of others by then. Nor does the environmental background stay fixed in these higher celestial realms – it changes to reflect the emotions of the inhabitants, something we would find extremely disconcerting in our current state.

Beyond these bare details, celestial beings cannot find words that we would understand to describe the wonderful environment that they inhabit.

Human beings look for meaning in many different mindful ideas. Few realise that divine love is the mystery of all mysteries that enables the soul to experience and know divine reality, including itself, God and all of creation. Focusing on developing our souls rather than our minds is what will lead us to immortality and a blissful future beyond our time on earth.

You Are Close To The Kingdom.

There’s a curious expression that gets used several times in the Padgett Messages, namely, ‘You are close to the kingdom’. It’s not the expression itself that raised my eyebrows since it’s an obvious reference to the celestial kingdom. It’s the context that is very revealing. This phrase is used several times to reassure James Padgett that if he prays to God for divine love in the prescribed manner, then he wouldn’t be long out of the kingdom.

What’s surprising is that he was told this almost from the outset – before he would have accumulated much love in his soul as a result of his prayers. If so, then all of us are likely in the same position, which is not what I expected since, to me, progress seems very slow. Of course, James may have received a certain amount of divine love unconsciously at an earlier stage of his life, which would have helped. But it was also clear that he had been far from virtuous at times, unlike what you’d expect if his soul was being strongly influenced by divine love.

There’s two points worth making. First, from the perspective of our celestial teachers who watch countless spirits progress slowly along their chosen spiritual paths, they know from observation that those who discover divine love while on earth are likely to enter the celestial kingdom within a short time after passing over. In recent times, there’s been testimony from a number of spirits that corroborate this from their personal experience. Second, it seems that while all serious divine love practitioners will make fast progress relatively speaking, there’s an option for all of us to do so extremely fast. This is harder because it requires more dedication, whereby our whole life is devoted to the divine path. It seems it’s particularly hard to take the final steps to becoming a celestial while on earth, but we can get so close that the transformation is almost complete. The point is that God has provided the potential for an incredibly quick journey, should we choose it, so that any suffering we endure is minimised.

James was also told that he could be very close to where Jesus resides within a short time. This seems even more surprising given Jesus, like all celestials, will have been progressing at an exponential rate in the spirit world, since celestials have a far greater capacity to receive divine love than we do and so are pulling away from us. I initially dismissed this statement as an unconscious bias being introduced by James’ mind while receiving the messages. However, I don’t rule out that it could be true. I think one of the reasons that James was selected for the role that he carried out may have been because he had an unusually strong susceptibility to receiving divine love once he became convinced of its existence.

There’s also what I refer to as the Ponzi effect. As the person on earth who is most directly responsible for reintroducing divine love in modern times to the whole world, I speculate that James may forever benefit from all the good that continues over time to come from that one action. If we introduce someone to divine love, could we continue to benefit when they then introduce someone to it, and so on? This idea may not be correct. But if it is, then by performing such an epic act at such an early stage of his soul journey, James may well have earned himself a very privileged and exalted position in the celestial realms.

Getting to the celestial kingdom is not a race. But knowing it’s close at hand is reassuring and can only add to our motivation. It seems that what we choose to do or not do during the relatively short period we spend on earth can have a surprisingly large effect on our future.

Stepping Into The New Version Of You.

When I started to receive divine love in response to my prayers, I initially felt that I was the lucky possesser of this love. But I’ve ended up accepting that it’s the love that really possesses me. It has somehow become who I am now, deep down, but without me losing my sense of identity in the process.

In augmenting the reality I experience, it’s starting to diminish the strong attachment I had to my mind. I sense that in time, the mind will become a mere shadow of itself as I become more centred in soul consciousness, and I have already started to view the human body as just an appendage that I carry around. It’s entirely up to me how much I choose to live in this blossoming soul consciousness. Fortunately, I was never enamoured with who I was, especially my many limitations, so giving up my old sense of self and stepping into the divine version of me is easy, at least in principle. In practice, soul consciousness seems within reach at times and elusive at other times, depending on my spiritual condition.

It’s a lifetime’s work to live fully in one’s soul consciousness, but the rewards are great. There’s also a price we pay in terms of our heightened perceptions of all the suffering and darkness around us, much of which is hidden from normal view. Once our soul is on fire through God’s divine love then we’ll seem different to others and this will tend to polarise people for or against us. However, once the predicted great reset of humanity’s values takes place, these problems will gradually disappear as widespread acceptance of God once again becomes established around the world.

Divine Truth Is Shocking And Revolutionary.

Truth in this world is normally carefully controlled, whether by governments or anyone else in a position of power or influence. The truth is often deliberately concealed and much of what we’re fed is not true. In addition, truth is rarely found in a pure form due to mankind’s inability to discern what is true from the imaginings of our own minds. The mind has a tendency to make complex that which is simple.

I’ve written extensively elsewhere about what divine love is and how it radically changes us. As more people experience this for themselves, it will power a revolution. In truth, we’re not really awake until we receive enough of this love to understand who we are, what God is and the purpose of our existence. The answers to these questions are too profound to express in mere words or to be held as thoughts in our material mind. This is because God’s reality is divine reality – something we can’t perceive or experience in our current spiritual state. What we’re capable of understanding with our minds is superficial to the point of being somewhat banal by comparison with what exists. Only as we develop completely new divine perceptions in our soul, which gives rise to a new divine consciousness, can we finally start to perceive and live absolute truth. From the perspective of where we start and end up, this process, while beautiful, is also shocking and devastating – but in a good way. Many of our strongly held beliefs are shattered along the way, but, in practice, it’s so gradual that we don’t typically experience any real discomfort. We may, however, experience discomfort during the process of soul expiation, when painful memories from the past may rise to the surface in order to be released. If we were to experience all the changes suddenly, it would be incredibly disorientating and would seriously affect our wellbeing.

Humanity has got carried away with its own power, of being able to transform the world to be as we wish. Coming to the truth requires great humility and an understanding that all that is worth having is given to us freely by God. At the core of this is divine love. It’s not just a source of pleasant feelings, as might be supposed. This love gives birth to a new consciousness within us. Truly, God is love, is life. All who open themselves to receiving this love will, for all eternity, remember the day that they found it as the greatest of all blessings.