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I am here, Jesus:
I am here, again, to write you about the Old Testament and its relationship to my Messiahship, that is to say, the steps in the Scriptures that show and point the way to the development of the spiritual truths that finally led to the Divine Love.
In my last message to you, I spoke about the prophet Hosea and I showed that he concentrated upon the subject of love, and this subject was of a twofold variety: the natural love of a man for a woman and the great quality of this love because of the sinful ways of his wife; but secondly, we have a change from this natural love to the love which is bestowed by the Father, because this prophet's love was symbolic of the Love which the Father had for His erring Israel.
The importance of the message of Hosea, then, was not in the usual type of prophetic message calling guilty Israel and her leaders to repentance and return to moral laws and worship of Jehovah, but a message which turned from the love of man to concentrate on the Infinite Love, and thus we might say Divine Love for mankind which animates the Father. And it is here that I learned the lesson of the Father as a Father of Love and not simply a Father of warning, of "wrath," of "anger" for sin, or as a leader in battle to win victory over the foes of Israel or to save her from destruction.
This concept of the Father's Love is not to be found again among the prophets of Israel or of Judah, for the condition of the people of both Hebrew countries was such that the call to repeated repentance had to take precedence during the following centuries over the call to the Father's Love and the Father's Love for His children. Yet, there were other writings amongst the Hebrews that complimented my knowledge and understanding of the Father's attributes and His Divine Love which was waiting to be rebestowed upon mankind at the moment which He deemed right and correct in His own wisdom; and these writings included some of the Psalms attributed to David and other Psalmists, and they are those which deal with the longings of the human soul for the Father's Love, the panting and trembling of the soul for God and His presence.
And these writings were important because they drew the attention of the people away from national problems like victories and defeats and threats of invasion by other Semitic peoples at the time, and turned them to thoughts of inward feeling and introspection and a consciousness that God was not only God of the Israel nation but the Father and Creator of each individual soul which, if it seeks the Father in earnestness, is the way for Him to provide His protection and His Love.
By combining these songs of the Psalmists, with their highly individualistic feelings of desire to approach and feel the presence of the Father through earnest longing of soul to obtain the Father's protection and loving presence, with the understanding that the Father loves His children as individual souls and wants His children as individual souls to turn to Him for each one's salvation and protection against the evils of the earth life, and His guidance and Love, that here was the way to obtain the Father's gifts through my earnest longing of my soul for the Father's presence and guidance and protection and, finally, and most important, His Love, for I knew from Hosea that God's Love was burning like a great fire to convey it to the soul that wanted it, and I prayed earnestly to the Father not only for His guidance and protection, but because of my intuition and condition of soul and the promptings of the Father, Himself, for that Love to come into my soul which I knew was waiting for everyone who sought it in earnest -- everyone, whether he be a sinner, as Gomer, the faithless wife, or a soul without sin.
My prayers to the Father were rewarded, not with the love that is termed the Spirit of God, for this love is one which comes in connection with the love of development and moral and intellectual efforts, but the Love which had never before come to mankind before the Divine Love which Hosea foresaw but did not receive, but which came to me through the Holy Spirit. This Divine Love came to me when I was very young, because my thoughts and soul longings were upon the Love of the Father unconsciously and without words; but the Father's Love began to be shed abroad in my heart in greater and greater abundance as I understood that the Divine Love of the Father was ready to be rebestowed upon man and, especially, specifically, upon me, if I prayed in earnestness of soul, which would cause the Love to be conveyed into my soul, and with that understanding, or shall I say intuition, or suggestions, made to me by the messengers sent by the Father to apprise me of these things and to instruct me.
I let my longings of soul go out even stronger and with greater intensity for the Father's Love, rather than any other of His good gifts, and the Love came burning more and more brightly in my soul, and I felt the glow and the incoming of the Love in my soul and I knew that my intuitions and the suggestions that came to me were things of reality. And I was soon convinced as I grew towards manhood that the Divine Love was mine and that this Divine Love would insure me a place near the Father.
And, indeed, I felt close to the Father and I felt His presence to the point where I could feel His Divine Love in my heart often, and finally, almost constantly. And, with Love came the conviction that I must be the Messiah whose mission it was to tell mankind the glad tidings that the Divine Love had been rebestowed.
And through continual study of the Scriptures, I began to understand how the first parents had failed and the consequences; and that death referred to, meaning separation from God, meant separation from God's actual presence through His Divine Love; and that I had been able to obtain it for the first time through the Father's Loving -- Kindness and Infinite Goodness and Mercy and Love for His children.
And also, in the Scriptures was the story of Jeremiah and the message which this persecuted prophet gave to his people: the message that Jehovah would at some time give the people a new chance to be with Him and make a New Covenant with them which would be engraved in their innermost parts, in their hearts and souls. And this New Covenant between God and man, through penetration of God's Being into man's very soul, showed me that I had been favored with this Covenant through God's living fire of Love in my soul which I could feel burning in my heart with my prayers to Him.
And this is the way in which I knew that I was the Messiah promised the Hebrew people and, indeed, all mankind. And, as the other prophets had received their call, I heard the voice proclaiming that I was the Messiah and that I should go throughout all Palestine and proclaim the message, regardless of the material conditions prevailing in the world at the time.
I have more to say to you about this subject, which you realize is a very important one, but I will stop now and wish you a pleasant good night and a word to the Doctor* that I love him, and you, that you both be of good cheer. And I will sign myself,
Jesus of Nazareth - Jesus of the Bible.
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* Dr. Leslie R. Stone.
