The Realization of Eternal Life
Greetings and good morning brothers and sisters. This is Dr. James Perry continuing with our series where we seek to explore the deeper meanings of our relationship with Jesus Christ. Over the years, the heavenly Father has revealed many revelations of spiritual truth to me, and I want to share them with you. This morning we seek to understand the realization of eternal life.
And now, sit back and listen to today's message.
The Realization of Eternal Life
Jesus said, "My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand." John, Chapter 10, Verses 27 and 28.
Brothers and sisters, in today’s broadcast we show how we realize eternal life. We know that Jesus gives eternal life to all who believe in him, and that they shall never perish. And this life begins as soon as we accept him as our savior. But just what is this eternal life and how do we realize it? Jesus says he came that we might have life and have this life more abundantly. And this more abundant life is eternal life. We must not confuse the material life that we already have with the eternal life that Jesus gives. This eternal life that Jesus gives to us is life in our souls. We know that the material life perishes, but the life in the soul, never perishes. Thus though our material bodies perish, the eternal life in our soul continues to live. Now we have indicated that this eternal life is bestowed upon us as we live the material life.
The eternal life is the endless pursuit of divine values and meanings. Therefore the eternal life that Jesus gives is eternal values and meanings. It is this pursuit of these eternal values that constitute eternal life. These divine values exists prior to the beginning of all time, and therefore are not conditioned by time. When we experience these divine values and meanings, we are experiencing values that have no beginning nor any ending. Life without beginning or ending is a concept, the experiencing of which is beyond the stretches of the material mind. Time is the consciousness of duration, and eternity is the absence of the consciousness of time. Nevertheless, by the grasp of our faith, we can experience these timeless values in our souls.
The secret of eternal life is wrapped up in the technique of living the Father's will, living the divine values of the Father. The Father's will is eternal, and living that will is eternal life. How do we integrate these timeless values into the life we are living which is characterized by a past, present and future. How can we compress the past, present, and future into the present, striking step with the eternal values? To help give our material minds a feel for how we accomplish this, imagine an unchanging purpose-a purpose in which the passing of time has not the slightest bit of influence on the steadfastness of that purpose. Next, try to envision solving a problem by looking further and further and further back into the past for wisdom, while at the same time looking further and further into the future for possible effects of the decision made in the present. The effect of this type of thinking is to free the decision made from the passing moment, time-striking step with the Eternal.
The living of the Father's will frees us from making responses that are solely rooted in the present. We know that in the Father there is only the everlasting present. The Father knows no past nor future. He only knows the everlasting now. Thus when we execute the Father’s will, that is choose the divine values used in our moral decisions, we compress the past and future into the present.
The spiritualized mind responds in only one way to any given situation-and that is the way of love, forgiveness, and mercy, all which are eternal in their manifestations. Such a Fatherly attitude toward reality effectively liberates us from the passing moment-since no amount of passing moments will make any difference in the response of the moment.
The realization of eternity is a function of the spiritualized mind that is conscious of striving to do the Father's will. This realization is not a result of living the Father's will in order to escape a painful life, but rather the result of submitting to that very life, and mastering it in the process with unending love, unceasing forgiveness, and everlasting mercy. This realization is the result of displaying to the Father a never changing attitude of love for our brothers and sisters under a constant stream of difficult and trying situations. The realization of eternal life is essential to living the spirit filled life. We can not exercise nameless patience when we feel deep within our souls that death will put an end to us and our patience. And neither can we exercise never ending unselfishness for the same reason.
With the exercise of our eternal faith, we experience eternal life in the soul now, even while we toil in the fields of material difficulties. And now brothers and sisters, will we grasp it? If we will grasp eternal life by faith, the Holy Spirit will allow us to experience it while the spirit of the Son, the Spirit of Truth will convict us of the reality of eternal life, and the Father's spirit will be the everlasting proof of our eternal life since it will be everlastingly fused with our souls.
This concludes today’s message on understanding the realization of eternal life. We hope you find something in this message to ponder and pray about as you go about your day.
Until next time, the is Dr. James Perry
Your Kingdom Come; Your Will Be Done!
Inspirational Messages of Light
By Dr. James Perry
The Realization of Eternal Life
