- 31 - As for the spirit spheres that were provided for in God’s Plan of Salvation and through which, by that plan, the human spirits were to ascend to God after the Redemption, they are 13 in number. I need not describe each in detail. What you, as a mortal, can understand of this subject has already been told to you personally by spirits from the several spheres in the many communications imparted through mediums for your enlightenment. From their manner of appearance and from what they said you were able to form an idea of their lot in each sphere, as well as of the general appearance of the spheres themselves. You have seen those suffering human spirits that went into the lowest of the 13 spirit spheres after their earthly death, and from them you have learned the meaning of Christ’s words: ‘Cast him into the outer darkness; there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ From them, also, you learned the meaning of these words of the Bible: ‘The dead know nothing.’ Those spirits that were severed from God and condemned to spiritual death as a result of their unbelief during their life on earth knew nothing. They did not know who they had been as human beings or where they had lived. They did not know where they now dwelt or the significance of the horrors that they experienced in this darkness and that made them so unhappy. You could observe that as the spirits rose into higher spheres their consciousness broadened and their opposition toward God decreased. You were able, likewise, during these communications, to distinguish the different light effects pertaining to the individual spheres, the colours ranging from the deepest black of the lowest stage, through all colours, to the most radiant white of the uppermost sphere. • The 13th sphere is of a white too dazzling to be endured by mortal eyes. This is the sphere inhabited by God’s pure spirits. It is what you call ‘heaven’. From what you have seen of the spirits of the lowest spheres you will have gathered how hard it is for them to struggle upward from their lamentable state. • For their ascent within those spheres is possible only if they turn to God. But you yourself have witnessed the rebellious attitude taken by these very spirits toward any thought of God. It is a great act of clemency on the part of God to allow them to reassume human form with the least possible delay, for it is easier for them to acquire a belief in God as human beings, from what they see of God’s Creation and learn from their own reflections or from the instruction and example of others, than it would be in those low spirit spheres. • Most human spirits must go back to earth repeatedly. Seeing that their lives there again and again leave much to be desired and cause them to return to the lowest spirit spheres instead of fitting them for the higher stages of the Beyond. Consider the lives of most humans. Are they not wholly centred on worldly matters? How many ever even think of God, firmly believe in Him and live righteously? • Ever since the Powers of Evil introduced money into the world, they have had an instrument that gives them an unrestricted dominion over the majority of mankind. The time that the spirits of the lower spheres must spend in the Beyond before they are reincarnated in human form varies in each individual instance. It is determined in part by that spirit’s
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