March 5th, 1915
Received by James Padgett.
Washington D.C.
I am here, your Grandmother.
Yes, it is I. I want to tell you of my experience in progressing in the spirit life.
Well, when I passed over, I was received in the spirit world by your grandfather and my own dear mother who had been in the spirit world for so very many years. She was then living in the seventh sphere and was a most beautiful and happy spirit. Now she is far up in the Celestial Spheres, and occasionally comes to see me and tells me of the great beauty of her home, and of the wonderful spirits who inhabit the spheres where she lives.
She lives in a high sphere of the Celestial Heavens, and is with many of the redeemed spirits who lived on earth many centuries ago. She mentioned some of them who were well known on earth, such as John Wesley and his brother Charles, and Luther and some of his contemporaries who were engaged in the great reforms of those days. Whitefield is one she named, and Bunyan, also. They seemed to have reached this sphere by obtaining the Love that we have written you of. So, when I think that, through gradual development and progression of my spiritual being, there are these high spheres for me to attain to, I feel that my faith and seeking for the Divine Love have a great deal yet to accomplish, in the way of soul development.
Well, shortly after I passed over, I progressed to the third sphere, and thought that there the very seat of heaven must be, because my happiness was so much greater than I ever anticipated.
Well, when I first entered the spirit world, I confess I was disappointed, because I did not see the Father on his throne and Jesus sitting on his right hand, as I had been taught to believe; but it was not long before I realized that such a belief had no foundation in truth, and that God has no throne, such as the writers of the Bible had declared, but that His Spirit is manifested everywhere and in all places, and is a Spirit that has no form in the sense that I had been taught to believe.
After living in the third sphere for some little time, and having received much information from spirits who lived in higher spheres, and having received a great abundance of God's Love, I progressed to the fifth sphere and found a wonderful home of beauty and harmony among spirits who had experiences similar to my own, and who had received the Divine Love to a degree which gives us all this great happiness that I tell you of.
In some of the planes of this sphere are many spirits who have not received this Divine Love, but who have attained to wonderful moral and intellectual qualifications; but they were not so happy as were those who had received the Great Love of the Father. They gave their thoughts and works more to things that pertain to moral and intellectual progress than to the soul development in the Divine Love.
It may seem strange to you that these spirits could live in an atmosphere where so much of God's Love was manifested by the numerous spirits who had received this Love, and yet, not realize that this Divine Love is the one great thing absolutely necessary for their further progress and greater happiness. But such is the fact, and many of these spirits of the greatest intellectual development are still pursuing their studies of laws that have to do solely with things that relate to the operations of spiritual laws and the causes of phenomena that astonish both mortals and spirits.
I have wondered many times that they have not had an awakening to the real and grander truths of spirit life, and to the causes of the development of the souls of those with whom they come in contact, who are so much more beautiful and happier than are these students of merely spiritual laws and causes that produce only astonishing phenomena.
Strange as it may seem to some, intellectual progression is not necessary to soul progression, but with soul progression by obtaining the Divine Love comes a wonderful knowledge of these other things that I speak of. I, as you know, was a person of just ordinary mental acquirements, yet in this spirit world I have left behind me many great minds possessed of wonderful intellectual information. I mean not only as regards the progress of my soul, but also as regards the attainment of knowledge that these men are devoting their time and work to obtain.
Strange also, it may seem to you, that with soul development in the Divine Love there comes intellectual development, but to us who have experienced this fact it is not strange, because the mind is only an attribute or, as I may say, a quality of the soul, and as the soul develops in the Divine Love, the mind must necessarily also develop.
Philosophy is merely the conclusion of minds that have given thought and investigation to the subject matter of that philosophy, and, when it is determined by the mere mind, it is still uncertain, and subject to revision and change as the mind may change. The mind, in its development, does not necessarily learn the full and real truth; and in this spirit life, among these men of purely great minds that do not possess the Divine Love, there is as much variety of opinion, and as many disputes as to what is the truth, as there are on earth. The mind, of itself, cannot always discern the truth, because it is not infallible, even when it is the mind of a spirit and that spirit a highly developed one.
But as the soul develops in the Divine Love, this development means that what comes to it as a fact is a truth - the everlasting truth. The soul does not learn all truths at once, but the truth that it does learn is one that never changes, and lets no revision alter or set it aside. No, truth of the soul's discernment is never shown to be error, and no error ever becomes a part of the soul's discernment of truth. So, you see, the great road to the ascertainment of the realities of God is through, and only through, the development of the soul by the inflowing of the Divine Love. The eye of the soul is that interior perception which needs not reason from cause and effect to discern and forever establish the truths of God.
So, how very necessary that men and spirits should learn the great fact, that if they would learn the truth of spirit life, they must endeavor to develop the soul's powers of perception by seeking for the inflowing into their souls of the Divine Love.
I could tell you many wonderful things to illustrate these propositions, if I had the time to do so, but I have not now; but sometime I will go more in detail on this subject, and then you will more fully understand what I mean.
Well, after I had lived in this fifth sphere and learned the great and wonderful truths that are taught therein, I progressed to the seventh and there learned what real happiness is, as I thought. No spirit who has not received this Great Love of the Father lives in this sphere, because the mind is, as it were, absorbed by the soul to such a great extent, that without the soul development the mind would have no place of lodgment. I mean that the mind, as such, then becomes so subordinated to the powers and operations of the soul perceptions that it cannot exist as mere mind, independent of the soul's development.
In this sphere all is grand and beautiful to an extent that I cannot describe, because you have no possible mental conception with which I can compare such beauty and grandeur.
Our homes are very harmonious and without stain or anything that emanates from things other than the soul's essence and power. No mere intellectual happiness exists, and no spirit who has not this Great Love could possibly be happy there. But yet, while all this happiness exists, I was told that happiness is far greater in the Celestial Spheres, and, consequently, I was not satisfied to remain in the seventh sphere, although I could not realize how my happiness could be any greater than it was. Yet, as I say, I was not contented to remain in my home there. And I was also told that there was a way to get into this Celestial Sphere, and a way so easy that the mere statement of it caused doubt. But I prayed for faith and the Divine Love, and on an occasion my faith brought the Divine Love into my soul in such abundance, and I progressed to the first Celestial Sphere, where I now am.
The Book of Revelation in the Bible, in its most extravagant description of the New Jerusalem, gives no true conception of what the beauty and magnificence of this sphere is; and I will not attempt to describe it, for I cannot. But a man, or spirit either, who has never seen the wonderful beauty of this sphere, cannot conceive of what its magnificence is.
I am so very happy that it seems to me there can be no greater happiness, and yet, my mother tells me that there is, and that the Divine Love of the higher spheres is so much more intense and filled with so much more of God's Divinity that I cannot have the slightest conception of what it is.
I am now trying to reach these higher spheres, and am told that faith and prayer for the inflowing into my soul of the Divine Love are the only instrumentalities that will enable me to do so. My prayers are constant and my faith is growing, and I realize, that when the Holy Spirit fills me with this Divine Love, as I expect it to do, I shall progress.
So you see, one great element of God's method of making His redeemed happy, is to set before them a higher mark for which they may seek with the assurance that it can be attained.
Well, I have written you quite a letter, and feel that I must stop now, as I need to leave the earth's atmosphere for awhile.
So with all my love and blessings, I am, Your Grandmother,
Ann Rollins