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2. The gospel carried a message of new confidence and true consolation for all men, even for the poor.
3. It was in itself a new standard of moral values, a new ethical yardstick wherewith to measure human conduct. It portrayed the ideal of a resultant new order of human society.
4. It taught the pre-eminence of the spiritual compared with the material; it glorified spiritual realities and exalted superhuman ideals.
5. This new gospel held up spiritual attainment as the true goal of living. Human life received a new endowment of moral value and divine dignity.
6. Jesus taught that eternal realities were the result (reward) of righteous earthly striving. Man's mortal sojourn on earth acquired new meanings consequent upon the recognition of a noble destiny.
7. The new gospel affirmed that human salvation is the revelation of a far-reaching divine purpose to be fulfilled and realized in the future destiny of the endless service of the salvaged sons of God." (1859)
Again and again did Jesus beseech that his apostles and disciples incorporate into evolutionary religion his teachings, but they insisted in going against his instructions, preaching instead about his life! "Jesus foresaw that a social organisation, or church, would follow the progress of the true spiritual kingdom." (1865). "The church was an inevitable and useful social result of Jesus' life and teachings; the tragedy consisted in the fact that this social reaction to the teachings of the kingdom so fully displaced the spiritual concept of the real kingdom as Jesus taught and lived it." (1864)
And today, "Christianity...the product of the combined moral genius of the God-knowing men of any races during many ages.. has truly been one of the greatest powers for good on earth...(and) still contrives to move the minds of reflective men with mighty moral emotions." (2085) However, "Christianity is seriously confronted with the doom embodied in one of its own slogans: 'A house divided against itself cannot stand.' The non-Christian world will hardly capitulate to a sect-divided Christendom. The living Jesus is the only hope of a possible unification of Christianity. The true church--the Jesus brotherhood--is invisible, spiritual, and is characterised by unity, not necessarily by uniformity. Uniformity is the earmark of the physical world of mechanistic nature. Spiritual unity is the fruit of faith union with the living Jesus. The visible church should refuse longer to handicap the progress of the invisible and spiritual brotherhood of the kingdom of God. And this brotherhood is destined to become a living organism in contrast to an institutionalized social organization. It may well utilize such social organizations, but it must not be supplanted by them." (2085)
Have we learnt from the evolutionary offshoots of the fourth revelation? We formed a social organisation, not a church, in the hope of protecting against the problems of the past 2000 years. The reality is that in the eyes of the revelators such structures are one and the same, and hence the strong words of the midwayers apply to us post-fifth revelation evolutionists: "But there is no excuse for the involvement of the church in commerce and politics; such unholy alliances are a flagrant betrayal of the Master." (2085) And should we as a social group of readers stoop to such 'unholy alliances' then: "the genuine lovers of truth will be slow to forget that this powerful institutionalized church has often dared to smother newborn faith and persecute truth bearers who chanced to appear in unorthodox raiment." (2085). We run the risk of also deterring, "Many earnest persons who would gladly yield loyalty to the Christ of the gospel find it very difficult enthusiastically to support a church which exhibits so little of the spirit of his life and teachings." (2085).
If we, as a social organisation insist on continuing such 'unholy alliances' then we ensure that The Urantia Book's contents are not utilised to create a new philosophy of living as requested by the Divine counselor (43), and that the 'great hope' of the midwayers (2086) cannot be carried into action.
What were we supposed to do? The apostles were clearly told to preach the good news. What were we told to do? Very clearly: "You may preach a religion about Jesus, but, perforce, you must live the religion of Jesus"
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