Jealousy from a spiritual viewpoint
Underlying topic(s):
- This page is part of an ERW course: Internal Guidance, section Fallen nature and the fall.
- By John Eagles, September 12, 2009.
Jealousy is an ugly type of evil nature. We don't like it when other people are jealous at us and most of the time we also don't like it when this feeling comes over us.
What is the right way to deal with envy? In order to understand how to overcome this type of fallen nature, we need to realize that there is a connection to the spiritual reality. Of course, jealousy is a trait or a feeling that we can understand on an individual level. But when someone is jealous, there is always at least one other person involved, who is the object of jealousy. In addition to that, there is a spiritual element. What do I mean with that?
What exactly is jealousy? Essentially it is a kind of selfishness. We want something that another person has or is able to do. There is much to be said about what jealousy is in ourselves and in the relations between people. Here I want to look at this problem from a spiritual viewpoint.
Lucifer was jealous at Adam. Adam represented something that Lucifer wanted for himself. Lucifer could not accept that Adam had a position that Lucifer aspired for himself. This is why Lucifer tried to take over Adam's position. In history, to a certain degree, Lucifer has also managed to actually take Adam's position. Lucifer, who was the first archangel or leading angel with the task to serve Adam and Eve, used his tricks to get Adam and Eve under him. Lucifer passed on his evil nature to many angels who are serving under him. Lucifer also influenced many people, human beings, to inherit his selfishness and fallen natures.
In the spiritual world, there are many fallen angels and also human spirits who carry in them the fallen nature of jealousy. Every person on earth living in a physical body can be influenced by such spirits, angels or people. There can be conditions because of our ancestry or the mission that we are having, or because people around us let such spiritual beings come through to us, or because of mistakes that we ourselves made, that can cause that we have to deal with the fallen nature of jealousy.
This means that jealousy, and all other fallen natures, are always a result of both our own inner faulty functioning and of influence by spirit world or people around us. Often such fallen natures are evoked by evil spirits, if they manage to get nearer to us or to attack us, for whatever reason.
In such a case, it is not enough to just try to control the feelings of jealousy. If people get attacked with the feelings of jealousy as they can be evoked from the spiritual world, it is necessary to recognize those sentiments in order to overcome them. We need to recognize that the feelings coming to us may not only be our own, yet whether we manage to not express that kind of fallen nature mainly depends on how well we are able to deal with it in ourselves.
One may not be jealous in normal situations, but when there are attacks from evil spirits, jealousy can suddenly become a problem to deal with. The worst thing one can do then is to deny the problem. There are people who tell themselves that they are not jealous and therefore they deny the problem when it comes to them. That is not the best way to overcome jealousy, because by denying the influence from evil spirits we give them more space to work.
Jealousy is essentially a kind of selfishness. When we do what God wants us to do, when we have the same desires as God, then jealously would not affect us. But if we made some kind of mistake, maybe by having a close relationship to another person who has a problem with jealousy, this kind of fallen nature may cause us difficulties. This also happened to Adam, who inherited this fallen nature from Lucifer through Adam's love relationship with Eve who had come under Lucifer.
Once we recognize that there came in us the fallen nature of jealousy, it is essential to not express it. On that basis we can study it in ourselves and pray about how it came into us. There can be different causes for how it came into us, but essentially the pattern is always the same. It comes into us because we accepted a kind of love that isn't true love, isn't unselfish love. We need to reflect on our ways and our relationships in order to find out how the fallen nature could affect us.
Because this type of fallen nature came into man through the influence of evil angels, we need to make a separation from this kind of spiritual evil. After we realized in prayer how this fallen nature came into us in a specific situation, we need to act in a way contrary to this fallen nature. This means that we need to know God's will for our lives. We need to unite with God's desires for us and with God's view on ourselves and on the people around us.
When there is someone around us who appears to be more loved by God than we are, we could get jealous, but we could also inherit God's desire to protect and support that person and to inherit from him or her. This needs to be done not just based on our own feelings and interpretations, because then again we are having our own views and not God's view. We need to pray and ask God how to overcome the problem in ourselves and by doing what God wishes us to do in our own lives and in relationship to others.
Comments
- Question: "There can be conditions because of our ancestry or the mission that we are having..." How precisely defined is this mission? Who defines this mission? God, angels, ancestors? When is it defined? At birth? When certain conditions are met throughout the course of life? Is the spiritual world willing to communicate to the earthly person what his/her mission is exactly? Or is this definition of mission perhaps too complex for the earthly person to understand? Does the spiritual world make unilateral efforts to make it clear to the earthly person what his particular mission is? Or is it solely the responsibility of the earthly person to seek and find out what his mission is? Does it help for the earthly person to consciously know (as soon as possible) what his particular life mission is (apart from the general mission of fulfilling the three great blessings etc...)? What is the best way to find out the content and scope of one's mission?
Our mission is given to us by God, it is the right of our Creator to give us our mission, like a cabinet maker determines the purpose of a piece of work to be a cabinet or a table.
Our mission is determined by God at birth, or even at our conception. I am sure that God knew Jesus' mission at his conception. When we are 12 years old we are supposed to begin preparing for our mission.
Most of the spiritual world is unaware of a person's mission. Remember, they usually are just your ancestors, your grandfather for example. He didn't suddenly get a lot of extra knowledge when he entered the spiritual world. Several angels are more knowledgeable about man's mission, especially when it concerns people with special missions. How these angels deal with that is another question. The angels of Lucifer have since oldest times been out to discover people born with a special mission, in order to then mess up with that.
To find out your mission would have been the responsibility of your parents first of all. If they didn't do it, you can get help from adopted parents who are representing God. But at any rate it is first of all your responsibility now you are an adult. Do not solely rely on what anybody tells you, however much you trust that person. Even if that other person is right, his or her understanding is not necessarily yours. You need to know it for yourself and this understanding you can only get from God.
Everybody should know his or her personal mission in order to be able to also fulfill the Three Blessings. You cannot separate one from the other. Fulfilling your Formula-Course of Restoration and the Three Blessings is a task everybody shares, it is a general mission of man. But each person also has a very personal mission.
Do not rely on spirit world alone to find out your mission. God can use the spirit world to help us in our mission and responsibility, but eventually the responsibility is ours alone.
We can fulfill our mission by always keeping our connection to God and receiving God's true love so we can pass that on to others. At first God can give us a general idea of what our mission is. It is only when we begin fulfilling that mission that God can give us deeper insight. God can use the spiritual world for that, but as said above, it ultimately is your mission and therefore also your own responsibility to know and do it right.
When you start doing your mission as given by God, you gradually will be filled in on many details. Each time that you advance in a good way, it makes a foundation for God to explain you more. It is progressive in this way, both for the understanding and also for the scope of your mission as God can put more weight on your shoulders.
- Question: One well-known example of a personal mission is the one of John the Baptist who had to fulfill the mission of Elijah Can you list and describe various other types and specifics of personal missions that God has assigned to people anno 2009? Please describe the personal mission of some of the people you know, who managed to figure out what their particular mission is exactly. "To find out your mission would have been the responsibility of your parents first of all." Do you know parents that came to understand the unique mission of each one of their children? At what age do parents start becoming aware of this and when do they come to a conclusion? Age 18? When and how would the parents communicate this to their children? Would this be the content of some special family ceremony?
It has become my conviction that what people really like to do from their original heart is also telling about their mission. For example, some people really love making music and they are good at it as well. Others have a mathematical mind and like to study the principles of the cosmos. Yet another person just loves farming, etc.
Why do they have such a liking for this? Apart from the fact that certain people can have been conditioned by society or by greed or such things, people have a desire to do what comes from their heart. I am convinced that God made them this way.
All these professions could be personal missions. But of course, just being a musician doesn't yet fulfill that personal mission. I don't mean to say that you could just follow your desire and that's your personal mission.
There are a few considerations here. First, a person can only fulfill his or her personal mission on the basis of relating well to God, and therefore must also go the course of fulfilling the Three Blessings. Second, each person also needs a more general external education. For example, we all need to get some experience with language, with creativity, with music, to mention only a few fields. We need this for a good development of our personality and also to be able to understand the world and society around us. Third, we cannot just do our mission regardless God's Providence of Restoration.
You mentioned John the Baptist. He got a mission entirely to serve God's Providence of Restoration. He was a prophet, which is one kind of mission we can receive from God. But also all the other mentioned personal missions should be to serve God and other man in the context of and in the right position in the world that God is building up.
When my children were born, I always prayed much before and after their birth and God always told me what their personal mission would be. The amazing thing is that even though I did not tell them until they were maybe seven or eight, they each showed special talents for their specific mission already at very young age. For example, one of them having the mission of defense of God's world developed a very strong body at very young age.
It is essential though for parents to guide their children in their development so they will not grow in a one-sided way and at the same time will get a deeper understanding what their mission means.
When a child is educated in the right way having a good connection to God, it will most likely get a deeper feeling of mission so around the age of 12. Many people in spirit world who had important missions for God in a long-away past told me that they began to realize what their mission was at age 12. Others only realized it at later age. This may have had to do with less than ideal circumstances.
I don't know of any particular external ceremony. As I wrote above, I usually told my children about their mission from the moment that they could understand this. Each of them felt that this really was their mission and they liked what God had revealed to me about it. Then when the child became about 12 years old, I would tell them that time of playing is gradually coming to an end and they need to get more serious. I never obliged them to anything, just encouraged them by explaining them about their mission and by giving them books or small tasks that have to do with their mission.
Then, as children grow up, there will be times of emphasis on learning God's Divine Principle and of being trained in external skills that do not directly relate to their personal mission. Eventually each person will find their place when they are correctly connected to a world where God is working.
Nothing of this kind of education should be forced upon children. It is much better to inspire them to help them find their unique talents. Of course, there are still battles to be fought in the present time and therefore it is not always possible that each person can always only do his or her personal mission. Also in life in the common world around us, people sometimes need to do special tasks when circumstances demand it, for example when a nation faces certain crises.
- Question: "Most of the spiritual world is unaware of a person's mission. Remember, they usually are just your ancestors, your grandfather for example. He didn't suddenly get a lot of extra knowledge when he entered the spiritual world." What about the help/guidance/assistance we receive from New-Testament saints through returning resurrection in the completion stage? These saints are having the merit, wisdom and ability to guide the earthly person to meet and attend the Messiah at his second advent. Can I expect that these more advanced spirits have access to important information regarding my individual course?
Concerning saints of the New-Testament age and their ability to give support to people on earth: It is my personal experience that besides some exceptions, few of these spirits can really help you much with this. In general it is so that those now living on earth can have a great advantage of knowing and understanding more of God's principles than people in the past. They may be able to guide you to connect to the center of God's Providence on earth, but that is not the same as having the experience to help individuals to go their course in a good way.
Is it not so that spirits need to return to earth and cooperate with physical people in order to complete their courses and missions? For example, would Elijah have been in a big advantage compared to John the Baptist? Elijah might have had more experience but as he had not completed his mission he was dependent on John the Baptist.
In the same way, we on earth are in the position to help ancestors to fulfill what was left unaccomplished.
As for your own course: When you reach a certain level God will send 'archangels' to you from the spirit world to help you. They are in the position to educate you and protect you until you reached a level that surpasses that of them. When you grow to a higher level than your archangels in spirit world, they must still protect you but you come in the position to internally guide them, while they may still further educate you in the fields of their expertise. This kind of thing happens to anybody who is seriously fulfilling his or her course.
For some people this may be a more conscious development, others may be less aware of the presence of such archangel spirits helping them. Of course, these spirits are called archangels because of their tasks, they may be people like you and me and not really angels.
In general it is so that all these things only happen on the basis of you or me fulfilling our own course. We should not make ourselves dependent on what help we get from the spiritual world. It will come anyway as we are getting more developed. We should not make ourselves dependent from this.
