Second Letter to Ben
Dear Ben,
I guess the best way to look at God is to look again at the sun. The sun has a definite shape. However the influence of the powerful umbra extends over thousands of miles of space far away from it. I am referring to waves of radiation of microwaves, x-rays, heat, and light etc. streaming from it. Try to imagine that those waves have a definite length and the very tip as some form of matter. In this analogy God has a shape even as the sun has a definite spherical shape. Yet the radiation of the sun which, in a way of thinking, is no longer part of the sun, has a potent effect on Earth millions of miles away. In like manner all forms of matter may be viewed as of God and outside of God. (In another letter we called the radiation streams power-cords or lines of force which is and upholds all matter ). You could consider things like solar flares, sun spots, electromagnetic streams of hot gases which are directly on the sun's surface, the features of and the clothing of God.
Absolutely... God is all things and in all things which are various forms of His substance. In this sense all the billions of galaxies and the whole cosmos contribute to the "bigness" of God. On a minute scale an atom with its particles is a miniature solar system. And on a grand scale our solar system can be viewed as an atom and the Milky Way Galaxy as one cell in God's Body. (Notice how this compares and contrasts with the first way of seeing God in the first paragraph. The cosmos is outside of Him). If you see both views as two sides of a coin, God can be observed as having "micro and macro dimensions." Everything that is a part of the shape He took so we could "see" Him as a being, can be construed as the "micro dimension". The "macro-dimension" is supra, for the galaxies are Body cells.
On a "spiritual" level, the only entities we can consider outside of Him are the Devil and his forces. In the view of physics, they constitute what is theorized as "anti-matter." Devils exist as a destructive force, yet they are invisible and intangible as far as man as a whole is concerned. Thus "the beast who was, is not, and yet is". I view devils as a temporary thought in God's mind given form. When they have served their purpose as obstacles for the benefit and aid of our learning by comparison and contrast, God shall take away their form erasing them.
Everything that God does has laws pertaining to it. Natural forces are powers following laws governing them. Science has not learned all the laws, but it attempts to discover and to study them. Nothing is independent of God's movement and everything obeys its own specific laws, Ode 6:4. Devils, too, must obey their "anti-laws," which are strange laws specifically for and to them. They must perform with behaviors totally opposite whatever the true nature of God is. Look at Secrets XXXIII:8. God's PLAN is set in motion, and everything that has happened, is happening, and shall happen is part of the complete format.
God is in total communication with all things at all times, Amos 9:9; Matthew 10:29. He can speak to and hold conversations with everyone at once, Psalm 139:1-4; Acts of John (p.229, Hennecke), Ode 8:15,19.
As a part of the substance that He is, we differ from a thought which is a nebula unmaterialized and exists only as an idea. We began as an idea in God's head which was good enough to make replicas of Himself with it. This began with Mother Wisdom. And now we exist not as an intangible thought, but as real Family! Proverbs 8:1-32; Matthew 11:19.
Before we knew what devils, or evil spirits, or the disobedient angels who fell really are, we attached more importance and value to their existence than God does. We were judging by "appearance" a matter we cannot see naturally, while wearing blinders. Some of us think of devils as bad "sons" of God. Some think of powers of darkness as corrupted angels who fell and who are superior to man. Others think of them as "living" beings like the birds, fish, plants, man, and angels who all have life. Needless to say all these thoughts were and are errors, Isaiah 55:8-9, because the "mystery of iniquity" was not revealed and still is not revealed to most men on earth. Today we know they are sophisticated robots who can reproduce.
Let us go back to the beginning before Satan or Lucifer (whose "pun" name means lose/suffer) fell. I might interject here that he did not fall alone with his troops, but "Babylon", the mother of their negative order, fell with them. Before the "fall", it appeared as though God had fathered two families through two females, Mother Wisdom and Babylon. Lucifer was Babylon's son and Jael (Jesus) and the angels were Wisdom's children. God gave to each group rights, properties, and leadership positions... and this is where all the problems began.
Part of the problem had to do with Satan's ambition to be a father. His jealousy and lust lead him to commit adultery with Babylon. On the Earth -stage God told this using Reuben as an actor for the educational benefit of the heavenly Hosts being taught at that time. Reuben had to commit adultery with Bilhah to reveal Satan's early crime. In Satan's case his angels were created as Babylon's children. Because of these events and because it seemed to be a marvelous thing to have offsprings, God had plans to teach us about sex and reproduction. Adam and Eve were chosen to be used in God's education scheme. They were to inherit the earth and to reproduce their seed. You know the rest. Jealous of Adam's inheritance Satan saw fit to cheat him out of it so that he could rule it. In God's scheme this made something called "salvation" a necessity in which man would "supplant" Satan inheriting his properties and place lost above. Later in the prolonged play or replay Jacob (which means to supplant) is cast into a role both like those of Adam and Jesus. In the same scene, Esau is cast into an opposing role like Judas Iscariot to teach another aspect of Satan's crimes. For Isaac's cooperation poor sight was a necessity in his role. He had to be tricked into switching the blessing from Esau to Jacob to illustrate that God took Satan's upper lost inheritance and gave it to man. Sarah and Rebekah also got in on the "act". They were cast in roles depicting Mother Wisdom's activities in the beginning. "Mother" did not want Babylon or Satan or any of their stock around heaven physically, nor did she want them to possess any property there. Thus Sarah uttered her famous words to Abraham regarding Hagar and Ishmael, and Rebekah used trickery to disenfranchise Esau Thus Mother Wisdom did the first "sting operation" to "get Satan" in his own wickedness up there. This is not to say that God's omniscience was botched or has blind spots. He sees all and knows I all. But for the purpose of trapping Satan, He let things transpire the way they did. Isaac was dull-eyed for this purpose also. Therefore is this saying, "He takes the wise in their own craftiness". He is wise as a serpent and harmless as a dove.