Before the first Mother Divine passed quietly away, surrounded by the luxury of Her Westchester County home in Tarrytown, New York in 1943, She expressed the desire for a youthful body that could keep step with Father Divine in His strenuous activities.
A few years later, after establishing His Headquarters in Philadelphia because of continued persecution and prosecution by New York City officials, on April 29, 1946, Father Divine married the second Mother Divine. The international, interracial Marriage made world-wide headlines. Together with Father, Mother Divine takes an active part in the various phases of the Movement. Recognized as the reincarnation of the first Mother Divine whom Father married in 1882, She is symbolic of the union of, Christ to His Church, God and His creation, Heaven and Earth, giving tangible evidence that the Christ Life can be lived in its fullness.
People who had voiced the opinion that Father Divine alone could live the life and that they as mortals could never live it, no longer had this argument.
'Had He not chosen One among them as His Virgin Bride to live the life of perfection also?'
They now understood that His Mission can be accomplished on earth.
Of Their Marriage, Mother Divine said:
'There are many people who are sincere in wondering how long Our Marriage can exist...they especially wonder if We are happy together, living lives of purity and chastity, free from lust and passion and self-indulgence. Yes, a marriage of this caliber can exist eternally for it is founded on the Spirit of purity, peace and Godliness and inspired by the desire to lift up a standard for the people...To be daily in the presence of Father Divine and be fully aware of Who He is, is the most glorious privilege any human being could have, and for this honor I am both proud and humble. He emanates such peace, joy and happiness and complete freedom from worry at all times, that anyone coming in contact with Him cannot help but be contagionized by such desirableness ...Father's Energy is infectious and pervades everyone and everything He touches, The Spirit of His Magnetic Presence among us enables us to slightly keep pace with Him as He goes about the many activities that require His Personal attention...and yet, with it all He is so loving and kind to everyone, has unending patience and a remarkable sense of humor.
'I, representing the Church, Am married to Father in fulfillment of the Scripture; but as God is Impersonal and Universal by nature, He is married to any and everyone who lives and expressed the conviction, I know You are God'...It was with this understanding that Father and I married and it is with this knowledge that I gladly relinquish all right that a natural woman would claim when married to a man.'
Speaking further of His Work, Mother Divine said,
'I have seen the physically sick and afflicted restored to health and vigor; I have been moved by the forsaken and downhearted as they have sought Father's counsel and have been encouraged and their faith restored through His understanding Words of Spirit and Life. I have actually witnessed the change in men and women from lives of vice and crime to lives of upright, honest, independent citizens. I have watched the arrogant humble themselves before the profound truth and astounding wisdom of Father Divine ....I have seen crowds who have stood sometimes for hours just for a glimpse of Him. I have been enraptured as I gazed with thousand of others, on the transcendent beauty and supernatural loveliness of His ageless, Holy Body. Never could anyone else express such overwhelming humility and love that could turn a heart of stone. This is the Father Divine I am married to, the One Who is greater than any atomic or hydrogen bomb and is able to save all who will just humble themselves long enough to call on Him in all sincerity.'
Father Divine, like His Work and Mission, is without limit. He declares:
'My Name is Democracy! My Name is Liberty! My Name is Righteousness!'
Predestined by His Own Law of the Universe to be the only One qualified and able to bring about emancipation from every angle, Father Divine's promise to mankind is
'You will get your emancipation in this God's Administration.'
This is His Mission.
He says:
'As and American Citizen and Constitution Reviver, yea, Americanism Reviver, I have revived Americanism and the Constitution as no other statesman or politician has ever done. I have quickened the spirit of Americanism in the hearts and lives of millions and converted them into a true citizenry.'
He has given emancipation from oppression.
He says:
'The spirit of the consciousness of the Presence of God is the source of all supply, it can and will satisfy every good desire.'
Nowhere on earth is there a greater abundance of all good and necessary things
than in and around the Movement.
'I came as the poorest among men, yet making many rich,'
Father Divine says, and He blesses everyone who will let Him. He has given emancipation
from poverty.
He says:
'Those detestable tendencies can knock out more energy that is within you and more ambition and more alertness, more spiritual substance in one hour than you can build up in many days ...maliciousness and excitement, anger and jealousy and prejudice and envy, malice and strife and other selfish tendencies that were prenataled within you, they can and they do destroy your physical tissues and cells...You grow old by sapping out your energy and ambition by self-indulgence, by resentment, by anger and by jealousy and prejudice...'
And,
'If a so-called incurable disease cannot be cured by man, because it is out of the ordinary - out of the realm of men, then you have to have a faith and a belief and a religion that is out of the ordinary - out of the realm of men.' '
Scientific and intellectual knowledge is not sufficient to cope with incurable
disease but faith is provided in the recognition of God"s Personified Presence
and in it Father Divine has given emancipation from disease. Medical treatment
is advised, however, for persons whose faith is not sufficient to produce the
cure.
Every advancement that is now coming into expression was called for by Father Divine years ago. Making it clearly understood that He was not asking men or depending on them to bring it about, He said:
'I came treading the winepress all alone and of the people there was none to help Me. I will do it with or without My Own Body, for it is not by power, nor by might, but by My Spirit.'
The fact that Father Divine raises the dead; heals the sick; feeds the poor and houses the needy in not redemptive in itself, for did not Elijah raise the widow's son and Elisha cure Naaman, the leper? Were not the children of Israel fed forty years in the wilderness and did not Jesus perform all types of necessary services for others, from the washing of their feet to the restoring of life to those buried in the tomb? Yet none of these good deeds brought body salvation to mankind. Father Divine says that only the Supreme Godship Degree can give man his complete redemption.
Father Divine has explained it thuswise:
'Why is it mankind of the different religions, their theories and their doctrines, cannot give you a full Salvation? It is because they do not request a full consecration, a full sacrifice, and a complete self-denial. Any religion or version of religion that requests only a partial surrender, a partial consecration, can only give you a partial Salvation, a partial redemption whichever. But because I request a full and a whole-hearted consecration, and a wide-open sacrifice of everything, even all of your versions, ideas and opinions, I can give you a complete and a full redemption by the recognition of My Actuated Presence and by you fulfilling My requests.'
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