MOTHER DIVINE at The Unity Mission Church
907 N. 41st Street, Philadelphia, Pennsyvania
Many great events happened during the celebration of this Anniversary, and numerous speakers from near and far gave tribute and praise to FATHER, and MOTHER, DIVINE for the glorious Work and Mi sa ion.
During the Holy Communion Service Followers also from here and abroad gave forth the sentiments of their hearts for this sacred honor and privilege to be he~e celebrating with the LAMB and the BRIDE.
MOTHER DIVINE, in Her radiant beauty and purity, clothed in Virtue and emanating Love to all surrounding Her, was stirred to speak after the following testimony, and rising in the Holy Spirit She spoke Words of Spirit and Life as She fairly floated back and forth across the Dining Hall—Her gown of gossamer white floating as a cloud of purity surrounding the beautiful Bride of the LAMB—a picture - of Virtue, Serenity and Grace!
First, the testimony of Mr. Ellie Diana, a Follower formerly from France, now living in this Country. He spoke as follows:
Peace FATHER, Peace MOTH ER, Peace Everyone: FATHER Dear, I thank YOU for bringing me here today, it is YOUR Spirit Who did it because I had not planned it. In fact, only two weeks ago I was still in Hawaii on a job, but YOU made the way so sweet and so smooth and I heard the Call, and here I am!
It is truly wonderful to know YOU and to deal with YOU as YOU are a Principle, (MOTHER exclaimed: "That's right!") lifting us and making us whole as YOU made YOUR, Creation. We love YOU ! Happy Anniversary, FATHER and MOTHER Dear! Thank YOU.
MOTHER DIVINE arose in the Power of the Holy Spirit, dancing as She sang:
"FATHER searched the Heaven and HE searched the earth,
Looking for Virtue, to give us a brand new birth,
At last HE found a Body, pure spotless and clean,
One worthy to sit with HIM, that the whole world might be redeemed"
The entire congregation sang with Her, and was caught up in this Virtuous Love and Beauty as the Bride of the LAMB sang praises to Her LORD.
MOTHER, DIVINE then spoke as follows:
Peace FATHER Dear, Peace Everyone : I Am responding to the sincere expressions of Love that extended to Me the best wishes far a Happy Anniversary—but it is true that I represent, as has been expressed, the expression of GOD's Creation that HE married, as a Symbol. GOD condescended to the earth plane and wed HIS Creation, that we might be lifted above the curse as FATHER so explicitly expressed in the Sermon that we heard, (Given: Unity Mission Church, 4/29/51 A.D.F.U.), how HE had redeemed HIS Followers from smoking and drinking and all of the vices and tendencies that separate man from GOD—FATHER has redeemed them and made them righteous. This is HIS great Condescension. And when HE married Me, I represented a11 of HIS Creation and that's why you love Me as you do! (thunderous applause) And it is not a Person but it is a Principle; just as FATHFR, is the GODHEAD BODILY, the PERSONIFICATION of GOD, so Am I the Personification of the Attributes of CHRIST that HE Condescended to wed HIMSELF to.
And we cannot live in the version of Anniversaries as those celebrated by man and woman, because when FATHER married Me thirty years ago it was the beginning of a New Era, as you read on your place card. (MOTHER, opened the place card which has on its cover 1946 — 1976 and underneath, FATHER's International Peace place card, with this inscription beneath the place card: 30th Anniversary of the Marriage of CHRIST to the CHURCH. 200th Anniversary of the INDEPENDENCE of the United States of America.
MOTHER read this portion of FATHER DIVINE's Words inside:
"For this cause we do rejoice and we are happy to say today as well as all other days but as the commemoration of the Marriage of the BRIDE to the LAMB on the Twenty-ninth day of April nineteen hundred and forty-six, the beginning of a New Era such as man had not comprehended, but yet the Bible predicted and explained it . . :"
MOTHER continued speaking: So we are in a new day and in a new dispensation, and the old versions have passed away. We live in, the recognition that GOD is our Husband. We all are married to GOD, we are married to the Principles of Righteousness, Justice and Truth and that's why it is not necessary to marry as once people married. FATAER said HE married that no longer man needed to marry, and you can see how all of those things are passing away. And it is not necessary to propagate children, there are too many people for GOD; we need to be fruitful, we need to dress the Garden. FATHER has created this beautiful world, HE has opened the knowledge of science and invention and prepared the way for the earth to be Heaven. Not only must we, as HE told Adam and Eve, dress the Garden, but we must get rid of all that is not of HIM and make this world a fit habitation for HIS Creation, so that GOD can really dwell with HIS People!
FATHER DIVINE is the GOD of the whole earth! HE came and set up HIS Kingdom—the Peace Mission Movement as a sample and as an example, a place where we could live this Holy and Virtuous and Righteous Life; but when HE laid HIS Body down it was to go into all the world, and now it is imperative that everyone copy after the fashion of FATHER DIVINE! Everyone must live this Life, every one must be married to GOD, everyone must produce the Attributes and Characteristics of Honesty, of Chastity, of Brotherhood, of Democracy and true Evangelism that shall save the world and really create international peace. We cannot have international peace as long as we live in all of the limited concepts of men, but we must rise and let GOD live in us, and let the barriers that have separated men go down.
FATHER, I thank YOU! I thank YOU for being GOD ALMIGHTY! I thank YOU for Purity and I thank YOU for Holiness. I thank YOU that YOU have conquered everything on this earth plane that is not like YOU and I thank YOU that YOU are ALL and in ALL. I thank YOU that it is a glorious freedom to live in this recognition, and to know that you are not depending on anyone or anything but GOD HIMSELF! (MOTHER sweetly dances in the Holy Spirit and the vast Assembly is lifted with Her in the blessed freedom of this recognition, to be lifted above all earthly things. MOTHER then says:)
It is a wonderful, wonderful Privilege to know the Allness of GOD and the nothingness of yourself. I really thank YOU. I really thank YOU, FATHER. Dear, how YOU have taught us to transcend a11 personalities and all individualities, and it seems that instead of transcending them we got more into them. I really thank YOU, FATHER Dear, for YOUR glorious Personality that we can all be lost in. None of us are anything anyway, so it doesn't matter what anybody says or what they don't say!("So true!" sanctioned the Congregation.)
You know, FATHER came to all of us that know HE is GOD and gave us this glorious Conviction and brought us this beautiful -Life, and I want everybody to have FATHER—and when we all get FATHER, why then we will all be ONE!(thunderous applause)
It's a wonderful, wonderful freedom! It's a wonderful freedom to live in the Allness of GOD FATHER DIVINE and the nothingness of everybody and everything else. This is where you really do have a happy admittance around the Throne of Grace, and then time really ceases to be! We would just live in the here and now— it isn't what was yesterday or what is going to be in the future, it is what is NOW. FATHER, YOU have given us everything right now and I thank YOU, FATHER Dear—I thank YOU. I really thank YOU ! I really thank YOU, FATHER Dear, and I want everyone to know not a one of you can honour Me more than I have been honored, and not a one of you can praise Me more than I have been praised, and not a one of you can love~ Me more than I have been loved! (thunderous applause)
FATHER taught Me not to be afraid of praise. I Am not afraid of praise and I Am not afraid of condemnation—it doesn't matter— only GOD matters! But this is HIS DAY and HE is having HIS Way!
I love YOU, FATHER Dear, and I love YOU wherever I see YOU. I know YOU wherever I see YOU. What FATHER has given us does bring that Peace that surpasses a11 human understanding, and it is Love that is incorruptible and cannot be touched! I just thank YOU, FATHER Dear!
You all should be very happy that you are seeing Me today, because you know FATHER came to us in a Body to teach us the way, but HE rea11y taught us the necessity of recognizing HIS Ever Presence, and being the same in HIS Personal absence as in HIS Personal Presence. And HE said, if you would love ME as you should, I would not have to take MY Personal Presence from you. I love GOD! You know, it is your recognition of Me and what I represent, it is a blessing to you, and it is a blessing when you can continue to hold that vision, as FATHER says, and be One with your Conviction at all times and let nothing change your Conviction. It is so wonderful! In Australia, in Germany, in Switzerland, in Panama, they know FATHER and I are with them and, they have never seen FATHER and Me Personally, the majority of them, but they recognize FATHER and I—and it is the same here.
But it is a great mystery, of the recognition and the disrecognition — the balance between 'glad I have a Body' and 'wishing I just was in the Spirit'! That's what FATHER said—they didn't want GOD in a Body because HE got in their way, so they want to keep GOD in the mythological heaven. But GOD has a BODY and HE is here to stay, and HE gave HIS Bride a Body. ("Yes!" came the sanction with thunderous applause.) And it really is no mystery because FATHER, has explained it all, and you all know I Am not trying to be anything as a Person, As Jesus said, "My Kingdom is not of this world,"—My Kingdom is not as of the material world, seeking and contending. There is no contention in the Allness of GOD and the nothingness of matter.
So we thank FATHER to walk and talk with GOD and for us all to let HIS Mind rule and reign in us. Then there will be perfect unity and there will be perfect harmony and there will be no contending, no adverse or undesirable conditions.
I do thank YOU, FATHER Dear, for this Love that gave us birth—this Love that gave birth to us into this glorious recognition and this Love that binds us all together in One. I thank YOU, FATHER Dear, that YOU are here to lead us on from one degree of Grace to another. FATHER said so stressfully that what HE had, HE came to give each and every one.
"Of all of all of HIS Fullness have a11 we received, Grace for Grace,"
and that we are a1l HIS only begotten Sons. As it was said, it is a Principle. It doesn't matter how many people work the principle of mathematics it doesn't take away from the principle! There can be as many mathematicians as those who qualify to be mathematicians, it doesn't take away from the principle! As FATHER has said,
"The more that come in with a right good will, It makes the band grow sweeter still."
So it is with the more that come into this real Fullness of the Christ. We know the Christ when He is operating. We know it in ourselves when we let Him live in us, and we know when we are letting the "other fellow" live in us; so we can discern in each other.
And it's a wonderful day when we can be free and we can free each other: Free each other! — because as FATHER, said that it was a New Covenant HE made with the people, and that they all should know HIM, they all would know HIM. You wouldn't have to say to your brother, "know the LORD."
You all know what's right, I don't have to tell you what's right. You all have been listening to every Word just as I have been listening to every Word, and FATHER so established HIMSELF in this earth through HIS Own Stripes, through HIS Own Sacrifice, that the Standard has been established.
Everybody knows the Standard of Christ, the Standard that FATHER DIVINE represents. We all know what it takes to put off corruption and put on incorruption. We can't fool ourselves, we can't fool anybody else and we certainly can't fool GOD. And even those who have not been blessed as we have been, to be exposed, to be called to this glorious recognition and exposed to the Truth, they know. They know that there is a great change taking place and they know that they must conform even to the truth of the Documents of the United States of America, which is the legalization of True Christianity and True Judaism, they know they must conform to it if America is going to stand. It is wonderful!
FATHER, truly YOU are the Light of the world and YOU have illuminated this planet earth with the Truth that YOU have established. Nobody can root it up and no one can stop YOUR Onward and Upward Everlasting and Eternal Purpose to bring all mankind into the glorious At-one-ment with YOU, the reason for which YOU condescended so low to wed YOUR Creation when YOU wed Me in nineteen hundred and forty-six on this day thirty years ago! Thank YOU, FATHER Dear.