Sharing the Good Word

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By Conrad Wood, Bowen Island, BC, Canada

Over many years, without much success, I have encouraged family, friends, and people I have met to read The Urantia Book. This has raised many questions in my mind, such as: Are they not interested? Are they unwilling to search for more? Do they think I am a casualty of fraud? Am I using the wrong methods? Is my motivation insincere? In honest reflection, the answer to all these questions is yes. Discouraging? A little, but I have learned to share in other ways what I believe and what I hope for. Now I no longer mention The Urantia Book unless someone specifically asks about it.

Sometimes at work and in social circumstances there are opportunities to foster discussions about God and religious beliefs with small groups of people who display spiritual interest and people who have sincere questions, comments, and doubts. The result always seems to be positive. We all come to a better understanding of one another and come to experience that "cohesiveness [that exists] among spiritual and spiritized personalities of any world, race, nation, or believing group of individuals." (82.5) 7:1.6

At home and at work I find that encouraging others to value the tasks at hand and to do them well appears to lift the spirits of my fellows. Wise praise and a sincere smile have much the same effect. We all have an inner understanding of the pleasure in striving for higher values and the striving for them is contagious and motivating to our work-place associates.

The more I study The Urantia Book, the more sure I am of the importance of showing unselfish love to anyone with whom we share our lives or to anyone we encounter "as we pass by."