Prophets have always been considered troublemakers. Their criticism of conditions and of the actions of men caused annoyance, and their prophesies seemed highly improbable to people, products of the imagination. Noah was ridiculed, Amos driven out of the country, and Jeremiah thrown into prison. Soon, however, the disasters they had predicted came upon the peoples who had not wanted to listen, with annihilating force.
Now as ever, the urgent warnings given by the Lord and the pure teaching offered will be received in different ways. However convincing the proof, many will refuse to accept that there is a supernatural charisma and that the prophet Jakob Lorber spoke in the name of the Lord. Judging from previous experience, the effect of warnings uttered by prophets must not be overestimated. That is also what Lorber was told: "Very many will not take heed; they will ascribe everything to natural forces, and the soothsayers will be called liars." (Gr VI 174, 6)
New Revelation makes it clear beyond all doubt that "now as ever, the prophets will mostly preach only before deaf ears." (Pr 24)
It is not at all easy to get a society which is largely devoted to materialism and hedonism (an attitude where pleasure ranks above everything) to change its ways. Cold intellectualism no longer has an organ able to perceive the transcendental and therefore also is unable to see the hand of God in the disasters that befall mankind. Once life has been reduced to a mechanism that can be understood by analytical thought, and people are thus cutting themselves off from the final causes and contexts of existence, they have to end up in an existential vacuum, convinced that life has no meaning. As a result, the masses who have lost their faith are increasingly looking for distraction in the superficial consumer life. Yet inner emptiness and the secret fear remain.
lf we base our prognosis on the following statements made by Jakob Lorber, there is little hope of progress in the direction of common sense.
"...Once the world has got someone in its clutches it will be very hard for that person to escape its powers." (Gr VIII 166, 15) "Once a river has started to move and grow in size, it will be too late to check it and stop its progress." "His (the clearsighted person's) views may be absolutely right, but what is he to do if the great mass is blind and deaf." (EM 66)
The normative power of the factual world makes it unlikely that there will be a change, i.e., that people will refuse to follow the attractive force of a way of thinking based on achievement and high living standards and on the good life. As the gospels say, and New Revelation very much confirms, no one can "serve the world and its mammon and at the same time also the living Kingdom of God. That is impossible." (Gr 77, 14)
The time has not yet come when everyone will understand the signs that indicate all kinds of misfortune to come for mankind signs that are increasing all the time.
Never yet has a nation nearing the end of its period of high civilization realized what is going on around it; nor have such nations ever grasped that inflationary demands mean the end civilization. The decline of the Roman Empire was also preced by a period of inflated demands and monetary inflation. In 301B.C., the Emperor Diocletian imposed a wage and price freeze, but this failed, just as similar measures have recently failed in the U.S.A. and some European countries. Diocletian complained: "Greed was raging everywhere in the world." 327 How the same picture repeats itself! In those days, too, cold desire for gain ruled before the decline occurred, and people were caugh up in the meshes of their unreasonable demands.
Some people will console themselves with the thought that life will go on, even after major disasters. This merely shows their lack of historical knowledge. Life will go on - but the question is - how. At the time of the Emperor Constantine (4th century), Rome had 1.5 million inhabitants." 328 After the collapse of the empire, forty thousand people were left there, and during the Middle Ages Rome had become a mere village. Goats were grazing in the forum." 329 Once the Teutonic tribes had erupted from the virgin forests, flooding the dying Roman empire, it took something like 500 years until small towns came into existence again, and again several centuries until cathedrals were built, to indicate the growth of a new culture. "Who would have believes", St. Jerome (d. A.D. 420) was to write, "that Rome, based on all the treasures of the world, would ever come to fall?" 330
In our day, too, the moving finger has already written the words on the wall, as is apparent from the alarming increase in disasters that threaten the world, as just discussed.
Clearsighted men and women are aware of the seriousness of the situation we are facing, and of the underlying trend. Ernst Benda, for example, 1971-1983 President of the Federal Constitutional Court in the F.R.G., said: "The feeling that we are living in a time of change and uncertainty is more than an emotional response. We are in a crisis situation. More than ever, people do not know where to turn. The process is a more dramatic one than in the past." 331 A warning issued by the renowned scientist Carl Friedrich von Weizsaecker, on the basis of insight gained, also should gave pause for thought: "It is my personal belief that increasing criticism of a technocratic world presages profound crises, and indeed disasters. lt is unforgivable to refuse to listen to Kassandra, to Jeremias (prophets of doom)." 332
Another message that now is taken more and more seriously and must be taken note of is that Fatima (1917), referring to the Last Days. According to the Catholic journal Stimme des Glaubens (October, 1981), Pope John Paul Il talked about some aspects of this to a close circle when visiting Fulda. Among other things, he referred to "whole continents to be flooded by the oceans, and people being called away from one minute to the next, in their millions."
In 1973, Bishop Rudolf Graber of Regensburg declared in a lecture given before many Bishops at Freiburg i. Br. (F.R.G.) that Fatima was "the great eschatological sign (eschatology = the four last things: death, judgement, heaven and hell) God had given for out time." 333
New Revelation says the following, in brief, on the events which are to come:
When "the signs of terrible disasters are increasing" (Pr 37), it will no doubt be generally realized that the Last Days are imminent. Only then, New Revelation says, will a change of heart occur for many. "My voice can usually only emerge clearly in the human soul when many bitter experiences of all kinds have made the soul more inward, making it turn away from outer things." (Gr XI p. 151)
"There shall be general suffering, misery and sorrow, greater than any the earth has ever seen. " (Gr VIII 185, 2) Then "the bad state of affairs in human life will soon bring many others to your camp." (LGh p. 90)
"From now onwards (in Jesus' day), less than a full 2000 years shall pass before the great judgement shall occur." (Gr VI 174, 7)
"I shall make the peoples sober through suffering. I shall rip away the delusion that the first thing man should look for is worldly pleasure, seeking enjoyment only. I shall teach them - sadly through unpleasant events - how short-lived worldly self-conceit, worldly fame and worldly blessings are, at the same time proving to them the eternal nature of spiritual treasures. That is how individuals shall fare, and also nations, rulers and priests. I shall show them all that there is yet one other who is above them, one who does let them do as they will, but yet alone holds the threads that link situations and circumstances. He knows how to use everything - even the worst men can do - for the greatest benefit of mankind as a whole and also of the individual." (Pr 308)
"I, creator of the whole universe, have to see My creatures, made by Me to attain to the highest spiritual rank, take the wrong road, rather than hasten towards the spiritual, conscious of their lofty origins." (Pr 220)
"Thousands of people who have lost their way are hastening down the wrong road to an early grave. They depart from this world still immature, arriving in the other world in an even more immature state. What is to become of such people? They were unable to stay here, and also do not feel at home there. O, you have no notion of the tortures gone through by souls that wander about in indecision. The earthly world they have lost is no longer accessible to them, and the spiritual does not accord with their way of thinking and their essential nature." (pr 110)
"That is why an awakening is needed, all the more so in these days when the solution of the whole question as to the spiritual destination of man is about to appear, and most men have entered so far into a worldly, egoistical way of life that the gentle touch of a finger will hardly waken anyone, and forceful ways will be needed to draw from the mire of the world the people who have sunk in so deeply." (Pr 309)
"Resistance offered by many there will be more than enough, but the medicine has to be taken, and the bitter cup drained to the lees. " (Pr 309)
"I could today repeat My lamentations over the fate of Jerusalem, for mankind foolishly still fails to recognize its mission, the purpose for which it was created, and the purpose of its present and future life." (Pr 220)
"Everywhere I let sparks of My light of Heaven be scattered, everywhere My voice, the voice of the Father, is heard: Turn around, you whose heads have been turned, hear the voice of your heavenly father, who is warning you before the great catastrophe approaches - as in days gone by over Jerusalem and its people." (Pr 222)
New Revelation has many unpalatable truths to tell the people of our time, through God's prophets. It addresses its urgent warnings to those who have become subject to the spirit of the age. New Revelation, the greatest opening of seals of all times, contains the whole story of creation and salvation, and the true teachings of Jesus. It drops into the souls of men with the impact of a great cataract. Taken aback and in amazement, many will perceive a widening of spiritual horizons, and come to see men's doings in these Last Days from a new point of view, from the outside as it were, or sub specie aeternitatis, i.e., from the point of view of immortality.
For many people who are beset, confused, seeking the truth, the true teaching of Jesus as made known by the prophet Jakob Lorber will open up the fundamental mysteries of the world and of human life, and become a joyful, exciting experience.
Many on the other hand will no doubt take affront at New Revelation - as they have at the Gospels until now. "Let them talk", the Lord said to Lorber, "let My old word (the Gospels) and every new word (New Revelation) be the barest nonsense to them." (Hi II p. 97)
"My teaching would deprive them of their sweet life on earth, when this is their greatest possession." (Gr I 124, 4) "My teaching, however, demands renunciation of the very thing that seems most pleasant to the people of the world." (Pr 130)
"The Kingdom of God can only be reached through force and great sacrifices." (Gr VIII 16, 3)
"A truly noble and good person is modest in his demands, whereas the wicked, lightless wordly person never finds his demands satisfied." (Gr II 201, 7)
Throughout New Revelation, modern man is reminded that his short life on earth is the training ground for a higher, eternal life. A mirror is held up to many. Yet has there ever been a time when prophets concerned themselves over the opinions of the masses or the words spoken by priests? They were in fact unable to do so, for it was not their own thoughts they were speaking or writing down. Jakob Lorber was told: "I say to you: If your words found acclaim in the world they would not be of Me. To be despised by the world has at all times been the greatest witness for that which comes from Me." (Hi II p. 98) "Where you can make no change, because of the freedom of will and of vision given to every man, save yourself all toil and trouble in future." (Hi II p. 97) "It is hard to preach to the deaf and blind." (Hi I p. 181) "Do not concern yourself over these; schools of correction will spread from here to beyond, extending wide." (Gr II 133, 6)
"Beyond, a place will be found for them where their obstinacy shall melt like wax." (Hi II p. 143)
Both in the Gospels and in New Revelation it is clearly stated that only part of the seed cast abroad will find fertile soil. On the other hand New Revelation also predicts that at almost 2000 years after Christ there will be a spiritual awaking for mankind, "that shall travel from one end of the world to the other, like a column of fire" and which will take hold of "many millions". (Gr I 72, 3)
History has shown that new spiritual impulses will sometimes come up with tremendous rapidity and irresistible force. Many people hold the view that the first signs are already apparent of a religious renewal occurring outside the churches which are disintegrating. According to Jakob Lorber, there can be no doubt but that "the rise of the spiritual and eternal sun of truth" (New Revelation) cannot be prevented, in spite of much resistance. (Gr VIII 46, 4)
"My work shall emerge into the light of day unhindered, as a great magnet that shall attract all." (Hi I p. 99)
There will be an increasing number of people who feel that the only way to restore a lost dimension to life and gave it meaning again is by filling the religious vacuum. It will come true what Jakob Lorber heard his inner voice say on June 27, 1841: "I am giving it to you in order to set a new corner and boundary stone for the world. Many shall fall over this, for they do not follow the way of humility, utter self-denial, patience, gentleness and great love that is shown in it." (Hi I p. 390)