Part VI: The challenge 1. Except these days be shortened

Part VI: The challenge

1. Except these days be shortened

My years of study and search had taught me one bitter truth. Religious movements, like man, pass through the progressive stages of childhood, adolescence, maturity and old age, and eventually die. Since the life span of great religions is measured in thousands of years, the period of old age often endures for centuries. Death comes so slowly that whole generations may not notice it. If the words of Christ Himself were correct, religious institutions maintained themselves long after the creative spirit that gave them birth had departed.

I recalled the three stages of religion spoken of by an educator and philosopher.

Stage One: God is real to man. He is intimate. His spirit is among the people in every walk of life. It is a living Faith.

Stage Two: Culture now becomes more important than God to man. Theology takes over the conduct of the Faith. There is an intellectual acceptance rather than a deep inner conviction of truth. The pilgrims and the holy men are pushed aside and are replaced by artisans and adventurers who spend their time in search of beauty and romance rather than spiritual truth.

Stage Three: In this last stage, material power and physical

pleasures become the determining factor, neither God nor culture dominate any longer. Of the once live and active religion only the outward form remains. The faith and teachings of the Messenger have crystallized as do the blood vessels of an old man. Religion then falls behind the times. It cannot understand nor interpret what is happening in the world. It lives in its past and, for this reason, appeals only to the old and the conservative in man. The highways that were once frequented by pilgrims and artisans are now travelled by tourists who neither contemplate nor seek beauty, but crave only pleasure and gratification of the outward senses.

Certainly our Western Civilization has reached, and is immersed in, stage number three. No wonder religion has been abandoned. Man attends his church, synagogue, mosque or temple as a social convention with an unbelieving heart.

Under almost any other circumstances, this part of the story of The case of the missing millennium is something which I would share only with my intimate friends. I would not offer it to the world. I know what can happen to the teller of such a story. Yet, because of the danger that is slowly but surely engulfing our society, I feel that it is a story which every one should hear. What they do about it rests with them.

It is not a case of how it can be told, but rather, I feel, of now it must be told. At least once, in clear, straight-forward terms. If a man is riding with a friend on a winding mountainous road, and sees him asleep at the wheel, he has no choice but to awaken him—for the sake of both the driver and himself. If a neighbour lies asleep in a burning house, it is the duty of the one that sees the fire to do everything in his power to arouse the victim.

I was a Christian when I first began my investigation into this century-old riddle of the Messiah. I had no idea where it

would lead me. Now that it is ended, I am still a Christian, but in a fuller, richer sense than I ever dreamed could be possible.

I have also become a follower of Bahá’u’lláh. I have become a Bahá’í. I had no choice. I had to accept Bahá’u’lláh or deny Christ.

There are four methods by which we can prove a thing:

1. By reason (logic and experiment).

2. By the senses (experience).

3. By tradition or prophecy (fulfilment of promises).

4. By inspiration or intuition (inward conviction above the senses or logic).

I had tested Bahá’u’lláh by all four. My self-importance had gradually diminished until I became like an ant that has come out to look at the sun.

With the exactness of the stars, Bahá’u’lláh had fulfilled all of the prophecies required. He had exalted reason to its proper throne. He had urged scientific method and experiment in seeking truth. His life, which is told in another book called The King of Glory,¹ was filled with such beauty and inspiration that a Christian clergyman, and famous Bible scholar, declared: “If there has been any prophet in recent times, it is to Bahá’u’lláh we must go”.²

I discovered the reason why the Bahá’ís have such a tender love and reverence for Christ and for Moses. To deny Moses and Christ would be to deny Bahá’u’lláh. They are one in the Holy Spirit they bring. God is like the sun, and Moses, Christ and Bahá’u’lláh, as well as the other prophets, are like mirrors. They all reflect the same truth. They merely come at different ages in history. For example:

I could not refuse to accept Bahá’u’lláh, or I would be denying Jesus Christ Himself, and Moses; for, in reality they were one. The same light of God shines in each mirror. The name Bahá’í became familiar, simple and filled with warmth and love. It meant: follower of Bahá’u’lláh. For example:

Christ—ian (of) follower of Jesus Christ

Bahá—í (of) follower of Bahá’u’lláh

A Christian is a follower of Christ and a Bahá’í is a follower of Bahá’u’lláh.

Now that I have become a follower of Bahá’u’lláh, perhaps I would write this book in a different manner. However, it was not written as a Bahá’í, but as a Christian who was led to search for the missing Messiah. I only know that my love for Christ is far greater now than ever before, and infinitely deeper and more precious than at any time when I was a Christian only. Bahá’u’lláh has taught me the beauty and majesty of Christ.

For all these reasons, I finally decided to share the entire story with you. It was impossible for me to remain silent when I learned these astonishing things. What a pity that the world still knows so little of them. The responsibility to tell the story weighed as heavily on my heart as did the story of the first coming of Christ on the heart of the Apostle of Jesus who said: “Yea, woe is unto me, if I preach not the Gospel!”¹

For over one hundred years, mankind has neglected this precious opportunity. From 1844 until today, man has turned a deaf ear to the entreaties of Bahá’u’lláh and His followers. It may, therefore, be too late now to prevent the final clash of nations intent on destroying themselves. Unless great numbers flock quickly to His banner, and give a mass transfusion of the spirit to humanity, the future looms ominous.

Yet there is still time for the individual believer to respond

to this call of the Messenger of God for this day. Each ear that ‘hears’ and eye that ‘sees’ can still arise to serve Almighty God. He can be numbered among the elect who were promised spiritual guidance in the last days when ‘two would be taken and one remain’. Christ said:

“And except those (last) days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved; but for the elects’ sake those days shall be shortened.”¹

In the chapter in which Isaiah prophesies that the followers of God in the last day will be called by a new name, he promises also that God will be merciful to His elect in the time of the end, so that

“I may not destroy them all.”²

If there is no God, and man is but a creature that comes up out of the earth for a few brief years in the sun, then nothing matters. Yet if, as the overwhelming evidence proclaims, he is a spiritual being with a soul, then the relationship of that soul to God is the most important and precious knowledge and possession he has in all the earth.

The following chapters present the two alternatives which, following my study, I feel face every single human being in the days immediately ahead. The sands are running out. The die is cast. The battle lines are being formed. Who will be of the elect?