Cause and Effect - Universal Spirituality

Law of Compensation and Law of Divine Love

God is both loving and merciful, but His Love and mercy are exercised only within His unchangeable laws. Due to the inexorable Law of Compensation (cause and effect, also known as the Law of Punishment or Recompense), man truly reaps what he or she sows. We ourselves, not Jesus, pay the penalties for our sins.

In the spirit world, a soul that has not been purified will suffer penalties for sins (violation of God’s law – 1 John 3:4) committed during earth life. The resultant suffering is not due to God’s individual condemnation, but rather due to the scourging of the person’s conscience and recollections. The person’s soul is to a greater or lesser extent filled with the memories of their sinful thoughts and deeds. The suffering can cease only when these memories, or the results of them, cease to be a part of the person.

This Law of Compensation cannot be humanly escaped except by a long expiation which removes the memories and satisfies the law. In other words, forgiveness and end of suffering occur only when the soul becomes pure and in harmony with the laws of its creation and when there is cessation of recollection of the wrong acts, so that they become as though they had never been.

However, Jesus taught the way by which the operation of the law of cause and effect (Compensation) with its penalties may be superseded by higher laws. While laws never change, different conditions and causes determine which law comes into effect. The Law of Love is the greatest law and can supersede other laws, which are all subordinate to it. Divine Love, when given to a person in response to earnest prayer from the soul, fulfills all law and frees a person from all other laws except itself.

When one prays for the Divine Love in earnestness and faith, God will freely give it, letting it flow through the Holy Spirit into the person’s soul. This love is a part of the divine essence. When possessed in sufficient amount, it blots out sin and this happens even during the physical life. This is the Law of Regeneration. The Love in the soul also gradually replaces the memories of sin and evil deeds. With the memories gone, there is nothing upon which the Law of Compensation (cause and effect) can operate. Such person is truly free.

In summary:

“God is Love and He is Merciful, but His Love and Mercy are exercised only in accordance with His fixed and unchangeable Laws—laws that apply impartially to all men and which make no exceptions in their operation. What a man sows, so shall he also reap is as true as that the sun shines for you on earth.

I found the Truth of this great law in my own experience, and I paid the penalties of my sins. Jesus could not do this for me and he never pretended that he could. But he could and does show the Way by which the operations of the laws which produce these penalties may be superseded by the operation of other laws which, as it were, remove the penalties. And if men would only learn this Way, they would not remain in the darkness and sin because they believe and assert that God’s Laws never change. If they would only understand that, while the laws do not change, yet, the condition of the spirit which calls for the operation of these laws does change, and new laws are brought into operation.” (ARDT 1, Ch. 15/2, Thomas Payne)

Reference: Angelic Revelations of Divine Truth, Vol 1, Chapter 12.

Photo Credit: Martin Boose

Another reference on the subject is here.