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THE
URANTIA BOOK came to me in
answer to a prayer I had made twenty
years before. It hadn’t come earlier as
I probably wasn’t ready for it.
I had grown up
in an orphanage in England. By 1960,
when I was 20, I was living alone in
London in a bed-sitter flat. It was
Christmas day and people all around me
were celebrating. As I lay alone in my
cheap room, feeling very sorry for
myself, I began to pray. “Why am I
alone? Why don’t I have a family like
other people? Give me someone to love
me, please, because I am so lonely!”
After my
crying stopped, I sat there listening to
the people downstairs laughing and
happy. I called out to God, “Do you
exist? Why are you so cruel? What did I
do? You don’t love me! I don’t even
believe you are hearing me! It’s all a
pack of lies!”
When I calmed
down, I said in a small voice, “If you
exist, then move something in this room.
Show me you hear me.” Suddenly I felt a
hand on my head, stroking it slowly. I
jumped up and looked around but there
was only the wall behind me. The
stroking continued for a few seconds,
then I felt a warmth inside of me. I
knew somebody or something was near me
in that room. I fell asleep.
Many years
later, in 1980, I was married with four
children and living in Greece, in the
town of Corinth. It was summer. One day
my English friend Pat, who also lived in
Corinth, brought an American friend of
hers around. Her name was Saskia. They
had recently met on a three-day bus trip
from London to Athens, and Saskia was
now staying with Pat for a while. We all
became friends. One evening Saskia began
telling my Greek husband George the
history of the Greeks, where they came
from and who they were.
“Where did you
get that information?” he asked, as he
had never heard it before.
“From a book
that I read,” she replied. “I’ll let you
borrow it.”
And so she
gave us the Urantia Book. That first
night I sat up all night reading about
Jesus. I was shocked, as it was just
what I wanted and needed. From the
minute I started reading I couldn’t put
the book down. It took me three months
the first time. I couldn’t wait for the
children to leave for school in the
morning so I could read it during the
day when I should have been doing my
housework. I’d go to bed at nine o’clock
just so I could read it, and I’d still
be reading at three in the morning. I
could hardly grasp my good fortune. It
was too good to be true. There it was,
all my questions about life answered in
one book!
Every day I
would put the baby in her stroller and
walk down to visit Saskia so we could
discuss what I’d read the night before.
We’d take long walks around the town,
talking about midwayers, Solitary
Messengers, angels and Jesus. I will
always be thankful to Saskia for being
my messenger and bringing such joy to
me, for delivering the good news all the
way from America right into my own home
in Greece.
It is now twenty years since I got the
book, and even on my fourteenth reading
of it, it is just like reading it for
the first time. It has given me hope and
comfort through this life. Now I know
that I do have a family—the whole
heavenly host! I belong at last!
I have tried
to tell my friends about it, but they
are either too busy or not ready for the
great news. I have given one to each of
my children, as it is worth more than
all the treasures on earth. The Urantia
Book tells us why we are here and where
we are going. What more can we ask?
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