I Appeal to You
... through Bertha Dudde  - 03.05.1942 

2321   Disposition .... Instincts of preliminary stages ....

The human being’s disposition does not release him from having to justify himself for his actions and thinking. For every person has strength and grace at his disposal to overcome every bad inclination if only he wants to do so. Besides, the soul brought characteristics into its human embodiment which it certainly could have discarded during its previous forms and as a human being is now allotted tasks which correspond to its present disposition, i.e., which offer the soul the opportunity to emerge victorious from its battle against this disposition. Yet in order to succeed free will always has to become active and this, too, will be strengthened by God in accordance with its attitude towards Him. If a person musters the will to appeal to God for help in his battle against himself, against his own weaknesses and faults, then the strength to release himself from them will indeed flow to the person. Admittedly, this requires a considerable struggle but it cannot be spared to him, because during its preliminary stages the soul had exceeded its designated limits .... i.e., the spiritual substance which stayed in already less restricting forms used this lack of restriction to the absolute limit. It effectively developed its instincts to the highest degree which it then, in the embodiment as a human being, has to reduce again and this requires greater willpower. Likewise, the spiritual substance can have tempered itself during the preliminary stages, hence made not full use of its designated limits, with the result that it now has a less difficult battle of higher development on earth. But the disposition has at all times been taken into account through the living condition in which the being, according to its inclination, also has the opportunity to master them. Indeed, many a person seemingly has to fight harden, yet nothing impossible will ever be expected of him since unmeasured strength and grace is always at his disposal, but it has to be requested by him himself, because the soul had used its previously granted freedom in the wrong way and this does not relieve it from its responsibility ....

Amen