Source: https://www.bertha-dudde.org/en/proclamation/5277

5277 The helping hand of Jesus Christ.... Deliverance from the abyss....

December 20, 1951: Book 58

On earth as well as in the beyond the Saviour’s saving hand reaches out to the souls in the abyss to aid the ascent of those who seize His hand. God’s love and mercy is constantly at work to bring redeeming help; but the souls themselves must want to be helped or every gift of grace from God will remain ineffective. But only a desperate situation can persuade someone to appeal for help. Every immature soul in the kingdom of the beyond suffers and is tormented, whereas the soul on earth seeks to numb itself with earthly pleasures and thus finds it far more difficult to appeal to God for help. Yet the spiritual hardship is just as severe but it has a perceptible effect in the beyond. The soul on earth could certainly advance with ease, since the person can use his energy of life for God-pleasing actions, whereas the soul in the beyond is powerless and depends on help, either from the beings of light or from human beings.

However, there is far less willingness to do good on earth than with the souls in the beyond, whose will is only weak as long as the soul lacks strength, but after its first gift of strength it constantly gets stronger. The torments in the beyond can bring about a change of will, and then the ascent is also guaranteed. But even on earth spiritual progress is impossible without a change of will, and since the world always has a numbing effect on people they occasionally have to be placed into a state of distress to instigate a change of will. In that case, however, the helping hand of Jesus Christ, the divine love, is always ready to elevate a person, and there is hope of redemption for every soul, yet the soul’s will, which inevitably has to aim upwards, decides the moment in time itself.... One day even the strongest opposing will shall be broken, yet not force but divine love will achieve this, which time and again will approach the being until it is recognised and reciprocated, until the being’s will overwhelmingly wants to give itself to God as His Own....

Amen

Translated by Heidi Hanna