Source: https://www.bertha-dudde.org/en/proclamation/8185

8185 Sacrificial death was not allowed to force into faith....

May 24, 1962: Book 86

Also My sacrificial death on the cross was not allowed to lead inevitably to faith in My Divinity in the human being Jesus.... For even when Love Itself offered this sacrifice, although I Myself was in Him until His death, because He Himself had united completely with Me, nevertheless the “deity“ drew back in Him.... that’s to say, He suffered and died as a man, He no longer made use of His power, that He possessed by agreement with Me.... He, as man, has taken all suffering and pains upon Himself and thereby He has redeemed the huge guilt of sins, which burdened the whole mankind.... And so the crucifixion had to be a process, which took place quite human, because no one could be forced to believe and each unusual appearance would have meant such a constrained faith.... So many people were caught by a restlessness the crucifixion caused, some people were touched, and they were depressed by the judgment, which was carried out in a man, they did not hold guilty.... But that it was a sacrifice, that accomplished the Deity Itself in the man Jesus, therefore any proof lacked, and it had to be this way, because the acceptance of the grace of the act of salvation had to be an act of free will.... because otherwise the forgiveness of sin could not take place as by the voluntary surrender to Jesus and acknowledging of Himself, as Son of God and Savior of the world, in Whom the eternal Godhead had incarnated. No one may be compelled to believe, it should be free for every man, to acknowledge Jesus Christ as Savior of the world and to accept His grace victim. Therefore, even the death of Jesus was a very human event, that in no way influenced coercively on the people, who were present at His hour of death or later learned of it, too. And so the act of salvation of Jesus remains a matter for all the people , that they can believe, but also can doubt, because the right knowledge requires a certain progress of the soul, a turning to Me, Who they are able to recognize also in Jesus Christ. A person, who is still in the power of My opponent, will never believe in the act of salvation of Jesus Christ, and even if it would also be described truthfully.... For he will not believe it, because he is still under the influence of the opponent, who will do everything to prevent a redemption by Jesus Christ. And yet people can also win a very confident belief in Him, when they make it possible, that My spirit teaches them.... if they allow also My mental influence through a life in love by My will.... But then there are no external evidences, which convince the man of the truth of God’s mercy work, but then his ideas of truth will be directed correspondingly, and the man understands the connexions and the foundation of the sacrifice on the cross, and he can also believe without evidences. Each proof is and will remain a compulsory faith for the people; but it is the proof of free will the only decisive factor in life on earth, and so the people must decide freely for the acceptance and recognition of Jesus and His sacrifice on the cross.... The man is not compelled to accept, and therefore all events must be described in their truth, as it has really happened: as the sentencing of a criminal, who has been ordered to the most shameful death, to the death on the cross. With His power Jesus truly might have averted this death by Himself.... because He got the power by the complete union with Me.... but He made no longer use of it, because He wanted, to suffer the death as completely powerless, to give people help in a hardship, from which they themselves would not have got free.... But He could help them to freedom, He could clear the way to the Father, He could open them the gate to the kingdom of light, but always only, while He took a gigantic guilt upon Himself and thus went the way to the cross.... while He took a degree of suffering upon Himself, which would have suffered a man scarcely, if not the love had given Him the strength for it.... I Myself was love.... But He did not use this power, to get rid off His sufferings, but only to that, to be able to endure the suffering and the bitter death on the cross.... Because He wanted to redeem the mankind from sin and death.... That even My followers doubted about Me, was understandable, suddenly they saw Me exposed of all power, when they had to watch, how I was handled, as I did not defend Myself and did not apply the power, that they so often had been able to find in Me.... But then the sacrifice on the cross would not have been accomplished, and My path as a human being on the earth would have been useless, because, despite My teachings and instructions, the people would stay always in the weakness towards My enemy, for the unredeemed guilt of sins was the weakness, the burden, that was on the humanity, of which they could not be released by their own efforts.... And, for strengthening their will, I died on the cross, for strengthening their will, I took even the enormous burden of sin upon Myself and redeemed it through the most painful work of commiseration, that has ever taken place on this earth and will take place also never.... I died for all people of the past, the present and the future, but every man must recognize and accept this My act of salvation of his own free will, for then he also recognizes Myself, Whom he once has failed his recognition and for that he is plunged into the depth....

Amen

Translated by Heidi Hanna