To gain the most from A Course in Miracles Text Made Simple, we recommend that
you read the corresponding chapter and section in the Text of the Second or
Third Edition of A Course in Miracles published by the Foundation for Inner Peace.
Read Chapter 1, Section V. (pages 12-13).
In the first paragraph, the miracle and the body are both described as learning aids, which are used only as long as they are needed. As we return to the awareness of our original state as Love, direct communication replaces the miracle and the body. Because we did not create ourselves, we cannot change our innate ability to create (which means extend Love) as our Creator does. We can imagine that we have destroyed our communication with our Source, but we cannot make it true.
In the first paragraph of section V the Course introduces the distinction between “make” and “create.” Whenever the Course refers to creation, it is referring to God’s extension of Love. It is not referring to creativity as we commonly think of it in reference to artists, writers, inventors, etc. In the Workbook for Students section 11. titled, What is Creation? we are told, “Creation is the sum of all God’s Thoughts, in number infinite, and everywhere without all limit. Only Love creates, and only like Itself.” (W-pII.11.1:1-2)
The ego, on the other hand makes illusions. When it says, “You can make an empty shell, but you cannot express nothing at all,” (1:4 italics added) it means the ego can make the body, which is an empty shell, but this empty shell can still be used by the Holy Spirit as a medium of communication for teaching.
In the second paragraph of section V, a key idea is that, as we become miracle-minded (or open to the correction of our perception), we shorten the need for time. As we open to miracles, we remember our true Identity as an extension of God’s Love and become aware of the universal abundance of Love in everyone. We remember everyone is the same Love because God gives all Love to all equally.
An important concept in the third paragraph of section V is that we must remember our total dependence on God in order to know the power of “the Son in his true relationship with the Father.” (3:4) The truth is we come from God and are just like God. God’s strength is ours. If we try to be independent of God, we lose awareness of our God-given strength. The ego’s highest priority is independence, and the idea of being dependent is repulsive to the ego. Yet this very independence from God is what makes us feel weak and vulnerable because we have lost awareness of God’s strength in us. So, contrary to what the ego teaches, to acknowledge our dependence on God is to accept God’s strength as ours and know our perfect safety and invulnerability.
The truth is we cannot change God and we cannot change God’s eternal extension of Love, Which is called the Son of God or the Sonship. If we do not realize we have been given all of Love (God), our perception is distorted. Because the Sonship is one, if any part of the Sonship is asleep to the truth, it affects the whole. That is why the Course often tells us that we don’t go Home alone.
The central theme in paragraph four of section V is that God’s extension is whole or one or holy. As we accept miracles, we are accepting our state of wholeness or our innate abundance because we recognize that All has All. We are affirming the truth about ourselves.
In paragraph five Jesus returns to what was discussed in paragraph three. We cannot change God’s Creation and we cannot change God. As we learn to accept Creation as It is and not try to change It, we release ourselves from the tyrannous and limiting control of the ego and we place our mind under God, or true Authority.
As we learn to step back and return to the abundance awareness of the Christ Mind, we let go of the false ideas of the ego, which is trying to replace God’s oneness with the individuality of separation. We let go of the idea that our safety lies in illusions of separate bodies. As we begin to recognize the illusions we have been believing in for what they are, it can seem quite disorienting. It is as though the foundation on which we have based our lives is crumbling.
Some react by defending their illusions more vigorously in an attempt to make them seem more real and thus hold on to them. But being illusions, they can never really provide a solid foundation. Beneath the bravado of defense, there is an underlying awareness that what we are defending is untrue. It is really upside down thinking, confusing illusion with truth. So we are seeing here that the disorientation and instability that seems to come with giving up the illusions that we had thought were true is to be expected. But it does not need to last. In exchange for giving up our belief in false ideas, the Holy Spirit offers us the rock solid, changeless strength of God. Nothing could be more stable.
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