Daily Inspiration for Living A Course in Miracles

Tweet

Subscribe

View all articles • Article index

The Valuable Function of Pain

Forgive, and you will see this differently.

²These are the words the Holy Spirit speaks in all your tribulations, all your pain, all suffering regardless of its form.

Shall we not learn to say these words when we are tempted to believe that pain is real, and death becomes our choice instead of life? ²Shall we not learn to say these words when we have understood their power to release all minds from bondage? ³These are words which give you power over all events that seem to have been given power over you.

How can you tell when you are seeing wrong, or someone else is failing to perceive the lesson he should learn? ²Does pain seem real in the perception? ³If it does, be sure the lesson is not learned. ⁴And there remains an unforgiveness hiding in the mind that sees the pain through eyes the mind directs.

God would not have you suffer thus. ²He would help you forgive yourself. ³His Son does not remember who he is. ⁴And God would have him not forget His Love, and all the gifts His Love brings with it. (A Course in Miracles, W-193.5:1-2;6:1-3;7:1–8:4. See also ACIM Lesson 193 Insights.)

There is no excuse for not recognizing when there is a need for forgiveness. We have been given a simple, very clear sign that tells us that we need to forgive. The presence of any form of pain is the key indicator: We need to forgive.

We don’t recognize every need to forgive only because we treasure the ego’s substitute for the oneness of God’s Love. But we can learn to distinguish the valuable from the valueless. God has given us His Teacher to help us learn this important lesson.

Pain has a valuable function in this world. Everyone has a point where their tolerance for pain reaches its limit. It brings us to a turning point where we are willing to accept the Holy Spirit’s help to forgive our mistaken perceptions. The misperceptions disappear with forgiveness, which removes barriers to Love’s presence. It makes way for the Light of Love to fill our mind, and we remember God’s Love is ours.

© 2024, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this copyright notice and website address are included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Freeing Ourselves from Our Denial of Love

Without forgiveness I will still be blind.

Sin is the symbol of attack. ²Behold it anywhere, and I will suffer. ³For forgiveness is the only means whereby Christ’s vision comes to me. ⁴Let me accept what His sight shows me as the simple truth, and I am healed completely. ⁵Brother, come and let me look on you. ⁶Your loveliness reflects my own. ⁷Your sinlessness is mine. ⁸You stand forgiven, and I stand with you.

So would I look on everyone today. ²My brothers are Your Sons. ³Your Fatherhood created them, and gave them all to me as part of You, and my own Self as well. ⁴Today I honor You through them, and thus I hope this day to recognize my Self. (A Course in Miracles, W-247. See also ACIM Lesson 247 Insights.)

The ego offers myriad “truths” that are all lies. The foundation of everything the ego calls true is the denial of Love. Because only Love is real, everything the ego offers is unreal — illusion.

The fact that we perceive ourselves as a body shows us that we believe the ego’s lies are true. This belief binds us to the dream of a world of war, hatred, fear and guilt. But our beliefs can change. We can choose to accept the truth of our Reality in God’s Love.

He has given us His Voice to help us recognize the difference between reality and illusion. If we are willing to accept His help, we can learn to forgive our mistaken beliefs that have kept us in a dark, loveless world.

As we forgive, we will see the Light of Love shining more and more brightly. We will learn to see past the false images and recognize every brother is one with us in the one Self that is God’s Son. In this vision we see the real world where we accept God as our Father. We release ourselves from the bondage of belief in a world that denies Love’s Reality.

© 2024, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this copyright notice and website address are included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Reconsidering Every Perception with Love’s Vision

The Son of God is my Identity.

My Self is holy beyond all the thoughts of holiness of which I now conceive. ²Its shimmering and perfect purity is far more brilliant than is any light that I have ever looked upon. ³Its love is limitless, with an intensity that holds all things within it, in the calm of quiet certainty. ⁴Its strength comes not from burning impulses which move the world, but from the boundless Love of God Himself. ⁵How far beyond this world my Self must be, and yet how near to me and close to God!

Father, You know my true Identity. ²Reveal It now to me who am Your Son, that I may waken to the truth in You, and know that Heaven is restored to me. (A Course in Miracles, W-252. See also ACIM Lesson 252 Insights.)

Our true Self is unlimited Love. We are unaware of the Love we are because we have accepted a false identity which denies Love in order to have a separate “will” it calls its own. By the grace of God, we are not permanently bound to this false identity.

His Voice calls to us in every instant offering us the reality of Love that is our true Identity. But we must be willing to accept this offer. As we are willing to question the meaning we give to our perceptions, we open our mind to hear His Voice. His Voice assures us that we are safe and unlimited in His Love. This Love brings with it all of God’s strength and peace.

Today we remember to pause and reconsider every perception with an open mind to hear His Voice teach us of our Reality in Love.

© 2024, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this copyright notice and website address are included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Walking the Path to Lasting Happiness

All idols of this world were made to keep the truth within from being known to you, and to maintain allegiance to the dream that you must find what is outside yourself to be complete and happy. ²It is vain to worship idols in the hope of peace. ³God dwells within, and your completion lies in Him. ⁴No idol takes His place. ⁵Look not to idols. ⁶Do not seek outside yourself.

Let us forget the purpose of the world the past has given it. ²For otherwise, the future will be like the past, and but a series of depressing dreams, in which all idols fail you, one by one, and you see death and disappointment everywhere.

To change all this, and open up a road of hope and of release in what appeared to be an endless circle of despair, you need but to decide you do not know the purpose of the world.

⁵Let Him remind you of His Love for you, and do not seek to drown His Voice in chants of deep despair to idols of yourself. ⁶Seek not outside your Father for your hope. ⁷For hope of happiness is not despair. (A Course in Miracles, T-29.VII.6:1–8:1;10:5-7. See also ACIM Text Made Simple.)

The wish to be unique and special denies the Source of true happiness. The ego thought system is a demand to be unique and special. Only in dreams can this appear to be true. The ego offers myriad forms it tells us will make us happy. They may seem to give us moments of pleasure, but they do not last.

The way to open the door to lasting happiness is to acknowledge that, on our own, we do not know what the world is for. With an open mind, we can turn to the Holy Spirit in our mind. He is the Voice for Truth. He will help us realize that we live in God’s Love. Love’s oneness is our Reality. God’s joy is His gift to His Son, our true Self.

Today we can put ourselves on the path to lasting happiness by frequently pausing to remember we do not know what anything is for. Then ask the Holy Spirit to show us the real meaning. He will help us see that all circumstances are opportunities to join with Love. Appearances of attack are calls for Love. When we answer these calls, we remember the Love that we are as God’s one Son.

© 2024, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this copyright notice and website address are included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Offering Our Open Minds to God

This day is God’s. It is my gift to Him.

I will not lead my life alone today. ²I do not understand the world, and so to try to lead my life alone must be but foolishness. ³But there is One Who knows all that is best for me. ⁴And He is glad to make no choices for me but the ones that lead to God. ⁵I give this day to Him, for I would not delay my coming home, and it is He Who knows the way to God.

And so we give today to You. ²We come with wholly open minds. ³We do not ask for anything that we may think we want. ⁴Give us what You would have received by us. ⁵You know all our desires and our wants. ⁶And You will give us everything we need in helping us to find the way to You. (A Course in Miracles, W-242. See also ACIM Lesson 242 Insights.)

Who do we choose as our advisor today? Do we choose a guide who wants us dead, as the ego does? Or do we choose a Guide Who would lead us to a life of joy and peace and Love? This Guide is with us now, ready to give His gifts when we are willing to receive them.

On our own, we do not know what is in our best interest. We have been wrongly advised. But the Holy Spirit knows how to help us let go of our mistaken beliefs that interfere with our acceptance of His gifts.

As we forgive, the Love in which we were created flows freely into our mind bringing all we really want — the unity of Love.

© 2024, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this copyright notice and website address are included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Forgiveness Opens Our Mind to Love’s Reality

What has been given you? ²The knowledge that you are a mind, in Mind and purely mind, sinless forever, wholly unafraid, because you were created out of love. ³Nor have you left your Source, remaining as you were created. ⁴This was given you as knowledge which you cannot lose. ⁵It was given as well to every living thing, for by that knowledge only does it live.

You have received all this. ²No one who walks the world but has received it. …⁷Experience cannot be shared directly, in the way that vision can. ⁸The revelation that the Father and the Son are one will come in time to every mind.

The time is set already. ²It appears to be quite arbitrary. ³Yet there is no step along the road that anyone takes but by chance. …⁶We but undertake a journey that is over. ⁷Yet it seems to have a future still unknown to us.

Time is a trick, a sleight of hand, a vast illusion in which figures come and go as if by magic. ²Yet there is a plan behind appearances that does not change. ³The script is written. ⁴When experience will come to end your doubting has been set. ⁵For we but see the journey from the point at which it ended, looking back on it, imagining we make it once again; reviewing mentally what has gone by. (A Course in Miracles, W-158.1:1–2:2,7-8;3:1-3,6-7;4. See also ACIM Lesson 158 Insights.)

The ego uses time to make us unaware of the eternal present in which we live in the oneness of God’s Love. By dwelling on the past, we carry images of separation which we use to judge what we perceive in the present. Because our perception of the present is based on past images, we cannot see the unity of Love that is our reality.

Forgiveness is the key that dispels the veil of the past. By forgiving our past learning, we let the Holy Spirit show us our true Self, which lives in Love. We joyously recognize that our brothers are joined with us as our one Self. Forgiveness opens our mind to receive the revelation that we remain at one with our Creator in changeless Love.

© 2024, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this copyright notice and website address are included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

We Gratefully Choose Christ’s Vision

Christ’s is the vision I will use today.

Each day, each hour, every instant, I am choosing what I want to look upon, the sounds I want to hear, the witnesses to what I want to be the truth for me. ²Today I choose to look upon what Christ would have me see, to listen to God’s Voice, and seek the witnesses to what is true in God’s creation. ³In Christ’s sight, the world and God’s creation meet, and as they come together all perception disappears. ⁴His kindly sight redeems the world from death, for nothing that He looks on but must live, remembering the Father and the Son; Creator and creation unified.

Father, Christ’s vision is the way to You. ²What He beholds invites Your memory to be restored to me. ³And this I choose, to be what I would look upon today. (A Course in Miracles, W-271. See also ACIM Lesson 271 Insights.)

Christ’s vision sees through forgiving eyes. It means we no longer prefer specialness over the unity of Love. Without this preference distorting our vision, we see the world God created one with Himself. We see no cause for conflict or loss. We see only our brothers united with us in the sameness of God’s Love.

With Christ’s vision, we are at peace because we see nothing that conflicts with our true Identity. We joyously join with the eternal giving and receiving of Love that is our Identity. Today we gratefully choose Christ’s vision.

© 2024, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this copyright notice and website address are included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Page 28 of 846 pages ‹ First  < 26 27 28 29 30 >  Last ›

<< Back to main page of Daily Inspiration.

Has this page been helpful to you?
Your contribution to support this site is greatly appreciated. To make a tax deductible contribution with a credit/debit card, click here.
Click here to donate from your PayPal account.
Or send a check to Pathways of Light, 12530 Lions Chase Court, Huntley, IL 60142.