Daily Inspiration for Living A Course in Miracles

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Building Our Life on Changeless Love

I. The Origins of Separation

To extend [Love] is a fundamental aspect of God which He gave to His Son. ²In the creation, God extended Himself to His creations and imbued them with the same loving Will to create [extend Love]. ³You have not only been fully created, but have also been created perfect. ⁴There is no emptiness in you. ⁵Because of your likeness to your Creator you are creative [loving]. ⁶No child of God can lose this ability because it is inherent in what he is, but he can use it inappropriately by projecting. ⁷The inappropriate use of extension, or projection, occurs when you believe that some emptiness or lack exists in you, and that you can fill it with your own ideas instead of truth. ⁸This process involves the following steps:
⁹First, you believe that what God created can be changed by your own mind.
¹⁰Second, you believe that what [the Son of God] is perfect can be rendered imperfect or lacking.
¹¹Third, you believe that you can distort the creations of God, including yourself.
¹²Fourth, you believe that you can create yourself, and that the direction of your own creation is up to you.

These related distortions represent a picture of what actually occurred in the separation, or the “detour into fear.” ²None of this existed before the separation, nor does it actually exist now. ³Everything God created is like Him. ⁴Extension, as undertaken by God, is similar to the inner radiance that the children of the Father inherit from Him. …all loving creation is freely given in one continuous line, in which all aspects are of the same order. (A Course in Miracles, T-2.I.1:1–2:4,8. See also ACIM Text Made Simple.)

Belief does not make true, but it can make a lie appear true. Our beliefs represent what we want to be true. If what we believe is an illusion or untrue, we need to disregard truth to maintain the illusions that a lie is true. The ego is the wish that separation, which could never be true, is real. The entire dream of a world of separation is built on a foundation of belief. It is like building a house on a foundation of sand. Like shifting sand, beliefs are unstable and changeable.

The Love of God is unchangeable, the rock upon which we create by extending His Love. The return to Love comes as we let go of our beliefs and accept that only Love is real. By the grace of God, beliefs cannot change Reality. He has given us the Holy Spirit to help us release our mistaken beliefs to free ourselves to be only Love.

Today we choose the Holy Spirit as our Guide all through the day.

© 2021, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Let’s Be Ministers of Love Today

…we will observe our trust as ministers of God, in hourly remembrance of our mission and His Love. ²And we will quietly sit by and wait on Him and listen to His Voice, and learn what He would have us do the hour that is yet to come; while thanking Him for all the gifts He gave us in the one gone by.

In time, with practice, you will never cease to think of Him, and hear His loving Voice guiding your footsteps into quiet ways, where you will walk in true defenselessness.

Today our theme is our defenselessness. ²We clothe ourselves in it, as we prepare to meet the day. ³We rise up strong in Christ, and let our weakness disappear, as we remember that His strength abides in us. ⁴We will remind ourselves that He remains beside us through the day, and never leaves our weakness unsupported by His strength. ⁵We call upon His strength each time we feel the threat of our defenses undermine our certainty of purpose. ⁶We will pause a moment, as He tells us, ‘I am here.’

⁴The ministers of God can never fail, because the love and strength and peace that shine from them to all their brothers come from Him. ⁵These are His gifts to you. ⁶Defenselessness is all you need to give Him in return. ⁷You lay aside but what was never real, to look on Christ and see His sinlessness. (A Course in Miracles, W-153.171-18:1;19;20:4-7. See also ACIM Lesson 153 Insights.)

Judgment is a key ego tool to defend against the oneness of God’s Love. From birth in the world we are carefully taught to judge everything. We learn to categorize and prioritize so that we know how to protect ourselves and survive in a dangerous world. All this reinforces the belief that we are alone, separate and subject to outside influences beyond our control.

As we relinquish our habit of judging based upon past learning and accept the Holy Spirit’s judgment on our behalf, our defenses are laid down. The Holy Spirit’s judgment is very simple—if it’s God’s Love it is real. Everything else is unreal.

As we learn to accept that the images of the world cannot be real because they represent separation which denies Love, we forgive the world. Our vision is cleared and we see the presence of Love everywhere, in everyone. There can be no judgment in defenselessness, for in our recognition that only Love is real, there is nothing left to judge. Today let us be ministers of Love.

© 2021, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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We Are Complete in God’s Love

Whenever you are angry, you can be sure that you have formed a special relationship which the ego has “blessed,” for anger is its blessing. ²Anger takes many forms, but it cannot long deceive those who will learn that love brings no guilt at all, and what brings guilt cannot be love and must be anger. ³All anger is nothing more than an attempt to make someone feel guilty, and this attempt is the only basis the ego accepts for special relationships. ⁴Guilt is the only need the ego has, and as long as you identify with [the ego], guilt will remain attractive to you. ⁵Yet remember this; to be with a body is not communication. ⁶And if you think it is, you will feel guilty about communication and will be afraid to hear the Holy Spirit, recognizing in His Voice your own need to communicate.

²In the holy instant guilt holds no attraction, since communication has been restored. ³And guilt, whose only purpose is to disrupt communication, has no function here. ⁴Here [in the holy instant] there is no concealment, and no private thoughts. ⁵The willingness to communicate attracts communication to it, and overcomes loneliness completely. ⁶There is complete forgiveness here, for there is no desire to exclude anyone from your completion, in sudden recognition of the value of his part in [your completion]. ⁷In the protection of your wholeness, all are invited and made welcome. ⁸And you understand that your completion is God’s, Whose only need is to have you be complete. ⁹For your completion makes you His in your awareness. ¹⁰And here it is that you experience yourself as you were created, and as you are. (A Course in Miracles, T-15.VII.10;14:2-10. See also ACIM Text Made Simple.)

Anger takes many forms. It can be as innocuous as a sigh of discontent or as violent as a murderous rage. These forms are the same because they can only seem to occur where separation seems real. We believe something in the world separate from us needs to change.

Separation is not what God wills for us. He created His Son one with Him and maintains this unity with the uninterrupted flow of His Love. But we cannot be aware of His Love if we interrupt it with belief that separation is real.

Loneliness and fear are inevitable if we believe separation is real. Only in separation can attack or isolation seem possible. God does not will to be alone, so His Creation remains eternally united with Him in Love. Forgiveness is the means to release us from the bondage of belief that separation is real.

As we accept our unity with the Love in every brother and with God, we know that we are complete in Him. We lack nothing for we have all that is real. Fear and guilt are impossible, for we know our Reality in the eternal flow of God’s Love.

© 2021, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Being a Messenger of God’s Love

Love holds no grievances.

²Grievances are completely alien to love. ³Grievances attack love and keep its light obscure. ⁴If I hold grievances I am attacking love, and therefore attacking my Self. ⁵My Self thus becomes alien to me. ⁶I am determined not to attack my Self today, so that I can remember Who I am.

These specific forms for applying this idea would be helpful:

²This is no justification for denying my Self.
³I will not use this to attack love.
⁴Let this not tempt me to attack myself. (A Course in Miracles, W-84.3:1–4:4. See also ACIM Lesson 84 Insights.)

Consider some of the many forms of grievances—frustration, impatience, sadness, irritation, guilt, fear, loneliness—are a few. The dream of separation is itself a grievance against the oneness of Love. Our habit of holding grievances needs to be undone if we want to experience the joy and peace that is the eternal condition of our true Self.

There is nothing we need do to qualify for God’s Love. But we do need to undo our grievances that block our awareness of His gift. That is why forgiveness is our only meaningful purpose in this world. It undoes the barriers that hide the Light of Love from our awareness.

Today we will be vigilant to bring every sigh of impatience, every form of grievance to the Holy Spirit for His help to let them go. We want to remember the Love we are. We want to experience the joy that comes with joining with the Love in every brother. We want to accept the gift of Love God has given His one Son. With the Holy Spirit’s help, we will be messenger’s of Love today.

© 2021, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Accepting a Day of Joy

In fearlessness and love I spend today.

This day, my Father, would I spend with You, as You have chosen all my days should be. ²And what I will experience is not of time at all. ³The joy that comes to me is not of days nor hours, for it comes from Heaven to Your Son. ⁴This day will be Your sweet reminder to remember You, Your gracious calling to Your holy Son, the sign Your grace has come to me, and that it is Your Will I be set free today.

We spend this day together, you and I. ²And all the world joins with us in our song of thankfulness and joy to Him Who gave salvation to us, and Who set us free. ³We are restored to peace and holiness. ⁴There is no room in us for fear today, for we have welcomed love into our hearts.” (A Course in Miracles, W-310.1:1–2:4. See also ACIM Lesson 310 Insights.)

Today can be a day of joy. It will be so if we choose to accept our true Self, which God created one with Him. In that oneness, He shares His joy without limit.

This joy has nothing to do with anything we perceive or experience through the body. The image of the body comes from the ego’s denial of oneness. The body does not exist in the oneness of Love, the only Reality and the Source of eternal joy. We have bought into the ego’s thought system of separation by teaching ourselves to believe that the images of the world are real.

To undo this mistaken belief, God gave us the Holy Spirit, His Teacher, Whose mission is to help us learn of our reality and recognize the illusions of the world for what they are. We choose joy when we choose to accept the Holy Spirit’s lessons in Love. And we choose peace, for it is an attribute of God’s Love.

Today we welcome the Holy Spirit’s lessons in Love, for we want it to be a day of joy.

© 2021, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Awakening to Our True Identity

Love, which created me, is what I am.

I seek my own Identity, and find It in these words: “Love, which created me, is what I am.” ²Now need I seek no more. ³Love has prevailed. ⁴So still It waited for my coming home, that I will turn away no longer from the holy face of Christ. ⁵And what I look upon attests the truth of the Identity I sought to lose, but which my Father has kept safe for me.

Father, my thanks to You for what I am; for keeping my Identity untouched and sinless, in the midst of all the thoughts of sin my foolish mind made up. ²And thanks to You for saving me from them. ³Amen. (A Course in Miracles, W-229. See also ACIM Lesson 229 Insights.)

The ego is an attempt to usurp our Identity. Fortunately the strength of God prevents any attempt to change the Son He created one with Himself. In truth, nothing can prevail against His Love, for nothing else is real.

Believing we are a separate identity in a separate body in a separate place and time is a dream of an identity crisis. It is not real but our belief in it makes it seem real. The healing antidote is to accept the vision of Christ, which sees only the truth—the unaltered, eternal Love that is our true Identity. When we are willing to pause and step back from our perceptions in the moment, we welcome the gift of vision that shows us the presence of Love in us and around us everywhere.

Today we remind ourselves often that Love is our Creator and our Self. As we remember this, we are able to see the Love in our brothers and answer their calls for Love with Love.

© 2021, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Accepting God’s Joy as Ours

Only God’s plan for salvation will work.

²It is senseless for me to search wildly about for salvation. ³I have seen it in many people and in many things, but when I reached for it, it was not there. ⁴I was mistaken about where it is. ⁵I was mistaken about what it is. ⁶I will undertake no more idle seeking. ⁷Only God’s plan for salvation will work. ⁸And I will rejoice because His plan can never fail.

These are some suggested forms for applying this idea specifically:

²God’s plan for salvation will save me from my perception of this.
³This is no exception in God’s plan for my salvation.
⁴Let me perceive this only in the light of God’s plan for salvation. (A Course in Miracles, W-86.1–2. See also ACIM Lesson 86 Insights.)

What we believe will make us happy we think is our salvation. The ego has a plan for our salvation, but like everything else the ego directs, it will not work. The ego sends us on myriad fruitless searches for forms that it tells us will make us happy. But forms are illusions without real content so they never satisfy. We tell ourselves if we get the right job, we will be happy. If we find the right significant other we will be happy, and on and on.

The ego has a million decoys that glitter with the possibility of making us happy. But if we achieve any of them, they do not satisfy. At best they offer temporary happiness that does not compare to the indescribable joy that comes with accepting God’s Love.

God’s plan for our salvation provides means for us to let go of the mistaken beliefs that prevent us from experiencing God’s joy and peace. Everything He is, we are. God holds nothing back in His eternal sharing of His Love with His Creation. Throughout every day we make choices between the ego’s offerings of pseudo happiness and God’s gift of joy unlimited.

Today we practice welcoming the Holy Spirit’s vision in place of our perceptions of the world. This is how we accept God’s plan for our salvation, our happiness.

© 2021, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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