Daily Inspiration for Living A Course in Miracles

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Learning to Be a Teacher of God

The centrality of open-mindedness, perhaps the last of the attributes the teacher of God acquires, is easily understood when its relation to forgiveness is recognized. Open-mindedness comes with lack of judgment. As judgment shuts the mind against God’s Teacher, so open-mindedness invites Him to come in. As condemnation judges the Son of God as evil, so open-mindedness permits him to be judged by the Voice for God on His behalf. As the projection of guilt upon him would send him to hell, so open-mindedness lets Christ’s image be extended to him. Only the open-minded can be at peace, for they alone see reason for it.

How do the open-minded forgive? They have let go all things that would prevent forgiveness. …Forgiveness is the final goal of the curriculum. It paves the way for what goes far beyond all learning. The curriculum makes no effort to exceed its legitimate goal. Forgiveness is its single aim, at which all learning ultimately converges. It is indeed enough.

It is the function of God’s teachers to bring true learning to the world. Properly speaking it is unlearning that they bring, for that is “true learning” in the world. It is given to the teachers of God to bring the glad tidings of complete forgiveness to the world. Blessed indeed are they, for they are the bringers of salvation.” (A Course in Miracles, M-4.X.1;2:1-2,9-12;3:6-9)

Whenever we judge, our mind is closed against the Voice of Love. We are blind to seeing that only Love is real. We have learned the “ability” to judge, a construct of the ego made to maintain separation. This ability is unlearned through forgiveness.

It is helpful to remind ourselves often throughout the day, everyday, that on our own we do not know what anything means. This practice opens our mind to the Holy Spirit with willingness to accept the meaning He offers in place of our misperceptions.

The Holy Spirit knows that Love is the Source of all meaning. As we practice letting the Holy Spirit teach us His lessons in forgiveness, we serve as a teacher of God. We demonstrate that we have unlearned the ego’s lessons in division and accepted the Holy Spirit’s lessons in the unity of Love. As we hold our minds open to the Holy Spirit’s guidance, we move forward on the journey of awakening to Love.

© 2019, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Awakening to the Christ Within

The name of Jesus is the name of one who was a man but saw the face of Christ [the symbol of forgiveness] in all his brothers and remembered God. So he became identified with Christ, a man no longer, but at one with God. The man was an illusion, for he seemed to be a separate being, walking by himself, within a body that appeared to hold his self from Self, as all illusions do. Yet who can save unless he sees illusions and then identifies them as what they are? Jesus remains a Savior because he saw the false without accepting it as true. And Christ needed his form that He might appear to men and save them from their own illusions.

In his complete identification with the Christ—the perfect Son of God, His one creation and His happiness, forever like Himself and One with Him—Jesus became what all of you must be. He led the way for you to follow him. He leads you back to God because he saw the road before him, and he followed it. He made a clear distinction, still obscure to you, between the false and true. He offered you a final demonstration that it is impossible to kill God’s Son; nor can his life in any way be changed by sin and evil, malice, fear or death.

Yet still it is [Jesus’] lesson most of all that he would have you learn, and it is this:

There is no death because the Son of God is like his Father. Nothing you can do can change Eternal Love. Forget your dreams of sin and guilt, and come with me instead to share the resurrection of God’s Son. And bring with you all those whom He has sent to you to care for as I care for you. (A Course in Miracles, C-5.2-3;6:8-12)

Jesus demonstrated what happens when we forgive all the illusions of the world without exception. Seeing the face of Christ means seeing the innocence of Love in our brother and nothing else. It means we see Love’s Reality and dismiss as meaningless the ego’s illusions of the body and other images in the world.

Seeing the face of Christ without exception is our single vocation in the world. Every encounter in our daily life experience is an opportunity to practice. In every instant we choose between seeing the face of Christ or believing that the ego’s illusions are real. Choosing Christ’s vision leads us to remember our true Self, the Christ, the perfect Son of God.

© 2019, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Accepting the Peace and Stillness of God

This is a day of stillness and of peace.

Christ’s vision looks through me today. His sight shows me all things forgiven and at peace, and offers this same vision to the world. And I accept this vision in its name, both for myself and for the world as well. What loveliness we look upon today! What holiness we see surrounding us! And it is given us to recognize it is a holiness in which we share; it is the Holiness of God Himself.

This day my mind is quiet, to receive the Thoughts You offer me. And I accept what comes from You, instead of from myself. I do not know the way to You. But You are wholly certain. Father, guide Your Son along the quiet path that leads to You. Let my forgiveness be complete, and let the memory of You return to me. (A Course in Miracles Workbook Lesson 291, W-pII.291. See also ACIM Lesson 291 Insights.)

We have a choice of two ways of seeing in the world. We can choose the body’s eyes which show us images founded on the belief that separation is real. Yet the Love of God is all that is real. Love has no form and cannot be limited to an image. Thus what the body’s eyes show us is not real.

The other choice for seeing is Christ’s vision. It overlooks the images the body’s eyes show us. Christ’s vision looks upon the reality of Love. This vision is available to us as we forgive, or let go of, the value we have given the images of the world. Images that are not real can have no value of their own.

That is why Christ’s vision sees a forgiven world where the meaning we have given it has been let go. Now is the presence of Love accepted as all there is. Our brothers are recognized as part of our one Self, united in Love. All conflict has faded away in Its Light. Peace comes to our mind through forgiveness of our mistaken values based on the belief in separation. We rest in the stillness of Love.

Today we ask the Holy Spirit to show us Christ’s vision in place of our perceptions in the world, for we want to know the peace and stillness of God.

© 2019, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Remembering Our Strength and Safety

I am one Self, united with my Creator.

Serenity and perfect peace are mine, because I am one Self, completely whole, at one with all creation and with God.

Salvation comes from my one Self.

From my one Self, Whose knowledge still remains within my mind, I see God’s perfect plan for my salva­tion perfectly fulfilled. (A Course in Miracles Workbook Lesson 113, W-pI.113. See also ACIM Lesson 113 Insights.)

In the world the self we are aware of is limited and fragile. It needs to be protected physically and emotionally. Most of our time and thoughts focus on keeping this self identity safe and providing for its needs. But this is a pseudo self, the ego’s made up image that hides the Self that Love created one with Itself. This is why it is important to remind ourselves frequently that we are one Self, united with our Creator.

This Self has no needs and is eternally safe in the changelessness of God’s Love. We need to change our mind about what we think we are. We are not the pseudo self the ego made. We are the eternal, changeless extension of God’s Love.

It is the pseudo self that we need to be saved from. Our one Self has the strength of God and so we simply need to claim what we have always been in truth. This is our salvation from the false image we thought we were.

Today we practice remembering that are we one Self, united with our Creator. And as we think of a brother we remind ourselves he is part of our one Self, united with us in our Creator. These thoughts, wholly accepted, save us from the false image we have believed we are.

© 2019, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Remembering Our Completion in Love

Idols are quite specific. But your will is universal, being limitless. And so it has no form, nor is content for its expression in the terms of form. Idols are limits. [Idols] are the belief that there are forms that will bring happiness, and that, by limiting, is all attained. It is as if you said, “I have no need of everything. This little thing I want, and it will be as everything to me.” And this must fail to satisfy, because it is your will that everything be yours. Decide for idols and you ask for loss. Decide for truth and everything is yours.

Behind the search for every idol [form] lies the yearning for completion. Wholeness has no form because it is unlimited. To seek a special person or a thing to add to you to make yourself complete, can only mean that you believe some form is missing. And by finding this, you will achieve completion in a form you like. This is the purpose of an idol; that you will not look beyond it, to the source of the belief that you are incomplete. Only if you had sinned could this be so. For sin is the idea you are alone and separated off from what is whole. And thus it would be necessary for the search for wholeness to be made beyond the boundaries of limits on yourself. (A Course in Miracles, T-30.III.1;3. See also ACIM Text Made Simple.)

We believe that we are separate and alone, disconnected from our Creator and our brothers. Feeling incomplete is the consequence of this belief. Everyone in the world feels incomplete because we have accepted the limitations of a separate body as what we are. The inevitable emptiness that comes with believing we are a limited form triggers a constant search for completion. The ego directs us to look for some form that will make us happy. Yet anything that is limited cannot complete us. The ego has no answer for our search for completion.

The Holy Spirit has the only answer that will satisfy our true Self, the Son of God. It is our will to be complete because we share God’s Will for us. The Holy Spirit’s answer to the call from our heart is to lead us to remember the Reality of God’s Love for us. His Love unites us with Him. It is eternal and changeless. Here is where our true meaning lies, for we complete God as God completes us. We share the limitless extension of Love that is God.

Dissatisfaction is symptom that we have chosen the limitation of a form or idol to be our completion. Today we practice being mindful of any perception that disturbs our peace. We acknowledge that we have mistakenly chosen a form as a substitute for our completion in the Love of God. We ask the Holy Spirit to help us let this go and remember our completion is in Love.

© 2019, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Learning to Live in the Eternal Present

Can you imagine what it means to have no cares, no worries, no anxieties, but merely to be perfectly calm and quiet all the time? Yet that is what time is for; to learn just that and nothing more. God’s Teacher cannot be satisfied with His teaching until it constitutes all your learning. He has not fulfilled His teaching function until you have become such a consistent learner that you learn only of Him. When this has happened, you will no longer need a teacher or time in which to learn.

…time, according to ego’s] teaching, is nothing but a teaching device for compounding guilt until it becomes all-encompassing, demanding vengeance forever.

The Holy Spirit would undo all of this now. Fear is not of the present, but only of the past and future, which do not exist. There is no fear in the present when each instant stands clear and separated from the past, without its shadow reaching out into the future. Each instant is a clean, untarnished birth, in which the Son of God emerges from the past into the present. And the present extends forever. It is so beautiful and so clean and free of guilt that nothing but happiness is there. No darkness is remembered, and immortality and joy are now. (A Course in Miracles, T-15.I.1;7:7-8:7. See also ACIM Text Made Simple.)

The guilt we feel is always about something in the past we believe caused harm. The fear we feel is always about the future being a repeat of something that brought pain in the past. Both guilt and fear skip over the present. If we would allow ourselves to experience the present with no thought of the past, the experience would be total Love, joy beyond description and peace that cannot be disturbed.

Guilt and fear are based entirely on the illusion of time. The Holy Spirit teaches us that only the present exists. This lesson, wholly learned, will free us completely from fear and guilt and return us to the eternal presence of Love. In this presence, the ego cannot seem to exist, for it is wholly dependent on maintaining belief in the past and overlaying the present with its mask built upon the past. This is why we must learn the Holy Spirit’s lessons to help us let go of our allegiance to the ego. This lesson frees us to remember our Home in God’s Love, where we have no worries, no fear, but only the joy and peace of Heaven.

© 2019, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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True Perception Saves Us from Fear and Guilt

You want salvation. You want to be happy. You want peace. You do not have them now, because your mind is totally undisciplined, and you cannot distinguish between joy and sorrow, pleasure and pain, love and fear. You are now learning how to tell them apart. And great indeed will be your reward.

Your decision to see is all that vision requires. What you want is yours. …God has one Son, and he is the resurrection and the life. His will is done because all power is given him in Heaven and on earth. In your determination to see is vision given you.

…as you repeat the idea, you are stating that you are determined to change your present state for a better one, and one you really want.

The extra repetitions should be applied to any situation, person or event that upsets you. You can see them differently, and you will. What you desire you will see. Such is the real law of cause and effect as it operates in the world. (A Course in Miracles Workbook Lesson 20, W-pI.20.2:3-7;3:1-2,6-8;4:3;5:3-6. See also ACIM Lesson 20 Insights.)

Whatever we think will make us happy or bring us peace, we believe is our salvation. If we are following the ego’s dictates, we will try to find protection from harm, to have a special relationship, status or financial security, for our salvation. Yet none of these can be counted on to last in the world.

But we cannot see truly if we are following the ego. If we are determined to see the truth, we must be willing to accept the vision of the Holy Spirit, which is not limited by the ego’s dictates. The Holy Spirit recognizes our misperceptions but knows they are not true.

Our determination to see reflects our willingness to receive true perception in place of the ego’s illusions. This vision that shows us that beyond the ego’s images is our oneness with our brothers and with God. This true perception frees us from the dream world of fear and guilt. In this freedom we stand at Heaven’s door, where we are welcomed Home.

© 2019, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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