Daily Inspiration for Living A Course in Miracles

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Healing Our State of Mind

The real world is the state of mind in which the only purpose of the world is seen to be forgiveness. Fear is not its goal, for the escape from guilt becomes [the real world’s] aim. The value of forgiveness is perceived and takes the place of idols, which are sought no longer, for their “gifts” are not held dear. No rules are idly set, and no demands are made of anyone or anything to twist and fit into the dream of fear. Instead, there is a wish to understand all things created as they really are. And it is recognized that all things must be first forgiven, and then understood.

“Here [in this world], it is thought that understanding is acquired by attack [perceiving separate bodies as real]. There [in the real world], it is clear that by attack [separation] is understanding lost. The folly of pursuing guilt as goal is fully recognized. And idols are not wanted there, for guilt is understood as the sole cause of pain in any form. No one is tempted by guilt’s vain appeal, for suffering and death have been perceived as things not wanted and not striven for. The possibility of freedom has been grasped and welcomed, and the means by which it can be gained can now be understood. The world becomes a place of hope, because its only purpose is to be a place where hope of happiness can be fulfilled. And no one stands outside this hope, because the world has been united in belief the purpose of the world is one which all must share, if hope be more than just a dream.” (A Course in Miracles, T-30.V.1-2. See also ACIM Text Made Simple.)

Seeing the real world has nothing to do with bodies, planets or stars. It is a state of mind that is dedicated to a single purpose — to see the oneness of Love as the only reality. To do this we must forgive or let go of belief in separation, where everything is separate and alone.

With this new purpose, guilt is released because we no longer value bodies or any form in the world as offering us anything we want. Our only desire is to let go, to overlook, all images of separation because we know they have no value. We know that all value is in the Love that is given us by our Creator. We know the value of Love is a gift given to everyone equally, uniting us in Its oneness.

In this state of mind we are no longer attracted to judge or see guilt. In this state of mind the purpose of the world has shifted to using every moment as an opportunity to accept the eternal presence of Love and dismiss the unreality of separation from God.

© 2018, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Being a Messenger of Love

The body does appear to be the symbol of sin while you believe that it can get you what you want. While you believe that [the body] can give you pleasure, you will also believe that it can bring you pain. To think you could be satisfied and happy with so little is to hurt yourself, and to limit the happiness that you would have calls upon pain to fill your meager store and make your life complete. This is completion as the ego sees it. For guilt creeps in where happiness has been removed, and substitutes for it. Communion is another kind of completion, which goes beyond guilt, because it goes beyond the body.

What has the body really given you that justifies your strange belief that in [the body] lies salvation? Do you not see that this is the belief in death?

The Holy Spirit’s messengers are sent far beyond the body, calling the mind to join in holy communion and be at peace. Such is the message that I gave [the messengers] for you. It is only the messengers of fear that see the body, for they look for what can suffer. Is it a sacrifice to be removed from what can suffer? The Holy Spirit does not demand you sacrifice the hope of the body’s pleasure; [the body] has no hope of pleasure. But neither can it bring you fear of pain. Pain is the only “sacrifice” the Holy Spirit asks, and this He would remove. (A Course in Miracles, T-19.IV.A.17:10-15;B.2:6-7;3. See also ACIM Text Made Simple.)

The Course tells us that the body was made by the ego as a limit on Love. Since we were created by Love as Love, to attempt to limit Love is to hurt ourselves. Believing we have limited Love automatically brings guilt with it because we believe we have hurt our Source.

The body is the symbol of the belief that we have limited Love, separated from our Source. Thus the body is the symbol of sin. The body image seems to be maintained through guilt. Guilt is attractive to the ego because it makes separation seem to be real. The ego is constantly alert for opportunities to perceive guilt because this is the basis for maintaining the ego’s seeming existence.

The Holy Spirit offers us another way of using the body to serve our awakening to Love instead of our imprisonment in guilt. The Holy Spirit’s messengers show us the Reality that lies beyond the body. It guides us to use the body to communicate the Love that we are. The body then becomes an instrument of communication instead of the ego’s tool of separation.

Let us today hold our minds and hearts open to Holy Spirit’s messages of Love that we may serve the awakening to Love.

© 2018, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Giving and Receiving the Gift of Forgiveness

Brother, you need forgiveness of your brother, for you will share in madness or in Heaven together. And you and he will raise your eyes in faith together, or not at all.

Behold your Friend, the Christ Who stands beside you [in your brother]. How holy and how beautiful He is! You thought He sinned because you cast the veil of sin upon Him to hide His loveliness. Yet still He holds forgiveness out to you, to share His Holiness. This “enemy,” this “stranger” still offers you salvation as His Friend. The “enemies” of Christ, the worshippers of sin, know not Whom they attack.

Forgive the sins your brother thinks he has committed, and all the guilt you think you see in him.

Give faith to your brother, for faith and hope and mercy are yours to give. Into the hands that give, the gift is given. Look on your brother, and see in him the gift of God you would receive. (A Course in Miracles, T-19.IV.D.12:7-8;14;15:10;17:1-3. See also ACIM Text Made Simple.)

Because in truth we are one with every brother, when we forgive a brother we are forgiven. The Love that our brother is deserves our faith in him, for it is faith in God’s Creation. Belief in the image of a brother as a body is undeserved, for it is belief in an illusion. Belief in an illusion is a veil that hides the truth of Love’s oneness and innocence. As we accept Christ’s vision, we see past the veil to the truth of our unity with our brother.

With the Holy Spirit’s help, we forgive or let go of the false images we have made and make way for Christ’s vision to show us our brother’s innocence and our own. This is how we receive God’s gift of the Atonement, which undoes the dream of fear and guilt and brings us back to Heaven where we belong.

Today we welcome Christ’s vision, for we would remember we are at Home in Heaven.

© 2018, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Accepting Holy Spirit’s Vision of Now

Unless the past is over in my mind, the real world must escape my sight. For I am really looking nowhere; seeing but what is not there. How can I then perceive the world forgiveness offers? This [the real world] the past was made to hide, for this [is] the world that can be looked on only now. It has no past. For what can be forgiven but the past, and if it is forgiven it is gone.

Father, let me not look upon a past that is not there. For You have offered me Your Own replacement, in a present world the past has left untouched and free of sin. Here [in the present world] is the end of guilt. (A Course in Miracles Workbook Lesson 289,W-pII.289.1:1-2:3.. See also ACIM Lesson 289 Insights.)

God’s Love is eternal and changeless. Being changeless, It has no past and Its seeming future is the same as well. God’s Love is ever present, now.

The ego is the wish to be separate from Love. This could only seem to be possible in a dream of time where the present is ignored. The ego holds a “memory” of the past, which it projects on the present, making God’s present Love unknown to us. Our thoughts about the future are constructed out of memories from the past. There is no consideration given to the possibility that present Love continues into the “future.” Thus our belief in the ego thought system leaves God’s present Love completely hidden. This is why forgiveness, letting go of the past, is the way we open our minds to the real world, where Love’s presence is accepted and guilt is left behind.

Today we practice letting go of the past and accepting Holy Spirit’s vision of now.

© 2018, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Freeing Ourselves from Limitation

This world is not where you belong. You are a stranger here. But it is given you to find the means whereby the world no longer seems to be a prison house or jail for anyone.

But you must change your mind about the purpose of the world, if you would find escape. You will be bound till all the world is seen by you as blessed, and everyone made free of your mistakes and honored as he is.

Peace is the bridge that everyone will cross, to leave this world behind. But peace begins within the world perceived as different, and leading from this fresh perception to the gate of Heaven and the way beyond. Peace is the answer to conflicting goals, to senseless journeys, frantic, vain pursuits, and meaningless endeavors. Now the way is easy, sloping gently toward the bridge where freedom lies within the peace of God.

And you look up and on toward Heaven, with the body’s eyes but serving for an instant longer now. Peace is already recognized at last, and you can feel its soft embrace surround your heart and mind with comfort and with love.

For peace is union, if it be of God. (A Course in Miracles Workbook Lesson 200,W-pI.200.4:3-5;5:2-3;8;10:5-6;11:6. See also ACIM Lesson 200 Insights.)

While we believe we are limited to a body, we will project that belief on what we see, perceiving other bodies and forms as real. By letting go of this projection, we free ourselves to look past the projections and see the unity of Love, which we share with All That is. In this perfect oneness, conflict does not exist and so there is perfect peace.

Forgiveness — letting go of the false image of a separate identity — is the means to welcome the peace of God. Judgment and peace cannot coexist. Judgment always involves conflicting purposes and goals. The oneness of Love has only one purpose — to extend Love. As we join with Love’s oneness, we find the peace and joy of God.  We extend Love to all.

© 2018, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Accepting Holy Spirit’s Help

Let me not forget my function [to forgive, overlook what never happened]. I would not forget my function, because I would remember my Self. I cannot fulfill my function if I forget it. And unless I fulfill my function, I will not experience the joy that God intends for me.

Suitable specific forms of this idea include:

Let me not use this to hide my function from me.
I would use this as an opportunity to fulfill my function.
This may threaten my ego, but cannot change my function in any way. (A Course in Miracles Workbook Lesson 82,W-pI.82:3-4. See also ACIM Lesson 82 Insights.)

When we act as if the body and what we see happen in the world is real, we have judged against the oneness of Love. We are believing that it is possible to limit Love by separating from It. But to separate from Love is to make ourselves totally unaware of It. Partial or selective love is impossible.

It is this attempt to limit Love, to judge against It, that must be forgiven. This is our only meaningful purpose in the world. To fulfill this purpose, we must join with the Holy Spirit, the Truth in our mind.

Every situation, every relationship, every perception is an opportunity to let the Holy Spirit show us how to see it as a whole, in the oneness of Love. He will help us see past the appearances of conflict and limitation to the reality of Love. In Love we will see our perfect safety, peace and joy. We will forgive the illusion of loss and welcome the reality of the changeless Love we are.

© 2018, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Accepting the Love We Are

We thank our Father for one thing alone; that we are separate from no living thing, and therefore one with Him. And we rejoice that no exceptions ever can be made which would reduce our wholeness, nor impair or change our function to complete the One Who is Himself completion. We give thanks for every living thing, for otherwise we offer thanks for nothing, and we fail to recognize the gifts of God to us.

Walk, then, in gratitude the way of love. For hatred is forgotten when we lay comparisons aside. What more remains as obstacles to peace? The fear of God is now undone at last, and we forgive without comparing. Thus we cannot choose to overlook some things, and yet retain some other things still locked away as “sins.” When your forgiveness is complete you will have total gratitude, for you will see that everything has earned the right to love by being loving, even as your Self.

Our gratitude will pave the way to Him, and shorten our learning time by more than you could ever dream of. Gratitude goes hand in hand with love, and where one is the other must be found. For gratitude is but an aspect of the Love which is the Source of all creation. (A Course in Miracles Workbook Lesson 195,W-pI.195.6;8;9:1-3. See also ACIM Lesson 195 Insights.)

The nature of Love is to be grateful. It is a natural effect that comes with the joy of being united in the oneness of Love. There are no differences in Love, no conflict. Nothing to compare because Love never changes. It is always the same all-encompassing Love of God. Love is our Home.

Judgment (unforgiveness) denies the oneness of Love. It makes us unaware of Love’s presence and leaves us feeling lack, sad and fearful. Judgment depends upon the belief in separation because differences depend upon there being separate states or forms.

To return to the full awareness of the Love we are, we must let go of all judgments. Today we call upon the Holy Spirit to replace our judgments with His singular judgment — that only the oneness of Love is real. With His help we will learn to see past the empty images of the world to the one Love that unites us with our Creator. And we will walk in gratitude.

© 2018, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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