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October - December, 2008

What Is Forgiveness?

Rev. Sally Pankratz

Even though I’ve been a sudent of A Course in Miracles for many years and more recently have also been communing with The Way of Mastery and The Holy Spirit’s Interpretation of the New Testament, I still haven’t felt comfortable with forgiveness. Most times when I read the word, I hear, “What’s forgiveness?” And when I apply what I think it is, it still feels like judgement and guilt.

I’ve been repeating Pathways course 906: Healing through Forgiveness and this past week while I Was meditating on ACIM Lesson 193 and getting excited. Yippee! I’m going to learn the lesson God wants me to learn and I’ll know home again. Then, there it was again, forgiveness, damn.

I asked for Spirit’s help and I got forgiveness is “for giving love ness.” Giving love to my brother, my self, and my Father. Wow! Now that felt totally right. I could do that, or at least I could practice that and it always feels great when I do.

This probably wouldn’t have helped me much previously, either, but I’d just gotten through a long period of questioning what Love actually is. I learned it wasn’t special love, sunday school love, pity love or sacrifice love. I came to see it best and feel it best as NTI describes it: peace, acceptance, joy; recognition or remembering, and always, the purpose of One.

Thank you Holy Spirit. Works for me!

Sally Pankratz, O.M.C., is a Pathways of Light minister living in Kiel, Wisconsin.

© 2008, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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October - December, 2008

God’s Insurance Plan

Rev. Annie Arbona

One of my favorite quotes from A Course in Miracles  (T-20.IV.8:4-12) is one that is included in Pathways of Light ministerial training course 201: Adventure into the Sacred Life — Introduction to Spiritual Ministry. Here Jesus lovingly explains to us how we are taken by the hand when we commit to following God’s Plan. I feel such power emanating from those words, and I feel so safe when I read them. It’s like having a Mega-Eternal-Perfect-God-Given Insurance Plan with no expiration date. And it’s not “like having,” we do have it forever. Wow!

Jesus reassures us that when we accept God’s Plan, there will be nothing that the Divine arranger of all things perfect, the Holy Spirit, “will not arrange for you without your effort.” So the plan will involve no effort on our part.

Is relief the correct term for what I feel when I read this? It is more like a deep sense of resting in God. We all need to realize it in the depth of our heart, so that we can enjoy the gift of reassurance.

“He will go before you making straight your path and leaving in your way no stones to trip on and no obstacles to bar your way.” My first reaction to this is, “too good to be true.” Then Spirit bathes me with the light of His Wisdom and I know in my heart that It’s Perfectly Good because it is Perfectly True!

Everything you need will be given you and every difficultly “will melt away before you reach it.” We must not forget the heavenly promises that we are heir to. This is the true abundance of the Spirit. In the words of this quote, the treasures that we partake of are brought back to our awareness. We have never walked alone.

God’s plan will definitely always be assured us; it’s fulfillment is given and also guaranteed. Is there anything we need to be preoccupied about? If time could ever be wasted, it would be wasted by our worrisome thoughts. There is no need to spend time worrying or thinking things will not work out for us.

Insurance means guaranteed protection, and God’s plan offers perfect insurance, for it “rests on certainty and not contingency. It rests on you. And what can be more certain than a Son of God.” My dear friends, following God’s plan makes it possible that we walk through life in perfect security and with perfect trust, knowing we are held while taken on a safe journey back Home; a journey without distance, a journey back to the Heart of God!

Rev. Annie Arbona is a Pathways of Light minister living in Charleston, South Carolina. She is on the Pathways of Light staff and is in charge of the Spanish translation project.

© 2008, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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October - December, 2008

A Weight Lifted

Rev. Marta Schwartz

Recently, I have had two incidents that I cannot fully explain without the help of Holy Spirit. The first happened while I was working. I am a massage therapist. While I was in session with a client, I kept experiencing a troubling thought pattern. This went on for several minutes and became very distracting to me.

I mentally asked Holy Spirit to help me. Holy Spirit immediately told me to say the Our Father and Hail Mary. Growing up Catholic, I am very familiar with these prayers. I mentally prayed one after another.

In less than a minute, I got the visual of two flying beings leaving me. The vision was a bit startling, but peace was restored to my heart and to this day, I cannot recall the thoughts that were troubling me. It worked that well.

The second incident happened even more recently. A student and friend of mine asked me to perform a house blessing in her newly built home. She practices Hinduism and wanted an invocation to three goddesses, Lakshmi, Saraswati and Durga. I have studied Hinduism but do not practice it. For clarification purposes, there is only one Supreme Being in Hinduism but aspects of the Supreme Being manifests in other deities.

I really wanted to do the house blessings and I knew that Holy Spirit would help. I researched the qualities of these deities, came up with an appropriate invocation and a few days later set out to do the house blessing.

It was a beautiful evening. There were eight people in attendance. After purifying everyone with sage and lavender, we sang a gratitude song taught to me by a local shaman. To represent the three goddesses and their properties of love, health, wisdom, abundance and protection, I added a drop of corresponding essential oils in the blessing water. We went through the entire house playing drums, bells and tambourines. Everyone was really participating in the ceremony.

After the whole house was blessed, we came back to our starting point, gave thanks and closed the ritual by throwing pennies and making wishes in her very elaborate fountain which sits in the foyer.

After sharing food and socializing, my husband and I left in a very good mood. Even though it was getting very late, we felt energized and relaxed. The following week I continued to feel energized as well as blessed by the goddesses I had invoked. I felt very happy, in great health, money flowed easily, new friendships formed and new clientele scheduled appointments with me.

My point to all of this is that Divine Grace is limitless. God shows Love in so many ways and with so many forms and symbols, depending on what would make the greatest impact in our hearts. It really showed me not to box God in by trying to define the One who really cannot be defined. To be open to all ways and allow, through Holy Spirit, Love to enter in and show us what true magic and miracles are all about. Thank You, God.

Rev. Marta Schwartz, M.D., O.M.C., is a Pathways of Light minister living in Lawrence, Kansas.

© 2008, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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October - December, 2008

What Is a Teacher of God?

Rev. Jean Weston

In the Manual for Teachers under section 1 the first sentence states: “A teacher of God is anyone who chooses to be one. His qualifications consist solely in this; somehow, somewhere he has made a deliberate choice in which he did not see his interests as apart from someone else’s.”

This is sooooo helpful to clear up the mistake of thinking teachers are somehow above others. A teacher doesn’t need a credential. A teacher wants to be helpful and learn themselves. I really like the point that states “somewhere he has made a deliberate choice in which he did not see his interests as apart from someone else’s.” This reminds me of the statement in the Bible that “where two or more are gathered in my name, there I will be.” I think this is very important. What does it mean “in my name?” By looking at it with this idea from the Manual for Teachers, I see that it means where two or more people truly come together and put aside any competition or way of measuring one against the other. They are joined. They are joined in purpose, but even more importantly, they are joined in spirit. They know they are one. This is the only way we can truly work together in spirit.

So, a teacher of God, it seems, needs to understand this. A teacher of God needs to know that whoever they are talking with is one with them. Their understanding of each other as one is crucial for anything to be accomplished by them that will be of any lasting importance. This is true of accomplishments in the illusion as well as eternally.

It also means that a teacher of God can be virtually anyone. They only need the willingness. The willingness to want to teach — whether through speaking or simply by being. They also need the willingness to see other’s interests to also be theirs — in each situation in which they find themselves.

Rev. Jean Weston is a Pathways of Light minister living in Salisbury Mill, New York.

© 2008, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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