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Study of Manual for Teachers 5-15-12

Day 134
2 We have repeatedly said that one who has perfectly accepted the Atonement for himself can heal the world. Indeed, he has already done so. Temptation may recur to others, but never to this One. He has become the risen Son of God. He has overcome death because he has accepted life. He has recognized himself as God created him, and in so doing he has recognized all living things as part of him. There is now no limit on his power, because it is the Power of God. So has his name become the Name of God, for he no longer sees himself as separate from Him.

As I read this paragraph my love and appreciation for Jesus is greater than ever. He perfectly accepted the Atonement and healed the world. That he did this means that I cannot fail in my part because it is done. It seems that I need do nothing but accept my healing. All of the words and practices in the Course are not to change me in any way, but to help me awaken to the realization that there is nothing to change. This has been done. The world is healed.

In accepting the Atonement he has recognized himself as part of God and part of us all. In this recognition of his unity to All That Is, the power of God became available to him. When I choose to accept my part in the Atonement, this same power will be available to me, and until then I can call on his certainty. In calling on the name of Jesus Christ, I am calling on the name of God because there is no separation between them.

There is no separation between me and God either, but I do not accept that as true right now and so my denial of the power of God keeps me from fully accessing it. It’s kind of like having an endlessly replenished bank account that I refuse to believe could be mine. It doesn’t do me any good until I accept it and start writing checks on it.

I’m especially grateful to Jesus this morning because my brother, John, is going for his procedure. He has been in severe pain for about three weeks and has lost nearly 30 pounds. I hear the ego voice in my head saying that there are no simple and harmless outcomes to this test today, that his symptoms prove he is seriously sick and that I can only hope for a lesser of evils. I hear the ego, and acknowledge the temptation to believe it. I ask the Holy Spirit to heal my mind and to use this situation to bring me closer to full acceptance of the Atonement.

Once I have asked for healing, I trust that it is done and so do not dwell on the ego thoughts. They are not true and so there is no reason to give them my attention. God is love, not pain and we are all in God so we cannot be in pain. There was a time when I would be afraid of my inability to hold only that thought in my mind, and would feel guilty that I could not. But not so much anymore.

I see those fearful thoughts, but I am not overwhelmed by them because I know that I have only one job; my job is to give my awareness to false beliefs that make themselves known through fearful thoughts, and to give my willingness to see them healed. I am doing this and so I am doing all I can do and all I need do.

I accept responsibility for not just my little corner of the illusion, but for everything. I am responsible for every illness, because every illness is the same illness. It is the effect of the belief in separation. This belief is the cause of all forms of pain and suffering. Owning responsibility is the first step in healing myself and healing the world. But there is a tremendous difference between responsibility and guilt. I held off on owning responsibility for so long because I did not at first understand this difference.

When I was still confused, every time I found a dark thought in my mind I felt guilty for having it and so I stopped looking. It felt like looking for the dark thoughts was the cause of my suffering. But I felt that Inner calling to heal, as have we all who are reading this, and so I kept returning to that which I was told would bring me this healing.

Eventually, I realized that looking with the Holy Spirit and accepting His healing was actually the way I experienced relief. I accepted that I was not guilty for my thoughts, and in fact, it was the belief I was guilty that caused the pain and suffering I felt. My most heart-felt and healing mantra has been that I am innocent. You are innocent. No matter what the appearance there is only innocence.

Recognizing that I could be responsible without being guilty was the understanding that I needed to redouble my efforts. I became fully willing to do the work I needed to do to bring me closer to realizing that I need do nothing. This undoing is still occurring for me, but it is a happier un-job than before.

Instead of feeling guilty and fearful when I see the wrong-minded thoughts, I feel grateful for the awareness because I have experienced the joy of letting them go. I don’t even feel discouraged that I sometimes find the same belief many times before I have fully allowed healing.

It seems there is nothing to judge and that I am always innocent even when it appears I am not. In fact, the Holy Spirit is helping me learn to disregard appearances because they are not truth. As I refuse to give false appearances my belief they are disappearing from my life. Truly, I am responsible for everything in my life, and innocent of all wrong, and my healing mind is giving me a glimpse of a healed world.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://dev.pathwaysoflight.org
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Posted by Rev. Myron Jones.

Study of Manual for Teachers 5-14-12

Day 134
23. DOES JESUS HAVE A SPECIAL PLACE IN HEALING?

1 God’s gifts can rarely be received directly. Even the most advanced of God’s teachers will give way to temptation in this world. Would it be fair if their pupils were denied healing because of this? The Bible says, “Ask in the name of Jesus Christ.” Is this merely an appeal to magic? A name does not heal, nor does an invocation call forth any special power. What does it mean to call on Jesus Christ? What does calling on his name confer? Why is the appeal to him part of healing?

This is very reassuring on more than one level. I am in Houston right now taking my turn being Brinda’s caretaker. I am also helping my brother, John, Brinda’s husband, because he is having a mystery stomach ailment that is very painful. He has to go for a colonoscopy tomorrow and I prepared his treatment last night before bed so it would be ready for him today and I will be driving him for his procedure.

I also helped prepare and give Brinda her medicine this morning. It is a very complicated procedure that took over an hour to complete. There are many, many medicines that require great care in preparing. There are shots to give and lots of other nursing type things that must be done. No one has ever confused me with a nurse before and it was all strange and a little disconcerting for me.

I knew that I was going to be faced with a lot of apparent proof that people are sick, weak and vulnerable. I knew that I was going to have to deal with magical treatments. For this reason I talked to Holy Spirit even before I got here. I asked Him to help me remember the truth. I asked Him to help me as I watch my mind for mistaken beliefs. I also asked him to help me be, not just a caretaker for Brinda’s body, but a healer for her mind.

How lovely this morning to read that it’s understood that my faith is not complete and that it will waver, but that’s ok. My patient is not going to suffer because I temporarily falter. Thank You, God, for that. I am also given the extra help I need. I can call on my “big brother” for help. I can use the name of Jesus Christ when I ask for healing. He is my source of inspiration as he was a master healer, but more than that, he completed the Atonement and so is Healer for the world. He and I share the same mind and so I can call on him for strength and assistance.

Brinda and I began the day with a reading from the Course and praying together. We looked at Lesson 190 which reminds us that we are responsible for our pain and that it is in the remembrance of our true nature that we are able to change our mind and choose joy instead. She and I talked about the difference between responsibility and blame. We are responsible for everything in our life, but there is no blame, no guilt. Nothing we do is a sin, only a mistake, and mistakes are easily corrected with the Holy Spirit’s help.

Another thought that came to me is that I, too, take responsibility for Brinda’s illness. There is in my mind a belief in guilt and sickness that contributes to the hold of guilt on the mind that we all share. I am excited to spend the day in full willingness to heal that belief in our mind. Lesson 190 says that we have the power to dominate all things we see by merely recognizing what we are. I am willing to look past appearances and seek only the truth. I call on the Power of God, that is also my power, to do this. 

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://dev.pathwaysoflight.org
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Posted by Rev. Myron Jones.

Study of Manual for Teachers 5-13-12

Day 133
7 Who can limit the power of God Himself? Who, then, can say which one can be healed of what, and what must remain beyond God’s power to forgive? This is insanity indeed. It is not up to God’s teachers to set limits upon Him, because it is not up to them to judge His Son. And to judge His Son is to limit his Father. Both are equally meaningless. Yet this will not be understood until God’s teacher recognizes that they are the same mistake. Herein does he receive Atonement, for he withdraws his judgment from the Son of God, accepting him as God created him. No longer does he stand apart from God, determining where healing should be given and where it should be withheld. Now can he say with God, “This is my beloved Son, created perfect and forever so.” 

How wonderful to be relieved of the burden of deciding who deserves healing and under what circumstances. How wonderful to know that there are no limits to God’s healing power and that never again do I have to suffer under the delusion that something cannot or should not be healed.

In fact, as my mind accepts that this true I realize that it could be no other way. There is only God and therefore there cannot be anything unlike God. If I think there is, then I must be looking at something that does not exist. I must be looking at illusion. As Lesson 190 says, “If God is real there is no pain. If pain is real, there is no God.”

I found this Lesson very helpful when I was suffering from a lot of pain last year. As I began to realize that this would have to be true (simply because if God is all there is then pain could exist only if God were pain) I learned to use those sentences as my mantra when I imagined I was in pain. I watched the pain I had suffered for years simply dissolve away.

Lesson 190 goes on to say:

It is your thoughts alone that cause you pain. Nothing external to your mind can hurt or injure you in any way. There is no cause beyond yourself that can reach down and bring oppression. No one but yourself affects you. There is nothing in the world that has the power to make you ill or sad, or weak or frail. But it is you who have the power to dominate all things you see by merely recognizing what you are. As you perceive the harmlessness in them, they will accept your holy will as theirs. And what was seen as fearful now becomes a source of innocence and holiness.

I have had to remind myself of this frequently, even though I experienced how true it is. It is still hard for me to hold onto the truth that I am God’s Son and that nothing has dominion over me. I have taught myself littleness for so long that this is my default position, and I still must remind myself that it is not true.

Since I am still in the practice stage of forgiving this form of the illusion, I can still be too easily distracted from the truth by appearances. I am going to Houston to take a turn at being Brinda’s caretaker today. I will be vigilant for thoughts that deny God’s power to forgive anything. I will be vigilant for thoughts that express judgment of any kind. I ask You, Holy Spirit, to help me in my vigilance and to heal all that I find there that denies God.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://dev.pathwaysoflight.org
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Posted by Rev. Myron Jones.

Study of Manual for Teachers 5-12-12

Day 132
6 The offer of Atonement is universal. It is equally applicable to all individuals in all circumstances. And in it is the power to heal all individuals of all forms of sickness. Not to believe this is to be unfair to God, and thus unfaithful to Him. A sick person perceives himself as separate from God. Would you see him as separate from you? It is your task to heal the sense of separation that has made him sick. It is your function to recognize for him that what he believes about himself is not the truth. It is your forgiveness that must show him this. Healing is very simple. Atonement is received and offered. Having been received, it must be accepted. It is in the receiving, then, that healing lies. All else must follow from this single purpose.

This paragraph says that Atonement is universal. It applies in all circumstances and to everyone. It heals all forms of sickness. This is because all sickness is the result of believing in separation. If I did not believe I was separate from God I could not be sick, not sick of mind or body. My sister in law and my brother would be healed of the sickness in their bodies just as Jesus healed physical bodies. Those I have thought of as unenlightened or less enlightened would awaken with me, as I allowed my mind to be healed of the belief they or I could be separated from God. The healed mind does not see any differences between sickness, nor any hierarchy of illusions. Forgiveness applies equally to all of them and is unfailing in its healing power.

How do I offer Atonement (or healing) for someone else who thinks he is separate from God? I know the truth for him, that’s all. I just know that he is not separate from God. I know that absolute certainty. I am not distracted by actions that appear to prove otherwise. I don’t believe anything I see that does not point to the truth.

How is it that my belief in the truth about him could affect him? This seems odd only if I really do believe in separation. If I believe that I am separate from this person then I question how my belief could heal his mind. But if I am a true healer, if I am a teacher of God and my mind is healed, then I know that we are one, and what is true in my mind is true in his mind as well. There is no separation of our minds.

The body and its ailments, the world we see, the little ego mind with its crazy beliefs, are all effects of thoughts in our mind, and ideas leave not their source. As our mind heals, so do the effects of the mind. And since there is only one mind, as mine is healed so is everyone’s. Does it appear that the healing is not accepted? Do not be deceived by appearances.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://dev.pathwaysoflight.org
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Posted by Rev. Myron Jones.

Study of Manual for Teachers 5-11-12

Day 131
5 When a teacher of God fails to heal, it is because he has forgotten Who he is. Another’s sickness thus becomes his own. In allowing this to happen, he has identified with another’s ego, and has thus confused him with a body. In so doing, he has refused to accept the Atonement for himself, and can hardly offer it to his brother in Christ’s Name. He will, in fact, be unable to recognize his brother at all, for his Father did not create bodies, and so he is seeing in his brother only the unreal. Mistakes do not correct mistakes, and distorted perception does not heal. Step back now, teacher of God. You have been wrong. Lead not the way, for you have lost it. Turn quickly to your Teacher, and let yourself be healed.

This paragraph is very clear. If I fail to heal then it is because I have forgotten who I am and so have forgotten who my brother is. I now believe he is this body with all its apparent problems. I have allowed my confusion to blind me to his brilliant perfection, thus I no longer even see him, but see only the reflection of my own mistaken beliefs. In this state I am no longer a healer, but one in need of healing and so must step back and allow the Holy Spirit to heal my mind.

This happened to me first thing this morning. Not that I am so healed that I usually see everyone as the Christ, but I saw my confusion very clearly when I thought of my brother (biological, not spiritual). John is Brinda’s husband. As I’ve mentioned before, Brinda is recovering from transplant surgery. John has been unable to help very much in her care because he became sick. Even though there have been tests run, he doesn’t know what is wrong, only that it has something to do with his stomach and is very painful.

I was thinking about how hard it is going to be to find enough caregivers over the long haul if John has something really bad, like cancer maybe. I thought how devastating it would be for Brinda and of course how hard it would be for John. Suddenly I realized that I was not seeing my brother, but seeing only my fears projected onto him. I was not a healer at all, but one who needed to be healed, and I asked Holy Spirit for help.

I don’t know if this is true for everyone, but I notice that when I am identified with ego the way I was this morning, even as I realize what has happened and decide differently, it takes a few minutes for me to back out of that thinking. I am for a moment or two confused. Confused is such a perfect word for what it feels like. I know I am thinking wrong, and yet, I cannot find the right thoughts. Then I ask the Holy Spirit to correct my thinking and bring me to truth and it is done. That period of confusion used to last a longer time, sometimes for days, but now it passes fairly quickly, but it is still disconcerting while it is happening.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://dev.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this notice is included.

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Posted by Rev. Myron Jones.

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