LESSON 175
God is but Love, and therefore so am I.
1 (159) I give the miracles I have received.
God is but Love, and therefore so am I.
2 (160) I am at home. Fear is the stranger here.
God is but Love, and therefore so am I.
Fear is the hardest belief for me to give up. I have succeeded in giving up many forms of fear. For instance, I realize that my grandchildren are going to begin feeling very real effects from global warming and their children will truly suffer. I don’t know what to do about that except to keep trying to get someone who cares elected.
At one time this sort of thing scared me and I would be anxious every time I thought of it. Now, I do what I can to change this, but I am not afraid of it. The same thing is true about the possibility of Trump getting us into a nuclear war. I recognize the possibility and do what I can but I am not afraid of it.
But I am still afraid of heights and I still fear for my son. I even get fearful for my granddaughter who is a fearless little explorer. What I do know about fear is that it is not real. It is the effect of believing in separation. As long as I identify with my humanness, I will have fear, but that fear lessens as I remember who I am. It lessens daily now. One day, I will shoo that stranger out of my mind altogether.
PS: The only fear I still have these months later is the fear of heights. I care about the other stuff to some degree and I will do what feels right to do, but I am not afraid. So it is that we can let go of the belief in fear. It can be done. It’s funny to me that I still have the fear of heights but each time it comes up, I give my willingness to see this differently, so let’s see how that goes.
Manual for Teachers
2.WHO ARE THERE PUPILS? 4,5
4 Time really, then, goes backward to an instant so ancient that it is beyond all memory, and past even the possibility of remembering. Yet because it is an instant that is relived again and again and still again, it seems to be now. And thus it is that pupil and teacher seem to come together in the present, finding each other as if they had not met before. The pupil comes at the right time to the right place. This is inevitable, because he made the right choice in that ancient instant which he now relives. So has the teacher, too, made an inevitable choice out of an ancient past. God’s Will in everything but seems to take time in the working-out. What could delay the power of eternity?
That we are here studying A Course in Miracles together was always inevitable because it has already happened. It only seems to be a new event, something we decided on in this lifetime. Like everything in our stories, what seems to be true is not. But it is not a choice made for us, but a choice we made ourselves long ago. Both student and teacher made an inevitable choice out of an ancient past. This is God’s Will and though it seems to have taken a lot of time to work its way, there is no time in eternity so it was done instantly and always had been done. Weirdly enough, though I have trouble finding words for this, I am beginning to make sense of it.
5 When pupil and teacher come together, a teaching-learning situation begins. For the teacher is not really the one who does the teaching. God’s Teacher speaks to any two who join together for learning purposes. The relationship is holy because of that purpose, and God has promised to send His Spirit into any holy relationship. In the teaching-learning situation, each one learns that giving and receiving are the same. The demarcations they have drawn between their roles, their minds, their bodies, their needs, their interests, and all the differences they thought separated them from one another, fade and grow dim and disappear. Those who would learn the same course share one interest and one goal. And thus he who was the learner becomes a teacher of God himself, for he has made the one decision that gave his teacher to him. He has seen in another person the same interests as his own.
I love the way paragraph 5 begins. Right away the stage is set to express the fluid nature of the teaching-learning situation. I have students I work with every day. It appears as if I am the teacher and they the student, and those are the terms we use to make things simpler to speak about. But actually, when we come together for the purpose of true learning, that is checking our egos at the door, leaving behind our separate agendas and all expectations based on what we think we know, neither is the teacher and both are the teacher.
In our emptiness, we have made a place for the Teacher to come forward in our awareness and to teach through us. Since He knows the gap of personhood is an illusion, He moves seamlessly from one to another, healing as we speak our inadequate words, or say nothing. All that is needed is a true Heart’s desire to be healed through our union of purpose. This profound event, this holy instant may even go unnoticed and unremarked by the two who have come together, but it is a miracle, none-the-less. It is the fulfillment of our purpose.
My experience of the process is that I have absolutely nothing to do with its fulfillment. I simply show up where prompted, follow guidance as best as I can, be as willing as I can be, and even all this is only vaguely in my awareness, and sometimes not at all. It’s not my job to choose where and with whom this is to happen. Jesus is in charge of the Atonement and knows where the chain needs to link next. What a relief to be moved, to be lived, to let go of the intolerable burden of making decisions and taking action on my own. And what an illusion it was anyway.
Holy Spirit, I invite you to guide me today in all things, to speak through me, to move me where I am needed, and above all, to call me back to sanity if I were to start running around on my own thinking I am the one doing something.
Text
XI. Christmas as the End of Sacrifice P 2
T-15.XI.2. The sign of Christmas is a star, a light in darkness. 2 See it not outside yourself, but shining in the Heaven within, and accept it as the sign the time of Christ has come. 3 He comes demanding nothing. 4 No sacrifice of any kind, of anyone, is asked by Him. 5 In His Presence the whole idea of sacrifice loses all meaning. 6 For He is Host to God. 7 And you need but invite Him in Who is there already, by recognizing that His Host is One, and no thought alien to His Oneness can abide with Him there. 8 Love must be total to give Him welcome, for the Presence of Holiness creates the holiness that surrounds it. 9 No fear can touch the Host Who cradles God in the time of Christ, for the Host is as holy as the perfect Innocence which He protects, and Whose power protects Him.
Journal
I used to abide in the darkness and didn’t even know it was dark. It was just all I knew. As I studied and practiced the Course, light began to shine within me, first just a spark, a tiny spark. The more I aspired to spiritual enlightenment, the brighter the light became. Now, in retrospect, I see how dark it was before and wonder how I could function in such dismal conditions. I had no idea who or what I was, and I didn’t feel the connection with all my brothers like I do now. How lonely it was, how discouraging and fearful to think I was alone.
Now it feels very strange that I was afraid of the light of love that was waiting for my desire for it so that it could ignite into the blaze of love it is now. I wonder what I thought it was going to cost me. I see now that there was no sacrifice asked of me. None. God is Love and Love can only offer Itself, certainly not harm, nor can It ask for sacrifice. Here is all I gave up in order to know this wonder; hatred, fear, guilt, rage, jealousy, competition, grievances, judgments and depression. It doesn’t feel like a sacrifice at all.
As soon as I made room for it, I received peace that hardly ever wavers and never wavers for long. I received love that seems to grow daily as if it has taken root within me and flourishes there. I feel the love in me and as it flows outward it is returned to me. What an amazing experience this is! I feel protected and upheld, enlightened and cherished. Instead of being upset that I am not perfect, I joyfully anticipate perfection as I open my heart to it. That I don’t seem to be a perfect expression of my Creator now, doesn’t matter at all. The perfection is there and I know it will show itself soon enough and I look forward to the experience of love that is total. What a Christmas gift this is!
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