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Study of Text, Chapter 12: VI. The Vision of Christ, P 5. 3-15-16

VI. The Vision of Christ, P 5
5 When you have seen this real world, as you will surely do, you will remember us. Yet you must learn the cost of sleeping, and refuse to pay it. Only then will you decide to awaken. And then the real world will spring to your sight, for Christ has never slept. He is waiting to be seen, for He has never lost sight of you. He looks quietly on the real world, which He would share with you because He knows of the Father’s Love for Him. And knowing this, He would give you what is yours. In perfect peace He waits for you at His Father’s altar, holding out the Father’s Love to you in the quiet light of the Holy Spirit’s blessing. For the Holy Spirit will lead everyone home to his Father, where Christ waits as His Self.

Journal
I can wake up and see the real world, Jesus says, but first I must learn what it is costing me to remain in the dream, and then, as he says, refuse to pay it. I am now fully aware of that cost. It includes sadness and fear and guilt.  In the dream I instead of being joyful, I am depressed. Instead of being satisfied and complete, I am empty and searching, always searching. Instead of seeing love everywhere I look, I see enemies and the need to defend myself. I am always looking for someone to blame, always trying solutions that never really work.

So I am fully aware of the cost of sleeping and dreaming of separation. I also know how to back out of this dream and I have begun to wake up. I see an enemy and I ask the Holy Spirit who it is in front of me. I am told that it is Christ, and I ask to see him. According to my willingness to step back from my own personal judgments, I see something holy and am forever changed. Never again is reality as obscured as it was before. I just keep doing this with every false picture. The joy and peace that I experience is strong motivation to continue.

Sometimes it feels like it is slow going and that I will never do this. I cannot even imagine why I would still prefer to keep this little ego idea intact knowing what I know. If I don’t understand why I want the little self, how will I ever be free of it? Then I start to think I really do want the self, and maybe this is all a trick by God to get me close enough to punish me and snatch my self away from me. Ha ha. This is the ego mind asking these questions and applying its twisted logic to something it can’t understand. The ego figures if you can’t beat them, join them, so it studies the Course along with me, “trying” to help. Not interested!

Here has what has helped me to get on course and to stay there with as few side trips into ego land as possible. I have one purpose and that is the peace of God. Every time I notice that I have taken up a different goal than the peace of God, I stop myself and remember… one goal, one purpose, one function. I want the peace of God because that is a peace that cannot be undone. Nothing can touch the peace of God.

I know this is true because I have experienced this. I have been in the midst of great personal loss and have remained in perfect peace, untouched by that loss. The same for strife. I have experienced the idea that someone wants to attack me and known that the result of this attack would change things, and still my peace remained untouched. The peace of God is independent of what seems to be happening in the world.

And I have also turned my back on that peace and submerged myself in the drama of the moment. This happens as soon as I forget my one goal, and take up another. I am doing my job and enjoying my customers and the fellowship of my co-workers, then I will hear some words, or have some thoughts and suddenly I am on alert. Is that an attack, I wonder? I mentally begin my preparations for battle.

Now I have another goal and that is to defend myself. And just like that, I have sold the peace of God. But hey, I’m back in charge. I’m my “self” again. I know what to do here, I’ve learned a lot about attack and defense in my 67 years of practice. I feel comfortable in that old role as I suit up for the fight. I also feel anxious and afraid and flooded with memories of past experiences that often turned out badly.

These days I pretty quickly change my mind. That peace of God stuff is something else, very compelling. I miss it even though I have given it away myself. I miss it right away. Thank God, very literally, for the Holy Spirit Who waits patiently in my mind for me to come to my senses and ask for His help. The peace of God is mine as soon as that is all I want. It doesn’t take long for me to remember that it really is all I want.

I don’t know how much longer I am going to fall for the ego desire for self-sufficiency and drama, but I know what to do about it and I will do it. The peace of God is my only goal even when I forget and think that I have another goal as well. 

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