Trust

“You abide nowhere but in the infinitude of God’s presence.  Mastery comes when finally you choose to release all attachment to fear.  And in perfect surrender, you release the dream of the dreamer itself, and allow the mystery of Life to live you, without obstruction, without fear, in perfect knowledge that:

“I and my Father are one.  There is nothing I have to do to get God.  There are only some things to be released, so that God can get me.”  (“The Way of Transformation,” WOM, Chapter 14, Page 177)

Ask what we need to do today so that God can have full rein in our lives, so that “God can get me.”  He is waiting patiently, deep within, for the blessing of our saying, “I surrender to You.”

We need to “be willing to have it so,” an Eastern concept that means that we surrender to what life evolves for us.  This doesn’t mean that we acquiesce to something bad; we can still choose to change things.  But often we don’t need to change anything at all.  God has everything in hand.

The “awful” thing that we want to turn from may, in fact, be a blessing in disguise.  We never know, in our finiteness, for in this world we are limited in what we can know at any given time. 

Trust in the future.  Trust God to take things in hand, and us with those things.

Seek First the Kingdom

“And by using time wisely, I cultivated over time, the willingness and the ability to seek first the Kingdom, even to the point where I was doing it prior to every word spoken, every gesture made with the body. . . .”  (“The Way of Transformation,” WOM, Chapter 14, Page 176)

If we could only be like Jesus in this—to seek the Kingdom prior to everything that we do!  We can only try, and when we succeed, we will be blessed beyond description.

How exactly would we do this?  It can only come by staying in close contact with our inner Being, where God dwells.  This part of us is accessed by intuition, listening to the Divine as it presents itself to us.  Our insight will grow the more that we turn to the Inner on as much of a constant basis as we can possibly manage.

Listen for the silent whispers of how to proceed in our day.  We don’t “hear” anything, but we do know, and this knowing is profound.

Don’t forget God today.  He is our Helper, our Guide, our guidance.  And the quicker that we turn to Him before we take action, the more our very actions will bless us.

Awe & Mystery of Our Self

“I decided to be in relationship with the totality of my Self—mind, spirit, soul, emotion, body—with the same sense of awe and mystery that I felt when I looked upon the farthest of stars deep into the night on a quiet hillside.  And that changed everything.”  (“The Way of Transformation,” WOM, Chapter 14, Page 175 – 176)

Jesus is speaking in this channeled work from Jayem.  Here Jesus says that he began to see his totality with awe and mystery.

We might do the same, for our spirit partakes of the same essence of God.  Jesus was onto something here.  If we think about ourselves as a mystery that we can’t fully comprehend, we will be led to turn to God for a resolution of that mystery.

Think about the wonder of our very Self today.  Let God speak to our heart about who we really are.

Jesus: “Awe of Mystery”

“I began to discern what brought me true joy.  Not just a moment of pleasure, or satisfaction, or sense of security, but which elicited true joy.  I discovered that what always brought joy was when I was willing to surrender into the awe of mystery. . . .”  (“The Way of Transformation,” WOM, Chapter 14, Page 175)

We too can experience true joy when we let our mind and heart rise upward to the true mystery of God.  Jesus is here laying out a pathway for us to follow, too.

We need to be aware when we are feeling joy as opposed to simply the earthly happiness.  Joy is on a higher plane, more akin to heaven on earth than our usual egoic world.  We have flights of happiness when the ego rules, but we don’t experience true joy—joy that lasts and warms our heart constantly.

Ask today to experience this true joy.  Lift our mind and heart to the mysteries of God.  Experience awe in His presence.

We will have a day like no other.

Stepping into Our Tomorrows

“The use of time determines, at all levels, what you will experience in your tomorrows. . . .[L]ong after the body dies, you will indeed be continually stepping into your tomorrows.”  (“The Way of Transformation,” WOM, Chapter 14, Page 172)

This quotation is a poignant reminder of our eternal life, “stepping into your tomorrows.”  We need to know that we are preparing for the future always, even as we try with all our might to live in the Now (as Tolle says).  If we stay close to God, we will know how to make the best use of all of the Now times.  We will thereby be doing all that we can to ensure a good future.

We must not live in the past.  It is true that we can learn from the past, but we don’t want to get “stuck” in it.  The best preparation for the future is today well lived.  I read that a long time ago, too long to give a footnote.  It is something that we need as a constant reminder of what we are doing and where we are heading.

We don’t often think of the “use” of time.  We may rue our present, and that is not the way to live well.  Time is an illusion, it is true, but it seems real enough for us in our present environment.  So we can’t just ignore it.

Make today count.  Make all our days count.

The life well lived starts with today.

Freedom

“[Y]ou are the power and the source for all that you think, all that you see, all that you feel, and all that you would be and do.  You abide in that freedom constantly.”  (“The Way of Transformation,” WOM, Chapter 14, Page 170)

We give lip service to the law of attraction, but all too often we don’t take it to heart and really live it.  We make the difference; we have that much power.

This is a secular way of viewing our world, but when we add spirituality to it, we benefit far more.  We try to live with only one hand to make a difference when we don’t listen to the New Testament, and learn that believing about the outcome of anything we do is vitally important.  Live with both hands today.  Let the power of a full commitment change our lives.

We make the difference in our lives and in the world we inhabit.  If all of us were to turn to the Force who guides everything, we would know a change for the better that would astound us.

Change of Mind

“Therefore, The Way of Transformation does not require you to change your circumstances.  It merely requires that you change your attitude toward them by recognizing that they are harmless, by recognizing that you have called all things to yourself.”  (“The Way of Transformation,” WOM, Chapter 14, Page 170)

It is very reassuring to me to realize that I have called all things to myself.  If I like what I have called, then all is well.  If I don’t, then I have the means to change it.  We really do have that power.

Attitudinal shifts can be easy.  It just requires that we make up our minds for a change.  When we pray, we get inklings of the things that need to change in our lives.  And then we make the tiny effort required to turn things around to something better—if we are not satisfied with what we have.  But often, the only thing that needs to change is our attitude.  We need to realize that God’s way is right and good, and when we follow the best and highest that we know, all is well.

Our circumstances may not seem harmless to us, but when we change our attitude toward what transpires, we can see the benefit in what we have been through.  We know more now, we love more now—and so attitudinal change is inevitable as we progress along life’s highway.

Make up our mind to alter what we don’t like.  We will be helped.

Awakening Is Simple, without Effort

“The Way of Transformation is simple, for the way of efforting one’s way into the Kingdom cannot flow from the guidance of the Holy Spirit.”  (“The Way of Transformation,” WOM, Chapter 14, Page 169)

We move into transformation when our heart is full, when Love overflows our being.  We don’t get God’s attention by imploring relentlessly and often.  He knows when we want to think that we are ready for Awakening.  He doesn’t always agree.

So we must be patient, know that by our effort we can do only so much.  A Course of Love counsels the removal of fear and judgment from our thoughts and feelings.  When we do this, we are removing the blocks to the awareness of love.  And that is what we need to do.

The only thing we need to do.  Awakening may come suddenly, when we least expect it.  I know someone who had suppressed anger for years, and then when he blurted out his discontent, he knew immediately that grace had descended upon him, and he felt intuitively that this Awakening would last.

God knew all along that he was cloaking his anger, and this very cloaking was standing in the way of genuine loving.  And God certainly wants us genuine.

Know that efforting will stand in the way.  Be ourselves, warts and all.  Then God can act in us to remove the impediments that have kept us from Awakening.  And we will find that removing fear and judgment, in genuineness, takes no effort at all.

Need

“I do not need the one that you call my Mother; she does not need me.  But, oh, how we delight in creating together that which extends the holy, the good, and the beautiful—without end!  Will you come and play with us?”  (“The Way of Transformation,” WOM, Chapter 13, Page 168)

“Need” is a slippery term.  Jesus and Mary are both whole in themselves, united with God, and so the human aspects of needing a soulmate are muted. 

We might learn from Jesus’ example.  If we approach our significant others with “need,” they may be overwhelmed, and paradoxically be less able to actually help us.  Our neediness drives them away, something that we don’t want.  When we love from a full heart, united with God, we love aright.  And “needing” another person is not part of the equation.

Of course, we are not as advanced as is Jesus, nor Mary.  We sometimes do “need” human companionship and human love in addition to what we feel from God.  This is as it should be.  We don’t have to pretend that we are more advanced than we are.  But our relationships blossom when we don’t lean on each other.  We go to God for that support. 

Don’t burden our nearest and dearest with gigantic needs than only God can fulfill.  Enjoy the companionship and the love, but go to God when we feel needy.

This puts things in the right perspective.

Wonder of This World

There are dimensions of experience awaiting you that are so much grander than the dimension of the body-mind!  But the way that you get to them is by bringing full awareness to what you are choosing to experience in each and every moment. (“The Way of Transformation,” WOM, Chapter 13, Page.167)

I don’t think that this quotation is describing dimensions of experience in the afterlife; I think this quotation is describing a greater dimension to experience right in this world we inhabit now.  The “body-mind” is circumvented, all too often.  Sometimes we have not given up the ego, and egoic tendencies and egoic patterns sabotage us at every turn.  Sometimes we have given up the ego, but we find that we still don’t know what to do with ourselves because we haven’t yet found Christ-consciousness.

Be gentle with ourselves.  We are not without limitations in this world.  But when we open to larger dimensions, intuitively, we are coming in to our own.  These intuitive responses are telling us how to live happily.  They are also solving problems for us, problems with solutions right with the problems.

If we focus on the wonder of this world, we will be taking the right path.  We are meant to be happy here, regardless of limitations, regardless of any suffering/pain.  We can rise above difficulties if we make the mental and heartfelt effort.  And there is very little struggle involved.  The Holy Spirit asks only for a “little willingness” (from A Course in Miracles).

Enjoy the wonder of nature.  Enjoy the wonder of our relationships, becoming holy rather than special.  Revel in the pleasures of this world, because this is not hedonism.  This is supreme good sense.  If we make the most of what we have now, then whatever comes in the future will be easier to take.

We will have discovered the secret to a good life.

Transformation

“The only transformation you can experience in space and time is the reaching down from the depth of the ocean into one tiny, temporary wave and readjusting the little foam drops on the tip of the wave you call the body-mind of the self, so that it begins to be a transparent conduit for an awareness of the ocean itself.  That is the game of awakening.  It is actually the most delightful use of time you will ever find.”  (“The Way of Transformation,” WOM, Chapter 13, Page 166 – 167)

Don’t we want to have delight in our lives?  Well, when we are out of sorts, then we need to adjust that tiny, temporary wave from the ocean that is our body-mind.  This personal self is temporarily inaccessible to a greater understanding.  But we can’t readjust on our own; we need help, and we can have it from God Himself.  Ask for help in removing discontent, moving us to delight.  There is no better use of time.

We are—all of us—engaged in Awakening, whether we are seeing glimpses or are sustaining it.  We can hope that our glimpses will elongate, and elongate they will when our attitude is right.  Ask to have a readjustment whenever we lapse into negativism.  Ask to see things properly again.

Yes, we want delight in living.  And we can have it!  This is the great promise of Awakening.

Unlimited, Unfettered, Unvictimized Living in This World

Note:  I will leave Choose Only Love for the moment, and return to The Way of Mastery in my blog posts.  I will return to Choose Only Love a little later on. – Celia

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“You then, are Christ, playing in the world—unlimited, unfettered, unvictimized by anything. . . .You simply create the structure of your experience.”   (“The Way of Transformation,” WOM, Chapter 13, Page 165)

Here we see that we are indeed creating our own reality, just as we heard in New Thought and in the New Age.  If we believe that Jayem channeled Jesus, and I believe he did, we have on the highest authority—Jesus himself—that we attract what happens to us by the focus to which we bring our consciousness.

This is how Jesus can be with us, any of us, at one and the same time.  He focuses his consciousness wherever he might wish.  This is indeed a reassuring concept.

So:  We are all—ALL—Christ, playing in our world.  We are not victimized by anything, because we always have the choice to change our minds about what we experience.  We are unlimited creations of God.  Our potential is therefore limitless.  A Course in Miracles talks about “limitless release” and it is this that we are confronting today in this blog post.  We have the right and the will to structure our experience in line with the will of God—or to avoid Him and choose to live by our own very limited ego.

I hope that all will choose the guidance of God and will follow His will for a glorious future—beginning today.  There is no better way to live.  Unlimited, unfettered, unvictimized. . . .

Heaven Is Where We Are Living Now

“Within your self is a place where you can read God’s purpose for you.  There, in the sacred precinct of your holy will, resides truth, love, and Heaven.  It is where we are living now.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 7:III

We often wonder what we are here for.  This quotation tells us that we simply must look within to find the answer.  Of course, we can still get ourselves all tangled up with superficial answers that are coming from either the ego or (later) the patterns of the ego.  We can still confuse ourselves.

The way to be certain that we are reading our purpose correctly is, in my opinion, to look back over our life and see what we have been doing that seemed “right.”  When we have really been on the beam, we have known it.  Our joy has been full, for joy is an indication that all is well.  God intends us to be joyous, even in the midst of living in a difficult world.  God’s joy is an indication that we are in our purpose.

I think we have an overall purpose, all of us, to heal ourselves, and our brothers and sisters.  This purpose obviously takes many forms, and it is these many forms that we need to focus upon—to know what is the particular form that healing takes in our lives.  A Course in Miracles has a good affirmation, “I am here only to be truly helpful.”  And in the healing that we will do, we will be truly helpful.  We don’t impose on another our own will, though.  We let healing occur through our connection with God.

Heaven resides in this inner place that we are accessing today.  As the quotation says, “It is where we are living now.”

Enjoy heaven today.

Listen to God

“God communicates eternally with your self and all selves without interruption of any kind.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 7:III

If we only listened to the message of this quotation!  Yes, God is always right here, trying to get through to us.  Why don’t we listen more?  We are willful, and sometimes that will is turned against divine guidance.  We think we know better, but we should know from experience that when we forge ahead, unmindful of what God might say, we make mistakes.  We don’t live as well.

Make a decision today that regardless of personal thought, we will lift up our decisions to a Higher Power.  He will show us why His way is best.  And when we think rightly, we know that we are communing with our interior, where God dwells.  We will make the right decision, if we listen attentively, if we discern carefully.

This communication with God is eternal.  We will place ourselves in a better position for the future if we listen well today.  There is no interruption to God’s influence on us.  Even the ego did nothing, when it held sway.  It acted only in illusion, and we would now be firmly embedded in reality.

All selves are the Self whom we all share.  When we make a decision with God’s input, we choose for all the lives that we touch.  And we touch everyone, though we can’t see how this is possible.  Don’t let our finite ideas change the truth that we are impacting a vast field of all of our brothers and sisters.

RIGHT OR HAPPY?

Note: Published in MIracles magazine (Jon Mundy, publisher).

by Celia Hales

“Seek not outside yourself. . . Do you prefer that you be right or happy? . . . No one who comes here but must still have hope. . .that there is something outside of himself that will bring happiness and peace to him.  If everything is in him, this cannot be so.”  (ACIM, T-29.VII.1:6, 9; 2:1-2)

“I asked within A Course in Miracles: Would you rather be right or happy?  For happiness can only be the result of perfect trust.  And perfect trust emerges from perfect loyalty.  And perfect loyalty emerges spontaneously in the mind that has rested in surrender.”  (“The Way of Knowing,” WOM, Lesson 31, Page 353)

“Your mind might still prefer to be right rather than happy, so it is important that you let your heart lead in making this new choice.”  (ACOL, C:10.18)

            Jesus comes right to the point when he asks the question, “Do you prefer to be right or happy?”  He knows that a large part of our difficulty is found in our stubbornness in special relationships, special relationships that he would ask us to transform into holy ones.  We ask for friction when we prefer being right.  We move to a conciliatory frame of mind when we let the heart feel love, and then let the heart lead us to a better type of interaction.

            This is simple psychology.  Secular psychology, but it points to the spiritual in the manner in which Jesus discusses it.  We are asked to trust, and this trust comes about automatically when we surrender to God—and to love.  Our way back home, according to ACIM, is found in our relationship to our brother [and sister].  These significant relationships heal us, and a large part of the healing is in our own attitude—an attitude that doesn’t cling obsessively to our own point of view. We turn within to find happiness and peace.  And these cannot be found if we are intent on being “right” in relationships.  Turn aside from the ego to let our heart speak.  Our heart will then inform our mind, and we will understand how our function can be happiness, salvation, forgiveness, and giving miracles.

Communion

“[T]rue communication is communion, the union of two souls and with them, all souls in union with the totality of self.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 7:III

The Self is another way of speaking of God.  Our Christ-Self, which we try to access as we progress, is one with this Self.  This is the “totality” of which Choose Only Love speaks (as does A Course of Love).  We are one with God, though we are too encased in ego sometimes to see this.  As we progress, we relinquish the ego and are left only with the patterns of the ego—something that can still trip us up.

Communion with our God is the sweetest thing we can ever do.  When we truly reach inward to Him, we know a peace that envelops all of our life.  We feel truly at home, for in this we are touching heaven.  Likewise, when we commune with our brothers and sisters in this world, we are soothed beyond belief.  We truly communicate, and when we truly communicate—understand and are understood—we are blessed beyond description.

We start with our brother or sister, our way home as described in A Course in Miracles.  Our holy relationships show us God.  And we go home to heaven holding the hand of our brother or sister.

Allow our communion with other people and with our God inform our day.  There is no better way to have a good day.

Purpose

“In the depths of your heart is inscribed the purpose of your existence.  Knowledge of that purpose is what we call the wisdom of the heart, an essential part of yourself.  All carry it.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 7:III

May we all reach deep today, inside, listening to our heart, to discover the purpose for which we came to earth.  There is one overriding purpose, though I think there may be different aspects demonstrated over time. 

Help us to discern rightly.  Help us to align our thoughts, feelings, and actions with the will of God (which A Course in Miracles says is the same will that we possess).

If we listen to our heart, we will be well served.  Listening to our heart is the only way to live well.  And the heart functions in love, something we all need to do.

Live in Love

“[I]t is essential that you remember that the fundamental thing is not to accumulate information or particular worldly knowledge.  The essential thing is to live in love, to know you are loved.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 7:II

First things first—and love is always and forever the answer.  Our knowledge/information is something in which we take pride.  But our love is the only thing that matters.  When our lifetime is nearing a close, we will know this.  Nobody wishes that they had spent more time at the office when that person is on a deathbed.

We who study Jesus’ channeled writings may be studying them for the wrong reasons.  Perhaps this is implied in what Jesus is saying here.  It is interesting to understand ultimate reality, but it is not essential.  And anybody who gives up grievances and resentments can live in love.  The knowledge that Jesus imparts in his books give us grounding in love, it is true.  But we are born with an innate ability to love.  It is our birthright.

Turn to our significant others today in love.  Express love.  Feel love.  Live love.  There is no other way to live successfully.  Living in love is the true measure of success.

Yearning that Takes Us to God

“The mind longs to know, but the heart longs for love.  In both yearnings, united, resides the longing to be, which is not other than yearning for God.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 7:I

This quotation highlights what has often been said about A Course in Miracles and A Course of Love—the former for the mind, the latter for the heart.  Together these two books explain our yearning for God and give us a way to fulfill that yearning.  Now the words of Choose Only Love are giving us a warm and inviting way to approach God experientially.  Not intended to be a “course,” like the other two, Choose Only Love is intended for meditative reading and inspirational thought.  Read slowly, COL fulfills its purpose of drawing us in to God, giving us the sustenance to know that we are experiencing God in our daily round.

Choose Only Love is a love letter to us from God.  And He never fails us.

Jesus: “This Work Is a Love Letter”

“The secret of this world lies not in what can be learned, but that love, and only love, is what it evokes.

“This work is a love letter.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 7:I

When we project love from within, then we see love without.  Our projections create our perceptions.  While we think negatively, this world does not seem to evoke love.  But Jesus, who channeled these words, sees with the eyes of love, and thus he sees in the world something infinitely better than we could ever imagine.

His words to us, this “work,” is thus a love letter to us.  How grand!  This message can and will evoke love in our heart, as surely as Jesus’ heart is filled with love.

May we lay aside all resentments, antagonisms, grievances today—right now.  These feelings are not worthy of God.  Ask Him to fill our mind and heart only with what is worthy of Him.

And what is worthy of Him is always and only seeking to live love.

Perfect Love

“The world understands power as a means to force submission.  Jesus also submitted, but not to the laws of the world, not to its codes, systems, or authorities.  Jesus wanted to show you, whom He loves infinitely, how far obedience should go to God, that is, to perfect love.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 6:II

Obedience to God counts for a lot.  We often reach out to Him without realizing that there are requirements in place that we might not want to fulfill.  If we sense that He is asking something of us, we need to dwell on that urge, that sense, and see if it is our personal mind who is speaking to us, or God within.  If what we are imagining will hurt nobody, then we are wise to consider carefully if now is the time to act on the feeling that we are getting.

If we are acting in perfect love, there will be no downside.  We have to use discernment here, though, because if we are still caught by the ego, we might imagine action that is actually far from God.  Practice prayer assiduously.  Really give some thought to the urge that is overwhelming us.  Be sure that what we are hearing is coming from a Higher Power, not our lowly egoic self.

Jesus was gentle.  If we use his example as our guide we will submit to God and not the world, but we will do so gently.  Ask if the will to react is a God-driven initiative, in the example of Jesus.  Ask to be shown the obedient-to-God way.

Eternal Is Real

“Once you accept that only the eternal exists and that everything else—however powerful to the separated mind—is illusory, then you can go through the continuum of life without clinging, but simply flowing.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 5:III

Our world of form feels real to us, and we in our physical bodies are, in a sense, “supposed” to let it feel real.  But I believe it is illusory, that, as A Course in Miracles says, “There is no world!”  ACIM also says that projection makes perception.  This would mean that our inner Self is taking from within and sending outside of us what we would experience, also what we would see.  We are in a mass hallucination, which could also be called a dream.

If so much is illusory, we can flow through life, knowing that that blood we see is really catsup—not real pain and suffering.  This gives us an equanimity that keeps us feeling safe.  We learn, discover, from our experiences, but we do best when we don’t take life too seriously. We are meant to experience life, physical life, as real; otherwise, the illusion would have no meaning to us.

Let life flow through us.  Let the dream that is life affect us, but not to our detriment.

It is illusion, an idea only, an idea in the Mind of God.  The world of physical form is simply slowed down energy, the stuff of God.  His eternity is all that is real, and His eternity includes the intangibles of peace, calm, tranquility, harmony, love.

This can only mean comfort for us.

We Are in League with Jesus & Mary

“Creation had to be restored, recreated again on the basis of divine love.  The original plan had become distorted and needed to be redirected back to the light of perfect love.  This is what my life and that of Jesus accomplished once and for all, in union with you.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 5:II

We have been part of the restoration of creation on the basis of divine love.  Of course, we don’t understand how this can, particularly because we don’t feel good enough.  But the lives of Jesus and Mary accomplished this, in union with us.  Here Mary makes this clear.

This is cause for rejoicing!  We must do what we can to bring salvation to the world.  We must allow ourselves to be conduits for divine love.  We can do this, if we reaffirm our dedication.  If we realize that everybody does a little bit for God, once a person has decided to be “for God” all the way.  We need to say, often, “I am determined to go God’s way.”

And it will be done.

Remember that we are loved deeply.  We couldn’t make any difference in the world unless we were loved, are loved.  Our tranquil and kind words and deeds, prompted by this love, do count for something.

Benevolence of Creation

“Remember once again that this problem that concerns you so much, I will solve it.  That paralyzing fear has no reason to be.  What you think will happen will not.  Rather you will see for yourself the benevolence of creation.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 4:III

Jesus is here referring to something specific, I think, in Sebastian’s (the receiver) life.  His “paralyzing fear” was without reason.  But now, in our world, we can take solace in these words as well as imagine that Sebastian did.  “What  you think will happen will not.”  So often we get ourselves tangled up in knots with anticipation of the worst.

It is true that sometimes the worst does happen.  Yet God gives us the grace to survive it.  He gives us the grace to be sustained through the worst of it.

God will always do this.  We can count on him.  We can know that He means what He says.  Creation is benevolent, though in our turmoil we cannot always see this.

Jesus: “I Want You to Be Happy”

“I want you to be happy, just as you want happiness.  Let go of your worries.  Give them to me.  I love.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 4:III

What a heartwarming message given by Jesus!  He is standing right beside all of us, embracing all of us with love.  He invites us to eliminate worry.  If we truly believed that he stands beside each of us, which one of us would still cling to worry?

None!  None of us would cling to worry.  Believe these words.  Jesus loves.  We learned this in Sunday school many years ago.  Now we can understand it on a more mature basis.  He can love more greatly than we can, for nothing in our experience has taught us as keenly as what Jesus knows about love.  Let him give to us the knowledge that is his.  Ask for this today.

We all want happiness, and while there is much that we can do to improve our attitudes, happiness does ask for divine bestowal.  We can believe, rightly, that happiness is God’s will for us, for all His children.  We get ourselves tangled up when we think we need to “deserve” love.  We are worthy children of God, and nothing that we do or say gives us worth in His eyes (from A Course in Miracles).  We are worthy as we are, without exception.  We need to ask forgiveness for our mistakes, for they are not dark sins. 

When we have done that, our function of salvation, forgiveness, happiness (as said in A Course in Miracles) becomes real to us.

Be Fully Ourselves to Avoid Pain/Suffering

Note:  After today’s post, I’m going to take a break from posting for a little while.  Thank you for your views.  Love, Celia

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“All pain comes from not being fully yourself.  Whenever you suffer, you suffer because somehow you are not being fully you.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 4:II

This is a novel idea, that not being ourselves can cause suffering/pain.  If this is true, we have some control over suffering and pain.  If we sense these things, we can simply ask in what way we are not being true to ourselves.  Not being fully ourselves is not being true to ourselves.

Perhaps we aren’t certain how to be fully ourselves.  This is a common problem, but a problem easily solved if only we remember to go within for our Answers.  Going within solves so much that has troubled us.  It is the way we reach God.  It is the way that we go home for a while, even while in the midst of this sometimes troubling world.

Pain is not the same as suffering.  In this world, we will sometimes have pain, but we can avoid the emotional context that leads to suffering, because suffering nearly always has an emotional component.  Jesus seems to be saying here that if we are fully ourselves, we won’t even have pain.  This is an ideal situation, and not all of us can reach to Jesus’ ideal.  But we can try.

Go within, in prayer, in contemplation—especially when something is troubling us.  If we nip the trouble in the bud by having as a goal being true to ourselves, then we will eclipse much that has been a problem in the past.

Remember that God sustains us.  When we turn to Him, we are much more likely to be successful in our desire to eliminate pain/suffering from what we experience, because it is not He Who brings bad things to us.  True, He allows it, but these mysteries of pain and suffering are not anything that we can fully understand with finite minds.  We need to practice acquiescence, as God does.  Then and only then, in our acceptance, will we have taken the first step toward getting rid of the things in our lives that we don’t want—principally, pain/suffering.

Love Is What We Are

“Love is not an idea.  Love is not an abstraction.  Love is you.  Love is what you are.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 4:II

We need to understand much more about love than we do.  We often think of it as simply a feeling or an emotion.  But it is a Force, the Force that is God.

When we give ourselves up to love, we know peace.  And we don’t know genuine and lasting peace any other way.

Here we learn that love is what we are.  This is actually saying that we partake of the essence of God.  He does not stand apart from His creation, but is in it, through and through.  So He overshadows us with the love that is the essence of Himself.

Ask to understand love better today.  Ask to see how love could be the essence of the universes, of us, of God Himself.  We are created of the essence of Him. 

We can thrive in no other way than to let love embrace us.

Love’s Embrace

“In the wisdom of love is where you will receive what you are waiting for, receive the certainty that you are seeking, the peace you are longing for, the embrace that your hearts need.  It is in love where all that is needed is given.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 4:II

We need that embrace!  A Course of Love has a wonderful passage in which Jesus talks to us, inviting us into his embrace.  And there he gives us certainty and peace.  Our hearts need the embrace.  We are bereft without it.

In love we find what we have been needing.  In love we both give and receive.  And our heart overflows with love that dwells deep within all of us, where God is.

Be patient toward all that is unsolved in our heart.  Be patient, for the blessing will come.  Jesus has promised, and, if anything, he keeps his promises.

Love = True Function

“Your function is not to be anything, but to be what you are, which is love.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 4:I

We don’t have to fulfill a self-described image of what we want to be, a self-image.  Images are often ego-originating, and false to the core.  Instead, we simply need to focus on what we know of love, to fulfill a vision of someone who loves.

This cannot be hard, though our real Self has been covered over by egoic notions for a long time.  Yet, even in the midst of folly, all of us have known love, from someone or something.  We first receive love from God, and this first receipt from Him enables us to be able to give.  If we had not first received, we would simply be unable to heal the separation, something that God Himself longs to see.

Simplify life today.  Know that when all is said and done, we don’t want more honors, more promotions, more achievements. When life is ending for us, we will never say that we wish we had spent more time at the office.  We will say that we wish we had loved better.

Begin today to rectify gaps in our experience of love.  Pray to be brought closer to true reality, which at base is nothing if it is not love.

Being Who We Really Are

“The wind does what is natural to wind.  The purpose of existence is to be its true nature.  That is why, we have spent so much time reminding you of who you really are.

“Being aware of who you really are allows you to live as who you truly are.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 4:I

Often we try to live up to an ideal that is only in our mind.  “Being who we are” is something more substantial than just an appeal to ideals.  Knowing who we are takes some deep thought, some mystical insight, and a connection to God Himself Who will guide us to blossom as He intended.

We are individuals who best live in love, not fear, and especially not egoic fear.  We know that we are really One with all our brothers and sisters, with whom, if things are good, we live in holy relationship.  We unite with the depth of ourselves, the Christ-Self.  As the Christ-Self learns over time, we see a bloom come to all we encounter, for projection makes perception.  What we are inwardly, we see as external to ourselves.  We are projecting “reality” as we view it.

God wants us to enjoy ourselves in this lifetime.  Often we don’t, because we know pain, sorrow, even suffering.  But these things can disappear more often than not when we are keen to follow guidance as we know it.  God means us well.  He does not visit bad things upon us.  Usually our free will has brought the more unfortunate parts of our lives to us.

Ask today, deep in contemplation and prayer, for an understanding of the personality that has been given us.  We do have some say in the matter, of course.  Some of life is meant to be play.  When we develop the best that is in us, we know a joy that cannot be known by anybody who is simply playing a part.  We know a joy because our innermost essence is divine, and when we touch the divine, we sense God’s love in everything about us.

Love

“To the extent that you allow your consciousness to live fully in the truth of who you are, the love that you truly are, to that extent you fulfill your purpose.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 4:I

Who we truly are is just – love.  And when we live love, we are on purpose.

We often don’t realize how much a simple decision to love more deeply will effect change in our daily life.  And this change is all good.

This is not a sentimental love, a love that overlooks bad things in an effort to make ourselves feel better.  We may still express negative emotions, when we feel them warranted, but we will find them unwarranted far more often than we realize now.  Love is a sold feeling, something substantial to cling to in uncertain times.  It is never a tame thing, but the hardiest sense of coming into our own.  We do nobody any favors when we let other people walk all over us.  This is a false way of viewing love that has turned people off all too often.

Love can be and is strong in the face of provocation.  Love is gentle in the extreme, but the gentlest feeling is the most powerful.  It is not a two-edged sword that can be turned against us.

Ask to be shown what love really means, because we have not known.  We have not known what it means to say that God is Love.  We have been in the dark about this, as about many things connected with love.  Love is many-faceted, solid, substantial, a Force to Whom we can cling.

Let God speak to our hearts today about this matter of His Love and what it means to us.  Give God some time to get through by spending some time in quietness. 

God speaks in the silence with sudden insights that warm the heart.

Jesus and Mary

“Today the face which was first shown in the feminine figure of Mary and the masculine figure of Jesus of Nazareth is now shown to the world in you.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 4:I

Here Jesus is saying that we are Christ.   While we may not have reached Christ-consciousness, our Self, deep within, is a Christ-Self just waiting to come out.  Be patient, because the great blessing Christ-consciousness may take some time.  It can’t be rushed.

When we remove barriers to love, principally fear and judgment, we are doing what we can to hurry Christ-consciousness.  And our role models are Jesus and Mary.  These role models were important long before Jesus’ channeled works arrived on the scene.  Now we are seeing these role models as ourselves.  If we can believe our holiness (as the Workbook of A Course in Miracles says), then we are making substantial progress toward our goal of being Christed.

Awakening comes to many in our world, especially now.  For reasons we do not understand, it is easier to reach Christ-consciousness today than it used to be.  Most people had to move into holiness after death, but now, right here in our bodies on earth, many will move into this step.

Pray for this blessing, a decision made by God Himself, today.  He wants it for us, and He will bestow Christ-consciousness as soon as He sees that only good will result.

Fear Overcome by Trust

“Fear produces what it fears.  Therefore, when one begins to distrust life, when one begins to create within oneself mechanisms of distrust, then facts arise that confirm that it is justified to distrust.  In reality, trust in such cases is lodged in what is unreliable.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 3:III

This quotation builds on the law of attraction directly.  We draw to ourselves the distrust: “. . .facts arise that confirm that it is justified to distrust.”  It is so obvious that the law of attraction is real, for spiritual texts constantly confirm these ideas.  And I am more likely to give credence to the law of attraction if it is discussed in a spiritual text.

We are lodging trust in that which is “unreliable”—that is, not trustworthy.  We need to place our faith in something more substantial, and, for me, that represents placing faith in God Himself, the Force that Star Wars, the movie, showed so well.

We attract fear if we are not careful, if we let our minds dwell on that which is fearful.  Like attracts like, as we know.  If we have a simple but profound trust in life, our attitude gives us the best.

We don’t have to fear.  We can turn to God, to our faith, to sustain us in our focus on higher ideals.

Trust Fully in God’s Love

“Being alert in favor of love means trusting fully in love—God’s love.  This is no idle clarification about trusting in the active love of God. Trusting others to solve what you think of as your problems constantly leads to disillusionment.  Two similar beings cannot have in each other what the other lacks to solve their apparent problems.  If this were true, one would have to be incomplete and another not, which would annul the equality of the children of God.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 3:II

I don’t think this means that we can’t get advice from other people.  If neither one has a clue, though, this quotation does make sense.  We can’t trust other people to solve our problems, because the problems are our contract, and for help with problems, we need to get quiet and go within, to God.

We have all we need to solve problems, but this idea will remain elusive to us until we depend on our one Source, God Himself.  Often we muddle along with a problem for weeks, months, years, never asking for help.  This makes no sense whatsoever.  But there it is.  We need to go immediately to our Higher Power when something puzzles us.  Ask for clarification, ask to be shown the light.

And we will be.

Release

“Concerns are a thought program.  I ask you now to observe that mechanism, recognized it for what it is, and accept the fact that it comes from fear.  It is fear of uncertainty, of not knowing what the future will bring.  This fear of uncertainty generates a state of anguish that must first be accepted, and then released.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 3:I

Jesus would have us take a look at our fears, and then, after looking at them, release them.  He would not have us just try to dismiss thoughts of uncertainty.  This dismissing never works very well, and the subconscious is less likely to be healed if we eject bad thoughts without considering them.  Of course, we don’t want to make them “real” to us (something A Course in Miracles warns against), and so it seems to be me that the moments of considering need to remain brief, not an obsession.

Acceptance is written all over what Jesus counsels in his channeled works.  If we cower, we will not accept, and then we will remain in anguish.  Just know that there is an Answer, that Jesus is right here with us, when we ask, helping us to move beyond fear.

If we have lived well in the past, our future will be certain to go smoothly.  Some fear death as the greatest uncertainty, but death is like walking through an open door, nothing to fear at all.  If we have not lived well in the past, we can nevertheless entertain a course correction.  We always get a second chance with Jesus.

Pray for the release of concerns and worries, the release of our own hesitancy in the face of a future that will always remain uncertain.  We cannot see the future, and I think this a great blessing. 

But it also means that the future may be brighter than we anticipate, and when we focus on those bright things, they tend to happen.

Blessings

“The days go by and it may seem that the problem has not been resolved, but then you realize that what you saw as a problem was a blessing, a blessing that you did not understand at the beginning.  It may have bothered you just as it bothers a child when a loving mother gives medicine that may taste bitter but is good for health.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 3:I

Our problems are not always to be lamented.  They may be blessings.  If we remember that the problem and solution are always found together (a tenet of A Course in Miracles), we will ask that the solution be shown to us, and we will be encouraged to ask, time and again, in the future.  When problems come up, we need to realize that, blessing or not, God has allowed it, though He did not cause it.  This allowing is one of the hardest things we have to accept.  But it is the way out of every quandary.

God means us well, but our free will makes for difficulties in our world.  And free will is one of our greatest blessings!  But we don’t know how to use it now, and so we, and others, suffer.  God would not be doing us a favor if he revoked free will when things get tough.  And this is something He understands completely.  He will never revoke free will.

Like medicine that is bitter, our blessings are not always recognized.  Ask to see the better part of any lesson that seems difficult in our world.  Ask to be shown the blessing.

And it will be so.

Inner Peace

“Once the thought pattern of concern arises, you make that concern real, which then encompasses the entire space of your mind and heart, and thereby you lose peace.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 3:I

When we dwell on a feeling, we make it real to us.  If we dwell on antagonism to our brother or sister, we make it real, and thus harder to overlook.  This is an idea from A Course in Miracles.  Likewise, with concerns or worries.  When we focus upon them, they grow in our mind and even our heart.  The concern overturns more positive thoughts, and then we really are in trouble.

When the bad feeling mushrooms, it encompasses, as this quotation says, the “entire space of. . .mind and heart.”  This takes away our peace, and inner peace is one of the greatest attributes we might aspire to have.  Inner peace goes hand-in-hand with a loving heart.  Inner peace gives us a world that is all-encompassing in its goodness.

We see what we want to see, because we invent our world (as ACIM says).  If we want trouble, we will see it, though we may not be aware that we “want” it.  Focus is everything, for the law of attraction is in operation.  What we focus upon becomes true for us, even if it is not objectively “true.”

Let the mind and heart swell with inner peace today. 

Do not dwell on worries or concerns, making them an obsession.  If we give up worries/concerns, we will walk throughout this world with a serenity that has eluded us until now.

Open the Way to Peace

“Observe how the thought pattern of worry blocks access to peace, and therefore to your true self.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 3:I

Our “true self” does not worry.  This is the Christ-Self described so well in A Course of Love.  If we are prone to worry, let’s decide today to give up negative obsessions.  Our lives will be so much better.  We do have the power to effect this.

All of us long for peace in this world, even when we are not aware of what we are longing for.  A Course in Miracles says that our future is to be “perfectly calm and quiet” all the time.  This may seem a bit extreme, but it is a good metaphor for the meek who will inherit the earth.  Meekness is not passivity, though, something we would all be wise to come to understand.

If we want peace, we are learning that we must drop worry from our habitual frame of mind.  Let the heart speak to us, for the heart knows how to love, and when we love rightly, we depend on our faith in God to evict worry from our mind.  Doing this can be as easy as dismissing worry thoughts, one right after the other, when they occur to us.  Substitute thoughts of love, loving thoughts, and the worry will have no place to occupy.  It is always best to substitute another thought, lest our attempt to dismiss thoughts is akin to ignoring an elephant in the room.  Not possible.

We want access to our true self.  It behooves us to take steps in that direction, especially when we are tempted to turn aside from our true self.  Worry is a form of fear, and we know that love cancels fear.

Let’s let love do its work today.

Answers to Prayers

“When you feel worried, sit down, relax, take a deep breath, connect with the desire, and wait for the answer.  The answer to desire will be given in due time and in perfect form.  Someone will knock on the door and bring you the solution, or a situation will be unlocked, or a successful idea will come, or simply the problem will be otherwise resolved.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 3:I

This good outcome is what happens when we pray with anticipation and a quiet mind.  I have found that some things that bother me have never found their way into my prayers.  And that is why the Answer may be a long time in coming.

If we articulate a need, the solution is found with the problem.  This tenet is part of A Course in Miracles.  I have found it to be very true.  Notice that there is no time delay.  Time delay is not always needed, particularly if we ourselves hold all the keys to the Answer.  Sometimes we just have to get ourselves and our worries toned down, and all will be well.

I notice that Jesus says here that we are to sit down, relax, take a deep breath.  Is this not common sense?  But how many of us do this, consistently?  We might get answers to our prayers more readily if we prepared ourselves as he describes.

If the Answer seems long in coming, know that there is a reason that we cannot fathom.  God Himself does not like delay; He works fast, once we know what we are really asking.

Focus on the questions for which we need Answers.  And give a prayer of thanks when the Answers come. 

Eliminating Worry

“I ask you to observe the pattern of concern, the recurring pattern of worry.  Always it takes concrete form:  maybe money, a business, health, the safety of the children.  Everyone has an area in which they feel insecure.  Maybe there are several areas, but they are always few and very specific.  We now work with these areas to experience those patterns of thought and emotional responses, and to transmute them.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 3:I

We get very practical help from Jesus here.  All of us have worries, and here he recognizes that these are very specific, and few, concerns.  We can lift our mind and heart from these negativisms, and Jesus is willing and able to help us do so.  Let’s accept his help. 

Of course, sometimes specific worries escalate into what is called “free-floating anxiety.”  Even if we suffer from this, we can spend some time in contemplation as we search out the specificity of what we are anxious about.  Identify the concerns, and take them one by one to a Higher Power.

We are not meant to dwell in worry.  At base, we are handicapped in trust.  If we open our mind and heart to God Himself, He will teach us how to trust Him in all things.

Then the concerns will fall away, often immediately.

Trust

“[T]oday I speak of trust.  Observe how the thought patterns of worries and concerns of all kinds seem to assault you again and again.  These concerns come, in fact, from beliefs contrary to trust.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 3:I

We would not worry so much if we trusted more.  If we trusted in God.  We do know that most of what we worry about never, ever, comes to pass.  How much better we could live if we dropped worry and replaced it with trust!

We can’t just determine to drop worry and concerns.  We need to edge these negative thoughts out of the mind with something more powerful.  The perfect alternative to worry/concerns is trust that a good God doesn’t mean us harm and, instead, is showering love on us just all the time.  He is, you know.  The bad things in life don’t come from God, but from our own misguided notions and ideas.  We use our free will to make for chaos, and chaos finds us.

Drop chaos when we drop worries and concerns.  Let trust in God, the first prerequisite for a teacher of God (according to A Course in Miracles), take their place.  Then, even if bad things happen, we won’t feel them nearly so much. 

We will have a faith in things ethereal and permanent that overshadow, and sometimes negate, the transient things of this world.

Living in Love

“[L]iving with fear was the reality of the contraction in which you lived.  Now we begin to live consciously without fear, joyfully recognizing that we are the resurrection and will live in love.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 2:III

The only two emotions, fear and love, are polar opposites to one another.  The degree to which we open to love is the degree to which the contraction of fear leaves us.  If we are feeling fear, ever, maybe we ought simply to stop, just stop, and ask ourselves in what way we are not being loving. 

This will make all the difference.  Love cancels out fear, always and forever.  It is true, however, that fear and anxieties may have such a toehold in us that we can’t, right away, focus on love.  First we need to relax.  Let the fear sweep over us, but do nothing about it.  It will come to a conclusion as we relax.  Open then to love and loving feelings.  Think of something or someone whom we truly love.  This shift in feeling will open the way to a tremendous surge, and in this surge, a surge of love, and Love (meaning God), we will be released enough to drop the fear from our mind and heart.

Experiment today, if you are in fear.  Let relaxation quell the emotion of anxiety, and then move serenely into the feeling of love.

Our day will brighten.  Our mind, through Christ, is very powerful: “I can do all things through Him who strengthens me.”  Let the heart rule the mind in this instance of turning to love.

The heart already knows how to do this.

Silence of Our Heart

“[S]tay for a few moments in the silence of your heart as you experience the peace of your soul as you hear these words:  You are safe and sound.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 2:III

This is a beautiful message attributed to Jesus.  He wraps us up in His love, cocoons us.   And we are open to knowing that we are safe and sound when we trust him to mean what he says.

I do trust Jesus.  And I trust that I am safe and sound.  The peace that envelops me is palpable.  And so it is for all of us.

Peace in our soul!  Yes!  We fear when we let the ego rule us, for the ego is steeped in fear.  Turn aside from the egotistical, and watch our experience of life improve.  We make enemies when we are in competition with each other rather than attempt to cooperate in our various tasks.  WE don’t appreciate seeing egotism in others, and they are the same as we.

How can we experience being safe and sound in a world that seems fraught with perils?  Is this “pie in the sky” thinking?  I think not.  We attract what we focus upon, and when we focus on Jesus’ reassurances, we are attracting safety.  He is right here with us, though we cannot understand how that might be.  His ability to focus his consciousness just anywhere is the secret of multiple presence.

And Jesus has companions who stay with us just all the time.  Do not we believe in guardian angels?  The angels are deeply involved, Sebastian has experienced, in these messages in Choose Only Love.

Trust is the first characteristic of a teacher of God, according to A Course in Miracles, the Manual for Teachers.  We will live so much better when we open our souls to trust in a Power that is in the world, but not of the world.

Focus on the words, “safe and sound,” as an affirmation today.  See if our day goes better. 

See if we aren’t led to trust Jesus more and more.

Retain Only What Is Love

“My beloveds, I cannot fail to mention that you must take charge of everything that you experience in yourself that is not love.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 2:III

WE have some power in our Awakening!  This message from Jesus asserts it.  WE must take charge of our thinking, being quick to dismiss those thoughts that are not loving.  If we do this consistently, we might believe that our Awakening will come sooner rather than later.  We will have made a difference.

We can’t “prepare” ourselves, though, as the Holy Spirit (A Course in Miracles) or the Christ-Self (A Course of Love) can.  The part that we do out of the whole is actually very little.  A Course in Miracles says that the part of the Holy Spirit is disproportionate to ours.  That means that we need His constant help.

We experience what is happening in our mind.  And we know that we have to listen to our heart, let our heart take the lead.

A Course of Love says that the barriers to Awakening, the impediments to the awareness of love, are fear and judgment.  Fear is seen as the opposite of love, with all feelings either being fear or love.  Judgment is described separately, but I see it as a subset of fear.  After all, we don’t love others if we are afraid of them or of what they might do to us.

What we experience that is not love should be a red flag, always and forever.  Then take steps to remove that other feeling from our awareness.  It can be done.  It just consists of dismissing the thought that brought on the feeling, and then substituting positive love as the anecdote.

Try it today, for many of us will experience feelings that are not love in the course of our walk.  Substitute love, for it is the strongest, most all-encompassing, feeling of all.  And God, and we, are made of it.

God Lives through Us

“To believe in a God incapable of experiencing that which comprises the vast range of human experience is to misunderstand.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 2:I

I want to believe that this is accurate channeling, because it supports an idea that I have long written about in this blog:  God is living through us.  If we are a part of Him, which Jesus’ channeled writings say, then it seems to me very evident that He knows.  Yes, he knows when we are going through a bad patch.  He knows when we need a helping hand.  He knows when we are getting downhearted and could use His wider view.

It is better not to misunderstand, though with our finite minds we frequently do.  A Course in Miracles has words that seem to indicate that only the Holy Spirit knows about us, because we are caught in illusion, and God does not know illusion.  But there is reality deep within us, and this reality, I believe, is “God-stuff.”  So the fact that we spin illusions does not mean that He lacks the will or the power to know what we are experiencing.  Here Choose Only Love seems to second this interpretation.  God knows, regardless of how deep into illusion we have fallen.

If we suffer, we have a helping Hand.  If we are in pain, He reaches back to us.  And His experiencing of what we are going through does lighten the burden.  I believe God also knows why these bad things happen to us.  We don’t know this; at best we have guesses only.  The mystery of suffering will remain a mystery as long as love is incomplete in us.  Love heals always, and if we love enough, A Course of Love indicates that healing is a fait accompli.

When times get rough, remember that God is experiencing right along with us.  His infinite mercy will ease the pain, give us back a good life.  We may never know why the rough patch is necessary, but A Course in Miracles says that we don’t have to learn through pain, that learning through rewards is more lasting.

Ask to learn, or to discover, the best way today.   Through rewards, not pain.

This can and will happen for all of us, when we stay attuned to our Creator.

Jesus Is Love

“Realize that I am love.  Remembering this is enough to bring true peace to your heart and mind.”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 2:I

As I drive through the streets of my town in the midst of a pandemic, economic uncertainty, and unrest in cities, I see signs out front of many houses that say, “My hope is in Jesus.”  Certainly the people who posted those signs have found hope in remembering that Jesus is love.  Here Jesus is quoted as saying that remembering him as love will bring true peace to heart and mind.

Take a moment to think as Jesus has asked.  This statement, “Realize that I am love,” brings comfort to my mind and heart.  It will do the same for yours.

Jesus speaks often in Choose Only Love as our personal savior. If this seems hard for some to accept, still there it is. Open the mind and heart a little. Consider that maybe traditional Christianity has it right. We need someone whose hand we can hold as we walk along in this difficult world. Nobody is so strong as not to need some help.

Jesus will empower us by his help. Open the mind and heart, and trust him.

He asks nothing more.

Veil Will Be Lifted. . .to Forgiveness

“Keep in mind during this journey that the world is a great illusion; and that the day will come when the veil will be lifted and in the forgiven world you will see the true creation of God. . . .”  Choose Only Love bk.3, 1:III

We are seeing an illusion when we live in this world.  Our best insight tells us this as well.  We cannot fully understand how all that we see is illusion, but there it is, in this quotation from the channeled work, Choose Only Love.

But we will live to see Heaven, the forgiven world.  This is true creation, and it is just a change of mind.  While the world, objectively, may still not be real, we will experience it as real in a way that is veiled to us now. This is what the “real world” truly is.

We project from our minds what we see.  Projection makes perception, as A Course in Miracles says.  Our vision, a more exalted concept, will show us a better world.  The Workbook of A Course in Miracles has us declare, early on, “I am determined to see.”  It does take our determination to see Heaven.  It does take our choice for a better world.

What we focus upon becomes our experience.  Never forget that we are beholden to God for our take on this world.  He always soothes away troubles, soothes away difficulties.

He does not leave us alone to fend for ourselves.

Mission for God

“Go into the world announcing the good news.  You have a means to do it.  Enjoy the joy of sharing.  Be messengers of peace.  Take love to the world.”  Choose Only Love bk.2, 21:II

What better way could we spend a life than to follow the directions given in this quotation?  What is the good news?  Simply that we are beloved of God, the beloved of God.  He stands with us in every earthly dilemma, every quandary, every mystery.  He may not take away every mystery, but if we bear with him patiently, the dilemmas and quandaries lift.

How might we announce the good news?  We won’t seek to recruit others to our way of life, unless they express obvious interest in knowing how we live.  We will turn off others if they are not ready for a change, even a change for the better.  So announcing the good news, when and where, needs deep prayer.  We need to discern when and where to offer the message.  Our own way may not, ultimately, answer the needs of our brothers and sisters if they are in a different place from ourselves, mentally and emotionally.

So depend on guidance in this delicate matter of influencing others.  But when the time is right, and the person before us is right, we can enjoy the joy of sharing.  And they too will be enlivened.

Offering peace and love to the world is a less delicate matter than sharing the good news of what we have found in God.  Peace and love are always welcome.

Love Is the Answer to Our Prayers

“Thus you go from the top of the mountain to the world with a clear goal: to bring love.”  Choose Only Love bk.2, 21:II

This quotation is strongly reminiscent of the journey to the top of the mountain that takes up the last 40 (actually 41) chapters of A Course of Love.  We take that journey with Jesus, and with our brothers and sisters.  And we return to the world with a burning message of Awakening in love.

I fear that discussing love so often in this blog will make others feel that the advice is trite.  The idea that love is trite is simply because religious leaders have harped on this idea for millennia.  It is the principal advice we find from Jesus as well:  Love God, and love our neighbor. 

We need to take a good, hard look at love, and realize, perhaps, that we have never fully considered its meaning before.  The ego had veiled our eyes.

The point is made in other channelings by Jesus that if love were some new substance in the universe just discovered by scientists, we would take a further look at it—saying that we had just been ignorant of it previously, but we are open to it now.  Well, as often as the word “love” has been evoked, we are missing the mark if we don’t take it seriously in our life.  But not serious in an egoic sense, but in a lighthearted, even playful, way.

Love will take us to lighthearted happiness.  And it is this that God would have us experience in this world.  Sure, there are serious problems in our world, but we do no one any favors by walking around with a long face.  We help our brothers and sisters most keenly when we love them in the joyful sense that Jesus means.  Then and only then do we make a difference.

Take a good, strong look at the love that we might have missed.  Know that this is indeed the Answer to our prayers.

Holy Path

“I invite you to walk a holy path, a simple way, just as love is.”  Choose Only Love bk.2, 21:II

We are the ones who complicate our lives.  The way of Jesus, the way of love, is just simple.  The holy path that we walk is simple.  We introduce the complexity.  And if we introduce it, we can stop it.

Jesus has our best interests in mind.  He sees the turmoil of our world, the awful catastrophes we get involved in, and I often think it hurts his heart.  He tries hard to get us to reconsider our choices, to change our lives, to honor the love with which we were born.  Our innate leanings are all toward love.  We obscure this truth because it would hurt us so much to truly realize how and where we have gone astray.

Walk a holy path today.  Ask for help, for none of us can see the footpath if we don’t ask for vision.  Keep life a little simpler today.

And watch miracles unfold.