The New

“Without trust in one’s own knowing, no matter how oblique or unspeakable, there will not be this advent of The New.

“What you are asked to do is to build anticipation for it, not to explain it.”  Mirari

We don’t know when The New will really get underway. But we will know our part in the New when we turn inward. No other way will answer our questions. No other way will provide the assurance that we are walking toward God in this pathway toward The New.

The New refers to a new world being created by love. We seem far from that now, but God can act swiftly when the time is right. He needs our co-creation, though; he needs our hands and feet. If we don’t act in the world, based on the inner knowing that we feel, there is nobody else to do it. God Himself looks to us to create the good world that we all want.

If all of us long for a new world, we are setting the stage for that new world to emerge. We might see things happening before its full advent that are mightily disturbing to us. We may not speak of these things, for speech tends to create the things being spoken of.

Go within for the knowing that we need. This inner knowledge is true guidance, for God dwells within all of us. We are immanent with Him. And if we will listen, we will always know what to do to make things better.

Discover through Revelation from God Himself

“Imagine this first as a place where no learning is needed. Ah, you might say now, this you have heard before. This idea of no longer needing to learn has intrigued you since it was first mentioned, and yet it seems too impossible, too “good” to be true. You are too used to thinking of yourself as a learning being to truly experience the freedom of not being bound by this constraint. In all of your life, you can think of no ability you have not achieved through learning. And yet most of you have “discovered” some¬thing that comes easily to you, something you might have said or been told you have a natural talent or ability to do. These things some of you have practiced or studied to take advantage of your natural ability and in doing so may have found a continued ability to learn faster or achieve more in this area than those who are not seen as having a “natural ability” of this partic-ular kind. But because you are prone to comparison, many of you have been discouraged by not being able to be the “best” despite your natural talent or ability, and have given up “working hard” to be the best. Others who have achieved the highest possible acclaim for their talents find this acclaim unfulfilling once it is achieved.” (ACOL, D:8.2)

It is difficult truly to imagine what Jesus is saying in the Dialogues of A Course of Love when he tells us that the time of learning is over. I think he means our learning about spiritual matters, the way to salvation, the way to Awakening or Christ-consciousness. I think it unlikely that he is saying the our young people don’t need schooling; surely he isn’t saying that. He is talking to us who have read this far in ACOL, first learning about ultimate salvation from what he has told us, and now “discovering” through revelation from God Himself. Discovery is the hallmark now in our desire to reach a greater depth in our spirituality.

We all have natural abilities that were not found through learning. These natural abilities may have been honed through learning and study, but the ability came to us originally as a gift from within. We ought never, anymore, to compare our achievements with those of others; this is competition, and it is an old way of thinking. We will each excel where we are the most talented, and innate talent is a gift from God. We need ask for the best that we are personally able to achieve. We need not to become discouraged because another seems to do something better than do we. There is always something that we can do better than anybody else, if only to be the particular person that a significant other can best receive love from. And this is not such a bad example, for is not the giving and receiving of love our greatest gift on this earth?

So: Let us go on to discover what we are to do with the rest of our lives. Let us turn within for the guidance that will direct us with direct revelation from the part of God Whom we are, the Christ-Self. This Self, we can imagine, is eager to share with our little self, and if we only listen, we will accomplish far more than would 1,000 years of learning.

Prayer

I would reach out to You today in a way that I have not done heretofore. I would be totally surrendered to Your grace, totally sure that Your way is best for me, totally at peace in sensing the depth of Your love for me. Thank You for giving me so often that sense of warmth that steels over me, comforting me that all is well.

Be with me as I seek to discover any and all future directions for my life. Let me be flexible and pliable in Your hands, ready to turn on a dime when You prompt a certain direction.

Thank You for always being here for me. You never lose track of me; help me never to lose track of You.

Amen.

Atonement and Healing Mean the Same

“Healing and Atonement are not related; they are identical. There is no order of difficulty in miracles because there are no degrees of Atonement. It is the one complete concept possible in this world, because it is the source of a wholly unified perception. (M-2.1)”

So healing equals Atonement! How obvious! Healing is a central concept of A Course in Miracles, and the undoing that Atonement comprises does indeed lead to healing in this world. This world knows perception, not usually knowledge (which is reserved for the “real world”), and a unified perception will mean that the mind is no longer split between the ego and your right mind.

“No degrees of Atonement” means that it is an all-or-nothing concept. We are either healed completely or not at all, though in time we will know a lessening of the ego, usually, over weeks, months, or even years.

We want to have a unified perception of this world, for this means that we are heading into Awakening, or enlightenment—when God deems us ready. There are things that we can do that will hasten God’s action. We cannot, though, dictate to Him. But we can leave behind judging, attacking, making plans against contingencies to come (unless these plans are endorsed by the Holy Spirit). And these three actions will move us closer to the ultimate choice in God to reach down and lift us up to Awakening.

Is It Not Clear that While You Still Insist on Leading or on Following, You Think You Walk Alone, with No One by Your Side?

1 – Afraid to Walk Beside

“He [your brother] is afraid to walk with you, and thinks perhaps a bit behind, a bit ahead would be a safer place for him to be. Can you make progress if you think the same, advancing only when he would step back, and falling back when he would go ahead? For so do you forget the journey’s goal, which is but to decide to walk with him, so neither leads nor follows. Thus it is a way you go together, not alone. And in this choice is learning outcome changed, for Christ has been reborn to both of you. (T-31.II.9)”

This passage capsules the essence of how A Course in Miracles is saving us time: We are focusing on our relationship to our brother (or sister). We are forgiving that significant other, because his distress is based on error, and calls for help—not retribution or retaliation. We live in an illusion, a dream, maya, and so nothing bad has actually ever happened to us. Forgiveness has a sound basis. We seek to forget the trespasses that our brother has made against us (or so we thought he has made against us). And this is an echo of the Lord’s Prayer from the New Testament: “Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.” So here we see, in essence, how much ACIM builds on previous Scripture.

2 – Cooperation

We often think that we want our brother to be the leader. But then, just as often, we think that we want to lead. Here Jesus is saying that neither is the way to get home. We walk together, with neither leading or following. We cooperate. We have a meeting of true minds (from Shakespeare’s Sonnet #116).

3 – Don’t Walk Alone

“Is it not clear that while you still insist on leading or on following, you think you walk alone, with no one by your side? This is the road to nowhere, for the light cannot be given while you walk alone, and so you cannot see which way you go. (T-31.II.11)”

Our light is given when we are with our significant others. It is not stated in ACIM, but we do not have to have a single significant other to follow ACIM’s way. Many of us walk through life as a single person. But we do know, if this logic is carried out, that we function best when we are not in competition with each other, but instead cooperate, making decisions jointly with others.

4 – Confusion

“And thus there is confusion, and a sense of endless doubting as you stagger back and forward in the darkness and alone. (T-31.II.11)”

This is our fate is we don’t walk with others: to stagger back and forward in the darkness and alone. Who would want that? There is another way, as Helen and Bill found out. They were the co-scribes of A Course in Miracles, with Helen taking dictation from Jesus, and each morning, at work, going to Bill to have him type up the notes. Their rancorous academic environment smoothed out, at least somewhat, though they themselves never reached a smooth relationship in its totality.

5 – Blindfolded?

“Yet these are but appearances of what the journey is, and how it must be made. For next to you is One Who holds the light before you, so that every step is made in certainty and sureness of the road. A blindfold can indeed obscure your sight, but cannot make the way itself grow dark. And He Who travels with you has the light. (T-31.II.11)”

This is the Holy Spirit, the guidance of Universal Inspiration. This is the part of the Trinity Who speaks to us of the way to walk. Many have had the baptism of the Holy Spirit, but many do not yet know all that this blessing holds out. Learn today. There are a variety of ways that guidance speaks to us. (Please read “The Gift of Guidance” in this blog. See “Articles and Book Reviews,” an icon at the top of the blog.)

6 – Personal Experience

Lately I have observed that, more and more, words come into my mind which are instructive and just a bit beyond me. They seem inspired, though I do not want my ego to have a field day with this interpretation. I have also learned that I can write a dialogue with my Inner Wisdom (as a friend calls the Holy Spirit, or the inner Christ Self), and come to better insight than my mind, working alone, can discover. The ways of receiving God’s guidance are manifold. Experiment today. Just be careful that the guidance that you think you get is not harmful to anybody at all, lest of all yourself. That would be the ego’s confiscation of mind, and the end of true guidance.

Prayer:

Dear Father/Mother,

Help me to walk with my significant others today. Help me to stay serene and relaxed so that I am flexible in my interactions. Help me not to be overbearing and rigid. This day can and will be good to the extent that I do not plan ahead. You have told me that. Thank You.

Be with my brothers and sisters also. We are all in this together, and we will get out of it together or not at all.

Amen.