Imaginary Comforters

"Know, then, Who abides with you merely by recognizing what is there already; and do not be satisfied with imaginary comforters, for the Comforter of God is in you." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section II, 7:8

"Jesus demonstrated Christ; He proved that Christ is the Divine Idea of God -- the Holy Ghost, or Comforter, revealing the Divine Principle, Love, and leading into all Truth." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 332, Lines 19-22

Have you ever wondered how Jeshua ben Joseph did all that he did without being anything at all? He healed the sick, but never claimed to be a healer. He fed the multitudes, but never claimed to be a philanthropist. He directed his disciples where to fish to get the biggest catch, and to find the money for taxes in the mouth of a fish, but he never claimed to be a manifester or a magician. When people asked him if he was this or that, he said things like, "you have said it." When the spiritually ambitious wanted to follow him and learn what he knew (the ego always enters relationships to get something), he told them, "the son of man has no place to lay his head." In other words, if you're looking for a better identity, you've come to the wrong place. His job was to show us the end of all earthly identities, the end of getting. At other times, when people praised him and tried to make him special, he said, "why do you call me good? There is none good but God." He wisely modeled for us how to walk in the world with the Beloved, as Oneness ItSelf. He showed us how to be truly happy and free in a world of sorrow and bondage. What a gift.

He uncompromisingly told the Truth of our Oneness with God. He knew It, and he lived It. He never passed a suffering person or avoided pain by saying, "oh, it's not real." He knew it wasn't real, and so he fed the hungry, healed the sick, and comforted the sorrowing with Truth. He didn't see himself as having a body or a home or an identity to protect. The forms were irrelevant. And he told us that unless we do the same, we can never truly remember Who We Are. "Verily I say unto you, inasmuch as you have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me." Likewise, he said that when we ignore the suffering around us, we are doing it to him, to our Self... and we suffer accordingly.

We spend our days with imaginary comforters, instead of listening to the Voice for God that is our true comfort. We look for roles, activities, ego enhancement, emotional or intellectual questions and preoccupations, or just bodily and emotional comfort, all in service to an imaginary 'I'. These all lead to suffering, since we are serving a false god (our self) and ignoring the longing for wholeness that is always present.

The Comforter of God is what The Bible calls the Holy Spirit. A Course in Miracles refers to the Holy Spirit as the Voice for God, the part of our holy mind that has never lost touch with God, our True Home, our True Self. This Comforter always alleviates suffering whenever and however possible, with the forms involved totally irrelevant, knowing that, "God is still Love, and this is not His Will... and so it cannot be at all." Even Jesus, with His Perfect Love and Perfect Knowing, urged us to love one another in tangible ways in order to remember, and to trust the Voice for God in all things. We don't need to fear the forms of suffering that present themselves, individually and collectively. We can fearlessly meet them with Love and Acceptance, knowing that the Truth of Love is only momentarily obscured by the lie of separation and suffering. And remember, Jesus fed them while knowing the Truth. He healed them while knowing it wasn't real. He did not abandon them while saying, "they're not really there."

It takes courage to leave behind our imaginary comforters, what ACIM calls the dark companions. These companions tell us that we have to take care of ourselves first, and that others have their own lives, their own stories. We see separate people and separate interests, and are comforted by our false autonomy. We enter into relationships (even spiritual ones) to get something, to figure out something, to acquire knowledge to better navigate our own personal dream, all in the service of a fictional, separate 'I'. We stay lost in the dream. And yet, the Comforter of God is in us. This is the Truth. The Voice for God is our salvation.

"Only God's Comforter can comfort you. In the quiet of His temple, He waits to give you the peace that is yours. But be Holy in the Presence of God, or you will not know that you are there. For what is unlike God cannot enter His Mind, because it was not His Thought. You cannot enter God's Presence with the dark companions beside you, but you also cannot enter alone. All your brothers must enter with you, for until you have accepted them you cannot enter. For you cannot understand wholeness unless you are whole, and no part of the Son can be excluded if he would know the Wholeness of His Father." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section III, 7:1-2, 4-5, 8-10