"Peace is impossible to those who look on war. Peace is inevitable to those who offer peace." -- A Course in Miracles; Manual for Teachers 11:4, 1-2
How then do we offer peace? In our Wednesday night ACIM Tele-class we were talking about judgment. We discovered that we even judge our spiritual experiences, those moments of Revelation that seem all too rare. This one was amazing, that one wasn't real, etc. Interestingly, it's the very judging and labeling of our experiences that makes peace seem fleeting and impossible. To the mind asleep and dreaming, every person, place, thing, or phenomenon is either/or. Everything is either this or that to the mind dreaming in duality. The categories of this or that are irrelevant. It's the categorization of every aspect of life that makes peace impossible... because where there is either/or, there is war.
Into this impossible situation comes the Teacher of God, the Voice that speaks in each and every seemingly separate mind. The Voice is One, and has One judgment that is Its' function: "We are One, not many. We are Whole, not parts. We are Peace. We are Joy. We are Love Itself. There is nothing else... There is no either/or..." Over and over the Voice echoes in our minds, behind every image of incompleteness, every image of conflict, every competitive or ambitious urge, behind every call to struggle and war with the images or people and situations we project and then think we see: "Nothing Real can be threatened. Nothing unreal exists. Herein lies the Peace of God." -- A Course in Miracles; Introduction, 2:2-4
This Peace extends infinitely and eternally. This means It isn't subject to our imagined concepts of time or space or circumstance. This means that when we remember our only function is forgiveness, we can forgive and release every imaginary obstacle to the awareness of this eternal Peace, Whose other name is Love. We are literally swimming, floating, flowing, Being as this Peace, this Love. We have no other existence.
Thank God we are neither this nor that. We are the All, the Everything... the All-Loving, All-Encompassing, Infinitely Joyous Peace that we mentally tried to distance ourselves from by calling it 'that'. Such machinations have never, and will never succeed. We offer Peace because we ARE the Peace of God, forever One and forever extending the Light of Love that shines from the heart of Peace.
This Holy Christmas Season, please don't get caught up in judging the world and its inhabitants as this or that. Let's forgive this madness, and see every Radiant aspect of Life as the Peace and Joy and Love that is its Reality. Whether it appears as big or little, cheap or expensive, good or bad, old or young, cold or hot, enjoyable or miserable, even alive or dead... these are just illusory judgment-veils, instigators of war. Peace remains untouched and radiant throughout Creation.
"Like to the sun and ocean your Self continues, unmindful that this tiny part regards itself as you. It is not missing; it could not exist if it were separate, nor would the Whole be whole without it. It is not a separate kingdom, ruled by an idea of separation from the rest. Nor does a fence surround it, preventing it from joining with the rest, and keeping it apart from its Creator. This little aspect is no different from the Whole, being continuous with It and at One with It. It leads no separate life, because its life IS the Oneness in which its being was created. Do not accept a little, fenced-off aspect as yourself." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 18, Section VIII, 6:1-6
Sunday, December 8, 2013
This or That
Labels:
A Course in Miracles,
ACIM,
Allness,
Christmas,
Forgiveness,
Joy,
Love,
Oneness,
Peace,
Self
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