The Course uses the term "Sons" 82 times.
The Course uses the term "children" to refer to the "children of God" 42 times.
The term "Sonship" is used 104 times.
The course also uses the term "parts", "minds", "aspects", "extensions", "channels", "brothers", "God's thoughts", "souls", and more, on multiple occasions.
All of these are plural. There are HUNDREDS of references to the fact that God created MANY SONS. Many extensions, many minds, many souls, many parts/aspects of the sonship.
The sonship having multiple parts does NOT mean the parts are separate, or separated by bodies, or estranged from each other by illusions of ego, or illusions of multiplicity, or any other form of separation that we would recognize as separation.
The sonship, in Heaven, in its entirety, experienced all simultaneously by God, is often referred to as "THE Son of God" or the "One Son". This does NOT erase or cancel out the fact that God created MANY Sons. It is simply talking about how ALL of the Sons are capable of SHARING equally, how they experience a Oneness with all parts of God's creation.
Oneness does not mean... one big blob. If it did, God would not have ANY SONS. Not even ONE. If God is oneness, then there is not even a Son of God. Clearly that would be severely against the Course's teaching. It does not teach that there is "no son". In fact, it teaches that because of what it is, LOVE MUST EXTEND and be shared, and it must CREATE, and the natural result of that is the creation of AT LEAST one Son. And the Course has explained that there are MANY, MANY, MANY Sons, many minds, many souls, which GOD CREATED, and which are whole in and of themselves.
The problem our ego minds have, is that we can't get our head around this idea:
There are many sons, who are simultaneously ONE, and who experience oneness, and are each a whole, and yet also are part of a combined whole, yet each is still an individual will free will. .... The ego has NO WAY to understand how that makes sense or is possible, especially when it considers any HINT of "separation" or "multiple" to mean... some kind of ego concept.
That we can't understand logically HOW this makes sense, or how it is possible, or what it means, does not mean it is lying to us. The Course is not lying to us. This is simply one area that the ego cannot easily get its head around. The ego cannot understand oneness. So to dismiss is on grounds of EGO LOGIC, which arrives at a false conclusion here, is a mistake.
"But how can God have multiple Sons if Oneness is a single thing" ..... this is the same question as, "How could the tiny mad idea happen". The ego is asking. The ego wants to figure it out. The ego thinks that it is capable of seeing WITHOUT separation, and that when it LOOKS AT the Sonship - the multiple Sons of God one with each other, it is CAPABLE of seeing the truth. It can't. When the ego looks at Oneness, ALL IT SEES IS SEPARATION. It will never be able to SEE the oneness of the sonship at the same time as recognizing that God created MANY SONS WITH FREE WILL.
To then base an entire theological understanding of what the Course says and means, on the idea that there are NOT multiple sons, and none of them have free will, and any way that they are distinct is "separation" and therefore illusion, WILL RESULT IN a very warped interpretation of the Course's metaphysics.
When there is no room in the ego's grasp of the Course to accept multiple sons, there is no way to explain properly how perception works or how minds work or what illusions are or how people have free will or who is dreaming what or who is responsible for what sickness or who is making what body appear. It ALL becomes confused in one big blur.
You'll defend something to the death if you think it's true. Your effort to be "right" about it is a combination of something that you believe is true combined with a sense of certainty. The power of conviction is not wrong, it is just misplaced onto something false. It's okay to acknowledge that your mind is powerful, it's just that it is 'mis-creating'.
If you are believing something is true which is actually false, and you are really adamant about it, it's going to take some 'undoing' to reverse this sense of conviction. You've probably built up a lot of "story" that explains, justified, rationalizes and establishes "why" this is true.
The more evidence you have gathered and the more you've "proven" it to yourself and talked yourself and others into it, the more volume of material is going to need to be undone. Those who are really extremely convinced of a lie are heavily "conditioned" by all of this psychological support, which may have come from culture or where you live or the kinds of people around you or your upbringing or experiences you had etc.
You'll need to look at what, in your belief system, 'supports' this truth. Look at all the scaffolding you've erected around it, all the supporting ideas and background information, the opinions of others, sources of authority that you believe in that support this truth, experiences you had which led you to be even more convinced this is true, affirmations that you make about its righteousness, ways you spin stories about it which back it up and regurgitate and reinforce it, how you defend it against other truth which seems to not be in accord with it, etc. All of these things add "weight" to this sense of it being real and valuable and correct.
It's not a problem to be correct. It's okay to be correct when you ARE correct. It's okay to be correct about Holy Spirit's truth which IS correct, and a correction of all else. But when you are correct about something that is an error or mistake or faulty conclusion or something based on dishonesty, it's going to present problems for you. You don't REALLY want to be right about how you need to suffer and die, for the sake of some "truth" that the ego has convinced you of, do you?
So as you pull apart your thought system you'll need to realize you've got all this support built up that defends this belief/truth and that all of that needs to be examined with Holy Spirit's light. It needs to be seen from a vantage point of a greater truth, otherwise you cannot recognize the falseness of it. You need to get outside of it and look in from a wider perspective.
For example, let's say you believe that you're in mortal danger because some body part seems to be failing and all the doctors said it's seriously bad and all your family members are showering you with sympathy and all you coworkers are retelling their own stories of woe and you've got yourself all worked up and terrified. Well, now this means that not only do you believe in sickness and so on but you also believe what your family and neighbors and coworkers are all telling you is the truth as well. And maybe you also "taught yourself" that all the doctors are well-trained and totally know what they're talking about, and that you don't dare question their authority. And maybe you yourself have justified to yourself why you need to be sick because it proves how guilty you are about something. All of these attitudes and opinions support keeping the problem real and true for you. You must be willing to question whether ANY of these supports are true.
What if absolutely everyone involved is telling you a lie, to show you what YOU believe that's a lie, and that you need to change your mind about what YOU think is true, so that they will stop telling you you're sure to die? Where is the empowerment and strength in listening to the voice for death? Where is the empowerment in not taking back responsibility for choosing to believe something that is grossly mistaken? You have to dismantle all of the lies that support the main lie in order for the main lie to be recognized as holding no ground. That it has no support. That it can't be justified. That it doesn't have any proof. And thus that you can't believe it. While you think lies are believable, you are stuck. The ego is literally unbelievable.
"The test of everything on earth is simply this; "What is it for?" The answer makes it what it is for you. It has no meaning of itself, yet you can give reality to it, according to the purpose that you serve."
The world was made for a purpose. It was deliberate, intentional, chosen. We wanted there to be an alternative to heaven. And its form and function were made to serve that purpose. Just as all sickness is intentionally used to serve a perceived need.
Purpose is based on "how you are using it" or "what it is for". What is the goal attached to it. What is the ambition. How is it being used to accomplish that goal. How does it serve you and God.
We started out with a purpose of separation and attack, and produced a world which seems to be a world where that purpose could be fulfilled. That it could serve or be used as a way to avoid being with God. A hell where God could enter not.
But since the PURPOSE of the world or what it MEANS or is USED FOR, is distinct from what the world IS (just a neutral illusion), it's possible to give it a different purpose and a different meaning or use.
The Holy Spirit uses the world in a totally different way to our original intentions. To bring you home to God, to wake you up, to get you to let go of your artificial meanings and the meanings you've given everything. He presents an alternative meaning and use of the world and the body, based in love.
So in forgiveness, we're giving the world a different meaning and purpose. We're re-interpreting it. We're re-purposing it and coming up with a different use for it. Instead of using it to keep you away from God, we're trying to use it in such a way that it doesn't serve as an obstacle, or as proof of sin, or as a way to keep you suffering.
In effect, we're trying to use what we made against itself, to undo it. We're cancelling it out by forgiving it, ie giving it a meaning from an opposite thought system, which runs contrary to the world's nature, so that the world is recognized sanely, setting you free from it. Because illusions recognized must disappear.
So when Jesus asks you to consider "what is it for?", he's trying to get you to look at how you're using it, or for what purpose, or what meaning you're inventing for it, and to question that choice, and choose again the Holy Spirit's alternative meaning and purpose and use of the world and the body.To "let me not use this as an obstacle to peace, but help me to use it to facilitate its coming."
The forgiven world is the same world with a different purpose. A world which came to damn, made in false perception, now being used to return you to salvation. A body which was made to separate, being used to bring help and healing. A life which was made to hide in darkness, being used to bring light to the world.
Purpose aligns with perception and belief, because when you change your mind about what you believe is true and want, you are changing the meaning of things. And now you project that meaning onto the world and see it.
So if you recognize and believe and accept God's meaning and truth, it will change the meaning you give to the world. And now you are perceiving closer to Christ Vision or Real Truth because you're looking at the world from a different vantage point or angle. Framing it differently.
Essentially, it's the same world, combined with a different attitude. A more holy attitude seems to render the world as though it is holy and harmless. Ancient hatreds turn into present loves. Serious suffering turns into effortless healing. Death turns into resurrection. And fear turns into happiness.
Another way of saying "what is it for?", is "what meaning do I want to give it?" Do I want to use this for attack and making sin real, or do I want to use it repurpose it to remind me of God's truth and method by which I might be saved from hell? Can I see it in another light? There must be a better way.
If I am presently using the world in such a way that it means attack and offense and threat and damage and suffering and hell, I can admit that I am using it in a certain way, thereby "doing this to myself".
And then I can change my mind and choose a different meaning. And then elect to tune into Holy Spirit's perspective of forgiveness and repurpose what I think happened to help me move towards peace instead.
"T-1.III.2. "Heaven and earth shall pass away" means that they will not continue to exist as separate states. 2 My word, which is the resurrection and the life, shall not pass away because life is eternal."
What this says in words is slightly deceptive in terms of what it MEANS. We must stay 100% compliant with the consistency of the truth.
1) It is impossible for there to be TWO REAL STATES.
2) It is impossible for there to be TWO REALITIES.
3) It is impossible for those realities to be UNLIKE each other in every way and BE REAL.
4) God does not create TWO DIFFERENT REALITIES or states.
5) Only what God creates is real. ONLY ONE of the two states is real. The other one MUST NOT BE REAL.
6) Therefore, if there SEEMS to be two states right now, THIS MUST BE AN ILLUSION.
7) Being an illusion of two separate states, it is the ILLUSION OF THERE BEING TWO STATES that will pass away when the truth comes.
8) Since only one of the two states is REALITY, And God only created Heaven, Heaven is the only REAL state, and Earth MUST BE an unreal state.
9) Nothing real can be threatened. Nothing unreal exists. Therefore, the state which is UNREAL, the illusion of a state of "earth", DOES NOT EXIST.
10) What does not exist, does not exist now, never existed, and never will exist.
11) The Earth as an illusion of a separate state, DOES NOT EXIST NOW and it is made of NOTHING.
12) The *ILLUSION* of there being two simultaneous real states - "heaven and earth", will pass away. This DOES NOT MEAN that Heaven will pass away. It means only that the ILLUSORY STATE, which WAS NEVER THERE, Earth, will CEASE TO APPEAR AS THOUGH IT EXISTS. Because it does not exist.
13) Therefore Earth will be RECOGNIZED AS AN ILLUSION, and illusions when recognized MUST DISAPPEAR.
14) The Earth will disappear because IT NEVER REALLY EXISTED IN THE FIRST PLACE, being 100% an illusory "2nd reality" that is impossible. "It is the world you see that is IMPOSSIBLE."
15) The idea of there being two states MUST refer to the level at which the illusion SEEMS to exist, and cannot therefore be a comparison between heaven being REAL and earth being REAL. It is an ILLUSION of a comparison. Therefore the quote is NOT speaking about the END OF HEAVEN. Only the end of the OPPOSITE of haven.
16) The FICTIONAL ILLUSION of the two separate states will end, because THE TRUTH is that ONLY THE TRUTH WILL REMAIN. The truth is HEAVEN. Earth is NOT the truth, because it is an ILLUSORY STATE. There cannot be two real states. Earth is an illusion!
17) "My world, which is the resurrection and the life, shall not pass away because it is eternal." is PURELY a post-undoing-of-illusion statement (actually true always), that HEAVEN, God's world, God's ONLY WORLD, will not pass away because it is eternal. This is a confirmation and reassurance that God's world will ALWAYS be there (heaven), therefore heaven ITSELF did not "pass away" when "the two states" passed away, and therefore THE OTHER WORLD - Earth, which was a fictional second reality, DID pass away. It never existed in the first place.
A clarifying REWORDING of Jesus's intention can be done as follows, completely 100% in line with the metaphysical logic:
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"Heaven and earth shall pass away" means that Earth never existed as an opposite to Heaven, and therefore Earth has never existed and will pass away when dreaming ends. The only thing which remains will be Heaven which God created as Eternal and never passes away, and Earth will have been recognized as having never existed.
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You can deny this if you want to. Or you can accept it is true. There is no logical fallacy in this black and white metaphysical logic. I challenge anyone to find a hole in it. You will not.
Any hole you find, MUST BE FICTIONAL and a rationalization by the ego to attempt to DENY that this is true. This being true has nothing to do with whether you will ACCEPT IT, and a even if it IS true and even if you can see it is true, you STILL can deny it if you want to.
Classic denial #1: they both become one so now we have a combined sum total of the parts. Bullshit.
Classic denial #3: heaven and earth both pass away leaving some other state. Heaven never passes away, so that's bullshit.
Classic denial #3: earth will be "translated into" heaven. Bullshit. There is NO EARTH TO TRANSLATE, because a 2nd state of "something real" cannot exist at all. Earth cannot exist. THE WORLD YOU SEE IS IMPOSSIBLE.
There is no world. There is no earth. Earth is not real. Heaven is the only reality. Heaven is your home.
God's Son is huge. Infinite, unlimited, eternal, omnipresent. He is everywhere at all times and beyond. There is no edge to His being and no limits to His Self.
Think of the Son of God like a huge canvas or giant blanket spanning the entire universe and beyond. Written all over this blanket it the word "Self".
Then, if you were to cover up your vision and narrow down your perception so that you only see one little piece of the blanket, obviously you're not going to be aware of the entire blanket. So you might now only be seeing a little tiny bit of the corner of the letter "E". Then, because your awareness stops at the edges of this little confined space, you will think, this is all that there is to my Self, this is the limit of who I am. And you will also think, that the full scope of this Self is the whole of you, and therefore you are whole.
Now, within that little limited sense of Self, it could be a very clear vision of that limited Self or it could be covered over with lots of false beliefs and a false sense of identity - the ego. You could then work to undo this ego and when it disappears it would reveal the full scope of your Self, WITHIN the confines of what seems to be your identity, ie within the limited scope of one body or one self. This is like a fully realized individual Self. This is "waking up in the dream" but still being confined by it.
But this Self isn't as large as or as aware of the entire scope of the huge blanket of Self that spans the whole universe. It does not experience all of time and space at once. It still sees limited objects and is limited by what the body can do and where it can go. It does not identify Self as the entire universe and beyond and is not experiencing that. It is the fullest experience of a limited self that's possible, within the scope of being an individual son in the sonship.
But there is more. There is more Self outside of the bounds of what you think is yourself. So like, if you are in a body, and are confined to what the body can do or where it can show up, everything outside the body you will regard as not yourself. But what if, the very edges of your sense of identity suddenly expanded out past the body and you became aware of the entire universe all at once? What if you suddenly were aware that you were everyone all at once, and all of the plants and animals and planets and stars? And then what if even beyond that, you knew that you were a single whole immensely unlimited Self - Christ - the Son of God - who is dreaming this whole universe into being?
That's quite a shift, away from being one of many selves, to being the only One Self. It means you are the entire sonship combined. It means the universe is inside of yourself, being a thought in your mind. This is the state of the Christ Self, and experiencing it constantly is what is required in order to realize it and identify with it. Or in other words, your sense of identity must grow way beyond what your perception shows you (all perception is limited) and must correlate to a FULL awareness of ALL that really does exist. Perfect complete awareness of God and His Creation.
What we might not realize has happened, is that Christ split Himself up into many many individual pieces, and each of those pieces has become an individual "soul", and each soul has found its way into a separate body. And each soul in each body now thinks that it is the whole of "Self". You can become fully aware of your individual Self as one of many Sons in the sonship, which awakens you inside the dream, but it doesn't put you in the awareness of being the one who is literally directly making the universe. You actually have to lift away the boundaries of your identity to a really huge degree in order to become larger than the universe itself, aware that you made it, identified as its dreamer and as God's One Son. This is what Jesus has accomplished.
We are all these little pieces of mind believing they are wholly independent, individual and autonomous. There is Self outside the extreme limits of the edges of our awareness. There is Self beyond the body. There is Self which spans the entire universe. There is Self so vast and endless that it knows no ends of any kind. It is a shared collective consciousness which becomes a singular consciousness and eventually is the end of consciousness, replaced with awareness of the whole of what is.
"Temptation has one lesson it would teach in all its forms wherever it occurs. It would persuade the holy Son of God he is a body, born in what must die, unable to escape its frailty and bound by what it orders him to feel. It sets the limits on what he can do; its power is the only strength he has; his grasp cannot exceed its tiny reach. Would you be this if Christ appeared to you in all His glory, asking you but this: Choose once again if you would take your place among the saviors of the world, or would remain in hell and hold your brothers there." - ACIM
Many ACIM folks appear to struggle between two sort of 'camps', in regards to whether to change the world or not.
There are many passages and quotable concepts in the Course which could be used to back up either viewpoint.
I think though the main reason people struggle with this is because the EGO has tremendous difficulty understanding anything outside of its backwards perspective.
For example, to the ego, control brings you freedom. It says that if you control things more, you'll be able to prevent all the things you don't want to happen, and enforce all the things you do want to happen. You'll 'get your way', and that means life will seem to be doing what you want it to do. And that is its interpretation of what freedom is.
The truth, which the ego cannot grasp or accept, is that control DIMINISHES your freedom, because it separates out some parts (of yourself ultimately) from others, sets them against each other, and elects to support only one of the two parts. Now your choices are diminished. In other words, if you choose A or B, once you've chosen, the other choice goes away, and now you are 'stuck' with the choice you made. This is freedom to the ego, but to your Real Self this is imprisonment.
So when you use the ego mind to try to understand a very basic principle like ACCEPTANCE, this I think is where the community's viewpoint hinges and stimulates controversy. It's because the ego does not understand HOW it could be possible that you can be accepting, or just working on changing how you perceive the world, and not be passive. So this is what it all pivots around.
Really these are the two conflicting attitudes of the EGO:
1) Accept everything as it is, don't try to change anything, be passive, work on your own mind, change your mind ABOUT the world, study in secret, don't tell anyone you're doing the Course, keep miracles to yourself, interpret miracles as shifts in your own perception only, and generally lay down any kind of 'interference' with the world as you go within. This is EGO because the ego has now separated you from the world, has isolated you to your body/mind with the justification of hundreds of Course quotes which SEEM to support its argument. This is EGO because the ego can't ALLOW there to be acceptance without interpreting it as SACRIFICE, i.e. the giving up of control which the ego thinks means like 'I need do nothing' i.e. I will literally stop expressing anything in the world. This is SPIRITUAL CONSTIPATION! You'll be stuck in your head and paralyzed from exerting the will and power of God. You will be disabled. The ego sees acceptance as disempowerment and disability, and this inspires all thoughts of how this kind of 'attitude' is the correct way to do the Course.
2) The second ego interpretation is that you aren't meant to just dwell on fixing your view of the world, but you're meant to change the world. Except that, to the ego, this means, using the ego to change the world. This turns into control. It turns into spiritualization of the world. It becomes the ego's party where all egos are invited to 'act spiritual' or to pursue special causes or use your ACIM learning to 'attack' what is. The EGO can't understand whatsoever how it could be possible to express something in the world and have it be ACCEPTING of the world at the same time. It does not get this. So if you were to express or exert or change the world, this is now considered 'unacceptable' to the Course theology, and therefore rejected by many students. And yet those who accept this idea then go on to shy away from some of the seemingly contradictory statements about acceptance or doing God's will or changing your mind and so on. This again is another ego play to flip your mind around a polarity of DUALITY, so that you stay within the ego thought system, and keep interpreting the course WITH the ego.
Neither of these camps have the truth.
Truth is of the Holy Spirit and his mind functions in a completely different way with rules that apply to all and which has no duality in it. The Holy Spirit has a completely different understanding of ACCEPTANCE. He has a completely different grasp of whether you are 'for or against' doing stuff in the world, knowing that this is a dualistic question. Holy Spirit would not see your 'accepting things as they are' attitude as being SEPARATE from 'being empowered to do God's will and heal the world'. And therefore, Holy Spirit supports BOTH camps combined, which completely defies the ego's logic.
It is possible to be accepting without that having to mean, you cut yourself off from the world or disappear into your intellectual correction of perception. It is possible to be accepting of what 'is' or what appears to be happening, while at the same time having the power and will to CHANGE IT. Because... after all, IT is just an effect of what's going on in the mind. IT is a dream that YOU are dreaming. So this has to mean, you can accept what you have made, but you can also make something different. So this division of separation in the community is really only there because the EGO has gotten ahold of the Course and DOES NOT understand the Holy Spirit's viewpoint or thought system.
As always with ANY polarizing, dualistic, separating set of questions, in which it seems that neither side seems to 'get it', this ALWAYS means that "there has to be a better way" and there always IS a third option. It's that third option that comes from Holy Spirit. Another way not just of looking at the situation, but another way of looking at HOW you look at looking at the situation.
You can accept without being controlling, and yet exercise tremendous freedom to intercede. "I [Jesus] inspire all miracles, which are really intercessions. They intercede for your holiness." - principle 32. "35 - Miracles are expressions of love, but they may not always have observable effects." - principle 35, which also means miracles USUALLY have observable effects, meaning they change the world.
There is not a contradiction here. The contradiction is in the ego mind that cannot understand this. It can't get it because the ego can only see WITH separation. It is blind to Oneness or true meaning. Any separation in the community has to be founded in the ego.
The Kingdom of God has the interesting property of having to be shared and extended in order to exist. And the Course teaches that in order to truly 'have' something, you must give it away, because giving it proves that you must have had it and you can only give what you have. It also tells us that in order to experience anything you must SHARE in it because it is available to all and is not for your private possession.
"To have all, give all to all".
This is also reflected in "giving and receiving are one".
What it means is, things of God don't just sit there idle doing nothing. God isn't just "being God" without any increase or creation. If you are not sharing and extending love, love is not being love. This is why definitions of 'oneness' and 'non-duality' fall far short of the creative, extending, loving qualities of God.
We are also told that miracles which come from love will "go out because of what they are", but that "you are needed that they can begin." What that means is, love simply automatically radiates and extends by its own nature, but in order to allow it to extend through you you have to remove your blocks to it first. Then it moves through you without you having to make it do so.
Everything about God's Kingdom shares this nature. Something is not real unless it is shared, open, extending, increasing. This sharing and extending is like a RADIANCE or a radiation, or radiating outward. This produces LIGHT and PRESENCE. In a sense "God said, let there be light", speaks to God's creative ability to shine and create and extend.
Remember that in God's Kingdom everything is increased by being given, and giving something does not mean there is a loss (an ego idea). Instead, giving anything real increases it because giving does the opposite of losing.
Jesus talks about this in terms of everything being an idea. When you share an idea it is increased and it becomes stronger the more people believe in it. It does not diminish and the person having the idea does not lose anything.
The Course also says, "nothing real can be increased except by sharing". It is also the nature of love to extend and increase, because it has absolutely no reservations or limits or reasons to withhold itself from "shining" and radiating and going out everywhere.
Jesus talks about this in how the children of God contain the same "inner radiance" as the Father, and this is the source of all extension and creation.
Creation and extension and sharing are the same thing. To share to the ego means both parties have less than the whole. To share in Heaven means that both parties SHARE the WHOLE, and there is no decrease, and in fact there is an increase. The total is greater than the sum of the parts.
This is also true of the Sonship - "the combined total of the Sonship is greater than the sum of its parts". This is because each Son in the Sonship is not just a finite unit. Instead, each son SHARES and extends and increases and amplifies the rest of the Sonship. So it's not just like 500 sons lined up alongside each other, it's more like 500 sons overlapping and increasing with each other, creating a wholeness which is far larger than their individual contributions. This is also part of the holographic nature of creation.
Everything about God, His Kingdom, Creation, Extension, Sharing, Reality, Truth, Love, it all has this property of increase and sharing and going out and radiating and illuminating. And if this radiating and extending were not occurring, none of this stuff would be able to exist.
Love could not be love unless love loved to love and radiated love and extended and increased love's presence. Creation would not be possible at all (since nothing real can increase unless it shares) if it weren't for this sharing, giving, increasing.
There would be no light without the ability for it to shine, which means to "project" or extend outward beyond its source. God would have no Sons or Sonship and Heaven could not exist without it being in a constant state of radiance and increase.
Also therefore you cannot have or enjoy or share in anything real unless you also are willing for it to be given and extended. This is because, if you think about it, in order to receive something of God, you cannot just take it and possess it and diminish God's supply of it. Instead you have to be open to receive, to SHARE it, ie both you and God are experiencing the same thing, which also means this openness makes you willing to GIVE it as much as you receive it - giving and receiving are one, and therefore to experience love requires the willingness to share, receive, and give love, which automatically increases it.
God's act of CREATION, which we also possess since God shared it with us and created us capable of creating like Him, is an act of RETAINING your own light and love and yet 'projecting' it outward so that you shine, and this shining produces an increase, and manifests a "new creation" which itself possesses the ability to create and extend to exactly the same degree as yourself and God, and so now there is the whole of God + the whole of you + the whole of your own creations, and nothing is lost, and so there has only been an INCREASE. This is why Heaven rejoices as each Son of God returns Home to increase its light, and why joy increases, and everything just keeps on "growing" infinitely.
As love is received, shared, and extended, it increases because you are now acting like an amplifier or a relay which boosts the signal as it passes through. By giving it, by sharing it, you can 'have it', but you can't 'have' it by claiming it in isolation for yourself (which is ego). And so anything that is real cannot be possessed it has to be shared, and so anything real automatically has this sharing/increasing quality to its "terms and conditions". To exist (to have), it MUST extend. This is also why God creates and why every child of God is imbued with the same will to create. It is NATURAL to extend and create and to increase the presence of love. Nothing can exist without sharing and extension and equal giving and receiving.
Miracles are everyone's right. Both their receipt and their expression.
God is not in a state of choosing whether to perform a healing. God is not waiting to make a healing occur. God is not considering whether it's right or wrong to heal. God is not delaying healing for some special reason.
God is always the same. God has already fully given all of Himself, to the maximum extent possible.
Prior to the separation, all of God was already given and received fully! You already had perfection.
The idea of the separation was an attempt to PUSH AWAY that which you ALREADY HAD and to deny that God has given it.
Every effort in the ego to make the separation real, tries to deny the reality of God's abundance.
If it seems rare or inconsistent that miracles occur, or that minds are joined at all, that's because the ego's separation has been so "severe" that what was once whole and full and freely abundant has been reduced to barely a trickle.
Such is the ego's resistance, the use of the physical form to repress and counteract the receipt of God's abundance, that when a rare miracle seems to happen everyone's like, oh my God, that's so fantastic. And when anyone shares a little bit of mind, it's like, wow, that's a special ability.
No. Miracles are everyone's right. They are natural expressions of love. When they are not happening, something has gone wrong. And in the ego's world, something has MAJORLY gone wrong, resulting in what appears to be miracles that are few and far between. Those willing to even entertain the possibility of miracles, yet alone becoming able to perform them, is even more uncommon.
A miracle, as an expression of God, and all miracles combined, are merely the abundance of God being shared. All of God's abundance was ALREADY shared. You already had it prior to the illusion of separation. You already had immortality, eternal life, divine health, and absolute invulnerability.
That we now claw and grasp at tiny morsels of miracles is a profoundly opposite state of being, where the idea of accessing even a PART of any of these God given promises is considered "miraculous" and applause-worthy. Miracles are supposed to be happening ALL THE TIME, for EVERYONE!
Recognize then that when attempting to perform a miracle, the doing so should NOT entail in any way notions that God has not yet given all that He is. You need to erase from your mind all beliefs that God has not given, will not give, is waiting to give, etc. You must stop looking and WAITING for God to do the miraculous. This means, you have a ROLE to fulfill to facilitate and support the miraculous expression of God, and you need to TAKE ACTION!
It MUST be true that God has ALREADY done his part! It's not God's FAULT that miracles aren't happening. It's not His responsibility that miracles aren't happening. God is not in error, God has not failed, God is not broken, and God did not decide to stop sharing eternal life with you or anyone.
It is US who have fucked up. Or more to the point, it is our choice to produce "ego" - resistances to sharing God - which are defenses against God's will being fully expressed and extended. We are trying to stick our thumb in the tap to stop the flow. We've become spiritually constipated. We are constantly trying to STOP miracles from happening. Like, all the time. Our state of denial and defense is so profound that we're actually convinced God is no longer GIVING eternal life. Our unwillingness to RECEIVE eternal life is a choice for death.
To perform miracles again, we must OVERCOME the separation, OVERCOME the ego, and TAKE BACK what is rightfully ours. We're not really taking it back from someone who has taken it from us, and we're not really victims of theft, but it SEEMS like we are. In order to take back our miracles, therefore, our divine right, we need to be willing to SURRENDER and own up to our natural role as Christ.
All that we have GIVEN AWAY, needs to be reclaimed. All that we have blocked, needs to be set free. All that we have chosen to live without, needs to be accepted once again.
So performing a miracle must entail you're not sitting there waiting for God to do something. Your role is not to go to God asking Him to do something. He's already done his part! Your role is not to look at the ego and keep checking it to see if it is changing "on its own", as though some other will is deciding to manifest the miraculous effects. These are all ways that we are still blaming God for our disowning of power and abundance. These are ways of disowning the miracles.
If God has done His part fully, and if we have rejected our part, and if it's us who have given away God's gifts, then performing a miracle is simply RE-RECEIVING what God has already given. Miracles are natural. It's taking it back, by ceasing to disown it. It's ceasing to believe that "someone else" or "some cause else" is the reason why we don't have eternal life. We need to take it back from our own imaginary thieves, who are really scapegoats for our own choice to NOT receive God's love.
The Christian miracle workers focus quite a lot on taking back what the devil has stolen from you. This doesn't recognize that you did it to yourself. Yet, in the ego's universe, it can seem as though there are "bad spirits" or other negativity which causes sickness etc. Really, though, we should be careful not to battle against "forces" that we ourselves have put in place, otherwise we're really trying to wage a spiritual "war" against our own decision to believe in the ego. Evil is not reality. There is no need for a spiritual war against an imaginary enemy, but there IS need for us to responsibly reclaim what is naturally ours - that we have given away.
Really, there is no enemy, such as sickness or death, it's just us pretending to disown and disallow God. When we own up to that and recognizing that we're doing this to ourselves, we will be supremely confident in working "miracles" because we will know with clarity that NOTHING CAN STOP US other than ourselves. So fear has absolutely no foundation and cannot stop the truth from manifesting.
Let's stop blaming God for sickness or trying to turn to Him to do something about it. He's already done everything that's real and everything that's true. He hasn't stopped loving. He hasn't stopped sustaining PERFECT HEALTH. He hasn't stopped infusing Eternal Life into us forever and ever. It's us who have chosen to resist and fail to claim it.
Therefore, recognize miracles are already FULLY GIVEN. The work we have to do now is to stop blocking them and learn to RECEIVE them. And this happens through SURRENDER, relaxation, openness to Holy Spirit, and ALLOWING Him to flow and rebuild by God's Will.
Holy Spirit said to me, simply, "Surrender, and let God do the rest". This is key to performing miracles. They are not effort. They require surrender of the ego, a calmness, an openness, and an allowing of God's Will to be done. You are a conduit for the extension of LOVE to flow THROUGH you. You just need to stop blocking it. When you allow God, miracles will be effortless, normal, abundant, and constant!
"This is the world of time, where all things end."
This should be fairly easy to understand. Time is the idea that what seems to be here now, cannot remain. It must change. It must stop being what it is.
This leads to realizing that time does not allow anything to be permanent. Everything becomes temporary. That means everything is forced to come to an end. Which means everything dies. And both birth and "death" are now part of a whole system of death, in which everything has the mark of death upon it, even from the outset of "new life".
Time is the very thing which seems to produce growth and change. It is the seeming driving force behind the beautiful flowers that grow from seed and bloom and share their fragrance for a little while, before time just as easily forces them to stop being this way, enforcing death and decay.
Time does not allow anything to remain as it is. It is an attack upon the idea of eternal life. It is a notion that what has always existed no longer exists, being the destruction of God himself. It essentially places God into the past and kills him off and converts him into some other mangled form. And even if it reflects glimpses of God it will only offer them temporarily.
The world, by which I mean planet Earth, but also the solar system, the galaxy and all the galaxies/interstellar objects, are all governed by time. Every particle of matter is governed by time. This means that everything in this system HAS to change, which produces a constant state of movement and the impossibility of perfect stillness. Nothing is ever allowed to rest and be truly at peace. Even the rocks sitting there for many years are gradually being changed and converted against their will. Nothing in the world or this "universe" can escape this.
"At no SINGLE instant does the body exist at all. It is always remembered or anticipated, but NEVER experienced just now. Only its past and future make it seem real. Time controls it entirely. For sin is never present."
Since time enforces change, it enforces ends, which means it enforces death. Don't be deceived in thinking there are exceptions to this. Absolutely everything in the world has the mark of death upon it and will die, unless perhaps there is an interventional miracle from another world beyond the laws of time and space.
Time wants you dead. The very thing which seems to allow your body to move and change is also the very thing which is seeking its destruction. Time is the very thing which permits birth but also death. It is not picky about what state anything is in. Jesus is telling me to use the word "unscrupulous" here.
In a world of time, all things end. There can at best be seeming periods in which things seem to be fairly consistent, fairly constant, or even long-lasting, but they are never endless, and a time will come when they will end. These temporary illusions of almost-permanence mask the fact that the whole system is still gradually destroying itself. And if you fall for the illusion of believing that its presentation of "life" is at its maximum, you are blind to the fact that even the living are partly dead.
"There IS no life outside of Heaven. Where God created life, their life must be. In ANY state apart from Heaven, life is illusion. At best, it SEEMS like life; at worst, like death. Yet both are judgments on what is NOT life, equal in their inaccuracy and lack of meaning."
Since there is no real eternal life outside of heaven, and Earth is a realm technically "outside" of heaven, or at least believed to be, it is not a world where there is real life, or maximum life. It is a world of death. This is because separation from heaven means the inducing of time and space, which is delay or avoidance or denial of reality.
So this whole system is set up for death. All the time it is devouring itself. All the time it is working on destroying itself. Sometimes it presents illusions of birth and newness and growth and prosperity, only to GUARANTEE that at some point it will just as easily take it all away without blinking an eyelid. And to some that may come as a shock or surprise, or something long put-off and avoided, as if it is not going to happen. But look at how everything you ever had in the world came to an end.
Essentially change is death. Although of course in this world it seems that you must change in order to "live", because the whole system is backwards. But change does not allow the immortal to remain immortal, and the eternal are brought into question by it. Without time you would live forever, but with time you are destined to be destroyed.
Jesus suggests that there is no hope of escape from death IN the world. You cannot stay IN time, and have there be no death. Time and space are both attacks on reality's nature. They cannot be combined or coexist. You cannot keep time, along with bodies moving and growing and so on, and still expect there to be no death. "Seek not ESCAPE from problems here. The world was made that problems could not BE escaped."
Read it carefully because it's telling you that there is NO WAY EVER to escape from problems WITHIN the world. The only way ultimately is to transcend it, rise above it, and eventually leave it. The whole system of spacetime will always entail death and destruction. It will not ever be heaven or offer eternal life. It cannot therefore save you and cannot save you from itself.
You HAVE to find a better way - another world, not of you, which God created perfect. The ONLY HOPE that you truly have is that this world is not real and is thankfully NOT doing what it appears to be doing. Do not be deceived into thinking that this world can ever be dressed up as a living world or a permanent world or a world of hope or a world of salvation and happiness. It is nothing and will never be true. All you really want is God.
"It might be worth a little time to think once more about the value of this world. Perhaps you will concede there is no loss in letting go all thought of value here. The world you see is merciless indeed, unstable, cruel, unconcerned with you, quick to avenge and pitiless with hate. It gives but to rescind, and takes away all things that you have cherished for a while. No lasting love is found, for none is here. This is the world of time, where all things end."
Innocence is goodness. If guilt is equated with evil, then innocence is equated with good. In order to forgive someone or something requires looking for the good in them - looking for their innocence. Seeing their harmlessness, their gentleness, their holiness and their perfection.
"Dream softly of your sinless brother, who unites with you in holy innocence. And, from THIS dream, the Lord of Heaven will Himself awaken His beloved Son."
"The good" is also combined with love, and light, and power, and strength. It is the realm of miracles. In effect, evil is a breakdown, malfunction, failure, weakness and a loss. So its opposite, good, is all that can actually work, solves all problems, repairs all sickness and resurrects.
"The good is what works" is a sound though insufficient statement. ONLY the good CAN work. Nothing else works at all."
The Holy Spirit also represents the state of forgiveness and the miracle, as the power of God which performs miracles, as the healer as the resurrector. Therefore seeing the good in your brother for example also equates with seeing the Holy Spirit in him.
"And now I place you in His hands, to be His faithful followers, with Him as Guide through every difficulty and all pain that you may think is real. Nor will He give you pleasures that will pass away, for He gives only the eternal and the good. Let Him prepare you further."
Jesus encourages us to find the good in things. To "look on the bright side". To make of the world a forgiven world where all is seen as innocent and harmless and guiltless and sinless.
"Have you been similarly grateful to each other? Have you consistently appreciated the GOOD efforts, and OVERLOOKED mistakes?" Indeed forgiveness puts you in touch with your true nature, brings you closer to God, aligns you with your soul, and reawakens the power of God in you. It is your natural divine function to create the good and to do only good.
Ultimately "the good" is God, and anything of God is good. The world, as an illusion, is not good, and can at best only reflect God's goodness. Moving away from evil takes you toward the good of God. And in God, everyone and everything is good.
"Child of God, you were created to create the good, the beautiful, and the holy. Do not lose sight of this."
""I am blessed as a Son of God."
Herein lies my claim to all good and only good. I am blessed as a Son of God. All good things are mine because God intended them for me. I cannot suffer any loss or deprivation or pain because of who I am. My Father supports me, protects me, and directs me in all things. His care for me is infinite, and is with me forever. I am eternally blessed as His Son."
"You have been told that everything brings good that comes from God."
"And as you gave your trust to what is "good" in him, you gave it to the "good" in you. In terms of concepts, it is thus you see him MORE than just a body, for the "good" is NEVER what the body seems to be."
"By focusing upon the "good" in him, the body grows decreasingly persistent in your sight, and will at length be seen as little more than just a shadow circling round the "good.""
"And look upon the "good" in him, that you may not be fearful of your "evil" thoughts, because they do not cloud your view of him." "ALL things work together for good. There are NO exceptions except in the ego's judgment."
"Man will ultimately look upon his own creations, and will to preserve only what is good, just as God Himself once looked upon what he had created, and knew that it WAS good."
"For what God gives can only be for good. And I accept but what He gives as what belongs to me."
"God is said to have looked on all He created and pronounced it good. No, He declared it perfect, and so it was."
"Something good must come from every meeting of patient and therapist. And that good is saved for both, against the day when they can recognize that only that was real in their relationship."
"And so there is a place for all relationships in this world, and they will bring as much good as each can accept and use."
"We look on everyone as brothers, and perceive all things as kindly and as good."
"The real world can ACTUALLY BE PERCEIVED. All that is necessary is a willingness to perceive nothing ELSE. For if you perceive both good AND evil, you are accepting both the false AND the true, AND MAKING NO DISTINCTION BETWEEN THEM. The ego sees SOME good, but never ONLY good. That is WHY its perceptions are so variable. It does not reject goodness entirely, for this you could not accept, but it always ADDS something that is NOT real TO the real, thus CONFUSING ILLUSION AND REALITY. For perceptions cannot be partly true. If you believe in truth AND illusion you CANNOT TELL WHICH IS TRUE."
"The perception of goodness is not knowledge, but the denial of the OPPOSITE of goodness enables you to perceive a condition in which opposites do not exist."
"What would give you the ability to be aware of all the facets of any problem, and to resolve them in such a way that only good can come of it?"
"But "good" and "deprivation" are opposites, and CANNOT meaningfully join in ANY way."
"Any ability that anyone develops has the potentiality for good." "Nothing good is lost, because it comes from the Holy Spirit, the voice for Creation. Nothing that is not good was ever created, and therefore CANNOT be protected."
"There is always some good in any thought which strengthens the idea that life and the body are not the same."
"The Resurrection demonstrated that NOTHING can destroy truth. Good can withstand ANY form of evil, because light abolishes ALL forms of darkness."
"It is secure in certainty that obstacles can not impede its progress to accomplishment of any goal which serves the greater plan established for the good of everyone."
"What could you not accept, if you but knew that everything which happens, all events, past, present and to come, are gently planned by One Whose only purpose is your good? Perhaps you have misunderstood His plan, for He would never offer pain to you. But your defenses did not let you see His loving blessing shine in every step you ever took. While you made plans for death, He led you gently to Eternal Life."
"Now close your eyes and see him in your mind, and look at him a while. Try to perceive some light in him somewhere; a little gleam which you had never noticed. Try to find some little spark of brightness shining through the ugly picture which you hold of him. Look at this picture until you see a light somewhere within it, and then try to let this light extend until it covers him, and makes the picture beautiful and good."
"The laws of God work only for your good, and there ARE no other laws beside His."
"The Biblical quotation should read "In this world you need NOT have tribulation BECAUSE I have overcome the world." THAT is why you should "be of good cheer.""
"He will remove all faith that you have placed in pain, disaster, suffering and loss. He gives you vision which can look beyond these grim appearances, and can behold the gentle Face of Christ in all of them. You will no longer doubt that only good can come to you who are beloved of God, for He will judge all happenings and teach the single lesson which they all contain."
"The Holy Spirit USES time, but does NOT believe in it. Coming from God, He uses EVERYTHING for good, but does not BELIEVE in what is not true."
"Out of Love he was created, and in Love he abides. Goodness and mercy have always followed him, for he has always extended the Love of his Father."
"You can do ANYTHING I ask. I have asked you to perform miracles, and have made it VERY clear that these are NATURAL, CORRECTIVE, HEALING, and UNIVERSAL. There is nothing good they cannot do."