Decisions are continuous. You do not always know when you are making them. But, with a little practice in the ones you recognize, a set begins to form which sees you through the rest. It is not wise to let yourself become preoccupied with every step you take. The proper set, adopted consciously each time you wake, will put you well ahead. And if you find resistance strong and dedication weak, you are not ready. DO NOT FIGHT YOURSELF. But think about the kind of day you want, and tell yourself there is a way by which this very day can happen just like that. Then try again to HAVE the day you want.
1. The outlook starts with this:
"Today I will make NO decisions by myself."
This means that you are choosing NOT to be the judge of what to do. But it must ALSO mean you will not judge the situations where you will be called upon to make response. For if you judge them, you HAVE set the rules for how you should react to them. And then ANOTHER answer cannot BUT produce confusion and uncertainty AND FEAR. This is your major problem now. You still make up your minds, and THEN decide to ask what you should do. And what you hear may not resolve the problem AS YOU SAW IT FIRST. This leads to fear, because it contradicts what you perceive, and so you feel attacked, AND THEREFORE ANGRY. There are rules by which this will not happen. But it does occur, at first, to everyone who listens well.
2. Throughout the day, at any time you think of it, and have a quiet moment for reflection, tell yourself again the kind of day you want; the feelings you would have, the things you WANT to happen, and the things you WOULD experience. And say,
"If I make no decisions by myself,
This is the day that will be GIVEN me."
These two procedures, practiced well, will serve to let you be directed WITHOUT fear, for opposition will not FIRST arise, and THEN become a problem in itself. But there will still be times when you have judged ALREADY. Now the answer will provoke attack, unless you quickly straighten out your mind to WANT an answer that will work. Be certain this has happened, if you feel yourself to be unwilling to sit by, and ask to have the answer GIVEN you. This means you HAVE decided by yourself, AND CANNOT SEE THE QUESTION. Now you need a quick restorative BEFORE you ask.
3. Remember once again the day you want, and recognize that something has occurred which is not part of it. Then realize that you have asked a question by yourself, and MUST have set an answer in your terms. Then say,
"I HAVE no question. I forgot what to decide."
This cancels out the terms which you have set, and lets the ANSWER show you what the question MUST have really been. Try to observe this rule without delay DESPITE your opposition. For you have ALREADY gotten angry, and your fear of being answered in a different way from what YOUR version of the question asks will gain momentum until you believe the day you want is one in which you get YOUR answer to your question. And you will not get it, for it would destroy the day by robbing you of what you REALLY want. This can be very hard to realize, when once you have decided by yourself the rules which PROMISE you a happy day. But these decisions still can be undone, by simple methods which you CAN accept.
4. If you are so unwilling to receive you cannot even let your QUESTION go, you can begin to change your mind with this:
"At least I can decide I do not LIKE what I feel now."
This much is obvious, and paves the way for the next easy step, which follows this.
5. Having decided that you do not like the way you feel, what could be easier than to continue with -
"And so I HOPE I have been wrong."
This works AGAINST the sense of opposition, and reminds you that help is not being thrust upon you, but is something that you want and that you need BECAUSE you do not like the way you feel. This tiny opening will be enough to let you go ahead with just a few more steps you need to LET yourself be helped.
6. Now you have reached the turning point, because it has occurred to you that YOU will gain, if what you have decided is NOT so. Until this point is reached, you will believe your happiness DEPENDS on being right. But this much reason have you now attained; YOU would be better off if you were WRONG. This tiny grain of wisdom will suffice to take you further. You are NOT coerced, but merely hope to have a thing you WANT. And you can say in perfect honesty,
"I WANT another way to look at this."
Now you have changed your mind about the day, and have REMEMBERED what you really want. Its PURPOSE has no longer been obscured by the insane belief you want it for the goal of being RIGHT when you are WRONG. This is the READINESS for asking, brought to your awareness, for you CANNOT be in conflict when you ask for what you want, and SEE that it is this for which you ask.
7. This final step is but acknowledgment of LACK of opposition to be helped. It is a statement of an open mind, not certain yet, but willing to be shown:
"Perhaps there IS another way to look at this.
What can I LOSE by asking?"
Thus are you made ready for a question that makes sense, and so the ANSWER will make sense as well. Nor will you fight AGAINST it, for you see that it is YOU who will be helped by it.
It MUST be clear that it is easier to have a happy day if you PREVENT unhappiness from entering at all. But this takes practice in the rules which will PROTECT you from the ravages of fear. When THIS has been achieved, the sorry dream of judgment has FOREVER been undone. But, meanwhile, you have need for practicing the rules for its undoing. Let us, then, consider once again the very first of the decisions which are offered here. We said you can begin a happy day with the determination NOT to make decisions by yourself. This SEEMS to be a free decision in itself. And yet, you CANNOT make decisions by yourself. The only question really is WITH WHAT you choose to make them. That is really all.
The first rule, then, is not coercion, but a simple statement of a simple fact. You WILL not make decisions by yourself whatever you decide. For they are made with idols or with God. And you ask help of Christ or anti-Christ, and which you choose WILL join with you, and tell you what to do. Your day is NOT at random. It is set by what you choose to live it WITH, and HOW the friend whose counsel you have sought perceives your happiness. You ALWAYS ask advice before you can decide ANYTHING. Let THIS be understood, and you can see there cannot BE coercion here, nor grounds for opposition that you may be free. There IS no freedom from what must occur. And if you think there is, you MUST be wrong.
The second rule as well is but a fact. For you and your adviser must AGREE on what you want BEFORE it can occur. It is but this AGREEMENT which permits all things to happen. NOTHING can be caused without some form of union, be it with a dream of judgment or the Voice for God. Decisions cause results BECAUSE they are not made in isolation. They are made by you and your adviser, for yourself, AND FOR THE WORLD AS WELL. The day you want you offer to the world, for it WILL be what you have asked for, and will reinforce the rule of your adviser through the world. Whose kingdom is the world for you today? What kind of day will you decide to have?
It needs but two who would have happiness this day to promise it to all the world. It needs but two to understand that they can not decide alone, to GUARANTEE the joy they asked for will be wholly shared. For they have understood the basic law which MAKES decision powerful, and gives it all effects that it will EVER have. It needs but two. These two ARE joined before there CAN be a decision. Let this be the ONE reminder that you keep in mind, and you will have the day you want, and give it to the world by having it yourselves. Your judgment has been LIFTED from the world by your decision for a happy day. And as you have received so MUST you give.
Be not content with littleness, but be sure you understand what littleness is, and why you could never BE content with it. Littleness is the offering you gave YOURSELF. You offered this in place of magnitude, AND ACCEPTED IT. Everything in this world is little, because it is a world made out of littleness, in the strange belief that littleness CAN content you. When you strive for anything in the world, WITH THE BELIEF THAT IT WILL BRING YOU PEACE, you are belittling yourself, and blinding yourself to glory. Littleness and glory are the choices open to your striving and your vigilance. You will ALWAYS choose one AT THE EXPENSE of the other.
But what you do not realize, each time you choose, is that your choice is your evaluation OF YOURSELF. Choose littleness, and you will NOT have peace, for you will have judged yourself UNWORTHY of it. And whatever you offer as a substitute, is much too poor a gift to satisfy you. It is essential that you accept the fact, and accept it gladly, that there is NO form of littleness that can EVER content you. You are free to try as many as you wish, but all you will be doing is to delay your homecoming. For you will be content ONLY in magnitude, which IS your home.
There is a deep responsibility you owe yourself, and one which you must learn to remember ALL the time. The lesson will seem hard at first, but you will learn to love it, when you realize that it is true, and constitutes a tribute to your power. You who have sought AND FOUND littleness, remember this: Every decision that you make stems from WHAT YOU THINK YOU ARE, and represents the value that you PUT upon yourself. Believe the little can content you, and, by LIMITING yourself, you will NOT be satisfied. For your function is NOT little, and it is only by finding your function, and fulfilling it that you can ESCAPE from littleness.
There is no doubt about what your function IS, for the Holy Spirit KNOWS what it is. There is no doubt about its magnitude, for it reaches you through Him, FROM Magnitude. You do not have to strive for it, because you HAVE it. All your striving must be directed AGAINST LITTLENESS, for it DOES require vigilance to protect your magnitude in this world. To hold your magnitude in perfect awareness, in a world of littleness, is a task the little cannot undertake. Yet it is asked of you, in tribute to your magnitude, and NOT your littleness. Nor is it asked of you alone.
The power of God will support every effort you make on behalf of the magnitude of His dear Son. Search for the little, and you DENY yourself His power. God is not willing that His Son be content with less than everything. For He is not content without His Son, and His Son cannot be content with less than His Father has given him. We asked you once before, "Would you be hostage to the ego or host to God?" Let this question be asked you by the Holy Spirit in you, EVERY time you make a decision. For every decision you make DOES answer this, and invites sorrow or joy, accordingly.
When God GAVE Himself to you in your creation, He ESTABLISHED you as host to Him forever. He has NOT left you, and YOU have not left HIM. All your attempts to deny His magnitude, and make His Son hostage to the ego, CANNOT make little whom God has joined with Him. Every decision you make is made for Heaven or for hell, and will bring you AWARENESS of what you decided FOR. The Holy Spirit can hold your magnitude, clean of ALL littleness, clearly and in perfect safety in your minds, untouched by every little gift the world of littleness would offer you. But for this, you cannot side AGAINST Him in what He wills for you.
Decide for God through Him. For littleness, and the belief that you can be CONTENT with littleness, are the decisions YOU have made about yourself. The power and the glory that lie in you, from God, are for all who, like you, perceive themselves as little, and have deceived themselves into believing that littleness can be blown up, BY THEM, into a sense of magnitude that can content them. Neither GIVE littleness, nor ACCEPT it. All honor is due the host of God. Your littleness deceives you, but your magnitude is of Him Who dwells in you, and in Whom you dwell. Touch no-one, then, with littleness, in the Name of Christ, eternal Host unto His Father.
In this season, which celebrates the birth of holiness into this world, join with me who decided for holiness for YOU. It is our task TOGETHER to restore the awareness of magnitude, to the host whom God appointed for Himself. It is beyond ALL your littleness to give the gift of God, but NOT beyond YOU. For God would give Himself THROUGH you. He reaches from you to everyone, and beyond everyone, to His Son's creations, but WITHOUT leaving you. Far beyond your little world, but still in you, He extends forever. Yet He brings all his extensions to you, as host to Him.
Is it a sacrifice to leave littleness behind, and wander not in vain? It is not sacrifice to wake to glory. But it IS a sacrifice to accept anything LESS than glory. Learn that you MUST be worthy of the Prince of Peace, born in you, in honor of Him Whose host you are. You know not what love means because you have sought to purchase it with little gifts, thus VALUING it too little to be able to understand its magnitude. LOVE IS NOT LITTLE, and love dwells in you, for you are host to Him. Before the greatness that lives in you, your poor appreciation of yourself, and all the little offerings you have given, slip into nothingness.
Holy Child of God, when will you learn that ONLY holiness can content you, and give you peace? Remember that you learn not for yourself alone, no more than I did. It is BECAUSE I learned for YOU, that you can learn of ME. I would but teach you what is yours, so that, together, we can replace the shabby littleness, that binds the host of God to guilt and weakness, with the glad awareness of the glory that is in him. My birth in you is your awakening to grandeur. Welcome me not into a manger, but into the altar to holiness, where holiness abides in perfect peace.
My Kingdom is not of this world, because it is in YOU. And YOU are of your Father. Let us join in honoring you, who MUST remain forever BEYOND littleness. Decide with me, who have decided to abide with you. I will as my Father wills, knowing His Will is constant, and at peace forever with Itself. You will be content with nothing BUT His Will. Accept no less, remembering that everything I learned is yours. What my Father loves, I love as He does, and I can no more accept it as what it is NOT, than He can. And no more can YOU.
When you have learned to accept what you are, you will make no more gifts to offer to yourselves, for you will know you are COMPLETE, in need of nothing, and unable to accept ANYTHING for yourself. But you will gladly give, HAVING received. The host of God need not seek to find ANYTHING. If you are wholly willing to leave Salvation to the plan of God, and UNwilling to attempt to grasp for peace YOURSELF, Salvation will be GIVEN you. But think not you can substitute YOUR plan for His. Rather, join with me in His, that we may release all those who would be bound, proclaiming together that the Son of God is host to Him.
Thus will we let no-one forget what YOU would remember. And thus WILL you remember it. Call forth in everyone ONLY the remembrance of God, and of the Heaven that is in him. For where you would help your brother be, there will you think YOU are. Hear not his call for hell and littleness, but only his call for Heaven and greatness. Forget not that his call is yours, and answer him with me. God's power is forever on the side of His host, for it protects ONLY the peace in which He dwells. Lay not littleness before His holy altar, which rises above the stars, and reaches even to Heaven, because of what is GIVEN it.
There is no time, no place, no state where God is absent. There is NOTHING to be feared. There is no way in which a gap could be conceived of in the Wholeness that is His. The compromise the least and littlest gap would represent in His eternal Love is quite impossible. For it would mean His Love could harbor just a hint of hate; His gentleness turn sometimes to attack; and His eternal patience sometimes fail. All this do you BELIEVE, when you perceive a gap between your brother and yourself. How could you trust Him, then? For He must be deceptive in His Love. Be wary, then; let Him not come too close, and leave a gap between you and His Love, through which you can escape if there be need for you to flee.
Here is the fear of God most plainly seen. For love is treacherous to those who fear, since fear and hate can NEVER be apart. No-one who hates but is afraid of love, and therefore MUST he be afraid of God. Certain it is he knows not what love MEANS. He fears to love and loves to hate, and so he thinks that love is fearful; hate is love. This is the consequence the little gap MUST bring to those who cherish it, and think that it is their salvation and their hope. The fear of God! -- the greatest obstacle that peace must flow across has not yet gone. The rest are past, but this one still remains to block your path, and make the way to light seem dark and fearful, perilous and bleak.
You had DECIDED that your brother is your enemy. SOMETIMES a friend, perhaps, provided that your separate interests made your friendship possible a little while. But NOT without a gap between you, lest he turn again into an enemy. Let him come close to you, and you jumped back; as you approached, he instantly withdrew. A cautious friendship, limited in scope and carefully restricted in amount, became the treaty you had made with him. You shared a qualified entente, in which a clause of separation was a point on which you both agreed to keep intact. And violating this was thought to be a breach of treaty not to be allowed.
The concept of "set" is among the better psychological percepts. Actually, it is used quite frequently in the Bible, and also here, under many different terms. "God will keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed (or set) on Thee because he trusteth in Thee."
The pronouns here are confusing without explanation, and the attempt to shift "Thee" to "Him" is a misinterpretation. The statement means that God's peace is set in the Holy Spirit, because it is fixed on God. It is also fixed in you. You, then, ARE fixed in the peace of God.
The concept of "fixation" is a very helpful one, which Freud understood perfectly. Unfortunately, he lost his understanding because he was afraid, and as you know all too well, fear is incompatible with good judgment. Fear DISTORTS thinking, and therefore DISorders thought. Freud's system of thought was extremely ingenious, because Freud was extremely ingenious. A mind MUST endow its thoughts with its own attributes. This is its inherent STRENGTH, even though it may misuse its power.
Freud lost much of the potential value of his own thought system because, much like Cayce, he did NOT include himself in it. This IS a dissociated state, because the thinker cuts himself off from his thoughts. Freud's thought was so conflicted that he could not have retained his sanity as HE saw it WITHOUT dissociating. This is why the many contradictions which are quite apparent in his thinking became increasingly less apparent to HIM.
A man who knows what fixation REALLY means and does NOT yield to it is terribly afraid. Fixation is the pull of God, on whom your mind IS fixed because of the Holy Spirit's irrevocable set. "Irrevocable" means "cannot be called back or redirected." The irrevocable nature of the Holy Spirit's set is the basis for its unequivocal voice. The Holy Spirit NEVER changes its mind. Clarity of thought CANNOT occur under conditions of vacillation. Unless a mind is fixed in its purpose, it is NOT clear. But clarity literally means the state of light, and enlightenment IS understanding. It stands UNDER perception because you have denied it as the REAL foundation of thought. This is the basis for ALL delusional systems.
The concept of fixation, as Freud saw it, has a number of real learning advantages. First, it recognizes that man CAN be fixated at a point in development which does NOT accord with a point in time. This clearly could have been a means toward real release from the time belief, had Freud pursued it with an open mind. But Freud suffered all his life from refusal to allow eternity to dawn upon his mind, and enlighten it truly. As a result, he overlooked NOW entirely, and merely saw the continuity of past and future.
Second, although he misinterpreted what the Holy Spirit told him, or better, reminded him of, he was too honest to deny more than he had to, to keep his fear in tolerable bounds, as he perceived the situation. Therefore, he EMPHASIZED that the point in development at which the mind is fixated is more real to ITSELF than the external reality with which it DISagrees. This again could have been a powerful RELEASE mechanism, had Freud not decided to involve it in a strong defense system because he perceived it as an attack.
Third, although Freud interpreted fixation as irrevocable danger points to which the mind can always regress, the concept can also be interpreted as an irrevocable call to sanity which the mind cannot LOSE. Freud saw return as a threat to maturity because he did not understand prodigality. He merely interpreted it as squandering. Actually, "prodigal" also means careful. This confusion between careful and careless led him to confuse the escape from care with something desirable. In fact, he even went so far as to equate it quite literally WITH desire.
But throughout his thought-system, the "threat" of fixation remained, and could never be completely eliminated by any living human being anywhere. Essentially, this was the basis of his pessimism. This was personally as well as theoretically the case. Freud tried every means his very inventive mind could devise to set up a form of therapy which could enable the mind to escape from fixation forever, even though he KNEW this was impossible. The knowledge plagued his belief in his own thought-system at every turn, because he was both an honest man and a healer. He was therefore only PARTIALLY insane at the perceptual level, and was unable to relinquish the hope of release even though he could not cope with it.
The reason for this amount of detail is because YOU are in the same position. You were eternally fixated on God in your creation, and the pull of this fixation is so strong that you will never overcome it. The reason is perfectly clear. The fixation is on a level that is so high that it cannot BE surmounted. You are ALWAYS being pulled back to your Creator because you belong in Him.
Do you REALLY believe you can make a voice that can drown out His? Do you REALLY believe that you can devise a thought-system which can separate you from His? Do you REALLY believe that you can plan for your safety and joy better than He can? You need be neither careful nor careless. You need merely cast all your cares upon Him because He careth for YOU. You ARE His care because He loves you. His voice reminds you always that all hope is yours BECAUSE of His care.
You CANNOT choose to escape His care, because that is not His will. But you CAN choose to accept His care, and use the infinite power OF His care for all those He created BY it. There have been many healers who did not heal themselves. They have not moved mountains by their faith because their faith was not WHOLE. Some of them have healed the sick at times, but they have not raised the dead. Unless the healer heals HIMSELF, he does NOT believe that there is no order in miracles. He has not learned that EVERY mind that God created is equally worthy of being healed because GOD CREATED IT WHOLE.
You are asked merely to return to God the mind as HE created it. He asks you only for what He gave, knowing that this giving will heal YOU. Sanity IS wholeness. And the sanity of your brothers IS yours. Why should you listen to the endless insane calls which you think are made upon you, when you KNOW the voice of God Himself is in you? God commended His Spirit to you, and asks that you commend yours to Him. He wills to keep it in perfect peace because you are of one mind and Spirit with Him.
Excluding yourself from the Atonement is the ego's last-ditch defense of its own existence. It reflects both the ego's need to separate, and your willingness to side with its separateness. This willingness means that YOU DO NOT WANT TO BE HEALED. When I told Bill that there is "just one more thing," he heard me very well. I hope he will hear me as well now. His intelligent mis-hearing of "river" as "rivet" showed that, even though he wanted release, he was not able to cope with it at the time.
But the time IS now. You have not been asked to work out the Plan of Salvation yourselves, because, as I told you before, the Remedy is NOT of your making. God Himself gave you the perfect correction for everything you have made which is not in accord with His Holy Will. I have made His Plan perfectly clear and perfectly explicit to you, and have also told you of your part in His Plan and how urgent it is that you fulfill it.
There is time for delay, but there need not be. God weeps at the sacrifice of His children who believe they are lost to Him. The "one more thing" that Bill must learn is merely that he is NOT the one more. He is both ONE and AT ONE. If he will learn this NOW, he will be willing in accord with the last judgment, which is really only the Biblical reminder of the inevitability of self-INCLUSION. This is what "Physician, heal thyself" really means. Bill has frequently observed for HIMSELF that this is hard to do. He has, however, been perfectly aware of JUST what YOU should do about it.
You might ask him for me whether he does not think he might be dissociating HIMSELF from his own awareness, since he is so clear about the remedy for YOU. You might also remind him that to whatever extent he separates himself from you, he is separating himself from ME. This IS a collaborative venture. Let me therefore return his own ideas to him, so that you can share them and thus help each other to help me.
But let me first remind you of something I told you myself. Whenever you are not wholly joyous, it is because you have reacted with a lack of love to some Soul which God created. Perceiving this as sin, you become defensive because you EXPECT ATTACK. The decision to react in that way, however, was YOURS, and can therefore be undone. It CANNOT be undone by repentance in the usual sense, because this implies guilt. If you allow yourself to feel guilty, you will reinforce the error, rather than allowing it to be undone FOR you.
Decisions CANNOT be difficult. This is obvious if you realize that you must ALREADY have made a decision NOT to be wholly joyous if that is what you feel. Therefore, the first step in the undoing is to recognize that YOU ACTIVELY DECIDED WRONGLY, BUT CAN AS ACTIVELY DECIDE OTHERWISE.
Be very firm with yourselves in this, and keep yourselves fully aware of the fact that the UNDOING process, which does NOT come from you, is nevertheless WITHIN you because God placed it there. YOUR part is merely to return your thinking to the point at which the error was made, and give it over to the Atonement in peace. Say to yourselves the following, as sincerely as you can, remembering that the Holy Spirit will respond fully to your slightest invitation:
I must have decided wrongly because I am NOT at peace.
I made the decision myself, but I can also decide otherwise.
I WILL to decide otherwise, because I WANT to be at peace.
I do NOT feel guilty, because the Holy Spirit will undo ALL
the consequences of my wrong decision IF I WILL LET HIM.
I WILL to let Him by allowing Him to decide for God for me.
What can it be but arrogance to think your little errors CANNOT be undone by Heaven's justice? And what COULD this mean, except that they are sins, and NOT mistakes, forever uncorrectable, and to be met with vengeance, NOT with justice? ARE you willing to be released from ALL effects of sin? You CANNOT answer this until you see all that the answer MUST entail. For if you answer "yes," this means you will forego ALL values of this world, in favor of the peace of Heaven. Not one sin would you retain. AND NOT ONE DOUBT THAT THIS IS POSSIBLE will you hold dear, that sin be kept in place. You mean that truth has greater value now than ALL illusions. And you recognize that truth must be REVEALED to you, because YOU know not what it IS.
To give reluctantly is not to gain the gift. BECAUSE YOU ARE RELUCTANT TO ACCEPT IT. It IS saved for you, until reluctance to receive it disappears, and you are WILLING it be given you. God's justice warrants gratitude, NOT fear. Nothing you give is lost to you or anyone, but cherished and preserved for you in Heaven, where all the treasures given to God's Son are kept for him, and offered anyone who but holds out his hand in willingness they be received. Nor is the treasure LESS as it is given out. Each gift received but ADDS to the supply. For God IS fair. He does not fight AGAINST His Son's reluctance to perceive salvation as a gift from Him. Yet would His justice not be satisfied until it is received by everyone.
Be certain any answer to a problem the Holy Spirit solves will ALWAYS be one in which NO-ONE loses. And this MUST be true BECAUSE He asks no sacrifice of anyone. An answer which demands the slightest loss to ANYONE has not RESOLVED the problem, but has added TO it, and made it greater, HARDER to resolve, AND MORE UNFAIR. It is impossible the Holy Spirit could SEE unfairness as a resolution. To Him, what is unfair must be corrected BECAUSE it is unfair. And EVERY error is a perception in which one, at least, is seen unfairly. Thus is justice NOT accorded to the Son of God. When ANYONE is seen as losing, HE HAS BEEN CONDEMNED. And punishment becomes his due, INSTEAD of justice.
The sight of innocence makes punishment impossible, and justice sure. The Holy Spirit's perception leaves no GROUNDS for an attack. Only a LOSS could justify attack, and loss of ANY kind He cannot see. The world solves problems in another way. IT sees a resolution as a state in which it is DECIDED who shall win and who shall lose; HOW MUCH the one shall take, and HOW MUCH can the loser still defend. Yet does the problem still remain unsolved, for ONLY justice can set up a state in which there IS no loser; no-one left unfairly treated and deprived, and thus with grounds for vengeance. Problem SOLVING can NOT be vengeance, which at best can bring another problem ADDED to the first, in which the murder is not obvious.
The Holy Spirit's problem solving is the way in which the problem ENDS. It has been solved BECAUSE it has been met with justice. And UNTIL it has, it will recur because it has NOT yet been solved. The principle that justice MEANS no-one can lose is crucial to this course. For miracles DEPEND on justice. NOT as it is seen through this world's eyes, but as God knows it, and as knowledge is reflected in sight the Holy Spirit gives. NO-ONE deserves to lose. And what would be UNJUST to him can NOT occur. Healing must be for everyone BECAUSE he does not merit an attack of any kind. What order CAN there be in miracles, unless someone deserves to suffer MORE, and others LESS? And is this justice to the wholly innocent?
A miracle IS justice. It is NOT a special gift to some, to be WITHHELD from others as LESS worthy, MORE condemned, and thus APART from healing. Who is there who can be separate from salvation, if its PURPOSE is the end of specialness? Where is salvation's justice if SOME errors are unforgivable, and WARRANT vengeance IN PLACE of healing and return of peace? Salvation cannot SEEK to help God's Son be MORE unfair than HE has sought to be. If miracles, the Holy Spirit's gift, were given specially to an elect and special group, and kept APART from others as LESS deserving, then is He ALLY to specialness. What He cannot perceive He bears no witness to. And everyone is EQUALLY entitled to His gift of healing and deliverance and peace.
To give a problem to the Holy Spirit to solve FOR you means that you WANT it solved. To keep it for yourself to solve WITHOUT His help is to decide it should remain UNsettled, UNresolved, and lasting in its power of injustice and attack. No-one can BE unjust to you, unless you have decided first to BE unjust. And then MUST problems rise to block your way, and peace be scattered by the winds of hate. Unless you think that ALL your brothers have an equal right to miracles with you, you will not claim YOUR right to them, because you were unjust to one with EQUAL rights. Seek to deny, and you WILL feel denied. Seek to deprive, and you HAVE BEEN deprived.
A miracle can NEVER be received because another could receive it NOT. Only forgiveness OFFERS miracles. And pardon MUST be just to everyone. The little problems that you keep and hide become your secret sins BECAUSE you did not choose to let them be removed FOR you. And so they gather dust and grow, until they cover EVERYTHING that you perceive, and leave you fair to no-one. Not ONE right do YOU believe you have. And bitterness, with vengeance justified and mercy lost, condemns you as UNWORTHY of forgiveness. The unforgiven HAVE no mercy to bestow upon another. That is why your sole responsibility MUST be to take forgiveness for yourself.
The miracle that you receive you GIVE. Each one becomes an illustration of the law on which salvation rests; that justice MUST be done to all, if ANYONE is to be healed. No-one can lose, and everyone MUST benefit. Each miracle is an example of what justice can accomplish, when it is offered to everyone alike. It is received and GIVEN equally. It IS awareness that giving and receiving ARE the same. BECAUSE it does not make the same unlike, it sees no differences where none exist. And thus it is the SAME for everyone, because it sees no differences in THEM. Its offering is universal, and it teaches but one message. What is God's BELONGS to everyone, and IS his due.
Are thoughts, then, dangerous? To bodies, YES. The thoughts that seem to kill are those which teach the thinker that he CAN be killed. And so he dies, BECAUSE of what he learned. He goes from life to death, the final proof he valued the inconstant more than constancy. Surely he THOUGHT he wanted happiness. Yet he did NOT desire it BECAUSE it was the truth, and therefore MUST be constant. The constancy of joy is a condition quite alien to your understanding. Yet, if you could even imagine what it MUST be, you would DESIRE it, although you UNDERSTAND it not.
The constancy of happiness has NO exceptions, no change of ANY kind. It is unshakable as is the Love of God for His Creation. Sure in its vision as its Creator is in what He KNOWS, it looks on everything and SEES it is the same. It sees NOT the ephemeral, for it DESIRES that everything be like itself, and SEES it so. NOTHING has power to confound its constancy, because its OWN desire can not BE shaken. It comes as surely unto those who see the final question is NECESSARY to the rest, as peace MUST come to those who choose to heal, and NOT to judge.
Reason will tell you that you CANNOT ask for happiness inconstantly. For, if what you desire you RECEIVE, and happiness IS constant, then you need ask for it but ONCE, to have it ALWAYS. And, if you do NOT have it always, being what it IS, you did NOT ask for it. For no-one fails to ASK for his desire of SOMETHING he believes holds out some promise of the power of GIVING it. He may be wrong in WHAT he asks, WHERE, and OF WHAT. Yet he WILL ask, because desire IS a request, an ASKING FOR, and made by one whom God Himself will never fail to answer.
God has ALREADY given him all that he REALLY wants. But what he is uncertain of, God CANNOT give. For He does NOT desire it while he REMAINS uncertain, and God's giving MUST be incomplete unless it is RECEIVED. You who complete His Will and ARE His happiness, whose will is powerful as His, -- a power that is NOT lost in your illusions, -- think carefully why it should be you have not yet decided how you would answer the final question. Your answer to the others has made it possible to help you be but partially insane. And yet it is the final one that REALLY asks if you are willing to be WHOLLY sane.
What is the holy instant but God's appeal to you to RECOGNIZE what He has given you? Here is the great appeal to reason; the awareness of what is ALWAYS there to see; the happiness that COULD be ALWAYS yours. Here is the CONSTANT peace you could experience forever. Here is what denial has denied, REVEALED to you. For here the final question is ALREADY answered, and what you ask for, GIVEN. Here is the future NOW, for time is powerless BECAUSE of your desire for what will NEVER change. For you HAVE asked that nothing STAND BETWEEN the holiness of your relationship, and your AWARENESS of its holiness.
We have repeated how little is asked of you to learn this course. It is the same small willingness you need to have your whole relationship transformed to joy. The LITTLE gift you offer to the Holy Spirit, for which He gives you EVERYTHING. The very little, on which salvation rests. The tiny change of mind by which the crucifixion is changed to Resurrection. And, being true, it is so simple that it cannot fail to be COMPLETELY understood. Rejected, yes, but NOT ambiguous. And, if you choose AGAINST it now, it will NOT be because it is obscure, but rather that this LITTLE cost seemed, in YOUR judgment, to be TOO MUCH to pay for peace.
This is the ONLY thing that you need do for vision, happiness, release from pain, and the COMPLETE escape from sin, ALL to be given you. Say ONLY this, but MEAN it with NO reservations, for here the power of salvation lies:
"I AM responsible for what I see. I CHOSE the feelings I experience, and I DECIDED ON the goal I would achieve. And everything that SEEMS to happen TO me, I ASKED FOR and received as I had asked."
Deceive yourself no longer that you are helpless in the face of what is done TO you. Acknowledge but that YOU have been mistaken, and ALL effects of your mistakes will disappear.
It is impossible the Son of God be merely driven by events OUTSIDE him. It is impossible that the happenings that come to him were NOT his choice. His power of decision is the DETERMINER of every situation in which he seems to FIND himself by chance or accident. No accident or chance is POSSIBLE within the universe as God created it, OUTSIDE of which is nothing. Suffer, and YOU decided sin was your goal. Be happy, and you GAVE the power of decision to Him Who MUST decide for God for you. This is the little gift you offer to the Holy Spirit, and even this He gave to you to give yourself. For, BY this gift, is given you the power to release your Savior, that HE may give salvation unto YOU.
Begrudge not, then, this little offering. WITHHOLD it, and you keep the world as now you see it. GIVE IT AWAY, and everything YOU see goes with it. Never was so much given for so little. In the holy instant is this exchange effected and MAINTAINED. Here is the world you do NOT want, brought to the one you DO. And here the one you do is GIVEN you, BECAUSE you want it. But, for this, the POWER of your wanting must first be RECOGNIZED. You must accept its STRENGTH, and NOT its weakness. You must perceive that what is strong enough to MAKE a world, can let it go. And CAN accept correction, if it is willing to see that it was wrong.
The world you see is but the idle witness that you were RIGHT. This witness is insane. You trained it in its testimony, and, as it gave it BACK to you, you listened and convinced yourself that what it saw was true. YOU DID THIS TO YOURSELF. See only this, and you will also see how circular the reasoning on which your "seeing" rests. This was NOT given you. This was your GIFT to you AND TO YOUR BROTHER. Be willing, then, to have it taken FROM him, and be replaced with truth. And, as you look upon the change in HIM, it will be given you to see it in YOURSELF.
Perhaps you do not see the need for you to give this little offering. Look closer, then, at what it IS. And, very simply, see in it the whole exchange of separation for salvation. All that the ego is, is an idea that it is possible that things should HAPPEN to the Son of God, WITHOUT his will. And thus, without the Will of his Creator, Whose Will cannot BE separated from his own. This is the Son of God's REPLACEMENT for his will, a mad revolt against what must forever be. This is the statement that he HAS the power to make God powerLESS. And so to take it from HIMSELF, and leave himself WITHOUT what God has willed FOR him.
This is the mad idea you have enshrined upon your altars, AND WHICH YOU WORSHIP. And anything that threatens this, seems to ATTACK your faith. For here it is invested. Think not that you are faithless, for your belief and trust in THIS is strong indeed. The Holy Spirit can GIVE you faith in holiness, and vision to see it, easily enough. But you have not left open and unoccupied the altar where the gift belongs. Where THEY should be, YOU have set up your idols to something ELSE. This OTHER will, which seems to TELL you what must happen, you GAVE reality. And what would SHOW you otherwise must therefore seem unreal.
All that is asked of you is to MAKE ROOM for truth. You are NOT asked to make or do what lies BEYOND your understanding. All you are asked to do is LET IT IN. Only to stop your INTERFERENCE with what will happen OF ITSELF. Simply to recognize again the presence of what you THOUGHT you gave away. Be willing, for an instant, to leave your altars free of what YOU placed upon them and what is REALLY there you CANNOT fail to see. The holy instant is NOT an instant of creation, but of RECOGNITION. For recognition comes of vision and SUSPENDED judgment. Then only is it possible to look within and see what MUST be there, plainly in sight, and wholly INDEPENDENT of inference and judgment.
Undoing is not YOUR task, but it IS up to you to welcome it or not. Faith and desire go hand in hand. For everyone believes in what he wants. We have already said that wishful thinking is how the ego deals with what it wants, to make it so. There is no better demonstration of the power of wanting, and therefore of FAITH, to make its goals seem real and possible. Faith in the UNreal leads to ADJUSTMENTS of reality, to make it fit the goal of madness. The goal of sin induces the perception of a fearful world, to JUSTIFY its purpose. What you desire, you WILL see. And if its reality is false, you will UPHOLD it by NOT realizing all the adjustments YOU have introduced, to MAKE it so.
When vision is DENIED, confusion of cause and effect becomes inevitable. The PURPOSE now becomes to KEEP OBSCURE the cause of the effect, and make effect appear to BE a cause. This seeming independence of effect enables it to be regarded as STANDING BY ITSELF, and capable of serving as a CAUSE of the events and feelings its maker thinks IT causes. Long ago, we spoke of your desire to create your own Creator, and be father and not Son to Him. This is the same desire. The Son is the effect, whose Cause he would deny. And so he seems to BE the cause, producing real EFFECTS.
Nothing can have effects WITHOUT a cause, and to confuse the two is merely to fail to understand them both. It is as needful that you recognize you MADE the world you see, as that you recognize that you did NOT create yourself. THEY ARE THE SAME MISTAKE. Nothing created NOT by your Creator, has ANY influence over you. And if you think what YOU have made can TELL you what you see and feel, and place your faith in its ability to do so, you ARE denying your Creator, and BELIEVING that you made yourself. For, if you think the world you made has power to make you what IT wills, you ARE confusing Son and Father; effect and Source.
The Son's creations ARE like his Father's. But, in creating THEM, the Son does not delude himself that he is INDEPENDENT of his Source. His union with It is the SOURCE of his creating. APART from this, he HAS no power to create, and what he makes is meaningless. It changes NOTHING in creation, depends ENTIRELY upon the madness of its maker, and can NOT serve to justify the madness. Your brother thinks he made the world with you. Thus he denies creation. With you, he thinks the world he made, made HIM. Thus he denies he MADE it.
Yet the truth is you were both created by a loving Father, Who created you together and as one. SEE what "proves" otherwise, and you DENY your whole reality. But grant that EVERYTHING that seems to stand BETWEEN you, keeping you from each other and separate from your Father, YOU MADE IN SECRET, and the instant of release has come to you. ALL its effects are gone, because its source has been uncovered. It is its seeming INDEPENDENCE of its source that kept you prisoner. This IS the same delusion that YOU are independent of the Source by which YOU were created, and have never left.
Do you not understand that to oppose the Holy Spirit IS to fight yourself? He tells you but YOUR will; He speaks for YOU. In HIS Divinity is but your own. And all He knows is but YOUR knowledge, saved for YOU, that you may do YOUR will through Him. God ASKS you do your will. He joins with YOU. He did not set His kingdom up alone. And Heaven itself but represents your will, where everything created is for you. No spark of life but was created with your glad consent, as you would have it be. And not one Thought that God has ever had but waited for your blessing to be born. God is no enemy to you. He asks no more than that He hear you call Him Friend.
How wonderful it is to do your will! For that IS freedom. There is nothing else that ever should be called by freedom's name. UNLESS you do your will, you are NOT free. And would God leave His Son WITHOUT what he has chosen for himself? God but ensured that you would never LOSE your will, when He gave you His perfect Answer. Hear It now, that you may be reminded of His Love, and learn YOUR will. God would not have His Son made prisoner to what he does not want. He JOINS with you in willing you be free. And to OPPOSE Him is to make a choice against YOURSELF, and choose that YOU be bound.
Look once again upon your enemy, the one you chose to hate instead of love. For thus was hatred born into the world, and thus the rule of fear established here. Now hear God speak to you through Him Who is His Voice, and YOURS as well, reminding you that it is NOT your will to hate, and be a prisoner to fear, a slave to death, a LITTLE creature with a LITTLE life. Your will is boundless; it is NOT your will that it be bound. What lies in you has joined with God Himself in all creation's birth. Remember Him Who has created you, and through YOUR will created everything.
Not one created thing but gives you thanks, for it is by your will that it was born. No light of Heaven shines except for you, for it was set in Heaven by your will. What cause have you for anger in a world which merely waits YOUR blessing to be free? If YOU be prisoner, then God Himself could not be free. For what is done to him whom God so loves is done to God Himself. Think not HE wills to bind you, Who has made you co-creator of the universe along with Him. He would but KEEP your will forever and forever limitless.
The world awaits the freedom you will give, when you have recognized that YOU are free. But you will not forgive the world until you have forgiven Him Who GAVE your will to you. For it is BY your will the world is given freedom. Nor can YOU be free APART from Him Whose holy Will you share. God turns to YOU to ask the world be saved, for by your OWN salvation is it healed. And no-one walks upon the earth but must depend on YOUR decision, that he learn death HAS no power over him because he shares YOUR freedom, as he shares your will. It IS your will to heal him, and because you have decided WITH him, he is healed. And now is God forgiven, for you chose to look upon your brother as a friend.
Special Message:
When you come to the place where the branch in the road is quite apparent, you cannot go ahead. You MUST go one way or the other. For now, if you go straight ahead, the way you were going before you came to the branch, YOU WILL GO NOWHERE. The whole purpose of coming this far is to decide WHICH BRANCH YOU WILL TAKE FROM HERE ON. The way you came no longer matters. IT CAN NO LONGER SERVE.
No-one who reaches this far CAN make the wrong decision. But he CAN delay. And there is no part of the journey that seems more hopeless and futile than standing where the road branches, and not deciding which way to go. It is only the first few steps along the right way that seem hard, because you HAVE chosen, but you still think you can go back and make the other choice.
This is not so. A choice made with the power of Heaven to uphold it cannot BE undone. Your way IS decided.
There will be nothing you will NOT be told, if you acknowledge this.
And so you stand, here in this holy place, before the veil of sin that hangs between you and the face of Christ. LET it be lifted! Raise it together, for it is but a veil that stands between you. Either alone will see it as a solid block, nor realize how thin the drapery that separates you now. Yes, it IS almost over, IN YOUR AWARENESS. And peace has reached you even here, BEFORE the veil. Think what will happen after! The love of Christ will light YOUR faces, and shine from them into a darkened world that NEEDS the light. And, from this holy place, He will return with you, not leaving it or you.
YOU will become His messengers, returning Him unto Himself. Think of the loveliness that YOU will see, who walk with Him! And think how beautiful will each of you look to the other! How happy you will be to be TOGETHER, after such a long and lonely journey where you walked alone. The gates of Heaven, open now for you, will you now open to the sorrowful. And none who looks upon the Christ in you but will rejoice. How beautiful the sight you saw beyond the veil, which you will bring to light the tired eyes of those as weary now as once you were. How thankful will they be to see you come among them, offering Christ's forgiveness to dispel their faith in sin.
Every mistake you make the other will gently have corrected FOR you. For, in his sight, your loveliness is HIS salvation, which he would PROTECT from harm. And each will be the other's strong protector from EVERYTHING that seems to rise between you. So shall you walk the world with me, whose message has not yet been given everyone. For you are here to let it be RECEIVED. God's offer still is open; yet it waits acceptance. From you who have accepted it, is it received. Into your joined hands is it safely given. For you who SHARE it have become its willing guardians and protectors.
To all who share the love of God the grace is given to be the givers of what they have received. And so they learn that it is theirs forever. All barriers disappear before their coming, as every obstacle was finally surmounted that seemed to rise and block THEIR way before. This veil you lift together opens the way to truth to more than you. Those who would let illusions be lifted from their minds are this world's Saviors, walking the world with their Redeemer, and carrying His message of hope and freedom and RELEASE from suffering to everyone who NEEDS a miracle to save him.
How EASY is it to offer this miracle to everyone! No-one who has received it for himself COULD find it difficult. For, BY receiving it, he learned it was not given him alone. Such is the function of a holy relationship; to RECEIVE together, and give as you received. Standing BEFORE the veil, it still seems difficult. But hold out your JOINED hands and touch this heavy-seeming block, and you will learn how easily your fingers slip through its nothingness. It is no solid wall. And only an illusion stands between you and the holy Self you share.
It has been said that there is a kind of peace that is not of this world. How is it recognized? How is it found? And being found, how can it be retained? Let us consider each of these questions separately, for each reflects a different step along the way.
First, how can the peace of God be recognized? God's peace is recognized at first by just one thing; in every way it is totally unlike all previous experiences. It calls to mind nothing that went before. It brings with it no past associations. It is a new thing entirely. There is a contrast, yes, between this thing and all the past. But strangely, it is not a contrast of true differences. The past just slips away, and in its place is everlasting quiet. Only that. The contrast first perceived has merely gone. Quiet has reached to cover everything.
How is this quiet found? No-one can fail to find it who but seeks out its conditions. God's peace can never come where anger is, for anger must deny that peace exists. Who sees anger as justified in any way or any circumstance proclaims that peace is meaningless, and must believe that it cannot exist. In this condition, peace cannot be found. Therefore, forgiveness is the necessary condition for finding the peace of God. More than this, given forgiveness there must be peace. For what except attack will lead to war? And what but peace is opposite to war? Here the initial contrast stands out clear and apparent. Yet when peace is found, the war is meaningless. And it is conflict now that is perceived as non-existent and unreal.
How is the peace of God retained, once it is found? Returning anger, in whatever form, will drop the heavy curtain once again, and the belief that peace cannot exist will certainly return. War is again accepted as the one reality. Now must you once again lay down your sword, although you will not recognize that you have picked it up again. But you will learn, as you remember even faintly now what happiness was yours without it, that you must have taken it again as your defense. Stop for a moment now and think of this: Is conflict what you want, or is God's peace the better choice? Which gives you more? A tranquil mind is not a little gift. Would you not rather live than choose to die?
Living is joy, but death can only weep. You see in death escape from what you made. But this you do not see; that you made death, and it is but illusion of an end. Death cannot be escape, because it is not life in which the problem lies. Life has no opposite, for it is God. Life and death seem to be opposites because you have decided death ends life. Forgive the world, and you will understand that everything which God created cannot have an end, and nothing He did not create is real. In this one sentence is our course explained. In this one sentence is our practicing given its one direction. And in this the Holy Spirit's whole curriculum is specified exactly as it is.
What is the peace of God? No more than this; the simple understanding that His Will is wholly without opposite. There is no thought that contradicts His Will, yet can be true. The contrast between His Will and yours but seemed to be reality. In truth there is no conflict, because His Will is yours. Now is the mighty Will of God Himself His gift to you. He does not seek to keep it for Himself. Why would you seek to keep your tiny, frail imaginings apart from Him? The Will of God is One and all there is. This is your heritage. The universe beyond the sun and stars, and all the thoughts of which you can conceive, belong to you. God's peace is the condition for His Will. Attain His peace, and you remember Him.