September 14, 2008

I Am the Light of the World


I had an intense week of grievance and upheaval in my mind. Some teacher really got to me, teaching all week long and using all the right words, but what an attitude! It made me FEEL everything I do is shit, and I should read more in the Course, watch more Master Teacher videos, do this, do that and on and on. Or maybe better that I am nothing but shit. And he is right, but what does that help me? I did not want to listen to him anymore. I got into this paranoid fear of being up against everything, and each and everyone and everything against me. Seeking for allies and friends that would share my perspective and experience, all the while feeding my perception of a schism between those with and those objecting to the teacher, seeing only two categories in my mind: friend and enemy, and I split in between with no means to solve this conflict. Who is the hero in all this? Who is the hero of my dream? Oh, it couldn't be me, could it?

Abstraction of Rage


I did not run away, though I kept my distance. I practiced the lessons of the Course like a madman. "I am the light of the world." "I need do nothing." "I am not separate from God." I had to, otherwise I would either give into what seemed complete insanity to me, or I accumulate more and more grievance and rage. And I have to give, I have to love, I have to extend to everyone and everything. Otherwise I am nothing. And loving is entirely possible, it just takes willingness. I don't know how, I feel totally justified in my rage, but I am willing to love, because only that can offer me an experience of love. I stood still. I went for a walk and talked with a great friend. And I had a talk with two friends I thought would be on the other side. I had a straight talk, plain honest and simple, and suddenly there is the light. I don't compare myself. I just ask for how things are for me. I don't need to judge when I turn to the light and, in fact, I have to suspend judging in order to turn to the light. I am NOT the author of reality. I need to be shown, so I look for help and certainty in God. And there is all the help. I am so grateful. What a good conflict can be used for. Amazing.

So what can I say? I could care less what anyone says, I have to remember always, I am not separate from God. I am the light of the world. There is nothing outside of my mind. Let it all break loose, and in my non-defense, taking responsibility as the light of the world, I experience a freedom and joy that is truly MINE forever, and that no man and nothing can take away from me. How awesome it is to be inspired and infused by the light of God, by this ever gentle but certain light that is in each of us to guide us and to call us home to God.

"How are things for me?" "How is this for me?" "How is that really?" Instead of relying on what someone else has to say, I turn inside, and THERE I find certainty and release, and possibilities to give and love, to stay and extend peace of mind. That is what I want, and I am sooooooo grateful to have found this, miraculously, by not running away from conflict, but by looking towards the solution and only option I have which is that I am whole and perfect as God created me. I can't believe it. It is so good.

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posted by Alban Fenle

 

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God is but Love, and therefore so are you.

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I Am under no Laws but God's
Workbook Lesson 76, one of the most challenging lessons in A Course In Miracles: I Am under no Laws but God's.

We have observed before how many senseless things have seemed to you to be salvation. Each has imprisoned you with laws as senseless as itself. You are not bound by them. Yet to understand that this is so, you must first realize salvation lies not there. While you would seek for it in things that have no meaning, you bind yourself to laws that make no sense. Thus do you seek to prove salvation is where it is not.

Today we will be glad you cannot prove it. For if you could, you would forever seek salvation where it is not, and never find it. The idea for today tells you once again how simple is salvation. Look for it where it waits for you, and there it will be found. Look nowhere else, for it is nowhere else.

Think of the freedom in the recognition that you are not bound by all the strange and twisted laws you have set up to save you. You really think that you would starve unless you have stacks of green paper strips and piles of metal discs. You really think a small round pellet or some fluid pushed into your veins through a sharpened needle will ward off disease and death. You really think you are alone unless another body is with you.

It is insanity that thinks these things. You call them laws, and put them under different names in a long catalogue of rituals that have no use and serve no purpose. You think you must obey the "laws" of medicine, of economics and of health. Protect the body, and you will be saved.

These are not laws, but madness. The body is endangered by the mind that hurts itself. The body suffers just in order that the mind will fail to see it is the victim of itself. The body's suffering is a mask the mind holds up to hide what really suffers. It would not understand it is its own enemy; that it attacks itself and wants to die. It is from this your "laws" would save the body. It is for this you think you are a body.

There are no laws except the laws of God. This needs repeating, over and over, until you realize it applies to everything that you have made in opposition to God's Will. Your magic has no meaning. What it is meant to save does not exist. Only what it is meant to hide will save you.

The laws of God can never be replaced. We will devote today to rejoicing that this is so. It is no longer a truth that we would hide. We realize instead it is a truth that keeps us free forever. Magic imprisons, but the laws of God make free. The light has come because there are no laws but His.

We will begin the longer practice periods today with a short review of the different kinds of "laws" we have believed we must obey. These would include, for example, the "laws" of nutrition, of immunization, of medication, and of the body's protection in innumerable ways. Think further; you believe in the "laws" of friendship, of "good" relationships and reciprocity. Perhaps you even think that there are laws which set forth what is God's and what is yours. Many "religions" have been based on this. They would not save but damn in Heaven's name. Yet they are no more strange than other "laws" you hold must be obeyed to make you safe.

There are no laws but God's. Dismiss all foolish magical beliefs today, and hold your mind in silent readiness to hear the Voice That speaks the truth to you. You will be listening to One Who says there is no loss under the laws of God. Payment is neither given nor received. Exchange cannot be made; there are no substitutes; and nothing is replaced by something else. God's laws forever give and never take.

Hear Him Who tells you this, and realize how foolish are the "laws" you thought upheld the world you thought you saw. Then listen further. He will tell you more. About the Love your Father has for you. About the endless joy He offers you. About His yearning for His only Son, created as His channel for creation; denied to Him by his belief in hell.

Let us today open God's channels to Him, and let His Will extend through us to Him. Thus is creation endlessly increased. His Voice will speak of this to us, as well as of the joys of Heaven which His laws keep limitless forever. We will repeat today's idea until we have listened and understood there are no laws but God's. Then we will tell ourselves, as a dedication with which the practice period concludes:

I am under no laws but God's.

We will repeat this dedication as often as possible today; at least four or five times an hour, as well as in response to any temptation to experience ourselves as subject to other laws throughout the day. It is our statement of freedom from all danger and all tyranny. It is our acknowledgment that God is our Father, and that His Son is saved.