Day 92 - A Course in Miracles
Day 92
You are NOT asked to make insane decisions, although you are free to THINK you are. But it MUST be insane to believe IT IS UP TO YOU to decide what God’s Creations ARE. The Holy Spirit perceives the conflict EXACTLY AS IT IS. Therefore, His second lesson is: To HAVE peace, TEACH peace to all and to LEARN it.
This is still a preliminary step, because having and being are still not equated but it is more advanced than the first step, which is really only a thought REVERSAL. The second step is a positive affirmation of WHAT YOU WANT. This, then, IS a step in the direction OUT of conflict, because it means that alternatives have been considered, and ONE has been chosen as MORE DESIRABLE.
But the evaluation “more desirable” still implies that the desirable has degrees. Therefore, although this step is essential for the ultimate decision, it is clearly NOT the final one.
It should be clear that the recognition of the lack of order in miracles has not yet been accepted at this point, because NOTHING is difficult that is WHOLLY DESIRED. To desire wholly is to CREATE, and creating CANNOT be difficult if God Himself created you AS a creator. The second step, then, is still perceptual but it is nevertheless a giant step toward the kind unified perception that parallels God’s knowing.
As you take this step and HOLD THIS DIRECTION, you will be pushing toward the center of your thought system, where the FUNDAMENTAL change will occur. You are only beginning this step now, but you have started on this way by realizing that ONLY ONE WAY IS POSSIBLE. You do not yet realize this consistently, and so your progress is intermittent. But the second step is easier than the first, because it FOLLOWS. The very fact that you have accepted THAT is a demonstration of your growing awareness that the Holy Spirit WILL lead you on.
“Be Vigilant Only for God and His Kingdom”
[FIP T-6.V.C.]
For your own salvation you MUST be critical, because YOUR salvation IS critical to the whole Sonship. We said before that the Holy Spirit IS evaluative, and MUST be. Yet His evaluation does extend BEYOND you, or you WOULD share it. In YOUR mind, and your mind
ONLY, He sorts out the true from the false, and teaches you to judge every thought that you allow to ENTER in the light of what God PUT there. Whatever is IN ACCORD with this light He retains, to strengthen the Kingdom in YOU. When it is PARTLY in accord with truth He accepts it and purifies it. But what is OUT OF ACCORD ENTIRELY He rejects by judging against. This is how He keeps the Kingdom perfectly consistent and perfectly unified.
But what you must remember is that what the Holy Spirit REJECTS the ego ACCEPTS. This is because they are in fundamental disagreement about everything, because they are in fundamental disagreement about WHAT YOU ARE. The ego’s beliefs on this crucial issue vary, and that is why it promotes different moods. The Holy Spirit NEVER varies on this point, and so the ONE mood that He engenders is joy. He PROTECTS this by rejecting everything that does NOT foster joy, and so He alone can keep you wholly joyous.
The Holy Spirit does not teach your mind to be critical of other minds, because He does not want you to teach your errors and LEARN THEM YOURSELVES. He would hardly be consistent if He allowed you to STRENGTHEN what you must learn to avoid. In the mind of the THINKER, then, He IS judgmental, but only in order to unify it so IT CAN perceive WITHOUT judgment. This enables the mind to TEACH without judgment and therefore learn to BE without judgment. The UNdoing is necessary only in YOUR mind, so that you cannot PROJECT it. God Himself has established what you can project with perfect safety. Therefore, the Holy Spirit’s third lesson is: Be vigilant ONLY for God and HIS Kingdom.
This is a major step toward FUNDAMENTAL change. Yet it is still a lesson in thought REVERSAL, because it implies there is something you must be vigilant AGAINST. It has advanced far from the first lesson which was PRIMARILY a reversal, and also from the second, which was essentially the identification of what is MORE desirable. This step, which follows from the second as the second does from the first, emphasizes the DICHOTOMY between the desirable and the UNdesirable. It therefore makes the ULTIMATE choice inevitable. But while the first step seems to INCREASE conflict, and the second still ENTAILS it to some extent, this one calls for CONSISTENT EFFORT AGAINST IT.
Urtext – Manual for Teachers
9. HOW CAN THE PERCEPTION OF ORDER OF DIFFICULTIES BE AVOIDED?
The belief in order of difficulties is the basis for the world's perception. It rests on differences; on uneven background and shifting foreground, on unequal heights and diverse sizes, on varying degrees of darkness and light, and thousands of contrasts in which each thing seen competes with every other in order to be recognized. A larger object overshadows a smaller one. A brighter thing draws the attention from another with less intensity of appeal. And a more threatening idea, or one conceived of as more desirable by the world's standards, completely upsets the mental balance. What the body's eyes behold is only conflict. Look not to them for peace and understanding.
Urtext – Workbook for Students
92. “Miracles are seen in light, and light and strength are one.”
1 The idea for today is an extension of the previous one. You do not think of light in terms of strength and darkness in terms of weakness. That is because your idea of what seeing means is tied up with the body and its eyes and brain. This is why you believe that you can change what you see by keeping little bits of glass or other clear material before your eyes held in a frame or placed against the eye.
2 These are among the many magical beliefs that come from the conviction you are a body and the body's eyes can see. You also believe the body's brain can think. If you but understood the nature of thought, you could but laugh at this insane idea. It is as if you thought you held the match that lights the sun and gives it all its warmth or that you had the universe imprisoned in your hand, securely bound until you let it go. Yet this is no more foolish than to believe the body's eyes can see, the brain can think.
3 It is God's strength in you that is the light in which you see, as it is His Mind with which you think. His strength denies your weakness. It is your weakness that sees through the body's eyes, peering about in darkness to behold the likeness of itself-the small, the weak, the sickly and the dying, those in need, the helpless and afraid, the sad, the poor, the starving, and the joyless. These are seen through eyes which cannot see and cannot bless.
4 Strength overlooks these things by seeing past appearances. It keeps its steady gaze upon the light that lies beyond them. It unites with light, of which it is a part. It sees itself. It brings the light in which your Self appears. In darkness you perceive a self that is not there.
5 Strength is the truth about you; weakness is an idol falsely worshipped, and adored that strength may be dispelled and darkness rule where God appointed that there should be light. Strength comes from truth and shines with light its Source has given it; weakness reflects the darkness of its maker. It is sick and looks on sickness, which is like itself.
6 Truth is a savior and can only will for happiness and peace for everyone. It gives its strength to everyone who asks, in limitless supply. It sees that lack in anyone would be a lack in all, and so it gives its light that all may see and benefit as one. Its strength is shared that it may bring to all the miracle in which they will unite in purpose and forgiveness and in love.
7 Weakness, which looks in darkness, cannot see a purpose in forgiveness and in love. It sees all others different from itself and nothing in the world that it would share. It judges and condemns but does not love. In darkness it remains to hide itself and dreams that it is strong and conquering, a victor over limitations that but grow in darkness to enormous size. It fears and it attacks and hates itself, and darkness covers everything it sees, leaving its dreams as fearful as itself. No miracles are here, but only hate. It separates itself from what it sees, while light and strength perceive themselves as one.
8 The light of strength is not the light you see. It does not change and flicker and go out. It does not shift from night to day and back to darkness till the morning comes again. The light of strength is constant, sure as love, forever glad to give itself away because it cannot give but to itself. No one can ask in vain to share its sight, and none who enters its abode can leave without a miracle before his eyes and strength and light abiding in his heart.
9 The strength in you will offer you the light and guide your seeing, so you do not dwell on idle shadows that the body's eyes provide for self-deception. Strength and light unite in you, and where they meet, your Self stands ready to embrace you as Its own. Such is the meeting place we try today to find and rest in, for the peace of God is where your Self, His Son, is waiting now to meet itself again and be as one.
10 Let us give 20 minutes twice today to join this meeting. Let yourself be brought unto your Self. Its strength will be the light in which the gift of sight is given you. Leave, then, the dark a little while today, and we will practice seeing in the light, closing the body's eyes and asking truth to show us how to find the meeting place of self and Self, where light and strength are one.
