Section Two: Revelation, Time, and Miracles
- Revelation induces complete but temporary suspension of doubt and fear. It reflects the original form of communication between God and His creations, involving the extremely personal sense of creation sometimes sought in physical relationships. Physical closeness cannot achieve it. Miracles, however, are genuinely interpersonal, and result in true closeness to others. Revelation unites you directly with God. Miracles unite you directly with your brother. Neither emanates from consciousness, but both are experienced there. Consciousness is the state that induces action, though it does not inspire it. You are free to believe what you choose, and what you do attests to what you believe.
- Revelation is intensely personal and cannot be meaningfully translated. That is why any attempt to describe it in words is impossible. Revelation induces only experience. Miracles, on the other hand, induce action. They are more useful now because of their interpersonal nature. In this phase of learning, working miracles is important because freedom from fear cannot be thrust upon you. Revelation is literally unspeakable because it is an experience of unspeakable love.
- Awe should be reserved for revelation, to which it is perfectly and correctly applicable. It is not appropriate for miracles because a state of awe is worshipful, implying that one of a lesser order stands before his Creator. You are a perfect creation and should experience awe only in the presence of the Creator of perfection. The miracle is therefore a sign of love among equals. Equals should not be in awe of one another because awe implies inequality. It is therefore an inappropriate reaction to me. An elder brother is entitled to respect for his greater experience, and obedience for his greater wisdom. He is also entitled to love because he is a brother, and to devotion if he is devoted. It is only my devotion that entitles me to yours. There is nothing about me that you cannot attain. I have nothing that does not come from God. The difference between us now is that I have nothing else. This leaves me in a state which is only potential in you.
- “No man cometh unto the Father but by me” does not mean that I am in any way separate and different from you except in time, and time does not really exist. The statement is more meaningful in terms of a vertical rather than a horizontal axis. You stand below me, and I stand below God. In the process of “rising up,” I am higher because without me the distance between God and man would be too great for you to encompass. I bridge the distance as an elder brother to you on the one hand, and as a Son of God on the other. My devotion to my brothers has placed me in charge of the Sonship, which I render complete because I share it. This may appear to contradict the statement, “I and my Father are one,” but there are two parts to the statement in recognition that the Father is greater.
- Revelations are indirectly inspired by me because I am close to the Holy Spirit, and alert to the revelation-readiness of my brother. It can thus bring down to them more than they can draw down to themselves. The Holy Spirit mediates higher to lower communication, keeping the direct channel from God to you open for revelation. Revelation is not reciprocal. It proceeds from God to you, but not from you to God.
- The miracle minimizes the need for time. In the longitudinal or horizontal plane, the recognition of the equality of the members of the Sonship appears to involve almost endless time. However, the miracle entails a sudden shift from horizontal to vertical perception. This introduces an interval from which the giver and receiver both emerge farther along in time than they would otherwise have been. The miracle thus has the unique property of abolishing time to the extent that it renders the interval of time it spans unnecessary. There is no relationship between the time a miracle takes and the time it covers. The miracle substitutes for learning that might have taken thousands of years. It does so by the underlying recognition of perfect equality of giver and receiver on which the miracle rests. The miracle shortens time by collapsing it, thus eliminating certain intervals within it. It does this, however, within the larger temporal sequence.[1]
Although we have completed our review of Principles of Miracles, let us return to them again and again until we clear our mind of all preconceived concepts of what they are and for what purpose they are to be used. In today’s reading of The Meaning of Miracles, Jesus focuses our minds and learning upon how revelation, time, and miracles are to be understood and observed during our human journey.
Unlike miracles, revelation mirrors the original form of communication between God and Creation. As spiritual creatures formed in God’s image, we shared close personal two-way friendship with God. We were like Him; we were one with Him. He did not keep any knowledge away from us; we did not try to keep secrets from Him. Where God went, we went. What God did, we did. We were made in His likeness. God our Father; we His Son.
That all changed when we separated from Him, from Creation, from each other. Apart from God, from Creation, from each other we can never experience the communion we once shared with Him except through revelation. Remember in Principle 28 we learned that miracles are the means to revelation, miracles restore to us our love for God and takes away our fear of Him. All fear gone, revelation takes us to God, restores to us our knowledge of God and our oneness as His Son.
Miracles are, or at least should be, everyday occurrences here in the world of separateness. A miracle happens each time I see you as myself and you see me as yourself. I offer you forgiveness, I offer you love, I offer you the gifts of God – and you offer them to me and in giving to you I receive and in giving to me you receive. This is a miracle. This is the realm of healing and all those other wonderful things that take place when two holy Selves recognize one another as who and what they really are! As nice as miracles are, they are only our means to get to God. They are not God. They should not inspire anything but gratitude. We do not make too much over miracles, brother. We do not stand there mouth gaping and hands clapping and prancing about in a state of specialness. We take them in stride because what they provide is only our due.
In Principle 24, Jesus informs us that we made sickness and death when we separated from God. God did not create imperfection, disease, darkness and death. We did. Now through the practice of miracles, we can abolish the unholiness we made simply by recognizing one another as perfect, blameless Sons of God. No matter how happy we are that we are healed, that we are loved, that we are forgiven – miracles are not God – they are acts of love, that we perform for each other that reflect our recognition of His Love. So be happy for them but do not be awestruck, Jesus says.
Reserve your awe for revelation, for it is in revelation that we hear and know God. God reveals Himself to us who have aligned ourselves with Christ and accepted the Atonement. While there is so much more to be gained from this text, this is where I sign off and I pray for our continued grasp of this material:
Dear Father in Heaven: From now on, all our awe is reserved for You. We will no more be saying this is awesome or that is awesome, for now we know that You alone are worshipful. We pray for return to Your Kingdom; we pray that we do Your Will. We ask that our time on earth is spent standing with Christ, becoming Christ even as Christ becomes us. We no longer want what we made of Creation; we want what You created. Dear Father, help us to understand and to practice our holy habits through our devotion to You and to the message of Christ – we are Your Son made perfect again through our faith in Christ. Deliver us from any belief system that would cause us, Your Son, to tremble, that would burn us in hell, that would curse us to outer darkness forever – restore to us our love and trust in You we pray in the name of Jesus, with Whom we are one. Amen.
[1] A Course in Miracles. Chapter 1:2 Revelation time and miracles, Foundation for Inner Peace, Second Edition (1992). pp. 7-8.
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