VI. Finding the Present 7-13
7. The present offers you your brothers in the light that would unite you with them, and free you from the past. Would you, then, hold the past against them? For if you do, you are choosing to remain in a darkness that is not there and refusing to accept the light that is offered you. For the light of perfect vision is freely given as it is freely received and can be accepted only without limit. In this one, still dimension of time that does not change, and where there is no sight of what you were, you look at Christ and call His witnesses to shine on you because you called them forth. And they will not deny the truth in you, because you look for it in them and found it there.
8. Now is the time of salvation, for now is the release from time. Reach out to all your brothers and touch them with the touch of Christ. In timeless union with them is your continuity unbroken because it is wholly shared. God’s guiltless Son is only light. There is no darkness in him anywhere, for he is whole. Call all your brothers to witness to his wholeness, as I am calling you to join with me. Each voice has a part in the song of redemption, the hymn of gladness and thanksgiving for the light to the Creator of light. The holy light that shines forth from God’s Son is a witness that his light is of his Father.
9. Shine on your brothers in remembrance of your Creator, for you will remember Him as you call forth the witnesses to His creation. Those whom you heal bear witness to your healing, for in their wholeness you will see your own. And as your hymns of praise and gladness rise to your Creator, He will return your thanks in His clear Answer to your call. For it can never be that His Son called upon Him and remained unanswered. His call to you is but your call to Him. And in Him you are answered by His peace.
10. Child of light, you know not that the light is in you. Yet you will find it through its witnesses, for having given light to them they will return it. Each one you see in light brings your light closer to your awareness. Love always leads to love. The sick, who asked for love, are grateful for it, and in their joy, they shine with holy thanks. And this they offer you who gave them joy. They are your guides to joy. For having received it of you they would keep it. You have established them as guides to peace, for you have made it manifest in them. And seeing it, its beauty calls you home.
11. There is a light that this world cannot give. Yet you can give it, as it was given you. And as you give it, it shines forth to call you from the world and follow it. For this light will attract you as nothing in this world can do. And you will lay aside the world and find another. This other world is bright with love which you have given it. And here will everything remind you of your Father and His holy Son. Light is unlimited, and spreads across this world in quiet joy. All those you brought with you will shine on you, and you will shine on them in gratitude because they brought you here. Your light will join with theirs in power so compelling, that it will draw the others out of darkness as you look on them.
12. Awaking unto Christ is following the laws of love of your free will, and out of quiet recognition of the truth in them. The attraction of light must draw you willingly, and willingness is signified by giving. Those who accept love of you become your willing witnesses to the love you gave them, and it is they who hold it out to you. In sleep you are alone, and your awareness is narrowed to yourself. And that is why the nightmares come. You dream of isolation because your eyes are closed. You do not see your brothers, and in the darkness, you cannot look upon the light you gave to them.
13. And yet the laws of love are not suspended because you sleep. And you have followed them through all your nightmares, and have been faithful in your giving, for you were not alone. Even in sleep has Christ protected you, ensuring the real world for you when you awake. In your name He has given for you and given you the gifts He gave. God’s Son is still as loving as his Father. Continuous with his Father, he has no past apart from Him. So he has never ceased to be his Father’s witness and his own. Although he slept, Christ’s vision did not leave him. And so it is that he can call unto himself the witnesses that teach him that he never slept. [1]
As we continue today in our quest for the present, Jesus assures us that we are safe, we are on solid ground in the present moment. There is no need to fear when we leave the past and meet our brothers in the light of Sonship. Meet them any other way and in any other tense of time – and we can be in great danger of our mortal life, our dignity, our self-respect, all that we hold dear. But in the one, still dimension of time that never changes and we are as God created us, we look at the Sonship, we see Christ in all, and in that moment and with that decision we call forth witnesses to that truth, to that love, to that goodness and they shine. They will not deny the Sonship, they will remember the God in them, because we chose to see it there in them and what we choose to see we find.
This concept holds much promise for each and every one of us in whatever profession we find ourselves in our human life. When doctors see Christ in their patients and begin to set them free from their disease instead of writing endless, costly prescriptions and unnecessarily risky operations we will witness miracles that reverberate throughout the whole world. Health scare will become health care. We will teach each other to lay down our greed, our over-consumption, our laziness, and ignorance and return our minds to Sonship, stewardship, serving one another with gladness instead of madness. When teachers see Christ in their students – their students are set free from learning disabilities, from over- and under-achievement, from maniacal competition and comparison as well as defeatism and ignorance. When police see citizens as Christ, when parents see their children and grandchildren as Christ, when prison guards and prisoners see each other as Christ – brutality, abuse, violence, and all manner of ungodliness goes away. We meet each other in that moment as Sons of God and that moment is replaced then by another moment and so on until we are healed, not one here and one there but all of us.
In paragraph eight, Jesus says that time is now. We reach out and touch others with the touch of Christ. We see them in the light. We do not call forth darkness, we call forth light. There is a song of redemption. A song that rings through our hearts and minds that make us glad and appreciative for we are Sons of God, the light of Christ not only shines on us but is in us shining forth from us.
We are not to be afraid of this light. In yesterday’s post I felt obligated to provide a caveat for our own personal safety – I mentioned how hurt I had been as a child feeling as if I had to forgive and keep forgiving abuse and violence and indignities and count it all joy. This is a different concept than the one that I was taught, and it takes a mature mind to grasp it. We are to be as children with a mind that is open to truth; we are to be mature when it comes to grasping it and applying it and teaching others to do the same. It is idiotic to live in such a way that we promote and do not correct meanness and ill intent. It is heartless and ignorant to teach our children that we should allow others to abuse them in the name of Christ.
Jesus is telling us to know that the light is in us and to know that light. That when we accept our Sonship, we are not suffering along with Jesus, but we are joined with Christ in the Sonship of God. We are health and we are wholeness, and we are the light of Christ. Our dedication to Christ is not some weirdo compulsion to go pass out tracts and invite people to our church and convince other people to give up their religious beliefs and instead believe in our version of the gospel. We are not here to add to the division and start another home church or mega church or any kind of physical church at all. We are here to be the church. You. Me. Us. There should be no denominational tag to this – we should not have to call ourselves anything but brothers and sons. There is no us and them – we are all in time until we end time and step into eternity together.
When we see one another in the light of Christ, we are not trying to save anyone for we know that all are saved. That brother on the street that you see Christ in has as much to give you as you have to give him. That patient that comes to you for healing has as much to heal in you as you have to heal in him. That student has as much to teach you as you have to teach them. We see each other in mutuality, as equals. If I look at you in anyway that does not see our mutuality, our equality, our Sonship – I am not looking at you in the present moment. I am bringing my past and your past and every association that I have about people that look like you and smell like you and act like you to the now and it is obscuring Christ in me and Christ in you. I will think I am better than you or I will think that you think you are better than me. I will call you a bum or a snob – it doesn’t matter to the ego how I see you as long as I do not see you in the present moment, as long as I do not see you as Christ, for if I do not see you as Christ, I do not see myself as Christ and another moment of time is added to the ego’s existence.
Love always leads to love. This is how we set ourselves free as we set others free. We lose our fascination with darkness in the light of love. We lose our taste for bloodshed and torment, for gossiping and blather in the light of truth. We no longer cherish and get rich off of the sick, the violent, the dying for we can no longer plunder and enslave those we love. We become witnesses not to the plight of humanity, the battles, the greed, the crimes, but we witness God’s Kingdom on earth as it is in heaven. And the beauty of God’s Kingdom in us and all around us calls us home to Him.
This is the light that only comes from Sonship. When we know ourselves as Christ within and we teach Sonship to others. This is the light that none of us can deny for it is the light of what we are, and we are awakened from the enchantment of the world, from the stupor of the ego, from the split that would oppose the things of God. The present moment is the way in which we lay aside this world for the other world for the present moment reminds us of our Father and who we are to Him. The present moment has this light, it is always there, it is never darkened, it is not a little light that flickers and can be extinguished – it is a light that joins with other lights across the world in quiet joy. There is nothing titillating about it. There is nothing loud and clamorous and nobody needs to clap or shout or jump up and down and do somersaults. It is quiet, it is light, its song is sweet and true and clear. It has no need to draw attention to itself. It does not collect followers and do headcounts and demand a tithe or even an offering. It does not command or curse or threaten. It does not draw forth weapons or rebuke or give lectures. There are no buildings to maintain, no outreaches to support, no missionaries to send to foreign lands and convince them to give up their heathen ways and be more like us. It is just a light that recognizes Christ in all and draws us out of darkness, disease, and death.
We give our all to the Light of Christ, not because we are afraid of going to hell, not because we are ashamed of the Crucifixion and pity Jesus for how He bled for us miserable sinners, not because we are miserable sinners saved by grace. We give our all to the Light of Christ because we recognize ourselves as we were created. Sons of God, worthy of redemption, because we mean as much to God as God means to us. We give our all to the Light of Christ because it is the Light of Sonship, the Light of Brotherhood, the Light of Love. We are not serving a nightmare God who destines some for heaven and some for hell – we are Sons of God who loves all His Sons equally and without favoritism and with no need for sacrifice or worship or groveling of any kind. Our humanity is a ruse, a dream of isolation, a nightmare of perversion – it does not define us. Doing time is over when the need for time comes to an end. Unlike this realm – when we have done our time it is put behind us. We are given true freedom and true liberty, not some stunted, ignorant version of it that limits our choices and curtails our opportunities.
Jesus ends this section by establishing our freedom in love. We have no rules for love requires only love, we have no orders, no regulations, no thou shalt nots. In love we have only the law of love. We are here to help, and we are here to heal. In the remaining bit of time we have, we practice the present moment, we follow the laws of love as best as we can. We join our minds with Christ. We understand the crucifixion not as our salvation but as the ego’s attempt to kill what can never be killed, to be rid of what can never go away, to steal from us the Light of Sonship and our eternal Being in God. Christ protects us from the nightmares we would make in place of gospel, in place of Love, in place of God the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. We are all witnesses to this Love and for this Love. It has always been there – no matter how darkness has tried to obscure it, turn it into something else, withhold it from some and make ninnies out of others. Christ’s vision is always there in each present moment. And it is for this we seek, and it is this we find – there is no darkness, only Light, there is no nightmare, only the ruse of time to teach us what is real and what is not.
[1] A Course in Miracles. Chapter 13 The guiltless world. VI Finding the present 7-13. Foundation for Inner Peace, Second Edition (1992).
For daily 2021 Workbook lessons visit www.i-choose-love.com courtesy of Linda R.
Audio credit: www.eckiefriar.com
the friar patch 