ACIM – MANUAL FOR TEACHERS INTRODUCTION

1. The role of teaching and learning is actually reversed in the thinking of the world. The reversal is characteristic. It seems as if the teacher and the learner are separated, the teacher giving something to the learner rather than to himself. Further, the act of teaching is regarded as a special activity, in which one engages only a relatively small proportion of one’s time. The course, on the other hand, emphasizes that to teach is to learn, so that teacher and learner are the same. It also emphasizes that teaching is a constant process; it goes on every moment of the day and continues into sleeping thoughts as well.

2. To teach is to demonstrate. There are only two thoughts systems, and you demonstrate that you believe one or the other is true all the time. From your demonstration others learn, and so do you. The question is not whether you will teach, for in that there is no choice. The purpose of the course might be said to provide you with the means of choosing what you want to teach on the basis of what you want to learn. You cannot give to someone else, but only to yourself, and this you learn through teaching. Teaching is but a call to witnesses to attest to what you believe. It is a method of conversion. This is not done by words alone. Any situation must be to you a chance to teach others what you are, and what they are to you. No more than that, but also never less.

3. The curriculum you set up is therefore determined exclusively by what you think you are, and what you believe the relationship of others is to you. In the formal setting in the formal teaching situation, these questions may be totally unrelated to what you think you are teaching. Yet it is impossible not to use the content of any situation on behalf of what you really teach, and therefore really learn. To this the verbal content of your teaching is quite irrelevant. It may coincide with it, or it may not. It is the teaching underlying what you say that teaches you. Teaching but reinforces what you believe about yourself. Its fundamental purpose is to diminish self-doubt. This does not mean that the self you are trying to protect is real. But it does mean that the self you think is real is what you teach.

4. This is inevitable. There is no escape from it. How could it be otherwise? Everyone who follows the world’s curriculum, and everyone here does follow it until he changes his mind, teaches solely to convince himself that he is where he is not. Herein is the purpose of the world. What else, then, would its curriculum be? Into this hopeless and closed learning situation, which teaches nothing but despair and death, God sends His teachers. And as they teach His lessons of joy and hope, their learning finally becomes complete.

5. Except for God’s teachers there would be little hope of salvation, for the world of sin would seem forever real. The self-deceiving must deceive, for they must teach deception. And what else is hell? This is a manual for the teachers of God. They are not perfect, or they would not be here. Yet it is their mission to become perfect here, and so they teach perfection over and over, in many, many ways, until they have learned it. And then they are seen no more, although their thoughts remain a source of strength and truth forever. Who are they? How are they chosen? What do they do? How can they work out their own salvation and the salvation of the world? This manual attempts to answer these questions.[1]

For those of you following the syllabus, I apologize for the delay in our study of the Manual for Teachers. Our Thanksgiving travels lasted a few more days than expected, and it has taken me a few days to regroup and get back to the public devotional.  I trust that you have continued with your personal lessons and devotional readings.  Thank you for all the kind emails and words of appreciation upon the completion of the Text.  It has been lovely to read the different ways in which the study has impacted your lives! We are blessed to have this Course available to us.

I am intentionally keeping my commentary as slight as possible not only because of the delay but also because we will study the Manual in depth throughout the coming year, focusing on practical and personal application on a daily basis.   

Today I have good reason however to stress that while this is a manual for the teachers of God, we are not perfect!  If we were perfect, we would not be here. We study this Course and we become teachers of God because we believe in the perfection of God and His Son.  To lose sight of God and His Son as perfect is to lose sight of who and what we really are and accept that we are flesh and ego and separate from one another and from God forever. 

Our mission then as teachers of God is to remember and reacquaint ourselves with the Christ within, and as we demonstrate, no matter how clumsily or awkward, no matter how many mistakes we make or how much we stumble, we come to Sonship by expressing through our words, thoughts, and deeds how to go about this until we get it right. We are in this process together.  To judge ourselves or others throughout this process is to impede our spiritual awakening.  So please be forgiving of yourself through all of this and no matter how jolly mad your fumbles and stumbles, remember: We are made perfect only through our trials and errors – this is what we learn when this is what we teach. 

Except for this teaching and teachers who are willing to demonstrate this concept, the world becomes dreary and weary, without meaning and purpose, full of pain, sorrow, shame, self-reproach, and disappointment.  Our religions let us down, our special relationships drive us batty, our bodies fail us, our wits and wiles stop working. The flesh withers on the bone and falls off. The world is a hellish realm to those who are deceived by it. 

This is a manual for those of us ready to demonstrate through the process of our perfection the attributes of God. It is a practice; it is both a calling and a response to a call, it is a simultaneous working out of our individual salvation as well as the salvation of all. We prepare for God’s Kingdom by teaching God’s Kingdom in whatever capacity we can. 

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[1] A Course in Miracles. Manual for teachers. Introduction. Foundation for Inner Peace, Second Edition (1992).

For 2021 daily Workbook lessons visit www.i-choose-love.com courtesy of Linda R.

Audio credit: www.eckiefriar.com