September 1, 2011

ACIM Lesson #244
“I am in danger nowhere in the world.
 
Your Son is safe wherever he may be, for You are there with him. He need but call upon Your Name, and he will recollect his safety and Your Love, for they are one. How can he fear or doubt or fail to know he cannot suffer, be endangered, or experience unhappiness, when he belongs to You, beloved and loving, in the safety of Your Fatherly embrace?”
 
[ACIM prayer for today]
“And there we are in truth. No storms can come into the hallowed haven of our home. In God we are secure. For what can come to threaten God Himself, or make afraid what will forever be a part of Him?”
 
[Marsha's thoughts]
Reading the above affirmation of our safety in any situation reminds me of a profound example of this Truth. A young woman was abducted from her college campus and taken to a remote area. Throughout this trip, the woman continued to affirm the One ever-presence which we all are, and not only in relation to her well-being but also for the perpetrator.  After quite a while, the man stopped the car and apologized to the woman, at which point she shared spiritual truths with him and they proceeded back to her apartment so she could give him a copy of Science and Health. I'm sure we all have stories of instances of protection through seeming divine intervention. Let's not think of this as intervention, but as the way things really are; not a setting aside of material danger, but a knowledge of the divine Principle of all being. By this, we rest in the assurance that all is well.
 
 (to hear this story in her own words, follow this link: 
 
http://www.spirituality.com/article.jhtml?ElementId=/repositories/shcomarticle/Mar2010/1268403069.xml&ElementName=I was abducted ... and released
 
 
Mary Baker Eddy poem:
 
Mother's Evening Prayer
 
O gentle presence, peace and joy and power;
         O Life divine, that owns each waiting hour,
Thou Love that guards the nestling's faltering flight!
         Keep Thou my child on upward wing tonight.
 
Love is our refuge; only with mine eye
         Can I behold the snare, the pit, the fall:
His habitation high is here, and nigh,
         His arm encircles me, and mine, and all.
 
O make me glad for every scalding tear,
         For hope deferred, ingratitude, disdain!
Wait, and love more for every hate, and fear
         No ill, — since God is good, and loss is gain.
 
Beneath the shadow of His mighty wing;
         In that sweet secret of the narrow way,
Seeking and finding, with the angels sing:
         "Lo, I am with you alway," — watch and pray.
 
No snare, no fowler, pestilence or pain;
         No night drops down upon the troubled breast,
When heaven's aftersmile earth's tear-drops gain,
         And mother finds her home and heav'nly rest.
(Poems by Mary Baker Eddy, pp. 4, 5)