December 9, 2011 - No sacrifice

ACIM Lesson #343
"I am not asked to make a sacrifice

To find the mercy and the peace of God."

[Marsha's comments]

"Parked at Perkins"
photo by Randal Thompson

To give up our own personalized system of grief and blame sometimes seems difficult. On the surface, it appears that we would do anything in order to gain peace and satisfaction. But when it gets right down to individual events, we want to hold on tight. Let's say all I need to do to find the peace of God is to stop thinking the limiting thought to which I've become accustomed. Let's say someone wants to change a personal relationship which we've had for some time, and to which we've become accustomed. What comes to mind is when my son was 14 and woke up one morning and said he didn't belong here, in this town, going to this school. My first thoughts were ones of blame -- toward myself and to him. Why would he want to leave? What have I done to cause him to feel this way? Now it's ten years past the time this happened, and it's easy to look back and see that his going away to school was the best thing that could have happened for both of us, but at the time it felt devastating. This is the type of feeling we so often bring to our lives when we look at the situation from an egotistical standpoint. But with an acceptance and loving assurance that all is well, these relationships ebb and flow, yielding to the peace of God which is ever-present, and which is found with a letting go which gives without sacrificing, other than a long-held belief in the way we want the situation to be. And so this is a form of giving up personal agendas, preconceived notions of how things should be, and saying "Namaste'" to yourself!

Mary Baker Eddy quote:
"LAMB OF GOD: The spiritual idea of Love; self-immolation; innocence and purity; sacrifice."
Science & Health Page 590:9-10.