Truth

photo credit: Richard Quick

ACIM Workbook Lesson #251 “I am in need of nothing but the truth."

Ask a group of people “What is truth?” and you will receive as many answers as there are people asked, don’t you think? You’ll hear talk of “my truth” and “your truth”, but hardly ever does Truth with a capital “T” come into the conversation. I’m beginning to understand that Truth is always unfolding as individual intuition and inspiration. This Truth doesn’t stand still in one spot and ask to be defined. It’s not opinion or belief, but rather the ideas heard within ourselves when listening for divine Mind which is the source of all. Leaving behind mortal mind’s ego definitions of the truth of our being opens the door to infinite possibilities! 

Mary Baker Eddy quote:

“A spiritual idea has not a single element of error, and this truth removes properly whatever is offensive.” Science & Health with Key to the Scriptures Page 463:12-13

Rapidly Shifting Thought

photo credit: Richard Quick

ACIM Workbook Lesson #250 “Let me not see myself as limited."

Thinking of ourselves as unlimited contradicts everything we've been taught. Many of our first memories are of being told to be careful or else something dire will happen. Quantum physics is helping us to understand form isn't as solid as we've been told. With that understanding, it becomes clear that many limitations we've placed upon ourselves are nothing more than beliefs in material laws. Limitations are discarded when an athlete breaks a record in the Olympics, or if someone performs a seemingly-impossible feat like lifting a car off of trapped loved ones. We've all heard people tell tales we think of as supernatural, such as falling great distances and feeling as though they landed on a cushion, or so-called incurable diseases disappearing.  Now, I'm not suggesting we exchange one human belief for yet another, but that we look to divine Mind to tell us the truth of our being and that we allow ourselves to be led in paths we wouldn't have considered otherwise. Thought is shifting so rapidly at this time! Let's not be afraid to listen.

Mary Baker Eddy quote:

“A mortal, corporeal, or finite conception of God cannot embrace the glories of limitless, incorporeal Life and Love. Hence the unsatisfied human craving for something better, higher, holier, than is afforded by a material belief in a physical God and man. ” Science & Health Page 258: 1-6

Bathed in Love

ACIM Workbook Lesson #249 “Forgiveness ends all suffering and loss."

One reason I loved working with the public was the stories I would hear every day. There was a 68-year-old woman celebrating a first marriage to a man she had been friends with for 15 years. I once talked with a woman who was dying of cancer. She came in showing me her beautiful red shoes which she planned to wear to her impending chemotherapy (which she described as throwing a bucket of water at a forest fire). I remember a child-like middle-aged man who spent quite some time telling me about Sheldon on a TV show called The Big Bang Theory. I’ll never forget the woman who gave away her home and all her belongings to her children and moved to a remote area in the woods, riding and tending to horses and building a rustic cabin while living in a small make-shift abode. Her friends all thought she had lost her mind; I thought she had found it! People share the most astonishing things when we’re open to hearing them! It’s beautiful to laugh with those who do not fear death, to cry happy tears with a giddy newly-wed couple, to giggle at a man’s happy childish tales, and cheer on a woman brave enough to follow her dream!

Mary Baker Eddy quote:

“Love, redolent with unselfishness, bathes all in beauty and light." Science & Health Page 516:9-13

The Reality of Love

photo credit: Chris Fischer

ACIM Workbook Lesson #248

“Whatever suffers is not part of me."

I am reminded of a family friend from long ago. She was a wonderful, spiritually-aware person who showed me the Truth of today's topic. Over the course of a year, her husband passed on, her daughter was in a car accident which left her in a coma for months before she died, and her house burned down. While I know she felt grief, I'm not sure there was despair. She always had a twinkle in her eye and a generous heart. When she herself passed on some 20 years later, I am told she went with a smile on her face. I often think of her. "Whatever suffers is not a part of me". This is not a heartless statement. It doesn't deny the feelings we have in favor of a hardness which excludes emotion. On the contrary! It's a pure Love which allows us to face hard times with a firm understanding of the beauty of Truth. After walking through the grief, we're free to see that nothing can touch our true Self or change the reality of Love.

Mary Baker Eddy quote:

“A blundering dispatch, mistakenly announcing the death of a friend, occasions the same grief that the friend's real death would bring. You think that your anguish is occasioned by your loss. Another dispatch, correcting the mistake, heals your grief, and you learn that your suffering was merely the result of your belief. Thus it is with all sorrow, sickness, and death. You will learn at length that there is no cause for grief, and divine wisdom will then be understood. Error, not Truth, produces all the suffering on earth.”

 Science & Health Page 386:16-25

Sight Through Forgiveness

photo credit: Aaron Springston

ACIM Workbook Lesson #247 “Without forgiveness I will still be blind."

The sight which appears with forgiveness is our topic today. What we call forgiveness isn't some sort of divine pardon, but a yielding within ourselves to the purity of divine Mind, without the impediments of holding on to personal memories of wrongdoing, resentment, and pain which seems engrained within.  This yielding includes the release of things which we think have been done to us, and things we think we have done to others, along with things going on everywhere else. So let's choose again, rest in Love, and let it Be!

Mary Baker Eddy quote:

“As mortals gain more correct views of God and man, multitudinous objects of creation, which before were invisible, will become visible.”

Science & Health Page 264:13-15

Love's Protection

photo credit: Aaron Springston

ACIM Lesson #246

“To love my Father is to love His Son."

"Clad in the panoply of Love, human hatred cannot reach you." This Mary Baker Eddy quote is one which I've always thought of as meaning that the human hatred others feel cannot reach me when I'm wearing the armor of divine Love. I now see that it also includes the hatred I may feel toward others. It's very easy for me to think that I don't hate anyone or anything. Actually, it's a word I have pruned from my vocabulary and simply do not use. BUT if I am irritated by another's actions or words, or if I replay a past situation in my mind which caused anger in the past, or if I allow criticism to gnaw at me and I think of retaliatory statements which could have been said -- isn't that human hatred? Wearing this cloak of Love calms these nagging feelings and thoughts. I know that if I'm wearing the protection of Love, hatred cannot enter from inside or out!

Mary Baker Eddy quote:

“As a drop of water is one with the ocean, a ray of light one with the sun, even so God and man, Father and son, are one in being.”  Science & Health Page 361:16-18

Peace Within

photo credit: Aaron Springston

ACIM Workbook Lesson #245 “Your peace is with me, Father.  I am safe."

Although I know peace is a choice within my own self, I want to share it with everyone, everywhere. It has taken quite a while to grasp the concept that the only thought I can change is my own! After years of trying to change loved ones, I think it was my children who finally taught me the meaning of Oneness. They showed me this as I watched the household mood change its tone along with my emotions. Holding to peace within myself is all I can do — and that’s a lot! Jumping on the bandwagon of resentment or other negative emotions can seem difficult to avoid, but it’s possible to simply witness these things without becoming a part of them. While I can't change what anyone else is thinking or feeling or experiencing, I can adjust my vision of reality. Every thought is important! We’re all in this together, in every way, at every moment. And so today I will make an effort to see through the eyes of Love, excluding nothing, no matter what!

Mary Baker Eddy quote:

“Spiritual living and blessedness are the only evidences by which we can recognize true existence and feel the unspeakable peace which comes from an all-absorbing spiritual love.” Science & Health with Key to the Scriptures Page 264:24-27