Lesson 98: I will accept my part in God’s plan for salvation.
As I’ve noted before, students of A Course in Miracles, and other metaphysical paths, have been accused by others as being nothing more than spiritual navel gazers – unconcerned with the world, just sequestering themselves away to think happy thoughts. The reality is, it’s often not easy for us to accept our part in God’s plan for salvation. Ego fights us at every turn and tells us we’re wasting time that we could be using to DO something about the situation in the world.
Author and spiritual mentor Michael Singer – as well as the Course – see things a bit differently. Instead of engaging in frantic “doing” in the world, when anxiety arises, we must surrender our allegiance to the ego and its plans and accept our part in God’s plan for salvation. “We need do nothing,” the Course tells us – which means we’ll be guided to right action if we remain as we are – spirits in the material world who are seeking to bring about its salvation of by remembering who we are and accepting our function!
Singer says instead of engaging in spiritual navel gazing, our acceptance of our part in God’s plan for salvation is our duty. He says: “You have a responsibility to reach a state where you are calm, clear, open and filled with good energy so that you can come forward and do the best that you can with the moment that is unfolding in front of you.”
This is not a feel-good, happy slappy endeavor. It is our responsibility to do our inner work, not just for ourselves but to the world. We don’t do this kind of work to “gain” anything in the world, we do it to remember who we are – the calm, clear, open, good-energy filled center that can bring peace, love and joy into the world. It is through our clarity that we find what Buddhists call “right action” – the thing we are called to do (or not do) to be the most effective in every situation. Singer urges us to live this way so that every moment that passes before us will better because it did.
Often, we heed the ego’s voice of fear that insists we need to be doing something, anything, in a time of crisis. The opposite is true, Singer – and the Course – counsel. We should do absolutely nothing until we have reached a place of peace and clarity. We cannot help the world when whatever we do stems from a place of fear or a sense of panic. We can only be effective when we act (or don’t act) from a place of centered peace.
We only achieve that peace when we accept our part in God’s plan for salvation. We each have assignments, work that only we can accomplish in this world. It’s through our willingness to set aside the ego’s voice of fear and listen only for the Voice of God that we fulfill the role we’ve been given.
We must be clear so we can hear and understand the assignments before us. Don’t worry about what others are doing or not doing. Don’t worry that your assignment may not seem as glamorous or “important” as others. Don’t worry if you’re told to not do one damn thing right now. Sit quietly until you feel so moved to act that to do otherwise would make you burst into flames.
We are the guiltless, this lesson says, and as such, we should have no fear. We are safe. We must take care of our bodies, but no matter what happens outside of ourselves, we are safe stay within that calm center of Spirit. When we know this peace, this lesson says, we can “rest in quiet certainty” that we will do whatever we are given to do.
This lesson continues: “They do not doubt their own ability because they know their function will be filled completely in the perfect time and place.”
This clarity and assurance, Hafiz says, is God’s promise to us.
He writes:
Has not the Architect, Love, built your heart
in a glorious manner,
with so much care that it is meant to break
if love ever ceases to know all that happens
is perfect?
And where does anything love has ever known
go, when your eye and hand can no longer
be warmed by its body?
So vast a room your soul, every universe can
fit into it.
Anything you once called beautiful, anything
that ever
gave you comfort waits to unite with your
arms again. I promise.
Photo by David Brooke Martin on Unsplash