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Lesson 64: Let me not forget my function.

Now that we know our sole function in this world is to be a beacon of God’s Light of Love and save the world through our forgiveness, the ego will do everything it can to undermine us. It will create doubt. It will create fear. It will tell us that this woo-woo junk is so much crap, wishful thinking and spiritual bypass.

“Your function in the world is to be happy?” it scoffs. “How can you be happy while so many suffer?”

And that’s where we forget our function because suddenly, we’re right smack back in the middle of guilt. There are so many suffering people in the world – kids in cages, human trafficking, wars, plagues, famines. “How dare you be happy amid all of this suffering?” the ego demands. “That’s just another sign of your privilege in this world.”

I admit, it’s a tough argument to overcome. I mean, how can you even think of your own happiness at a time like this? Well, if there were such things as private thoughts and separation, then it might actually be a good question. However, since there really is only one of us here, it only takes one of us to truly nail this happiness thing for all of us to step out of our suffering.

Continue reading “AYoMW: March 4, 2020 — Forget me not.”

Lesson 63: The light of the world brings peace to every mind through my forgiveness.

One of the things that most confused me when I first started reading the Course is its use of terms that come from my Christian background. Words such as “redemption,” “forgiveness,” “atonement,” “purification,” “crucifixion,” “resurrection,” and even “heaven” and “hell” figure prominently in the text and workbook. Yet, they are all redefined by the Course – made into positive things that do not require any sacrifice on my part, but are turned into tools to help me navigate my path back to the Joy and Love that I was created to be.

This lesson mentions another of those distinctly Christian words – but gives it a twist: Salvation.

To my Southern Baptist ears, that word speaks of a very specific thing: Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross. My tradition teaches that salvation comes about by Jesus dying on the cross for my sins – making himself a sacrificial lamb to take away the sins of the world.

This is not what the Course means by “salvation.” No one has to die, no one has to sacrifice and, indeed, no one has to do anything but accept that salvation and it will bring peace to every mind. Salvation isn’t an act by one man giving his life to save the world – instead it is an undoing of illusion. Salvation peels back the veil we have set before us when we believed in separation and created this ego world of confusion and suffering.

Continue reading “AYoMW: March 3, 2020 — Save me!”

Lesson 62: Forgiveness is my function as the light of the world.

Years ago, I wrote a piece for the Huffington Post where I talked about forgiving a past landlord for what I felt was an outrageous slight after he sued me and then-girlfriend for some alleged damage we had inflicted to the apartment we had rented. I wrote about how every time I drove by his house (which was often, since it was on my way to work) I would give him the one-finger salute, which was even more satisfying if he was out working in his yard at the time.

This was during the time I have mentioned before when I was a very, very angry and cynical person. This landlord had simply confirmed all of my suspicions about people – that they were bad, out for themselves and would take advantage of you if you let your guard down.

In the article, I talked about the process I had used to forgive him because I realized – much as the unforgiveness for my father had done – my anger and disgust at him was doing harm to exactly one person – me.  You would have thought that I had asked people to give up breathing or eating. The outrage in the comments was overwhelming. People recounted terrible things that others had done to them and asked, pointedly, if they should just let that go, too.

The answer is, well: “Yes.” Our function in this world is to forgive, today’s lesson tells us. The ego is all over it, loudly protesting what those commenters said: “If we just forgive everyone then we’ll just be doormats and taken advantage of by every Tom, Dick and grifter on the planet.”

Continue reading “AYoMW: March 2, 2020 — Shed your coat”

Lesson 61: I am the light of the world.

Back in 1989, a youth minister from Michigan was inspired after reading a collection of sermons by a Kansas minister named Charles Sheldon to create friendship bracelets with the acronym WWJD on them. Sheldon, in 1886, preached a series of sermons where he created a cliffhanger each week by ending his talks by asking, “What would Jesus do?” He would answer the question in next week’s sermon.

The bracelets created by Janie Tinklenberg became pop culture icons, emblazoned on t-shirts, mugs, jewelry and more. The slogan was meant to remind us to be like Jesus in the world – but eventually it became a banal call to just “be nice,” which isn’t really like Jesus at all. Most often, the WWJD question would be asked and summarily dismissed because, y’know, he’s the Son of God and we’re not, so why even strive to be something we’re not meant to be? To even try would be the height of arrogance.

A Course in Miracles takes a completely different view of our role in this bodily world. It asks us not to try to emulate Jesus, but to realize that we are exactly like Jesus. We have the capacity to awaken, to remember our true nature as Children of God, and accept that our function here is to be the light of the world.

Continue reading “AYoMW: March 1, 2020 — Got a Light?”

Lesson 60: Review of Lessons 46 – 50

These are the main ideas from lessons 46 – 50:

46. God is the Love in which I forgive.

47. God is the strength in which I trust.

48. There is nothing to fear.

49. God’s Voice speaks to me all through the day.

50. I am sustained by the Love of God.

I’ve always been the sort to rely on myself and am very hesitant to ask other people to help me – even when that might be a good idea. I often feel like I am imposing on others when I ask for help and wonder, sometimes, why they would help at all. What’s in it for them? Consequently, I end up relying on my own strength, knowledge and wits – which often don’t work out very well for me.

These last five lessons that we’re reviewing remind us that we are not in this life alone, no matter how hard the ego tries to convince us that we are. In the US, we are enamored with the individual – the self-made man or woman, the one who “goes it alone.” What we overlook in the “self-made” person are all the societal and other often invisible supports or advantages they had over others and too often those who “go it alone” can, too soon, become “lone wolf” types who may do harm to themselves or others.

Continue reading “AYoMW: Feb. 29, 2020 — Help!”

Lesson 59: Review of Lessons 41 – 45

Here are the main ideas from Lessons 41 – 45:

41. God goes with me wherever I go.

42. God is my strength. Vision is His gift.

43. God is my Source. I cannot see apart from Him.

44. God is the light in which I see.

45. God is the Mind with which I think.

There’s a trite church billboard slogan I saw one day that I immediately scoffed at until I began doing the Course workbook. It read: “If God feels distant, who moved?”

My kneejerk reaction was negative, but as I ponder the review of these past five lessons, it seems cogent to ask who moved if we ever feel like we’ve lost our connection to God. God never goes anywhere that we are not. The Holy is always there to provide its presence and strength, to be our Source to meet all our needs, to provide the light of peace and love and guide our thoughts to become Holy.

If you’re not feeling that in any moment – you moved, not God. Whenever we feel “abandoned” by the Holy, we can be assured that our ego has thrown up a barrier of some sort, whether it’s a feeling of despair, fear or sorrow. The ego wants us to believe that we are on our own here in this world of form – that only it can “save” us from the suffering of the world through its weapons of attack, competition and fear.

Continue reading “AYoMW: Feb. 28, 2020 — Catching the happy virus”

Lesson 58: Review of Lessons 36 – 40

The ideas from Lessons 36 – 40 are:

36. My holiness envelopes everything I see.

37. My holiness blesses the world.

38. There is nothing my holiness cannot do.

39. My holiness is my salvation.

40. I am blessed as a Son (Child) of God.

Singer and songwriter Rickie Byars sings about living in a “Wholly Holy Way,” proclaiming that love is all around us, seeking to learn from failure and asking to walk in each day a little wiser. Her song helps us to understand what this lesson means when it talks about our “holiness.”

For those of us who grew up in more fundamentalist Christian traditions, such as the Southern Baptist Church, humans are considered the furthest thing from “holy.” Martin Luther, the founder of the Protestant strain of religion, once compared himself (and therefore the rest of humanity) to “a stinking bag of worms.” This form of religion teaches that there’s nothing good about us and God had to send his son, Jesus, to die on a cross to even make the human race into something that didn’t make God puke every time He (and, yes, it was always a He) thought of us.

This idea that we could be “holy” was preposterous.

Continue reading “AYoMW: Feb. 27, 2020 — The worm turns”

Lesson 57: Review of Lessons 31 – 35

Here are the main ideas from Lessons 31 – 35:

31. I am not the victim of the world I see.

32. I have invented the world I see.

33. There is another way of looking at the world.

34. I could see peace instead of this.

35. My mind is part of God’s. I am very Holy.

Author Wayne Dyer once told a story about a day he was running on the beach near his home in Hawaii and a woman stopped him and told him she was thinking of moving to the area.

“How are the people here?” she asked him.

“How are the people where you live now?” he asked back.

“Oh, they’re horrible. Rude, mean, nasty. Nobody cares for each other there,” she told him.

“Well, folks are a lot like that here,” he told her and they said their goodbyes.

A little further down the beach, he was stopped by another woman who also expressed a desire to move to this island paradise and wanted to know how the people were in this area. He asked her the same question as the previous woman, “What are they like where you come from?”

Continue reading “AYoMW: Feb. 26, 2020 — Peace, Schmease”

Lesson 56: Review of Lessons 26 – 30

Here is a review of the main ideas for Lessons 26 – 30:

26. My attack thoughts are attacking my invulnerability.

27. Above all else I want to see.

28. Above all else I want to see differently.

29. God is in everything I see.

30. God is in everything I see because God is in my mind.

The reason I am not an enlightened master is that I forget a lot. One of the things that makes me such a good pastor, is that I forget a lot. When you talk to your pastor, you expect they’ll keep your confidence. I’ve found that’s easy for me because I tend to forget what people tell me anyway. Go ahead, tell me your deepest, darkest secret. My CRS (Can’t Remember Shit) affliction will keep it safe from the world for eternity. Thus, I am horrible at gossip.

The reason I remain in my body, in this world we have all created with our collective ego belief in separation, is that I have forgotten who I truly am. My ego tells me my true “self” is created by my past, which shaped my worldviews and my opinions about things, which I reinforce by posting messages on Facebook and arguing with anyone who dares to disagree with how I see the world.

Continue reading “AYoMW: Feb. 25, 2020 — A Cure for CRS”

Lesson 55: Review of Lessons 21 – 25

Here are the main ideas from Lessons 21 – 25:

21. I am determined to see things differently.
22. What I see is a form of vengeance.
23. I can escape from this world by giving up attack thoughts.
24. I do not perceive my own best interests.
25. I do not know what anything is for.

In 2016, the presidential candidate that I didn’t support won – and I went on the attack. I posted on social media every day about the need to “resist” and fight back and undo what I perceived to be a massive injustice. I railed against those who voted third party or chose to stay home on their butts while the nation went down the tubes. I was angry. I was scared.

My attacks and negativity lost me a lot of friends, both online and in real life, but also gained me a bunch more who were with me in solidarity attacking the new regime that we felt had been thrust upon us in some form of cheating or scandal. We knew we were right and everyone else was wrong.

Then, my attack thoughts and actions began to manifest in my body. I almost passed out one morning while sitting at my desk as my heart’s rhythm went wonky and made me swoon. My father died of a massive heart attack at the age of 53. I was 51 at the time, so this episode sent me to a cardiologist for the first time in my life.

Continue reading “AYoMW: Feb. 24, 2020 — Resistance is futile”