Friday, June 9, 2017

Does A Course in Miracles Need Defending? - David Hoffmeister ACIM

Question:
Dear David,

I notice that Jesus says in the Bible: Love your enemy; resist not evil; turn the other cheek. And in the Course he says: "In my defenselessness my safety lies"; "if I defend myself, I am attacked.”

But aren't there exceptions to this? If someone tells me to stop publishing quotes from A Course In Miracles without permission, shouldn't I resist? After all, this work is from Jesus and it is my duty to help get His message out to the world. In a copyright case about the right to use its words as freely as I am able, must I not defend the right to use the Course and the words Jesus has given to me? Should I not fight against the copyright owners and try to free the Course for the benefit of the rest of the world?

Or am I supposed to just step back and let the Holy Spirit handle it all. Just not resist at all? What am I to do?

David Hoffmeister:
Hello Beloved One,

Thanks for pouring out your thoughts and questions. The sincere prayer of the heart is always Answered in illumination, and beyond the words offered is always the deep desire to Know Thy True Self. Ours is the willingness to forgive and be at peace, for lasting peace is our Inheritance as the Christ. This world is a world of symbols, and words are only symbols of symbols twice removed from reality. God Answers the prayer of the heart. Any question or doubt is always about identity, and it is helpful to be reminded that words were made to maintain the belief in separation:

"Strictly speaking, words play no part at all in healing. The motivating factor is prayer, or asking. What you ask for you receive. But this refers to the prayer of the heart, not to the words you use in praying. Sometimes the words and the prayer are contradictory; sometimes they agree. It does not matter. God does not understand words, for they were made by separated minds to keep them in the illusion of separation. Words can be helpful, particularly for the beginner, in helping concentration and facilitating the exclusion, or at least the control, of extraneous thoughts. Let us not forget, however, that words are but symbols of symbols. They are thus twice removed from reality." (M-21.1)

My Answer is always Love, and the Holy Spirit uses words for a Purpose that heals and blesses the mind. Made to isolate and attack and separate, words have been re-directed or re-translated for miracles and harmony. Miracles unite you with your brother and render attack meaningless. Miracles show that nothing need ever be defended. Miracles bring peace instantly to the mind that is still an instant. Words can never come between you and your brother, for there is no gap in our Glorious Identity. Words and books and things and events but represent the purpose given them. Would you see the shining symbol of a forgiven world through the Perspective of the Holy Spirit or the fragmented, disunited misperceptions of the ego, for such is the choice you must make? You love your brother with a love so deep that you would weep in Joy at the very Thought, and would you now place "rights" about a "book" and "words" before the very Love Which is God? Love makes no demands. Love does not possess. Love is whole and complete and needs nothing. Love recognizes ItSelf. As you experience your brother you experience God.

"When you meet anyone, remember it is a holy encounter. As you see him you will see yourself. As you treat him you will treat yourself. As you think of him you will think of yourself. Never forget this, for in him you will find yourself or lose yourself. Whenever two Sons of God meet, they are given another chance at salvation. Do not leave anyone without giving salvation to him and receiving it yourself. For I am always there with you, in remembrance of you." (T-8.III.4)

Our mind is united in forgiveness. Mind is indeed singular. Only the belief in a private mind, tiny and separated from the whole, could conceive of defense as meaningful. Being everything you have no need. Being everything you extend freely and without limit. The Love of Christ is meant to be given away freely, for such is the beatitude of life and the state of mind the Holy Spirit offers without cost. Yet true generosity is an attitude that accepts everything and asks for nothing. You have the right to perfect peace. Do not confuse our Inheritance with unreal thoughts about words and the use of words. "To have give all to all" requires simply that you release the concept of expectation. Do you not see that asking a brother to act differently or wishing circumstances to be different than they are is the ego's "plan" of salvation? It is as if you actually believed: "If he/she/they will change, I will be happy." This "plan" requires that anything except your own mind must change for all to be well and good. Yet I have said that Atonement or complete forgiveness is the sole responsibility of the miracle worker, and this is changing your mind about your mind. Atonement is accepting our Changelessness as Eternal Mind and releasing the belief that there is anything "else."

Who are you attempting to follow to Enlightenment, the ego or the Holy Spirit? Whom do you call master, remembering that you cannot serve two masters? If your master is anger you will attempt to deny the Christ and defend an illusion. If your master bids you confront or fight someone perceived as "not yourself" you are deceived in purpose and remain devoted to an unconscious "death wish." Who can judge a brother and hope to Awaken to a Oneness that knows not of judgment? You CAN refuse to take a side, refuse to make a judgment, and refuse to align your mind with thoughts of the past or future - and in vigilance for this Perspective will you abide in the peace that passes the understanding of the world. Anger is a false sense of control, attempting to tell Reality what It must be. You must realize that the "control issue" or "authority problem" is not with the "copyright holders." To cling to the ego and a tiny self-concept IS the belief that you can author yourself. You are as God created You. Accept the Fact and You are Home in Peace.

In one holy instant the Holy Spirit neutralized the world of judgment, the apparent hierarchy of illusions was Answered, and the Solution to the one belief in separation was Given. In accepting this Atonement it is apparent that the separation never happened. In true forgiveness you forgive or release what never happened. It is impossible to forgive what is believed to "have happened" and no amount of "evidence" will convince you of what you do NOT want. If you want peace you must relinquish the thought of attack forever. For if you believe attack is possible in any form you will seem to perceive the "evidence" to justify defense. Defense makes the error of separation real in awareness, for it reinforces the belief that attack is real. Forgiveness and defenselessness are symomymous. Take a stand "against" anybody or anything and Peace is completely gone from awareness. Stand firm in the Peace of Christ and there is nothing "outside" to stand "against."

Do not confuse nonjudgment or seeing the neutrality and nothingness of form with passivity or weakness. The Observer or Witness is Above the battleground. Forgiveness looks and watches and judges not. Meekness is Strength, and the Meek Perspective has literally overcome the world with Its Strength. It is Strength Which reminds the mind: "Nothing I see means anything. I do not understand anything I see. My meaningless thoughts are showing me a meaningless world. I see only the past." It is the ego that encourages a "fight" and "battle" and "taking a stand for Truth against a brother." To actively align with Jesus is to lay down the sword of judgment. Love does not oppose. To oppose a brother is a sign of weakness.

Yes, there are no neutral thoughts. Thoughts are not powerful or weak, good or bad, pleasing or painful, they are either real (Spirit) or unreal (time-space). Judgments of time-space, be they positive or negative, are never neutral and they seem to produce a world of images that is anything but neutral. Images are not Reality. Judgment is the attempt to pull a part from the whole, give it a name, and set it off from the rest. A judgmental thought seems to make a form of that which is forever formless. Nonjudgment, the Holy Spirit's Perspective, sees all form as neutral or nothing. The mind in accord with Jesus, beyond the possibilty of judgments of time- space, sees everything of time as neutral:

"My body is a wholly neutral thing." (Lesson 294)

"Money is not evil. It is nothing." (P-3.III.1.5)

"Time is as neutral as the body is, except in terms of what you see it for." (T-26.VIII.3.7)

"...the body is merely neutral. It is not sinful, but neither is it sinless. As nothing, which it is, the body cannot meaningfully be invested with attributes of Christ or of the ego. Either must be an error, for both would place the attributes where they cannot be. And both must be undone for purposes of truth." (T-20.VII.4.4)

"Like every lesson that the Holy Spirit requests you learn, the miracle is clear.... Now are you freed from this much of the dream; the world is neutral, and the bodies that still seem to move about as separate things need not be feared." (T-28.II.10)

Be not concerned with publishing or words or organizations or getting the message "out," for the Kingdom of Heaven is within. Images mean nothing and cannot be "reached." There are no "private minds" to "reach." Mind is One. There is literally no "body" "out there." "When you pray go to your closet" means make not a show of outward appearances to display your devotions and prayers. Our state of mind is the witness or demonstration of the miracle, and peace is its own reward. There is nothing outside of you. The transformation of mind is NOT physical, for what is nothing cannot BE transformed. The transformation is a recognition of the wholeness of mind. Extending the "message" in a world of unreality is therefore impossible. Nothing can ever block the extension within (creation), and forgiveness sees there is nothing to fix or change in meaningless images. You are the Kingdom of Heaven and there is nothing outside You:

"What has been given you? The knowledge that you are a mind, in Mind and purely mind, sinless forever, wholly unafraid, because you were created out of love. Nor have you left your Source, remaining as you were created. This was given you as knowledge which you cannot lose." (W-158.1)

"Mind reaches to itself. It is not made up of different parts, which reach each other. It does not go out. Within itself it has no limits, and there is nothing outside it. It encompasses everything. It encompasses you entirely; you within it and it within you. There is nothing else, anywhere or ever." (T-18.VI.8.5)

If you would know that Jesus lives, teach that there is no death by demonstrating our invulnerability in Christ. Defense is the sign of vulnerability and weakness and is not the lesson of forgiveness the Holy Spirit offers. Singularity of mind has no exceptions. When you seek to defend a "position" you are attempting to deny singularity. Holding a defense is a denial of realization that there is no order of difficulty in miracles, for an exception is being attempted. Make no exceptions, transfer the training, for truth has no exceptions and Salvation is no compromise of any kind. One compromise, held apart from Truth, renders "Enlightenment" a mere concept in awareness. Yet truly Enlightenment is an Experience, and the ego is afraid to go beyond words to the Unspeakable Love of God.

In Christ there are no limits, and you can indeed afford to laugh at the ego's "battle over words." Love has nothing to do with form. If you are concerned about the "form" of expression or "the message" being blocked by "somebody," remember this comforting thought from A Course In Miracles:

"Whenever any form of special relationship tempts you to seek for love in ritual, remember love is content, and not form of any kind. The special relationship is a ritual of form, aimed at raising the form to take the place of God at the expense of content. There is no meaning in the form, and there will never be."

A Course In Miracles is a book which may symbolize, reflect, or point to Divine Love. A Course In Miracles is nothing "in and of itself." No "thing" exists in and of itself apart from the whole. You are the Point of everything. In the recognition of Self are symbols gone forever. Leave the symbol behind and ... Experience Self. Drop the "stance" for it is nowhere to be found. Jesus is a name which symbolizes a Love not of this world. Christ is the Reality. Reality needs no defense. Acceptance of Self is the Point. Do not cling to symbols or words. In the Holy Instant, the Eternal Present, only Christ Is.

Love & Blessings,

David


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from David Hoffmeister A Course in Miracles Blog https://livingmiraclescenter.org/news-blog/blog/105-does-a-course-in-miracles-need-defending-david-hoffmeister-acim.html

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