Hi,
I'm Teresa Hubbard.
Welcome back to our continued reading of the text,
To A Course in Miracles.
We begin today in chapter 17.
Forgiveness,
And the holy relationship.
Section 1 bringing fantasy to truth.
To summarize my takeaways,
In Section 1 of Chapter 17,
We are reminded that we do not need to be forgiven,
But awakened.
We cannot be faithful to two teachers who ask conflicting things of us.
When we maintain that there must be an order of difficulty in miracles,
All we mean is that there are some things we would withhold from truth.
Therefore,
We are giving part of our illusions to one teacher and another part to another teacher.
We must be willing to give all we have held outside of truth to the Holy Spirit,
Who knows the truth,
And in whom all is brought to truth.
Salvation from separation must be complete or will not be at all.
We must be concerned then with nothing except our willingness to have this be accomplished.
And the Holy Spirit will accomplish it,
Not us.
And we must forget not this.
When we become disturbed and lose our peace of mind because another is attempting to solve his problems through fantasy,
We are refusing to forgive ourself for just this same attempt.
And we are holding both of us away from truth and from salvation.
As we forgive our brother,
We restore to truth what was denied by both of us.
And we will see forgiveness where we have given it.
I invite you to keep a few things in mind as you listen to the reading.
The Course uses male pronouns,
Yet this is simply a way of pointing to the spiritual being,
Having no gender.
The Course is written in first person,
And although not introduced directly to the reader,
It becomes clear that the words are from Jesus,
Often quoting from the Bible.
The course uses traditional Christian terms in a non-traditional manner.
These words are simply pointers to truth,
Nothing more.
A few terms you will hear within this reading.
The two teachers are the ego and the Holy Spirit.
The ego is our belief in the separated or false self that we made as a substitute for the self that God created.
The Holy Spirit is the communication link between God and us.
Bridging the gap between the mind of Christ and our human minds.
The voice for God.
God.
The creator,
The source of all being or life.
God's essence is Spirit,
Which is shared with all creation.
Yet the word God can be limiting,
Since universal energy and life are infinitely vast and cannot be contained in a word.
Sin.
And illusion,
Whereby we believe in the reality of our separation from God.
This stems from our egoic sense of our unworthiness of forgiveness,
Which leads to guilt.
Such guilt is projected onto ourselves and others.
Truth.
Something is either true or false,
Reality or illusion.
There can be no compromise.
We are either created by God or made by the ego.
This principle explains why there is no order of difficulty in miracles,
Since all that is needed for healing,
Or the miracle to occur,
Is to shift from the illusion of the ego to the truth of the Holy Spirit.
Forgiveness.
A shift in our perception of an other to brother or friend.
The ability to look at ourselves or others without guilt or judgment.
Salvation.
We are saved from our belief in sin and guilt through the change of mind that forgiveness and the miracle bring about.
And now,
On to the reading.
A Course in Miracles,
Chapter 17.
Forgiveness,
And the holy relationship.
Section 1.
Bringing fantasy to truth.
The betrayal of the Son of God lies only in illusions.
And all his quote sins are but his own imagining.
His reality is forever sinless.
He need not be forgiven.
But awakened.
In his dreams,
He has betrayed himself,
His brothers,
And his God.
Yet what is done in dreams has not been really done.
It is impossible to convince the dreamer that this is so,
For dreams are what they are,
Because of their illusion of reality.
Only in waking is the full release from them.
For only then does it become perfectly apparent that they had no effect upon reality at all,
And did not change it.
Fantasies change reality.
That is their purpose.
They cannot do so in reality,
But they can do so in the mind that would have reality be different.
It is then only your wish to change reality that is fearful,
Because by your wish,
You think you have accomplished what you wish.
This strange position,
In a sense,
Acknowledges your power.
Yet by distorting it and devoting it to,
Quote,
Evil,
It also makes it unreal.
You cannot be faithful to two masters who ask conflicting things of you.
What you use in fantasy,
You deny to truth.
Yet what you give to truth to use for you is safe from fantasy.
When you maintain that there must be an order of difficulty in miracles,
All you mean is that there are some things you would withhold from truth.
You believe truth cannot deal with them.
Only because you would keep them from truth.
Very simply.
Your lack of faith in the power that heals all pain arises from your wish to retain some aspects of reality for fantasy.
If you but realized what this must do to your appreciation of the whole.
What you reserve for yourself,
You take away from Him who would release you.
Unless you give it back,
It is inevitable that your perspective on reality will be warped and uncorrected.
As long as you would have it so.
So long will the illusion of an order of difficulty and miracles remain with you.
For you have established this order in reality by giving some of it to one teacher and some to another.
And so you learn to deal with part of the truth in one way,
And in another way,
The other part.
To fragment truth is to destroy it by rendering it meaningless.
Orders of reality is a perspective without understanding.
A frame of reference for reality to which it cannot really be compared at all.
Thank you that you can bring truth to fantasy and learn what truth means from the perspective of illusions.
Truth has no meaning in illusion.
The frame of reference for its meaning must be itself.
When you try to bring truth to illusions,
You are trying to make illusions real and keep them by justifying your belief in them.
But to give illusions to truth is to enable truth to teach that the illusions are unreal and thus enable you to escape from them.
Reserve not one idea aside from truth,
Or you establish orders of reality that must imprison you.
There is no order in reality,
Because everything there is true.
Be willing,
Then,
To give all you had held outside the truth to him who knows the truth,
And in whom all is brought to truth.
Salvation from separation would be complete,
Or it will not be at all.
Be not concerned with anything except your willingness to have this be accomplished.
He will accomplish it,
Not you.
But forget not this.
When you become disturbed and lose your peace of mind because another is attempting to solve his problems through fantasy.
You are refusing to forgive yourself for just this same attempt.
And you are holding both of you away from truth and from salvation.
As you forgive him,
You restore to truth what was denied by both of you.
And you will see forgiveness where you have given it.
