A Course In Miracles - Chapter 8, Section VI

ACIM is read one section at a time. It is a guidebook leading us back to our true natures, as we open to the awareness of love's presence. All quoted material is from A Course in Miracles, copyright ©1992, 1999, 2007 by the Foundation for Inner Peace, publisher, and the copyright holder. This material is used with permission. (Foundation for Inner Peace, 448 Ignacio Blvd #306 Novato, CA 94949 USA). Glossary-Index for a Course In Miracles, 8th edition, Kenneth Wapnick, Ph.D. Music by Bensound.

Transcript

Hi,

I'm Teresa Hubbard.

Welcome back to our continued reading of the text to A Course in Miracles.

We continue today in Chapter 8,

The Journey Back.

Section 6,

The Treasure of God.

To summarize my takeaways,

In Section 6 of Chapter 8,

We are told that our only function is to add to God's treasure by creating our own.

We must remember that we neither made ourselves nor our function,

But we did make the decision to be unworthy of both.

Yet in reality,

We cannot make ourselves unworthy,

Because we are the treasures of God Himself and what He values is valuable.

There can never be a question of our worth,

Because our value lies in God sharing Himself with us and establishing our value forever.

We were created by God extending Himself as us and willing us to extend ourselves as He did,

Yet we do not understand this.

We learn here that God's will is thought and cannot be contradicted by thought.

Yet our thoughts are so powerful they can imprison our minds if we so choose.

We are lovingly cautioned here that we cannot behold the world and know God.

Only one is true.

The Journey Back to God is merely the reawakening of the knowledge of where we are always and what we are forever.

It is a journey without distance,

To a goal that has never changed.

Truth can only be experienced,

It cannot be described and it cannot be explained.

Jesus our teacher and guide reminds us here that He can make us aware of the conditions of truth,

But the experience of truth is always of God.

Together we can meet truth's conditions,

But truth itself will dawn upon us of itself.

We begin the journey back to God by setting out together and gathering in our brothers as we continue together.

Every gain in our strength is offered for all,

So that each of us can lay aside our perception of weakness and add our strength for all of us.

We must not forget the Kingdom of God for anything the world has to offer.

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.

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.

Kingdom,

A state of consciousness.

The non-dualistic world of knowledge wherein God and His creations dwell in perfect unity.

Holy Trinity.

The levels of the Trinity are not understandable in the world of illusion or the ego.

The Trinity consists of 1.

God,

The Father and Creator.

2.

The Son,

Christ,

Our true self,

Which includes our creations.

And 3.

The Holy Spirit,

The bridge of communication,

The voice for God.

And now,

On to the reading.

A Course in Miracles Chapter 8,

The Journey Back Section 6,

The Treasure of God We are the joint will of the Sonship,

Whose wholeness is for all.

We begin the journey back by setting out together,

And gather in our brothers as we continue together.

Every gain in our strength is offered for all,

So they too can lay aside their weakness and add their strength to us.

God's welcome waits for us all,

And He will welcome us as I am welcoming you.

Forget not the Kingdom of God for anything the world has to offer.

The world can add nothing to the power and the glory of God and His holy Sons,

But it can blind the Sons to the Father if they behold it.

You cannot behold the world and know God.

Only one is true.

I am come to tell you that the choice of which is true is not yours to make.

If it were,

You would have destroyed yourself.

Yet God did not will the destruction of His creations,

Having created them for eternity.

His will has saved you,

Not from yourself,

But from your illusion of yourself.

He has saved you for yourself.

Let us glorify Him whom the world denies,

For over His Kingdom the world has no power.

No one created by God can find joy in anything except the eternal,

Not because He is deprived of anything else,

But because nothing else is worthy of Him.

What God and His Sons create is eternal,

And in this and this only is their joy.

Listen to the story of the prodigal son and learn what God's treasure is in yours.

This son of a living father left his home and thought he had squandered everything for nothing of any value,

Although he had not understood its worthlessness at the time.

He was ashamed to return to his father because he thought he had hurt him.

Yet when he came home,

The father welcomed him with joy,

Because the son himself was his father's treasure.

He wanted nothing else.

God wants only His Son because His Son is His only treasure.

You want your creations as He wants His.

Your creations are your gift to the Holy Trinity,

Created in gratitude for your creation.

They do not leave you any more than you left your Creator,

But they extend your creation as God extended Himself to you.

Can the creations of God Himself take joy in what is not real?

And what is real except the creations of God and those that are created like His?

Your creations love you as you love your Father for the gift of creation.

There is no other gift that is eternal,

And therefore there is no other gift that is true.

How then can you accept anything else or give anything else and expect joy in return?

And what else but joy would you want?

You made neither yourself nor your function.

You made only the decision to be unworthy of both.

Yet you cannot make yourself unworthy because you are the treasure of God and what He values is valuable.

There can be no question of its worth because its value lies in God sharing Himself with it and establishing its value forever.

Your function is to add to God's treasure by creating yours.

His will to you is His will for you.

He would not withhold creation from you because His joy is in it.

You cannot find joy except as God does.

His joy lay in creating you and He extends His Fatherhood to you so that you can extend yourself as He did.

You do not understand this because you do not understand Him.

No one who does not accept His function can understand what it is.

And no one can accept His function unless he knows what He is.

Creation is the will of God.

His will created you to create.

Your will was not created separate from His and so you must will as He wills.

An unwilling will does not mean anything.

Being a contradiction in terms that actually means nothing.

When you think you are unwilling to will with God,

You are not thinking.

God's will is thought.

It cannot be contradicted by thought.

God does not contradict Himself and His sons who are like Him cannot contradict themselves or Him.

Yet their thought is so powerful that they can even imprison the mind of God's Son if they so choose.

This choice does make the Son's function unknown to Him but never to His Creator.

And because it is not unknown to His Creator,

It is forever knowable to Him.

There is no question but one you should ever ask of yourself.

Do I want to know my Father's will for me?

He will not hide it.

He has revealed it to me because I asked it of Him and learned of what He had already given.

Our function is to work together because apart from each other we cannot function at all.

The whole power of God's Son lies in all of us but not in any one of us alone.

God would not have us be alone because He does not will to be alone.

That is why He created His Son and gave Him the power to create with Him.

Our creations are as holy as we are and we are the sons of God Himself,

As holy as He is.

Through our creations we extend our love and thus increase the joy of the Holy Trinity.

You do not understand this because you are God's own treasure.

Do not regard yourself as valuable.

Given this belief,

You cannot understand anything.

I share with God the knowledge of the value He puts upon you.

My devotion to you is of Him,

Being born of my knowledge of myself and Him.

We cannot be separated.

Whom God has joined cannot be separated and God has joined all His sons with Himself.

Can you be separated from your life and your being?

The journey to God is merely the reawakening of the knowledge of where you are always and what you are forever.

It is a journey without distance to a goal that has never changed.

Truth can only be experienced.

It cannot be described and it cannot be explained.

I can make you aware of the conditions of truth but the experience is of God.

Together we can meet its conditions but truth will dawn upon you of itself.

What God has willed for you is yours.

He has given His will to His treasure,

Whose treasure it is.

Your heart lies where your treasure is,

As His does.

You who are beloved of God are wholly blessed.

Learn this of me and free the holy will of all those who are as blessed as you are.