Dear Hearts,
In my meditation this week, I brought to Jess my thoughts about teachers of God, and the mistakes we make, sometimes clobbering those who have come vulnerably into our circles, using spiritual principles that deny or neglect their cry for help. Absolute Truth can be used for ego’s purpose, a means to negate others and bypass the Unity Consciousness which is the goal of our joining. I have done this and want to learn from my mistakes. I have made beautiful weapons of holy words and holy words into hellish debates. Who does not want to leap into Heaven slipping past the junk yards and hungry dogs of the world? I do and have tried, only to find that leap is not Heaven bound but into the numb-psychosis of inauthentic communication and separation.
In A Course in Miracles, level confusion is the brain fog that arises when one attempts to fit the unchanging, eternal truth of God into the split mind of ever changing, temporary human perception. A teacher may be hurtful saying, if there is God (Love) there is no pain, or sickness, or war and therefore what you experience does not exist. This is true if you are experiencing yourself as Christ but honestly, (please take at least a little peek at today’s world) most of us are not consciously experiencing the absolute Love of Christ and more often live in a dualistic, incomplete thought paradigm still challenged by soul wounding lessons. In this reality, the belief we are not of God is manifest as a world of unjust, abusive, hellish experiences.
Well-meaning teachers may think they are doing good to proclaim some paramount Law, placing themselves above the ego, but I wonder if we might do better to embrace the practical lessons which are the path and process to undoing the ego, letting the Reality of Christ’s unconditional Love unveil What we are together, in truth. Sometimes, I am sorry for your pain, is the most loving refrain to one who is hurting.
The Course implies, If you spot it, dear teacher, you got it. This is my lesson. This is how perception works. I see what belongs to me. Indeed, the world is within and healed at its source. Participants who express something that irks my peace, make me aware of my personal edge. The assignment is not to fix them, but to become the tender mercies and attributes that have been developed as part of our self-study and relationship with God.
ACIM Workbook offers a process for healing painful perceptions through relationship with Jesus as He is welcomed into our relationship with our brothers and sisters. With a willingness to be vulnerable in sharing and disciplined in listening, we learn to use His eyes, His Voice, making His choice for us, applying His lessons and forgiving. In this way we gently surpass our learned reality and come to See differently, experiencing miracles, God, truth in universal ways, ways that heal and bless us and glimpse our unity.
As facilitators of a circle, we may be tempted to ride a false power, believing we are the one who knows the Answer for everyone, or feeling that surely I must provide the solution to some conundrum. Yes, I have done this too, usurping the power of breath, silence and the Holy Spirit, forgetting stillness is the field of every precious pearl.
Reflecting on my feelings during and after a group meeting, provides epiphany. Feelings enable me to sort through what is truly helpful as I recognize my own limits and opportunities for awakening. My own pain, anger, fear tell me I may be facilitating erroneously. I have lost my heart’s wisdom.
Our gatherings are merely the classrooms we have been given to realize our true Identity and to express authentically. We know but are yet reluctant to share this authentic self, sometimes propping up our insecurities and doubts with real Laws of God, made impotent by my ignorance or lovelessness. i.e., My thoughts do not mean anything. ACIM WB 10
Jess calls us to humbly and vulnerably fulfill His Plan. I need devoted teachers who share my aim of healing the mind. ACIM T-4.13 Teacher, you are the one who…answered …The Call…to speak for it and redeem the world MT-1:2 Everything we do demonstrates our willingness to learn of Him and of our minds. Would you have all of it (mind) transformed into a radiant message of God’s Love, to share with all the lonely ones who have denied Him? God makes this possible. Would you deny His yearning to be known? T-14:V.1
I love the question, Who do you say I am (?) as an overarching theme for every gathering. After forty days in the desert, Jesus asks this question of His Disciples. Some said, preacher, prophet, teacher. You have to wonder if Jess himself was seeking a witness of His Identity to buoy Him in the revelation of His Purpose. Peter called out, you are the messiah, the one who has come to save the world. The pearl of salvation He offered, was not a denial of physical or feeling experiences. He was thoughtful, feeling, and physical even unto death. He was fully embodied in humanity through which he lived and expressed the revelation of Christ, as human being. Certainly, He struggled. Certainly, He taught Absolute Truth through the demonstration of ultimate Love, laying down one’s life for another. Here is our resurrection and mind-blowing Cosmic Consciousness of Love.
Perhaps this is a question we might ask of each other, again and again, Who do you say I am (?) visioning our study group families as our saviors and giving up, though not absolutely, our podiums for salvation.
I know, I know, I am talking to my Self. There is only one of us here….
I love you.
Looking forward to our meeting tonight.
Below tidbits on teaching from this week’s journaling, unpolished and yet clear Jess.
Please join us for our Thursday night ACIM meeting, tonight! 7:30.Scroll to the bottom for the Zoom link.
The Peace of Love,
MaryBeth
http://www.foundationofopenhearts.com/
foundationofopenheart@gmail.com
The Gentle Teacher
Words of God enter the door of the intellect,
such well-dressed guests upon which you stew,
but soon confound your efforts to understand
your smaller-than-the-head-of-a-pin-mind,
desperate to teach the Universal Christ.
Can you teach from such arrogance?
It would be better to tear the veils you make of truth
and wipe your you know what and you know where,
than use them for separation.
Who has taught you to teach, teacher of God?
Did you take a course?
Perhaps you have an PH.D in divinity?
Yes, I know the respected Foundations
that turn your books into ordinations.
But none of these could possibly teach you to teach.
They are given to support your remembrance of what you are…
to rouse you from the dead and make you willing to die again
if that end is waking in God.
Who then shall teach you what you are?
Will you take notes on the shimmering movement of creativity?
or test the silent stillness for the progress of your nothingness?
Who can teach the Love you discover there?
Who can Love the Teacher but the student Who is aware
of What I am in them, clear in Desire for a pearl of great price.
To teach is to feel what it is, what it means
to touch a heart, to rouse a soul to weep for joy,
to find yourself, over there and here too,
like a bird who eats the worms of earth
but also knows the sky.
Be that bridge Who spans the worlds.
To teach is to become and become and become,
an un-inflated balloon that nonetheless rises
by dying, dying, dying,
as what you touch and what you rouse to life
is the hope of your salvation,
your special function in this world;
void of hot air and full of appreciation.
Ultimately, We are only one student,
roused, weeping, become a living resurrection.
listening to our Self,
arms wrapped around our innermost longings,
forgiving and blessing our cursed hallucinations.
Let Me come, Teacher of God into every classroom
and show you What you Are, demonstrating so gently,
correction so Light, forgiveness so easy,
My teaching, full of mercy.
Every student, a gift, brilliant as the Ray of Son
worthy of the Plan, and ordained by God
to facilitate Our Will, the reign of Love on earth.
Let Me be your Teacher and demonstrate Christ’s Love.
I promise to be gentle.
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