CIMS
|
LOVE OFFERING
In Support of Daily Lesson Mailing
[Tax Deductible]
|
|
CIMS
eMAGAZINE
POEM "Uphill"
by Christina Rossetti (1830-1894)
| 
|
|
ACIM
2015 Calendar
| 
|
SEE HOW LIFE WORKS
by Carol Howe
VIDEO #7
ACIM Video Series
Now Available
|
SHOP HERE and Support CIMS
|
|
LIMITED EDITION
|
 | | Deluxe Gift Set |
TEXT
WORKBOOK
and Manual
On Sale for $36
Distinctive Black Cloth Hardcover,
with Gold Embossed Lettering
Pocket Sized with Slip Cover
Only 500 published
MORE INFORMATION
|
If you need to receive the LESSON early
you can join the
EARLY LESSON MAILING
list.
Update your Profile here:
♥
|
|
|
LARGE PRINT ACIM on sale now!
| |
| |
|
| MUSIC from mARTin |  | |
|
|
Now Available
|  | |
Now you can read The Course in Miracles ~ Original Edition on your KINDLE!
This Kindle Edition contains the Text, Workbook and Manual.
|
| E-Book
Text
Workbook
Manual
|  | |
The electronic PDF
version of
A Course in Miracles
original edition
is now available.
BUY NOW
$9.95
|
 | |
REVIEW
A Course in Miracles is a self-study course. In the beginning it tells us, "This is a course in miracles. It is a required course. Only the time you take it is voluntary. Free will does not mean
you can establish the curric...
|  |
| About CIMS |  |
Course in Miracles Society (CIMS) is an international group of Course students and teachers organized to discover, authenticate and propagate the Divine Teachings of A Course in Miracles.
As students, we seek to increase our knowledge of Jesus' words and to deepen our experience of His teachings.
As teachers, we work to circulate the message of
A Course in Miracles throughout the world by our words, by our deeds, and by the example of our lives. COURSE IN MIRACLES
SOCIETY
Omaha, NE USA
800-771-5056
402-315-3607[email protected]
|
|
"THE INNER PICTURE"
IX. "The Inner Shift" 87 The constancy of happiness has no exceptions-no change of any kind. It is unshakable as is the love of God for His creation. Sure in its vision as its Creator is in what He knows, it looks on everything and sees it is the same. It sees not the ephemeral, for it desires that everything be like itself and sees it so. Nothing has power to confound its constancy because its own desire cannot be shaken. It comes as surely unto those who see the final question is necessary to the rest, as peace must come to those who choose to heal and not to judge. *And do I want to see what I denied because it is the truth?
|
<AUDIO><VIDEO>
Voice and Music by CIMS SonShip Radio
The world is false perception. It is born
of error, and it has not left its source.
It will remain no longer than the thought
that gave it birth is cherished. When the thought
of separation has been changed to one
of true forgiveness, will the world be seen
in quite another light; and one that leads
to truth, where all the world must disappear,
and all its errors vanish. Now its source
has gone, and its effects are gone as well.
The world was made as an attack on God.
It symbolizes fear. And what is fear
except love's absence? Thus the world was meant
to be a place where God could enter not,
and where His Son could be apart from Him.
Here was perception born, for knowledge could
not cause such insane thoughts. But eyes deceive,
and ears hear falsely. Now mistakes become
quite possible, for certainty has gone.
The mechanisms of illusion have
been born instead. And now they go to find
what has been given them to seek. Their aim
is to fulfill the purpose which the world
was made to witness and make real. They see
in its illusions but a solid base
where truth exists, upheld apart from lies.
Yet everything which they report is but
illusion which is kept apart from truth.
As sight was made to lead away from truth,
it can be redirected. Sounds become
the call of God. And all perception can
be given a new purpose, by the One
Whom God appointed Saviour to the world.
Follow His light, and see the world as He
beholds it. Hear His Voice alone in all
that speaks to you. And let Him give you peace
and certainty, which you have thrown away,
but Heaven has preserved for you in Him.
Let us not rest content until the world
has joined our changed perception. Let us not
be satisfied until forgiveness has
been made complete. And let us not attempt
to change our function. We must save the world.
For we who made it must behold it through
the eyes of Christ, that what was made to die
can be restored to everlasting life.
|
DAILY LESSON
L e s s o n 242
This day is God's. It is my gift to Him.
<AUDIO><VIDEO>
I will not lead my life alone today.
I do not understand the world. And so
to try to lead my life alone must be
but foolishness. For there is One Who knows
all that is best for me. And He is glad
to make no choices for me but the ones
that lead to God. This day I give to Him,
for I would not delay my coming home,
and it is He Who knows the way to Him.
And so we give today to You. We come
with wholly open minds. We do not ask
for anything that we may think we want.
Give us what You would have received by us.
You know all our desires and our needs.
And You will give us everything we want
and that will help us find the way to You.
~ Original Handscript of ACIM October 19, 1970
|
|
|
ACIM Edmonton - Sarah's Reflections
Lesson 242
This day is God's. It is my gift to Him.
The quotes in this article are from the Foundation for Inner Peace edition, with the reference cited. There is also the quote references for similar quotes in the ACIM Original Edition.
Sarah's Commentary:
In the lesson commentary yesterday, the focus was on the world as false perception, made as an attack on God. It was stated that the world is a result of our choice for separation, and with it our individuality and differences. Now Jesus shows us that what we have made can be used as a classroom for undoing the ego thought system. He tells us, "As sight was made to lead away from truth, it can be redirected." (W.PII.Q3. 4.1) Just like anything we have made, the world, the body, and our special relationships, can all be used by the Holy Spirit for healing. So while the ego tries to ensure that we see the world as real, the Holy Spirit can redirect our way of seeing it and give it a new purpose, which is to wake up from this dream. "Sounds become the call of God, and all perception can be given a new purpose by One Whom God appointed Savior to the world." (W.PII.Q3.4.2) Now we are called to see the world as the Holy Spirit beholds it. It is to see beyond the forms of this world and beyond their unreality, to the content of love. It is ultimately to learn that we have been wrong about everything that we think we know and think we understand about ourselves, others and the world.
What this means is that we look at the purpose that we have given the world, which is for seeing our guilt in others, using others for our own ends, and winning at their expense. Now we can turn these experiences to a new purpose, where we no longer want to see others guilty, we no longer want the power struggles and conflicts, and we choose to use our special relationships for healing and holiness. We increasingly choose to see that the peace and joy that comes from joining has more appeal than maintaining our focus exclusively on what we think we want. There is now a willingness to see that we have been wrong and are willing to be taught.
Jesus pleads with us to, "Hear His Voice alone in all that speaks to you. And let Him give you peace and certainty, which you have thrown away, but Heaven has preserved for you in Him." (W.PII.Q3.4.4-5) While we believe that we have thrown away our peace and joy, Jesus assures us that this hasn't happened. It has been preserved for us. We cannot and have not changed ourselves from our holy creation. However, we have lost awareness of who we really are. The peace and certainty is still in us, covered over by our mistaken perceptions. Our eyes may still see misbehaving bodies and our ears may still hear sounds of war, but now the purpose is to see with Christ's vision beyond the forms of what our eyes report. What we see and hear is now being questioned. We become the observers of the characters in the dream, seeing it from outside of the dream, where we look at it without judgment. And each time we do, we bring back more light to our minds and to the world, and with that is the realization that no one is separate from us. We all share the same ego and the same One Self. And though this is the case in reality, the forgiveness work that we undertake in the world is with regard to how we are currently seeing differences.
"Let us not rest content until the world has joined our changed perception." (W.PII.Q3.5.1) Our interests are not separate from anyone else's. We save the world by our willingness to release the meaning that we have given it. Thus "what was made to die can be restored to everlasting life," (W.PII.Q3.5.5) meaning we awaken to the reality that life cannot end. While the body was made to die, who we are can't die. We are changing our minds from thoughts of death to thoughts of life. Our reality, as infinite, eternal beings has always been. As Jesus said, "Before Abraham, I am." The world, of bodies and of death, has no reality.
Today's lesson, "This day is God's. It is my gift to Him," is a lesson of humility. When we lead our lives alone, we are actually leading them with the ego. We are believing that we know what is best for us. To recognize "there is One Who knows all that is best for me" (W.242.1.3) is to acknowledge that I don't know anything. The information on which I base my decisions is very limited. This means that I am always uncertain, but with the Holy Spirit, everything is known. It is to live in the flow of total trust and certainty.
How do I know when I have turned to the wrong teacher? It is whenever I feel anxious, stressed, worried, unhappy, and focused on my plans and goals for happiness, but never certain of what to do. I know that I am mistaken when I feel less than peaceful. I know that I am choosing to rely on my own resources, trying to figure out how to resolve the problems of my life as I perceive them. It is a relief to remember that I just need to step back and turn to the Guide within that does know where my peace resides. My issue is forgetting to ask and going off on my own, thinking I know what I need. We think we need to maintain control over all of the many decisions in our lives. We get upset if our preferences for how things should be don't pan out. Yet if we release our attachments to our preferences and remember that the script is already written, then what is there to manage? All that is left is to ask for help to see the situation differently.
I recall when we were at the funeral for Don's Dad. Our friend, Linda, was to sing at the grave site, but was not there when the internment was about to take place. At first, I was feeling quite attached to having her there and very disappointed that she had not turned up as planned. I chose to let the disappointment go and accept things as they were. Just as the minister was about to start the proceedings, coming from the distance was the sound of her beautiful voice as she was moving toward where we were standing. The hymn we had chosen for her to sing was, "It is Well with my Soul." And yes, those words reverberated with my soul and I knew then that it is truly well with my soul. That is the case whenever we let go of our expectations of how things should be. Letting go of our attachments does not necessarily mean that everything will show up in this way, but it does release us from the upsets we experience as a result of our attachments. For me this was a situation that reinforced the value of acceptance.
To let go, to accept and to trust are the ways we learn the foolishness of living our lives alone (1.2) without turning to our inner guidance and recognizing the support of the Holy Spirit that is always there. He is not only our Guide but Companion. He walks with us. We are never alone, but in order to experience that truth, we need to admit that we don't know, and we don't understand. To surrender our understanding and turn within, where truth abides, is to release our reliance on the ego. There are just too many variables for us to ever be certain,so make space for guidance from the One who does know all the variables we can't know. We make space through forgiveness of all that is false.
When I look at my life, it does not always look like things are working out the way I would like. But the way I would like does not mean that it is the way that will lead to God. The goal is to awaken. It is not to have a prettier dream. I have to remind myself daily that I don't know my own best interests. What I think serves me can set me back, while what I think is good can keep me invested in the dream. As Jesus tells us, "Some of your greatest advances you have judged as failures, and some of your deepest retreats you have evaluated as success." (T.18.V.1.6)(ACIM OE T.18.VI.41)
In Chapter 24.VI we are told to, "Forget not that the healing of God's Son is all the world is for." (T.24.VI.4.1) (ACIM OE T.24.VII.52) The situations that offer us the most healing may take place in ways that we do not welcome, but what does the ego know about true healing? About coming home? It is the end of the ego for us to awaken from this dream, so the ego has invested its resources in keeping us from choosing the right mind. Indeed, when we make progress in releasing our mistaken thoughts, tremendous resistance can arise. I know all of us have experienced it from time to time in many different ways. We seem to take two steps back with every step forward. Resistance is there because we still cling to our individuality and our specialness, and when we do make progress, the ego can become very suspicious. Then we question whether this path is right for us.
Whenever something that we think we want fails to happen, we need not be distraught. It can all be used for our greater good. We have not been abandoned. He knows our deeper needs. It is only my interpretation of meaning that gives rise to my emotional experience, and that interpretation is what I need to be willing to release for His judgment. In the Manual for Teachers, Section 10, we learn, "It is necessary for the teacher of God to realize, not that he should not judge, but that he cannot. In giving up judgment, he is merely giving up what he did not have. He gives up an illusion; or better, he has an illusion of giving up. He has actually merely become more honest. Recognizing that judgment was always impossible for him, he no longer attempts it." (M10.2.1-5)(ACIM OE 10.2)
Don't we all feel the burden of deciding by ourselves? Wouldn't it be easier if we learned to trust the Guide who offers us so much? Jesus tells us, "When you have learned how to decide with God, all decisions become as easy and as right as breathing. There is no effort, and you will be led as gently as if you were being carried down a quiet path in summer." (T.14.IV.6.1-2)(ACIM OE T.13.IX.92) Don't we all wish for that? Just to be in the flow where everything works.
So let's give this day to God. Let's remember to enter the quietness of our minds and ask for His help with everything. Let's determine to take our hands off the controls that we think we have, which is only an illusion anyway! We may protest that we aren't hearing guidance from the Holy Spirit, but we need to take the quiet time in meditation. We leave room for His Answer by stepping back from the problem, and continuing to ask in every situation. Then we trust that the answer will come and we are willing to receive it, continually expressing gratitude for every answer we get. It may mean that we literally have to leave the room, sometimes in the midst of a discussion, where the ego is holding sway, to take a few moments away from the storm, in order to return our minds to sanity. Taking the time we need in order to remind ourselves that we don't know our own best interests and asking Him to set the goal for us allows us to reenter the situation that seemed to be causing us so much distress, and ask for help to return our minds to sanity.
Jesus continually encourages us to focus our healing on behalf of our own happiness. Many of the things we ask for from God delay our homecoming. They are things that we think we need for our happiness. Isn't that what we usually pray for? Isn't that what the secret of the "Secret" is all about? We believe that we know what we want for our happiness, but the 'me' that thinks it knows is always the ego, and the ego thought system is not about our best interests. The things that I think that I want may instead weigh me down and keep me attached to the world. But if we insist on keeping our goals and staying in charge of our decisions, then we will find that turning our minds over to the Holy Spirit and surrendering to His guidance will indeed be threatening. His priority is not about our stuff, our status or our special relationships. He knows, just as a good parent knows, that what a child thinks he wants will not deliver the joy and happiness that he believes is contained in what he asks for. Jesus reminds us often that we are like that child.
So let us give this day to God today as our gift to Him. Let us be determined to protect the day from our own whims and wishes by asking for Him to be the Guide today. When we are tempted to define the day today, let us take a moment and step back and release our desires and wishes. Our experience of the day comes from God and not what seems to be happening to us. Come to the day with a wholly open mind. It is not for us to define what is in our own best interests. We truly don't know.
Love and blessings, Sarah
[email protected]
The quotes in this article are from the Foundation for Inner Peace edition, with the reference cited. There is also the quote references for similar quotes in the ACIM Original Edition.
|
| TEXT Paused for Weekend
85 Are thoughts then dangerous? To bodies, yes! The thoughts that seem to kill are those which teach the thinker that he can be killed. And so he dies because of what he learned. He goes from life to death, the final proof he valued the inconstant more than constancy. Surely he thought he wanted happiness. Yet he did not desire it because it was the truth and therefore must be constant.
86 The constancy of joy is a condition quite alien to your understanding. Yet if you could even imagine what it must be, you would desire it although you understand it not.
87 The constancy of happiness has no exceptions-no change of any kind. It is unshakable as is the love of God for His creation. Sure in its vision as its Creator is in what He knows, it looks on everything and sees it is the same. It sees not the ephemeral, for it desires that everything be like itself and sees it so. Nothing has power to confound its constancy because its own desire cannot be shaken. It comes as surely unto those who see the final question is necessary to the rest, as peace must come to those who choose to heal and not to judge.
88 Reason will tell you that you cannot ask for happiness inconstantly. For if what you desire you receive and happiness is constant, then you need ask for it but once to have it always. And if you do not have it always, being what it is, you did not ask for it. For no one fails to ask for his desire of something he believes holds out some promise of the power of giving it. He may be wrong in what he asks, where, and of what. Yet he will ask because desire is a request, an asking for, and made by one whom God Himself will never fail to answer. God has already given him all that he really wants. Yet what he is uncertain of, God cannot give. For he does not desire it while he remains uncertain, and God's giving must be incomplete unless it is received.
89 You who complete God's Will and are His happiness, whose will is powerful as His, a power that is not lost in your illusions, think carefully why it should be you have not yet decided how you would answer the final question. Your answer to the others has made it possible to help you be but partially insane. And yet it is the final one that really asks if you are willing to be wholly sane.
90 What is the holy instant but God's appeal to you to recognize what He has given you? Here is the great appeal to reason; the awareness of what is always there to see, the happiness that could be always yours. Here is the constant peace you could experience forever. Here is what denial has denied revealed to you. For here the final question is already answered and what you ask for given. Here is the future now, for time is powerless because of your desire for what will never change. For you have asked that nothing stand between the holiness of your relationship and your awareness of its holiness.
ON LINE SEARCHABLE Original Edition
ONE YEAR Schedule of Lessons & Text Reading
2014 MON-FRI TEXT CONFERENCE CALLS
2013 CONFERENCE CALL *ARCHIVE*
|
|
Course in Miracles Society
|
|
|
BOOK Offer
Several of you have asked about buying "A Course in Miracles - Original Edition" by the case to make it more affordable to your study group.
CIMS is announcing that ACIM - Original Edition is now available by the case at the distributor price which is 40% below retail, plus shipping.♥
Hard Copy book is reg $35. A case of 10 would have been $350. However, the price for a case is $210. [$21 per book, which is 40% off]
Soft Cover book is $30 [although on sale at $25, when purchased individually.] A case of 12, at $30 per book, is $360. However, when a case is purchased, there is a 40% discount and the price is $216 [$18 per book]
This is a savings of $144!
Please call for more information or contact us at [email protected] 800-771-5056 |
| |
|
|
 Audio Recording of ORIGINAL EDITION!!
Kellie Love [considered the VOICE of ACIM] recorded the Original Edition.
The Full set [8 cds, 68 hours] is available for $109.
Text only [4 cds, 38 hours] is
available for $64.95
Workbook only [3 cds, 20 hours] is
available for $43.95
Manual for Teachers only [1 cd, 8 hours] is
available for $14.95
LISTEN to a PREVIEW
Order Here
|
|
To GIVE and to RECEIVE are One in Truth. Lesson 108
Presently all CIMS projects are wholly supported by free will gifts of time, talent, and money. If you would like to support any of the activities of the Society in any way, please do not hesitate to get in touch. Because of the international character of CIMS, the internet is our primary means of communicating and collaborating.
CIMS is a section 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation, and donations are tax deductible.
ALSO, by means of your will or other estate plan, you can name "Course in Miracles Society" as the beneficiary of a portion of your estate, or of particular assets in your estate.
In this way, you are honoring your loved ones while also providing critical support to the extension of LOVE.
Namaste and Thank You!
To make a tax deductible donation in support of the Daily Lessons, just click the "DONATION" button below. |
|
____________________________
COURSE IN MIRACLES SOCIETY
7602 Pacific Street, Suite 200
Omaha, NE 68114 USA
Voice: 800-771-5056
Fax: 402-391-0343
|
|
|
