Allowing the body to serve His Purpose

Transcription of Satsang with Cate, 10APR2022

Gratitude to Laura S for transcribing this talk into a readable blog.

YouTube Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TTzMSpbqORI&t=12s

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Cate: Hello again…hello everyone. Anyone who's listening back to this on the recording –you are welcome. A big virtual hug in the mind…. the Love in our mind.

This is all about mind training, all about our mind, not about bodies. It’s all about going within and doing more and more work with letting go of the blocks in our mind so that the presence of an all-encompassing Love can be in our awareness. And that all-encompassing Love is One. It shows us we don't have to see Oneness (with our eyes). We're going to experience everything as Oneness. The experience of Oneness shows us that what we're seeing as through the eyes and hearing through our ears…and touching… is false. It's an illusion. We're very, very gently brought to that awareness.

A Course in Miracles is the bridge between the world we think is real and the Real world, which you might say is the happy dream. It is hard to put words to anything that we experience which is outside our egoic experience because words are made by our mind that was separate. So we are trying to use these words to point us to Truth, but they're not the Truth. The words aren't the experiences. That's why He (Jesus in ACIM) says do not waste time on debating about the Course – who is right and who is wrong about the Course.

What we want to put our focus on is receiving a correction. Really feel into that He's asking us to allow ourselves to be corrected, so we can have a change of perception and, therefore, experience deep and abiding peace which cannot be disturbed. And if it is disturbed a little bit, it's very easily and gently corrected.

Today Shannon and I will be reading through the rest of that section in Chapter 27. We'll finish that off then we're going to read through lesson 159 which ties in nicely with this section. This was guided and then [Cate loses her place and Shannon confirms their guidance] we’ll read lesson 108.

That was guided but I wasn’t guided to put a bookmark in there. [laughs] You see? Even if you forget, something else will come in and help you, so you can just have a little laugh. It’s going to come in – whatever you need to do – and even if you do something else, it's got the same message. You literally cannot get this wrong. You can't get it wrong because nothing is going wrong. That's the happy dream, right? It's just seeing that there's nothing to forgive. But let's do forgiveness anyway because we've got false thoughts and false beliefs in our mind about ourselves and our brother. That's really what the Course is about. We only think our brother's guilty, separate, horrible, mean, nasty. But there's no brother out there. It's a projection, and it's all coming from this particular part of our mind that we're not even aware of.

It is like watching the movie at the cinemas. We can't see the projector, but that projector that's projecting the movie is in our mind. And that's why it [ACIM[ says that I am the dreamer of the dream. This is what we'll get to in the end. We'll get to this section. That's why I was guided to this because this is the healing of the dream. He (Jesus) is going through in this section many aspects of how we are keeping ourselves stuck in a dream.

I just want to touch on a summary of last week so we can go forward and finish this section.

The summary of what we read last week is really this – “Behold me, brother. At your

hand I die.” We hold a picture of our crucified body in front of our brother. Now I hope if you didn't get some deeper understanding of this last week that you might have had some insight during the week that led to you say to yourself, “Yes, I see what I'm doing. There is this deeper feeling that I want my brother to see what he's done to me, so I'm going to show him my sick body, my mental illness. I'm going to talk about my stress and depression to him or let him know, hey, I'm really stressed out over this. I'm going to show you the pain and suffering you are causing…this is my crucified body or my crucified mind that I'm showing you, so you can know that you're the guilty one and you did this to me.”

That's all the ego thought system that keeps us stuck. Jesus wants us to see what we're doing so we can change. He wants us to look at the ego. The only way we can become freer – very gently free, we don't have to do it all in one day…Jesus is going to guide us very gently – is to see what we're doing. And what He's telling us is that you’re continually doing this—trying to show someone your crucified mind/body. But there's nothing outside of you, so the person that you're trying to make guilty isn't even there. He's a projection in your mind. You are projecting onto a shadow figure. You can't see that the person is an image. The awareness that there's no one outside you comes in as you work with the Holy Spirit and let go.

For me, on my journey, I said, “Look, it really looks like there's someone outside me. I can't pretend that there's not.” He (Jesus) said, “You don't have to pretend. It's my job to show you that there's no one, that you're projecting onto an image.” And I said, “Well, you know, you'll need to do a lot of work to show me that, because I am so stuck in the illusion” …oh no, I didn't say ‘the illusion’ because I was stuck! I said to Him, “It really looks like someone's doing this to me.” So that's the Holy Spirit's job. He went to work in my mind to show me, in a particular way for me.

He's here for all of us. He's going to bring the lesson in for you in your particular way, so we just have to trust. We have to say to Him, “Look – this is how it looks to me. It looks like someone's really attacking me,” or “I'm scared of this person.” We have to go within and ask Him to show me, for a miracle, a change of perception.

The Holy Spirit is the only true therapist because He's with us wherever we go. We might go and talk to a therapist or come to this group, but all the rest of the time the therapist is in our mind. The Spirit can speak through others but really, it's our inner guide that we want to spend a lot of time with and really give our dedication and devotion. The inner guide –connecting to that Being in quietness in whatever way you can get quiet—this is where the help is for all of us. Yes, a brother can help us, but remember that Jesus told Helen to tell Bill just to sit quietly and say, “Here I am Lord.” There weren't many great instructions—it was four words: “Be quiet,” … “Be still and know that I am God,” … or “Be still and listen.”

A few weeks ago, that guidance came through to share with the group just to sit still and say, “I am listening.” This is what it's all about. When we come to these groups, we just really open up. There might just be one little thing that is said. Maybe not even by me, but by someone else.

We don't know. Everything we give to Him to help us.

The ego will do whatever it can. It's a trickster. It will try to trick you into thinking that awakening is fearful, but Jesus promises us we're going to awaken to a beautiful peace, the peace of God. That's why the peace of God has to be our really strong goal, because the ego mind values separateness. It values individuality. It values everything of the world. It values a body that it's not. It must be very gently undone in our minds that we are Spirit and not a body.

Last week, it was “Behold me, brother, at your hand I die” or “I suffer” or “I have mental issues” or “I am sick” or “I am in pain.” When Jesus makes a statement like this in the Course, He's telling us that this is what we are all doing. If you're not aware of it, you may feel, “I don't, I don't have any connection to this teaching…. all I feel is sick. All I feel is stressed out, depressed, tired, anxious, sad…you know, I've got hives, I've got stomach issues, I've got this or that…’ One thing about the teachings of the Course in Miracles is that you won't be aware of it, and then you will be.

You become aware that this is what we're doing –it’s the secret sin in us we're hiding in our mind, and we really are trying to hold a picture of a suffering self out to everyone. That's why we have to spend time trying to connect to this teaching about what we’re doing and give this importance. If you're feeling okay at the moment, you can look back at a recent time when you have been sick, or in pain or suffering, Sit quietly and find in your mind how you tried to make someone guilty. You can even say, “Holy Spirit, show me who I was trying to make guilty. To whom did I say, ‘You're guilty and I'm innocent, and here I'm going to show you my fatigued self, my stressed-out self…. I'm going to tell you all about it or show you in some way … or stop speaking to you … or stop going out or doing whatever.’” It will be shown to you.

Today we're going to be reading further in this section, and we're going to get to the words where it says, “Behold me, brother. At your hand I live.” That's right at the end of this section. So today's talk is going to be about showing our brother this.

This is what he took me through, and he's taking us all through this. It's the same ego and it's the same healing, so he meets us where we are. He meets us in the belief that we're a body, in the belief that we're a suffering self, in the belief that we're vulnerable, in the belief that the world is doing this to me. He knows where we are at, stuck in this mire, and unable to get out by ourselves.

An unforgiving mind is stuck. Jesus says it's like a ball of steel: it doesn't open up to any doubt about (being right), it doesn't open up to any wisdom. Forgiveness is opening our minds up to the possibility that perhaps there is another way. And we want to open up to another way because when we're continually doing the same thing with the ego – trying to seek for happiness and never finding it, being upset, projecting guilt –there just doesn't seem to be any freedom. We’re trying to escape. We might escape in sex, drugs, shopping. We try to make the body all beautiful. It can be anything. We try to escape using alcohol. You might even try to escape by going into some sort of community where you hide out. I’m not talking about Course in Miracles communities, but that can happen as well. Generally, people go to them because they're really seeking to join and practice the Course, but sometimes people do seek just to get away.

It’s not actually people seeking. It's the egoic thoughts. The ego has its own plan for our salvation. It's always got a plan. It's like – get away from this, and stop doing that, and move here, and move countries, move cities, move houses, move jobs, move relationships. We get to the end of the tether where we're so fatigued and tired because it never works. We've tried all these ego-seeking ways, and now we come to A Course in Miracles teachings. This was my path. It's not for everyone. The Holy Spirit has many paths.

We'll start the reading for today. Shannon will read the first paragraph, and then I'll read the next two. Thanks, Shannon.

Shannon: Thanks, Cate.

“The strongest witness to futility, that bolsters all the rest and helps them paint the picture in which sin is justified, is sickness in whatever form it takes. ²The sick have reason for each one of their unnatural desires and strange needs. ³For who could live a life so soon cut short and not esteem the worth of passing joys? ⁴What pleasures could there be that will endure? ⁵Are not the frail entitled to believe that every stolen scrap of pleasure is their righteous payment for their little lives? ⁶Their death will pay the price for all of them, if they enjoy their benefits or not. ⁷The end of life must come, whatever way that life be spent. ⁸And so take pleasure in the quickly passing and ephemeral.” (ACIM, T-27.I.7:1-8)

Cate:

“These are not sins, but witnesses unto the strange belief that sin and death are real, and innocence and sin will end alike within the termination of the grave. ²If this were true, there would be reason to remain content to seek for passing joys and cherish little pleasures where you can. ³Yet in this picture is the body not perceived as neutral and without a goal inherent in itself. ⁴For it becomes the symbol of reproach, the sign of guilt whose consequences still are there to see, so that the cause can never be denied.” (ACIM, T-27.I.8:1-4)

What these two paragraphs are really talking about is that He wants us to see that we believe that we've got these tiny little lies where we’ve tried to get scraps of pleasure because we know we're going to our death, and we're just trying to grab what we can before that happens. We believe there's innocent people and there's guilty people, but that we all die. And because we have this belief that we're bodies and we die and we've only got maybe a hundred years of time, then we've got to try and get all the scraps of pleasure, like checking off a bucket list –you know, the little scraps of pleasure in amongst all the awful stuff we have to put up with. This is how we feel ourselves to be as ego minds in the ego world.

So now we're getting to what he's asking us to do.

[para 9]

“Your function is to show your brother sin can have no cause. ²How futile must it be to see yourself a picture of the proof that what your function is can never be! ³The Holy Spirit’s picture changes not the body into something it is not. ⁴It only takes away from it all signs of accusation and of blamefulness. ⁵Pictured without a purpose, it is seen as neither sick nor well, nor bad nor good. ⁶No grounds are offered that it may be judged in any way at all. ⁷It has no life, but neither is it dead. ⁸It stands apart from all experience of love or fear. ⁹For now it witnesses to nothing yet, its purpose being open, and the mind made free again to choose what it is for. ¹⁰Now is it not condemned, but waiting for a purpose to be given, that it may fulfill the function that it will receive.” (ACIM, T-27.I.9:1-10)

He says this many times throughout the Course about the body being repurposed, to see it as neutral. It has no life, but neither is it dead because it's a body in a dream. It's a dream body in a dream, so when you dream at night you dream you see yourself as a body. It's neither alive nor dead. It's a symbol in a dream. And we can give it a new purpose in the dream.

We just let it be used for His purposes. We surrender, and we don't have any plan or idea. We just listen in every moment for whatever guidance is coming through about what to do and say. We may get guided about something in the future occasionally, but generally it will be about the present moment. So you are opening up to the inner guide, the voice of God, the Holy Spirit, and He is just giving you what to do and what to say and where to go.

Like I always say, sometimes that might be to be in silence, to stay still, rest, do nothing, say nothing. That is guidance. It's not all about being out and saying things, saying, “Well, the body’s neutral, and now I have to give it loads and loads of Purpose… you know, it has to be doing stuff. So let the Spirit speak…I've got to get out and speak.... let the Spirit speak.”

So that's when we really surrender. We let go and have no plan at all, absolutely no plan for it, and we just let the body now be used by the mind. It's already being used by the ego mind. The ego is associating itself as the body. But when we're in the Holy mind, when we're in God's mind, we can transcend all pain. It is literally possible to experience no pain at all, and if you do start to feel pain, you can use something to remind yourself “I'm not a body.” You can do something that would seem to the world as though it would cause a lot of pain, but you're associated with your Holy mind, the Christ mind so intrinsically that you're not experiencing any pain at all.

This is where Jesus was when He was seemingly crucified in the dream. Of course, that's why we have no pain because we see we're a character in a dream. We're associating that this is a dream, and our mind is with God and there's no form. We're experiencing the dream very differently by this stage.

Shannon, I'll get you to read on.

Shannon:

[para 10]

Into this empty space, from which the goal of sin has been removed, is Heaven free to be remembered. ²Here its peace can come, and perfect healing take the place of death. ³The body can become a sign of life, a promise of redemption, and a breath of immortality to those grown sick of breathing in the fetid scent of death. ⁴Let it have healing as its purpose. ⁵Then will it send forth the message it received, and by its health and loveliness proclaim the truth and value that it represents. ⁶Let it receive the power to represent an endless life, forever unattacked. ⁷And to your brother let its message be, ‘Behold me, brother, at your hand I live.’” (ACIM, T-27.I.10:1-7)

Cate:

Isn't that beautiful. That's the healing. To remember last week and the ego’s purpose for the body – to point the accusing finger at our brother and show him our suffering self he caused – the lesson from the Holy Spirit is to show our brother that he's unable to hurt us, harm us, or make us move out of peace. We are to show our brother that he is not an ego and to show our brother that I am not an ego. So we become the evidence. Even though the body is neutral, Jesus says that we will send forth a message to our brother by our health and loveliness.

So I'm always representing health and loveliness to everyone I meet. I don't have to say anything about not ever being sick; it's just showing up. Maybe Jesus will get me to say something sometime but very rarely. It's just (representing) the evidence of accepting the truth about myself because the love of God can't be sick. It has no pain in it, and we're associating more and more on the journey with the love of God. We're releasing these ideas that we're a body in a little world of suffering and death.

When you look at this world, it has to be seen that it has nothing to do with a loving God. And very gently we just let go of the values of the world and let our inner voice guide us what to do and say. The main thing of our lives is to be corrected, constantly corrected, any time we are upset. Asking, “Help me! I'm upset.” He doesn't ask us to deny our upset. He says just open up anytime. He's here to help us. That's how we become free—through the correction. The correction helps bring us to peace. So why wouldn't we want a correction? Why wouldn't we want to open up and say, “Hey, I'm thinking about this this way.” He'll correct us very gently and lovingly.

So we stand before our brothers. We don't have to literally say these words, “Behold me, brother, at your hand I live” to him. No matter how he is – he could be enraged in the ego – and we're just standing there. Our peace and our happiness and our attitude towards our brother will be healing for him because we will never withdraw God's Love. We're enveloped in that Love, and our mind knows that I am one with my brother. It's not interested in the body and what it's got to say… it's little “bla-biddy-blahs.” It's not interested in that. It knows that's all happening, yet the healed mind knows what to say or what to do and how to be for the healing.

We don't have to work it out. In the moment, we'll just know because the guidance is there. We're connected into that inner guide that is giving us the answers. It's not like you even have to ask because (when we identify with the Holy Spirit in our mind), because it's just a stream of what to do and what to say. It might be just “step back, rest, have some silence, listen.” You know, you'll feel it. For me it's like “just listen now,” and then I'll be given the words to say. It may be like, “step back.” It might be “text a blessing the next day – ‘I love you brother’ or ‘I love you whoever you are. I'm here if you'd like to talk.’” It can be many different things.

The main thing is we have to stay open. That's the hard thing because the ego always loves to plan. We have to stay open for the guidance in the moment, right now. It is always now, so we're always open to that inner guide leading us.

If we are really triggered and we feel really overwhelmed and like we can't hear the Holy Spirit, the guidance, then we need to get into a place where we're on our own in quietness. Maybe go for a walk, or go to another room, or just go somewhere where we can get some quietness. Sit quietly. Just say, “This is what's coming up for me. Help me.” You might be guided to talk to someone, but generally for me, it was about connecting and getting that correction, that helpfulness, that change of perception, letting go, releasing this idea that I'm right. More and more, you start to see as the observer looking at the ego's thoughts. As you do this correction, you start to be able to observe the thoughts of the ego and see the Holy Spirit's correction coming in. You start to feel yourself as that part of the mind that's watching, even the correction coming in.

[para 11]

The simple way to let this be achieved is merely this; to let the body have no purpose from the past, when you were sure you knew its purpose was to foster guilt. ²For this insists your crippled picture is a lasting sign of what it represents. ³This leaves no space in which a different view, another purpose, can be given it. ⁴You do not know its purpose. ⁵You but gave illusions of a purpose to a thing you made to hide your function from yourself. ⁶This thing without a purpose cannot hide the function that the Holy Spirit gave. ⁷Let, then, its purpose and your function both be reconciled at last and seen as one. (ACIM, T-27.I.11:1-7)

To repeat: “A simple way to let this be achieved is merely this to let the body have no purpose from the past.” So just for a few minutes just sit quietly and think about all the purposes that you've given the body from the past.

[pause]

I was just shown in that pause period that these two sentences “behold me, brother –at your hand I live” and “to let the body have no purpose from the past” are combined. He's saying to me now that this is a simple way to achieve how you're going to stand before your brother and say, “Behold me brother -- at your hand I live.” It is achieved through letting go all the purposes that you've given the body in the past.

In the past you've probably tried to make it look beautiful to seek love. You've probably tried to use it to garner approval and used it as a weapon of attack like “I'm not speaking to you” or “I'm going to say these words,” “I'm going to put you in your place,” “I'm going to tell you off.” These are all the purposes the body's been given. You probably have many more that the Spirit's bringing to your mind at the moment, showing you how you've used the body.

How we tell our brother, show our brother, give our brother the message “behold me, brother. At your hand I live” is to let go of all those things, all the purposes we've given the body. We come to see our body as neutral –not dead or alive, just a neutral thing. We hold it in our mind as neutral. As we tell ourselves that it can't be sick or well, or good or bad, that it's neutral, we can then give this body as a neutral thing. We still take care of it. We don't have to do anything special to it. We just use it as a neutral thing, and he will guide you how to do this.

We don't have to go around saying to our brother, “Hey, look how great I am… how, you know, I'm super happy, I'm super fit. You're not guilty because I'm super fit. I’m at the gym!” You don't have to do it that way either. We do it through this quietness.

He's guided me through this, that this is like this quietness and this inner silence. We’ve talked about this over the last few weeks, this inner silence, this deep abiding peace knowing that I am not a body. The body is neutral, and I'm now using the body for the Holy Spirit to speak through, to love through, to give miracles, to see the holiness of my brother.

[from para 10] “Let it receive the power to represent an endless life” … in other words, my immortal self “forever unattacked.” That's the message. This is the “healing of the dream” section. This is the message that he's asking us to do. He's telling us we don't have to speak out loud or put on a big show to our brother. It's a consistency. Every time we meet our brother, whoever they may be, we're consistently showing up as peaceful, as not sick, not in pain. We don't have to do a big show and dance about it. We just show up peaceful.

Over a period of time, our brother sees that no matter what he has said or done to us in the past, or even yesterday, we're showing up as the Love of God, using this neutral thing [the body]. When he says that it's going to be seen as healthy and lovely, he means that that's how it's going to be viewed by the dualistic mind that believes in sickness and in health. It is going to be seen as healthy and lovely. But to us, we're seeing it as neutral because we can see that a body can't be sick or healthy because it's a neutral thing. Only the mind can be split, the ego. Only the mind can do anything. Everything is done in the mind; the body has no autonomy to do anything.

We're all going to come along this path to experience that. Some not in this lifetime maybe, but in another. It doesn't matter. If you dedicate this life to doing as much undoing as you can – don't judge yourself – and then maybe another lifetime is given over again for it. The guilt in our mind is going to be slowly healed through these dream lifetimes. It's really important not to concern yourself with where you're at.

Only concern yourself with what is coming up for me right now. So I’ll ask for a miracle. I'll ask for a change of perception on this particular thing, now. That's all we need to do. And if we don't do it, we'll have another opportunity to do that same forgiveness. He says that lessons come around time and time again. You're going to be upset by the same thing again sometime seemingly in the future, so this world is our classroom. Lessons are going to be presented to us.

If we don't learn it, we just get another chance further down. But we will learn it, and every lesson has already been learnt. That's an interesting thing because we're going through learning it and forgiving, but we will see that this world was over long ago.

While we believe we're here, we need correction—we need a Guide to come in and help us. We can't get out of this ourselves. That's why it's so important to turn within and ask. Really surrender yourself. It's the best thing to just say, “I don't know. My thoughts are keeping me and suffering, so I don't want them anymore. Why would I want and seek and value thoughts that cause me to suffer?” That's where we come to really want to surrender and give up -- we come to our knees, really – and say, “I want the peace of God. I don't want to keep suffering.”

Then we move into this really being to be open. We want to practice forgiveness more and more then. There is a period of mind training. We all have to go through it, and we all go through fear, but you will be carried across the more you surrender and allow your Guide to help you. He will speak to you. He will! He's in your mind—there's no doubt.

It is tough at times. It's not easy. It wasn't easy for me, either. The ego is very loud, and you're very attracted to it. It's going to try to tempt you. It’s a seductress. It's going to try to find something to seduce you into believing that someone is guilty. Time and time again, you'll be seduced, attracted to the guilt. That's okay. You'll eventually see how you're attracted to it. You just keep asking for help. We have to be constantly asking for help; notice it and ask for help.

[From workbook lesson 159]

Lesson 159, “I give the miracles I have received.” We’re going to be going through this lesson today and then doing a Christ blessing. Shannon, would you like to start?

Shannon:

“I give the miracles I have received. No one can give what he has not received. ²To give a thing requires first you have it in your own possession. ³Here the laws of Heaven and the world agree. ⁴But here they also separate. ⁵The world believes that to possess a thing, it must be kept. ⁶Salvation teaches otherwise. ⁷To give is how to recognize you have received. ⁸It is the proof that what you have is yours. (ACIM, W-159.1:1-8)

Cate:

“You understand that you are healed when you give healing. ²You accept forgiveness as accomplished in yourself when you forgive. ³You recognize your brother as yourself, and thus do you perceive that you are whole. ⁴There is no miracle you cannot give, for all are given you. ⁵Receive them now by opening the storehouse of your mind where they are laid, and giving them away.” (ACIM, W-159.2:1-5)

Shannon:

“Christ’s vision is a miracle. ²It comes from far beyond itself, for it reflects eternal love and the rebirth of love which never dies, but has been kept obscure. ³Christ’s vision pictures Heaven, for it sees a world so like to Heaven that what God created perfect can be mirrored there. ⁴The darkened glass the world presents can show but twisted images in broken parts. ⁵The real world pictures Heaven’s innocence.” (ACIM, W-159.3:1-5)

Cate:

“Christ’s vision is the miracle in which all miracles are born. ²It is their source, remaining with each miracle you give, and yet remaining yours. ³It is the bond by which the giver and receiver are united in extension here on earth, as they are one in Heaven. ⁴Christ beholds no sin in anyone. ⁵And in His sight the sinless are as one. ⁶Their holiness was given by His Father and Himself.” (ACIM, W-159.4:1-6)

Shannon:

“Christ’s vision is the bridge between the worlds. ²And in its power can you safely trust to carry you from this world into one made holy by forgiveness. ³Things which seem quite solid here are merely shadows there; transparent, faintly seen, at times forgot, and never able to obscure the light that shines beyond them. ⁴Holiness has been restored to vision, and the blind can see.” (ACIM, W-159.5:1-4)

Cate:

“This is the Holy Spirit’s single gift; the treasure house to which you can appeal with perfect certainty for all the things that can contribute to your happiness. ²All are laid here already. ³All can be received but for the asking. ⁴Here the door is never locked, and no one is denied his least request or his most urgent need. ⁵There is no sickness not already healed, no lack unsatisfied, no need unmet within this golden treasury of Christ.” (ACIM, W-159.6:1-5)

Shannon:

“Here does the world remember what was lost when it was made. ²For here it is repaired, made new again, but in a different light. ³What was to be the home of sin becomes the center of redemption and the hearth of mercy, where the suffering are healed and welcome. ⁴No one will be turned away from this new home, where his salvation waits. ⁵No one is stranger to him. ⁶No one asks for anything of him except the gift of his acceptance of his welcoming.” (ACIM, W-159.7:1-6)

Cate:

“Christ’s vision is the holy ground in which the lilies of forgiveness set their roots. ²This is their home. ³They can be brought from here back to the world, but they can never grow in its unnourishing and shallow soil. ⁴They need the light and warmth and kindly care Christ’s charity provides. ⁵They need the love with which He looks on them. ⁶And they become His messengers, who give as they received.” (ACIM, W-159.8:1-6)

Shannon:

“Take from His storehouse, that its treasures may increase. ²His lilies do not leave their home when they are carried back into the world. ³Their roots remain. ⁴They do not leave their source, but carry its beneficence with them, and turn the world into a garden like the one they came from, and to which they go again with added fragrance. ⁵Now are they twice blessed. ⁶The messages they brought from Christ have been delivered, and returned to them. ⁷And they return them gladly unto Him.” (ACIM, W-159.9:1-7)

Cate:

“Behold the store of miracles set out for you to give. ²Are you not worth the gift, when God appointed it be given you? ³Judge not God’s Son, but follow in the way He has established. ⁴Christ has dreamed the dream of a forgiven world. ⁵It is His gift, whereby a sweet transition can be made from death to life; from hopelessness to hope. ⁶Let us an instant dream with Him. ⁷His dream awakens us to truth. ⁸His vision gives the means for a return to our unlost and everlasting sanctity in God.” (ACIM, W-159.10:1-8)

That’s the end of the lesson. To highlight a couple of sentences here: “You recognize your brother as yourself and thus do you perceive that you are whole. Christ beholds no sin in anyone. And in its power can you safely trust to carry you from this world into one made holy by forgiveness. Christ’s vision is the bridge between the worlds. And in its power can you safely trust to carry you from this world into one made holy by forgiveness.”

This Christ vision is what I was guided to focus on towards the end of the journey with the Course and with Jesus and the Holy Spirit. He’s told me this is something I will continue going back to with groups and whoever I’m talking to whether I bless them in my mind or whether we do a blessing to each other.

The main crux of the Christ vision blessing is that – as I give the blessing, I receive it. This is the “I give the miracles I have received.” If we can understand that in the world when we give something away it seems to go, but when we give away this blessing, we strengthen it in ourselves, we feel it in ourselves. It changes our mind. So we are giving and receiving at the same time. It works from different laws than the laws of the ego. So he’s asking us to keep giving this blessing away and receiving it.

So let’s start the blessing. Lesson 108…we’re going to just use this lovely blessing.

[Discussion between Shannon and Cate about whether to keep the recording going or not. They decided to turn it off (due to zoom attendees not wanting their video recorded on YouTube) and directed people to other recordings on Cate Grieves YouTube channel, already made with the Christ blessing. Search Christ Blessing on Youtube, if you wish to hear these beautiful holy blessings. Cate encouraged listeners to do the blessing with words out loud or just silently from the heart.]

Thanks to Laura and Shannon for all their help with the zoom, groups, videos and transcriptions. How blessed are we to have these wonderful teachings from Jesus, the master teacher. LOOOOOOVVVVEEEEEE YYYYYOOOOUUUU xxxxx Love Cate xxx