I will there be light.
Today we are considering the will you share with God. This is not the same as the ego's idle wishes, out of which darkness and nothingness arise. The will you share with God has all the power of creation in it. The ego's idle wishes are unshared, and therefore have no power at all. Its wishes are not idle in the sense that they can make a world of illusions in which your belief can be very strong. But they are idle indeed in terms of creation. They make nothing that is real.
Idle wishes and grievances are partners or co-makers in picturing the world you see. The wishes of the ego gave rise to it, and the ego's need for grievances, which are necessary to maintain it, peoples it with figures that seem to attack you and call for "righteous" judgment. These figures become the middlemen the ego employs to traffic in grievances. They stand between your awareness and your brothers' reality. Beholding them, you do not know your brothers or your Self.
Your will is lost to you in this strange bartering, in which guilt is traded back and forth, and grievances increase with each exchange. Can such a world have been created by the Will the Son of God shares with his Father? Did God create disaster for His Son? Creation is the Will of Both together. Would God create a world that kills Himself?
Today we will try once more to reach the world that is in accordance with your will. The light is in it because it does not oppose the Will of God. It is not Heaven, but the light of Heaven shines on it. Darkness has vanished. The ego's idle wishes have been withdrawn. Yet the light that shines upon this world reflects your will, and so it must be in you that we will look for it.
Your picture of the world can only mirror what is within. The source of neither light nor darkness can be found without. Grievances darken your mind, and you look out on a darkened world. Forgiveness lifts the darkness, reasserts your will, and lets you look upon a world of light. We have repeatedly emphasized that the barrier of grievances is easily passed, and cannot stand between you and your salvation. The reason is very simple. Do you really want to be in hell? Do you really want to weep and suffer and die?
Forget the ego's arguments which seek to prove all this is really Heaven. You know it is not so. You cannot want this for yourself. There is a point beyond which illusions cannot go. Suffering is not happiness, and it is happiness you really want. Such is your will in truth. And so salvation is your will as well. You want to succeed in what we are trying to do today. We undertake it with your blessing and your glad accord.
We will succeed today if you remember that you want salvation for yourself. You want to accept God's plan because you share in it. You have no will that can really oppose it, and you do not want to do so. Salvation is for you. Above all else, you want the freedom to remember Who you really are. Today it is the ego that stands powerless before your will. Your will is free, and nothing can prevail against it.
Therefore, we undertake the exercises for today in happy confidence, certain that we will find what it is your will to find, and remember what it is your will to remember. No idle wishes can detain us, nor deceive us with an illusion of strength. Today let your will be done, and end forever the insane belief that it is hell in place of Heaven that you choose.
We will begin our longer practice periods with the recognition that God's plan for salvation, and only His, is wholly in accord with your will. It is not the purpose of an alien power, thrust upon you unwillingly. It is the one purpose here on which you and your Father are in perfect accord. You will succeed today, the time appointed for the release of the Son of God from hell and from all idle wishes. His will is now restored to his awareness. He is willing this very day to look upon the light in him and be saved.
After reminding yourself of this, and determining to keep your will clearly in mind, tell yourself with gentle firmness and quiet certainty:
I will there be light. Let me behold the light that reflects God's Will and mine.
Then let your will assert itself, joined with the power of God and united with your Self. Put the rest of the practice period under Their guidance. Join with Them as They lead the way.
In the shorter practice periods, again make a declaration of what you really want. Say:
I will there be light. Darkness is not my will.
This should be repeated several times an hour. It is most important, however, to apply today's idea in this form immediately you are tempted to hold a grievance of any kind. This will help you let your grievances go, instead of cherishing them and hiding them in darkness.
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The Following is forwarded by Devan from Pathways of Light
Lesson 73
“I will there be light.”
In this lesson, Jesus is helping me to build the habit to see the Christ in everyone I meet or even think of. Jesus is helping me focus on the truth in everyone and not the idle wishes and grievances that come from the ego split mind. Seeing the idle wishes and grievances have cost me the awareness of What I am. Remembering that my real will is one with God’s Will brings me back into alignment with my true happiness, my true unlimited freedom.
Saying to myself all through the day, “I will there be light,” reminds me of my true will. This helps me behold the Light that reflects God’s Will and mine. I need this practice to free up my mind from the idle wishes and grievances of the ego thought system.
Idle wishes and grievances have imprisoned my will and have been the cause of my seeing darkness. I really do not want to continue seeing darkness. I will there be light. This is where I wake up to the light. The light has always been there. I am now training my mind to behold it.
This is a very important lesson for me. This is very important work. Beholding the Light brings me true happiness. Beholding the Light reflects my true will and helps me remember my true identity as part of God. I am determined to practice this consistently today.
This lesson is helping me disconnect from identification with the ego. It is strongly emphasizing that I will there be light and this will I share with God. Because I share this will with God, I also share God’s strength and power.
If this is what I am, then I cannot be the darkness, conflict, guilt and grievances that the ego shows me. What a relief that pain and fear and guilt is not me. I have believed it was me and have experienced it as though it were true. But belief does not make reality.
If I am experiencing anything but the peace and Light of God, I am seeing only a reflection of the ego thought system. The world I see gives me instant feedback, showing me what I believe about myself. If I see conflict, pain, unhappiness, lack of peace of any kind, I am identifying with the ego. If I see light, innocence and peace, I am identifying with my Self and seeing the reflection of the light that is my Self.
It’s very simple, always one or the other. All I need do is pay attention to the feedback and if I am not seeing peace, if I am not seeing the reflection of light, if I am not seeing innocence, I have identified with a false image — the ego thought system. Then it is time to remind myself, “This is not my will. I will there be light. Let me behold the world that reflects this light.”
I know that I am making real progress doing these lessons. It would be hard for me to put this progress into words that someone else would understand, but I can see it clearly. But, as I do each lesson it seems that something comes up that proves this lesson isn't true or that I can't do it.
For instance, I am going to buy my son a car since he is graduating from high school this year and will be going away to college. I have been doing the preliminary work; getting prices, checking on insurance. As I am reading today's lesson, my mind is straying to my budget. The more it does, the more trouble I have reading the lesson, the more worried I become.
At one time I would have seen this as proof I really am an ego and I would never reach the lofty heights the Course says are my rightful place. At one time, I would have quit trying to do the lesson and told myself I would do it later when I was better able to concentrate. I would then have been free to indulge in some real fear.
I thought of it differently this morning. I realized that this isn't proof I can't see the light, it is a perfect circumstance to help me learn today's lesson. I did my lesson right through the fear. I'm not going to say it was easy, but I stuck with it and did the best I could. When I felt like giving it up, I reminded myself that I was setting the course for my whole day with this lesson. I reminded myself that there was nothing I would do today that was as important as what I was attempting to accomplish right here. This lesson deserved all the effort I could put into it.
It is comforting to me to realize that when these seeming setbacks come up, they are really opportunities. They are a chance for me to make the daily lessons concrete in my mind, to see how I can use what I am learning to grow.
Today I can see clearly the ego game of idle wishes to manufacture the world I see -- wanting this thing or that thing. Then manufacturing grievances based on judgments to maintain the world -- not getting the thing and its someone's fault or this thing is better or worse than someone else's.
Getting idle wishes is junk food joy which then requires another fix or not getting it, in either case onto the next step in the ego's tiresome game. This is darkness, suffering, anxiety and pain. This is not the real me. I will there be light. Darkness is not my will. I want salvation. I want true joy.
True joy is the creation that comes from the Light -- being one with the Father. It does not come from the idle wants of the ego. True joy comes from listening to the sound of the Voice for God. It does not come from the voices of the ego aspects. True joy is found within. This is where salvation comes alive and ego dissolves. This is where we are resurrected. This is where peace radiates from the connection with the Source of Love within. It comes from the core of our Self like a beacon of light that shines out from within in all directions like a lighthouse.
I will that the Light shines. I am one with God in the willing for this to be. I am the Light that shines. This is my salvation. This is my Life. This is my true joy.
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