I will accept my part in God's plan for salvation.
Today is a day of special dedication. We take a stand on but one side today. We side with truth and let illusions go. We will not vacillate between the two, but take a firm position with the One. We dedicate ourselves to truth today, and to salvation as God planned it be. We will not argue it is something else. We will not seek for it where it is not. In gladness we accept it as it is, and take the part assigned to us by God.
How happy to be certain! All our doubts we lay aside today, and take our stand with certainty of purpose, and with thanks that doubt is gone and surety has come. We have a mighty purpose to fulfill, and have been given everything we need with which to reach the goal. Not one mistake stands in our way. For we have been absolved from errors. All our sins are washed away by realizing they were but mistakes.
The guiltless have no fear, for they are safe and recognize their safety. They do not appeal to magic, nor invent escapes from fancied threats without reality. They rest in quiet certainty that they will do what it is given them to do. They do not doubt their own ability because they know their function will be filled completely in the perfect time and place. They took the stand which we will take today, that we may share their certainty and thus increase it by accepting it ourselves.
They will be with us; all who took the stand we take today will gladly offer us all that they learned and every gain they made. Those still uncertain, too, will join with us, and, borrowing our certainty, will make it stronger still. While those as yet unborn will hear the call we heard, and answer it when they have come to make their choice again. We do not choose but for ourselves today.
Is it not worth five minutes of your time each hour to be able to accept the happiness that God has given you? Is it not worth five minutes hourly to recognize your special function here? Is not five minutes but a small request to make in terms of gaining a reward so great it has no measure? You have made a thousand losing bargains at the least.
Here is an offer guaranteeing you your full release from pain of every kind, and joy the world does not contain. You can exchange a little of your time for peace of mind and certainty of purpose, with the promise of complete success. And since time has no meaning, you are being asked for nothing in return for everything. Here is a bargain that you cannot lose. And what you gain is limitless indeed!
Each hour today give Him your tiny gift of but five minutes. He will give the words you use in practicing today's idea the deep conviction and the certainty you lack. His words will join with yours, and make each repetition of today's idea a total dedication, made in faith as perfect and as sure as His in you. His confidence in you will bring the light to all the words you say, and you will go beyond their sound to what they really mean. Today you practice with Him, as you say:
I will accept my part in God's plan for salvation.
In each five minutes that you spend with Him, He will accept your words and give them back to you all bright with faith and confidence so strong and steady they will light the world with hope and gladness. Do not lose one chance to be the glad receiver of His gifts, that you may give them to the world today.
Give Him the words, and He will do the rest. He will enable you to understand your special function. He will open up the way to happiness, and peace and trust will be His gifts; His answer to your words. He will respond with all His faith and joy and certainty that what you say is true. And you will have conviction then of Him Who knows the function that you have on earth as well as Heaven. He will be with you each practice period you share with Him, exchanging every instant of the time you offer Him for timelessness and peace.
Throughout the hour, let your time be spent in happy preparation for the next five minutes you will spend again with Him. Repeat today's idea while you wait for the glad time to come to you again. Repeat it often, and do not forget each time you do so, you have let your mind be readied for the happy time to come.
And when the hour goes and He is there once more to spend a little time with you, be thankful and lay down all earthly tasks, all little thoughts and limited ideas, and spend a happy time again with Him. Tell Him once more that you accept the part that He would have you take and help you fill, and He will make you sure you want this choice, which He has made with you and you with Him.
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The Following is Forwarded from Pathwaysoflight.org
Lesson 98
“I will accept my part in God’s plan for salvation.”
The sentence that stands out to me the most in this lesson is: “We side with truth and let illusions go.” As I am willing to side with truth, all the silly ego squabbles found in this world of separate identities are seen as just plain silly. I am not as tempted to take them so seriously. As I am willing to side with truth, I am open to seeing the Light that lies beyond the separate images, beyond time and space. When I side with truth, I am siding with eternal reality and letting illusions go.
The illusions of bodies seem so important in this world -- the struggle for survival, the desire to be entertained. But here Jesus shows me that God’s way works. God’s way brings me everything I really want. God’s plan brings me happiness and peace and certainty.
The ego’s plan always goes for seek and do not find. The ego always looks for conflict and strife. The ego grows strong in strife. When I am following the ego’s plan I can tell by the level of anxiety I feel. When I follow God’s plan, I can tell by the level of peace and inner joy I feel.
The first five minutes of every hour seems like a lot of time to take out from my busy day. But when I realize that this time is a time dedicated to accepting the truth and opening to God’s peace and Love, I see that it is really very little time to give to this most important practice. I feel like I am being given such a powerful gift, a way Home that is truly beautiful and simple and perfect for me. I give my time to God. I give time to opening to God’s peace. How could time be more well spent?
The ego likes to make it appear that accepting my part in God’s plan for salvation is a burden and a sacrifice. It does not want me to recognize that it is really accepting God’s gift of joy that is beyond anything this ego world has to offer. The only reason I have any doubt or resist this dedication at all is because some part of me believes that I can find happiness in the world of the ego. It is true that I will need to give up everything the world has to offer in order to receive the magnificent gifts God has given me. But what is also true that the ego does not want me to recognize is that everything the world has to offer has no value whatsoever. It is all empty illusions, nothing, meaningless. So what I must give up to experience God’s gift of perfect joy is absolutely nothing. I give up nothing to recognize I have everything.
This world is the effect of believing it is possible to have more than everything, to somehow be special, different, unique. The only way to seem to have this specialness, to seem to have more than everything, is to make up illusions and call them real. But believing illusions are real does not make them real in truth. It is only a self delusion, a deceit that I use to make believe that I have what I want. But beneath this deception is a deep longing to return to the Love that seems to be so distant, yet in truth is what I am.
When I choose to accept my part in God’s plan for salvation, I simply choose to accept His gifts of Love. Nothing more and nothing less, for there is nothing else. I am deeply grateful for this reminder and this practice to strengthen my dedication to accepting God’s gift that is my part in God’s plan for salvation. For when I accept God’s Love, I cannot but offer it to all that Is, for that is Love’s nature.
I am worthy of His Love because I was created worthy of It. It is simply a fact to accept. Nothing need be done to make me worthy. I need merely accept what Is. Today I will practice accepting God’s Love and offering God’s Love. Today I will accept my part in God’s plan for salvation.
I woke up this morning with some concerns for the coming day. This lesson was a welcome reminder that I am upset because I am looking for salvation in a place where it is not. I went over my worries one at a time and saw that their solutions did not bring me salvation. This helped me to settle into the lesson realizing that I can find salvation if I look in the right place.
I also found it comforting to realize I am not alone in what I am doing today. I loved reading that "They will be with us..." because I surely feel that I need support today.
I wrote my lesson on a sheet of paper today along with a few lines to help me focus on my five minute prayers. This way, even on the road I can easily pull over and do my lesson at each hourly interval. At the bottom of the page I quoted the Course, "Is it not worth five minutes of your time...?" These last several lessons have been reminding us of how important this work is and I'm glad of that reminder.
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