Above the Battleground

Chapter 23 – 5. Above the Battleground

Do not remain in conflict, for there is no war without attack. The fear of
God is fear of life, and not of death. Yet He remains the only place of
safety. In Him is no attack, and no illusion in any form stalks Heaven.
 
Heaven is wholly true. No difference enters, and what is all the same cannot
conflict. You are not asked to fight against your wish to murder. But you are
asked to realize the form it takes conceals the same intent. And it is this you
fear, and not the form. What is not love is murder. What is not loving must
be an attack. Every illusion is an assault on truth, and every one does
violence to the idea of love because it seems to be of equal truth.
 
What can be equal to the truth, yet different? Murder and love are
incompatible. Yet if they both are true, then must they be the same, and
indistinguishable from one another. So will they be to those who see God’s
 
Son a body. For it is not the body that is like the Son’s Creator. And what is
lifeless cannot be the Son of Life. How can a body be extended to hold the
universe? Can it create, and be what it creates? And can it offer its creations
all that it is and never suffer loss?
 
God does not share His function with a body. He gave the function to create
unto His Son because it is His Own. It is not sinful to believe the function of
the Son is murder, but it is insanity. What is the same can have no different
function. Creation is the means for God’s extension, and what is His must be
 
His Son’s as well. Either the Father and the Son are murderers, or neither is.
 
Life makes not death, creating like itself.
 
The lovely light of your relationship is like the Love of God. It cannot yet
assume the holy function God gave His Son, for your forgiveness of your
brother is not complete as yet, and so it cannot be extended to all creation.
 
Each form of murder and attack that still attracts you and that you do not
recognize for what it is, limits the healing and the miracles you have the
power to extend to all. Yet does the Holy Spirit understand how to increase
your little gifts and make them mighty. Also He understands how your
relationship is raised above the battleground, in it no more. This is your
part; to realize that murder in any form is not your will. The overlooking of
the battleground is now your purpose.
 
Be lifted up, and from a higher place look down upon it. From there will
your perspective be quite different. Here in the midst of it, it does seem real.
 
Here you have chosen to be part of it. Here murder is your choice. Yet from
above, the choice is miracles instead of murder. And the perspective coming
from this choice shows you the battle is not real, and easily escaped. Bodies
may battle, but the clash of forms is meaningless. And it is over when you
realize it never was begun. How can a battle be perceived as nothingness
when you engage in it? How can the truth of miracles be recognized if
murder is your choice?
 
When the temptation to attack rises to make your mind darkened and
murderous, remember you can see the battle from above. Even in forms you
do not recognize, the signs you know. There is a stab of pain, a twinge of
guilt, and above all, a loss of peace. This you know well. When they occur
leave not your place on high, but quickly choose a miracle instead of
murder. And God Himself and all the lights of Heaven will gently lean to
you, and hold you up. For you have chosen to remain where He would have
you, and no illusion can attack the peace of God together with His Son.
See no one from the battleground, for there you look on him from nowhere.
 
You have no reference point from where to look, where meaning can be
given what you see. For only bodies could attack and murder, and if this is
your purpose, then you must be one with them. Only a purpose unifies, and
those who share a purpose have a mind as one. The body has no purpose of
itself, and must be solitary. From below, it cannot be surmounted. From
above, the limits it exerts on those in battle still are gone, and not perceived.
 
The body stands between the Father and the Heaven He created for His Son
because it has no purpose.
 
Think what is given those who share their Father’s purpose, and who know
that it is theirs. They want for nothing. Sorrow of any kind is inconceivable.
 
Only the light they love is in awareness, and only love shines upon them
forever. It is their past, their present and their future; always the same,
eternally complete and wholly shared. They know it is impossible their
happiness could ever suffer change of any kind. Perhaps you think the
battleground can offer something you can win. Can it be anything that
offers you a perfect calmness, and a sense of love so deep and quiet that no
touch of doubt can ever mar your certainty? And that will last forever?
 
Those with the strength of God in their awareness could never think of
battle. What could they gain but loss of their perfection? For everything
fought for on the battleground is of the body; something it seems to offer or
to own. No one who knows that he has everything could seek for limitation,
nor could he value the body’s offerings. The senselessness of conquest is
quite apparent from the quiet sphere above the battleground. What can
conflict with everything? And what is there that offers less, yet could be
wanted more? Who with the Love of God upholding him could find the
choice of miracles or murder hard to make?