The Holy Encounter

Chapter 8.3
The Holy Encounter
 
Glory to God in the highest, and to you because he has so willed it. Ask and
it shall be given you, because it has already been given. Ask for light and
learn that you are light. If you want understanding and enlightenment you
will learn it, because your decision to learn it is the decision to listen to the
Teacher Who knows of light, and can therefore teach it to you. There is no
limit on your learning because there is no limit on your mind. There is no
limit on his teaching because he was created to teach. Understanding his
function perfectly he fulfills it perfectly, because that is his joy and yours.
 
To fulfill the Will of God perfectly is the only joy and peace that can be
fully known, because it is the only function that can be fully experienced.
 
When this is accomplished, then, there is no other experience. Yet the wish
for other experience will block its accomplishment, because God’s Will
cannot be forced upon you, being an experience of total willingness. The
Holy Spirit understands how to teach this, but you do not. That is why you
need him, and why God gave him to you. Only his teaching will release
your will to God’s, uniting it with his power and glory and establishing them
as yours. You share them as God shares them, because this is the natural
outcome of their being.
 
The Will of the Father and of the Son are One, by Their extension. Their
extension is the result of Their Oneness, holding Their unity together by
extending Their joint Will. This is perfect creation by the perfectly created,
in union with the perfect Creator. The Father must give fatherhood to his
son, because his own fatherhood must be extended outward. You who
belong in God have the holy function of extending his fatherhood by
placing no limits upon it. Let the Holy Spirit teach you how to do this, for
you can know what it means only of God himself.
 
When you meet anyone, remember it is a holy encounter. As you see him
you will see yourself. As you treat him you will treat yourself. As you think
of him you will think of yourself. Never forget this, for in him you will find
yourself or lose yourself. Whenever two Sons of God meet, they are given
another chance at salvation. Do not leave anyone without giving salvation to
him and receiving it yourself. For I am always there with you, in
remembrance of you.
 
The goal of the curriculum, regardless of the teacher you choose, is “Know
thyself. “There is nothing else to seek. Everyone is looking for himself and
for the power and glory he thinks he has lost. Whenever you are with
anyone, you have another opportunity to find them. Your power and glory
are in him because they are yours. The ego tries to find them in yourself
alone, because it does not know where to look. The Holy Spirit teaches you
that if you look only at yourself you cannot find yourself, because that is not
what you are. Whenever you are with a brother, you are learning what you
are because you are teaching what you are. He will respond either with pain
or with joy, depending on which teacher you are following. He will be
imprisoned or released according to your decision, and so will you. Never
forget your responsibility to him, because it is your responsibility to
yourself. Give him his place in the Kingdom and you will have yours.
 
The Kingdom cannot be found alone, and you who are the Kingdom cannot
find yourself alone. To achieve the goal of the curriculum, then, you cannot
listen to the ego, whose purpose is to defeat its own goal. The ego does not
know this, because it does not know anything. But you can know it, and you
will know it if you are willing to look at what the ego would make of you.
 
This is your responsibility, because once you have really looked at it you
will accept the Atonement for yourself. What other choice could you make?
 
Having made this choice you will understand why you once believed that,
when you met someone else, you thought he was someone else. And every
holy encounter in which you enter fully will teach you this is not so.
 
You can encounter only part of yourself because you are part of God, Who
is everything. His power and glory are everywhere, and you cannot be
excluded from them. The ego teaches that your strength is in you alone. The
Holy Spirit teaches that all strength is in God and therefore in you. God
wills no one suffer. He does not will anyone to suffer for a wrong decision,
including you. That is why he has given you the means for undoing it.
 
Through his power and glory all your wrong decisions are undone
completely, releasing you and your brother from every imprisoning thought
any part of the Sonship holds. Wrong decisions have no power, because
they are not true. The imprisonment they seem to produce is no more true
than they are.
 
Power and glory belong to God alone. So do you. God gives whatever
belongs to him because he gives of himself, and everything belongs to him.
 
Giving of yourself is the function he gave you. Fulfilling it perfectly will let
you remember what you have of him, and by this you will remember also
what you are in him. You cannot be powerless to do this, because this is
your power. Glory is God’s gift to you, because that is what he is. See this
glory everywhere to remember what you are.