Waking to Redemption

Chapter 11 – 7 – Waking to Redemption
 
It is impossible not to believe what you see, but it is equally impossible to
see what you do not believe. Perceptions are built up on the basis of
experience, and experience leads to beliefs. It is not until beliefs are fixed
that perceptions stabilize. In effect, then, what you believe you do see. That
is what I meant when I said, “Blessed are ye who have not seen and still
believe,” for those who believe in the resurrection will see it. The
resurrection is the complete triumph of Christ over the ego, not by attack
but by transcendence. For Christ does rise above the ego and all its works,
and ascends to the Father and his Kingdom.
 
Would you join in the resurrection or the crucifixion? Would you condemn
your brothers or free them? Would you transcend your prison and ascend to
the Father? These questions are all the same, and are answered together.
 
There has been much confusion about what perception means, because the
word is used both for awareness and for the interpretation of awareness. Yet
you cannot be aware without interpretation, for what you perceive is your
interpretation.
 
This course is perfectly clear. If you do not see it clearly, it is because you
are interpreting against it, and therefore do not believe it. And since belief
determines perception, you do not perceive what it means and therefore do
not accept it. Yet different experiences lead to different beliefs and
experience does teach. I am leading you to a new kind of experience that
you will become less and less willing to deny. Learning of Christ is easy,
for to perceive with him involves no strain at all. his perceptions are your
natural awareness, and it is only the distortions you introduce that tire you.
 
Let the Christ in you interpret for you, and do not try to limit what you see
by narrow little beliefs that are unworthy of God’s Son. For until Christ
comes into his own, the Son of God will see himself as Fatherless.
 
I am your resurrection and your life. You live in me because you live in
God. And everyone lives in you, as you live in everyone. Can you, then,
perceive unworthiness in a brother and not perceive it in yourself? And can
you perceive it in yourself and not perceive it in God? Believe in the
resurrection because it has been accomplished, and it has been
accomplished in you. This is as true now as it will ever be, for the
resurrection is the Will of God, which knows no time and no exceptions.
 
But make no exceptions yourself, or you will not perceive what has been
accomplished for you. For we ascend unto the Father together, as it was in
the beginning, is now and ever shall be, for such is the nature of God’s Son
as his Father created him.
 
Do not underestimate the power of the devotion of God’s Son, nor the
power the god he worships has over him. For he places himself at the altar
of his god, whether it be the god he made or the God Who created him. That
is why his slavery is as complete as his freedom, for he will obey only the
god he accepts. The god of crucifixion demands that he crucify, and his
worshippers obey. In his name they crucify themselves, believing that the
power of the Son of God is born of sacrifice and pain. The God of
resurrection demands nothing, for he does not will to take away. He does
not require obedience, for obedience implies submission. He would only
have you learn your will and follow it, not in the spirit of sacrifice and
submission, but in the gladness of freedom.
 
Resurrection must compel your allegiance gladly, because it is the symbol
of joy. Its whole compelling power lies in the fact that it represents what
you want to be. The freedom to leave behind everything that hurts you and
humbles you and frightens you cannot be thrust upon you, but it can be
offered you through the grace of God. And you can accept it by his grace,
for God is gracious to his Son, accepting him without question as his own.
 
Who, then, is your own? The Father has given you all that is his, and he
himself is yours with them. Guard them in their resurrection, for otherwise
you will not awake in God, safely surrounded by what is yours forever.
 
You will not find peace until you have removed the nails from the hands of
God’s Son, and taken the last thorn from his forehead. The Love of God
surrounds his Son whom the god of crucifixion condemns. Teach not that I
died in vain. Teach rather that I did not die by demonstrating that I live in
you. For the undoing of the crucifixion of God’s Son is the work of the
redemption, in which everyone has a part of equal value. God does not
judge his guiltless Son. Having given himself to him, how could it be
otherwise?
 
You have nailed yourself to a cross, and placed a crown of thorns upon your
own head. Yet you cannot crucify God’s Son, for the will of God cannot die.
his Son has been redeemed from his own crucifixion, and you cannot assign
to death whom God has given eternal life. The dream of crucifixion still lies
heavy on your eyes, but what you see in dreams is not reality. While you
perceive the Son of God as crucified, you are asleep. And as long as you
believe that you can crucify him, you are only having nightmares. You who
are beginning to wake are still aware of dreams, and have not yet forgotten
them. The forgetting of dreams and the awareness of Christ come with the
awakening of others to share your redemption.
 
You will awaken to your own call, for the Call to awake is within you. If I
live in you, you are awake. Yet you must see the works I do through you, or
you will not perceive that I have done them unto you. Do not set limits on
what you believe I can do through you, or you will not accept what I can do
for you. Yet it is done already, and unless you give all that you have
received you will not know that your redeemer liveth, and that you have
awakened with him. Redemption is recognized only by sharing it.
 
God’s Son is saved. Bring only this awareness to the Sonship, and you will
have a part in the redemption as valuable as mine. For your part must be
like mine if you learn it of me. If you believe that yours is limited, you are
limiting mine. There is no order of difficulty in miracles because all of
God’s Sons are of equal value, and their equality is their oneness. The whole
power of God is in every part of him, and nothing contradictory to his will
is either great or small. What does not exist has no size and no measure. To
God all things are possible. And to Christ it is given to be like the Father.