Our Unacknowledged Reason for Sickness & Pain in Our Bodies…
Our Ego Need to Have Enemies
(1) separate interests vs shared interests
“A teacher of God is anyone who chooses to be one. His qualifications consist solely in this… somehow, somewhere he has made a deliberate choice in which he did not see his interests as apart from someone else’s.” Man. p.3 par.1
(2) asking help from the Holy Spirit and/or Jesus to let go of judgments & condemnation
“When pupil and teacher come together, a teaching-learning situation begins. For the teacher is not really the one who does the teaching. God’s Teacher [The Holy Spirit] speaks to any two who join together for learning purposes. The relationship is holy because of that purpose, and God has promised to send His Spirit into any holy relationship…Those who would learn the same course share one interest and one goal… He has seen in another person the same interests as his own.” Man. p.6 par.5
No one should attempt to answer these questions alone. Surely no teacher of God has come this far without realizing that. The curriculum is highly individualized, and all aspects are under the Holy Spirit’s particular care and guidance. Ask and He will answer. The responsibility is His, and He alone is fit to assume it. To do so is His function. To refer the questions to Him is yours. Would you want to be responsible for decisions about which you understand so little. Be glad you have a Teacher Who cannot make a mistake. His answers are always right. M.p.70 par.2
In respect to sickness and pain in the body… the Course is adamant that internally in our minds we choose to believe that we are our bodies. that could be healthy, or sick. The reason is simply and only to prove that our belief in separate interests from others is justified… meaning: if I’m sick and in pain it’s someone’s or something else’s fault (eg, ‘you are a pain in my neck’, or ‘I’ve got the flu.’)
Cause could be a person or a germ (doesn’t matter, as long as I believe it’s not me). These causes are now my ‘enemies.’ They are different and have different interests from me because look at what they are doing… they are the ones causing me pain…. and not me and a decision in my mind. The Course uses the word enemy 166x.
I make all things my enemies, so that my anger is justified and my attacks (my judgments) are warranted. I have not realized how much I have misused everything I see by assigning this role to it. I have done this to defend a thought system that has hurt me, and that I no longer want. I am willing to let it go. Lesson 51, par.5, p.83
(For further discussion of purpose: click here)
