IV. Practicing the Holy Instant, P 3
3 Be humble before Him, and yet great in Him. And value no plan of the ego before the plan of God. For you leave empty your place in His plan, which you must fill if you would join with me, by your decision to join in any plan but His. I call you to fulfil your holy part in the plan that He has given to the world for its release from littleness. God would have His host abide in perfect freedom. Every allegiance to a plan of salvation apart from Him diminishes the value of His Will for you in your own mind. And yet it is your mind that is the host to Him.
Journal
Be humble before Him, and yet great in Him.
What I think this means to me is that it is God in me that is great and that works through me. It is not the ego in me that is holy, but rather it is in undoing the ego that I am released from littleness and can take my place beside Jesus in saving the world. Yes, the power of God is in me and it is through this power that we perform miracles as is His Will and our will, too. But I cannot use that power if I am trying to manipulate the world using the ego mind.
That is the difference between God’s plan for salvation and my ego plan. In my ego plan, I look at the effects of the ego thinking and try to save these effects using more ego thoughts. Today, in doing Lesson 347, I was reminded of how we misunderstand salvation. Here is what I wrote.
Something that helped me to see what I have been doing is a message from the Holy Spirit shared by Regina Dawn Akers, in which He was helping her see that she uses her body as a depository for her sense of unworthiness. The way she explained it is that she looks at her body and feels unworthy and thinks it is the body that makes her feel this way. The Holy Spirit helped her to see that it works the other way around. She feels unworthy, projects it onto the body and then she can hope to improve the body and thereby become worthy. It is her plan for salvation. When I read this it was like a bright light came on in a darkened room.
When I first heard Regina say this, I understood how it is that I try to find salvation fixing the effect rather than correcting the cause. I make the problem with my ego thoughts and then I try to fix the problem by manipulating what I made with those thoughts, like trying to diet or use other means to enhance the body and thus feel more worthy. Wouldn’t it be more effective to let the Holy Spirit heal my belief in unworthiness instead, and then I won’t use the body to prove my unworthiness?
I once used this faulty reasoning with relationships and lack and loss, and all the ego effects in my world. I have learned to spot that and to choose differently. Now, if I feel attacked by someone, I immediately turn inward to the Holy Spirit to look at what is going on in my mind rather than trying to change how I am seen by that one or to try to stop him from attacking me.
If I am in a difficult situation, I don’t use my ego mind to find a way out of it. I turn inward to see how I got into it, what were my thoughts, what is the lesson in this situation? Then, I find that no one is at fault, and I am not the victim of the world I see. I ask the Holy Spirit to heal my mind of any remaining beliefs like these, and thus, through the power of God in me, I am truly saved.
The more I do this, the more I am able to take my place in God’s plan for salvation. When I am defenseless in the face of attack, I am teaching the other that he is innocent. If I defend myself I am teaching him he is guilty. Clearly, it is not God’s plan to have us teach guilt. Guilt is not salvation. Before I can teach innocence, I must be willing to allow my mind to be healed of guilt. Sometimes I have noticed that the healing of my mind is simultaneous with teaching innocence. Perhaps it occurs because of the heart’s desire for innocence.