Lesson 194

Lesson 194

I place the future in the Hands of God.

Today’s idea takes another step toward quick salvation, and a giant stride it is indeed! So great the distance is that it encompasses, it sets you down just short of Heaven, with the goal in sight and obstacles behind. Your foot has reached the lawns that welcome you to Heaven’s gate; the quiet place of peace, where you await with certainty the final step of God. How far are we progressing now from earth! How close are we approaching to our goal! How short the journey still to be pursued!

Accept today’s idea, and you have passed all anxiety, all pits of hell, all blackness of depression, thoughts of sin, and devastation brought about by guilt. Accept today’s idea, and you have released the world from all imprisonment by loosening the heavy chains that locked the door to freedom on it. You are saved, and your salvation thus becomes the gift you give the world, because you have received.

In no one instant is depression felt, or pain experienced or loss perceived. In no one instant sorrow can be set upon a throne, and worshipped faithfully. In no one instant can one even die. And so each instant given unto God in passing, with the next one given Him already, is a time of your release from sadness, pain and even death itself.

God holds your future as He holds your past and present. They are one to Him, and so they should be one to you. Yet in this world, the temporal progression still seems real. And so you are not asked to understand the lack of sequence really found in time. You are but asked to let the future go, and place it in God’s Hands. And you will see by your experience that you have laid the past and present in His Hands as well, because the past will punish you no more, and future dread will now be meaningless.

Release the future. For the past is gone, and what is present, freed from its bequest of grief and misery, of pain and loss, becomes the instant in which time escapes the bondage of illusions where it runs its pitiless, inevitable course. Then is each instant which was slave to time transformed into a holy instant, when the light that was kept hidden in God’s Son is freed to bless the world. Now is he free, and all his glory shines upon a world made free with him, to share his holiness.

If you can see the lesson for today as the deliverance it really is, you will not hesitate to give as much consistent effort as you can, to make it be a part of you. As it becomes a thought that rules your mind, a habit in your problem-solving repertoire, a way of quick reaction to temptation, you extend your learning to the world. And as you learn to see salvation in all things, so will the world perceive that it is saved.

What worry can beset the one who gives his future to the loving Hands of God? What can he suffer? What can cause him pain, or bring experience of loss to him? What can he fear? And what can he regard except with love? For he who has escaped all fear of future pain has found his way to present peace, and certainty of care the world can never threaten. He is sure that his perception may be faulty, but will never lack correction. He is free to choose again when he has been deceived; to change his mind when he has made mistakes.

Place, then, your future in the Hands of God. For thus you call the memory of Him to come again, replacing all your thoughts of sin and evil with the truth of love. Think you the world could fail to gain thereby, and every living creature not respond with healed perception? Who entrusts himself to God has also placed the world within the Hands to which he has himself appealed for comfort and security. He lays aside the sick illusions of the world along with his, and offers peace to both.

Now are we saved indeed. For in God’s Hands we rest untroubled, sure that only good can come to us. If we forget, we will be gently reassured. If we accept an unforgiving thought, it will be soon replaced by love’s reflection. And if we are tempted to attack, we will appeal to Him Who guards our rest to make the choice for us that leaves temptation far behind. No longer is the world our enemy, for we have chosen that we be its friend.

Journal

God holds your future as He holds your past and present. They are one to Him, and so they should be one to you. Yet in this world, the temporal progression still seems real. And so you are not asked to understand the lack of sequence really found in time. You are but asked to let the future go, and place it in God’s Hands. And you will see by your experience that you have laid the past and present in His Hands as well, because the past will punish you no more, and future dread will now be meaningless.

I feel the truth of this. If I place the future in the Hands of Love what could there be to fear? But the ego mind is scoffing at this thought. It lists its objections, pointing out all the possible awful things that could happen. The script is written and life continues to unfold. What if people I love die and certainly some of them will die before I do. What if other catastrophes occur and I know that it is possible that will happen.

What I am given when I question thus, is that my painful perceptions will be corrected. It is never the situation or person that causes me to suffer, but my thoughts about them cause me pain. My trust in God will correct my perceptions so that I will understand that everything is in our best interests even when it is not apparent how this could be.

Everything that has caused me to be upset has been a memory of the past or a fear for the future. I remember when I had dental surgery that went badly, I was in so much pain. But the fear of the future, that the pain might get worse or that it might not go away was the real problem. When I saw what I was doing to myself, I stopped, and the pain lessened and while there was still pain, it was controllable with the medicine and most importantly, I was no longer suffering from the pain. Resisting the fact that it was present had made the pain worse. I accepted it as being present and did what I needed to do. Then it passed.

Everyone knows how torturous it can be to dwell in the past. We mourn our losses every time our thoughts wander to the past. The past no longer exists except in our memories and so if we bring the memory to mind, we are bringing the past into existence for ourselves in that moment. We deliberately torture ourselves with our guilt and cause ourselves to be fearful of more to come (the future). And it must be guilt that drives this need to revisit the painful past. Otherwise, we would not do it. And let us not forget that what we do for ourselves we do for the world and everyone in it.

“Now are we saved indeed. For in God’s Hands we rest untroubled, sure that only good can come to us. If we forget, we will be gently reassured. If we accept an unforgiving thought, it will be soon replaced by love’s reflection. And if we are tempted to attack, we will appeal to Him Who guards our rest to make the choice for us that leaves temptation far behind. No longer is the world our enemy, for we have chosen that we be its friend.”

Regina’s Tips

Regina emphasizes that this is not just something to say, it is something to do. I absolutely agree with her on this point.

“I place the future in the Hands of God,” means ‘I do not know what is in my best interest or in the best interest of others, and so I let go of worry and control, and I trust the unfolding as it is.’

Again, this is not something that we say. This is something that we do. We need to actually let go of worry and control, and trust the unfolding as it is. The way to do this is right-reason, through realizing that we do not know what is in the best interest of others and ourselves.

Thinking we know what is best and thinking we are right is the problem. With a little bit of right-reason, we can see that we are wrong about both of those assumptions.

If we become really honest with ourselves through right-reason, we see that we don’t know what is in our best interest or in the best interest of others. With this genuine realization, we can let go of worry and control, and simply trust the unfolding as it is.

Past Entry

I was listening to the Course this morning as I woke up and I heard Jesus say this: You do not need to understand, only to want to understand. I was about to take this lesson apart in an attempt to understand why salvation lies in placing the future in the Hands of God. But I am not going to do that. I am not going to struggle to understand with my ego mind.

I accept that God wants me to be happy and at peace and He wants me to remember Him. And I accept that placing the future in His hands will allow Him to do that for me. I accept that giving Him my future takes care of the past as well, so I will not be dragging it behind me on the way to the gates of Heaven. I accept it even though I have no memory of timelessness.

All that is left for me to do is to remember and practice this lesson. As I was reading it, I remembered that I have to do something I don’t want to do. I “forgot” to do it last week and I cannot let myself do that again this week. I wrote it down on a piece of paper along with something else I don’t want to forget today. What I noticed is how anxious I feel about this commitment.

I must take care of this business, but must I give up peace and happiness to do so? Could I place this bit of the future in the hands of God and allow it to unfold without trying to control the outcome? Could I trust God with this? I am going to place the future in the Hands of God. I give this to Him and look forward to performing this task with ease. Instead of being anxious about trying to make something happen, I am going to trust that I will say the right words and the result will be exactly as it is meant to be.

You know what I notice happening? My mind is thinking about the situation. It is thinking about what to say, how to say it, how to bend the other person to my will. I feel my stomach clenching and burn with the caffeine I just had. I feel a sense of dread as I face the oncoming day with its many problems. Wow! It didn’t take me long to snatch the future out of God’s hands! And the outcome was predictable.

The ego wants to think that placing the future in the Hands of God just isn’t going to work for me, that I am too much of a control freak. I know that the ego is wrong. Jesus has said that I can do whatever he asks of me. I relinquish the belief that I cannot give over control to the Holy Spirit. The ego thinks it must control everything; I think I must have the peace of God.

The ego thinks to do this job right I must subjugate the other person to my will. I think I must recognize that my brother and I share the same will and that is the Will we share with God. I think I have no desire to attack this brother of mine or to defend against him. The ego can’t see a way for us both to get what we need, but I remember Jesus telling me that the Holy Spirit’s solution that will provide for the needs of all. I relinquish it to the One Who knows what is needed for everyone concerned. I place the future in the Hands of God. I will do this as often as I need to because practice makes perfect and I want to do this perfectly.