that bears repeating. He came to show us the possibilities of infinite life. Physics, chemistry and biology are all quantum forces and as such, are subject to the thoughts we bring to them. Jesus came into this world knowing this and it was his life purpose not just to teach us this through his words, but to demonstrate and prove it through his healing mission. He intended for us to understand that we are all capable of doing what he did, hence his words ‘…the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do…(4)’ More than any time in the ages since Jesus’ era, humanity is ready to understand this.
Common usage has mistakenly used the two words, “Jesus” and “Christ”, interchangeably, but they are not the same. ‘Jesus’ is the name for the man who was one of humanity’s greatest embodiments of the Christ Spirit. He embodied It, but he was not It. In the same way as the wave is not synonymous with the ocean, Jesus the man was the manifestation and expression of the Christ Spirit, nothing more, and nothing less.
It is a fine distinction, but an important one in our understanding of Who We Are, and in our own inextricable relationship with the Christ. The Spirit that was ‘made flesh’ in Jesus exists in, and gives life to, us all. Jesus understood this supremely, and it was this wisdom that enabled him to turn the seeming facts of physics and matter on their heads in his healings and so-called miracles. Because we all comprise the ‘Sonship’ then all that Jesus was capable of is potentially achievable by us.
It is this understanding the enables those not of Christian faith or background to acknowledge the relevance of Jesus to all humanity. No one should be deterred by the use of the word ‘Christ’ as a substitute for ‘Holy Spirit.’ Other religions, including Buddhism and Hinduism, have the notion of a three-in-one Reality. Christ Jesus represents the Sonship for all mankind and for all faiths. The names and labels are changeable and unimportant. It is the principle that is crucial.
Our Oneness in the Holy Spirit means that we are all equal, in potential, with Jesus and all other avatars. The miracle of Jesus’ power over the physical world lies dormant as pure potential in all of us. But it is because Jesus lived his potential, and consciously manifested (the Holy or Christ) Spirit - the bridge to our Source- that he was able show the Way, diminishing the gap between us and our Source.
In our current state, in this dream world of illusion and limitation, we have no possibility of grasping Truth in its entirety. But we can move towards Truth, inspired moment by moment, with Spirit’s help, which is available, at all times and under all circumstances.
Further, whether we know it or not, and whether we call on it or not, (the Holy) Spirit works continuously on our behalf, ceaselessly communicating with us and sending us signs to help us understand true Life and Reality.
Oneness, or At-One-Ment
The process of opening one’s mind to the idea of Oneness could be described, using the traditional terminology, as the Atonement. A more helpful interpretation of the concept is At-one-ment. At-one-ment is a re-interpretation of the traditional religious doctrine that was originally based on the premise of our innate state of sinfulness and unworthiness, and is commonly associated with penance, punishment, and reparation.
At-one-ment rejects this premise completely. If we are made in the image of a perfect and Omnipotent Creative Source, then logically we must be both sinless and guiltless. Thus there can be nothing for which we should be punished or made to feel guilty.
The world where men and women are seen as sinful and attacking has only the substance of a dream. Each person creates his or her own ‘dream’ life with their thoughts. The vast majority of us are still on this plane of existence because we have the thoughts that make this life meaningful to us. We have these thoughts because we believe we are separated from our Source, and each other, and therefore we believe we are flawed, weak and inadequate, and that we need to struggle and fight for the things we believe we don’t have. But because, in Truth, we are the emanation and manifestation of All That Is, this perception of ourselves is completely false, and therefore has only the quality of a dream, or illusion.
Human life is like ‘lucid dreaming,’ which is the knowing, whilst in the dream state, that we are actually dreaming. In lucid dreams we have the power to direct the dream, to decide what happens and when to wake up. Life in the duality state is a form of lucid dreaming. We have control over what happens to us here, and we can decide when we will wake up.
There is a direct connection between the degree to which we drop the attacking and ‘sinful’ thoughts and the amount of peace and happiness in our lives. When we realize this we start to waken from that dream. Atonement, or at-one-ment, is no different from, and requires no more than that: waking from the dream.
At-one-ment is the process whereby we become so aware of our origin and connection with our Source that we feel at one with It. The Atonement in this sense is not a judgment or condemnation. Rather, it is the end goal of spiritual enlightenment, where all sense of separation dissolves and we transcend our duality, ultimately reverting to our true nature as the emanation of Source.
Love and forgiveness, the path to the realisation and practice of the Atonement, is our fundamental purpose in this life. Miracles demonstrate our spiritual potential, but they are not the end goal. They are merely the assistance we receive along the way to Oneness, and thus they will only ever be bestowed in circumstances that will further our enlightenment.
The True Meaning of Forgiveness
Forgiveness must be explained because the usual meaning attributed to the term is not intended here. Usually when we choose to forgive another, we deem the other person as having inflicted some injury – physical or emotional- which has caused us pain and suffering. Ultimately we must decide whether we will ‘forgive’ the other for his/her transgression, and once decided, we then endeavour to ‘overlook’ the injury and try to carry on as if it didn’t happen. It is common, however, that beneath the struggle to leave the past in the past, a sense of hurt persists, which we can only hope will fade with time.
This is not what I mean by forgiveness. We create our own experience by our own thoughts and actions. We can never be hurt by the actions of another, unless we choose to be hurt. That doesn’t mean we can’t perform actions that are aggressive or attacking, even violent. Of course we can. But the consequences of such actions are up to the person on the receiving end. It is their thoughts that are key to their experience.
Conversely, through an understanding that we are all One, in origin and nature, we realise we can never be hurt by others because in Reality there is only Love. When we are faced with the negative actions and intentions of others, it is always open to us to know that our experience is only determined by our own thoughts, and we can always, at any time, choose not to be hurt or suffer as a result of what others do.
We have compassion for ourselves and the other person, understanding that despite appearances in this state of duality – that we are an ego housed in a body separate from all other bodies – we can always rely on the power of Love to protect and guide us away from strife and towards peace. Whatever seems to be harmed, lost or damaged can always be restored and healed, no matter the seeming evidence to the contrary of our physical senses.
In the realm of Oneness, what we do to and for others, we do to ourselves. We understand that anything less than compassion for all parties involved will only lead to our own suffering. As Oprah Winfrey says about hatred, a lack of compassion or the unwillingness to forgive is like hoping that if we drink poison, it will be the other person who will die.
This is why Jesus’ fundamental guide for life is the Golden Rule. In contradiction to common Christian interpretations, this is not a call for us to be spineless doormats with no personal boundaries, or self-denying martyrs who always put others’ needs before our own. Rather, this rule is grounded in the most practical of philosophies. It is crucial to understand that whatever we put out there will, due to the principle of Oneness, return back to us and become our experience.
For