Hi Amy,
Here are my answers to this week's lesson:
1. Give my understanding of what it means to serve Truth or illusions: I believe we have forgotten who we are. We have forgotten our Divine selves. We have forgotten we are One with the All That Is. As we have "forgotten" our heritage we have invented an illusion that we are separate and we are small and not up to the task of doing whatever it is we believe we are supposed to do. We believe we are weak and we believe that if we fail to live up to some imagined standard that we will be punished and forever separated from the All That Is. With the Holy Spirit we can "re-member" that we are not separate and therefore there is nothing to fear. Without fear we move out of illusion. We change from "responsible" (and therefore guilty of doing or failing to do something) and we move into the ability to "respond". When we respond in Truth we are answering our Divine calling. We are in partnership with the Divine.
2. In my own words explain how perception and projection work to dilute the power of prayer: I think that perception and projection are examples of separateness. It keeps us into thinking of "me" rather than "I". If we attend to "perception" i.e. our illusory beliefs about something we then must find a reason for why this perception is so. When we do this we are locked into the illusion and are not open to the What Is. These "defense mechanisms" keep us from realizing the Truth and from accepting any answer that does not fit into our false belief system. I am reminded of a Buddhist story I read several years ago that seems to fit this lesson. It talked about a priest and his followers walking along a mountain path on their way back to the monastery. They looked up and saw an elderly man walk into the river and saw him go over a waterfall. They ran as fast as they could to try to rescue this man, however, were quite a distance from the river. When they finally arrived they were astonished because the elderly man was wading out of the river. They asked him "how he had survived" as they were sure he must have died during this experience. The elderly man replied, "I learned a long time ago not to fight the river." I think the priest and his followers represent "illusion" and the elderly man represents "Oneness with the All That Is." I think he also demonstrates that by surrendering ourselves to the Truth there is no death, there is no separation.
Rev. Monnie
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