Discernment

SAT., SEPT. 15, 1984, 6:45 AM
FARM, STUDY

Hear, o son! Can you hear and can you discern My words as you sit here in this meditative mode We have established over these more than five years? Can you continue to answer with certainty those who suggest that these words come just from your own fertile mind? Do you have a gift of discernment? Have you developed a capacity for discernment? I commence with questions for this shall be a form of “test” for you as this morning develops.

It is a test in that the very subject must cause you to question the truth and “accuracy” of what you write. (I had you put “accuracy” in quotes because it applies differently If you are hearing Me… or if you are just writing what your own mind generates. If you are doing it all, then there is no question about accuracy; if you are hearing Me, then it becomes an important issue.) You feel that you are hearing Me, and you are trying (and not trying) to discern what you hear from Me as apart from what your own mind provides. Are you doing this with any real accuracy?

One way to determine this – the immediate way – is immediately suspect because what I say to you comes through the very process that is in question. (Did I really want to use “immediate” and “immediately” so close together in the same sentence? You would edit so that wouldn’t be present in a “final copy”? But I have told you I do not want these edited. You have to assume that what you hear and write are what I want. You certainly know that I have the power and the will to correct.) You have no standard against which to compare these words, phrases, and ideas that you discern. There is no agreed-upon set of writings from Me composed in American English. So, am I a model of English composition… or am I a Model by definition, no matter how the words are written?

Another way to gauge accuracy is the comparison of Teachings over time. Just as Holy Scripture must be compared with Holy Scripture (and I have shown you that there is agreement only by definition) so these Teachings must be compared with one another over this time span in which We have been together. You discern the same spirit and feeling, even as some are more personal and some more universally instructive. Yet (could) you (could) be making this all up, now couldn’t you? (You heard it but you wrote it inaccurately. That is a matter of attention.)

Let’s now combine these two approaches to accuracy in an Affirmation from Me. I say here, after these questions which raise doubts, that I, the Holy Spirit, am leading you in these meditations, and that you discern My Teachings rather well. If I corrected every word, phrase, and sentence that was not exactly as I wanted it you would go away in discouragement and there would be no enlightening and motivating flow to the Teachings. You have not been inaccurate in your general discernment. What I have told you is the basis for your personal version of the Christian story. Its commonalities with other “versions” is sufficient; its differences come from a planned uniqueness.