How the ACIM Study Guide Was Created

 The Making of the Study Guide 

“There is a book that’s become the center of my spiritual journey. It’s
called A Course in Miracles. You might want to take a look at it.”

When my father said those words, I was intrigued. It was January 1982. My father had been a manager at UPS but had left the corporate world five years earlier to answer his calling to become a Unity minister. And now, as an associate pastor at Hillside Chapel and Truth Center in Atlanta, he was truly using his high intelligence and tremendous communication skills to help so many people.

I had come to Atlanta following Spirit’s direction. Six months before, I was living in Washington, DC. I was two years out of college and about to go off to Harvard Business School—the next step in my ten-year plan to become Under Secretary of Housing and Urban Development. My desire was to be in a position to have a positive impact on people’s lives. I believed government service provided a platform to do that. I wanted to be high enough to have impact, but not so high as to be caught up in the political whirlwind. 

One morning, a few months before starting business school, I was in the shower thinking about the next stage of my life when I “heard” the words:

“If the most important thing in your life is your relationship with Me,
 how is going to Harvard Business School going to help you with that?”

The voice sounded so real that I actually pulled the shower curtain back to see who was there! But I knew. It was my inner guide, the Voice for God. I also knew what the question meant: my ten-year plan to become Under Secretary of Housing and Urban Development was my plan for my life, not His plan. Now I saw my plan crumbling before my eyes.

So, I asked, “Okay, God. What do you want me to do? Do you want me to go off on a mountain and contemplate my navel? Do you want me to become a minister? Do you want me to stand on a corner and ask people, ‘Have you thought about God today?’ Just tell me, and I’ll do it.” 

I got complete silence. God has a sense of humor: For those of us who are doers, He blows everything up and then tests our patience to see if we are willing to let the dust settle so that we can gain clarity.

My spiritual upbringing taught me that whenever you aren’t sure what to do, it is important to get quiet and be still. So, I got still. I told Harvard I wasn’t coming. Since I was supposed to be going to business school, I had already submitted my resignation to my manager at work. So, I let that stand. In essence, I cleared my plate. 

This started my six-month faith walk with God where I was “gainfully unemployed” yet very rich in Spirit. I started each day asking what I was to do that day, where I was to go, who I was to speak to. It was a fun and freeing time, 29 days out of each month. It was that 30th day when rent was due that was interesting! And yet, something would always happen to fill the need … an unexpected check in the mail, a request to speak followed by a generous love offering, a gift from a friend, etc.

That time was filled with many lessons. One of the most important ones: I learned that the word “ministry” means to serve, and that in this sense we are all called to ministry, that is, we are all called to serve. For some it takes the form of the pulpit; for most it does not. One day, I “heard”: “Go forth and serve. Further directions will follow.” I learned it wasn’t about doing; it was about learning to listen and to being open to guidance from Spirit.

Toward the end of this faith walk, I felt the prompting from Spirit to move to Atlanta and spend time living under my parent’s roof. I must admit that my 24-year-old ego was far from thrilled, but my ageless spirit knew that blessings would be forthcoming. So, within a month of moving to Atlanta, here was my father making a recommendation to me about a book he was finding helpful. 

He explained that A Course in Miracles essentially was comprised of three books: the Text, which laid out the Course’s thought system; the Workbook, which contained 365 lessons, one for every day of the year; and the Manual for Teachers, not a teacher’s manual in the traditional sense but instead a manual for anyone who wanted to be one of God’s teachers. He said that a person could start with any of the three books, but he recommended that I start with the Workbook.

Several weeks later I took his recommendation to heart. I opened the Workbook and read that first lesson.

"Nothing I see in this room means anything." (3/W-1) 

I did the exercise, looking around the room as I said, “This chair does not mean anything. This bookcase does not mean anything. This hand does not mean anything.” I remember thinking, This is a little strange. The next day, I took on the second lesson. 

"I have given everything I see in this room all the meaning that it has for me." (4/W-2)

And so, once more, I did the lesson: “I give this plant all the meaning it has for me. I give this television all the meaning it has for me.” My thought: This is very strange. The next day, lesson three: 

"I do not understand anything I see in this room." (5/W-3) 

My thought: Okay I am done. I closed the book. While interesting, it was clearly not for me.

It took another six months before I made a second attempt at this book that my father found so fascinating. This time I started with the Text. I saw that it had a little over 600 pages. It was September 1, and I remember thinking that if I sat down for an hour every day and read about 20 pages, I would have finished this entire book by the beginning of October. My accomplishment-addicted ego was inspired by the challenge. 

That first day I read for two and a half hours and only got through five pages! 

The material was so dense and a real mind blower. I found myself having complete conversations with myself as I read through each paragraph.

Introduction (T-in.1:1-2:4)

"This is a course in miracles. It is a required course." 

Required? Really? Who says?

"Only the time you take it is voluntary." 

Wait a minute. What about free will?

"Free will does not mean that you can establish the curriculum. It means only that you can elect what you want to take at a given time." 

Hmm … I get that.

"…The opposite of love is fear, but what is all-encompassing can have no opposite." 

This makes sense. But if this is true, there are some major implications here. If love can’t have an opposite, where does fear come from? Where does hate come from?

"This course can therefore be summed up very simply in this way: Nothing real can be threatened. Nothing unreal exists. Herein lies the peace of God." 

Oh, my. This is deep.

I was all in. In that first month, I got through the first 6 of 31 chapters. I was particularly struck by the clarity and authority with which the author of the Course spoke. When I encountered the many “I” statements in those first few chapters, I was a bit shaken at first. But the writing made it very clear who the author of the Course is.

"I was not “punished” because you were bad. The wholly benign lesson the Atonement teaches is lost if it is tainted with this kind of distortion in any form." (T-3.I.2:10-11)

"I have been correctly referred to as 'the lamb of God who taketh away the sins of the world,' but those who represent the lamb as blood-stained do not understand the meaning of the symbol. Correctly understood, it is a very simple symbol that speaks of my innocence." (T-3.I.5:1-2)

"I was a man who remembered spirit and its knowledge. As a man I did not attempt to counteract error with knowledge, but to correct error from the bottom up. I demonstrated both the powerlessness of the body and the power of the mind. By uniting my will with that of my Creator, I naturally remembered spirit and its real purpose." (T-3.IV.7:3-6)

I loved the many uplifting passages that call on us to see ourselves as God sees us, to see ourselves as we really are. 

"Child of God, you were created to create the good, the beautiful and the holy. Do not forget this." (T-1.VII.2:1-2)

"God and His miracle are inseparable. How beautiful indeed are the Thoughts of God who live in His light! Your worth is beyond perception because it is beyond doubt. Do not perceive yourself in different lights. Know yourself in the One Light where the miracle that is you is perfectly clear." (T-3.V.10:5-9)

Over the next decade I went from being a student of the Course to becoming the facilitator for a Saturday morning study group at Hillside, helping others engage with the material. By the mid-1990s, however, my spiritual practice had taken a backseat as the distractions of career, family, and relationships took center stage. I remember during this period constantly having the feeling that I was living life incompletely, that something important was missing, that I was going through the motions but asleep at the wheel and not living the life I was supposed to be living.

My wake-up call came in 2003 when my father made his transition. My mind went to thinking about my own mortality. I remember calling out for answers: “God, what is all this for? Why am I here? Am I supposed to just be a loving person to my neighbors? Or am I just a pawn on your great chessboard being asked to do certain things to achieve a greater good in your grand design? Or am I…? Or am I…?” 

When the student is ready, the teacher appears. 

My mother introduced me to Gary Renard’s first book, The Disappearance of the Universe (DU). What an amazing gift. If A Course in Miracles is the “can,” I believe DU is the can opener. In his book, Gary Renard describes 17 visits he received from two ascended masters who, in those visits, provided a detailed linear description of the Course and how it applies to our lives. I believe that the conversational style of the writing and the clear explanations provided by his teachers can help Course students gain a richer understanding of the Course.

Whether you believe Gary Renard was actually visited by ascended masters can be an ego distraction. My sense is that the real question is whether the insights provided in the book are helpful to you or not. For me, my understanding of the Course was raised to a new level based on some key insights:

· The explanation of why the Text is so difficult for most of us to understand became clear. (It is written as a hologram where every part contains the whole. That is, it is written as if you already understand it and not as a linear, step-by-step, mind-shifting study.) This forces you to read it both more slowly and multiple times.

· It explains how, despite the Course making it clear that the only answer is forgiveness, most Course teachers don’t understand true forgiveness and don’t teach it. (I certainly didn’t in my first rendition as a Course facilitator.)

· It emphasizes how the Course is designed to be a practical guide for daily living, not a theoretical, academic spiritual work. Every day, and every moment of every day, should be dedicated to the miraculous forgiveness principles of the Course.

· It makes it very clear that as we see our brothers, we see ourselves. As we forgive our brothers, we forgive ourselves. That we can be thankful to those people who “get on our last nerve” because without them, we would be unaware of the areas of healing needed inside of ourselves. 

· It describes how our natural tendency is to interpret the Course in terms of what we already know and to devolve the non-dualistic principles into dualistic ones where we believe God, our brothers, and everything else in our version of reality is outside of us.

· Yet, we can’t “enter” Heaven alone, because we are not alone. There is only one of us, and it is all of us, without exception.

· It reminds us that our “return” to Heaven is guaranteed. It is a done deal because we never left. Just as when we dream at night that someone is chasing us, it can be terrifying. It feels very real because our awareness is on the dream. But when we wake up, our awareness shifts, and we find that we are really at home in our bed. The dream disappears because it was never there in the first place. It was only our awareness that made it seem real.

· In this same way, we are dreaming that this experience of our life is real, because this is where our awareness is. When we wake up, our awareness will shift back to where we really are and have always been, at home in God. And the universe, for us and everyone, disappears. How do we wake up? That is what forgiveness is all about. When we see our brothers and the world as the Holy Spirit sees them, that is, when we have forgiven the world, we will let go, wake up, and “return” home.

DU helped set me back to living my purpose of being a teacher of God and understanding that I teach every moment through my thoughts, words, and actions. I knew I needed to learn the Course at a much deeper level.

On Sunday, January 5, 2020, a group from Unity Atlanta started a two-year study of the Course. Many of us had been a part of study groups for the Course before and recognized it was easy to get bogged down in academic discussions debating terminology. Several had been a part of groups over the years but had never gotten through the entire Text.

Our intention was to create a different experience for ourselves.

· We laid out a two-year weekly schedule which had us covering 2–4 sections of a chapter each week and starting a new chapter every 3 or 4 weeks.

· We set up a workgroup process that started with meditation, had discussion time about the Course content, and included small group breakout where we shared in a smaller group how we applied the Course content in our lives.

· Our focus was on practicing the presence of God. Our mantra: “Father, in this moment, what would You have me think, say, or do?”

There was one other piece of our study that proved helpful. In my work life, I was a Certified Master Facilitator, someone whose expertise focuses on helping leadership teams come together to develop and implement strategies to drive their organization’s success. One of the key differences between a consultant and a facilitator is that while a consultant often studies an organization’s situation and provides answers, a key role a facilitator plays is to ask the questions that allow a team to get to their own answers. Facilitators know that when people create their own answers, they have much higher levels of commitment to action.

In my role as our study group facilitator, I used this same principle. A week before each class I would review the study and provide study group members with a series of questions that I believed would help us get at the key insights in the week’s reading. 

The questions were designed to guide participants in understanding the key meaning in each section. See, I believe the scribe and editor of the Course added the section headings to provide us with the key idea to be gleaned from each section. However, in my early days of reading the Course, I could easily get to the end of a section and look back at the section heading and have no idea what I had just read! 

At one point I began making it a habit to read a section and then at the end write down what I believed was the key point that “answered” the section title. This pushed me to slow down and helped to ensure I was seeking to understand rather than just get through the reading. These notes helped me later to formulate the questions used in the Study Guide.

Along with questions about the content, you will see that the Study Guide also includes an application question for each week’s study that is designed to provoke thinking and action around applying the reading to our lives. There are over 100 application questions.

Here is a sample application question from Chapter 1.

Application: Read 9/T-1.III.2:3-4. Remembering who we are and who our brothers are is a key component. What are the things in your life that can help you remember that you are wholly lovable and wholly loving?

As that first two-year study proceeded, our discussions grew richer, and our application of the material increased. In the small group discussions, I could hear how people’s lives were transforming, how relationships were healing, and how we were carrying peace and bringing peace so much more often in our lives.

When the shutdown occurred in March 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic, we immediately moved our study group to Zoom. An unintentional positive consequence of this move was that we began attracting participants from different parts of the country.

By December 2021, as we neared completion of our two-year study, the group decided to repeat the experience and deepen our study. By this time, I had created an individual study guide for each of the 31 chapters of the Course. This second time through gave me the opportunity to refine the study guides based on learnings from the first cycle. 

Toward the end of 2022, someone asked when I was going to publish the study guides so other people could benefit from them. 

What a great idea, I thought.