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The Fourth Obstacle

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NOTE
The following is a conversation
between Paul and Raj
which occurred early
this morning.

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Paul: Good morning, Raj!

Raj: Indeed. Good morning.

Paul: I understand that you have some things to say . . .

Raj: It’s all right if you use the words, “some things you need to say,” because that does reflect the truth of the situation.

But let’s back off a little. We don’t need to make your experience the focus. And it will be easier to hear me if you aren’t listening with that slant.

Paul: I am apprehensive, but insistent upon Listening and hearing!

Raj: I know, Paul. Relax. We are learning about “persistence of Vision,” believe it or not! And the meaning of those words only becomes truly clear when it no longer feels justifiable to have faith in their meaning.

Right now, today, you are discouraged enough to not want to persist in doing the work it takes to experience Vision — the perspective enjoyed in joined communion. And now you know that there is a limit as to how much effort you’re willing to put forth . . . or, put another way, that you have placed a value on Vision which isn’t relevant to Vision, but to your level of comfort!

What that means is that the only value Vision has had for you has been an arbitrary one, determined not by any absolute Value, but a value of personal convenience — an unpleasant but essential discovery.

I know you can now see that, in this mindset, you have been the center and circumference of it all! And although, in the independence and privacy of that perception, it has not been impossible to actually experience Vision . . . or hear the Voice for Truth in order to be able to give voice to It . . . it has been insufficient for Awakening.

I also know you’re surprised. I know you thought that it was current circumstances which simply overwhelmed and depressed you . . . more extremely than anything has before. But it’s not true.

What you can now see, even though reluctantly, is that you have been unconsciously bargaining for improvement — even for Awakening — unaware that in the periods between Listening for, Hearing, and giving voice to the Voice for Truth, you were not yet faced with the absolute requirement to engage in it permanently because THAT’S what “coming Home” means!

Abandoning the “far land” and the further “squandering” of your Birthright puts you (puts the Prodigal) in the position of finding your Father coming out to meet YOU and taking the last step for you! But! Even the trek home, through familiar but miserable territory doesn’t prepare the Prodigal for the surprise and demand to shake the dust from his feet and leave EVERYTHING behind! And you are discovering that the intent to wake up, the intent to shift allegiance from the ego to the Holy Spirit, although essential, is not sufficient!

Not sufficient for what? It is not sufficient to move one into the perspective where the Father can be seen, coming out to meet you, so that you may abandon all of the apparently exciting and meaningful experiences you had in your adventure of independence and yield into What you Are — the Son of a Father, who, whether he slopped with the hogs or slept with beautiful women, or managed to gain the respect of a whole village, never actually lost His Identity, or His Brotherhood with His Brother at Home, who didn’t join in the “adventure.” His holiness remained intact.

In the end there is only one learning to be gained from the excitement, terror and suffering of the adventure: There is nothing to learn from it! Nothing to take Home with you . . . being nothing but a misperception of Home, indulged in and finally abandoned.

As the Prodigal headed Home and his Father saw him a long way off, the Father didn’t see him in the exciting, terrorizing, suffering land which the son (Who didn’t believe he was a Son) thought he was still in the process of leaving. And the Father didn’t go into that “far off land” to meet him, but met him where His Son had been all along . . . at Home.

So, now you know that you still identify with orphanhood, with being a “divine one” in a human condition, even after all of our time together. And the part of you which still believes this, is offended by the requirement, the DEMAND, to stop taking time out to be an orphan — an independent “self.”

You had no idea that there was a limit as to just how far you would go, a point at which YOU would refuse to go any further. But that is where you find yourself. And learning this is what you didn’t want to learn. And actually leaving it all behind is not what you WHOLEHEARTEDLY want to do, even though you ”definitely” do.

In the Course, this is named the Fourth Obstacle to Peace — the final one — called the “Fear of God.” No one returning Home bypasses this “intimidating” surprise. It is unavoidable, but not a sign that something has gone wrong.

The “one” who “thinks” he is a Prodigal cannot return Home! And as an experience, this is not pleasant, because while he is still in the “far-land” perception, leaving it seems to be the extinction of “who he is” instead of the restoration of Who He IS! And the restoration of Who He IS will not occur until he lets His Father meet Him. And he will not let His Father meet Him until he risks extinction and humbly says to His approaching Father, “Thy will, not mine be done.”

When that happens, the profound meaning of the statement which has always had a negative connotation will illuminate his divinity!

“That which I most greatly feared
has come upon me.”
I yielded and
let It in!

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