 Okay, hello everybody, welcome. Thank you for joining us. Hi, I'm Peter. I'm going to be hosting this weekend. Welcome to our online retreat, Purposes Everything. And we have a beautiful weekend ahead of us. We have quite a variety of different sessions, and so Spirit's going to reach you in many different ways, whatever way you can hear, just what you need to hear. And we have people joining us from all across the world and quite a few new participants this weekend too, so welcome. For those who are just watching the preview here on YouTube, you can also sign up. There's still time to sign up, so please do. So for today, we are going to be joined by Francis and David. I will just quickly mention, we will also have a community session later on this evening with some beautiful sharing. We have a movie workshop tomorrow and a very full weekend. So to start with, I'm going to pass it over to you, David and Francis. Thank you. Thank you, Pete. Hi, Francis. Hi, everyone. Hi, David. Hi, everyone. So welcome. Wow. I know I'm going to have a lot of fun this weekend with a retreat titled Purpose Is Everything. How can you not have fun? It's going to be deep. Yeah, Francis and I were talking this morning about Purpose, and you were getting all lit up and fired up too with the topic. Some beautiful passages flowing into you from, of course, some interesting miracles about purpose. And yeah, it's like we have, we all have grown up with, with this word purpose. And we've associated with different things in form with our personality. What's our purpose specifically in this world, you know, what are we supposed to do? We've associated with the doings, but yeah, Francis, I'm reading some quotes today from Jesus that kind of lifted up from the horizontal and the everyday mundane definitions of purpose to a higher purpose. That's really what Jesus could call a true purpose, a more accurate purpose, experience of purpose. I actually just, I just want to read this one sentence, because it felt so meaningful and relaxing when I read it, and I trust it will bring you immediate peace. So this is just a one sentence from the course that Jesus talked about purpose. He said, you have been called together with your brother to the most holy function this world contains. It is the only one that has no limits and reaches out to every broken fragment of the sunship with healing and uniting comfort. So yeah, when I read it yesterday, actually, I felt particularly meaningful because, because, you know, at the beginning of this journey, I felt it was quite, I was quite clueless about what I was called into except there was a recognition of a joy and attraction when I pick up the course, when I go toward, you know, letting up all my darkness and joining with my brothers in a very authentic way. There was a, there was a bubbling joy that started to happen in my heart, which was very, very foreign to me. And I thought if I can feel this way, there is no reason I have to, you know, go back to this depressing state of trying to make it out in this world. If heaven is feeling this way to me in those little glints, and that's all I want. That's all I would give my life over to. So that was really the only conscious choice I think I made. I want this. That's, that's the conscious decision. I want happiness. I want this bubbly joy. And I want it to be forever for me. That's all that there is. Then just looking back, I feel like just with this desire and this purpose held in my mind, then suddenly this pathway showed up. And every single step has been given to this point when I see again, reading again in the course that Jesus said, he's been called together with your brother to the most holy function this world has. I feel like this is the truth that we can all relax into. This is something that we can now celebrate together and relax into. Because we have found our purpose, which is in the Holy Spirit, which is the Spirit's purpose. So we're going to, I think this is a very, very deep topic because it is really the one decision that sets, that solves everything. That's why David and I feel so excited because we have come to the core of the only choice there is. And we're going to really go deep into this topic. And my wish and my prayer is, may we come out of this retreat being reminded of our heavenly function, and may we be inspired to just give it all to Jesus so that we can be happy with him. Yeah. Yeah, I join you friends in that prayer. We want to be happy. We really deep, deep down inside want to be happy. And I can just see Jesus smiling and go, yeah, that's great. That's your, that's your birthright. That's your inheritance. That's sure everything. And purpose is, is the key. I remember Jesus has written a lot of books through this David character over the years and there's some big books that are like three books and one, you know, unwind your mind back to God. And, but the, the tiniest book that I ever had come through from Jesus, it's so tiny that Jesus says it's not really a book, it's just a little pamphlet. And it was originally published as a little tiny pamphlet that would fit in a purse or fit in your back pocket. If you had jeans on, you could take this little booklet is called purpose is the only choice. And I remember when I took that down. It was basically such a beautiful teaching, but it was very brief. But it was about how all the purposes that you've tried to follow in this world aren't really your purpose. And you felt guilt because you tried to follow these definitions and these shoulds and obtuse and you've tried to be spiritual and you had your spiritual goals and then you seem to fall short on those. And Jesus is like, basically in the course he says, one question you can ask safely with any situation is what is it for. There's one place in the course where he tells us that there's one question we could ask safely with any situation. What is it for what is the purpose. And from the purpose you will perceive the situation you will perceive your, yourself, your brothers your sisters, all from that one question, what is it for. So I thought to start off today, you know, how many of you deep in your heart know that there's something called truth, and you've been on your journey to find the truth you know real simply. I want the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help me God. What about if I told you that when I opened my heart to truth. Be show me show me the truth, reveal to me the truth show me the truth. What I got was. It's simple. It's almost like the Beatles you know write all these songs and then they, they write. Okay, give it to me. It's easy. All you need is love. You know, we feel that when we hear that song. There's something inside us that leaps because we do identify with it's easy. All you need is love. So Jesus has done many teachings over the years but I'm going to take his two tiniest teachings, and both of the teachings. Help us get a get a grasp on this purpose because in a sermon on the mount there was many things spoken but the smallest little bit in the sermon on the mount was judge not. Okay, he said judge not and then for 2000 years people have been trying to practice that one with great difficulty. Like it's sticky flypaper you know, I'm trying to Jesus I'm trying to follow your follow your instructions there 2000 years ago judge not and it's like, Oh, it's so sticky that it seems to be more than a bad habit. It seems to be stuck. I want to describe the human condition stuck stuck on judgment, and Jesus says judge not. And then some of you read in the Gospel of Thomas that Jesus this is the second tiny tiny teaching, or Jesus said be passers by. He was telling us in just two words that were to pass this world by we're not to get caught up in its complexities, or not to get caught up in its nuances. Judge not be passers by you want it short and simple. There it is. Judge not be passers by. So, when we go for this topic today purpose purposes everything we are basically saying, we are praying to be shown a purpose that that is not of this world it's a purpose that's inspired from the Holy Spirit the great disorder, the great corrector, the representative of God, in terms of a sleeping mind the Holy Spirit's purpose is what we're going for. And I guess we could start off Francis by saying that that basically this purpose of the Holy Spirit is completely different from anything you've ever learned or heard about the word purpose. We think of the purpose of a car, the purpose of a house, the purpose of a glass, the purpose of a hand, you know, the purpose of a career, the purpose of a family, the purpose of you name it a job. We have been convinced of purposes that the ego made up and Jesus is just saying I want you to come in side to the Holy Spirit and realize that the purpose of forgiveness is completely unlike anything that you've ever associated ever in your life with this word purpose. So I think that's that's a good place to start. That's, that's, we have to really be open to having been wrong about everything we thought about purpose to be shown to be revealed what the Holy Spirit's purposes. I think that's that's why this journey feels so different because we are saying yes, because the purpose is in the mind. So when we say yes, we're saying yes to in our mind to join the Holy Spirit. That's really our willingness to say yes. I actually read just read this recently Jesus says, you know, the world is used to heal the Son of God. That's really the only purpose the Holy Spirit gives the world. And it's a collaborative effort, which means that I, Jesus, I will tell you what to do. But you have to trust that I know and you have to want to hear the guidance. So that's the collaboration he's talking about. So what he is saying is the whole purpose of this world is completely retranslated by the Holy Spirit to something you would never know. But you can play your part by wanting to hear the Holy Spirit guidance to guide you throughout this journey. And by trusting that I know by trusting that he knows is very, very important because the temptation I know for myself, starting with a very intellectual mind is trying to figure out big time. What the purpose is. If okay, if, if, if I'm not going to do this, if this doesn't make me happy, then how do I, you know, understand everything else along this awakening journey. How do I do? How do I forgive this situation? For, you know, joy in my relationships as if I can actually figure out and understand how to reach heaven. But the biggest learning for me along this journey is realizing that we actually have a divine helper with us. And it is his purpose to translate everything to us if we're willing to listen. So that means that we cannot understand anything unless we choose to join with the Holy Spirit first, unless we choose to have peace and forgiveness first. But it also makes the journey very, very simple. Very, very simple. Because I, you know, Jesus is saying, you know, the plan is not decided by you and you need to take thoughts for nothing. Careless of everything except the purpose that you're given. And we're given this heavenly purpose in every single moment. And I, when I read that, I thought, wow, I've never heard Jesus say to me, be careless, be careless, be careless of everything. That really caught my attention and I like that. That, that is how different it is. We're not going to try to figure out the form of things and what this world means to us, what every situation. And every, you know, everything means for us, except we're going to be saying yes, and let the Spirit tell us in every single situation. Yeah. So when you look, even at a Course in Miracles and you think, wow, it's a course. Jesus says it's a required course, only the time you take it is voluntary. But even a Course, you, you tend to think of learning the Course and then the more you get deeper into it. You're like, oh, it looks like he wants me to unlearn everything. I thought for sure this was a Course in learning and now it looks like, oh, oh, it's, it's going in the other direction. It's more empty my mind unlearn everything that I've ever learned unlearn the purposes I gave to everything as an ego. Unlearn everything I ever learned in the past. And, and again, Francis and I were, we like to speak from our experiences, you know, Francis and I spent about 23 years combined in the university. I see Mariana from over in Spain, you're from university, we can relate Mariana can relate to us, you know, we were in that university game, you know, playing the roles with, you know, helping teachers having being in graduate assistance. I mean, you know, there's a lot of work with undergrad and grad and it just goes on and on it's like a game. And when you're part of it. It's, it's like how do I step out and live the course now. And that's what we're going to do we're going to talk about that because, because it does require the willingness to be shown the Holy Spirit's purpose of forgiveness that even in the metaphysics of a Course in miracles. Jesus tells us, you know, into eternity where all is one there crept a tiny mad idea, which the Son of God remembered not to laugh. And he's describing this little puff of nothingness ego it's a false belief of about identity and about everything. And then he tells us that, you know, God did not create a meaningless world. Wow. There goes my biblical training from Genesis in the Genesis and the Bible that God created the heavens and the earth. But in workbook lesson 14 already just 14 out of 365. He says God did not create a meaningless world. And he's teaching us that the ego made time and space who. Oh my gosh that's that's a big one. And then I was reading through the course for years and going deeper deeper and then I remember the first time I came up on the place in the text where Jesus said, he referred to the maker of another world, and he capitalized maker. Oh, you got me spinning now. So God didn't create this world. The ego made this world. And now there's a capital M maker of another world. And he's like, he's referring to the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit answered the distorted, deceived fragmented world that the ego made up with a holistic, beautiful, shiny, forgiven world. And he calls it the happy dream. Oh my gosh, the Holy Spirit made the happy dream that's my gift from God, even while I'm perceiving a world there's a happy dream. Well that must be associated with this purpose that I'm supposed to follow, because if the Holy Spirit is the capital M maker of this other world. Jesus does refer to this even in lesson 129 of the workbook beyond this world is a world I want. There's a workbook lesson that that praise and ask to let me see your holy world. Ooh, he's putting holy world, two words together that that I thought I didn't think went together but he's talking about the happy dream. And then in the simplest way to say it, the happy dream is is a dream without judgment. It's like you have to behold the world in a new way. Then, then you ever saw it before you have to let go of all aspects of the past to behold the forgiven world. That's our gift. Forget the Christmas gifts. This is a gift that our mind needs. We don't need perfume and some ornaments we actually need. We need forgiveness. We need the true experience of forgiveness. I think what it's been for both Francis and I was it took it it's just taking a willingness to go in that direction because our past learning is saying you know, you've got to personally meet all your needs. And Jesus is saying no actually I will provide for you if you trust and listen to me. In the world, the world says you're responsible for lots of things. That's part of being a mature citizen of the world is to be a responsible mature citizen of the world and Jesus is like, Well, why don't you give me that responsibility word that's so heavy for you. And, and give it to me and I'll give it back to you in a new way I'll retranslate it. Ah, you're responsible for your state of mind. Oh, thank you. You're responsible for accepting the correction. Oh, good. I like that. You're not responsible for the world the ego made why would you be responsible for the egos errors. If the ego is not you. Why should you take on the egos errors if the ego is not you. So, this weekend, we're just going into this so deeply to start to realize that that we have to let go of trying to be in charge of our own awakening. Because you cannot wake.