Greetings to you, this day. I am Jeshua. And you have asked me a question this day. And your question is this—“Why is the world?” As you seek to understand, in your thinking, life here, as you seek for peace and love and the atonement and forgiveness, the question has arisen– “Why has creative spirit created and made this world in the first place?” And the answer follows from the question– “Why does, would, creative spirit do anything?” When you use the word “do”, you think of bodies as doing things. You might have a physical task that you accomplish, something that you make or construct. You might think of a project that you would finish, even if it be academic and involves thinking and writing. But you think of doing something.
Spirit does not do anything. Spirit simply becomes. God, the source of all that is, created beings like unto himself with creative power, to create and experience whatever could be desired or imagined, in your terms. And as I have told you, the only thing that the created beings cannot do is turn around and change the Creator. For the nature of the Creator, for the nature of God, is perfect, infinite, unconditional love. And that is what you, creative spirit, are, and must be, and can not change.
What, then, is the purpose of being itself? The purpose is to create. To create what? Anything at all. Love is perfect freedom, and existence simply is. It does no good to ask the question– “Where did God come from? Why is God?” God is simply existence, as I have told you. God is love. Outside of your time, God is. Within your time, God has always been and shall always be, infinite, and forever. And that is all. So being exists. And it creates. And creation flows outward from the source. You have creations. And those creations have creations, and on and on unto what you perceive as infinity.
And still the question arises– “Why this world?” I have told you in A Course in Miracles, for you, in this world, God’s will for you is perfect happiness. Happiness comes from doing and experiencing that which brings you joy. And that is the purpose of existence. Joy– and that is all.
It is easy for you here to perceive that you need to grow, and accomplish, and become. And that is because, without recourse, you are constrained, at one time or another, to find the pathway home. And that is part of the design of this world. However, spirit does not need to grow. Spirit is not in a testing ground. Spirit, you, creative spirit, was not created as a spirit child who then must grow and mature and evolve, eventually graduating into a fully fledged creative spirit. No, in the instant of your creation, you were complete and whole. And so, there is nothing as spirit that you need to become, or need to accomplish, in your world.
You look out at all of your brothers, who seem separate from you, and you want to care about them, because there is within you the quiet knowing that you are one. And you look at the circumstances in your world, and you are wont to help others, if you understand love. In the world of spirit, it is not so. Spirit is complete. Spirit is perfect. Spirit is unconditional and infinite love. So is there anything that spirit needs to do to care for others, if you think of separation, or to contribute to the oneness, if you think in spirit terms. And the answer is no, indeed. So is there anything that spirit needs to become, or to do, or to imagine, or to create? And the answer is– not at all.
So why would you do anything? To make happy, in the sense of your world. You might say, to have fun. Can you think of this world, if you wish, as a game? For you do play games, and some of your games use your computers. Fun, indeed. And you might find yourself in a world that you must discover and perhaps escape from, or to reach some goal. And in many of your games, the goal is not even defined. You have to figure it out as you go along. And you thoroughly enjoy those games because of fun and challenge. And you know that in such scenarios in your game, you are absolutely safe.
And here is a world that creative spirit has made up. And that is the illusory part of this world. The physical world is made up made up only of love, but still made up. You, your body, your brain, your thoughts, are just made up. You are placed in a world out of love, and that out of necessity came and went in but an instant. But that is how creative power works. It knows not of time. But, in the illusion of this world, the illusion of your brain, the illusion of your thoughts which I have told you have no meaning and are just images, in the illusion of this world, it seems, does it not, that your thoughts can make a difference. And you can choose, as I have told you before, between two voices, the voice of fear, the voice of the illusion and the voice of love.
You are placed here in an imaginary world as spirit created it, and think of it as a game if you wish, in which you need to find your way home. You are given a brain. And thoughts are placed in it. And those are the images which seem to tell you of your world. And above all, those images tell you of who you are. And that is your ego. And you know enough now to see that the goal of the game is to release fear so that you can discover love and be home. The goal of the game is to release the building blocks of your ego, which likewise, are fear, so you can find your way home.
And there is guidance within your world, as I have told. You spirit, placed a tiny, tiny, spark of discontent, deep within your being that tells you that you need to be seeking for something. But if you knew right from the start what you were to do, it wouldn’t be as much fun. So you can think of your space-time as a game which you created, a game in which all spirit is absolutely safe and no harm can come to anyone.
So you have a tiny spark within you. Yet you live a life based on egos and the notion of separation. And it doesn’t take long to realize that it seems not to be so much fun. For there seem to be struggles, and becoming, agendas, and the absence of peace. You can play that game as long as you like. But as I have told you, you must one day in your time evolve back into the awareness of love and exit the playground totally. Or can you come back here and play in different lifetimes, different chapters in different scenarios. And indeed, you can try being rich and being poor. You can you try being healthy and being sick. You can try being male and being female. And the list goes on.
So the purpose of the world is simply happiness. And when you play your games here, you do it because it is fun, because it makes you happy– all the while knowing that no harm can come to you. So a huge step for you in enjoying this world is realizing that no harm can come to you. And eventually, as I have told you, you will discover that the real pathway home is to let go of all of your fears, to let go of ego itself, of your whole belief that you are separate and isolated and alone. And then you can live life here as long as you like in a world which is totally love, and a world that is oneness and peace and harmony.
And when you do that, then you will realize, of course, that the world of fear and the world of ego, even though it may have seemed fun at the time, was nothing compared to the happiness and joy you will feel when living here in a world that is totally of love. And that, of course, is living in the world but not of the world. It is living in the world without the confines and constraints of ego and fear. And that, in essence, is what spirit created, a world of space- time, just for fun, a world that is totally made of love because it could not be otherwise.
So you ask—“why the world?” You ask—“Why anything?” I have told you, spirit does not need to become. Spirit does not need to contribute to, or help, the oneness. For it is already complete and whole.
So in your world, you think of imagination. And the purpose of creation is to experience joy and use that creative power, doing whatever you can imagine. And this world of space-time is but one of those. And there are myriads and myriads of other creations that as spirit you can experience and enjoy forever and ever in your time. In the world of spirit everything is love. You are love. This world is love. And that is happiness, and that is joy.
My blessings upon you all. That is all.
Brent A. Haskell, Ph.D., D.O.
(Editor’s note: Brent Haskell is the author of Journey Beyond Words and The Other Voice: A Companion to the Text of The Course Chapters 1-15 (Miracles Studies Book). During October, 2012, I had the pleasure of meeting Brent at the Miracles In The Mountains conference in Cañon City, Colorado and hearing him give a presentation there, during which he offered to send several articles – including this one – via an email to those interested.)