OrEd-T-25.3-Savior From the Dark.1

12. What the body's eyes perceive does fill me with fear. Perhaps I fancy to attain some peace and satisfaction in the world as I perceive it. Yet, it is evident the outcome does not change. Despair is always the result, despite my hopes and wishes. There is no exception, and never will be. The past gave me no rewards that I wish to keep. My learning this is the only value the past can have. This makes me willing to relinquish it and have it gone forever.

13. It is strange that I would cherish hope of satisfaction from the world I see. Fear and guilt has always been my reward. How long is needed for me to realize the chance of change in this respect is not worth delaying the change that might result in a better outcome? The way I see now gives no support to future hope and success. This makes me hopeless. Yet this is my choice, while I seek for hope where none is ever found.

14. But it is also true that I have found some hope apart from this--some glimmering, wavering, yet dimly seen, that hope is warranted on grounds that are not in this world. But, I still hope that rewards may still be here, preventing me from giving up the hopeless, unrewarding task I set for myself. It does not make sense to keep doing what has never succeeded, believing that this time it will be different.

15. The past has failed. I am glad that it is gone from my mind. Because form is only a means for content, now I must not confuse form and content. The frame is only a means to hold up a picture so it can be seen. There is no purpose to a frame that hides the picture. If the frame is all I see, it cannot be a frame. A frame without a picture has no meaning. The purpose of a frame is to show the picture.

16. Who hangs an empty frame, and stands gazing as if seeing a masterpiece? Yet, if I see my brother as a body, this is what I do. The masterpiece that God set within the frame (his body), is all there is to see. The body holds it for a while without obscuring it in any way. Yet, what God created needs no frame, for He supports and frames within Himself what He created. He offers His masterpiece for me to see. I would rather see God's masterpiece than the frame.