One of the key teachings of A Course in Miracles (ACIM) is that we are not our body and God did not create our physical form. Several lessons in the Workbook of ACIM ask us to focus on the following affirmations: “I am not a body. I am free. For I am still as God created me.” When I first began to study ACIM I had difficulty with this radical concept. How could God not have created the body?

I found the answer to that question in ACIM teacher, Gary Renard’s book, “The Disappearance of the Universe,” p.39. Speaking about non-dualism, one of Gary’s Ascended Masters explains that: “…anything that comes from God must be exactly like Him. God could not create anything that is not perfect or else He wouldn’t be perfect. The logic of that is flawless. If God is perfect and eternal, then by definition anything He creates would also have to be perfect and eternal.” That made sense to me. It became obvious that God could not have created our human bodies as the words “perfect” and “eternal” could hardly be used to describe them.

So, what are we? Jesus says in ACIM that we are eternal spirit, created by God as an extension of Him. As He has no physical form, how could we have one? If we can really grasp this, then the transiency of life on the physical plane, will not be such a sad thing to think about. It is as though we are just passing through in temporary bodies on a journey that must ultimately take us back Home. Along the way we will dip in and out of many different physical forms, in many different eras, on many different planets and all of it is part of the great illusion that we managed to inflict upon ourselves at the time of the “tiny, mad idea” of separation from God. So it helps to remember that: “I am not a body. I am free.”