Miracles are a way of earning release from fear. Revelation induces a state in which fear has already been abolished. Miracles are thus a means and revelation is an end (T-1.I.28:1-3).
Use of the word “earning” here is distracting – it implies contingency. If I do this, then God will do that. And God does not work that way.
Rather, it is helpful to think that miracles are the means by which release from fear is experienced in a context of separation. Fear is not real; yet our belief in separation causes it to seem very real indeed. The miracle penetrates the erroneous belief in separation and fear, and induces as much healing as we are capable of accepting in that moment.
Bargaining and negotiation never enter into it. Quid pro quo never enters into it.
Still, miracles are a means to an end, where the end is the personal experience of revelation, which “reflects the original form of communication between God and His creations, involving the extremely personal sense of creation sometimes sought in physical relationships (T-1.II.1:2).
Revelation is temporary, but in that state fear is completely abolished. In that state, there is only the total realization of oneness with God, which is our true identity.
Here, A Course in Miracles is breaking with much of traditional Christianity. In ACIM, revelation is a direct experience of unity with God; it is not an exchange of information, resulting in updated scripture or other texts. It is more in the nature of a cosmic hug.
Always, the focus in ACIM is on our personal interior transformation. We move from separated being alone in the cosmos, pitted against fate, and doomed to die, to Christ, in which the knowledge that Love holds everything brings about the end of doubt and fear. This transformation is reflected in our acceptance of Love over fear, which is the very experience the miracle induces.
This is not a matter of attainment. There is nothing special about the one who experiences the miracle. And in revelation, there is no individual at all to subsequently claim some special insight or gift.
Indeed the focus of the miracle is in undoing any egoic inclination to specialness or uniqueness. As the eighteenth principle of miracles makes clear, miracles establish our equality before and as God. There is no difference anywhere.
