1. Everyone who is sent to you is a patient of yours. ²This does not mean that you select him, nor that you choose the kind of treatment that is suitable. ³But it does mean that no one comes to you by mistake. ⁴There are no errors in God’s plan. ⁵It would be an error, however, to assume that you know what to offer everyone who comes. ⁶This is not up to you to decide. ⁷There is a tendency to assume that you are being called on constantly to make sacrifices of yourself for those who come. ⁸This could hardly be true. ⁹To demand sacrifice of yourself is to demand a sacrifice of God, and He knows nothing of sacrifice. ¹⁰Who could ask of Perfection that He be imperfect?

2. Who, then, decides what each brother needs? ²Surely not you, who do not yet recognize who he is who asks. ³There is Something in him that will tell you, if you listen. ⁴And that is the answer; listen. ⁵Do not demand, do not decide, do not sacrifice. ⁶Listen. ⁷What you hear is true. ⁸Would God send His Son to you and not be sure you recognize his needs? ⁹Think what God is telling you; He needs your voice to speak for Him. ¹⁰Could anything be holier? ¹¹Or a greater gift to you? ¹²Would you rather choose who would be god, or hear the Voice of Him Who is God in you?

3. Your patients need not be physically present for you to serve them in the Name of God. ²This may be hard to remember, but God will not have His gifts to you limited to the few you actually see. ³You can see others as well, for seeing is not limited to the body’s eyes. ⁴Some do not need your physical presence. ⁵They need you as much, and perhaps even more, at the instant they are sent. ⁶You will recognize them in whatever way can be most helpful to both of you. ⁷It does not matter how they come. ⁸They will be sent in whatever form is most helpful; a name, a thought, a picture, an idea, or perhaps just a feeling of reaching out to someone somewhere. ⁹The joining is in the hands of the Holy Spirit. ¹⁰It cannot fail to be accomplished.

4. A holy therapist, an advanced teacher of God, never forgets one thing; he did not make the curriculum of salvation, nor did he establish his part in it. ²He understands that his part is necessary to the whole, and that through it he will recognize the whole when his part is complete. ³Meanwhile he must learn, and his patients are the means sent to him for his learning. ⁴What could he be but grateful for them and to them? ⁵They come bearing God. ⁶Would he refuse this Gift for a pebble, or would he close the door on the savior of the world to let in a ghost? ⁷Let him not betray the Son of God. ⁸Who calls on him is far beyond his understanding. ⁹Yet would he not rejoice that he can answer, when only thus will he be able to hear the call and understand that it is his?