June 30, 2020

Lesson 182 –

I will be still an instant and go home.   ACIM.p1.182

This is one of my favorite lessons from the Course. It never fails to bring peace to my mind. Always a return to the awareness of my true holiness and wholeness – my true Self. It reminds me that I am One with each One in Oneness. From this place I can see another, myself and the world differently. I am reminded to look beyond the appearance of what I think I see and understand to the beaty of the truth and reality beyond. I am healed as I alow the healing of another.

Take time today to lay aside your shield which profits nothing, and lay down the spear and sword you raised against an enemy without existence. Christ has called you friend. They have even come to ask your help in letting Them go home today, completed and completely. They have come as does a little child, who must beseech their parent for protection and for love. They rule the universe, and yet They ask unceasingly that you return with Them, and take illusions as your gods no more.   W-pI.182.11:1-5

There is a child in us who knows our true Self. This child knows the way home. This holy child is our guide. They ask us to rest an instant, to slow down in our frantic effort to make sense of the chaos and confusion of the world we think we see. When we are still an instant, when the world recedes from us, when valueless ideas cease to have value in our restless mind, then will we hear Their Voice. They call to us so poignantly that we stay with them a little longer. In that instant we are at home, and we will stay there with Them in perfect stillness, silent and at peace, beyond all words, untouched by fear and doubt, sublimely certain that we are at home.

You have not lost your innocence. It is for this you yearn. This is your heart’s desire. This is the voice you hear, and this the call which cannot be denied. The holy Child remains with you. Their home is yours. Today They give you Their defenselessness, and you accept it in exchange for all the toys of battle you have made. And now the way is open, and the journey has an end in sight at last. Be still an instant and go home with Them, and be at peace a while.   W-pI.182.12:1-9

Practice this lesson frequently. The holy Child within you is strong. Come without defenses, for They offer only love’s messages to those who think they are their enemy. They hold the might of Heaven and give Their strength. In stillness we find our true home. We have always been there, but blocked it from our awareness. Let your defenses fall away. We are already safe in our true home. Allow the holy Child within to bring us there as we become still for just an instant, long enough to allow Heaven to appear before our eyes.

June 23, 2020

Lesson 175 – Review of lessons 159 and 160

God is but Love, and therefore so am I.

(159) I give the miracles I have received. 
God is but Love, and therefore so am I.

(160) I am at home. Fear is the stranger here. 
God is but Love, and therefore so am I.   W-pI.175.1:1-2:3

This set of review lessons frames each lesson review in the idea that God [Source or Oneness] is nothing but Love, and therefore so are we. The main teaching of the Course is that we are simply Love – nothing else. How would our view of ourselves, each other and the world change if we adopted and believed this idea? Perhaps we are even afraid to go there. But this is where the Course askes us to go. It asks us to set aside all our preconceived ideas and notions about ourselves and just be open to the idea that we might actually be whole and holy. Let’s look at each review lesson in this light.

Lesson 159 tells us that we give the miracles we have received. The Course teaches us that we have everything we need. It also teaches us we have been given an abundance of miracles – even limitless. Perhaps we have mistakenly blocked all those miracles from our awareness. Be assured they are there and they are real just waiting to be given. For as with all that is real, all is shared. We receive miracles by giving them. This idea is contrary to any belief in separation for separation believes in limitation.

You understand that you are healed when you give healing. You accept forgiveness as accomplished in yourself when you forgive. You recognize another as yourself, and thus do you perceive that you are whole. There is no miracle you cannot give, for all are given you. Receive them now by opening the storehouse of your mind where they are laid, and giving them away.   W-pI.159.2:1-5

Miracles are Love and their result is Love. What else could we possibly want? Look then at lesson 160. The Course teaches us that Love and fear are opposites and cannot coexist. One of the sayings so famous from the Course is, “Love is letting go of fear.” When we align our minds with the miracle of Love, fear is the stranger to our mind and fades to nothingness. How many times have we been told to not be afraid? We have nothing to fear in the light of our wholeness and holiness. An open mind will find this idea completely plausible.

How simply, then, the question is resolved. Who fears has but denied themselves and said, “I am the stranger here. And so I leave my home to one more like me than myself, and give them all I thought belonged to me.” Now are they exiled of necessity, not knowing who they are, uncertain of all things but this; that they are not themselves, and that their home has been denied to them.   W-pI.160.5:1-4

The gist of the problem is that we have denied who we really are and thus blocked our true identity and holiness from our minds. The solution is simply the reverse, to be willing to stop denying who we really are and allow the miracle of a shift in our minds to awaken us to our wholeness. Let this lesson bear its fruit in our minds. We are Love and nothing else in reality. We will see the world, ourselves and each other differently when we make this realization. Today we can realize the healing of our mind.

June 16, 2020

Lesson 168 –

Your grace is given me. I claim it now.   ACIM W.p1.168

As I began to contemplate this lesson again, I asked myself, “What does the Course mean by ‘Your grace is given me.’” I have learned that we all have everything we need.  I have also learned that we are all holy, complete, whole and limitless. If I already have everything, what is this grace I am given? Then I realized this lesson is talking to my split mind. My split mind does need healing and awakening. And, it appears to my split mind that I am lacking what I need. I see the grace as the beautiful way in which Spirit holds the truth of who I really am for me until I am ready to accept and step into that awareness. Who or what holds that remembrance may appear different to each of us. Perhaps we see that entity as God, Source, Spirit, Oneness or our Higher Holy Spirit Self. The grace is that it is held without judgement, knowing we are already whole even when we don’t see it ourselves. The Course tells us this:

Today we ask of Source the gift They have most carefully preserved within our hearts, waiting to be acknowledged. This the gift by which Source leans to us and lifts us up, taking salvation’s final step Themselves. All steps but this we learn, instructed by Their Voice. But finally Source comes Themselves, and takes us in Their Arms and sweeps away the cobwebs of our sleep. Their gift of grace is more than just an answer. It restores all memories the sleeping mind forgot; all certainty of what Love’s meaning is.   W-pI.168.3:1-6

What are we waiting for? The split mind we have made for ourselves is not real. It is separation and thus is illusion. We are not separated in any way for we are all of one Mind,. When we realize our Oneness, we recognize our wholeness, completeness, limitlessness and holiness. These are the unchangeable essences of our true being. What Joy it is to recognize this. What Peace and Love wells up in our mind when we realize this. This perfection has always been within us, though hidden by our belief in separation. In our acceptance, the ancient memory of our true Self in Oneness rises in our Mind. All memories of unworthiness recede in the light of Truth when we embrace such Light.

Source loves Their One Child. Request Them now to give the means by which this world will disappear, and vision first will come, with knowledge but an instant later. For in grace you see a light that covers all the world in love, and watch fear disappear from every face as hearts rise up and claim the light as theirs. What now remains that Heaven be delayed an instant longer? What is still undone when your forgiveness rests on everything?   W-pI.168.4:1-5

Let us now claim this grace that has been given us. It is within us in plain sight. Nothing of reality and truth are hidden from us. Only our disbelief in our holiness blocks our awareness of our truth from us. Turn to the Light grace reveals to us and see clearly who we really are. Not one of our mistakes matters. They fade into nothingness in the Light of Truth. Let them go, for they do not serve us. Peace, Love and Joy are always ours. Repeat again this lesson, this prayer.

Your grace is given me. I claim it now. Source, I come to You. And You will come to me who ask. I am the One Child You love.   ACIM W.p1.168.6:5-9

June 9, 2020

Lesson 161 –

Give me your blessing, holy Child of God.   ACIM W.p1.161

Are we willing to accept  blessing? Our willingness is key to true change and growth. Our minds must be willing to be open to a different perception. We become engrained in a certain way of thinking which keeps us fully entrenched in our belief in separation. Allowing our mind to even consider a different perception is the beginning  of a new way of thinking and a new experience of our true Self. This lesson asks us to ask another for blessing. The blessing is the realization of who we really are. Perhaps we are unwilling to trust another, but this lesson begins to show us a way to perceive others in a different light. In that different light we begin to see them as our savior, seeing our holy Self reflected in them. Thus begins the beginning of stepping into the realization that we are all One, joined in the completeness of the unification of Creation – Oneness.

Today we practice differently, and take a stand against our anger, that our fears may disappear and offer room to love. Here is salvation in the simple words in which we practice with today’s idea. Here is the answer to temptation which can never fail to welcome in the Christ where fear and anger had prevailed before. Here is At-one-ment made complete, the world passed safely by and Heaven now restored. Here is the answer of the Voice for God.   W-pI.161.1:1-5

We are used to thinking in specifics in the world we see. We are not used to seeing in the abstract. So, our learning will be in the form of specifics. We don’t comprehend that we are all One at this time, so our teaching and learning will come from the understanding of separation while that is what we believe. Each one we encounter at any given moment is who Spirit uses to teach us.

One friend is all friends. Every mind contains all minds, for every mind is one. Such is the truth. Yet do these thoughts make clear the meaning of creation? Do these words bring perfect clarity with them to you? What can they seem to be but empty sounds; pretty, perhaps, correct in sentiment, yet fundamentally not understood nor understandable. The mind that taught itself to think specifically can no longer grasp abstraction in the sense that it is all-encompassing. We need to see a little, that we learn a lot.   W-pI.161.4:1-8

And so we begin to see the world differently. We look beyond the appearance of the world to the glimpses of reality beyond. It will take practice, but if we are willing, we will begin to see the transformation. Our readiness is closer now, and we will come nearer true vision. If we are intent on reaching it, we will succeed. Once we have succeeded, we will not be willing to accept what we previously settled for. What we will see will sing to us of ancient melodies we remember. This is the remembrance of Heaven, which we have never really left.

Select one friend, symbol of the rest, and ask salvation of them. See them first as clearly as you can, in that same form to which you are accustomed. See their face, their hands and feet, their clothing. Watch them smile, and see familiar gestures which they make so frequently. Then think of this: What you are seeing now conceals from you the sight of one who can forgive you all your mistakes; whose sacred hands can take away the nails which pierce your own, and lift the crown of thorns which you have placed upon your bleeding head. Ask this of them, that they may set you free:

Give me your blessing, holy Child of God. I would behold you with the eyes of Christ, and see my perfect sinlessness in you.   W-pI.161.11:1-8

And Spirit will answer Whom you called upon. For Spirit will hear the Voice for God in you, and answer in your own. Behold your friend now, whom you have seen as merely flesh and bone, and recognize that Christ has come to you. Today’s idea is your safe escape from anger and from fear. Be sure you use it instantly, should you be tempted to attack another and perceive in them the symbol of your fear. And you will see them suddenly transformed from enemy to savior; from the devil into Christ.   W-pI.161.12:1-6

Let this blessing flow over and through you. Let this grace fill you as it raises you to a higher place where we can see clearly.