Lesson 230
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A COURSE IN MIRACLES
CH 20 THE PROMISE OF THE RESURRECTION
VIII. THE CONSISTENCY OF MEANS AND END
    
65 The body cannot be looked upon except through judgment. To see the body is the sign that you lack vision and have denied the means the Holy Spirit offers you to serve His purpose. How can a holy relationship achieve its purpose through the means of sin? Judgment you taught yourself; vision is learned from Him Who would undo your teaching. His vision cannot see the body because it cannot look on sin. And thus it leads you to reality. Your holy brother, sight of whom is your release, is no illusion. Attempt to see him not in darkness, for your imaginings about him will seem real there. You closed your eyes to shut him out. Such was your purpose, and while this purpose seems to have any meaning, the means for its attainment will be evaluated as worth the seeing, and so you will not see.

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A COURSE IN MIRACLES
WORKBOOK for STUDENTS
What is Forgiveness
WHAT IS FORGIVENESS? 

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*IAMBIC PENTAMETER*
 
   Forgiveness recognizes what you thought
   your brother did to you has not occurred.
   It does not pardon sins, and make them real.
   It sees there was no sin. And in this view
   are all your sins forgiven. What is sin
   except a false idea of God's Son?
   Forgiveness merely sees its falsity,
   and therefore lets it go. What then is free
   to take its place is now the Will of God.
 
   An unforgiving thought is one which makes
   a judgment that it will not raise to doubt,
   although it is untrue. The mind is closed,
   and will not be released. The thought protects
   projection, tightening its chains, so that
   distortions are more veiled and more obscure;
   less easily accessible to doubt,
   and further kept from reason. What can come
   between a fixed projection and the aim
   that it has chosen as its needed goal?
 
   An unforgiving thought does many things.
   In frantic action it pursues its goal,
   twisting and overturning what it sees
   as interfering with its chosen path.
   Distortion is its purpose, and the means
   by which it would accomplish it as well.
   It sets about its furious attempts
   to smash reality without concern
   for anything that would appear to pose
   a contradiction to its point of view.
 
   Forgiveness, on the other hand, is still
   and quietly does nothing. It offends
   no aspect of reality, nor seeks
   to twist it to appearance that it likes.
   It merely looks and waits and judges not.
   He who would not forgive must judge, for he
   must justify his failure to forgive.
   But he who would forgive himself must learn
   to welcome truth exactly as it is.
 
   Do nothing, then, and let forgiveness show
   you what to do through Him Who is your Guide,
   your Saviour and Defender, strong in hope
   and certain of your ultimate success.
   He has forgiven you already, for
   such is His function, given Him by God.
   Now must you share His function, and forgive
   whom He has saved, whose sinlessness He sees,
   and whom He honors as the Son of God. "
 
  ~ Original Hand Script September 21, 1970

  
CIRCLE OF ATONEMENT ~ COMMENTARY
          
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DAILY LESSON
SonShip Workbook
 L e s s o n 230
Now will I seek and find
the peace of God.


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   In peace I was created. And in peace
   do I remain. It is not given me
   to change my Self. How merciful is God
   my Father, that when He created me
   He gave me peace forever. Now I ask
   but to be what I am. And can this be
   denied me when it is forever so?

    Father, I seek the peace you gave as mine
    in my creation. What was given then
    must be here now, for my creation was
    apart from time and still remains beyond
    all change. The peace in which Your Son was born
    into Your Mind is shining there unchanged.
    I am as You created me. I need
    but call on You to find the peace You gave.
    It is Your Will that gave it to Your Son.

    ~ Original Handscript of ACIM  
 
  
          
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ACIM Edmonton - Sarah's Reflections 
ACIM Edmonton, CA
LESSON 230

Now will I seek and find the peace of God.

Sarah's Commentary:   

It is important to recognize in this Lesson that the state of peace and happiness is not something we need to achieve. Yearning for peace is based on the belief that we do not have it in us now. It denies the reality that the peace and joy we seek have been given us by a merciful God and given us forever. "What was given then must be here now, for my creation was apart from time, and still remains beyond all change." (W.230.2.2)
 
The Atonement Principle guarantees we cannot change the truth of what we are. "It is not given me to change my Self." (W.230.1.3) When we do not have peace, we are actually choosing against it. This is the case every time we choose the ego thought system, which is a choice to listen to our specialness and our attack thoughts rather than the Thought of God. If I am upset, I am actually choosing to be separate from the love I am. And if I stay upset, then I am stubbornly resisting surrendering my story. It seems insane to choose against our own peace, and it is. Our very identity in this world carries with it the insanity of the ego thought system. It is the belief the innocent, unlimited Son of God could make of itself a separated, lacking, and limited self. Why do we continue to hold onto our limited beliefs? We hold on because we have a fear of God's Will and have projected our fear onto God. Now we see Him as a punishing God, Who will extract from us what we value.
 
What we value most is our individual will. We think we will have to sacrifice to this "god" made- up by the ego. The final obstacle to peace is the fear of God. The mind is split and is in conflict between the truth of what we are, always and forever at peace as we were created and remain, and the part of the mind the ego has taken over. In our minds are both the belief in separation (the ego) and the memory of Oneness (the Holy Spirit). "The ego's goal is as unified as the Holy Spirit's, and it is because of this that their goals can never be reconciled in any way or to any extent. The ego always seeks to divide and separate. The Holy Spirit always seeks to unify and heal." (T.7.IV.5.1-3) (ACIM OE T.7.V.36)
 
So while we seek peace, we are actually afraid of it. This puts us in conflict with ourselves. Total peace means the end of our specialness, the end of our unique personality self, and the end of the body identification to which we are attached. This brings up fear, but we must remember we are not being hurled into reality. The Course is very practical. It offers us a daily process of undoing the thought system of the ego, which is what keeps us in hell. "The ego is the symbol of separation, just as the Holy Spirit is the symbol of peace." (T.5.III.9.4) (ACIM OE T.5.V.41) We work to fulfill our needs, based on our idea of what will bring us peace and happiness, but now we are pursuing real peace and trying more and more to trust in the Love of God. We are actually straddling two separate and distinct thought systems. We continue to follow the laws of the world, seeking for our happiness in the world, and blaming the world for our condition, while trying to trust in the teaching of Jesus and releasing our misperceptions about ourselves.
 
While we do both, we will be in conflict. The result is inconsistency in the way we experience our day. We say we want God as our only goal and we want the healing of our minds, yet we stubbornly hold onto our perspectives, arguing for our positions and demanding our needs be met at the expense of others. We cannot stubbornly hold onto our perspectives while still showing up fully in our own lives. The answer is to choose the Holy Spirit more and more consistently so that joy and peace can be more prevalent in our lives. This requires considerable vigilance. Clearly, once on this path, the choice to revert entirely to egoic thinking is no longer possible. Once we have started on this path, it is like having swallowed the blue pill (The Matrix), having said "yes" to the Call, and now it is impossible to make a total reversal. The "blue pill" has taken hold in our experience.
 
When we have an experience of the holy instant, it is an experience of the peace in us. When we choose and value our ego goals, we bring this peace to an end. The peace is still in us, but we are blocking it. We are always choosing between the truth, which brings peace, and falsity, which maintains our suffering. As I look at my concerns, my feelings of being overwhelmed, my excitement over plans I have, and the busyness of my life, I sometimes feel as if life were conspiring against me and actually robbing me of my peace, but it is just the ego's game. When my mind has made a choice for the ego, I am distracted by my thoughts and my conflicted goals. It is all a set-up, but it is set up by me! We continue to choose it because we think we know our own best interests, and we continue to choose it because we want to maintain the separate self.
 
Jesus is showing that us we are not victims of external circumstances. He is showing us that all we have to do is learn to recognize the mind's choice by paying very close attention to our feelings and judgments in this dream. Every time we feel the loss of peace, whether in the form of anger, depression, irritation, anxiety, concern, distress of any kind, excitement, or frustration, we bring our attention to the fact that we have once again made a decision for separation from the love in the mind. By recognizing this, we can become more vigilant about the choices being made by the mind. It requires us to rest our story about what we tell ourselves as the cause of our angst, accept our thoughts and feelings, turn them over to the Holy Spirit, and trust Him to do the rest.
 
It is only by this kind of attentiveness that we can undo our denial and let the Holy Spirit bring us to the truth. This is what salvation is all about---to be saved from our mistaken thoughts. But, like the miracle, salvation does nothing because nothing needs to be done. We are already perfect. We just need to bring our mistaken perceptions to the truth. When we become aware of how painful it is to choose the ego, we get very motivated to choose differently. Without this awareness and recognition, we become very confused about what seems to be coming at us. We feel like helpless victims of the world, but this victimhood is a way of not taking responsibility for our lack of peace. It is not because someone took it from us, but only because we have chosen to throw it away and blame our brother for taking it. We blame and attack because we do not want to be responsible for our own condition. We would rather put the blame on conditions and circumstances we believe are outside of our own minds.
 
When we identify with our ego and our specialness, we will always feel guilt, which is inevitably projected in some form of judgment against ourselves and others. This happens very quickly. Because of the mind's speed in forgetting (denial), we do not even notice what we have done. This is why it appears that everything is coming from outside of our own minds. It is why we need to pay attention to our thoughts and become aware of our judgments because they show us our choice for separation from the truth that has never left us.
 
We may even judge ourselves when we are not at peace. We may feel like poor Course students, who just aren't getting it. Yet both the conditions of peace and lack of peace are very valuable experiences for our learning. Through them, we can see how peace feels and how judgments cause us pain. Through these contrasts, we become aware of the choices we are making. When we are not at peace, it is for no other reason than we have chosen the ego. The world is just an outside picture of our inward condition. Thus, it is a sign of the choice we have made in our minds and which voice we are listening to, the ego or the Holy Spirit. It is not helpful to judge ourselves, but it is helpful to look at our mistaken decisions. Everything can be used by the Holy Spirit. It all has value when used for healing purposes.
 
And now we conclude our section on "What is forgiveness?" (W.PII.Q2) "Do nothing, then, and let forgiveness show you what to do, through Him Who is your Guide, your Savior and Protector, strong in hope, and certain of your ultimate success." (W.PII.Q1.5.1) "Now must you share His function, and forgive whom He has saved, whose sinlessness He sees, and whom He honors as the Son of God." (W.PII.Q1.5.3) We have not changed ourselves as a result of our foolish thoughts of sin. We can only become unaware of who we are. I love the line in the Text Chapter 19 that says, "What you would still contain behind your little barrier and keep separate from your brother seems mightier than the universe, for it would hold back the universe and its Creator." (T.19.IV.A.3.7) (ACIM OE T.19.V.a.42) That is precisely the power we have. It is our decision to choose illusion or the truth.

Through our healed perception, we share His function in the world. We are His manifestation in the world, bringing peace to other minds, offering kindness and gentleness, and by doing so, we know it is in us to give. It is, in fact, what we are in truth.

Love and Blessings, Sarah 
ACIM Original Edition
VIII. The Consistency of Means and End  
 
58 We have said much about discrepancies of means and end and how these must be brought in line before your holy relationship can bring you only joy. But we have also said the means to meet the Holy Spirit's goal will come from the same Source as does His purpose. Being so simple and direct, this course has nothing in it that is not consistent. The seeming inconsistencies or parts you find more difficult than others are merely indications of areas where means and end are still discrepant. And this produces great discomfort. This need not be. This course requires almost nothing of you. It is impossible to imagine one that asks so little or could offer more.
 
59 The period of discomfort that follows the sudden change in a relationship from sin to holiness should now be almost over. To the extent you still experience it, you are refusing to leave the means to Him Who changed the purpose. You recognize you want the goal. Are you not also willing to accept the means? If you are not, let us admit that you are inconsistent. A purpose is attained by means, and if you want a purpose, you must be willing to want the means as well. How can one be sincere and say, "I want this above all else, and yet I do not want to learn the means to get it"?
 
60 To obtain the goal, the Holy Spirit indeed asked little. He asks no more to give the means as well. The means are second to the goal. And when you hesitate, it is because the purpose frightens you, and not the means. Remember this, for otherwise you will make the error of believing the means are difficult. Yet how can they be difficult if they are merely given you? They guarantee the goal, and they are perfectly in line with it. Before we look at them a little closer, remember that if you think they are impossible, your wanting of the purpose has been shaken. For if a goal is possible to reach, the means to do so must be possible as well.
 
61 It is impossible to see your brother as sinless and yet to look upon him as a body. Is this not perfectly consistent with the goal of holiness? For holiness is merely the result of letting the effects of sin be lifted so what was always true is recognized. To see a sinless body is impossible, for holiness is positive, and the body is merely neutral. It is not sinful, but neither is it sinless. As nothing, which it is, the body cannot meaningfully be invested with attributes of Christ or of the ego. Either must be an error, for both would place the attributes where they cannot be. And both must be undone for purposes of truth.
 
62 The body is the means by which the ego tries to make the unholy relationship seem real. The unholy instant is the time of bodies. But the purpose here is sin. It cannot be attained but in illusion, and so the illusion of a brother as a body is quite in keeping with the purpose of unholiness. Because of this consistency, the means remain unquestioned while the end is cherished. Vision adapts to wish, for sight is always secondary to desire. And if you see the body, you have chosen judgment and not vision. For vision, like relationships, has no order. You either see or not.
 
63 Who sees a brother's body has laid a judgment on him and sees him not. He does not really see him as sinful; he does not see him at all. In the darkness of sin, he is invisible. He can but be imagined in the darkness, and it is here that the illusions you hold about him are not held up to his reality. Here are illusions and reality kept separated. Here are illusions never brought to truth and always hidden from it. And here in darkness is your brother's reality imagined as a body, in unholy relationships with other bodies, serving the cause of sin an instant before he dies.
 
64 There is indeed a difference between this vain imagining and vision. The difference lies not in them, but in their purpose. Both are but means, each one appropriate to the end for which it is employed. Neither can serve the purpose of the other, for each one is a choice of purpose, employed on its behalf. Either is meaningless without the end for which it was intended, nor is it valued as a separate thing apart from the intention. The means seem real because the goal is valued. And judgment has no value unless the goal is sin.
 
65 The body cannot be looked upon except through judgment. To see the body is the sign that you lack vision and have denied the means the Holy Spirit offers you to serve His purpose. How can a holy relationship achieve its purpose through the means of sin? Judgment you taught yourself; vision is learned from Him Who would undo your teaching. His vision cannot see the body because it cannot look on sin. And thus it leads you to reality. Your holy brother, sight of whom is your release, is no illusion. Attempt to see him not in darkness, for your imaginings about him will seem real there. You closed your eyes to shut him out. Such was your purpose, and while this purpose seems to have any meaning, the means for its attainment will be evaluated as worth the seeing, and so you will not see.
 
66 Your question should not be, "How can I see my brother without the body?" Ask only, "Do I really wish to see him sinless?" And as you ask, forget not that his sinlessness is your escape from fear. Salvation is the Holy Spirit's goal. The means is vision. For what the seeing look upon is sinless. No one who loves can judge, and what he sees is free of condemnation. And what he sees he did not make, for it was given him to see, as was the vision which made his seeing possible.
          

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