Lesson 345
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ACIM Original Edition
A COURSE IN MIRACLES
MANUAL FOR TEACHERS  
#7. SHOULD HEALING BE REPEATED?

1 This question really answers itself. Healing cannot be repeated. If the patient is healed, what remains to heal him from? And if the healing is certain, as we have already said it is, what is there to repeat? For a teacher of God to remain concerned about the result of healing is to limit the healing. It is now the teacher of God himself whose mind needs to be healed. And it is this he must facilitate. He is now the patient, and he must so regard himself. He has made a mistake and must be willing to change his mind about it. He lacked the trust that makes for giving truly, and so he has not received the benefit of his gift.

ACIM.OE.MN.7.1     
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A COURSE IN MIRACLES
WORKBOOK for STUDENTS
What is a Miracle
WHAT IS A MIRACLE?

<AUDIO>
<VIDEO>   
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*IAMBIC PENTAMETER* Example MP3
 
   A miracle is a correction. It
   does not create, nor really change at all.
   It merely looks on devastation, and
   reminds the mind that what it sees is false.
   It undoes error, but does not attempt
   to go beyond perception, nor exceed
   the function of forgiveness. Thus it stays
   within time's limits. Yet it paves the way
   for the return of timelessness and love's
   awakening, for fear must slip away
   under the gentle remedy it gives.
 
   A miracle contains the gift of grace,
   for it is given and received as one.
   And thus it illustrates the law of truth
   the world does not obey, because it fails
   entirely to understand its ways.
   A miracle inverts perception, which
   was upside-down before, and thus it ends
   the strange distortions that were manifest.
   Now is perception open to the truth.
   Now is forgiveness fully justified.
 
   Forgiveness is the home of miracles.
   The eyes of Christ delivers them to all
   they look upon in mercy and in love.
   Perception stands corrected in His sight,
   and what was meant to curse has come to bless.
   Each lily of forgiveness offers all
   the world the silent miracle of love.
   And each is laid before the Word of God
   upon the universal altar to
   Creator and creation, in the Light
   of perfect purity and endless peace.
 
   The miracle is taken first on faith,
   because to ask for it implies the mind
   has been made ready to conceive of what
   it cannot see and does not understand.
   Yet faith will bring its witnesses, to show
   that what it rested on is really there.
   And thus the miracle will justify your faith
   in it, and show it rested on a world
   more real than what you saw before;
   a world redeemed from what you thought you saw.
 
   Miracles fall like drops of healing rain
   from Heaven on a dry and dusty world,
   where starved and thirsty creatures came to die.
   Now have they water. Now the world is green.
   And everywhere the signs of life spring up,
   to show that what is born can never die,
   for what has life has immortality.
 
    ~ Original Hand Script  
 
  
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A COURSE IN MIRACLES
DAILY LESSONS
SonShip Workbook
L e s s o n 345
I offer only miracles today,
For I would have them returned to me.


< AUDIO>
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    Father, a miracle reflects Your gifts
    to me, Your Son. And every one I give
    returns to me, reminding me the law
    of love is universal. Even here
    it takes a form which can be recognized,
    and seen to work. The miracles I give
    are given back in just the form I need
    to help me with the problems I perceive.
    Father, in Heaven it is different,
    for there there are no needs. But here on earth
    the miracle is closer to Your gifts
    than any other gift that I can give.
    Then let me give this gift alone today,
    which, born of true forgiveness, lights the way
    that I must travel to remember You.
 
   Peace to all seeking hearts today. The light
   has come, to offer miracles to bless
   the tired world. It will find rest today,
   for we will offer what we have received.
 
     ~ Original Handscript of ACIM   
          
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ACIM Edmonton - Sarah's Reflections 
ACIM Edmonton, CA
LESSON 345
  I offer only miracles today,
For I would have them returned to me
.

Sarah's Commentary:

All the Lessons in this part of the Workbook are prayers. This is a beautiful prayer as a reminder to ourselves to try to remember the importance of the law of love, that what we give returns to us. Knowing this, we are motivated to apply this Lesson in our lives all through the day when we choose to have a day of miracles. In this Lesson, we are reminded to see everything that seems to be happening as an opportunity to have the judgments of the ego transformed through forgiveness. Thus, in the undoing of the wrong-minded thinking, we remember who we are.
 
I have heard people say we should not judge and that is true, but to the ego mind, judgment is like oxygen on which it thrives. If we see this as a problem, we will crucify ourselves for our judgments. The only problem is not that we make judgments but when we stubbornly choose to hold onto them. When we are willing to look at our judgments and take responsibility for them without judging ourselves, we become an objective observer. From this place, we can now choose to ask for the miracle. It is a willingness to release our grievances.
 
The miracle shifts our perception from the wrong mind to the right mind. This means we recognize that external events and circumstances are not the source of our happiness. Our loss of peace is caused only by our wrong-minded choice to judge and to hold grievances. The Holy Spirit reflects the part of the mind that remembers, we are One with our Father. When we are willing to look at the ego by taking our judgments and projections back into our own minds, the healing process will start. Now, instead of seeing the sin in our brother, we take responsibility for our interpretations and recognize that we are wrong about our judgments. Our willingness to have our misperceptions brought to correction opens the way for us to experience the miracle. The miracle brings correction to the wrong-minded ego thought system.
 
What this means to us practically is that whenever we see any brother as guilty, we can choose to withdraw the blame we put on him and acknowledge that we do not see him as he is. What we see are our own self-attacks projected onto our brother. All we see in him is what we judge in ourselves. He is a perfect mirror for us, giving us an opportunity to see what is unhealed in our own minds; and this takes the willingness to acknowledge that we have been mistaken about what we judged in him. Any lack of peace we experience is a result of the choice we first make in the mind to listen to the ego, which is a decision for separation. To forgive anyone means to release them of responsibility for our state of mind and for our experience in the dream. We remind ourselves that if we don't have peace, it is because we have chosen to throw it away and hold our brother responsible. Now we learn to "Be willing to forgive the Son of God for what he did not do." (T.17.III.1.5) (ACIM OE T.17.IV.14)
 
We are not asked to deny that others may indeed be doing hurtful things to us; but we are asked to accept responsibility for the decision to see the cause of our feelings of hurt and betrayal as coming from outside our own minds. It appears to come from others' behaviors toward us, but that is what the conditioned mind believes because it believes the dream is real and we are its effect. The recognition that we are responsible for the choice we make in our own minds to listen to the ego or the Holy Spirit is the most loving thing we can do for ourselves and for others because this is the birthplace of miracles. It is the recognition that if we are hurt by what someone has said or done, it is because we have interpreted their behavior as attacking instead of a call for love and understanding. When we see that it is just our own call, we will be motivated to heal our minds, and with healing, comes the recognition that we are the same as our brothers. Sameness in the world is a reflection of the Oneness we are---all joined in the Mind of God.
 
Acknowledging that we are all the same means that what we do to another we actually do to ourselves. Whether we listen to the ego's lie of separation or to the Holy Spirit's message that we are One with our Father, it is a choice we make in every encounter. The choice is for Heaven or hell in every instant. It is a choice to forgive and experience the miracle, or to hold onto our grievances, maintain our victimhood, and withhold our love. There are many ways we withhold love. It is important that we begin to notice the particular way we do this. To do so requires a great deal of honesty and introspection, as we don't like to admit that we actually withhold love as a way to protect ourselves and gain at the expense of others.
 
Think of the ways you withhold your love from someone. It becomes visible to you when you look at the strategies you have adopted to make others feel guilty and punish them when they do not meet your needs as you perceive them. It may be in the form of withholding money, diminishing or delaying payment to someone you perceive has hurt you, withholding sex from your partner, reneging on an agreement, being consistently late, refusing to share your feelings of hurt, withholding praise from someone, withdrawing from others in a relationship, or bargaining to get what you want. We believe we protect ourselves through these and other strategies, but they only hurt us and keep us from the love we say we desire. We are always the ones who lose, as we end up hurting ourselves.
 
When we will to investigate how we withhold love and practice bringing our mistaken perceptions to the Holy Spirit, space is made for His love to come shining through us. Forgiveness is the reflection of God's gift of love to us. It is simply the undoing of our wrong-minded strategies for protecting ourselves from what we most desire.
 
We can't fix ourselves, but we can choose to take the necessary steps to bring our unforgiving thoughts to the light of truth within and give it to the Holy Spirit, Who does the healing. Let us trust that the healing will come when we are ready to experience it. It is a process where the whole thought system of the ego is reversed, meaning everything we have held to be true in the world of form is understood to be false. What we see in the world is no more true than our experience in our nighttime dream state. We are not a character in the dream, but the dreamer of the dream. When we see this, we demonstrate to our brothers that their attacks have no effect on us. We no longer have the experience of feeling victimized by anyone regardless of their behavior in the dream.
 
"Learning of Christ is easy, for to perceive with Him involves no strain at all. His perceptions are your natural awareness, and it is only the distortions you introduce that tire you." (T.11.VI.3.7-8) (ACIM OE T.10.VII.61). The only "effort" we are asked to put forth is a "little willingness" to question our interpretations of everything. This is enough to introduce a slight doubt or suspicion in what we are believing and to help us accept that we may be wrong in our belief that we are separate from our Source and from each other: "Salvation, perfect and complete, asks but a little wish that what is true be true; a little willingness to overlook what is not there; a little sigh that speaks for Heaven as a preference to this world that death and desolation seem to rule." (T.26.VII.10.1) (ACIM OE T.26.VIII.56) Each time we make this little effort, our belief in the ego's thought system lessens and our fear of the Holy Spirit's loving perception diminishes. This is the miracle given to each brother and received for ourselves in a form that will be of help to us. "The miracles I give are given back in just the form I need to help me with the problems I perceive." (W.345.1.4)
 
Thus, what is meant by a miracle is a correction. It is called a Course in Miracles because it is a Course in learning to change our minds from thinking with the ego to thinking with the Holy Spirit. It is a process of undoing the ego by learning a new perspective that reverses the ego's view on everything and everyone. The ego tells us that we are bodies, separate from God and from each other, and subject to change by external forces. The Holy Spirit tells us that we are minds, One with our Father and with each other, subject to change only by the power of the mind to choose. We accept miracles for ourselves to the extent that we accept this teaching and apply it to all events, situations, and experiences in our lives. We offer miracles to others, as we recognize the same power of their minds to choose. As Jesus tells us in the text, "The miracle extends without your help, but you are needed that it can begin. Accept the miracle of healing, and it will go forth because of what it is. It is its nature to extend itself the instant it is born. And it is born the instant it is offered and received. No one can ask another to be healed. But he can let himself be healed, and thus offer the other what he has received." (T.27.V.1.2-7) (ACIM OE T.27.VI.44)
 
A miracle has nothing to do with anything external. Miracles pertain only to what is going on in our own minds. In that sense, they are not at all what traditional religious systems have thought of as miracles. Traditionally, conditions in the body and the world have been viewed as the problem and therefore miracles, simply put, were viewed as the healing or removal of those conditions, usually through some kind of divine or supernatural intervention. A Course in Miracles, on the other hand, teaches that the body and the world are projections of thoughts in our minds: "It [the world you see] is the witness to your state of mind, the outside picture of an inward condition. As a man thinketh, so does he perceive. Therefore, seek not to change the world, but choose to change your mind about the world." (T.21.IN.1.5-7) (ACIM OE T.21.I.1)
 
If you could really accept that the world is merely a projection of a thought system of sin and guilt in your mind, you would realize that to try to alter things in the world or the body is ultimately futile and that to change your mind about the reality of sin and guilt is truly healing. That is why the workbook states, "A miracle is a correction. It does not create, nor really change at all. It merely looks on devastation, and reminds the mind that what it sees is false." (W.13.1.1-3) It thus corrects our thinking, which may be reflected in a change in the condition in the body or the world, but this is ultimately not what is important, although it is helpful as a witness to the change of mind.
 
We are not asked to just blithely dismiss our perceptions of the world as simply illusions. Rather, we are to look at the devastation or problems in our lives and bring our perceptions of them to the loving presence of the Holy Spirit in our minds. There, in our choice to join with that Reflection of Truth, we will remember that what we perceive is but the content of a dream and not reality. "The miracle establishes you dream a dream, and that its content is not true." (T.28.II.7.1) (ACIM OE T.28.VIII.22) To dismiss everything as just an illusion is to fail to recognize that while we still believe in what we are seeing and experiencing, healing is necessary.
 
This takes a lot of practice, which is why we have a Workbook with 365 Lessons, at the end of which Jesus tells us that we are just at the beginning stages of this process of thought-reversal. The entire Course is about this: What we are so used to thinking about as the cause of our distress is really just showing us the effects of our own thoughts. A miracle occurs when we remember and accept, for just an instant, that the cause of our lack of peace, sickness, deprivation, and problems, is not something of the body or the world, but rather a choice we are making in our minds to identify with the thought system of separation, sin, guilt, and fear. "The miracle is the first step in giving back to cause the function of causation, not effect." (T.28.II.9.3) (ACIM OE T.28.VIII.24)
 
A miracle occurs when we do not take someone's attack personally, recognizing instead that we all share the same needs and goals. We all share the same insanity of the ego, and we all share the same sanity of Christ's vision. It requires stepping back for just an instant from our usual reactions. It requires being quiet when we are tempted to say something reactive in the moment. It requires that we continue to ask how to see the situation and how to respond with love instead of attack.
 
Miracles occur as frequently as our willingness makes space for them. They come in the form we need, based on our own individual experiences and in the context of our unique special relationships. Indeed, the parking space may show up in answer to a need we have, and we may see it as the perfect miracle today to witness to our choice for the Holy Spirit. "The miracles I give are given back in just the form I need to help me with the problems I perceive." (W.345.1.4)
 
"The curriculum is highly individualized, and all aspects are under the Holy Spirit's particular care and guidance." (M.29.2.6) "If you but knew the glorious goal that lies beyond forgiveness, you would not keep hold on any thought, however light the touch of evil on it may appear to be." (T.29.V.6.1) (ACIM OE T.29.VI.35) We are called to be highly vigilant and discern our unloving thoughts and actions so we won't tolerate even the slightest irritation. Instead, we are called to turn everything over to the Holy Spirit so the miracle can shine forth in our minds and extend to all those who cross our path or cross our minds. It is a gift to ourselves that frees us from the imprisonment of the ego mind.

Love and blessings, Sarah
ACIM Original Edition
#6. Is Healing Certain?

1 Healing is always certain. It is impossible to let illusions be brought to truth and keep the illusions. Truth demonstrates illusions have no value. The teacher of God has seen the correction of his errors in the mind of the patient, recognizing it for what it is. Having accepted the Atonement for himself, he has also accepted it for the patient. Yet what if the patient uses sickness as a way of life, believing healing is the way to death? When this is so, a sudden healing might precipitate intense depression, and a sense of loss so deep that the patient might even try to destroy himself. Having nothing to live for, he may ask for death. Healing must wait, for his protection.
 
2 Healing will always stand aside when it would be seen as threat. The instant it is welcome it is there. Where healing has been given, it will be received. And what is time before the gifts of God? We have referred many times in the text to the storehouse of treasures laid up equally for the giver and the receiver of God's gifts. Not one is lost, for they can but increase. No teacher of God should feel disappointed if he has offered healing and it does not appear to have been received. It is not up to him to judge when his gift should be accepted. Let him be certain it has been received and trust that it will be accepted when it is recognized as a blessing and not a curse.
 
3 It is not the function of God's teachers to evaluate the outcome of their gifts. It is merely their function to give them. Once they have done that, they have also given the outcome, for that is part of the gift. No one can give if he is concerned with the result of the giving. That is a limitation on the giving itself, and neither the giver nor the receiver would have the gift. Trust is an essential part of giving; in fact, it is the part that makes sharing possible, the part that guarantees the giver will not lose but only gain. Who gives a gift and then remains with it to be sure it is used as the giver deems appropriate? Such is not giving but imprisoning.
 
4 It is the relinquishing of all concern about the gift that makes it truly given. And it is trust that makes true giving possible. Healing is the change of mind that the Holy Spirit in the patient's mind is seeking for him. And it is the Holy Spirit in the mind of the giver Who gives the gift to Him. How can it be lost? How can it be ineffectual? How can it be wasted? God's treasure house can never be empty. And if one gift were missing, it would not be full. Yet is its fullness guaranteed by God. What concern, then, can a teacher of God have about what becomes of his gifts? Given by God to God, who in this holy exchange can receive less than everything?

#7. Should Healing Be Repeated?   

1 This question really answers itself. Healing cannot be repeated. If the patient is healed, what remains to heal him from? And if the healing is certain, as we have already said it is, what is there to repeat? For a teacher of God to remain concerned about the result of healing is to limit the healing. It is now the teacher of God himself whose mind needs to be healed. And it is this he must facilitate. He is now the patient, and he must so regard himself. He has made a mistake and must be willing to change his mind about it. He lacked the trust that makes for giving truly, and so he has not received the benefit of his gift.
 
2 Whenever a teacher of God has tried to be a channel for healing, he has succeeded. Should he be tempted to doubt this, he should not repeat his previous effort. That was already maximal because the Holy Spirit so accepted it and so used it. Now the teacher of God has only one course to follow. He must use his reason to tell himself that he has given the problem to One Who cannot fail, and recognize that his own uncertainty is not love but fear and therefore hate. His position has thus become untenable, for he is offering hate to one to whom he offered love. This is impossible. Having offered love, only love can be received.
 
3 It is in this that the teacher of God must trust. This is what is really meant by the statement that the one responsibility of the miracle worker is to accept the Atonement for himself. The teacher of God is a miracle worker because he gives the gifts he has received. Yet he must first accept them. He need do no more, nor is there more that he could do. By accepting healing, he can give it. If he doubts this, let him remember Who gave the gift and Who received it. Thus is his doubt corrected. He thought the gifts of God could be withdrawn. That was a mistake, but hardly one to stay with. And so the teacher of God can only recognize it for what it is and let it be corrected for him.
 
4 One of the most difficult temptations to recognize is that to doubt a healing because of the appearance of continuing symptoms is a mistake in the form of lack of trust. As such, it is an attack. Usually it seems to be just the opposite. It does appear unreasonable at first to be told that continued concern is attack. It has all the appearances of love. Yet love without trust is impossible, and doubt and trust cannot coexist. And hate must be the opposite of love, regardless of the form it takes. Doubt not the gift, and it is impossible to doubt its result. This is the certainty that gives God's teachers the power to be miracle workers, for they have put their trust in Him.
 
5 The real basis for doubt about the outcome of any problem that has been given to God's Teacher for resolution is always self-doubt. And that necessarily implies that trust has been placed in an illusory self, for only such a self can be doubted. This illusion can take many forms. Perhaps there is a fear of weakness and vulnerability. Perhaps there is a fear of failure and shame associated with a sense of inadequacy. Perhaps there is a guilty embarrassment stemming from false humility. The form of the mistake is not important. What is important is only the recognition of a mistake as a mistake.
 
6 The mistake is always some form of concern with the self to the exclusion of the patient. It is a failure to recognize him as part of the self and thus represents a confusion in identity. Conflict about what you are has entered your mind, and you have become deceived about yourself. And you are deceived about yourself because you have denied the Source of your creation. If you are offering only healing, you cannot doubt. If you really want the problem solved, you cannot doubt. If you are certain what the problem is, you cannot doubt. Doubt is the result of conflicting wishes. Be sure of what you want, and doubt becomes impossible.


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