COURSE IN MIRACLES SOCIETY
(non-profit)
Please Support this Mailing with a

A COURSE IN MIRACLES
Original Edition
Nothing real can be threatened.
Nothing unreal exists.
Herein lies the peace of God.
Only the son himself was his father's treasure. He wanted nothing else.
Graphic by ©Deposit Photos

44 Listen to the story of the prodigal son, and learn what God's treasure is and yours: This son of a loving father left his home and thought he squandered everything for nothing of any value, although he did not know its worthlessness at the time. He was ashamed to return to his father because he thought he had hurt him. Yet when he came home, the father welcomed him with joy because only the son himself was his father's treasure. He wanted nothing else.

ACIM OE TEXT
CH 8 THE JOURNEY BACK

Course in Miracles
Original Edition
Workbook for Students
Part 1
Lesson 93
Light and joy and peace
abide in me.
1 You think you are the home of evil, darkness, and sin. You think if anyone could see the truth about you he would be repelled, recoiling from you as if from a poisonous snake. You think if what is true about you were revealed to you, you would be struck with horror so intense that you would rush to death by your own hand, living on after seeing this being impossible.

2 These are beliefs so firmly fixed that it is difficult to help you see that they are based on nothing. That you have made mistakes is obvious. That you have sought salvation in strange ways—have been deceived, deceiving, and afraid of foolish fantasies and savage dreams and have bowed down to idols made of dust—all this is true by what you now believe.

3 Today we question this, not from the point of view of what you think, but from a very different reference point from which such idle thoughts are meaningless. These thoughts are not according to God's Will. These weird beliefs He does not share with you. This is enough to prove that they are wrong, but you do not perceive that this is so.

4 Why would you not be overjoyed to be assured that all the evil that you think you did was never done, that all your "sins" are nothing, that you are as pure and holy as you were created, and that light and joy and peace abide in you? Your image of yourself cannot withstand the Will of God. You think that this is death, but it is life. You think you are destroyed, but you are saved.

5 The self you made is not the Son of God. Therefore, this self does not exist at all. And anything it seems to do and think means nothing. It is neither bad nor good. It is unreal and nothing more than that. It does not battle with the Son of God. It does not hurt him nor attack his peace. It has not changed creation nor reduced eternal sinlessness to sin and love to hate. What power can this self you made possess when it would contradict the Will of God?

6 Your sinlessness is guaranteed by God. Over and over this must be repeated until it is accepted. It is true. Your sinlessness is guaranteed by God. Nothing can touch it nor can change what God created as eternal. The self you made, evil and full of sin, is meaningless. Your sinlessness is guaranteed by God, and light and joy and peace abide in you.

7 Salvation requires the acceptance of but one thought—you are as God created you, not what you made of yourself. Whatever evil you may think you did, you are as God created you. Whatever mistakes you made, the truth about you is unchanged. Creation is eternal and unalterable. Your sinlessness is guaranteed by God. You are and will forever be exactly as you were created. Light and joy and peace abide in you because God put them there.

8 In our longer exercise periods today, which would be most profitable if done for the first five minutes of every waking hour, we will begin by stating the truth about our creation:

9 Light and joy and peace abide in me.
My sinlessness is guaranteed by God.

10 Then put away your foolish self-images and spend the rest of the practice period in trying to experience what God has given you in place of what you have decreed for yourself.

11 You are what God created or what you made. One Self is true; the other is not there. Try to experience the unity of your One Self. Try to appreciate its holiness and the love from which it was created. Try not to interfere with the Self which God created as you by hiding its majesty behind the tiny idols of evil and sinfulness you have made to replace it. Let it come into its own. Here you are. This is you. And light and joy and peace abide in you because this is so.

12 You may not be willing or even able to use the first five minutes of each hour for these exercises. Try, however, to do so when you can. At least remember to repeat these thoughts each hour:

13 Light and joy and peace abide in me.
 My sinlessness is guaranteed by God.

14 Then try to devote at least a minute or so to closing your eyes and realizing that this is a statement of the truth about you.

15 If a situation arises that seems to be disturbing, quickly dispel the illusion of fear by repeating these thoughts again. Should you be tempted to become angry with someone, tell him silently:

16 Light and joy and peace abide in you.
 Your sinlessness is guaranteed by God.

17 You can do much for the world's salvation today. You can do much today to bring you closer to the part in salvation which God has assigned to you. And you can do much today to bring the conviction to your mind that the idea for the day is true indeed.
Read Online here

Audio, Music, and Video
by CIMS SonShip Radio

AUDIO: Lesson 93-mp3

Lesson ARCHIVE

Course in Miracles
Original Edition
TEXT
Chapter 8
The Journey Back

VI. The Power of Joint Decision
par 42-52
[READING PAUSED FOR WEEKEND]
42 We are the joint will of the Sonship, whose wholeness is for all. We begin the journey back by setting out together and gather in our brothers as we continue together. Every gain in our strength is offered for all, so they too can lay aside their weakness and add their strength to us. God's welcome waits for us all, and He will welcome us as I am welcoming you. Forget not the Kingdom of God for anything the world has to offer. The world can add nothing to the power and the glory of God and His holy Sons, but it can blind the Sons to the Father if they behold it. You cannot behold the world and know God. Only one is true.

43 I am come to tell you that the choice of which is true is not yours. If it were, you would have destroyed yourselves. Yet God did not will the destruction of His creations, having created them for eternity. His Will has saved you, not from yourselves, but from your illusions of yourselves. He has saved you for yourselves. Let us glorify Him whom the world denies, for over His Kingdom, it has no power. No one created by God can find joy in anything except the eternal. That is not because he is deprived of anything else, but because nothing else is worthy of him. What God and His Sons create is eternal, and in this and this only is their joy.

44 Listen to the story of the prodigal son, and learn what God's treasure is and yours: This son of a loving father left his home and thought he squandered everything for nothing of any value, although he did not know its worthlessness at the time. He was ashamed to return to his father because he thought he had hurt him. Yet when he came home, the father welcomed him with joy because only the son himself was his father's treasure. He wanted nothing else.

45 God wants only His Son because His Son is His only treasure. You want your creations as He wants His. Your creations are your gift to the Holy Trinity, created in gratitude for your creation. They do not leave you, any more than you have left your Creator, but they extend your creation as God extended Himself to you. Can the creations of God Himself take joy in what is not real? And what is real except the creations of God and those which are created like His? Your creations love you as your Soul loves your Father for the gift of creation. There is no other gift which is eternal, and therefore there is no other gift which is true.

46 How, then, can you accept anything else or give anything else and expect joy in return? And what else but joy would you want? You made neither yourself nor your function. You made only the decision to be unworthy of both. Yet you could not make yourself unworthy because you are the treasure of God. What He values is valuable. There can be no question of its worth because its value lies in God's sharing Himself with it and establishing its value forever.

47 Your function is to add to God's treasure by creating yours. His Will to you is His Will for you. He would not withhold creation from you because His joy is in it. You cannot find joy except as God does. His joy lay in creating you, and He extends His Fatherhood to you so that you can extend yourself as He did. You do not understand this because you do not understand Him. No one who does not know his function can understand it, and no one can know his function unless he knows who he is. Creation is the Will of God. His Will created you to create. Your will was not created separate from His, and so it wills as He wills.

48 An "unwilling will" does not mean anything, [because it is] a contradiction in terms which actually leaves nothing. [You can make yourself powerless only in a way that has no meaning at all.] When you think you are unwilling to will with God, you are not thinking. God's Will is thought. It cannot be contradicted by thought. God does not contradict Himself, and His Sons, who are like Him, cannot contradict themselves or Him. Yet their thought is so powerful that they can even imprison the mind of God's Son if they so choose. This choice does make the Son's function unknown to him, but never to his Creator. And because it is not unknown to his Creator, it is forever knowable to him.

49 There is no question but one you should ever ask of yourself- "Do I want to know my Father's Will for me?" He will not hide it. He has revealed it to me because I asked it of Him and learned of what He had already given. Our function is to function together because apart from each other we cannot function at all. The whole power of God's Son lies in all of us, but not in any of us alone. God would not have us be alone because He does not will to be alone. That is why He created His Son and gave him the power to create with Him.

50 Our creations are as holy as we are, and we are the Sons of God Himself and therefore as holy as He is. Through our creations, we extend our love and thus increase the joy of the Holy Trinity. You do not understand this for a very simple reason. You who are God's own treasure do not regard yourselves as valuable. Given this belief, you cannot understand anything. I share with God the knowledge of the value He puts upon you. My devotion to you is of Him, being born of my knowledge of myself and Him. We cannot be separated. Whom God has joined cannot be separated, and God has joined all His Sons with Himself. Can you be separated from your life and your being?

51 The journey to God is merely the reawakening of the knowledge of where you are always and what you are forever. It is a journey without distance to a goal that has never changed. Truth can only be experienced. It cannot be described, and it cannot be explained. I can make you aware of the conditions of truth, but the experience is of God. Together we can meet its conditions, but truth will dawn upon you of itself.

52 What God has willed for you is yours. He has given His Will to His treasure, whose treasure it is. Your heart lies where your treasure is, as His does. You who are beloved of God are wholly blessed. Learn this of me, and free the holy will of all those who are as blessed as you are.
Online here

Audio, Music, and Video
by CIMS SonShip Radio


ONLINE SEARCHABLE Original Edition

Current Schedule of
Join ACIM Students
on Free
TEXT Conference Calls


ACIM Edmonton
Sarah's Workbook Reflections
Lesson 93
Light and joy and peace
abide in me.
Sarah's Commentary:
The idea given here that "You think you are the home of evil, darkness and sin," (W.93.1.1) feels very dark and may not be something we consciously think is true for us. Sin is a belief that we have destroyed God so we could exist. "You think if anyone could see the truth about you he would be repelled, recoiling from you as if from a poisonous snake." (W.93.1.2) Clearly, this is not anything I consciously perceive about myself. I don't recognize the depth of guilt in me described in this Lesson. My image of myself does not include this although there may be a shadow in us of what we don’t want to see. Jesus says we achieved our individual self through the death of God. We built our self-concept at the cost of His death because we can't exist if He does. It has to be one or the other because both can’t be true.

Continue to Read in Word or PDF
[To View PDF, turn device lengthwise and enlarge screen]

Love and blessings, Sarah

Donations are gratefully received via PayPal to: huemmert@shaw.ca
Allen Watson's
Workbook Commentaries
Lesson 93
Light and joy and peace
abide in me.
Allen Watson joined Robert Perry to form the Circle of Atonement in 1993 in Sedona, Arizona where Allen led retreats and workshops and authored many books based on “A Course in Miracles.”

One of his most popular books is: A Workbook Companion: Vol I and II.

Please send gifts of gratitude via PayPal to watsona@innocent.com.
ACIM OE on TWITTER
Click picture below
COURSE IN MIRACLES SOCIETY
(non-profit)
Tax-Deductible Donation
Presently CIMS projects are supported by free will gifts of time, talent, and money. If you would like to support any of the activities of the Society in any way, please do not hesitate to get in touch.

To make a Tax-Deductible Donation
in support of the Daily Lessons

Also, by means of your will or other estate plan, you can name "Course in Miracles Society" as the beneficiary of a portion of your estate, or of particular assets in your estate. In this way, you are honoring your loved ones while also providing critical support to the extension of LOVE.
CIMS | 800-771-5056 | reja-joy@jcim.net | jcim.net