Wholly Correctable Mistakes – Not “Sin”

It is particularly hard for newcomers to the A Course in Course to believe it when they are told that they have never sinned: They have only made wholly correctable mistakes. People with background such as mine may think that this is the deception of which we are warned from a “devil.” So what are we to make of this?

It one can just entertain the notion that our minds are, to greater or lesser degrees, at one time or another, in one person or another, insane, then we are well on our way out. Even our society treats the insane criminal differently from the one judged sane, controversial though a given case may be. We recognize diminished responsibility, an inability to see clearly right from wrong. Is this not what we are faced with on a daily basis? We see so dimly without the Holy Spirit’s guidance; sometimes we hardly know which way to turn. Would a loving God condemn us for our lack of clear understanding? No! He would merely give us a Guide who would lead us out of the maze.

Does a loving God demand payment, sacrificial payment, because we have done something bad and need to be punished for it? Certain traditional Christian theology teaches this, in that Jesus “died for our sins” and is the “sacrificial Lamb who takes away the sins of the world.” The Course reinterprets all of this into a much more benign concept. “I was not ‘punished’ because you were bad,” Jesus says. (T-3.I.2:10) He goes on to explain that this interpretation is an egoistic projection borne of the insanity of the ego. So we are back to the concept of insanity.

Surely no parent or loved one who sees his child or family member commit violent acts when diagnosed as mentally ill holds that person by the same standards as she holds a “sane” person. Let us entertain the notion that we only need to enlarge our definition of insanity to accommodate all people, to a greater or lesser degree. Jesus condemned no one. He recognized while on earth that most people did the best that they could with what they had. It behooves those of us who follow in the footsteps of Jesus, however blindly, to try to do the same.

Do Not Crucify One’s Self

“Do not embark on foolish journeys, because they are indeed in vain. The ego may will them because the ego is both lean and foolish, but the spirit cannot embark on them because it is forever unwilling to depart from its foundation. The journey to the cross should be the last foolish journey for every mind. Do not dwell upon it, but dismiss it as accomplished. If you can accept that as your own last foolish journey, you are free also to join my resurrection.
. . .
“Do not make the pathetic human error of ‘clinging to the old rugged cross.’ The only message of the crucifixion is in respect to your ability to overcome the cross. Unless you do so, you are free to crucify yourself as often as you choose. But this was not the gospel I intended to offer you.” (ACIM, COA ed., T:4.I.7:1-5 and 8:4-7)

Jesus says repeatedly in A Course in Miracles that the real message of the Atonement is the resurrection, that life is eternal—not that he suffered and died as a sacrificial lamb for us in order to appease God because of our sins. He says that we have made mistakes only, mistakes that are correctable and forgivable, and that to categorize our mistakes as “sins” seems to make them beyond correction.

Moreover, God never condemns, and so He has no need to forgive us of anything. This is a new interpretation, contrary to traditional Christianity, but to us it ought to come as welcome news, a new interpretation that lets us off the hook. So many over the years have condemned themselves because of errors that they called sins, and suffered accordingly.

Now we can let this type of interpretation fall by the wayside. Correctable mistakes call for correction, not denunciation. All of us make mistakes, because this is unavoidable, given the limited viewpoints that we have. We are finite, with finite minds, and with a finite mind, we cannot see all the ramifications of the least thing that we do. So mistakes happen.

Jesus stands at the end of the long pathway to correct mistakes that we could not otherwise correct; he tells us this in ACIM. Be grateful to him for walking the pathway first, all the way back to God. Why would we seek to invent new ways to walk the pathway, when his path is there for us to emulate?

A Part of Heaven Is Laid in Our Relationships

“Before a holy relationship there is no sin. The form of error is no longer seen, and reason, joined with love, looks quietly on all confusion, observing merely, ‘This was a mistake.’ And then the same Atonement you accepted in your relationship corrects the error, and lays a part of Heaven in its place. How blessed are you who let this gift be given!” (T-22.VI.5)

We can easily accept Atonement when we accept it through our special relationships turned holy. A holy relationship, we are told, is a means of saving time. And when we turn to our brother, overlooking his mistakes as just mistakes (not sins), then we see Heaven itself in our relationship. We have walked further toward the grace that is always held out to us.

We have been confused when we fail to overlook mistakes in our brother. Of course, overlooking is hard when we believe ourselves to have really been attacked, and to have suffered from this attack. But to think in such a way is to compound the error, the mistake.

Our brother had only attacked us because his mind is lost in illusion, and we ourselves are attached to that illusion as well. Our real Self has not been harmed in any way. We are intact. And being intact, we can show our brother an innocent face, a face that has not been hurt, and in the showing of this unhurt face, our brother will receive (as do we) a part of Heaven itself.

The Sole Responsibility of God’s Teacher Is to Accept the Atonement for Himself.

“The sole responsibility of God’s teacher is to accept the Atonement for himself. Atonement means correction, or the undoing of errors. (M48)”

1 – Atonement Means Correction

This tenet of the Course is not always understood. Many people want to describe the Atonement as “at – one – ment,” and this may be a reasonable conclusion. Jesus’s answer, though, is that Atonement means the correction, or undoing of errors. Certainly we are not perfect here, or we would not be in this world. Jesus says elsewhere that it is our purpose to become perfect, and when this happens, we will not return to this world at all. We can reasonably conclude that we will have help from the Other Side, because he also says elsewhere that the Teachers of Teachers are not seen by people who live in this world.

2 – Undo Errors

May we follow the guidance of the Holy Spirit so completely that we do see the undoing of errors in ourselves. The only way that this undoing can happen is to follow this guidance. We are not strong or brave enough to bring about our own perfection. It takes divine intervention.

3 – Be a Healed Healer

This passage implied that our first responsibility is to ourselves. We will make mistakes in trying to extend salvation to others if we are “unhealed healers” who wish to do good, but don’t really know how. Once we have accepted Atonement for ourselves, we will be in a position to extend salvation to others. Our times of making mistakes will fall away, leaving Jesus in a position to work through us in a way that he has never been able to do so before.

4 – Miracle Worker

“When this has been accomplished, the teacher of God becomes a miracle worker by definition. (M48)”

Would you like to be a miracle worker? This passage says that when we have accepted the atonement, the undoing of errors in ourselves, then we become a miracle worker by definition.

5 – Not Perfect

Now I do not think that this means that we have become perfect. This would be the ego speaking. In A Course of Love, Jesus indicates that we just turn aside from those character traits that make us less than we would like to be. If we have anger, and we don’t want anger, we just turn aside from it; it will be there or not, as we will it. And, in the case of anger, we would will it away.

6 – Jesus

The idea that we have to be perfect before God can accept us is not true. Jesus says that he stands at the end of the pathway to correct those errors that we ourselves cannot correct. He corrects our unresolved mistakes.

7 – Ideal

It is an unnecessary burden on us to try to be perfect, though the New Testament does indicate that we ought to be perfect, even as our Heavenly Father is perfect. This is an ideal, and we will know many ideals in this life when we sign on with Jesus. He will hold us by the hand and gently lead us forward.

8 – Limitations

He knows our limitations, and in this world we are not free of limitations. Making mistakes is one of those limitations, and he is, as I said, here to correct what we are not wise or strong or keen enough to correct.

9 – Ego

I worry that some will allow the ego to intrude and call us “miracle workers” when we actually have far to go, still, on the pathway. We can effect change, it is true, but we still will fall down. The Holy Spirit will take charge in our lives to lead us to be true miracle workers, but the credit goes to him, not us.

10 – “Sins”

“His sins have been forgiven him, and he no longer condemns himself. How can he then condemn anyone? And who is there whom his forgiveness can fail to heal? (M48)”

“Sins” are a misnomer, as we have learned. We make mistakes, and mistakes don’t have the attracting value that sins do. We will repeat mistakes when we call them “sins,” because of this attracting feature. It is a perversity, in my opinion.

11 – Mistakes

But all the wrong thinking and the wrongdoing a “mistake,” and we just want to correct it. We don’t condemn ourselves for our mistakes, and it is certain that when we forgive ourselves, we are setting ourselves up to forgive others. I think we cannot really forgive others until we have first forgiven ourselves.

12 – God

God does not forgive, we are told in A Course in Miracles, because He has never condemned. If we ourselves never condemn our mistakes, and never condemn the mistakes of others, we will recognize the highest—that there is really nothing to forgive in the misthoughts and misdeeds of others.

13 – Healing

We do want to heal, to heal personally and to reach out to others to heal them as well. Ask today what you can do to effect this great miracle. Ask what miracles you are to perform. Jesus will guide us, for the Atonement principle is in his power.

Prayer:

Dear Father/Mother,

Please assist me to understand Atonement. May I accept it fully for myself, and then may I reach out to others from a state that approaches error-free circumstances.

I know that Your guidance will help me to reach Your will for me. Atonement for myself is my first directive from You, and I know that You will help me to reach this glorious state.

Amen.

The Road to Hell Is Paved with Good Intentions

“While you continue to see the call of this course as a call to goodness, you will surely fail. (Treatises of A Course of Love: Treatise on the Personal Self, 3.10)”

Affirmation: “Being good is not my ‘goal’ today.”

Reflections:

1 – Good Intentions

Jesus makes it easy on us. We don’t have to make extravagant attempts to be “good” to fulfill his requirements in this course. Why? We would surely fail. Good intentions, we have always been told, are not enough. And it is good intentions that prompt us to be “good” (an interpretation, not stated in ACIM or ACOL).

2 – Failure

Jesus makes the comparison between a failure to stick to a diet and the failure to be consistently good. We always fail to live up to our ideal.

3 – Change

Later on, Jesus says in the Dialogues that we will simply make a decision to change some trait about ourselves, because it is a mistake, and then we will simply see that trait disappear. Thus he does not feel a call to have us seek goodness in and of itself. He is not even calling us to be perfect, which seemed to be a biblical injunction. In ACIM, Jesus points out that he stands at the end of the pathway to correct all mistakes that we could not correct. Let this be enough for us. Jesus will stand by us. He will do for goodness what we cannot do.

4 – No Lament

The certainty of failure as we seek to be “good” is not a cause for lament. It is a statement of fact. And hidden in the assertion is the truth that we do not have to try to be good. This goodness will come about naturally as we walk further along the pathway. Of course, if the ego gets involved, we will fall away from the correct walk. But Jesus also says, further along in this chapter, that the ego is gone now. What a delightful thing to hear!

5 – Reread ACOL

If the ego is indeed gone, we are following Jesus’s way in A Course of Love. Don’t be sure, though. The ego is wily, and sometimes we have to read and reread ACOL to get its message. But get its message we will, and then we are assured a happier walk through the earth.

Prayer:

Dear Father/Mother,

I was not so good yesterday, and so the message for today speaks to me as well as to my readers. Thank You for the timing of this message. It is true, so true, that my good intentions are not enough, for surely that is of the ego, and I will surely fail. May I start each day over when I get on the wrong path. Help the events of my day to stay on an even keel, with nothing going awry.

Thank You for Jesus’s help, even though I struggle with the assertion that he can be anywhere, anytime—just by my call, my unequivocal call.

Be with me so that this day goes better than the one yesterday. And may I learn from my mistakes, never to repeat the same ones. I appreciate that you call my misdeeds just “mistakes,” and not “sins.” I would see nothing attracting in a mistake, and I might be tempted to repeat a sin.

Thank You for the insights that A Course of Love gives to me.

Amen.

Forsake Anger / Guilt Forgiven = Overlooked Completely

“And now is guilt forgiven, overlooked completely in His sight and in God’s Word.

“Anger but screeches, ‘Guilt is real!’ Reality is blotted out as this insane belief is taken as replacement for God’s Word.  (M-18.2 – M-18.3)”

Affirmation:  “guilt forgiven”

Reflections:

1 – Varying Definitions of the Ego

Anger is empowered by the ego when it screeches at us, “Guilt is real!”  This is a tenet of A Course in Miracles which differs from traditional Christianity.  But then the ego was not known about, in the sense that we know about it now.  Freud changed all that, though Freud’s definition of the ego is not the same as that of Jesus.  Freud thought that we all needed a strong ego to mediate between the superego and the id.  Jesus’s definition of the ego as a part of our belief about ourselves, but not a necessary thing to secure a central place in our psyche.  Jesus would have the ego wither away (though he does not use the term “wither”).

2 – The Ego Becomes Strong in Strife

We cannot let the ego wither by trying to overcome it with drastic measures.  We cannot launch a frontal assault.  The ego becomes strong in strife (a Text tenet).  That is why anger is so real when the ego is in the ascendancy.

3 – Jesus Corrects Errors that Are Beyond Us

But we have only made correctable mistakes.  And Jesus stands at the end to correct all errors that we ourselves cannot correct (an ACIM tenet).  This suggests that he is our friend, as traditional Christianity tells us.  He is always there for us, taking our hand, if we wish to so imagine.  He says that this is no “idle fantasy” (a quotation from ACIM).

4 – Mistakes / Not Sins

Because our mistakes are correctable, they are not “sins,” which would seem to be forever uncorrectable without a sacrifice made by Jesus on the cross.  And Jesus in A Course in Miracles asks us to look beyond the cross to the resurrection.  He says that we make a mistake when we “cling to the old rugged cross.”

5 – Theology May Delay Us

These ideas are definitely a step beyond the New Testament, and Christianity as taught in most of our churches.  If we are not yet ready to entertain these concepts, do cling to the practical nature of A Course in Miracles.  Theology will only delay us, and we do not need to be controversial.

6 – Guilt Recedes when Anger Recedes

See if the idea of guilt does not recede when anger recedes.  That is really all that we need to test.

Prayer:

Dear Father/Mother,

I would let the ego wither; I would not accentuate the ego through anger, for the ego is strong in strife.  I would feel no strike today.  And that becomes easy when I am having a good day.  Thank You for this good day today.  And may the same occur tomorrow.  We need Your help to be happy, for many of us have not always thought that happiness is a laudable goal.  But it is one of our functions, along with salvation and forgiveness, and I believe that when we reach for salvation and forgiveness, we find ourselves, unaccountably, happy.  We grow from the days spent in pain, but we do not have to learn through pain, as Jesus says in A Course in Miracles.  We can learn through rewards, which give us a lasting learning experience.

Be with me as the day closes.  And help me to remember to express gratitude to You tomorrow morning, first thing, for another day in which to enjoy this world.  We are not meant to yearn only for a hereafter.  We are meant to be happy with this world as well, and the Holy Spirit will see that we have happy dreams in this illusory world.  Healing may occur for us, emotional and/or physical, and we would do well to remember that we are making the illusion that we live in.

Amen.

Quiet Listening

“Learn to be quiet, for His Voice is heard in stillness.  And His Judgment comes to all who stand aside in quiet listening, and wait for Him.  (M-15.2)”

Affirmation:  “Let me be quiet awhile today.”

Reflections:

1 – Benign Judgment

“His Judgment” is not bad; we only make mistakes, and these can be corrected.  If we cannot make amends with the person whom we have wronged, we can still ask forgiveness in quietness, and on some level we will be heard.  The Judgment of which this passage speaks is coming from the Holy Spirit, God’s Communicator with us.  It is always a benign judgment.

2 – Quiet

We cannot live well unless we live, at least from time to time, in quiet.  My quiet time used to be three times a day, which I spent in meditation.  This went on for ten years, and then six years ago I began to pray more, and I was quiet in that way.  Prayer works for me when I pray aloud, and frequently I do so when driving the car.  I do concentrate on the road, of course, but I am carrying on, also, a conversation with God.  Despite the noise of the car and the road,  I know this time as a particularly effective quiet time.

3 – Listening

We must try to follow God’s Way for us.  And we learn this Way in quiet listening.  Sometimes the Answer will come in a quiet “knowing,” and sometimes in just the next quiet words that come into our minds.  Sometimes we experience a feeling that we attribute to intuition.  There is no limit to the ways that the Holy Spirit can and does speak with us.

4 – Personal Experience

My favorite quiet time is early in the morning, before my husband awakes.  I slip out of the bedroom, and find an easy chair in our study.  There I sit quietly, thinking, sometimes, of the day ahead.  This time alone, before the day begins, is a very effective way to get close to God in my thinking.  If I miss this time, I know it.  So I try not to miss being alone first thing in the morning.

Prayer:

Dear Father/Mother,

I would be still and quiet a bit today, to hear Your Voice.  I would relax, so that my body accommodates to my wish to hear You.  I would listen with a warm and soft heart.  Help me to do all of these things, for without Your help I am lost.

Be with me today.  I have already done a good bit of work this morning, and I am already tired.  If I could relax during my work, I could get along better and for longer periods of time.  Help me to do this tomorrow morning.  And today:  Help me to relax today even as I continue to work.

Be with all my loved ones.  I cannot control their destinies, but I do turn them over to You.  And I turn myself over to You also.  As always.

Amen

Guilt Reinforces the Error

“If you allow yourself to become guilty, you will reinforce the error rather than allow it to be undone for you.  (T90)”

Affirmation:  “If. . .feel guilty. . .allow it to be undone”

Reflections:

1 – Psychology in ACIM

This passage emphasizes an important psychological truth, but one that we may never have heard before reading the Course.  The passage also contains some Course teaching that would preclude full understanding without our reading ACIM itself.

2 – Guilt

One of the greatest problems that we face when engulfed by the ego is the problem of guilt.  We think that we have done horrendous things, and maybe we have, but only in illusion and only as mistakes–not sins.  Mistakes cry out for resolution, for remedying.  They do not have the attraction that a deed named a “sin” seems to have for our frail psyches.  Sins remain attractive, but mistakes call out for simple correction.  We probably do not realize the extent to which the ego depends on our sense of guilt when we believe that we have “sinned.”  Elsewhere we learn that guilt is hell.  And so we are getting into territory with this theology from ACIM that will be very, very threatening to us when we are identified with the ego.

3 – Error Undone

If we choose to eliminate guilt, we will help the error to be undone as well.  But “we” do not undo the error; that is the providence of the Holy Spirit.  He works in cooperation with our willingness to leave guilt behind.  And, with guilt behind, the error is easily overlooked.  We choose not to repeat the error as soon as we label it thusly–an error, or mistake, not a sin.

Prayer:

Dear Father,

If I make mistakes, I will feel guilty when I come to myself.  This feeling of guilt can be undone when we seek to be forgiven, of ourselves and of the other person whom we feel we have wronged.  May I find that forgiveness now, and leave guilt behind.

Help me to turn to the Holy Spirit when I am tempted to make mistakes that will induce guilt.  Thank you for being there for me.

Amen.

Errors = Lacks of Love

“The miracle joins in the Atonement by placing the mind in the service of the Holy Spirit.  This establishes the proper function of the mind and corrects its errors, which are merely lacks of love.  (T11)”

Affirmation:  “May I love fully today.”

Reflections:

1 – Definition of Errors

Our errors are merely lacks of love, but lacks that are healed by the Holy Spirit.  Virtually all of us in this world have dark places that indicate lack of love.  But the good news is that we can ask for guidance from the Holy Spirit, and He will lead us into the right pathway to leave these errors behind.  Our mind can be healed by relinquishing errors that are merely “lacks of love.”  This is concept that is easy to understand, and, if we reflect a bit, anyone (not necessarily a student/teacher of ACIM) would see the truth in the equation:  “errors = lacks of love.”

2 – Miracles and the Atonement

Miracles and the Atonement are given an equal place in this passage for effecting this change in the mind.  And Jesus is in charge of both.  This is another place within ACIM that we are asked to see Jesus in a particular light as our leader.  We have chosen that he be our leader by reading and studying his words.  This is akin to choosing Jesus as our “personal Savior” (a tenet of traditional Christianity).

3 – Jesus’s Role

Remember that he is always there for us when we ask.  He will lead the way out, in the service of the Holy Spirit.  Surely all of us recognize that we would remedy these lacks of love.  When we do so, the errors that caused the lacks of love are gone forever.

Prayer:

Dear Father/Mother,

I ask for the help of Jesus today.  I do not understand how he can answer all of our calls, but I think he implies this in ACIM, and I would choose to believe, even in the face of the incomprehensible nature of this.  I know that there are physical laws that our scientists do not yet know, as there have always been.

Be with me as I seek to do the miracles that I seem guided to do.  May I not let my ego intrude and lead me astray.  And may I never seek to do something on my own volition.  Be with me to help be discern correctly.

Help this to be a good day, for others and myself.   May we follow Your pathway exclusively.  Thank You for Your felt presence.

Amen.

Temptation

“‘Lead us not into temptation’ means ‘Recognize your errors and choose to abandon them by following my guidance.’  (T9)”

Affirmation:  “I would abandon my errors today.”

 

Reflections:

1 – Jesus’s Words

This is Jesus’s interpretation, for students/teachers of A Course in Miracles, of a biblical statement attributed to him.  Perhaps the interpretation has always been in place, but now the world is ready to hear it through ACIM.  We may see herein that the temptation to go against the guidance of Jesus, or the guidance of the Holy Spirit, is a choice that will slow us down.  We need to be flexible, to find the affirmations that will keep us from rebelliously avoiding guidance because we are still so strong-willed.  My personal favorite, which is very secular, is simply, “Be flexible.”  This talks to my ego in a way that undoes it, and it uses secular language that will not cause temptation to overcome me.

2 – We Do Not Sin in Eternity / We Make Mistakes in Time

Elsewhere the Course makes clear that we do not sin in eternity (we are still innocent, because we are caught in illusions), but we do make mistakes.  And if we recognize mistakes, we will move quickly to correct them.  Calling a mistake a “sin,” though, is highly attracting, in a perverse sort of way.  We will sometimes choose to sin again and again; changing the concept to that of a “mistake” eliminates the attraction at its core.  Who would repeat mistakes that, with Jesus’s guidance, are very easily corrected?  At one point in ACIM, we are told that we have “sinned” in time, but that time does not really exist.  Eternity is on the valid concept that is close to time, but not the same.

3 – How Do We Recognize Our Errors?

We need to recognize when we have made errors, though.  This is not always easy, because our conscience may have damaged areas in it.  We may be led astray, having rationalized poor thinking and behavior in ourselves many times previously.  This is the time to return to A Course in Miracles, and to ask humbly for guidance to see anew.  This guidance will lead us along more positive lines, and we will leave behind the erroneous thoughts and misdeeds of the past.

Prayer:

Dear Father/Mother,

Sometimes when my emotions are especially strong, I am sure that I have great difficulty in discerning Your guidance.  My emotions, sometimes ruled by my ego, interfere with my intuition, my discerning of Your way.

I would not have it thus today.  I would stop, calm myself, and then ask quietly and peacefully, “What would You have me do?”  I pray that this is enough.  Please guide me even when my thinking is muddled by overwrought emotions.  When stress is heavy, we often cannot discern in peace.  Be with me especially at such times.  I know that my good intentions are not enough, but I pray that when times are hard, You will always remember me–even when I forget You.

Thank You.

Amen.

You Never Hate Your Brother for His Sins, but Only for Your Own

“Learn this, and learn it well, for it is here delay of happiness is shortened by a span of time you cannot realize.  You never hate your brother for his sins, but only for your own.  Whatever form his sins appear to take, it but obscures the fact that you believe them to be yours, and therefore meriting a ‘just’ attack. (T651)”

Affirmation:  “I would not hate my brother for my ‘sins.'”

Reflections:

1 – “Only for Your Own”

“. . .[O]nly for your own.”  This statement will go a very long way toward eliminating judging in our little world.  If we can believe that we are looking within (unconsciously), and then looking outward, seeing that same secret sin in others that we think is within ourselves, we will have a moment of recognition that will be illuminating.  It is always ourselves that we are seeing.  We blame our brothers and sisters for the thoughts or actions that we ourselves would be prone to have or make.

2 – Especially Helpful Truth

This truth is especially helpful within the family, our significant other (our “brother,” in the terminology of the A Course in Miracles), or “brothers” in our circle of friends.

3 – Avoid Judging

Avoiding judgment is very important to learning the ACIM.  If we fail at this juncture, we are likely to fall away from the “happy dreams the Holy Spirit brings, (WB270)” and darkness will close upon us once again.

4 – Judgment Does Not Keep Us Safe

How do we avoid judgment when we have been taught in this world that judgment keeps us safe?  We think that we made a place of safety for ourselves, but it is not so.  We think that defending ourselves against presumed attacks will help us to walk a smoother pathway.  It is not so.  We cannot know all the facts in any given situation, and that is why ACIM counsels leaving all judgment to the Holy Spirit (who does know all the facts).  We avoid judgment by a concerted decision to do so, recognizing that we will not always refrain, and knowing that forgiveness is called for when we have judged without considering the full ramifications of what we are doing.  We go within, perhaps by distancing ourselves from the source of trouble, and we seek God’s solace.  Then we are in a much better position to reenter the world with a clear conscience, one that has reaffirmed that judgment is not the way that we wish to go.

Prayer:

Dear Father/Mother,

I would join with my brother today, my most significant other, and I would not judge him in any way.  I would long for the time that we live harmoniously, just as harmoniously as, blessedly, we are living today.  May I forgive myself when I misstep.  And may I forgive him.  Thank You for being there for me as I find my way through the maze of relationship in our insane world.  I would live in the real world more and more, and I would ask You to help me do the things that are up to me to do.  But I would lean on the Holy Spirit as my Guide, until the time that Christ-consciousness as enveloped me on a sustained basis.

Be with us in safety today.  So often I have longed to be safe.  And, even though this world is insane, I know now that I can be safe in it, for I have You in me.  May the dream that I project not turn nasty.  May my innermost feelings reflect the best that You would choose for me.

Thank You for this good day.  I choose intimacy and happiness over being right all the time.  I choose to be happy rather than right, as A Course in Miracles implies that I should.

Amen.

I Am Eternally Innocent

ACIM Workbook Lesson 309 – for Saturday, November 5, 2011

Affirmation:  “I will not fear to look within today.”

“Within me is Eternal Innocence, because it is God’s Will that It be there forever and forever.  His Son, whose will is limitless as is His Own, can will no change in this.  (WB454)”

Reflections:

1 – Looking Within

We sometimes fear to look within because we imagine that we are really despicable creatures.  We fear what we will see if we get a good look within.  But is this realistic?

2 – Mistakes – Not “Sins”

A Course in Miracles says that we are innocent.  We may have made mistakes, in illusion, but we have not “sinned.”  So we must be good on the inside.

3 – Ask for Forgiveness

When we know that we can ask forgiveness of the Universe (we do not have to ask forgiveness of God, because He has never condemned us–an ACIM tenet) and of ourselves, not to mention our brothers and sisters, then all is well.  We need the exercise of asking forgiveness.  It heals our minds.

4 – Avoid Stress = Avoid Anger and Attack

Asking forgiveness also calms us.  And it is normally in our stress that we get into trouble with attack and anger.  When we are at peace, these emotions do not often occur at all.  When we have avoided forgiveness and all that it holds out to us, and we attack or respond in anger, then we need to ask forgiveness of the individual against whom we have judged.  We have judged him or her, or we would not attack.  And our attack, we think, has brought us something that we want.  It has been a defense for ourselves (a Text tenet).  But we do not need defenses.  We are little and weak, in need of defense; we are actually quite strong as we follow the Holy Spirit.

5 – “Eternal Innocence”

“Within me is Eternal Innocence”:  This is a phrase that will mean much to us as we memorize it.  It will give us a day in which we feel justified in God’s Sight.

Prayer:

Dear Father/Mother,

I thank You that You have led me to believe that I have sinned in time, but not in eternity.  And it is only eternity that counts.  I have made mistakes in eternity, but I can ask for correction, and it is mine as soon as I make the request.  Help me to remedy any wrongs that I have perpetrated on my brothers and sisters.  And help me to forgive myself, as well as any wrongs that I have imaged that others have done to me.

Be with me today as I seek to avoid mistakes.  I know that I will always make mistakes that need correction, but I ask to be shown where I am wrong, and I ask to be shown how to make amends immediately.  May I discern the guidance of the Holy Spirit accurately today and every day.

Amen.