My thoughts* on ACIM Workbook Lesson 198, for July 16, 2024. Deny the Reality of Illusion Even as We Must “Deal With It.”
Only my condemnation injures me.
1. Injury is impossible.
* HEAR THAT! Denial of what is unreal is smart but do not think this means that you do not have to deal with it because:
²And yet illusion makes illusion.
³If you can condemn, you can be injured.
⁴For you have believed that you can injure, and the right you have established for yourself can be now used against you, till you lay it down as valueless, unwanted and unreal.
* You might want to read that again! Imagination is “real” until we decide it has no value, is unwanted, and unreal.
* Have you ever imagined that you would be happier if someone were not around? This can manifest toward you in a lot of ways. If “freedom” to you is isolation then this is what you will have with its challenges of loneliness or feeling separated. However, from the Atonement, you can recognize that all of us have freedom and will be free once we accept our place in God Who has ESTABLISHED our freedom. From that place no matter how your story goes you KNOW that no one could ever be alone EXCEPT in their IMAGINATION.
⁵Then does illusion cease to have effects, and those it seemed to have will be undone.
* I am sensing the manifestation of this in my life but please understand that it is not necessarily instantaneous.
⁶Then are you free, for freedom is your gift, and you can now receive the gift you gave.
2. Condemn and you are made a prisoner.
* I cannot convince others that this is how it works. I can live it and let that be my witness.
²Forgive and you are freed.
³Such is the law that rules perception.
⁴It is not a law that knowledge understands, for freedom is a part of knowledge.
⁵To condemn is thus impossible in truth.
* The law being referred to here is one of forgiveness; forgive and you are freed. KNOWLEDGE knows you are free without any need to forgive.
* DO NOT mistake this to be saying that you do not need to forgive and PLEASE understand that the ONLY THING you need to forgive is the ORIGINAL belief in separation from God because that will allow the Holy Spirit to show you that anything that came from that cannot be real EVEN THOUGH you have to “deal with it” in the world of form at this time.
⁶What seems to be its influence and its effects have not occurred at all.
⁷Yet must we deal with them a while as if they had.
* I.E. we MUST deal with them for a while even though they are not truly real.
⁸Illusion makes illusion.
⁹Except one.
¹⁰Forgiveness is illusion that is answer to the rest.
* This RELEASES you from your addictions as you put God’s Reality and FAITH before any illusion you may be currently addicted to.
3. Forgiveness sweeps all other dreams away, and though it is itself a dream, it breeds no others.
* Here is where you can trust that what you are being shown is the cloak that others believe they are wearing within their illusion (the MATRIX) that they still believe is real. It is important to remember that you are NOT to sacrifice yourself so that they can learn the truth! SACRIFICE is NOT a true principle so do not put yourself in a position to be used and abused.
* THIS is a HUGE addiction that we have had for many generations.
²All illusions save this one must multiply a thousandfold.
³But this is where illusions end.
⁴Forgiveness is the end of dreams, because it is a dream of waking.
⁵It is not itself the truth.
⁶Yet does it point to where the truth must be, and gives direction with the certainty of God Himself.
* It actually gives you God Himself or the awareness of Him and that you and All That Is are His Son.
⁷It is a dream in which the Son of God awakens to his Self and to his Father, knowing They are one.
4. Forgiveness is the only road that leads out of disaster, past all suffering, and finally away from death.
* I have no illusions about not dying to this form but I know that my consciousness lives on and the memories I perceive as “real” stay with me. Any work that I can do in this lifetime to clear away the clutter that the belief in separation from God and All That Is as myself will go with me when this body has finished it’s role.
²How could there be another way, when this one is the plan of God Himself?
³And why would you oppose it, quarrel with it, seek to find a thousand ways in which it must be wrong; a thousand other possibilities?
5. Is it not wiser to be glad you hold the answer to your problems in your hand?
²Is it not more intelligent to thank the One Who gives salvation, and accept His gift with gratitude?
³And is it not a kindness to yourself to hear His Voice and learn the simple lessons He would teach, instead of trying to dismiss His words, and substitute your own in place of His?
6. His words will work.
* We are speaking of God, the Father’s Words here, NOT those of Jesus.
²His words will save.
³His words contain all hope, all blessing and all joy that ever can be found upon this earth.
⁴His words are born in God, and come to you with Heaven’s love upon them.
* Here is the confusion on the part of the scribes who still see Jesus as “The Christ” and do not include themselves in that paradigm.
⁵Those who hear His words have heard the song of Heaven.
⁶For these are the words in which all merge as one at last.
* I feel no separation from others even though the illusion suggests it is possible.
⁷And as this one will fade away, the Word of God will come to take its place, for it will be remembered then and loved.
7. This world has many seeming separate haunts where mercy has no meaning, and attack appears as justified.
²Yet all are one; a place where death is offered to God’s Son and to his Father.
³You may think They have accepted.
⁴But if you will look again upon the place where you beheld Their blood, you will perceive a miracle instead.
⁵How foolish to believe that They could die!
⁶How foolish to believe you can attack!
⁷How mad to think that you could be condemned, and that the holy Son of God can die!
* I hope that you are letting these truths sink in.
8. The stillness of your Self remains unmoved, untouched by thoughts like these, and unaware of any condemnation which could need forgiveness.
²Dreams of any kind are strange and alien to the truth.
³And what but truth could have a Thought which builds a bridge to it that brings illusions to the other side?
9. Today we practice letting freedom come to make its home with you.
* THIS will NOT HAPPEN without freeing the Whole of Christ. THERE CAN BE ~ NO ~ NO ~ NO ~ PRACTICE. YOU EITHER HAVE FORGIVEN CHRIST OR YOU HAVE NOT.
²The truth bestows these words upon your mind, that you may find the key to light and let the darkness end:
³Only my condemnation injures me.
⁴Only my own forgiveness sets me free.
⁵Do not forget today that there can be no form of suffering that fails to hide an unforgiving thought.
⁶Nor can there be a form of pain forgiveness cannot heal.
10. Accept the one illusion which proclaims there is no condemnation in God’s Son, and Heaven is remembered instantly; the world forgotten, all its weird beliefs forgotten with it, as the face of Christ appears unveiled at last in this one dream.
* I live in Heaven, kids!
* My belief in what is illusion IS GONE but I still get to “deal with” the issues of the illusion. So, the statement that the world is “forgotten” should read “the world is forgiven and Christ is seen in All That Is.
²This is the gift the Holy Spirit holds for you from God your Father.
* The Holy Spirit will show you how to live through Him Alone. And bear witness to you that He embodies all that truly is.
³Let today be celebrated both on earth and in your holy home as well.
* YES!
⁴Be kind to Both, as you forgive the trespasses you thought Them guilty of, and see your innocence shining upon you from the face of Christ.
11. Now is there silence all around the world.
* “Silence” in the sense that your ego NO LONGER defines you or your circumstance.
²Now is there stillness where before there was a frantic rush of thoughts that made no sense.
* “Stillness” where the ego used to rule and tell you that you had to listen to everyone BUT yourself.
³Now is there tranquil light across the face of earth, made quiet in a dreamless sleep.
* This statement gets a bit too “out there” for me. Except when I consider that my ego has surrendered to the TRUTH that God IS and that the Son of God/Man could NEVER have erred in the first place. And I can trust that it is left behind me.
⁴And now the Word of God alone remains upon it.
* The “Word of God” is Christ, IE. God’s Will and Son. It really is pretty cool! Now, you can get in quarrels with others about the fact of this Reality but they will not know of it until they see a reason to forgive the belief in separation from God. They will INSIST on suffering until then.
⁵Only that can be perceived an instant longer.
* We then exists Holy Instant by Holy Instant in awareness of God’s Presence and the Son’s.
⁶Then are symbols done, and everything you ever thought you made completely vanished from the mind that God forever knows to be His only Son.
* Not “vanished” but Known to be unreal. AND It is ONLY a PART of His Only Son.
12. There is no condemnation in him.
* This is you, along with All That IS as Christ.
²He is perfect in his holiness.
³He needs no thoughts of mercy.
⁴Who could give him gifts when everything is his?
⁵And who could dream of offering forgiveness to the Son of Sinlessness Itself, so like to Him Whose Son he is, that to behold the Son is to perceive no more, and only know the Father?
* Indeed, this is where I am. Only God, the Father is REAL to me and ALL THAT IS is His Son.
⁶In this vision of the Son, so brief that not an instant stands between this single sight and timelessness itself, you see the vision of yourself, and then you disappear forever into God.
* I am there.
* Someday you will know that you are there as well.
13. Today we come still nearer to the end of everything that yet would stand between this vision and our sight.
²And we are glad that we have come this far, and recognize that He Who brought us here will not forsake us now.
* I expect that Jesus is speaking of the Holy Spirit here.
³For He would give to us the gift that God has given us through Him today.
⁴Now is the time for your deliverance.
⁵The time has come.
⁶The time has come today.
* Which is another way of saying; if you had any smarts, you would choose to will, see, or desire that God is REAL today and give up your role as an ego within the illusion and become a Light in what truly appears to be the darkness.
(ACIM, W-198.1:1–13:6)
Till next time, God bless, debi.
