To gain the most from A Course in Miracles Lesson Insights, we recommend
that you read the corresponding lesson in the Workbook of the Second or
Third Edition of A Course in Miracles published by the Foundation for Inner Peace.
“Without forgiveness I will still be blind.”
Sin is another word for lack of Love, or separation from Love. Belief in being separated from Love is an attack on Love because it is a denial of unity. Forgiveness is letting go of the ego, which is the idea that separation could be possible.
As long as I hang on to the ego thought of being a separate identity, I cannot see the unity that Christ’s vision would show me. The whole Course is leading me to recognize the nothingness and meaninglessness of the ego. With this recognition, I can be brought to the point of letting it go.
I only hang on to the ego because I think it has meaning and therefore gives me meaning. Yet what is truly nothing cannot give meaning. It has nothing to give. When I identify with the ego, I identify with nothing. To the degree that I am able to let go of a separate identity, to that degree I am able to see the Love that unifies my brother with me and with our Father, our Source.
Every moment is a choice. Do I want the loneliness and isolation of a separate identity or do I want the joy and communion that comes with identifying with All That is? Do I want to spend my life searching for moments of happiness, that even if achieved, bring with them a sense of impermanence and uncertainty so that even those happy moments cannot be fully appreciated? This is the best the ego has to offer.
On the other hand, what the Holy Spirit has to offer is joy beyond words, a deep peace that cannot be disturbed and a sense of Love that cannot be experienced in a world of separation. Best of all, what the Holy Spirit offers is eternal and changeless. Looking at these two options, the choice seems obvious. Yet most of the time I don’t make the obvious choice because of a lingering belief that if I give up my unique identity, I will lose all that I value. This is true. But this lingering resistance is only because I do not realize what I have been valuing is valueless. I may be giving up all that I value, but I will be giving up nothing valuable.
By valuing the nothingness of the ego, I am blind to the gifts every brother has to offer me because of What he is in truth. This is why I need to turn every day, and as many times a day as I can to the Holy Spirit for His Light to show me what is truly valuable and what is valueless. He will teach me to recognize the mistakes and let them go. Thus will I receive the blessings of Christ’s vision as I learn to look on my brothers as my Self. Through forgiveness I will see.
The Course asks me again and again to see past my brother’s separate identity to the Light of God which lies behind it. The Course reminds me to see the Light in my brother again and again, which reminds me of the truth about myself. Without remembering the truth, I am blind. Being blind is making illusions of separation real. This does not bring happiness. It brings only fear. Our unity in God is the only truth. Love is sharing unity. Awareness of sharing the unity of God comes with taking the blindfold off.
Today I will practice taking the blindfold off by mentally telling each brother I meet or think of, “My brother, I share God’s unity with you. We are one in God.” I cannot see both the ego identity and our unity in God at the same time, for they are total opposites. As I practice remembering the truth and telling the truth, I will see the truth and teach the truth today. This is practicing forgiveness.
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