Grace is acceptance of the Love of God within a world of seeming hate and fear. By grace alone the hate and fear are gone, for grace presents a state so opposite to everything the world contains, that those whose minds are lighted by the gift of grace can not believe the world of fear is real.
Grace is not learned. The final step must go beyond all learning. Grace is not the goal this course aspires to attain. Yet we prepare for grace in that an open mind can hear the Call to waken. It is not shut tight against God’s Voice. It has become aware that there are things it does not know, and thus is ready to accept a state completely different from experience with which it is familiarly at home. (A Course in Miracles Workbook Lesson 169, W-pI.169.2-3. See also ACIM Lesson 169 Insights.)
This world was made as a place where God could not enter. It makes sense then that the way out of the world of hate and fear is to accept God, to accept Love.
Judgment denies God, for it is founded on the belief in separation, which denies the oneness of God. To accept God’s Love, we must let go of judgment; we must forgive. We have been given a Teacher Whose only function is to show us that only Love is real.
As we practice bringing all of our unloving, fearful and guilty thoughts to the Holy Spirit, our judgments are undone. We are shown that what we thought was cause for fear and guilt was only a harmless false image. What is not real can have no effect in reality. As we continue the practice, the appearances of the world has less affect on us, for we see past them to the truth that nothing is really happening.
We may still have beliefs we are protecting from the Holy Spirit’s Light. We think these beliefs are sacred and protect us from loss. But as we continue the practice of forgiving with the Holy Spirit’s help, we learn that these cherished beliefs do not serve us. We become willing to let them go. This is how we prepare to receive the grace of God, to accept God’s Love.
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