Have you consistently appreciated the good efforts, and overlooked mistakes? Or has your appreciation flickered and grown dim in what seemed to be the light of the mistakes [of your brother]? Perhaps you are now entering upon a campaign to blame him for the discomfort of the situation in which you find yourself. And by this lack of thanks and gratitude you make yourself unable to express the holy instant, and thus lose sight of it.
To give thanks to your brother is to appreciate the holy instant, and thus enable its results to be accepted and shared. To attack [judge] your brother is not to lose the [holy] instant, but to make it powerless in its effects.
You have received the holy instant, but you may have established a condition [of attack] in which you cannot use it. As a result, you do not realize that [the holy instant] is with you still. And by cutting yourself off from its expression, you have denied yourself its benefit. You reinforce this every time you attack your brother, for the attack must blind you to yourself. And it is impossible to deny yourself, and to recognize what has been given and received by you. (A Course in Miracles, T-17.V.11:7-10;12:5-6;13. See also ACIM Text Made Simple.)
Love is the way we walk in gratitude. When we accept God’s gift of Love, joy comes with It. When we believe the appearances of the world are real, we are denying God’s Gift. Fear and unhappiness are inevitable while we deny the Love of our true Self.
Forgiveness clears away the barriers that blind us to the awareness of Love’s eternal presence. As we forgive, we let go of the judgments about what our brother seems to be or do. It frees us to appreciate the truth of the Love that our brother is. Judgment has yielded to joining in Love and we experience the joy of the eternal exchange of Love that occurs in the Heaven of God’s Love.
If we choose to judge the world we perceive, appreciation and happiness are impossible. If we choose to let the Holy Spirit help us forgive our judgments, the world becomes a place where Love is recognized everywhere. With consistent practice, the holy instants of forgiveness blend into the real world where forgiveness is complete. We accept God’s eternal welcome into the Heaven of His Love.
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