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January-March, 2021

Grace in Everyday Moments

by Rev. Peggy Rivera, Ordained Ministerial Counselor

In choosing a topic today I was moved to address how important it is to see grace every day so that we can find comfort from our Creator in knowing that no matter what happens, we are fine. We are loved no matter what happens in the world of dreams because this is not our true reality. Grace is that connection to the remembrance of that.

A Course in Miracles, Lesson 169, begins with “By grace I live. By grace I am released.” I think that is very important to remember because it tells us that we don’t have to do anything. It’s not something we earn nor something we learn. It is something given to us freely. It also says in Lesson 168, “Your grace is given me. I claim it now.” It teaches us how God’s Love is limitless, and even when we sleep, He Loves us still.

We often try to tell ourselves stories that disprove His unconditional Love for us. But through A Course in Miracles we learn that the ego makes up these stories out of fear. The truth is none of those lies are real. How do we find evidence of this truth? We find the evidence through forgiveness. When we accept that all of us are One, we realize that the only constant in life is Love.

It does not matter if we get mad at someone who cuts us off in traffic or gets pushy at the grocery store. When we try to see them through the eyes of Love and accept that they are also doing the best they can. In that moment we find grace.

Jesus tells us, “Grace is the 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 lighted by the of gift of grace cannot believe the world of fear is real.” (W-pI.169.2:1) “As an expression of what you truly are, the miracle places the mind in a state of grace. The mind then naturally welcomes the Host within and the stranger without. When you bring in the stranger the stranger becomes your brother.” (T-1.III.7:4)

There seems to be a need for a shift in awareness from egocentric thoughts to a more spiritual experience. Once we shift our beliefs to realize that no matter what happens, the state of our Being is pure Love and acceptance, we experience grace. It is the acceptance of God’s Love, even when we feel betrayed. How comforting it is to know that we are loved and accepted, no matter what. I remember a time in my life when the God I believed in was judgmental and was waiting to throw me into a fire pit for eternity if I didn’t believe a certain way.

I have since learned that is not the truth. And to me that is also what grace is. Knowing who we are and accepting who we are in relationship with God. As I contemplate about finding grace in everyday life, I make it a point to forgive myself for all my misinformation and for allowing myself to believe untruths. Now I pay attention to the grace moments in my world.

I was scrolling through my Facebook feed the other day, and I heard a story of a woman who was standing in line to vote in the rain. She was soaking wet and the line was very long. A man pulled up and handed her an umbrella. She asked how she could get it back to him and he said to pass it on. That is a lovely expression of compassion.

Those are the moments in which we find grace. But grace is really about finding Love, even when it is hard to. There are many different ways grace is described. Like it is a thing of beauty, a woman’s name, as in Grace Kelly, or a smooth flawless movement, as in dancing with grace.

But the kind of grace that stabilizes us in life is the grace that is the connection with unconditional Love. There is a clear pathway to experience it through forgiveness. When we forgive ourselves and our perceptions of others, we are left with a profound feeling of joy that grace bestows upon us. It is seeing our brother through Love instead of judgment.

The world that we are living in today takes a lot of focus to be able to forgive even when it seems like the other is unforgivable. When I saw on television the death of a man in police custody, my heart broke and I felt angry. I wanted to lash out at everyone involved. Regardless of the politics of it, it was the disregard of another human where a life was snuffed out that shook me to my core.

I had only seen another life taken at the hands of another person on purpose once before in my life. When I was a teenager working at a local supermarket as a cashier, the store was being robbed by several men. When a customer reacted by grabbing hold of the robber and shaking him, he pulled out a gun and started shooting. A man in my line was shot. He showed me a bullet hole in his chest. But the worst was a woman waiting in line who was fatally shot. She had stopped at the store to pick up one item on the way to pick up her child from school.

Watching those type of crimes does not compare to watching someone pass from illness. There is a feeling of such loss and sadness that it takes time to process it. Fear leads people to do those things. These things make me stop to look for the opportunity to find it in my heart to forgive. I remember hearing a family tell of forgiving a man who killed their daughter. That is really grace — knowing that God loves us all no matter what.

We do not know what led to these things, but God does. Our job is to see who they are underneath the appearance. We are not asked to perform miracles but miracle mindedness ensures our state of grace. “…the action aspect of the miracle should be controlled by me because of my complete awareness of the whole plan.” (T-1.III.8:4)

We have a job to do and our judgment is not part of that. We need to find a way to forgive and accept that sometimes we witness what seems to be a lack of Love. This is our job, to see it for what it is — unreal. Anything that is not Love is not real. I think this is the really hard part for me and I guess I’m not alone in that. What is real is God’s Love for us.

Our bodies are not our reality; only our Spirit is real. But in our current ego-state we are trained to see differences, good and bad. Don’t think that I am saying it’s okay for someone to harm another and chalk it up to it doesn’t exist. Our behavior while we are expressing through a body is like a barometer showing us where we need to heal. But be assured in this world of ego, people are held accountable from the world’s view of their behavior.

I would love to see a time when we live totally in a state of grace, where we don’t need any evidence that Love is unconditional. I want to wake up in the morning and feel Love envelop me, seeing with eyes that see only grace. We have to practice that.

We can surround ourselves with things of beauty — gardens, flowers, birds, music, art, people who we love and who love us. Sometimes it can be a pet. We don’t always have access to family or friends so we can find it in our dogs and cats etc.

I recently saw a movie called “My Octopus Teacher.” It was about a man who had lost his job so he began going skin diving every day. He found an octopus den and he began watching it. Amazingly after a while the octopus reached out and began to touch him. Each day the octopus reached out a little more until she formed a very sweet relationship with the diver. At one point it showed the octopus nestled up on the diver’s chest like a kitten curled up affectionately.

Sharks in the area of the den would comb the bottom looking for food. One of them found her and a chase began. The diver did not want to interfere with nature so he painfully watched as the shark wrestled with the octopus and tore one of her legs off. Thankfully she survived that time.

How beautiful this story was to me and the surroundings were in kelp forests in South Africa. The story showed how this man found unconditional love during a down time in his life. To experience grace, we only have to be aware of the Love of God in all of us.

Remember that our physical eyes were not created to see Spirit. They only see the body. Through our bodies we can find and reconnect with our true nature. When we watch a beautiful sunset or sit beside a stream of crystal-clear water and listen to the sounds in nature. “Spirit is in a state of grace forever. Your reality is only spirit. Therefore you are in a state of grace forever.” (T-1.III.5:4-6)

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