[acimlessons_list] LESSON 316 - NOVEMBER 12

[Sue Roth]

LESSON 316 - NOVEMBER 12

"All gifts I give my brothers are my own."

PRACTICE INSTRUCTIONS 

See complete instructions in separate document.  
A short summary:

* Read the commentary paragraph slowly and personally.

* Pray the prayer, perhaps several times.

* Morning and evening: Repeat the idea and then spend time in Open Mind
Meditation.

* Hourly remembrance: Repeat the idea and then spend a quiet moment in
meditation.

* Frequent reminders: Repeat the idea often within each hour.

* Response to temptation: Repeat the idea whenever upset, to restore peace.

* Read the "What Is" section slowly and thoughtfully once during the day.

Practice suggestion: You may want to try the following visualization. It
will probably work better if someone reads it to you, or if you read it onto
a tape and play the tape back to guide you through it.

	Begin by repeating this line from the Urtext: "Help me to perform
whatever miracles you want of me today."
	
Then ask the Holy Spirit to whom he wants you to give a miracle today. 
For this exercise, we'll focus on just one person.
Once you have a person in mind, then ask the Holy Spirit what form this
miracle should take. 
It might be sitting down and forgiving this person. 
It might be a kind word or some outer gesture. 
	
	Ask Him, "What form should this miracle take?"
	
	Now visualize actually giving this miracle to this person, at
whatever time of day you expect this to occur. See the scene unfold in your
mind.
	
	Now, in your mind's eye, look off in the distance a bit. There you
see a temple-like structure. Its two magnificent doors are open wide, and on
either side of the massive doorway an angel is standing. You see people from
all directions walking towards this building, carrying treasures into it.
These treasures are the gifts that these people have been given by others.
One person has been given the precious gift of forgiveness and is carrying
that into the building. Another has been healed by a miracle worker, and is
carrying in this gift of healing. Another has received unconditional love
from a friend and is carrying that in.
	
	As you look, you begin to see specific people that you have given
to, carrying into the building the treasures you have given them. See one
person after another that you have given gifts to, walking inside to deposit
their gifts. You see recent people you've given to, and those you gave to a
long time ago. You see people you gave some particular thing to, and people
you gave to continually over years. Note each person specifically.
	Seeing these people, you realize that this is your treasure house.
Even though you experience yourself as being outside the building,
everything on the inside belongs to you. It's all yours. And after seeing so
many people carrying inside the gifts you have given them, you begin to get
a sense of just how many treasures you have stored up.
	
	The person you are giving to today is beside you. This person looks
at you and says, "Come with me." See this person take you by the hand and
walk you towards your treasure house. He or she is your escort into the
building. You see the treasure house looming closer. You see the doors open
wide in welcome. As you approach, the angels greet you and say, "Welcome.
Your house has been waiting for you. Enter in where you are truly welcome
and at home, among the gifts that God has given you."
	
	Walk in through the doors and see the dazzling splendor that awaits
you. Feel the holiness that pervades the place. Feel the peace and the sense
of home. As you look at the treasures, feel a sense of ownership. Feel the
abundance that comes from all these treasures being yours. This is your new
home, the home in which your mind will live from now on. Sit down in this
home and spend some time just soaking in the holiness, peace, and abundance.

COMMENTARY
	
This lesson is obviously a companion to yesterday's, "All gifts my brothers
give belong to me." We receive all the gifts our brothers give, and we also
receive all the gifts we give. Of course the reverse is true as well:
Everything any brother or sister gives, they also receive, and they receive
all the gifts we give as well. Everyone receives everything. It must be so
because we are all one.
	
"Each one allows a past mistake to go, and leave no shadow on the holy mind
my Father loves" (1:2). The gifts we are speaking of are gifts of
forgiveness in which we let a past mistake go, instead of holding on in
unforgiving grievance about it. When I give such a gift, I am blessed
because the shadows of that past mistake are removed from my mind. The
shadows no longer obscure the truth about my brother; my forgiveness shows
me Christ in him.

Therefore, we not only receive a gift every time one is given by someone
else-a smile, a word of mercy, an act of love-but also, we receive a gift
each time anyone else receives a gift! "His grace is given me in every gift
a brother has received throughout all time, and past all time as well"
(1:3). When Jesus looked at the woman caught in adultery and said, "Neither
do I condemn you, go and sin no more," and she received his gift of
forgiveness, I received a gift as well as she.

Our treasure house is full, says the lesson (1:4). "Angels watch its open
doors that not one gift is lost, and only more are added" (1:4). The fact
that we may not be aware of these gifts makes no difference; they can't be
lost. Every loving thought is treasured up and kept for us; not one is lost.
The treasure of love just keeps growing, just as God keeps eternally
expanding and extending.

You know, if we could really get a grasp on these thoughts our lives would
be transformed. We are being showered, deluged, with gifts of love in every
moment. We have the rich inheritance of all the love for all of time, "and
past all time as well" (1:3), to draw upon. Our perspective is so horribly
constrained by our self-inflicted isolation! We have no idea how rich we
are.

But I can come now, today, this moment, into my treasure house. I can "come
to where my treasures are, and enter in where I am truly welcome and at
home, among the gifts that God has given me" (1:5). I can remember all the
gifts I have and guarantee them to myself by giving them away, as Lesson 159
instructs us:

	There is no miracle you cannot give, for all are given you. 
	Receive them now by opening the storehouse of your mind where 
	they are laid, and giving them away.	(W-159.2:4-5)

The treasure house is in my mind; the gifts are all there. I can recognize I
have them by giving them away. It's like keeping the circulation going. And
since all the gifts I give my brothers are my own, giving them is how I know
I have them, and how I keep them. That's another way to understand the
lesson theme: <The only gifts I have are the ones I give away>. So let me
today give love to my brothers, give joy to my brothers. Let me offer peace
of mind to everyone. As I do, the gifts will be mine.

If we feel uncertain how to go about claiming and recognizing all these
treasures, this deluge of blessing, we can join in the prayer that closes
this lesson, phrased to recognize the fact that we do not, as yet, recognize
all these gifts, and asking for instruction in doing so:
Father, I would accept Your gifts today. I do not recognize them. Yet I
trust that You Who gave them will provide the means by which I can behold
them, see their worth, and cherish only them as what I want.	(2:1-3)

WHAT IS THE LAST JUDGMENT?

Part 6: W-pII.10.3:2

To fear God's saving grace is but to fear complete release from suffering,
return to peace, security and happiness, and union with your own Identity.

If the Last Judgment contains no condemnation, if we are, all of us, free
from our errors and every effect they ever seemed to have, how foolish to
fear it! Street evangelists with their placards proclaiming, "Prepare to
meet thy God!" are offering a message of fear: "Look out! Soon you will
stand before the judgment seat of Christ, and if you are not ready, you will
be damned." Jesus, in the Course, is telling us that there is no reason to
fear. Fearing God's judgment is fearing the very thing we all want: complete
release from suffering. The judgment of God does not damn, it redeems.

We suffer because of our guilt; forgiveness releases us. We are in distress
because of our fear; forgiveness returns us to peace, security, and
happiness. We are estranged from our own Identity by our belief in sin, but
forgiveness brings back union with our Self.

Our fear of God is deeply ingrained. When God approaches we react like a
trapped wild animal, feral, vicious and terrified. Oh, my soul! He comes
only with healing! He comes only to bring us everything we have ever truly
wanted, and more. "Fear not!" the angels announced at Jesus' birth, "For
behold! I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people"
(Lk 2:10). That is what we are being asked to believe, that underneath all
the appearance of terror, death and vengeance we have overlaid on it, God's
creation consists of pure joy, pure love, pure peace, pure safety. God waits
for us, not to punish, but to fold us forever in His everlasting Arms.