[acimlessons_list] Lesson 234 - August 22

[Sue Roth]

Lesson 234 - August 22

"FATHER, TODAY I AM YOUR SON AGAIN."

PRACTICE INSTRUCTIONS

See complete Part II practice instructions. 
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: I see today's lesson as a kind of holy escapism, in
which we anticipate that glorious day when we at last awaken to Heaven. So,
as you repeat today's idea, imagine that this is the day when you awaken
from time and space once and for all and open your eyes in Heaven again. You
may want to try repeating it once in this spirit now and see how it feels.

COMMENTARY

This lesson is about anticipating Heaven.

"Today we will anticipate the time when dreams of sin and guilt are gone,
and we have reached the holy peace we never left" (1:1).

That is what we do each day as we draw near to God in these times of quiet
and stillness. We are giving ourselves a foretaste of Heaven. Just in this
moment, just for now, imagine that all your dreams of sin and guilt are
gone. Imagine that all fear has ended--all fear! Imagine that every thought
of conflict is past. Imagine that there is nothing and can be nothing ever
again that will disturb your perfect rest.

What you are imagining is real--the true state of things.

"Nothing has ever happened to disturb the peace of God the Father and the
Son" (1:4).

The dreams of sin and guilt, the dream of fear, the dream of conflict, the
dream of any disturbance at all is just that. Nothing more than a dream. Let
it go, let it float away, meaningless and without significance. Just a
bubble in the stream.

Merely a tiny instant has elapsed between eternity and timelessness. So
brief the interval there was no lapse in continuity, nor break in thoughts
which are forever unified as one. Nothing has ever happened to disturb the
peace of God the Father and the Son. This we accept as wholly true today.
(1:2-5)

In these moments of remembrance, these holy instants we set aside each day,
we are anticipating the time when our bad dreams are wholly absent. No, I am
not there yet, nor are you, not in our experience--although in reality, as
the lesson states so clearly, we never left. There has never been a "lapse
in continuity," and not one note in Heaven's song was missed. We, however,
are still living most of the time in the dream. But we can experience
moments of anticipation, direct experiences of the truth. It is that we seek
right now. A moment of anticipation. A sense in the core of our beings,
something we identify with the word "peace," something that words cannot
capture.

These are practice times in which we deliberately stretch ourselves above
the level of our normal, mundane experience. We choose to "accept as wholly
true" the fact that the peace of God, Father and Son, has <never> been
disturbed. Just for the moment, just for now, we allow ourselves to
experience believing that. We don't worry that in fifteen minutes we may not
believe it. We don't worry about what will happen to our lives if we believe
it. We don't consider all the evidence to the contrary our senses have
brought us in the past. We just let all that go, and breathe deeply of the
rarified atmosphere of Heaven. This is my Home. This is what I really am.
This is what is really true. This is all that I want.

If thoughts of sin, or of guilt, or of fear do arise in our minds, we gently
dismiss them. "This is not what I want to experience right now. Right now, I
want the peace of God. Right now, I have the peace of God."

Jesus, our elder brother, joins us and leads us in prayer, praying with us:

<We thank you, Father, that we cannot lose the memory of You and of Your
Love. We recognize our safety, and give thanks for all the gifts You have
bestowed on us, for all the loving help we have received, for Your eternal
patience, and the Word which You have given us that we are saved>. (2:1-2)

WHAT IS SALVATION?

PART 4: W-PII.2.2:4-5

To our mind, the separation is real. "The separation is a system of thought
real enough in time, though not in eternity" (T-3.VII.3:2). "The mind can
make the belief in separation very real" (T-3.VII.5:1). The mind experiences
itself as split, separated from God, and with one fragment of mind separated
from other fragments. This is our experience in time, and it is "real
enough" in time, although it is not real in eternity. In truth, the mind is
not actually split; it is simply failing to recognize its oneness (2:4). But
within that one mind, the experience of separation <seems> real.

Think of nearly any dream you have had in which you are interacting with
other people. You are yourself in the dream, and there are other characters.
Perhaps someone is making love to you. Perhaps you are arguing with someone,
or being chased by a monster. Within the dream, every character is distinct
and separate. The other people in the dream may say or do things that
surprise you, or that you do not understand. And yet, in fact, every one of
those "other characters" exists only in your one mind! Your mind is making
them up. In the dream there is separation between the characters. In
reality, there is only one mind, and different aspects of that mind are
interacting with one another as if they were separate entities.

This, according to the Course, is exactly the case with this entire world.
It is one mind, experiencing different aspects of itself as if they were
separate beings. Within that dream the separation between the different
characters seems to be clear and distinct, unbridgeable. And yet the mind is
still one. The one mind does not know itself; it believes that "its own
Identity was lost" (2:5). But the Identity was not lost in fact, only in a
dream.

And so, within each fragment of the mind that is failing to recognize its
oneness, God implanted the Thought of peace, "the Thought that has the power
to heal the split" (2:4). This "part of every fragment" (2:4) remembers the
Identity of mind. It is a part that is shared by every fragment. Like a
golden thread running through a piece of fabric, it binds us all together,
and draws the seemingly separated fragments constantly toward their true
oneness. This Thought within us knows that "nothing has ever happened to
disturb the peace of God the Father and the Son" (W-pII.234.1:4).

This Thought, implanted within us by God, is what we seek when we become
still within the holy instant. By quieting all the separated thoughts, we
listen for this Voice within us, speaking of our oneness, our wholeness, our
eternal peace. This Thought has power to heal the split, to dissipate the
seeming solidity of our illusions of separation, and to restore to the
Sonship the awareness of its unity. "[Salvation] restores to your awareness
the wholeness of the fragments you perceive as broken off and separate"
(M-19.4:2).