EPILOGUE to Workbook for Students

This course is a beginning, not an end. Your Friend goes with you. You are not alone. No one who calls on Him can call in vain. Whatever troubles you, be certain that He has the answer, and will gladly give it to you, if you simply turn to Him and ask it of Him. He will not withhold all answers that you need for anything that seems to trouble you. He knows the way to solve all problems, and resolve all doubts. His certainty is yours. You need but ask it of Him, and it will be given you.

You are as certain of arriving home as is the pathway of the sun laid down before it rises, after it has set, and in the half-lit hours in between. Indeed, your pathway is more certain still. For it can not be possible to change the course of those whom God has called to Him. Therefore obey your will, and follow Him Whom you accepted as your voice, to speak of what you really want and really need. His is the Voice for God and also yours. And thus He speaks of freedom and of truth.

No more specific lessons are assigned, for there is no more need of them. Henceforth, hear but the Voice for God and for your Self when you retire from the world, to seek reality instead. He will direct your efforts, telling you exactly what to do, how to direct your mind, and when to come to Him in silence, asking for His sure direction and His certain Word. His is the Word that God has given you. His is the Word you chose to be your own.

And now I place you in His hands, to be His faithful follower, with Him as Guide through every difficulty and all pain that you may think is real. Nor will He give you pleasures that will pass away, for He gives only the eternal and the good. Let Him prepare you further. He has earned your trust by speaking daily to you of your Father and your brother and your Self. He will continue. Now you walk with Him, as certain as is He of where you go; as sure as He of how you should proceed; as confident as He is of the goal, and of your safe arrival in the end.

The end is certain, and the means as well. To this we say “Amen.” You will be told exactly what God wills for you each time there is a choice to make. And He will speak for God and for your Self, thus making sure that hell will claim you not, and that each choice you make brings Heaven nearer to your reach. And so we walk with Him from this time on, and turn to Him for guidance and for peace and sure direction. Joy attends our way. For we go homeward to an open door which God has held unclosed to welcome us.

We trust our ways to Him and say “Amen.” In peace we will continue in His way, and trust all things to Him. In confidence we wait His answers, as we ask His Will in everything we do. He loves God’s Son as we would love him. And He teaches us how to behold him through His eyes, and love him as He does. You do not walk alone. God’s angels hover near and all about. His Love surrounds you, and of this be sure; that I will never leave you comfortless.

8. What Is the Real World?

Commentary (full lesson beneath commentary)

In Part II of the Workbook, every 10 lessons we are given an instruction.  It comes in the form of a question.  There are 14 of these questions all together, and each one of them corresponds to a set of 10 lessons, and is to be read every day for the next 10 days along with our lesson for the day.  “What Is the Real World?” is the eighth instruction and goes with Lessons 291 – 300.

8.  What Is the Real World?

The real world is a symbol, like the rest of what perception offers. Yet it stands for what is opposite to what you made. Your world is seen through eyes of fear, and brings the witnesses of terror to your mind. The real world cannot be perceived except through eyes forgiveness blesses, so they see a world where terror is impossible, and witnesses to fear can not be found.

The real world holds a counterpart for each unhappy thought reflected in your world; a sure correction for the sights of fear and sounds of battle which your world contains. The real world shows a world seen differently, through quiet eyes and with a mind at peace. Nothing but rest is there. There are no cries of pain and sorrow heard, for nothing there remains outside forgiveness. And the sights are gentle. Only happy sights and sounds can reach the mind that has forgiven itself.

What need has such a mind for thoughts of death, attack and murder? What can it perceive surrounding it but safety, love and joy? What is there it would choose to be condemned, and what is there that it would judge against? The world it sees arises from a mind at peace within itself. No danger lurks in anything it sees, for it is kind, and only kindness does it look upon.

The real world is the symbol that the dream of sin and guilt is over, and God’s Son no longer sleeps. His waking eyes perceive the sure reflection of his Father’s Love; the certain promise that he is redeemed. The real world signifies the end of time, for its perception makes time purposeless.

The Holy Spirit has no need of time when it has served His purpose. Now He waits but that one instant more for God to take His final step, and time has disappeared, taking perception with it as it goes, and leaving but the truth to be itself. That instant is our goal, for it contains the memory of God. And as we look upon a world forgiven, it is He Who calls to us and comes to take us home, reminding us of our Identity which our forgiveness has restored to us.

Remember, in Part II of the Workbook, every 10 lessons we are given an instruction.  It comes in the form of a question.  There are 14 of these questions all together, and each one of them corresponds to a set of 10 lessons, and is to be read every day for the next 10 days along with our lesson for the day.  “What Is the Real World?” is the eighth instruction and goes with Lessons 291 – 300.

To see the entire Workbook for Students, get a copy of the book, A Course in Miracles, or visit the original publisher, Foundation for Inner Peace, online at http://acim.org/Lessons/index.html. To have the lesson delivered daily to your email box for free, sign up with http://www.acimdailylesson.com/category/daily-lessons-from-a-course-in-miracles. An excellent line-by-line analysis called Journey Through the Workbook of A Course in Miracles is offered by Kenneth Wapnick through the bookstore at http://www.facim.org.

Lesson 284 – I can elect to change all thoughts that hurt.

Commentary (full lesson beneath commentary)

Nothing need be experienced as painful.  Nothing need be experienced as loss.  At first that seems callous but it is not.  It is not callous to view a mirage and then see it is nothing.  Any images that floated in that mirage, temporarily and erroneously, are automatically dismissed as it evaporates into nothing.

LESSON 284

I can elect to change all thoughts that hurt.

Loss is not loss when properly perceived. Pain is impossible. There is no grief with any cause at all. And suffering of any kind is nothing but a dream. This is the truth, at first to be but said and then repeated many times; and next to be accepted as but partly true, with many reservations. Then to be considered seriously more and more, and finally accepted as the truth. I can elect to change all thoughts that hurt. And I would go beyond these words today, and past all reservations, and arrive at full acceptance of the truth in them.

Father, what You have given cannot hurt, so grief and pain must be impossible. Let me not fail to trust in You today, accepting but the joyous as Your gifts; accepting but the joyous as the truth.

Let’s practice together!  Watch and hear Amy reading each ACIM Lesson on Youtube.  Also, check out Workin’ the Workbook, Amy’s online class which supports the ACIM Workbook practice. 

Lesson 283 – My true Identity abides in You.

Commentary (full lesson beneath commentary)

The light of Heaven is infinite … the light of Heaven is what we are … my Father loves me … my Father is Our Father and He loves Us.  We are His Creation and Creation is Light, for Light is Love.  Love extends infinitely and eternally, uniting lovingly with all the world … which is the happy dream just before we recognize our true Self.

LESSON 283

My true Identity abides in You.

Father, I made an image of myself, and it is this I call the Son of God. Yet is creation as it always was, for Your creation is unchangeable. Let me not worship idols. I am he my Father loves. My holiness remains the light of Heaven and the Love of God. Is not what is beloved of You secure? Is not the light of Heaven infinite? Is not Your Son my true Identity, when You created everything that is?

Now are we One in shared Identity, with God our Father as our only Source, and everything created part of us. And so we offer blessing to all things, uniting lovingly with all the world, which our forgiveness has made one with us.

Let’s practice together!  Watch and hear Amy reading each ACIM Lesson on Youtube.  Also, check out Workin’ the Workbook, Amy’s online class which supports the ACIM Workbook practice. 

7. What Is the Holy Spirit?

Commentary (full lesson beneath commentary)

In Part II of the Workbook, every 10 lessons we are given an instruction.  It comes in the form of a question.  There are 14 of these questions all together, and each one of them corresponds to a set of 10 lessons, and is to be read every day for the next 10 days along with our lesson for the day.  “What Is the Holy Spirit?” is the seventh instruction and goes with Lessons 281 – 290.

 7.  What Is the Holy Spirit?

The Holy Spirit mediates between illusions and the truth. Since He must bridge the gap between reality and dreams, perception leads to knowledge through the grace that God has given Him, to be His gift to everyone who turns to Him for truth. Across the bridge that He provides are dreams all carried to the truth, to be dispelled before the light of knowledge. There are sights and sounds forever laid aside. And where they were perceived before, forgiveness has made possible perception’s tranquil end.

The goal the Holy Spirit’s teaching sets is just this end of dreams. For sights and sounds must be translated from the witnesses of fear to those of love. And when this is entirely accomplished, learning has achieved the only goal it has in truth. For learning, as the Holy Spirit guides it to the outcome He perceives for it, becomes the means to go beyond itself, to be replaced by the eternal truth.

If you but knew how much your Father yearns to have you recognize your sinlessness, you would not let His Voice appeal in vain, nor turn away from His replacement for the fearful images and dreams you made. The Holy Spirit understands the means you made, by which you would attain what is forever unattainable. And if you offer them to Him, He will employ the means you made for exile to restore your mind to where it truly is at home.

From knowledge, where He has been placed by God, the Holy Spirit calls to you, to let forgiveness rest upon your dreams, and be restored to sanity and peace of mind. Without forgiveness will your dreams remain to terrify you. And the memory of all your Father’s Love will not return to signify the end of dreams has come.

Accept your Father’s gift. It is a Call from Love to Love, that It be but Itself. The Holy Spirit is His gift, by which the quietness of Heaven is restored to God’s beloved Son. Would you refuse to take the function of completing God, when all He wills is that you be complete?

Remember, in Part II of the Workbook, every 10 lessons we are given an instruction.  It comes in the form of a question.  There are 14 of these questions all together, and each one of them corresponds to a set of 10 lessons, and is to be read every day for the next 10 days along with our lesson for the day.  “What Is the Holy Spirit?” is the seventh instruction and goes with Lessons 281 – 290.

To see the entire Workbook for Students, get a copy of the book, A Course in Miracles, or visit the original publisher, Foundation for Inner Peace, online at http://acim.org/Lessons/index.html. To have the lesson delivered daily to your email box for free, sign up with http://www.acimdailylesson.com/category/daily-lessons-from-a-course-in-miracles. An excellent line-by-line analysis called Journey Through the Workbook of A Course in Miracles is offered by Kenneth Wapnick through the bookstore at http://www.facim.org.

6. What Is the Christ?

Commentary (full lesson beneath commentary)

In Part II of the Workbook, every 10 lessons we are given an instruction.  It comes in the form of a question.  There are 14 of these questions all together, and each one of them corresponds to a set of 10 lessons, and is to be read every day for the next 10 days along with our lesson for the day.  “What Is the Christ?” is the sixth instruction and goes with Lessons 271 – 280.

 6.  What Is the Christ?

Christ is God’s Son as He created Him. He is the Self we share, uniting us with one another, and with God as well. He is the Thought which still abides within the Mind that is His Source. He has not left His holy home, nor lost the innocence in which He was created. He abides unchanged forever in the Mind of God.

Christ is the link that keeps you one with God, and guarantees that separation is no more than an illusion of despair, for hope forever will abide in Him. Your mind is part of His, and His of yours. He is the part in which God’s Answer lies; where all decisions are already made, and dreams are over. He remains untouched by anything the body’s eyes perceive. For though in Him His Father placed the means for your salvation, yet does He remain the Self Who, like His Father, knows no sin.

Home of the Holy Spirit, and at home in God alone, does Christ remain at peace within the Heaven of your holy mind. This is the only part of you that has reality in truth. The rest is dreams. Yet will these dreams be given unto Christ, to fade before His glory and reveal your holy Self, the Christ, to you at last.

The Holy Spirit reaches from the Christ in you to all your dreams, and bids them come to Him, to be translated into truth. He will exchange them for the final dream which God appointed as the end of dreams. For when forgiveness rests upon the world and peace has come to every Son of God, what could there be to keep things separate, for what remains to see except Christ’s face?

And how long will this holy face be seen, when it is but the symbol that the time for learning now is over, and the goal of the Atonement has been reached at last? So therefore let us seek to find Christ’s face and look on nothing else. As we behold His glory, will we know we have no need of learning or perception or of time, or anything except the holy Self, the Christ Whom God created as His Son.

Remember, in Part II of the Workbook, every 10 lessons we are given an instruction.  It comes in the form of a question.  There are 14 of these questions all together, and each one of them corresponds to a set of 10 lessons, and is to be read every day for the next 10 days along with our lesson for the day.  “What Is the Christ?” is the sixth instruction and goes with Lessons 271 – 280.

Let’s practice together!  Watch and hear Amy reading each ACIM Lesson on Youtube.  Also, check out Workin’ the Workbook, Amy’s online class which supports the ACIM Workbook practice. 

5. What Is the Body?

Commentary (full lesson beneath commentary)

In Part II of the Workbook, every 10 lessons we are given an instruction.  It comes in the form of a question.  There are 14 of these questions all together, and each one of them corresponds to a set of 10 lessons, and is to be read every day for the next 10 days along with our lesson for the day.  “What Is the Body?” is the fifth instruction and goes with Lessons 261 – 270.

5.  WHAT IS THE BODY?

The body is a fence the Son of God imagines he has built, to separate parts of his Self from other parts. It is within this fence he thinks he lives, to die as it decays and crumbles. For within this fence he thinks that he is safe from love. Identifying with his safety, he regards himself as what his safety is. How else could he be certain he remains within the body, keeping love outside?

The body will not stay. Yet this he sees as double safety. For the Son of God’s impermanence is “proof” his fences work, and do the task his mind assigns to them. For if his oneness still remained untouched, who could attack and who could be attacked? Who could be victor? Who could be his prey? Who could be victim? Who the murderer? And if he did not die, what “proof” is there that God’s eternal Son can be destroyed?

The body is a dream. Like other dreams it sometimes seems to picture happiness, but can quite suddenly revert to fear, where every dream is born. For only love creates in truth, and truth can never fear. Made to be fearful, must the body serve the purpose given it. But we can change the purpose that the body will obey by changing what we think that it is for.

The body is the means by which God’s Son returns to sanity. Though it was made to fence him into hell without escape, yet has the goal of Heaven been exchanged for the pursuit of hell. The Son of God extends his hand to reach his brother, and to help him walk along the road with him. Now is the body holy. Now it serves to heal the mind that it was made to kill.

You will identify with what you think will make you safe. Whatever it may be, you will believe that it is one with you. Your safety lies in truth, and not in lies. Love is your safety. Fear does not exist. Identify with love, and you are safe. Identify with love, and you are home. Identify with love, and find your Self.

Remember, in Part II of the Workbook, every 10 lessons we are given an instruction.  It comes in the form of a question.  There are 14 of these questions all together, and each one of them corresponds to a set of 10 lessons, and is to be read every day for the next 10 days along with our lesson for the day.  “What Is the Body?” is the fifth instruction and goes with Lessons 261 – 270.

To see the entire Workbook for Students, get a copy of the book, A Course in Miracles, or visit the original publisher, Foundation for Inner Peace, online at http://acim.org/Lessons/index.html. To have the lesson delivered daily to your email box for free, sign up with http://www.acimdailylesson.com/category/daily-lessons-from-a-course-in-miracles. An excellent line-by-line analysis called Journey Through the Workbook of A Course in Miracles is offered by Kenneth Wapnick through the bookstore at http://www.facim.org.

2. What Is Salvation?

Commentary (full lesson beneath commentary)

In Part II of the Workbook, every 10 lessons we are given an instruction.  It comes in the form of a question.  There are 14 of these questions all together, and each one of them corresponds to a set of 10 lessons, and is to be read every day for the next 10 days along with our lesson for the day.  “What Is Salvation?” is the second instruction and goes with Lessons 231 – 240.

2.  WHAT IS SALVATION?

Salvation is a promise, made by God, that you would find your way to Him at last. It cannot but be kept. It guarantees that time will have an end, and all the thoughts that have been born in time will end as well. God’s Word is given every mind which thinks that it has separate thoughts, and will replace these thoughts of conflict with the Thought of peace.

The Thought of peace was given to God’s Son the instant that his mind had thought of war. There was no need for such a Thought before, for peace was given without opposite, and merely was. But when the mind is split there is a need of healing. So the Thought that has the power to heal the split became a part of every fragment of the mind that still was one, but failed to recognize its oneness. Now it did not know itself, and thought its own Identity was lost.

Salvation is undoing in the sense that it does nothing, failing to support the world of dreams and malice. Thus it lets illusions go. By not supporting them, it merely lets them quietly go down to dust. And what they hid is now revealed; an altar to the holy Name of God whereon His Word is written, with the gifts of your forgiveness laid before it, and the memory of God not far behind.

Let us come daily to this holy place, and spend a while together. Here we share our final dream. It is a dream in which there is no sorrow, for it holds a hint of all the glory given us by God. The grass is pushing through the soil, the trees are budding now, and birds have come to live within their branches. Earth is being born again in new perspective. Night has gone, and we have come together in the light.

From here we give salvation to the world, for it is here salvation was received. The song of our rejoicing is the call to all the world that freedom is returned, that time is almost over, and God’s Son has but an instant more to wait until his Father is remembered, dreams are done, eternity has shined away the world, and only Heaven now exists at all.

Remember, in Part II of the Workbook, every 10 lessons we are given an instruction.  It comes in the form of a question.  There are 14 of these questions all together, and each one of them corresponds to a set of 10 lessons, and is to be read every day for the next 10 days along with our lesson for the day.  “What Is Salvation?” is the second instruction and goes with Lessons 231 – 240.

Let’s practice together!  Watch and hear Amy reading each ACIM Lesson on Youtube.  Also, check out Workin’ the Workbook, Amy’s online class which supports the ACIM Workbook practice. 

1. What Is Forgiveness?

Commentary (full lesson beneath commentary)

In Part II of the Workbook, every 10 lessons we are given an instruction.  It comes in the form of a question.  There are 14 of these questions all together, and each one of them corresponds to a set of 10 lessons, and is to be read every day for the next 10 days along with our lesson for the day.  “What Is Forgiveness?” is the first instruction and goes with Lessons 221 – 230.

1.  WHAT IS FORGIVENESS?

 Forgiveness recognizes what you thought your brother did to you has not occurred. It does not pardon sins and make them real. It sees there was no sin. And in that view are all your sins forgiven. What is sin, except a false idea about God’s Son? Forgiveness merely sees its falsity, and therefore lets it go. What then is free to take its place is now the Will of God.

An unforgiving thought is one which makes a judgment that it will not raise to doubt, although it is not true. The mind is closed, and will not be released. The thought protects projection, tightening its chains, so that distortions are more veiled and more obscure; less easily accessible to doubt, and further kept from reason. What can come between a fixed projection and the aim that it has chosen as its wanted goal?

An unforgiving thought does many things. In frantic action it pursues its goal, twisting and overturning what it sees as interfering with its chosen path. Distortion is its purpose, and the means by which it would accomplish it as well. It sets about its furious attempts to smash reality, without concern for anything that would appear to pose a contradiction to its point of view.

Forgiveness, on the other hand, is still, and quietly does nothing. It offends no aspect of reality, nor seeks to twist it to appearances it likes. It merely looks, and waits, and judges not. He who would not forgive must judge, for he must justify his failure to forgive. But he who would forgive himself must learn to welcome truth exactly as it is.

Do nothing, then, and let forgiveness show you what to do, through Him Who is your Guide, your Savior and Protector, strong in hope, and certain of your ultimate success. He has forgiven you already, for such is His function, given Him by God. Now must you share His function, and forgive whom He has saved, whose sinlessness He sees, and whom He honors as the Son of God.

Remember, in Part II of the Workbook, every 10 lessons we are given an instruction.  It comes in the form of a question.  There are 14 of these questions all together, and each one of them corresponds to a set of 10 lessons, and is to be read every day for the next 10 days along with our lesson for the day.  “What Is Forgiveness?” is the first instruction and goes with Lessons 221 – 230.

Let’s practice together!  Click here for more information and to sign-up for Workin’ the Workbook, my online class which supports the ACIM Workbook practice.