Lesson 94. I am as God created me.
(1) Today we continue with the one idea which brings complete salvation; the one
statement which makes all forms of temptation powerless; the one thought which
renders the ego silent and entirely undone. You are as God created you. The
sounds of this world are still, the sights of this world disappear, and all the
thoughts that this world ever held are wiped away forever by this one idea. Here
is salvation accomplished. Here is sanity restored.
(2) True light is strength, and strength is sinlessness. If you remain as God
created you, you must be strong and light must be in you. He Who ensured your
sinlessness must be the guarantee of strength and light as well. You are as God
created you. Darkness cannot obscure the glory of God's Son. You stand in light,
strong in the sinlessness in which you were created, and in which you will
remain throughout eternity.
(3) Today we will again devote the first five minutes of each waking hour to the
attempt to feel the truth in you. Begin these times of searching with these
words:
I am as God created me.
I am His Son eternally.
Now try to reach the Son of God in you. This is the Self that never sinned, nor
made an image to replace reality. This is the Self that never left Its home in
God to walk the world uncertainly. This is the Self that knows no fear, nor
could conceive of loss or suffering or death.
(4) Nothing is required of you to reach this goal except to lay all idols and
self-images aside; go past the list of attributes, both good and bad, you have
ascribed to yourself; and wait in silent expectancy for the truth. God has
Himself promised that it will be revealed to all who ask for it. You are asking
now. You cannot fail because He cannot fail.
(5) If you do not meet the requirement of practicing for the first five minutes
of every hour, at least remind yourself hourly:
I am as God created me.
I am His Son eternally.
Tell yourself frequently today that you are as God created you. And be sure to
respond to anyone who seems to irritate you with these words:
You are as God created you.
You are His Son eternally.
Make every effort to do the hourly exercises today. Each one you do will be a
giant stride toward your release, and a milestone in learning the thought system
which this course sets forth.
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The commentary on this lesson is an excerpt from Kenneth Wapnick's eight volume
series of
books, called: "Journey Through the Workbook of A Course in Miracles," which can
be purchased at the following site:??~ M. Street
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Lesson 94. I am as God created me.
*This is the only lesson repeated in the workbook. It appears again in Lesson
110, and still again in Lesson 162. It is also the central theme of Review VI
and an important part of the last section in the text (T-31.VIII.) This crucial
theme is the basis of the Atonement principle that corrects the ego thought
system, which says: I am <not> as God created me, but a separated mind that now
makes its home in the body.*
(2) "True light is strength, and strength is sinlessness. If you remain as God
created you, you must be strong and light must be in you. He Who ensured your
sinlessness must be the guarantee of strength and light as well. You are as God
created you. Darkness cannot obscure the glory of God's Son. You stand in light,
strong in the sinlessness in which you were created, and in which you will
remain throughout eternity."
*Jesus elaborates on the meaning of the day's idea. "I am as God created me"
means that nothing the ego's thought system of darkness ever conceived has
effected the light of Heaven. Since we, as Christ, are part of that light --
referred to in the text as the Great Rays (see, e.g., T-18.III.8:7) -- we have
been unaffected as well. Sinlessness is our strength, for it reflects the
Atonements truth: the separation from light never happened. The darkness of
guilt can cover this light in our nightmares, but in reality there remains only
light.*
(3) "Today we will again devote the first five minutes of each waking hour to
the attempt to feel the truth in you. Begin these times of searching with these
words:
I am as God created me.
I am His Son eternally.
Now try to reach the Son of God in you. This is the Self that never sinned, nor
made an image to replace reality. This is the Self that never left Its home in
God to walk the world uncertainly. This is the Self that knows no fear, nor
could conceive of loss or suffering or death."
*We are now asked to think of the day's thought every hour. We begin with a
clear statement of the truth of our Identity, a truth that invalidates the ego's
illusions of sin, and fear, alienation and suffering. that have no home in our
Self. Recall the text's reference to the first commandment:
"Thou shalt have no other gods before Him because there are none." (T.4.III.6.6)
In the next paragraph Jesus describes how we reach the true Son of God, moving
beyond our illusory self, rooted in the belief that separation is sin, to the
glorious truth of Christ:*
(4:1) "Nothing is required of you to reach this goal except to lay all idols and
self-images aside; go past the list of attributes, both good and bad, you have
ascribed to yourself; and wait in silent expectancy for the truth."
*This succinctly describes the process of forgiveness: in order to remember God
we have to let go of the ego. Our task, therefore, is not to affirm the truth we
are as God created us, but to deny the ego's denial. We have already seen this
summarizing statement:
"The task of the miracle worker thus becomes to deny the denial of truth."
(T.12.II.1.5)
In order to reach this goal of remembering our Self, we "have to lay all idols
and self images aside." The key obstacle is the belief we <are> our self image,
the core of which is our specialness. We seek to protect this image by denying
responsibility and making a world in which the sin of existence is seen in
everyone except ourselves. Thus our self-image is not only that of a special
individual, but a special, <innocent> individual. This means someone else is
guilty.
The ego's defensive system makes forgiveness virtually impossible. In order for
us to reach God and remember Who we are as Christ, we have to let go of <all>
images. As Jesus reminds us, these images include not only the bad, but the
good. We have already seen that if we talk about a positive self-image, we imply
there is negative one, too. This results in a dualistic world of opposites, a
state impossible in Heaven. In the end, therefore, we to transcend even the
wrong-mind right-mind duality. However, we first must bring our illusions of
hate to the correction of forgiveness, the darkness of separation to the light
of Atonement. Only then can we complete the journey and find our One-minded
Self.*
(5:1-4) "If you do not meet the requirement of practicing for the first five
minutes of every hour, at least remind yourself hourly:
I am as God created me.
I am His Son eternally.
Tell yourself frequently today that you are as God created you."
*The test of our resolve to remember our Self is the commitment to remembering
the day's lesson. As we shall see in Lesson 95, the true value of the workbook
lies in showing us how much we do not wish to remember the exercises, which,
again, reflects our not wishing to remember we are as God created us.*
