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Lesson 46. God is the Love in which I forgive.

 

Lesson 46. God is the Love in which I forgive.

God does not forgive because He has never condemned. And there must be
condemnation before forgiveness is necessary. Forgiveness is the great need of
this world, but that is because it is a world of illusions. Those who forgive
are thus releasing themselves from illusions, while those who withhold
forgiveness are binding themselves to them. As you condemn only yourself, so do
you forgive only yourself.

Yet although God does not forgive, His Love is nevertheless the basis of
forgiveness. Fear condemns and love forgives. Forgiveness thus undoes what fear
has produced, returning the mind to the awareness of God. For this reason,
forgiveness can truly be called salvation. It is the means by which illusions
disappear.

Today's exercises require at least three full five-minute practice periods, and
as many shorter ones as possible. Begin the longer practice periods by repeating
today's idea to yourself, as usual. Close your eyes as you do so, and spend a
minute or two in searching your mind for those whom you have not forgiven. It
does not matter "how much" you have not forgiven them. You have forgiven them
entirely or not at all.

If you are doing the exercises well you should have no difficulty in finding a
number of people you have not forgiven. It is a safe rule that anyone you do not
like is a suitable subject. Mention each one by name, and say:
God is the Love in which I forgive you, [name].<
The purpose of the first phase of today's practice periods is to put you in a
position to forgive yourself. After you have applied the idea to all those who
have come to mind, tell yourself:
God is the Love in which I forgive myself.<
Then devote the remainder of the practice period to adding related ideas such
as:

God is the Love with which I love myself.
God is the Love in which I am blessed.<

The form of the application may vary considerably, but the central idea should
not be lost sight of. You might say, for example:

I cannot be guilty because I am a Son of God.
I have already been forgiven.
No fear is possible in a mind beloved of God.
There is no need to attack because love has forgiven me.<

The practice period should end, however, with a repetition of today's idea as
originally stated.
The shorter practice periods may consist either of a repetition of the idea for
today in the original or in a related form, as you prefer. Be sure, however, to
make more specific applications if they are needed. They will be needed at any
time during the day when you become aware of any kind of negative reaction to
anyone, present or not. In that event, tell him silently:

God is the Love in which I forgive you.<
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The commentary on this lesson (below) is 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

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Lesson 46. "God is the Love in which I forgive."

*This lesson is the first time we find a serious discussion of forgiveness.*

(1:1-3) "God does not forgive because He has never condemned. And there must be
condemnation before forgiveness is necessary. Forgiveness is the great need of
this world, but that is because it is a world of illusions."

*As we shall see later, Jesus "likes" this first sentence so much that he
repeats it verbatim in the review lesson. Forgiveness has no place in Heaven,
but only in the dream that began with the condemnation thought of sin and will
end with sin's undoing through forgiveness, love's reflection. "There must be
condemnation before forgiveness is necessary," which makes forgiveness an
illusion since it corrects what never happened. Since God does not (because He
<cannot>) recognize the illusion, He cannot correct it. There is no need for it
in Heaven.*

(1:4-5) "Those who forgive are thus releasing themselves from illusions, while
those who withhold forgiveness are binding themselves to them. As you condemn
only yourself, so do you forgive only yourself."

*Jesus is making it very clear that forgiveness has nothing to do with anyone we
think is outside us. It occurs in the context of a relationship we have made
real, but must recognize that what we are forgiving is a projection of the guilt
we do not want, not to mention the responsibility for our distressing situation.
Lesson 196 - 198, which we shall discuss much later in this series, elaborate on
this essential point, as their titles suggest:

"It can be but myself I crucify."

"It can be but my gratitude I earn."

"Only my condemnation injures me." *

(2:1) "Yet although God does not forgive, His Love is nevertheless the basis of
forgiveness."

*We are reminded here that forgiveness is a real and right-minded thought that
reflects the real thought of love in our Christ Mind.*

(2:2-3) "Fear condemns and love forgives. Forgiveness thus undoes what fear has
produced, returning the mind to the awareness of God."

*The right mind, or forgiveness, undoes the wrong mind of fear and hate. When
the right mind undoes the wrong mind, both disappear and all that remains is the
awareness of God. Once again, we need to recall that A Course in Miracles does
not teach the truth, but the <undoing> of the illusory barriers to truth; a
process that allows the memory of God to dawn upon our sleeping minds, awakening
us at last from the ego's nightmare world of guilt and fear.*

(2:4-5) "For this reason, forgiveness can truly be called salvation. It is the
means by which illusions disappear."

*Salvation thus has a different meaning in A Course in Miracles. Rather than
being the plan of God to save us from our very real sinfulness, it now becomes
the Holy Spirit's correction of forgiveness for our <belief> in sinfulness. It
is the simple change of mind from the illusion of separation to the truth of
Atonement.*

(3) "Today's exercises require at least three full five-minute practice periods,
and as many shorter ones as possible. Begin the longer practice periods by
repeating today's idea to yourself, as usual. Close your eyes as you do so, and
spend a minute or two in searching your mind for those whom you have not
forgiven. It does not matter "how much" you have not forgiven them. You have
forgiven them entirely or not at all."

*This is an expression within the dream of the <all or none> idea, what we
earlier described as Level One. In our experience we do not forgive totally; we
forgive a little bit here and a little bit there; we forgive this person but not
another. This passage is telling us, however, that if that is our practice of
forgiveness, we are not finished yet. Forgiveness has to be total, otherwise it
is not real. This <all or none> idea finds a similar expression in the following
statement about A Course in Miracles itself: "This course will be believed
entirely or not at all" (T-22.II.7:4).*

(4) "If you are doing the exercises well you should have no difficulty in
finding a number of people you have not forgiven. It is a safe rule that anyone
you do not like is a suitable subject. Mention each one by name, and say:
God is the Love in which I forgive you, [name]."

*This is the first of several exercises in which Jesus asks us to identify those
people we have chosen not to forgive. He assures us we shall have no trouble in
identifying these special hate objects. Later on we shall be gently instructed
to expand this category to include those we believe we love. An important
teaching of the text is that special love and special hate are the same, being
but different <forms> of the same basic <content> of separation. Thus we need to
forgive <everyone>, since everyone -- friend or foe -- is perceived to be
separate from us.*

(5:1) "The purpose of the first phase of today's practice periods is to put you
in a position to forgive yourself."

*"Forgiving yourself" is what this course is all about. I think I am forgiving
someone outside of me, but I am really forgiving myself. Again, needless to say,
this thought is the central theme of A Course in Miracles. It reflects the
dynamic of projection, wherein we seek to place in others the guilt we cannot
accept within ourselves. Once having projected the guilt, we have no further
awareness of its ongoing presence in our minds, which for all intents and
purposes have been forgotten beneath the <double shield of oblivion>
(W-pI.136.6:2) -- the belief in guilt in ourselves (mind) and in others (body).
Only by recognizing our unforgiveness of another can we be led to the
unforgiveness of ourselves, and beyond that to the Atonement that links us back
to Love we never truly left.

The next few lines present various statements as suggestive of our practice for
the day. These, incidentally, should not be taken as <affirmations> as is the
practice of many New Age students. By this I mean that statements such as these
should <not> be used to cover the ego's thought system of negativity and hate,
but rather understood as symbols of the right-minded presence of correction, <to
which> we bring the ego's thoughts:*

(5:2--6:7) "After you have applied the idea to all those who have come to mind,
tell yourself:

God is the Love in which I forgive myself.

Then devote the remainder of the practice period to adding related ideas such
as:

God is the Love with which I love myself.
God is the Love in which I am blessed.

The form of the application may vary considerably, but the central idea should
not be lost sight of. You might say, for example:

I cannot be guilty because I am a Son of God.
I have already been forgiven.
No fear is possible in a mind beloved of God.
There is no need to attack because love has forgiven me.

The practice period should end, however, with a repetition of today's idea as
originally stated."

*If we do these exercises properly, we will become increasingly able to note our
ego thoughts of separation and specialness and bring them quickly to the love
that embraces the Sonship as one, at the same time it undoes our thoughts of
guilt, fear, and attack. This is reiterated in the lesson's final paragraph,
where Jesus returns to his central emphasis of using the idea for the day, as
well as its variations, whenever we are tempted to choose the ego instead of the
Holy Spirit:*

(7) "The shorter practice periods may consist either of a repetition of the idea
for today in the original or in a related form, as you prefer. Be sure, however,
to make more specific applications if they are needed. They will be needed at
any time during the day when you become aware of any kind of negative reaction
to anyone, present or not. In that event, tell him silently:
God is the Love in which I forgive you."

*Jesus is asking us, once again, to be aware of any kind of negative reaction,
major or minor, and then to bring these reactions <to> the suggested thoughts of
the day. In this way his light can shine away the darkness in which we had
sought to hide. This process requires great vigilance and diligence as we seek
continually to <practice> the holy instant (T-15.IV). I am reminded of the
famous joke: A lost New Yorker asks someone how to get to Carnegie Hall, the
legendary concert auditorium. The response is: <Practice, practice, practice>!*


Love and Blessings,

Lyn Johnson
719-369-1822

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