Commentary on ACIM Lesson 122

©2010 Rev. David Seacord

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Forgiveness offers me everything I want.

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Today, after editing the 'first person lesson' I find I am complete, and have nothing more to say (beyond the 'first person version' :-).....  

 

Namaste, 

 

David

 

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First person version.

 

Lesson 122

Forgiveness offers everything I want.

What could I actually desire that forgiveness cannot give? Do I desire peace? Forgiveness offers it. Do I desire happiness, a quiet mind, a certainty of purpose, and a sense of worth and beauty that transcends the world? Do I desire care and safety, and the warmth of sure protection always? Do I desire a quietness that cannot be disturbed, a gentleness that never can be hurt, a deep, abiding comfort, and a rest so perfect it can never be upset?

I know forgiveness offers me all this, and more. It sparkles on my eyes as I awake, and gives me joy with which to meet my day. It soothes my forehead while I sleep, and rests upon my eyelids so I see no dreams of fear and evil, malice and attack. And when I wake again, it offers me another day of happiness and peace. All this forgiveness offers me, and more.

Forgiveness lets the veil be lifted up that hides the face of Christ from those who look with unforgiving eyes upon the world. It lets me recognize the Son of God, and clears my memory of all 'dead (death) thoughts' so that remembrance of my Father can arise across the threshold of my mind. What would I desire or want that forgiveness cannot give? What gifts but these are worthy to be sought? What fancied value, trivial effect or transient promise, never to be kept, can hold more hope than what forgiveness brings?

Why would I seek for an answer other than the answer that will answer everything? Here is the perfect answer, being freely given in response to all imperfect questions, meaningless requests, halfhearted willingness to hear, and less than halfway diligence and partial trust. Here is the answer! I shall search for it no more, for I know I will not find another any other in its stead.

God's plan for my salvation cannot change, nor can it fail. I am so thankful it remains exactly as He planned it. Changelessly it stands before me like an open door, with warmth and welcome calling from beyond the doorway, bidding me to enter in and make myself at home, HERE, where I truly belong.

Here is the answer! Here is my answer! Why would I stand outside while all of Heaven waits for me within? I will forgive this world, and thus I will be forgiven, for as I give I do receive. There is no plan but this for the salvation of the Son of God. Let me today rejoice that this is so, for here I have an answer which is clear and plain and beyond deceit in its simplicity. All the complexities the world has spun of fragile cobwebs disappear before the power and the majesty of this extremely simple statement of the truth.

Here is the answer! I shall not turn away to aimless wanderings again. I will accept the wholeness of salvation now. It is the gift of God, ---- not the gift of the world. The world can give no gifts of any value to my mind, for I am now receiving what God has given me as my own. God has willed that salvation be received today by me, and that the intricacies of my ego's dreams no longer hide their true nothingness from me.

With open eyes today I look upon a happy world of safety and of peace. Forgiveness is the means by which it comes to me to take the place of my self-made hell. In quietness it rises up to greet my open eyes, and fill my heart with deep tranquility (as ancient truths, forever newly born, arise into my awareness). What I will remember then can never be described. Yet my acceptance of forgiveness offers it to me.

Therefore, remembering these gifts that forgiveness gives, we (I and my Teacher within me) shall undertake our practicing today with certainty and faith that this shall be the day salvation shall be mine. Earnestly and gladly will we affirm the truth of it today, aware we hold 'the key' within our hands, accepting Heaven's answer to the hell I made, but where I now choose to remain no more.

Morning and evening will I gladly give a quarter of an hour to the practicing in which the end of hell is guaranteed. I begin in high spirits, for I have been shown I have reached the turning point--- the point at which the road becomes far easier. And now the way is short that I have yet to travel. Indeed, I am close to the appointed ending of the dream.

I shall sink into happiness as I begin these practice periods, for they hold out the sure rewards of questions answered and what my acceptance of the answer brings. Today it will be given me to feel the peace forgiveness offers, and the joy the lifting of the veil holds out to me.

Before the light I will receive today the world will fade until it disappears, and I will see another world arise I have no words to picture. Now, let me walk directly into God's light, that I may receive the gifts that have been held in store for me since time began, kept in waiting just for today.

Forgiveness offers everything I truly desire. Today all things I ask for are given me. Let not these gifts recede throughout the day, as I return again to meet a world of shifting change and bleak appearances. I shall retain in clear awareness these holy gifts as I see the changeless in the heart of change; and the light of truth behind appearances.

Although I may be tempted to let these holy gifts slip by (and drift into forgetfulness), I shall not.  I will hold them firmly in my mind and think of them for at least a minute as each quarter of an hour passes by. I will remind myself how precious these gifts are with this reminder thought, which has the power to hold God's gifts in my awareness through the day:

Forgiveness offers everything I desire.
Today I have accepted this as true.
Today I have received the gifts of God.