ACIM 13. What Is a Miracle? A miracle is a correction.
A miracle is a correction. ²It does not create, nor really change at all. ³It merely looks on devastation, and reminds the mind that what it sees is false. ⁴It undoes
What Is a Miracle?
ACIM Workbook 13
What Is a Miracle?
1. A miracle is a correction. ²It does not create, nor really change at all. ³It merely looks on devastation, and reminds the mind that what it sees is false. ⁴It undoes error, but does not attempt to go beyond perception, nor exceed the function of forgiveness. ⁵Thus it stays within time’s limits. ⁶Yet it paves the way for the return of timelessness and love’s awakening, for fear must slip away under the gentle remedy it brings.
Miracles correct the thoughts which are the cause of our miscreations. It works with perception undoing error through forgiveness. When we have awakened from the world of time, we will no longer need them. When I notice that I believe something that is not true, I forgive that belief and it is undone in my mind. It just falls away as if I had never believed it. That is a miracle.
My favorite sentence in this section is this. ³It merely looks on devastation, and reminds the mind that what it sees is false. I love this sentence because it is another way of saying that while much has been seen, nothing has happened. The world is an idea in the mind, an error in the mind. That is all it is, and the miracle reveals this to us. For a while, it is revealed one error at a time, but eventually, the mind remembers the truth.
The Gift of Grace
2. A miracle contains the gift of grace, for it is given and received as one. ²And thus it illustrates the law of truth the world does not obey, because it fails entirely to understand its ways. ³A miracle inverts perception which was upside down before, and thus it ends the strange distortions that were manifest. ⁴Now is perception open to the truth. ⁵Now is forgiveness seen as justified.
When we perceive the world through the ego mind, we see everything upside down. We think that the world caused us. In truth, we caused the world. Have you ever heard someone justify an attack by saying they were just defending themselves? This is saying that the world (or someone specific in the world) caused them to react. This is not so. Our interpretation of the action is what we respond to, not the action itself. This is why I never look outward for a solution. I am the cause of my life. My life does not cause me.
Forgiveness Is the Home of Miracles
3. Forgiveness is the home of miracles. ²The eyes of Christ deliver them to all they look upon in mercy and in love. ³Perception stands corrected in His sight, and what was meant to curse has come to bless. ⁴Each lily of forgiveness offers all the world the silent miracle of love. ⁵And each is laid before the Word of God, upon the universal altar to Creator and creation in the light of perfect purity and endless joy.
Miracles are what occur when we forgive. When I divorced my husband, I did so because I thought he was impossible to live with. After a while, he remarried and his wife thinks he’s just fine. My husband wasn’t the problem, my interpretation of him was the problem. This is not to say that I would want to be married to him again, but I also am certain there is nothing wrong with him.
When we were first divorced, I was taking my courses with Pathways of Light to be a minister. Through taking those courses, I learned to see things from a different perspective. I wanted to be free of all remaining grievances but I knew it would take a miracle to accomplish this. Fortunately, I also knew that miracles come from forgiveness. I began the process of forgiving everything I believed about him and myself and the relationship. The miracle occurred and we are now friends and I have nothing but love for him.
The Miracle Is Taken on Faith
4. The miracle is taken first on faith, because to ask for it implies the mind has been made ready to conceive of what it cannot see and does not understand. ²Yet faith will bring its witnesses to show that what it rested on is really there. ³And thus the miracle will justify your faith in it, and show it rested on a world more real than what you saw before; a world redeemed from what you thought was there.
When I first began the forgiveness of that relationship, I was conflicted. I knew it had to be forgiven and I trusted that I could do this and would be glad I did it. I trusted but had little proof it was so. Nevertheless, I took Jesus at his word and I forgave. Often, I had to revisit the same memory over and over because I had convinced myself that I was right and that being right mattered. I returned to it as often as I needed to until my mind was clear. Once a belief was undone, I would wonder why I ever believed it. I was never sorry that I let a grievance go.
Drops of Healing Rain
5. Miracles fall like drops of healing rain from Heaven on a dry and dusty world, where starved and thirsty creatures come to die. ²Now they have water. ³Now the world is green. ⁴And everywhere the signs of life spring up, to show that what is born can never die, for what has life has immortality.
My life is filled with miracles now. I am so grateful for A Course in Miracles. Sometimes I can’t believe that this incredible thing has happened to me. I remain vigilant for the need to forgive and now I never hesitate. I almost never have to revisit a grievance, but if I do, that’s OK. I’m just glad I know what to do with them now.
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