Lesson 165
Let not my mind deny the Thought of God.
1. What makes this world seem real except your own denial of the truth that lies beyond? ²What but your thoughts of misery and death obscure the perfect happiness and the eternal life your Father wills for you? ³And what could hide what cannot be concealed except illusion? ⁴What could keep from you what you already have except your choice to see it not, denying it is there?
Or to put it more simply, ⁴You did this to yourself. (ACIM, T-21.II.5:4) This is the good news. What we did , we can undo with the help of the Holy Spirit Who knows what we believe but does not join us in that belief.
2. The Thought of God created you. ²It left you not, nor have you ever been apart from it an instant. ³It belongs to you. ⁴By it you live. ⁵It is your Source of life, holding you one with it, and everything is one with you because it left you not. ⁶The Thought of God protects you, cares for you, makes soft your resting place and smooth your way, lighting your mind with happiness and love. ⁷Eternity and everlasting life shine in your mind, because the Thought of God has left you not, and still abides with you.
No matter what I might feel like right now or how I have felt in the past, this is the only thing that is true and it is always true. There is never a moment when it is not true. If I don’t feel the intensity of this love and care, I must be actively blocking it from my mind. I am in God and He is in me. How could I miss that?
3. Who would deny his safety and his peace, his joy, his healing and his peace of mind, his quiet rest, his calm awakening, if he but recognized where they abide? ²Would he not instantly prepare to go where they are found, abandoning all else as worthless in comparison with them? ³And having found them, would he not make sure they stay with him, and he remain with them?
If I were always sane, I definitely would. When I am sane, I do. The reason that we decided not to laugh at this whole idea of life outside of Life is that it is absurd and if we remembered God, we would throw ourselves into Him and never leave again. And then laugh to realize we never left. We have been asleep in God dreaming of being in hell.
4. Deny not Heaven. ²It is yours today, but for the asking. ³Nor need you perceive how great the gift, how changed your mind will be before it comes to you. ⁴Ask to receive, and it is given you. ⁵Conviction lies within it. ⁶Till you welcome it as yours, uncertainty remains. ⁷Yet God is fair. ⁸Sureness is not required to receive what only your acceptance can bestow.
Thank you, God, that we don’t have t start with conviction. We can ask and then ask again and again until we are convicted in our desire. I only have to desire a thing to have it.
5. Ask with desire. ²You need not be sure that you request the only thing you want. ³But when you have received, you will be sure you have the treasure you have always sought. ⁴What would you then exchange for it? ⁵What would induce you now to let it fade away from your ecstatic vision? ⁶For this sight proves that you have exchanged your blindness for the seeing eyes of Christ; your mind has come to lay aside denial, and accept the Thought of God as your inheritance.
Our acceptance of God’s gifts will convince us we do truly want them. The more often I allow my mind to be healed, the happier and more peaceful I am and the more I want to heal my mind.
6. Now is all doubting past, the journey’s end made certain, and salvation given you. ²Now is Christ’s power in your mind, to heal as you were healed. ³For now you are among the saviors of the world. ⁴Your destiny lies there and nowhere else. ⁵Would God consent to let His Son remain forever starved by his denial of the nourishment he needs to live? ⁶Abundance dwells in him, and deprivation cannot cut him off from God’s sustaining Love and from his home.
As I continue this practice, my doubts have melted away. Now I only have doubts once in a while instead of all the time. I don’t simply accept the doubts anymore. Now I question them and I talk to the Holy Spirit and ask for another way to see. I remind myself that the Answer to this problem (whatever it might be) is simple, I am as God created me.
7. Practice today in hope. ²For hope indeed is justified. ³Your doubts are meaningless, for God is certain. ⁴And the Thought of Him is never absent. ⁵Sureness must abide within you who are host to Him. ⁶This course removes all doubts which you have interposed between Him and your certainty of Him.
8. We count on God, and not upon ourselves, to give us certainty. ²And in His Name we practice as His Word directs we do. ³His sureness lies beyond our every doubt. ⁴His Love remains beyond our every fear. ⁵The Thought of Him is still beyond all dreams and in our minds, according to His Will.
It’s a process. We have to take our time and be consistent and vigilant. We need to look at the same issues repeatedly until our mind accepts the shift in perception. That’s OK. It is normal and expected. But what we can depend on, the truth we can lean on is that God is still God and we are still His Son. We cannot fail to be what we are and He will not fail to guide us Home.