Lesson 168
Your grace is given me.
I claim it now.
Your grace is given me. I claim it now.
1. God speaks to us. ²Shall we not speak to Him? ³He is not distant. ⁴He makes no attempt to hide from us. ⁵We try to hide from Him, and suffer from deception. ⁶He remains entirely accessible. ⁷He loves His Son. ⁸There is no certainty but this, yet this suffices. ⁹He will love His Son forever. ¹⁰When his mind remains asleep, He loves him still. ¹¹And when his mind awakes, He loves him with a never-changing Love.
2. If you but knew the meaning of His Love, hope and despair would be impossible. ²For hope would be forever satisfied; despair of any kind unthinkable. ³His grace His answer is to all despair, for in it lies remembrance of His Love. ⁴Would He not gladly give the means by which His Will is recognized? ⁵His grace is yours by your acknowledgment. ⁶And memory of Him awakens in the mind that asks the means of Him whereby its sleep is done.
The message here is clear; God loves us with an enduring and unchanging love. He loves us while we sleep and dream of being separate from Him and He loves us when we awaken to our union with Him. Despair is answered with His Love. He wants us to remember His Love and therefore gives us the means to do so. When the mind asks for the means to awaken, the means are given. This is why we are studying the Course; our minds have asked and we have received. All that is required now, is the practice of what we study and our unwavering desire for awakening.
3. Today we ask of God the gift He has most carefully preserved within our hearts, waiting to be acknowledged. ²This the gift by which God leans to us and lifts us up, taking salvation’s final step Himself. ³All steps but this we learn, instructed by His Voice. ⁴But finally He comes Himself, and takes us in His Arms and sweeps away the cobwebs of our sleep. ⁵His gift of grace is more than just an answer. ⁶It restores all memories the sleeping mind forgot; all certainty of what Love’s meaning is.
Oh, my! What a lovely vision that is. This is why I stay true to my purpose and why I put nothing before it. I want to remember. I want to remember God and Self in union. I want to remember Love. I want to be done with dreams of separation. So, I do the part given me; I study and I practice and I learn. The rest is out of my hands.
4. God loves His Son. ²Request Him now to give the means by which this world will disappear, and vision first will come, with knowledge but an instant later. ³For in grace you see a light that covers all the world in love, and watch fear disappear from every face as hearts rise up and claim the light as theirs. ⁴What now remains that Heaven be delayed an instant longer? ⁵What is still undone when your forgiveness rests on everything?
Every day, I ask the Holy Spirit to show me what else needs to be undone in my mind. I ask what it is He wants me to learn today. I ask Him to guide me and to heal my mind. I tell Him that I want to have a completely healed mind and I am willing to do whatever it takes to achieve this. I don’t know what that is, but He does and I will follow His directions.
What happens is this. I have become aware very quickly when my mind becomes interested in an ego thought. I notice if I make a casual judgment or if I have feelings of resentment. I notice right away if my emotions shift to something less than happiness or if my peace is disturbed. This quick awareness is the Holy Spirit showing me what He needs me to do now, and because I see it so quickly, it is easier for me to release it before it carries me into some story.
5. It is a new and holy day today, for we receive what has been given us. ²Our faith lies in the Giver, not our own acceptance. ³We acknowledge our mistakes, but He to Whom all error is unknown is yet the One Who answers our mistakes by giving us the means to lay them down, and rise to Him in gratitude and love.
I notice the errors in my mind and call on Him and He answers with a miracle. After all these years, I am still sometimes amazed at this. I might be caught up in a fear thought and I acknowledge this and ask for healing. Suddenly it all evaporates and is gone, just like that! Sometimes I don’t even remember what the fear was about. I am just filled with gratitude.
6. And He descends to meet us, as we come to Him. ²For what He has prepared for us He gives and we receive. ³Such is His Will, because He loves His Son. ⁴To Him we pray today, returning but the word He gave to us through His Own Voice, His Word, His Love:
⁵Your grace is given me. ⁶I claim it now. ⁷Father, I come to You. ⁸And You will come to me who ask. ⁹I am the Son You love.
What a beautiful prayer of love! I will take this into the silence with me.