When this is firmly understood and kept in full awareness, you will not attempt
to harm yourself, nor make your body slave to vengeance. You will not attack
yourself, and you will realize that to attack another is but to attack yourself.
You will be free of the insane belief that to attack a brother saves yourself.
And you will understand his safety is your own, and in his healing you are
healed.
Perhaps at first you will not understand how mercy, limitless and with all
things held in its sure protection, can be found in the idea we practice for
today. It may, in fact, appear to be a sign that punishment can never be escaped
because the ego, under what it sees as threat, is quick to cite the truth to
save its lies. Yet must it fail to understand the truth it uses thus. But you
can learn to see these foolish applications, and deny the meaning they appear to
have.
Thus do you also teach your mind that you are not an ego. For the ways in which
the ego would distort the truth will not deceive you longer. You will not
believe you are a body to be crucified. And you will see within today's idea
the light of resurrection, looking past all thoughts of crucifixion and of death
to thoughts of liberation and of life.
Today's idea is one step we take in leading us from bondage to the state of
perfect freedom. Let us take this step today that we may quickly go the way
salvation shows us, taking every step in its appointed sequence as the mind
relinquishes its burdens one by one. It is not time we need for this. It is but
willingness. And what would seem to need a thousand years can easily be done in
just one instant by the grace of God.
The dreary, hopeless thought that you can make attacks on others and escape
yourself has nailed you to the cross. Perhaps it seemed to be salvation. Yet it
merely stood for the belief the fear of God is real. And what is that but hell?
Who could believe his Father is his deadly enemy, separate from him, and waiting
to destroy his life and blot him from the universe, without the fear of hell
upon his heart?
Such is the form of madness you believe, if you accept the fearful thought you
can attack another and be free yourself. Until this form is changed, there is no
hope. Until you see that this, at least, must be entirely impossible, how could
there be escape? The fear of God is real to anyone who thinks this thought is
true. And he will not perceive its foolishness, or even see that it is there so
that it would be possible to question it.
To question it at all, its form must first be changed at least as much as will
permit fear of retaliation to abate, and the responsibility returned to some
extent to you. From there you can at least consider if you want to go along this
painful path. Until this shift has been accomplished, you can not perceive that
it is but your thoughts that bring you fear, and your deliverance depends on
you.
Our next steps will be easy, if you take this one today. From there we go ahead
quite rapidly. For once you understand it is impossible that you be hurt except
by your own thoughts, the fear of God must disappear. You do not now believe
that fear is caused without. And God, Whom you had thought to banish, can be
welcomed back within the holy mind He never left.
Salvation's song can certainly be heard in the idea we practice for today. If
it can but be you you crucify, you did not hurt the world and need not fear its
vengeance and pursuit. Nor need you hide in terror from the deadly fear of God
projection hides behind. The thing you dread the most is your salvation. You are
strong and it is strength you want. And you are free, and glad of freedom. You
have sought to be both weak and bound, because you feared your strength and
freedom. Yet salvation lies in them.
There is an instant in which terror seems to grip your mind so wholly that
escape appears quite hopeless. When you realize, once and for all, that it is
you you fear, the mind perceives itself as split. And this had been concealed
while you believed attack could be directed outward, and returned from outside
to within. It seemed to be an enemy outside you had to fear. And thus a god
outside yourself became your mortal enemy; the source of fear.
Now, for an instant, is a murderer perceived within you, eager for your death,
intent on plotting punishment for you until the time when it can kill at last.
Yet in this instant is the time as well in which salvation comes. For fear of
God has disappeared. And you can call on Him to save you from illusions in His
Love, calling Him Father and yourself His Son. Pray that the instant may be
soon, - today. Step back from fear and make advance to love.
There is no Thought of God that does not go with you to help you reach that
instant, and to go beyond it quickly, surely and forever. When the fear of God
is gone, there are no obstacles that still remain between you and the holy peace
of God. How kind and merciful is the idea we practice! Give it welcome, as you
should, for it is your release. It is indeed but you your mind can try to
crucify. Yet your redemption, too, will come from you.
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