A Course in Miracles

Lesson 139 - I will accept atonement for myself.

Here is the end of choice. For here we come to a decision to accept ourselves as God created us. And what is choice except uncertainty of what we are?

There is no doubt that is not rooted here. There is no question but reflects this one. There is no conflict that does not entail the single, simple question,

"what am I?"

Yet who could ask this question except one who has refused to recognize himself? Only refusal to accept yourself could make the question seem to be sincere. The only thing that can be surely known by any living thing is what it is. From this one point of certainty, it looks on other things as certain as itself. Uncertainty about what you must be is self-deception on a scale so vast its magnitude can hardly be conceived.

To be alive and not to know yourself is to believe that you are really dead. For what is life except to be yourself, and what but you can be alive instead?

Who is the doubter?
What is it he doubts?
Whom does he question?
Who can answer him?

He merely states that he is not himself, and therefore, being something else, becomes a questioner of what that something is.

Yet he could never be alive at all unless he knew the answer. If he asks as if he does not know, it merely shows he does not want to be the thing he is. He had accepted it because he lives, has judged against it and denied its worth, and has decided that he does not know the only certainty by which he lives. Thus he becomes uncertain of his life, for what it is has been denied by him.

It is for this denial (of what you are) that you need Atonement.

Your denial made no change in what you are, but you have split your mind into what knows, and does not know, the truth (of what you are).

You are yourself. There is no doubt of this, and yet you doubt it. But you do not ask what part of you can really doubt yourself. It cannot really be a part of you that asks this question, for it asks of one who knows the answer. Were it part of you, certainty would be impossible.

Atonement remedies the strange idea that it is possible to doubt yourself, and be unsure of what you really are.

This is the depth of madness. Yet it is the universal question of the world. What does this prove except the world is mad? Why share its madness in the sad belief that what is universal here is true?

Nothing the world believes is true.

It is a place whose purpose is to be a home where those who claim they do not know themselves can come to question what it is they are. And they will come again until the time Atonement is accepted, and they learn it is impossible to doubt yourself, and not to be aware of what you are.

Only acceptance (of what you are) can be asked of you, for what you are is certain. It is set forever in the holy Mind of God, and in your own. It is so far beyond all doubt and question, that to ask what it must be is all the proof you need to show that you believe the contradiction that you know not what you cannot fail to know.

Is this a question or a statement which denies itself in statement? Let us not allow our holy minds to occupy themselves with senseless musings such as this. We have a mission here. We did not come to reinforce the madness which we once believed in. Let us not forget the goal that we accepted. It is more than just our happiness alone we came to gain. What we accept as what we are proclaims what everyone must be, along with us.

Fail not your brothers, or you fail yourself. Look lovingly on them, that they may know that they are part of you, and you of them. This does Atonement teach, and demonstrates the oneness of God's Son is unassailed by his belief he knows not what he is.

Practice Instructions

Today accept Atonement, not to change reality, but merely to accept the truth about yourself, and go your way rejoicing in the endless Love of God. It is but this that we are asked to do. It is but this that we will do today.

1. Five minutes in the morning and at night we will devote to dedicate our minds to our assignment for today. We start with this review of what our mission is:

"I will accept Atonement for myself, for I remain as God created me.”

We have not lost the knowledge that God gave to us when He created us like Him. We can remember it for everyone, for in creation are all minds as one. And in our memory is the recall how dear our brothers are to us in truth, how much a part of us is every mind, how faithful they have really been to us, and how our Father's Love contains them all.

2. In thanks for all creation, in the Name of its Creator and His Oneness with all aspects of creation, we repeat our dedication to our cause today each hour, as we lay aside all thoughts that would distract us from our holy aim.

For several minutes let your mind be cleared of all the foolish cobwebs which the world would weave around the holy Son of God. And learn the fragile nature of the chains that seem to keep the knowledge of yourself apart from your awareness, as you say:

“I will accept Atonement for myself, for I remain as God created me.”