I have disowned the truth. Now let me be as faithful in disowning falsity. Whatever suffers is not part of me. What grieves is not myself. What is in pain is but illusion in my mind. What dies was never living in reality, and did but mock the truth about myself. Now I disown self-concepts and deceits and lies about the holy Son of God. Now am I ready to accept him back as God created him, and as he is.
"Father, my ancient love for You returns, and lets me love Your Son again as well. Father, I am as You created me. Now is Your Love remembered, and my own. Now do I understand that they are one."
The Final Judgment is one of the greatest threat concepts in man's perception. This is only because he does not understand it. Judgment is not an essential attribute of God. Man brought judgment into being only because of the Separation. God Himself is still the God of mercy. After the Separation, however, there WAS a place for justice in the schema, because it was one of the many learning devices which had to be built into the overall plan. Just as the Separation occurred over many millions of years, the Last Judgment will extend over a similarly long period, and perhaps even longer. Its length depends, however, on the effectiveness of the present speed-up. We have frequently noted that the miracle is a device for shortening but not abolishing time. If a sufficient number of people become truly miracle-minded quickly, the shortening process can be almost immeasurable. But it is essential that these individuals free themselves from fear sooner than would ordinarily be the case, because they MUST emerge from basic conflict if they are to bring peace to the minds of others.
The Last Judgment is generally thought of as a procedure undertaken by God. Actually, it will be undertaken solely by man, with My help. It is a Final Healing, rather than a meting out of punishment, however much man may think punishment is deserved. Punishment as a concept is in total opposition to Right-Mindedness. The aim of the Final Judgment is to RESTORE Right-Mindedness TO man.
The Final Judgment might be called a process of Right-evaluation. It simply means that finally all men must come to understand what is worthy and what is not. After this, their ability to choose can be reasonably directed. Unless this distinction has been made, the vacillations between free and imprisoned will cannot but continue. The first step toward freedom, then, MUST entail a sorting out of the false from the true. This is a process of division only in the constructive sense, and reflects the true meaning of the Apocalypse. Man will ultimately look upon his own creations, and will to preserve only what is good, just as God Himself once looked upon what he had created, and knew that it WAS good. At this point, the Will will begin to look with love on its creations, because of their great worthiness. The mind will inevitably disown its miscreations, and having withdrawn belief from them, they will no longer exist.
The term Last Judgment is frightening, not only because it has been falsely projected onto God, but also because of the association of "Last" with death. This is an outstanding example of upside down perception. Actually, if it is examined objectively, it is quite apparent that it is really the doorway to life. No man who lives in fear is really alive.
His own final judgment cannot be directed toward himself, because he is not his own creation. He can apply it meaningfully, and at any time, to everything he has ever created, and retain in his real memory only what is good. This is what his own Right-Mindedness CANNOT BUT dictate. The purpose of time is solely to "give him time" to achieve this judgment. It is his own perfect judgment of his own creation. When everything that he retains is lovable, there is no reason for any fear to remain in him. This IS his part in the Atonement.
Any split in will MUST involve a rejection of part of it, and this IS the belief in separation. The wholeness of God, which IS His peace, cannot be appreciated EXCEPT by a whole mind, which recognizes the wholeness of God's creation and BY this recognition knows its Creator.
Exclusion and separation are synonymous. So are separation and dissociation. We have said before that the separation was and IS dissociation, and also that once it had occurred, projection became its main defense, or the device which KEEPS IT GOING. The reason, however, may not be as clear to you as you think. What you project you disown, and therefore DO NOT BELIEVE IS YOURS. You are therefore EXCLUDING yourself from it, by the very statement you are making that you are DIFFERENT from someone else. Since you have also judged AGAINST what you project, you attack it because you have already attacked it BY rejecting it. By doing this UNCONSCIOUSLY, you try to keep the fact that you must have attacked yourself FIRST out of awareness, and thus imagine that you have made yourself safe.
Projection will ALWAYS hurt you. It reinforces your belief in your own split mind, and its ONLY purpose is to KEEP THE SEPARATION GOING. It is solely a device of the ego to make you feel DIFFERENT from your brothers and separated FROM them. The ego justifies this on the wholly spurious grounds that it makes you seem better than they are, thus obscuring equality WITH them still further.
Projection and attack are inevitably related, because projection is ALWAYS a means of JUSTIFYING attack. Anger without projection is impossible. The ego uses projection ONLY to distort your perception of both yourself AND your brothers. It begins by excluding something you think exists in you which you do not want, and leads directly to your excluding yourself from your brothers.
But we know that there is another use of projection. Every ability of the ego has a better counterpart, because its abilities are directed by the mind, which has a better voice. The Holy Spirit, as well as the ego, utilizes projection but since their goals are opposed, so is the result. The Holy Spirit begins by perceiving YOU as perfect. KNOWING this perfection is shared, it RECOGNIZES it in others, thus strengthening it in both. Instead of anger, this arouses love FOR both because IT ESTABLISHES INCLUSION. Perceiving equality, it perceives equal needs. This invites Atonement automatically, because Atonement IS the one need which is universal.
To perceive YOURSELF in this way is the ONLY way in which you can find happiness in this world. This is because it is the acknowledgement that you are NOT in this world, and the world IS unhappy. How else can you find joy in a joyless place EXCEPT by realizing that YOU ARE NOT THERE? You cannot be ANYWHERE that God did not put you, and God created you as part of HIM. That is both WHERE you are and WHAT you are. This is COMPLETELY unalterable. It is total inclusion. You cannot change this now or ever. It is forever true. It is NOT a belief, but a fact.
Anything that God creates is as true as He is. Its truth lies only in its perfect inclusion in Him Who alone IS perfect. To deny this in any way is to deny yourself AND Him, because it is impossible to accept one without the other. The perfect equality of the Holy Spirit's perception is the counterpart of the perfect equality of God's knowing. The ego's perception has no counterpart in God, but the Holy Spirit remains the bridge between perception and knowledge. By enabling you to use perception in a way that PARALLELS knowledge, you will ultimately meet it and KNOW it.
The ego prefers to believe that parallel lines do not meet, and conceives of their meeting as impossible. But you might remember that the human eye perceives them as if they DO meet in the distance, which is the same as IN THE FUTURE, if time and space are one dimension. The later mathematics support the interpretation of ultimate convergence of the parallel theoretically. EVERYTHING meets in God, because everything was created BY Him and IN Him. God created His Sons by extending His Thought and retaining the extensions of His Thought in His Mind. ALL His Thoughts are thus perfectly united within themselves and with each other because they, were created neither partially nor in part.
The Holy Spirit enables you to PERCEIVE THIS WHOLENESS NOW. You can no more pray for yourselves alone than you can find joy for yourself alone. Prayer is a re-statement of INCLUSION, directed by the Holy Spirit under the laws of God. God created you to create. You cannot EXTEND His Kingdom until you KNOW of its wholeness. But thoughts begin in the mind OF THE THINKER, from which they extend outward. This is as true of God's thinking as it is of yours. Because your minds are split, you can also perceive as well as think, but perception cannot escape from the basic laws of mind. You perceive FROM your mind, and extend your perceptions outward.
Although perception of any kind is unnecessary, YOU made it and the Holy Spirit can therefore use it well. He can INSPIRE perception and lead it toward God by making it PARALLEL to God's way of thinking, and thus guaranteeing their ultimate meeting. This convergence SEEMS to be far in the future ONLY because your mind is NOT in perfect alignment with the idea, and therefore DOES NOT WANT IT NOW. The Holy Spirit USES time, but does NOT believe in it. Coming from God, He uses EVERYTHING for good, but does not BELIEVE in what is not true.
Since the Holy Spirit IS in your minds, then your minds MUST be able to believe ONLY what is true. The Holy Spirit can speak only for this, because he speaks for God. He tells you to return your whole mind to God, BECAUSE IT HAS NEVER LEFT HIM. If it has never left Him, you need only perceive it AS IT IS to BE returned. The full awareness of the Atonement, then, is the recognition that the separation NEVER OCCURRED. The ego CANNOT prevail against this, because it is an explicit statement that the EGO never occurred.
The ego can accept the idea that RETURN is necessary, because it can so easily make the idea seem so difficult. But the Holy Spirit tells you that even RETURN is unnecessary, because what never happened CANNOT involve ANY problem. But it does NOT follow that YOU cannot make the idea of return both necessary AND difficult. God made nothing either necessary OR difficult. But YOU have perceived both AS IF they were part of His perfect creations. Yet it is surely clear that the perfect NEED nothing, and CANNOT experience perfection as a difficult accomplishment because that is what they ARE.
This is the way in which you MUST perceive God's Creations, bringing all of your perceptions into the one parallel line which the Holy Spirit sees. This line is the direct line of communication with God, and lets YOUR mind converge with HIS. There is NO CONFLICT ANYWHERE in this perception, because it means that ALL perception is guided by the Holy Spirit, whose mind is fixed on God. ONLY the Holy Spirit can resolve conflict, because ONLY the Holy Spirit is conflict-free. He perceives ONLY what is true in YOUR mind, and extends outward to ONLY what is true in other minds.
The difference between the ego's use of projection and projection as the Holy Spirit uses it is very simple. The ego projects to EXCLUDE and therefore to deceive. The Holy Spirit projects by RECOGNIZING HIMSELF in EVERY mind, and thus perceives them as ONE. Nothing conflicts in this perception, because what the Holy Spirit perceives IS the same. Wherever He looks He sees Himself, and because He is UNITED, He offers the whole Kingdom always. This is the one message which God gave TO Him, and for which He must speak because that is what He IS. The peace of God lies in that message, and so the peace of God lies in YOU.
The great peace of the Kingdom shines in your mind forever, but it must shine OUTWARD to make YOU aware of it. The Holy Spirit was given you with perfect impartiality, and only by perceiving Him impartially can you perceive Him at all. The ego is legion, but the Holy Spirit is one. No darkness abides ANYWHERE in the Kingdom, so your part is only to allow no darkness to abide in your OWN mind. This alignment with Light is unlimited, because it is in alignment with the Light of the world. Each of us IS the Light of the world, and by joining our minds IN this Light, we proclaim the Kingdom of God together and AS ONE.