 We continue today with Chapter 25 The Justice of Heaven What can it be but arrogance to think your little errors cannot be undone by Heaven's justice? And what could this mean except that there are sins and not mistakes, forever uncorrectable, and to be met with vengeance, not with justice? Are you willing to be released from all effects of sin? You cannot answer this until you see all that the answer must entail. For if you answer yes, it means you will forgo all values of this world in favor of the peace of Heaven. Not one sin would you retain, and not one doubt that this is possible will you hold dear that sin be kept in place. You mean that the truth has greater value now than all illusions. And you recognize that truth must be revealed to you because you know not what it is. To give reluctantly is not to gain the gift because you are reluctant to accept it. It is safe for you until reluctance to receive it disappears. You are willing? It be given you. God's justice warrants gratitude, not fear. Nothing you give is lost to you or anyone but cherished and preserved in Heaven, where all of the treasures given to God's Son are kept for Him, and offered anyone who but holds out his hand in willingness they be received. Nor is the treasure less as it is given out, each gift but adds to the supply. For God is fair. He does not fight against His Son's reluctance to perceive salvation as a gift from Him. Yet would His justice not be satisfied until it is received by everyone? Be certain any answer to a problem the Holy Spirit solves will always be one in which no one loses. And this must be true because He asks no sacrifice of anyone. An answer which demands the slightest loss to anyone has not resolved the problem, but has added to it and made it greater, harder to resolve and more unfair. It is impossible that the Holy Spirit could see unfairness as a resolution. To Him what is unfair must be corrected because it is unfair. And every error is a perception in which one, at least, is seen unfairly. Thus is justice not accorded to the Son of God. When anyone is seen as losing, he has been condemned, and punishment becomes his due instead of justice. The sight of innocence makes punishment impossible and justice sure. The Holy Spirit's perception leaves no ground for an attack. Only a loss could justify attack and loss of any kind he cannot see. The world solves problems in another way. It sees a resolution as a state in which it is decided who shall win and who shall lose, how much the one shall take and how much can the loser still defend. Yet does the problem still remain unsolved, for only justice can set up a state in which there is no loser, no one left unfairly treated and deprived, and thus with grounds for vengeance. Problem-solving cannot be vengeance, which at best can bring another problem added to the first in which the murder is not obvious. The Holy Spirit's problem-solving is the way in which the problem ends. It has been solved because it has been met with justice. Until it has, it will recur because it has not yet been solved. The principle that justice means no one can lose is crucial to this course. For miracles depend on justice, not as it is seen through this world's eyes, but as God knows it and as acknowledged is reflected in the sight the Holy Spirit gives. No one deserves to lose, and what would be unjust to him cannot occur. Healing must be for everyone, because he does not merit an attack of any kind. What order can there be in miracles unless someone deserves to suffer more and others less? And is this justice to the Holy Innocent? A miracle is justice. It is not a special gift to some to be withheld from others as less worthy, more condemned, and thus apart from healing. Who is there who can be separate from salvation if its purpose is the end of specialness? Where is salvation's justice if some errors are unforgivable and weren't vengeance in place of healing, in return of peace? Salvation cannot seek to help God's Son more, be more unfair than he has sought to be. If miracles, the Holy Spirit's gift, were given specially to an elect and special group, and kept apart from others as less deserving, then he is ally to specialness. What he cannot perceive, he bears no witness to, and everyone is equally entitled to his gift of healing and deliverance and peace. To give a problem to the Holy Spirit to solve for you means that you want it solved. To keep it for yourself to solve without his help is to decide it should remain unsettled, unresolved, and lasting in its power of injustice and attack. No one can be unjust to you unless you have decided first to be unjust, and then must problems rise to block your way and peace be scattered by the winds of hate. Unless you think that all your brothers have an equal right to miracles with you, you will not claim your right to them because you were unjust to one with equal rights. Seek to deny, and you will feel denied. Seek to deprive, and you have been deprived. A miracle can never be received because another could receive it not. Only forgiveness offers miracles, and pardon must be just to everyone. The little problems that you keep and hide become your secret sins because you did not choose to let them be removed for you. And so they gather dust and grow until they cover everything that you perceive and leave you fair to no one. Not one right do you believe you have. And bitterness with vengeance justified and mercy lost condemns you as unworthy of forgiveness. The unforgiven have no mercy to bestow upon another. That is why your sole responsibility must be to take forgiveness for yourself. The miracle that you receive you give. Each one becomes an illustration of the law on which salvation rests. That justice must be done to all if anyone is to be healed. No one can lose and everyone must benefit. Each miracle is an example of what justice can accomplish when it is offered to everyone alike. It is received and given equally. It is awareness that giving and receiving are the same. Because it does not make the same unlike. It sees no differences where none exists. And thus it is the same for everyone because it sees no differences in them. Its offering is universal and it teaches but one message. What is God's belongs to everyone and is His due. And from the workbook lesson 199, I am not a body, I am free. Freedom must be impossible as long as you perceive a body as yourself. The body is a limit. Who would seek for freedom in a body looks for it where it cannot be found. The mind can be made free when it no longer sees itself as in a body, firmly tied to it and sheltered by its presence. If this were the truth the mind were vulnerable indeed. The mind that serves the Holy Spirit is unlimited forever in all ways beyond the laws of time and space, unbound by any preconceptions and with strength and power to do whatever it is asked. Attack thoughts cannot enter such a mind because it has been given to the source of love. And fear can never enter in a mind that has attached itself to love. It rests in God. And who can be afraid who lives in innocence and only loves? It is essential for your progress in this course that you accept today's idea and hold it very dear. Be not concerned that to the ego it is quite insane. The ego holds the body dear because it dwells in it and lives united with the home that it has made. It is part of the illusion that has sheltered it from being found illusory itself. Here does it hide and here it can be seen as what it is. Declare your innocence and you are free. The body disappears because you have no need of it except the need the Holy Spirit sees. For this the body will appear as useful form for what the mind must do. It thus becomes a vehicle which helps forgiveness be extended to the all-inclusive goal that it must reach according to God's plan. Cherish today's idea and practice it today and every day. Make it part of every practice period you take. There is no thought that will not gain thereby in power to help the world and none which will not gain an added gifts to you as well. We sound the call of freedom round the world with this idea. And would you be exempt from the acceptance of the gifts you give? The Holy Spirit is the home of minds that seek for freedom. In Him they have found what they have sought. The body's purpose now is unambiguous and it becomes perfect in the ability to serve an undivided goal. In conflict-free and unequivocal response to mind with but the thought of freedom as its goal the body serves and serves its purpose well. Without the power to enslave it it is a worthy servant of the freedom which the mind within the Holy Spirit seeks. Be free today and carry freedom as your gift to those who still believe they are enslaved within a body. Be you free so that the Holy Spirit can make use of your escape from bondage to set free the many who perceive themselves as bound and helpless and afraid. Let love replace their fear through you except salvation now and give your mind to Him who calls to you to make this gift to Him. For He would give you perfect freedom, perfect joy and hope that finds its full accomplishment in God. You are God's Son. In immortality you live forever. Would you not return your mind to this? Then practice well the thought the Holy Spirit gives you for today. Your brothers stand released with you in it. The world is blessed along with you. God's Son will weep no more and heaven offers thanks for the increase of joy your practice brings even to it. And God Himself extends His love and happiness each time you say, I am not a body. I am free. I hear the voice that God has given me and it is only this that my mind obeys. Amen.