Lesson 161: Understanding the One Mind

And the King will answer them, " Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of my brothers, you did it to me."
Matthew 25:40 ESV

I am rereading Lesson 161 from ACIM and am reminded of the above words from Matthew. What we do to each other, we do to the King, Christ, God. We do to all.  So we should be mindful how we treat one brother because this seemingly single  act will be felt by all,  just as the  compassion shown to one will be felt by all.  Even the Divine will feel it because we are all expressions, creations of that divinity.  When we attack one another we attack God.  When we love one another, we love God.  

Say what???

The major learning in this lesson centers around the idea that Every mind contains all minds, for every mind is one. ACIM-W-161:4:1-2  A course recognizes how difficult that concept will be for many of us to truly grasp beyond a superficial conceptual understanding.  Most of us will not experience the meaning of those words...but we will, maybe...understand what Matthew is saying.

As divine creations, God is in all of us, ...therefore...when I attack my neighbor I attack all. When I yell obscenities at the driver in front of me for going to slow, I yell at all.  When I am angry with someone for breaching the social isolation protocol , I am angry at all.  When I reach out a hand of support to one, I reach out to all. When I forgive one brother, one sister...I forgive all.  
It is the body that attacks, not the one collective mind. It is, the body that symbolizes fear and when we look out at another's bodily form we see a reason for fear.  
The  body symbolizes fear because it is the part of us that can cause physical harm when it attacks. Yet, the body cannot attack on its own. It is the mind, clouded by ego, that directs the body to attack.  It is this veil of cloud that prevents us from seeing the connection of the One Mind in us. We see, instead, separate little bodies with separate little minds.  When we look out at the world with this perception we see that the separate little bodies  of others have the potential to cause harm to our separate little body.  This is fear! Fear leads us to attack before we are attacked.

When we focus on relating body to body...we fear and that leads to a constant cycle of defense and attack.  It doesn't have to be this way.

We can ask our brothers ( and sisters) to give us something other than their fear and their attack.  We ask that they give us their blessing . We ask that they look beyond the body form and all that body is doing to see what God sees when He looks at us.  We ask that they see us as themselves rather than their enemies.  We do the same.  We choose to seek the divinity in all  rather than the danger.

Well that is how I interpret this lesson but what do I know ?

All is well.

ACIM

ESV Bible

Note: I am not sure where this font and double spacing is coming from...it is not my doing???