LESSON 187 I bless the world because I bless myself.

1. 1No one can give unless he has. 2In fact, giving is proof of hav­ing. 3We have made this point before. 4What seems to make it hard to credit is not this. 5No one can doubt that you must first possess what you would give. 6It is the second phase on which the world and true perception differ. 7Having had and given, then the world asserts that you have lost what you possessed. 8The truth maintains that giving will increase what you possess.

2. 1How is this possible? 2For it is sure that if you give a finite thing away, your body’s eyes will not perceive it yours. 3Yet we have learned that things but represent the thoughts that make them. 4And you do not lack for proof that when you give ideas away, you strengthen them in your own mind. 5Perhaps the form in which the thought seems to appear is changed in giving. 6Yet it must return to him who gives. 7Nor can the form it takes be less acceptable. 8It must be more.

3. 1Ideas must first belong to you, before you give them. 2If you are to save the world, you first accept salvation for yourself. 3But you will not believe that this is done until you see the miracles it brings to everyone you look upon. 4Herein is the idea of giving clarified and given meaning. 5Now you can perceive that by your giving is your store increased.

4. 1Protect all things you value by the act of giving them away, and you are sure that you will never lose them. 2What you thought you did not have is thereby proven yours. 3Yet value not its form. 4For this will change and grow unrecognizable in time, however much you try to keep it safe. 5No form endures. 6It is the thought behind the form of things that lives unchangeable.

5. 1Give gladly. 2You can only gain thereby. 3The thought remains, and grows in strength as it is reinforced by giving. 4Thoughts extend as they are shared, for they can not be lost. 5There is no giver and receiver in the sense the world conceives of them. 6There is a giver who retains; another who will give as well. 7And both must gain in this exchange, for each will have the thought in form most helpful to him. 8What he seems to lose is always some­thing he will value less than what will surely be returned to him.

6. 1Never forget you give but to yourself. 2Who understands what giving means must laugh at the idea of sacrifice. 3Nor can he fail to recognize the many forms which sacrifice may take. 4He laughs as well at pain and loss, at sickness and at grief, at poverty, starva­tion and at death. 5He recognizes sacrifice remains the one idea that stands behind them all, and in his gentle laughter are they healed.

7. 1Illusion recognized must disappear. 2Accept not suffering, and you remove the thought of suffering. 3Your blessing lies on every­one who suffers, when you choose to see all suffering as what it is. 4The thought of sacrifice gives rise to all the forms that suffer­ing appears to take. 5And sacrifice is an idea so mad that sanity dismisses it at once.

8. 1Never believe that you can sacrifice. 2There is no place for sac­rifice in what has any value. 3If the thought occurs, its very pres­ence proves that error has arisen and correction must be made. 4Your blessing will correct it. 5Given first to you, it now is yours to give as well. 6No form of sacrifice and suffering can long endure before the face of one who has forgiven and has blessed himself.

9. 1The lilies that your brother offers you are laid upon your altar, with the ones you offer him beside them. 2Who could fear to look upon such lovely holiness? 3The great illusion of the fear of God diminishes to nothingness before the purity that you will look on here. 4Be not afraid to look. 5The blessedness you will behold will take away all thought of form, and leave instead the perfect gift forever there, forever to increase, forever yours, forever given away.

10. 1Now are we one in thought, for fear has gone. 2And here, before the altar to one God, one Father, one Creator and one Thought, we stand together as one Son of God. 3Not separate from Him Who is our Source; not distant from one brother who is part of our one Self Whose innocence has joined us all as one, we stand in blessedness, and give as we receive. 4The Name of God is on our lips. 5And as we look within, we see the purity of Heaven shine in our reflection of our Father’s Love.

11. 1Now are we blessed, and now we bless the world. 2What we have looked upon we would extend, for we would see it every­where. 3We would behold it shining with the grace of God in everyone. 4We would not have it be withheld from anything we look upon. 5And to ensure this holy sight is ours, we offer it to everything we see. 6For where we see it, it will be returned to us in form of lilies we can lay upon our altar, making it a home for Innocence Itself, Who dwells in us and offers us His Holiness as ours.