T. 17. IV. 10 -14. Jesus: “The truth itself needs no defense! But you do need defense against your acceptance of the gift of death, hidden within the glittering frame of the ‘picture of reality’ the ego offers you. When you who are truth accept into your mind an idea so dangerous to the awareness of truth, you threaten truth with destruction. So your defense must now be undertaken, to keep truth whole for you.
The power of Heaven, the Love of God, the tears of Christ, and the joy of His eternal Spirit are marshalled to defend you from your own attack. For being part of Them, you attack Them with your pretense of separation, and They must save you from it, for They love Themselves as they love you.
The holy instant is a miniature of Heaven, sent you from Heaven. It is a picture, too, also set within a frame. Yet if you accept this gift, you will not see the frame at all, because the gift can only be accepted through your willingness to focus all of your attention on the picture!
The holy instant is a miniature of eternity. It is a picture of timelessness, though set within a frame of time! If you focus on this picture, you will realize that it was only the frame that made you think it was a picture at all. Without the frame, the picture is seen as simply what it represents. For as the whole thought system of the ego lies in its gifts, so the whole of Heaven lies in this instant, borrowed from eternity and set in time for you.
Two gifts are thus laid before you. Each is complete, and cannot be partially accepted. Each is a picture of ‘all that you can have,’ although each is seen very differently from the other. You cannot compare their value by comparing a picture in one to the frame of the other! It must be the pictures only that you compare, or the comparison is wholly without meaning. Remember that it is the picture that is the gift. And only on this basis are you really free to choose.
Look at the pictures now; both of them! One is a tiny picture, hard to see at all beneath the heavy shadows of its enormous and disproportionate frame. The other is lightly framed and hung in light, lovely to look upon just for what it is!
You who have tried so hard, and are still trying, to fit the better picture into ‘the wrong frame’ and so combine what cannot be combined, accept this and be glad: These pictures are each framed perfectly, for what they represent! One is framed to distract your focus and not be clearly seen. The other is framed for perfect clarity and ease of viewing. The picture of darkness and of death grows less convincing as you search it out and look honestly upon it amid its shiny wrappings. As each senseless jewell that seems to shine from the frame in darkness is exposed to light, it is recognized as dull and lifeless, and ceases to distract you from the picture. And finally you look upon the picture itself, seeing at last that, unprotected by the frame, it is one that has no meaning.
The other picture is lightly framed, for time cannot contain eternity. There is no distraction here. The picture of Heaven and eternity grows more convincing as you look upon it. And now, by real comparison, a transformation of both pictures can at last occur. And each is given its rightful place when both are seen clearly in relation to each other.”