Workbook · Part I
Lesson 169
By grace I live. By grace I am released.
What this lesson is saying
Today’s idea is: “By grace I live. By grace I am released.” In ordinary English: You live by grace. You are released by grace. Earning was never the door.
You are used to building a self from parents, work, the glass, the mood, the ranking of other people. This lesson says what you are was given, not achieved: as God created you, and so are they. That is not a compliment. It is a fact you practice when the other self-image is loud.
You do not have to believe it first. You use the words on one real judgment — of someone, of yourself, of a situation — and then you take the next ordinary step.
This is not saying
This is not a self-esteem project and not a claim that you are more powerful than God. You will not lose your personality. The sharp edges — the attack on you, the attack on them — can go.
Why this can change a day
If you are a private, failing self, then of course you must defend, compare, and prosecute. If you are as God created you, so is the one who irritated you, and the war has nothing left to stand on.
In your day
Same idea, three ordinary places — a relationship or encounter, the case against yourself, and a situation at work or at home. You do not need a special mood.
With someone
The day looks hostile before anything has happened. The painting is already up.
What to do
Say the words as written: “By grace I live. By grace I am released.” Your thoughts are painting the world, then showing it to you. Notice the loop. Stop treating the painting as God. Then look away and do the next kind thing.
Toward yourself
A symptom, a doctor’s waiting room, a score you took as a verdict.
What to do
Say the words as written: “By grace I live. By grace I am released.” See a practitioner if you need one. Then apply the idea to the story that this is who you are. Do both. Neglect is not the lesson.
At work, at home, or in a situation
Someone you merely overlook — not an enemy, just not important enough to see.
What to do
Say the words as written: “By grace I live. By grace I am released.” Look at one you called important and one you called background. Take both votes back for one look. That is the lesson.
Two voices in the same mind
Hear which one is running. Then today’s idea, on a real person — or on you.
Unloving thought
The day is against me. Focusing on the negative is seeing clearly. Hope would be a lie.
Jesus’s way
“By grace I live. By grace I am released.” Identity, not a mood. The same sentence is true of them. That is not a self-esteem project. You are not more powerful than God, so you can rest.
Spalding · 2019 · episode #373
Jesus’s commentary for Lesson 169
Tina reads the official workbook lesson first. Then she channels. The video is the source. The notes below are study notes of that sitting — not a transcript, and not A Year of Forgiveness.
After the reading
In the video · Jesus speaking
This is the channeled portion — after Tina has read the lesson. Study notes of that sitting. Not a transcript.
- By grace I am released” is identity, which is the whole war.
- Be this in the room you are in, without a pose, and without waiting to feel worthy of the sentence.
- After Tina reads Lesson 169, the channeling is living “By grace I live. By grace I am released.” He will not let it stay a slogan. Use these words. Do not swap them for a thought you like better.
- Identity, not a self-esteem project. You are not more powerful than God, so you can rest — and so can the one who irritated you.
How to sit today
Part I · Grace
The idea is above. This is the one sitting this number asks — how often, how long, and the words. Not a second lesson.
- How often
- Morning sitting as Lesson 153 began it, plus hourly remembrance, plus when you are tempted to forget
- How long
- Five minutes is the least you give the morning sitting. Ten is better; fifteen better still. The evening pair matches. Hourly: even a minute if that is all you can offer
- Through the day
- When the hour strikes, remember. When you can, give more than a minute.
- When shaken
- When the day’s idea is the medicine, use it on the actual situation, not later in a chair.
- If you forget
- A lapse is not a failure story. Resume. Guilt about missing is another idle thought.
How
- Lesson 169 keeps the form begun in Lesson 153. Sit without armor. Read the idea (and the prayer if the lesson gives one). Then wait. Defenselessness is the method, not a mood.
- Do not throw the day away because an hour was forgotten. Return at the next hour.
Longer sitting
Two extended sittings — fifteen minutes twice is the standard for this stretch
- Today’s idea is: “By grace I live. By grace I am released.”
- Read the idea (and the prayer or specific form the official lesson gives). Spend the sitting in that idea.
- Say, slowly: “By grace I live. By grace I am released.”
- Let related thoughts come. Return to the idea when the mind wanders. Give the rest of the day to remembering it.
Short / hourly
A reminder on the hour — even a minute if that is all you have
- Say, slowly: “By grace I live. By grace I am released.”
When shaken
When the day’s idea is the medicine, use it on the actual situation, not later in a chair
- Say, slowly: “By grace I live. By grace I am released.”
These scripts follow the workbook’s own method for this number — duration, frequency, and the sentences it asks you to use. They are a study paraphrase, not a replacement. Read the official lesson at acim.org and follow any wording it gives that is more specific than this card.
Words you may not know
Full glossaryCourse words do not mean what church, psychology, or ordinary English usually mean. These notes are for this lesson — tap a word.
Other voices — Tina, Ra, Carla
Short notes from the four streams. The teaching above is the lesson. These are doors if you want them.
Spalding
“By grace I live. By grace I am released” is identity, which is the whole war. He will not let it stay poetry. Be this in the room you are in, without a pose, and without waiting to feel worthy of the sentence.
Watch this lesson’s commentaryRa
This lesson is practice in polarizing with the person in front of you. Service to others is not a slogan. It is whether you treat them as the same being you are.
Open streamRueckert
A wanderer on Earth does not need a different lesson. She needs this one, done with her hands. Carla's whole archive is the proof: contact follows a life, it does not replace it.
Open stream