While the Atonement was created and completed simultaneously in Eternity the instant the split mind occurred, the Plan of Atonement operating in time – at lease as far as human beings are concerned – waited for a separated one, a human being, to fully complete their individual part in the Plan, at which point they would set into motion the process of helping their sisters and brothers also to accept Atonement for themselves and awaken, creating a chain reaction that would eventually lead to every separated one awakening to their true Self and returning to the Divine. The Course indicates that the event known historically as the Resurrection was the occasion that set the Plan of Atonement into motion in time, as it represented the first separated human being fully completing their part in the Atonement through their transcendence of the final illusion of death. “The Resurrection, which was accomplished by the complete Union of my [Jesus’] will with the Divine Will, was the start of the return to Knowledge for all my sisters and brothers.”
When Jesus went through the Resurrection – which was the most profound experience of forgiveness given the temptation to misperceive his sisters and brothers in connection with the horror of the crucifixion – he fully awakened to the eternal divine Self, i.e., to Divine Essence. “The crucifixion had no part in the Atonement. Only the Resurrection became my [Jesus’] part in It. That is the sign of the release from guilt by Innocence.” When this happened, Jesus also experienced in Eternity the entire completed Atonement, and knew the eternal unified and whole State of the Divine Family in which all human beings have awakened to who they truly are, and through doing so have become One again with the Divine and with their true Self.
The Resurrection was thus the experience of the first human being fully completing their part in the Plan, which included transcending eternally all illusions of time and space, including death. But until every separated one has awakened, the Plan of Atonement in time will remain incomplete for the whole Divine Family, both for those who have already completed their individual parts in the Plan (both Jesus and others who have done so) and those who haven’t. This is because the Plan will only be totally complete when every individual part has been completed and all Children of the Divine have awakened, at which point the Divine Family will be One again.
The Atonement is the promise of everyone’s awakening, and also the means to achieve it. Once we have become aware of Truth and Reality, our sole responsibility becomes to accept the Atonement for ourselves, which simply means fully trusting what has already been accomplished for us in Eternity by the Holy Spirit, i.e., the healing already completed of the first mistake we made so long ago, and of all mistakes since, and all their effects. Doing so allows us to discontinue the projecting of our guilt, fear, hate, and confusion outwards and then attacking that projection. Accepting Atonement for ourselves means ceasing to attempt by our own efforts the correction of mistakes and the achieving of awakening. It is the ongoing acknowledgment that we cannot accomplish these things without Spirit’s Help. When we accept what has already been accomplished for us, we stop being anxious and miserable and begin being joyful, confident, and at peace about our lives, because we have good reason to. “The Atonement is so gentle that you need only whisper to It and all Its Power will rush to your assistance and support.”
Just as the separation took vast eons to unfold in time, the completion of the Atonement in time, that is, until the last split mind has been healed and the Divine Family is One again, could take even longer to be realized, because of the principle of the sanctity of our creative activity, which means that only each individual can choose to give up their miscreations through their own free will. This giving up of illusions and awakening to Reality cannot be forced on any Child of the Divine. In order to make this choice each individual must become convinced that it is in their own best interest to do so, and then choose to do so through the process of awakening. At the same time no one can be left out of Heaven no matter how long it takes them to return. But the Atonement’s accomplishment in time can be shortened immeasurably through miracles. The focus of the Course is to contribute to this shortening of the duration of time through the completion of the Atonement in time.
It may be concluded that if the completion of the Atonement in time depends on the free will of each of the billions of human beings, it might in fact never be completed. However, the Divine has thankfully set limits on the capacity for error and the amount of pain Its Children can tolerate in their separation from their Creator and their true Home. “Each person’s perfect creation by the Divine is beyond their own capacity for error, however great this may be, and this is why every single human being must eventually choose to heal the separation.”
“The acceptance of the Atonement by everyone is only a matter of time. In fact, both time and matter or space were repurposed and therefore re-created for this End. This appears to contradict free will, because of the inevitability of this decision. If you review the idea carefully, you will realize that there is no contradiction. Everything is contained and therefore limited in some way by the manner of its creation. Free will can temporize, and is capable of enormous procrastination. But it cannot depart entirely from its Creator, Who set the limits on Its Children’s ability to miscreate by virtue of their own real Purpose.
“The misuse of will engenders a situation that, in the extreme, becomes altogether intolerable. Pain thresholds can be high, but they are not limitless. Eventually everybody begins to recognize, however dimly, that there must be a better way. As this recognition becomes more firmly established in the mind, it becomes a perceptual turning point. This ultimately reawakens the spiritual eye, simultaneously undoing and releasing the overwhelming investment in physical sight. The alternating investment in the two types or levels of perception, looking with the physical eyes and seeing with the spiritual eye, is usually experienced as conflict for a long time, and can become very acute. But the outcome is as certain as the Divine. The spiritual eye literally cannot perceive error, and merely seeks Atonement. All the solutions that the physical eyes seek dissolve in the vision of the spiritual eye. The spiritual eye, which sees within, recognizes immediately that the Altar [our unified mind, heart and will as the Divine created them] has been defiled, and needs to be repaired and protected. Perfectly aware of the right defense, it passes over all others, seeing beyond error to Truth. Because of the real Strength of its vision, it pulls the will into its own service, which compels the mind to concur. This reestablishes the true Power of the will, and makes it increasingly unable to tolerate delay. The mind then realizes, with increasing certitude, that delay is only a way of increasing unnecessary pain, which it need not tolerate at all. The pain threshold drops accordingly, and the mind becomes increasingly sensitive to what it would once have regarded as very minor intrusions of discomfort.”
Because in time the Atonement seems to be a future state, It has yet to be achieved by humanity. But because It transcends time and space, It has already been achieved and is present and accessible at all times and in all places. That is why Jesus was able to access and experience It as a result of the Resurrection, and why It is accessible and achievable by and for everyone else. Because the Atonement was not touched in any way by the separation, though It is the Answer to it, It is the only response to the separation that can’t end up contributing to or in some way reenforcing the illusion of separation. In this characteristic the Atonement is identified by the Course as the only defense that isn’t double-edged, that is, the only one that can only bring healing and not also be used in a way causing harm, i.e., more illusions.