About two years ago, in our Association work, we took up the "church" thought and tried to demonstrate, in our lives, what the true church meant. We laid our "foundation stones" in purity, honesty, and spiritual unity. With a deep-lying and earnest desire to have a fitting place, wherein to worship the only true and living God, we established one year ago last August, a church building fund, the first dollar being paid in September, 1897. Much earnest work was done, and much of material sense and self went down under the purifying and uplifting work of spiritual regeneration.
In the face of much opposition, and against the evidence of the so-called material senses, we continued our work.
A cosy and modern little church building, erected some years ago by the Unitarian society here, was unoccupied. An effort was made by our building committee to get terms on this property, and utterly failed. This project was abandoned, and the decision made to purchase a lot and eventually build our own church. Some months later we learned that the church property could be bought, and we at once commenced negotiations. Truth had opened the way, and the property was secured upon our own terms. Early in July of the present year, we made our first payment; and firm in the understanding of the one Source of supply, we have no fears for the future. A beautiful reading-desk, finished in light antique oak, and said to be the handsomest in the city, has been added since we began to occupy the new church. It is the loving gift of a faithful student. Strangers are beginning to come in to our public services, and much interest is developing in the community. The world around us, secular and religious, is full of wonder that such a little handful of people dare undertake to buy and pay for a church, and this, too, without recourse to the usual and stereotyped methods of raising money; but the leaven of Truth is at work among them. Only a short time ago one of the Orthodox church people said: "I think the Christian Scientists are right about some things after all. They have no church fairs or socials. They get the money all the same, and they don't work their people to death, either." Good work is being done in the physical healing, and altogether we feel that we have abundant cause for rejoicing. The Lord of the harvest is with us.
