As wider skies broke on his view
God greatened in his growing mind.
Sam Walter Foss.
MOST men would readily agree that the true rank of nations and of individuals is correctly registered by their concept of God, but as yet the more important fact, that in each instance the acquired rank has been determined by this concept, is not so clearly seen. The shaping influence which pertains to our sense of Deity is, however, being pressed upon the world's attention to-day, through Christian Science, as it has not been before since the days of the Son of Man, and that a great and eventful transformation has taken place in Christian thought is abundantly evidenced.
Since liking shapes the thought, and thinking shapes the man, it is apparent that human habit and experience as a whole are at-one with the dominating idea, and that practically men pay their devotions and give their service to their highest sense of good. If, therefore, any individual identify this good with the satisfaction of the appetites, then he is worshiping mortal sense indulgence, is living upon the animal plane, and, as St. Paul puts it, his God is his belly. Between this concept of the highest good or God and that exalted realization in which good is seen to be infinite, omnipresent Spirit, Life, Truth, and Love, there is a distance whose vastness warrants the assertion that "to understand God is the work of eternity" (Science and Health, p. 3). It is evident that if one is to pass from the common material belief about God, which George MacDonald rightly pronounced "rationally untenable," to the Christ-concept of the Supreme Being and nature, his idea must be steadily progressive; the past and imperfect sense must constantly be replaced by a new and nobler one as spiritual truth is unfolded in consciousness. God will remain ever perfect and unchanged, but our concept of Him will continually advance. Each day we shall think of a greater and grander God than we thought the day before. Nobler sense stimulates to better living, which in turn makes possible a yet clearer apprehension, and this interaction between the thought of God and the practical every-day life which it moulds, becomes both the prophecy and the fulfilment of continuous spiritual growth.
