IN the eleventh chapter of St. John's Gospel, we read: Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus. When he had heard therefore that he was sick, he abode two days still in the same place where he was." On reading these words, the thought may be awakened, that our Lord's demeanor on hearing of his friend's sickness was somewhat inexplicable, and that the more loving way would have been for him to have gone straight to his friends, on being informed that Lazarus was sick, that he might comfort them in their distress, instead of waiting "two days still in the same place where he was." When, however, the words are illumined by the light of spiritual understanding, we gain a glimpse of the healing nature of that spiritual love which always animated him and which was his incentive then, and we have a practical illustration of his purely mental method of treating disease.
The questions. Where did Jesus really abide, or live? and, What is life? here present themselves. "This is life eternal." said Jesus, "that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent." A full understanding of this statement comprises the realization of the allness of God. and of the fact that man is blessed and sustained in Him now and forever, and has no existence apart from God. Life which is eternal can be the only real Life; it is for all time, and must be for us now. Indeed it will be observed that Jesus' definition of Life, "that they might know thee," applies essentially to men. The word knowledge in its final analysis means demonstrable apprehension, a provable understanding. To know God, then, means to demonstrate good. Our Master always exemplified in practice what he taught in words. His life was a constant realization of good, an unbroken at-one-ment with God. It was this quiet period of preparatory contemplation, implied in his abiding "two days still in the same place where he was," and his serene and untroubled recognition of the truth of being, which enabled him shortly thereafter to vanquish the seeming power of the grave in raising Lazarus from the dream of death.
Jesus always spoke and acted from the point of view of the reality of Spirit, of God and His creation, which is the true basis of being. On one occasion, addressing the people round about him, he said, "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect;" and again, "The Kingdom of God is within you." In speaking thus, it is plain he could not have been referring to the "flesh and blood" which the apostle tells us "cannot inherit the kingdom of God," nor to the carnal mentality which constitutes the material sense of selfhood. His meaning is made manifest in the following passage from Science and Health: "Jesus beheld in Science the perfect man, who appeared to him where sinning mortal man appears to mortals. In this perfect man the Saviour saw God's own likeness, and this correct view of man healed the sick" (p. 47).
