THE first glad impulse of those set free from sin and sickness through Christian Science is the desire to pass the healing cup to others. This outgoing of loving gratitude forms the endless chain which is linking the world in a vital consciousness of the fatherhood and motherhood of God, and the brotherhood and sisterhood of man. Mrs. Eddy says, "The student who heals by teaching and teaches by healing, will graduate under divine honors" (Miscellaneous Writings, p. 358). The wise student, therefore, knowing that Christian Science healing results from divine Principle understood and demonstrated, sets about correcting the false concept of God which has held humanity in bondage to sin, sickness, and death, and thus is unfolded that true idea of God and man's relation to Him which gives freedom from the pains and sorrows of sense.
Probably no two people hold exactly the same concept of God. yet by most persons He is regarded as being apart from man. All seem to hold a masculine concept of Him, regarding Him as Father, and this incomplete concept is responsible for much of the sorrow and loneliness of a yearning, hungry-hearted world. Christian Science, however, teaches that God is both Father and Mother, and shows that the nature of God is feminine as well as masculine. We may well wonder why this fact has so long been hidden, when we have in the Bible the self-explanatory statement. "God created man in his own image, . . . male and female created he them."
When the sick seek healing, it is not difficult to teach them that because man is the image and likeness of God, he is the manifestation of eternal Life, for God is Life, or to bring them to realize how flawless the divine Life must be. When the sinful are seeking freedom from sin, they are more readily brought to understand God as the one Mind, perfect, pure, and holy; that because man is the likeness of God, he is the likeness of the Mind that is sinless and undefiled; that because man is the manifestation of God, he has no other mind than God, and can n more be separated from this source than a sun-ray can be separated from its source. The realization of this brings to each the supply for his own particular need.
When the sorrowful, the bereaved, the lonely or betrayed, seek surcease from their tribulation, and the Christian Scientist sets about his loving task of binding up the brokenhearted, it is not uncommon for him to have his gentle message of solace, "God is Love," fall upon deaf ears and stony hearts, for the majority have lost hope of receiving from the heavenly Father the tender ministrations which their human parents unselfishly bestowed upon them. Our Leader speaks of God as "the patient, tender, and true, the One 'altogether lovely'" (Science and Health, p. 3); yet probably no one has ever been so grossly misjudged as God has been, even by those who think they reverence Him, and this false thinking is the procurer of increased inharmony in the mortal realm.
A business man to whom the writer spoke of God as Love, indifferently replied: "I know of no love in connection with God. In my office, in the busy mart, in the pulsing heart of commerce, we are shoulder to shoulder with competition, rivalry, and greed; and I with human love fight the battle of existence for my children. Often I pause and ask for just a moment's gleam of something beyond this sordid existence to refresh the heart and rest the head, but never yet has there reached me an inspiration which would lead me to feel that I am any more to God than are the cattle of the field. My dearest concept of love is a memory of bygone times, when I, a growing lad, lay in drowsy unrest listening to the boisterous night and the falling rain as it fretted itself upon my windowpane, heralded by the wailing night wind that made the darkness fearsome to my childish mind. Then comes the flooding memory of a gentle presence stealing in, a soothing, protecting pressure as the blankets were tucked more closely about me; a gentle touch upon the forehead; a whispered 'God bless you' as my mother took her good-night look at her child and stole away to her rest. Though the wind and the rain wept on, the comfort of that presence remained and is undying to this day, though the loving heart that inspired it has long since fallen to decay. Now I toil on the daily treadmill of life, knowing no God that inspires such reverence or satisfies a deep longing need."
Others yearningly tell of the ecstasy of love they still retain for one who once loved them, but whose heart, alas, is changed. Others again tell of hearts burdened with wealth of art and music, but of hopes blighted through lack of opportunity and the unresponsive heart of the world. So the plaintive cry goes on for something nearer, dearer, more satisfying than has yet been found; yet God is Love, and as our Leader says, "Can we ask Him to be more?" (Science and Health, p. 2). God is something more than merely, a loving being, us we have blindly believed Him to be; God is Love itself, the cause or Principle of all that is loving, lovely, and true.
The image of anything depends for its existence upon that which is imaged. God is eternal Love. Man as the image of Love is forever the eternal reflection, and manifests the capacity of endless giving. St. Paul says, "For if that which is done away was glorious, much more that which remaineth is glorious." Looking away from the finite concept of love to the infinite, we realize that the most hallowed memories we can cherish of tender, compassionate human motherhood but dimly hint the effulgent holiness of the God who is Love, the one great heart that never knows age or decay. The most chastened remembrance of ecstasy inspired by the strong protecting presence of the lover of youth's romantic day but counterfeits the vivifying nature of the one heart that never changes or wearies. The most poetic dream of artist or author as portrayed in rhythm, form, or color, but dimly shadows the sublimity of the true concept of God as Love, the Principle of all real being.
Before the august declaration, "God is Love," we may pause and know that man is the overflow of the divine nature; not alone a channel through which the overflow may pour, but the overflow itself. Infinite Love is omni-action, and its idea must be manifested in ceaseless giving forth from its source. Thus it is seen that man, as the image of the Father-mother Love, can find in his own being all the strength and wisdom of the masculine, all the compassion and intuition of the feminine, and this constitutes the one perfect Love. He need not therefore look out to person, place, or thing to find satisfaction, but by striving to give to others in unstinted measure the richness of the Love that he reflects, he may hope to have his own need supplied, for, as our Hymnal says (p.89),—
Ceasing to give, we cease to have,
Such is the law of Love.
Mortal mind with eager yearning may cry: "Is this all you offer? Is there no other way? Must I ever be lonely and sorrowful? Must I give love when my own heart is starving?" How beautifully our dear Leader has met this situation in the first six pages of the chapter on Christian Science Practice (Science and Health, p. 362). She there makes it clear that the one who would bind up the broken-hearted must himself clearly reflect infinite Love and manifest Christ's compassion, thus helping the needy one to become willing to part with self-will, its sorrows, bitterness, loneliness, and grief, even as the sick are ready to part with their pain and the sinner with his sin.
When Abraham was called upon to give up his beloved child, he obeyed. The dews of night were about him as he set out to toil up the mountainside. Though only sorrow faced him at the end of his climb, he went steadily on, doing his lesson of obedience, and out of that night of faithfulness was born a new day, which revealed the ever-present Christ. His example may encourage us in our efforts to overcome sin, sickness, and sorrow; to demonstrate divine law without outlining or planning how that law shall work. It may encourage the once broken-hearted to know that they can be an active overflow of the one great heart; and thus the one who is "trusting where he cannot trace," will in due time reap, in Love's own way, the peace, happiness, and joy that know no regret or repining, and thereby gain a new understanding of the beloved disciple's words, "He that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him."
