At the beginning of the year one cannot help recalling the words in Isaiah's prophecy, "Watchman, what of the night?" also the answer, "The morning cometh." Two years ago reference was made in a Journal editorial to "the year of our Lord," and it is possible that some may have regarded the outcome of 1914 as a sad fulfilment of the hope that the year would bring greater light and harmony than had ever before come to humanity. It is even possible that many outside of Christian Science are echoing the plaintive cry of those whose words are to be found in the second epistle of Peter, who said, "Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation." In answer to the dismal foreboding thus expressed, the apostle says, "Beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day." This statement is, moreover, followed by the assurance that "the day of the Lord will come," and Peter tells us that while we must expect the passing of old conditions with all their imperfections, the consuming of all materiality in the fervent heat of divine Love, it rests with us to look continually for new and better conditions, for "new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness."
The student of Christian Science at all times finds strength and inspiration in pondering the words of the Master, and never more so than during the last two years. In reading the twenty-fourth chapter of Matthew's gospel we find the disciples of the Master eagerly questioning him regarding his coming and the end of the world. As we read his answer we discern the method of a great and wise teacher who is endeavoring to present great ideas to immature thought. He outlined disturbances corresponding with those of the present time, but the one statement which above all others appeals to the Christian Scientist is his declaration that the "gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come." In this discourse, which also appears in the gospels of Mark and Luke, we see that all the temples which men have built for the worship of their own ideals must be thrown down. In other days the god of war had his temples and votaries, while in our own time Ruskin tells of temples built to "the goddess of Getting-on." Every false concept, however, must go down before the operation of Truth's great law of progress, so that the declaration of the angel which John heard in Patmos. "The Lord God omnipotent reigneth," will at last come to the realization of humanity.
Mrs. Eddy, who was a close and constant student of the Master's teachings, foresaw this great and decisive struggle on the plane of human consciousness when she said in Science and Health: "This material world is even now becoming the arena for conflicting forces. On one side there will be discord and dismay; on the other side there will be Science and peace" (p. 96). This prophecy is now being fulfilled even in what she here terms the "arena of contest," for many who are obliged to participate in the outward strife realize in the depths of their own consciousness neither discord nor dismay, but the great and abiding peace of divine Science.
