Mrs. Eddy well indicated the universality of the teaching of the Lesson-Sermons when she said in "Miscellaneous Writings" (p. 382): "In 1895 I ordained that the Bible, and 'Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,' the Christian Science textbook, be the pastor, on this planet, of all the churches of the Christian Science denomination. This ordinance took effect the same year, and met with the universal approval and support of Christian Scientists. Whenever and wherever a church of Christian Science is established, its pastor is the Bible and my book." That which is of most interest, however, to the individual student is the opportunity which he has for his own study of the Lesson-Sermon. In religious matters it has been so long customary for the general public to receive teaching and listen to advice that the beginner in Christian Science finds it surprising and sometimes startling to be called upon to think and decide for himself. The method of the practitioner who is healing him is Socratic; that is, he makes him recognize by means of skillful questioning that he already knows some aspects of truth. He is awakened also to the responsibility he has for making practical the truth which he knows, for translating it out of sentiment into activity. Very often, indeed, he is reluctant to perform any act of thinking for himself and wishes very much to remain a docile listener, approving what he hears.
At this point the weekly Lesson-Sermon is found to be a help of immeasurable value. By a continuous process, by gentle advance, the study of it brings the one who begins as a listener to the point of being a thinker. Once he may have been content to consider himself as being at a disadvantage regarding spiritual things, not able to know them for himself but dependent for knowledge on the sermonic deliverances of a preacher or the guiding counsel of a personal teacher, but he now finds within himself the wisdom he previously sought as being in another. He becomes able to arrive at decisions without asking advice, because the way to decide becomes as simple as addition to one competent in mathematics.
It is interesting to consider that when one becomes a student of the Christian Science Bible Lessons, he conjoins his activity with that of a vast multitude of students who by means of this study find the Bible illumined, and man's atonement with God discerned. Mrs. Eddy says in Miscellany (p. 238): ''On the swift pinions of spiritual thought man rises above the letter, law, or morale of the inspired Word to the spirit of Truth, whereby the Science is reached that demonstrates God. When the Bible is thus read and practised, there is no possibility of misinterpretation." In the same connection she further says: "The Science of the Scriptures coexists with God; and 'Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures' relegates Christianity to its primitive proof, wherein reason, revelation, the divine Principle, rules, and practice of Christianity acquaint the student with God. In the ratio that Christian Science is studied and understood, mankind will, as aforetime, imbibe the spirit and prove the practicality, validity, and redemptive power of Christianity by healing all manner of disease, by overcoming sin and death."
