A recent issue of a monthly magazine contained an article on the possibilities incident to a greater recognition and realization of the actuality, activity, and availability of God. The article was remarkable from the Christian Scientist's point of view, because the rare and beautiful experiences related, so far from being isolated incidents of unusual character, are matters of daily, if not hourly, occurrence in the lives of those who have to some extent proved the truth of Mrs. Eddy's declaration in "The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany" (p. 238), "God is understandable, knowable, and applicable to every human need."
The tendency of human thought to relegate to the realm of the mystical all that lies beyond the province of material sense testimony is, of course, a great stumblingblock to an approach to any appreciation of the reality and practicability of the unseen things of which Paul speaks. Jesus of Nazareth emphasized this when he said that if a man did not receive the kingdom of God as a little child, he should "in no wise enter therein." This childlike, though by no means childish, attitude of thought —this willingness to relinquish preconceived beliefs, and to accept as a basis of demonstration the fundamental proposition that God is, and that He may therefore be known through that which manifests Him— necessarily preceded any possibility of achieving what the article referred to terms "contact and commerce with reality beyond the margins of [one's] personal self." That there is the truth about all things, and that this truth is the unseen but available reality indicated in the Master's assurance, "Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free," is mankind's one hope of deliverance from the thralldom of all that is untrue from the dissatisfactions of existence, as existence is now generally apprehended.
The present writer's acquaintance with the truth, as it is revealed in Christian Science, was preceded by a long period of skepticism, bordering at times on actual infidelity. Brought up to believe in the usual concept of God as a corporeal personality, taught to pray to this Being, who might or might not answer such prayer, as to Him seemed best; confronted with endless failure to realize one's worthiest desires; and hampered by an underlying conviction of the futility of expecting a changeless Deity to change in response to human pleading, thought finally revolted; and there followed many years of indifference to spiritual matters. Aroused at length by the needs of others; dissatisfied with the barrenness of merely material living; and finding a concept of God which had apparently benefited many,—a concept which invited consideration and understanding, instead of mere acceptance and belief,—thought again took up the contemplation of the possibility of proving spiritual verities.
