THE bugle-call to spiritual advancement, from Genesis to Revelation, is overcoming. "Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good," must therefore be the Christian Scientist's working motto, when he sets out to prove the availability of the divine Principle, God, who is good. And he must believe that God is "a rewarder of them that diligently seek him."
In the lesson of the fig tree, barrenness and unfruitfulness are shown as cursed. In the transition from mortal superstition to Christian Science, there are lessons all must learn; for the human heart has been the same in all ages. The Old Testament refers to all enemies as false gods established in the heart, which separate men from God. Peter instructs us specifically how to cast them out—by the evangelization of self. Diligence is the first quality mentioned, and charity (love) is the last and highest; between them come patience, temperance, faith, and brotherly kindness. We are dedicating ourselves to the truth of a brief, three-word sentence: God is All! And we must be prepared to spend our lives proving this, sometimes in the face of seemingly terrific assaults of evidence in support of the false testimony of the material senses. Our faithfulness to this line of action constitutes us Christian Scientists.
As beginners, after an enthralling moment of spiritual uplifting, we face the sober reflection that in order to retain that supreme experience we shall have to reverse our former aims and change our standards of thinking; for this is surely the promised regeneration and mental renewing. We surmise that real seeing and hearing are mental achievements. Perhaps out of wrongs and sufferings, in endeavoring to escape the ultimatum of evil, we have come to the crossroads and are taking stock of ourselves and the changes we must inaugurate in obedience to the reformation beginning in us; and we ponder these aims that have suddenly become so compelling. With the smell of the wilderness still upon us, we know that we want to be new men, desirous of staying out in this broad and living way that we have just glimpsed.
