God and His expression constitute everything there really is. From this it follows that matter and everything material is unreal. When our understanding of creation is most clear, we are most aware of the presence of God and His ideas, and of the nothingness of any claim of matter. When we most rid ourselves of the false belief that matter exists, we are best able to perceive that God is All. We experience a new sense of spiritual power, moral courage, unlimited substance, abundant health, and indestructible happiness.
It is a blessing to lay aside the false. Yet is it not one of the universal fears of mankind that material things will be taken away or lost? In Christian Science we learn that much of what the world calls loss is truly gain. It is an unburdening of error, an experience of protection, a demonstration, perhaps unrecognized, yet turning us to God to gain a greater realization of His great good. Rising above adversity brings us blessing and awakening. Though material things are lost, though friends betray, reality remains. Christian Science enlightens our consciousness and designates it as a blessing that we are alone, yes, alone with God and the possessions He bestows upon His children.
Such an occasion becomes our opportunity for quiet, effective prayer, for the proof of our unfalering faith, for the spiritual realization of God's abundant ever-presence. Jesus followed his sacred admonition, "Thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet," with the assurance, "Thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly." Surely, the experience of communing alone with God, whereby we gain a clearer perception of the man and the universe God has made, is a blessing to us.
