Christian Scientists are grateful, with much reason, for their churches. Many of them experienced on their first visit to one of these institutions a peace which they had not known before, and have seen it continue to unfold for them. It is safe to say that all who have taken full advantage of the opportunities offered by the church—The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and its branches—have been healed or strengthened, and have found their lives greatly enriched. Thus the Christian Scientist comes to regard his church as a light to himself and his neighbors—a sign that whatever is needed by anyone in the community is available. For he has usually seen proof many times in the experience of himself and others that health, employment, supply, safety, happy relationships—all that is commonly needful—can be had through the demonstration of Christian Science. Christ Jesus' statement, "If ye shall ask any thing in my name, I will do it," has been thus practically confirmed for him. It is not strange after such experience that the Scientist should delight in serving his church and forwarding its work for mankind.
There is therefore no dearth of workers in the average Christian Science church. For the ushering, the committee work of various kinds, the board work, the reading, and other necessary tasks, members who will serve with thoroughness and love are, as a rule, readily found. But Christian Scientists know that the human activity evident in such service is not all or ever the main part of their work as church members. They understand indeed that if such activity is to accomplish anything of value, it must have back of it other work—the mental work of recognizing and maintaining the spiritually true concept of Church. For the human institution, vitally essential as it is, stands as but a measure of demonstration to human sense of something far better—the real Church, as revealed in Christian Science. This Church the beloved Leader of Christian Scientists, Mary Baker Eddy, has defined (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 583) as, "The structure of Truth and Love; whatever rests upon and proceeds from divine Principle."
Now the value of knowing the spiritual truth about anything soon becomes obvious to the student of Christian Science. He is enabled to see that imperfection, limitation, and evil in any form are not real; that, being unlike God, the sole cause and creator, they represent a merely false sense of things. Therefore what is required to overcome them scientifically, wherever they appear, is the understanding and realization of spiritual truth—basically, the truth that what God has made is perfect, unlimited, and altogether good. It is such knowing of the truth that makes free from any false sense. If then a church seems limited or in any other difficulty, what is needed to help it is a clearer sense of the Church which perfectly and without measure shows forth the presence of God. Proportionally as this clearer sense is gained by those concerned, or even one of those concerned, the church, as it humanly seems, is improved, and its usefulness increased. In this manner human experience yields to divine reality.
Knowing the truth about Church is thus the prime essential for improving and extending the usefulness of our churches. But how, it may be asked, is one to know this truth more clearly and helpfully? It is plain that to understand God better is better to understand His Church, for Church expresses His nature. Hence in all one's earnest endeavor to grow in the understanding of God through study of the Bible, together with the textbook and other literature of Christian Science, one is serving his church. Obviously, it is essential that he strive to put into practice what he is learning. There is no genuine growth in understanding or usefulness without practice. It may be added that as such growth goes on, this fact becomes more and more clear: that there is no true comprehension and no true usefulness without love; that love, indeed, is the essence of all good work, whether in the church or elsewhere. Therefore in all that he does for the church, the advancing student seeks to love more truly, with the love that expresses God.
But though he has done all these things, and continues to do them, there is still other work that the Scientist can and should do often for his church; and even when no possible human means seem likely to avail, he can see this further work meeting the need. He can pray. He can specifically remind himself of the truth about Church, and thus broaden and brighten his sense of it. He can recognize joyfully that that which is definable as "whatever rests upon and proceeds from divine Principle" includes the full manifestation of God, and that the real Church therefore is unlimited in scope and power. It is not contending with evil, but proving that there is no evil; not overcoming inertia or opposition to good, but demonstrating that there can be neither; not dispelling darkness, but manifesting the allness of God, who "is light," and in whom "is no darkness at all."
The Scientist may remind himself with deep conviction that lack—lack of anything needful—is impossible in the only real Church. He can thus see any appearance of lack in the church as mere false suggestion, and be assured that through the understanding of the completeness of Church as the idea of God, such a false sense may be overcome. So with any appearance of dullness, apathy, disunity, or discord. The real and only Church is untouched and untouchable by any such condition, for it directly expresses the one Mind, which is ever harmonious and inspiring.
Rightness of thought and action, the Scientist can see, is always available and availing in the only true Church. Intelligence and order characterize all its activity, and that which needs to be done in it is done spontaneously and with joy. Moreover, its blessings are not for a few, but for all; nor are they limited for any.
Such prayer, it has often been proved, lights the way for any needful human footsteps in a church, even though these have not seemed discernible or possible before. But it does more than this. It leads to actual realization of the truth thus declared; and in the measure that spiritual truth is realized, it is demonstrated, by an unfailing rule in Science.
The remarkable growth of the Christian Science movement has come about as the result of healing work and by such means as those here described; and Christian Scientists know that this growth is only an indication of what is possible through advancing church work. They know that a branch church which has greatly prospered, no less than one which has seemed to go on for a while without growth, can see further extension of its usefulness by such prayer and demonstration. They know indeed that there is no limit to the good which can be accomplished anywhere in this way. Recognizing this fact, they press on steadfastly to higher proofs of the Church revealed in Christian Science.
