It is natural for everyone to desire to progress. The highest progress is spiritual. It is a divine urge. The student of Christian Science who is earnestly seeking an understanding of God is gaining it day by day; and as he gains it, he finds that he has made progress in human affairs as well, for the understanding of God, good, brings God's goodness into view. Thus the student proves that as he seeks "first the kingdom of God" all necessary things are "added unto" him.
However, real progress brings a higher joy than the joy of added things. On page 233 of the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," the beloved Leader of the Christian Science movement, Mary Baker Eddy, says: "Every day makes its demands upon us for higher proofs rather than professions of Christian power. These proofs consist solely in the destruction of sin, sickness, and death by the power of Spirit, as Jesus destroyed them. This is an element of progress, and progress is the law of God, whose law demands of us only what we can certainly fulfil." Every day demands that we prove our religion by the destruction of evil and not just profess to be Christian Scientists. Evils are overcome by the power of Spirit, God, not by human power. These overcomings are proofs of the progress which is God's law; and Mrs. Eddy says that God's law never demands anything of us which we cannot do. Herein, surely, is great comfort. No evil can arise in our experience that we cannot overcome. No problem can present itself to us to which there is not a solution.
We must faithfully claim this overcoming every day. We cannot expect to go forward if we work one day and let the next day's wrong thinking undo this work. Steadfastness, sincerity, and persistence make for progress. Every wrong thought replaced with a right thought means progress. Every impure motive replaced with a pure one, every hateful word left unsaid and a kind one put in its place, every wrong action corrected, every sickness healed—all these are proofs of progress and bring lasting joy.
