In the Acts of the Apostles it is related that Herod, the king, had killed James, one of Jesus' disciples, and taken Peter prisoner. It was planned that "after Easter" he should be brought before the people for trial. For greater security he was guarded by soldiers, bound with chains, and keepers were placed before the prison doors. Mortal belief had fettered him in every way it knew, "but prayer was made without ceasing of the church unto God for him."
The Bible tells us that "Peter was sleeping between two soldiers, bound with two chains. . . . And, behold, the angel of the Lord came upon him, and a light shined in the prison: and he smote Peter on the side, and raised him up, saying, Arise up quickly. And his chains fell off from his hands." The outlook must have been dark and foreboding; it must have seemed as though armed guards and heavily barred doors made escape impossible, even if he succeeded in freeing his hands from the chains which manacled him.
It was then that the light of spiritual understanding of God's ever-presence flooded Peter's consciousness in such glory that he beheld an angel, an inspiration straight from God, and it was revealed to Peter by this messenger, and accepted in consciousness, that he was no longer in bondage to matter. He perceived that these fetters, which seemed to be so powerful, so mighty, and so binding, were nothing but material beliefs forged by mortal mind, linked by so-called material laws. The angel, or inspiration from God, came with power far greater than any material evidence, for he "raised him up, saying, Arise up quickly."
Peter was obedient to the divine command. He acknowledged divine power and obeyed divine impulsion. The narrative continues, "When they were past the first and the second ward, they came unto the iron gate that leadeth unto the city; which opened to them of his own accord." The light of spiritual understanding had dissipated that which was impeding his progress and robbing him of his God-given freedom and dominion.
Peter, led by the angel thought, must have seen clearly that Truth was at once his liberator and his protector, for he entered unobserved into the city.
Do we find ourselves imprisoned in matter with material problems and burdens, bound with chains of fear, confusion, indecision, lack, loss, destruction? Is our progress halted by erroneous convictions that disease is real and incurable, or that it is too late to be healed? The all-knowing God, the great Physician, knows no such thing as "too late," knows no disease; but He is ever saying to us, "Arise up quickly"; claim your Godgiven heritage of health, joy, freedom, and wholeness.
In the presence of angels—God's thoughts—the chains fall off, but chains do not fall off when we fight them as something real. There can be no consciousness of bonds or bondage in the true understanding of God; there can be no obstructions in the path of progress. Truth is spiritual power and unerring divine law. It operates to destroy the lying beliefs about God and His perfect man, who, collectively, is the full representation of Himself.
A mother's heart was heavy and her thought distressed because her little daughter, a year old, had been born with a deformed hand. This woman's husband had received an instantaneous healing of almost total blindness, and they decided to have Christian Science treatment for their little girl.
The practitioner, realizing that a false mortal thought externalized must be replaced with a clear vision of the perfect man, had turned the parents to "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," where Mary Baker Eddy states (pp. 243, 244), "Inasmuch as God is good and the fount of all being, He does not produce moral or physical deformity; therefore such deformity is not real, but is illusion, the mirage of error." For an hour and a half they pondered this profound saying, endeavoring to understand and accept its sacred import. They realized that an infinitely good God, who is eternal Life, divine Love, could not create any deformity; that this child was in her real being God's perfect likeness, His idea, as perfect as God is perfect; therefore, that there was no imperfect child to be healed. Such a phenomenon had never existed; it was simply an illusion. It was like a mirage of a beautiful lake they had seen in the desert, but when they reached it, they found that there was no lake, and never had been one in that place. They were asked not to look at the hand or watch for a healing.
Ten days later the practitioner called, and when she asked about the little girl, there came the exclamation, "Oh! I have never thought of it again to this day, and I have washed her hands many times each day; I shall have to go and see." The hand was normal—the child was completely healed. The parents had arisen from the false material beliefs which had bound them, and the chains had fallen off.
Are Christian Scientists praying ceaselessly to awaken men from the bondage of belief in life and sensation in matter, the source of all disease and suffering? The importance of gaining a clear realization of the incorporeality of God and man as the very foundation of Christian Science is brought to us forcefully by our Leader, Mrs. Eddy, in "The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany" (p. 117), where she says: "'In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God' (St. John). This great truth of God's impersonality and individuality and of man in His image and likeness, individual, but not personal, is the foundation of Christian Science. There was never a religion or philosophy lost to the centuries except by sinking its divine Principle in personality."
Is the church adamant against the adversary which claims that man must be punished for breaking a law of mortal mind? Mortal mind would sentence man to suffer and die for the good deeds of service and kindness that divine Mind requires of him. But men cannot suffer for preaching the gospel to the sick and sorrowing, for binding up the broken-hearted— those wounded by the cruel beliefs of mortal mind—for raising the dead, those dead to their true selfhood as God's likeness. Divine Mind sustains men and protects them in every right endeavor.
Inspiration from God delivers from all danger and suffering. Peter recognized the Christ, Truth, as the foundation for all right activity. Struggling against his chains did not loose him; but understanding the nothingness of matter, recognizing man as God knows him, delivered him from material beliefs and elevated him to a high plane of spirituality and demonstration.
Our Leader writes (Science and Health, p. 535): "Divine Science deals its chief blow at the supposed material foundations of life and intelligence. It dooms idolatry. A belief in other gods, other creators, and other creations must go down before Christian Science. It unveils the results of sin as shown in sickness and death. When will man pass through the open gate of Christian Science into the heaven of Soul, into the heritage of the first born among men? Truth is indeed 'the way.'"
