"IF I can just get through the first group of songs, the rest will go beautifully," said a singer before a recital. To her surprise, the evening of the concert the first section went perfectly, but in the middle of the very next song she forgot the words and had to start the song over from the beginning. A fellow musician, on being told of this incident, remarked, "It is always the part that we take for granted in our preparation that is weakest in performance."
An adequate preparation should be all-inclusive, omitting and neglecting nothing. For a concert this may well be possible: the program is set, the notes and words are there. But is there any way to prepare for life in general—for a day, a week, a year, where all the factors are unpredictable? Christian Science shows that this is indeed possible because true preparation is based on an understanding that all is God, good. As Mrs. Eddy says in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 473), "God is everywhere, and nothing apart from Him is present or has power." A daily study of the Lesson-Sermon in the Christian Science Quarterly increases our understanding of the omnipresence of God. Such study by spiritualizing their thought has prepared many for a greater degree of perfection in their performance of whatever the day or year had in store.
One architectural student was failing in a mechanical drawing course. She went to a Christian Science practitioner, who promised to help her if she would study the Lesson-Sermon faithfully every morning before the class. She did so, and by the end of the term she had her best grade in the subject she had once failed in.
