Christian Science reveals the vast difference between material, wishful thinking and spiritual knowing. One takes place in the realm of belief; and the other in spiritual consciousness. For instance, the mortal mind project of going somewhere, such as taking a journey, even of going to heaven, is interlocked with beliefs of distance, time, and separation. Christian Science unfolds intelligent knowing based on an unvarying, present reality. And, paradoxical as it may at times appear to be, Christian Science shows the true basis of thought to be its destination, and the true destination to be the basis of thought.
In her book "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 275), well known as the Christian Science textbook, Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer of the Science of being, says: "The starting-point of divine Science is that God, Spirit, is All-in-all, and that there is no other might nor Mind,—that God is Love, and therefore He is divine Principle. To grasp the reality and order of being in its Science, you must begin by reckoning God as the divine Principle of all that really is."
To begin rightly we must start with reality in view, which has no beginning or absence. We know that God and man are immortal, that is, without beginning or other limitations. We know that man is created in the image and likeness of God. This creation is not the result of God's causing man to appear where there had been no man before, as a carpenter might construct a house where none had been. True creation reveals the fact that man originates with God and unfailingly reflects the substance of his source, just as the sunlight portrays its single point of origin. Actual creation exists, but never commences. God did not at some time commence to be a creator, and His image did not at some time commence to be man. Similarly, revelations from divine Mind are perpetually present and operative, since the creator and the created, their purpose and achievements, are immortally united.
