"I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture," said the Master (John 10:9). With customary simplicity, using figurative language which they could easily understand, Jesus taught the people the fundamental truths about God and man. The audiences which he addressed were familiar with such sights as those of the shepherd and the sheepfold, the sower and his seed, and the mender of old garments; hence his use of such illustrations to drive home the spiritual truths which he wished to impress upon them. The sheepfold as a symbol of love and protection is a well known figure of speech both in the Bible and in secular poetry. In Wordsworth's "Michael" it was a sheepfold which the father planned to build for his only son. Throughout this tender and moving poem the sheepfold serves as a symbol of the love and hopes which Michael held for the boy.
To the Christian Scientist the words, "I am the door," are a challenge to seek to know what is the "I" to which Jesus referred. Surely it was not his material selfhood, the human, corporeal form, which his disciples saw as he walked and worked among them. A study of the four Gospels denies such a conclusion. "I and my Father are one," he taught (John 10:30). And the Father is Spirit, Mind. Not Jesus the man, but Christ the spiritual idea, is the door, through which all may pass to salvation from sin, sickness, and death.
Of much significance is the -sixth and last of the Tenets of Christian Science (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy, p. 497), to which all must subscribe who would unite with The Mother Church. This tenet reads: "And we solemnly promise to watch, and pray for that Mind to be in us which was also in Christ Jesus; to do unto others as we would have them do unto us; and to be merciful, just, and pure." It is the only tenet containing the phrase, "We solemnly promise." It indicates the qualities for which Christian Scientists are asked to watch and pray—mercy, justice, and purity. The idea of mercy includes compassion, forgiveness, tenderness, humility—attributes of Love; justice suggests honesty, wisdom, obedience, spiritual power—attributes of Truth; purity implies temperance, harmony, holiness, spiritual beauty—attributes of Soul. To express these qualities, to whip out of the temple of human consciousness all that is unlike Spirit, is to enter by the door of love into the very presence of God, our heavenly Father.
