"Son, thou art ever with me, and all that I have is thine" (Luke 15:31). This teaching of Christ Jesus, in the parable of the prodigal son, expressing the fact of the Father's abundant provision for His son, constitutes the basis for the demonstration of supply for every human need.
What are termed demonstrations in Christian Science are manifestations of the absolute truth that God is one primal cause. In the textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," Mary Baker Eddy writes (p. 207): "There is but one primal cause. Therefore there can be no effect from any other cause, and there can be no reality in aught which does not proceed from this great and only cause." In the degree that it is understood, this truth pierces the seeming mist of the human mind with tangible expressions of God's allness or the ever-presence of good. It is God's allness that the student aims to understand and demonstrate, and the overcoming of the false beliefs of sin, sickness, fear, and limitation is a tangible expression of His goodness.
Therefore in giving a Christian Science treatment the student thinks more of God than of the patient. God being All, He includes all that is effect. His spiritual creation is the expression of Himself. In thinking of God, meditating on the divine nature and character, the student begins to realize and express what God is and is doing, and thus beholds His creation as very good. To put it another way, God sees the universe including man and the perfection of what He has created. So man, reflecting God, recognizes the perfection not only of God but of His spiritual universe. As the practitioner ponders this universal perfection, the patient's consciousness will be changed from a sick state of thought to a healthy one; and this improved consciousness in turn will be objectified in better bodily conditions.
