For those who teach or contemplate teaching in the Christian Science Sunday School, some statements by Mary Baker Eddy on page 454 of the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," will serve as a source of increasing guidance and helpfulness in this work. One of the sentences reads, "Love for God and man is the true incentive in both healing and teaching."
When we think of our Sunday School work as the evidence, expression, and fulfillment of our love for God and man, it can only be a lovely experience for both teacher and pupils. Our love for man expressed through Sunday School activity is the natural effect of our love for God. It is natural to love God, for does not John tell us in the Bible (I John 4:19), "We love him, because he first loved us"? This love for God, manifested in the teaching work, is evidence of our gratitude for God's great blessings revealed through the discovery of Christian Science.
Sunday School teaching beheld as an activity which is a reflection of Love uplifts the purposes and aims of the work. As we establish on a spiritual foundation the incentive or motive for teaching, we can expect to see the fulfillment of another statement made by Mrs. Eddy on the page in Science and Health previously referred to: "Right motives give pinions to thought, and strength and freedom to speech and action." Thus teaching becomes inspired. No longer is it carried out in forms such as merely reading the Lesson-Sermon in the Christian Science Quarterly during the class period, or by parroted, memorized lessons, without any new insight into their meanings and application. In accordance with the Rules provided by Mrs. Eddy in the Manual of The Mother Church (Art. XX, Sect. 3), lessons unfold through questions and answers given by teachers and pupils.
It is most helpful for the teacher to remember that Mind, God, is in reality the only teacher, that Mind is the source of all wisdom, and that therefore pupils and teacher stand, as Moses did before the burning bush, in a full recognition that they are on holy ground. Then is the Sunday School work recognized as the fulfillment of the Bible passage (John 6:45): "They shall be all taught of God." In the classwork it is helpful to point out to the pupils that God is the real teacher. An awareness of the divine source of the message will improve the teacher's and the pupils' receptivity to the unfoldment of Truth. The thought of the class will be found more consecrated, more appreciative, and consequently more orderly.
In addition to approaching Sunday School work from the absolute standpoint of the unfoldment of Truth, every teacher should be aware of and should handle the specific arguments which would interfere with the smooth and efficient operation of the Sunday School activity. For example, it is important that attendance of pupils and teachers be regular. Since Spirit is the only attraction, the claim that activities outside the Sunday School tend to keep our pupils away must be seen as a counterfeit sense of attraction and therefore powerless to influence the thought of teachers or pupils at any time.
Occasionally teachers or pupils are faced with the argument of not feeling well enough to attend. When it is recognized that man is spiritual and perfect and that illness is not a physical condition, but is aggressive mental suggestion, which has no identity or individuality, no mind to believe or express it, no place to operate, and no substance on which to manifest itself, the mesmerism is broken. Every earnest worker in our movement has had occasion to prove that standing up to such arguments has brought freedom and healing.
Teaching that is inspired and fresh and applicable to daily problems will command the pupils' interest and thus help them to avoid misbehavior. Disobedience or mischievousness among the children can be healed through good metaphysical work by teachers and the Sunday School staff. We should behold at all times man's true selfhood and not attach an ungodlike trait to anyone. The beholding of good in each of God's spiritual ideas will encourage the expression of such goodness in the schoolroom. Often unruliness is attributed to immaturity, home conditions, or parental background. Let us see the children as God made them, and let us be alert so that we shall not seek excuses or reasons to justify error's seeming presence and activity.
On pages 582 and 583 of the textbook is the definition of "children," which reads in part, "The spiritual thoughts and representatives of Life, Truth, and Love." An understanding of this definition nullifies all of the limitations attached to a sense of children as materially conceived and reveals the truth that they are ideas of God. Later in the definition, in reference to the human sense of children, we read, "Counterfeits of creation, whose better originals are God's thoughts, not in embryo, but in maturity."Thus in reality the children are "not in embryo," nor are they in infancy, in childhood, in adolescence, or in any other material state or stage. Being "in maturity" they are representatives of Mind and are capable of understanding and expressing their perfect selfhood. When the teacher understands that man is God's reflection, the children respond naturally to the truth, because reflection is a state of responsiveness. In Science, no other sense of order can evidence itself than that which responds to the unfoldment of Truth and the orderliness of Principle.
Approaching the teaching work along these lines makes it a joyous and selfless experience. Teachers and pupils are freed from any false sense of responsibility, from anxious cares, from a burdensome sense of human preparation. As both the pupils and their teachers become conscious of the truth contained in another statement on page 454 of Science and Health, "Love inspires, illumines, designates, and leads the way," then the Sunday School experience will be characterized by interest, expectancy, joy, harmony, understanding, and progress.
