Christian Science offers hope to those who seek health, happiness, and success. This Science stresses the importance of satisfying the spiritual needs of the individual as a practical means of meeting the human need. What everyone really needs more than anything else is to understand God, for this understanding imparts the ability to maintain harmony.
It is legitimate to want to be well, happy, and affluent. Nothing in God's nature denies these aspirations. On the contrary, everything which God is assures the possibility of bringing them into abundant manifestation. Christ Jesus knew and illustrated this in many ways. He healed the sick, reformed the sinning, and raised the dead. It is our divinely bestowed privilege to follow his example by doing the same work for ourselves and others. In her book "The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany," Mary Baker Eddy says (p. 238), "On the swift pinions of spiritual thought man rises above the letter, law, or morale of the inspired Word to the spirit of Truth, whereby the Science is reached that demonstrates God." And she adds: "God is understandable, knowable, and applicable to every human need. In this is the proof that Christian Science is Science, for it demonstrates Life, not death; health, not disease; Truth, not error; Love, not hate."
When the primary human need is seen to be that of learning more of God, Spirit, and of man, His spiritual creation, then thought is naturally and spontaneously devoted to the procurement of this knowledge. This purpose can be accomplished, for a Scriptural promise reads (Jer. 29: 13), "Ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart." To find God and to understand Him is to find the way to present salvation.
Christian Science is emphatic and correct in its teaching that God is perfect, infinite, and incorporeal Spirit, entirely above and separate from all material notions or concepts. True prayer based on this truth does not ask God to change, as though He were the cause of offensive discord, but declares what He really is, the creator of all good. The realization of this spiritual truth brings harmony to the physical body and to one's affairs.
Were one to overemphasize the material things wanted, without keeping in thought the desire to understand and reflect God, he would find his prayers of little avail. It is sheer mesmerism to argue mentally for the acquisition of material things, however desirable they may appear to be.
God is one God without an opponent; that is, He is supreme in His own nature, good, and this fact is the basis for demonstration. The corollary to this truth is that matter, the seeming opposite of Spirit, is not substance, nor does it have any of the presence or power it claims. Assured of these facts the sinning, sorrowing, and sick may turn with confidence to the cultivation of those spiritual qualities which constitute man as God's reflection and which will bring them the substantive satisfaction that they need.
The demonstration of spiritual satisfaction is individual. It includes an understanding of the facts of being, together with the manifestation of them in human experience. The demonstration of spiritual satisfaction also calls for the destruction of all errors of belief. One cannot be successful in the demonstration of spiritual truth without casting out that which, in belief, opposes Truth, God. More love, humanity, kindness, honesty, are needed in all relationships. To find expression, these qualities need to have a place in the affections. One needs to develop a fervent zeal to be Godlike. In "Miscellaneous Writings" Mrs. Eddy says (p. 107): "More love is the great need of mankind. A pure affection, concentric, forgetting self, forgiving wrongs and forestalling them, should swell the lyre of human love."
In meeting the human need, prayer is not to be used as a mental substitute for a human duty performed. All wholesome responsibilities need to be discharged, not avoided. For example, the breadwinner in a home cannot properly replace honest endeavor with poor work and expect to reap the fruitage which would accrue from the satisfactory performance of his business. Time should never be wasted, especially when it belongs to an employer who is paying for services he may rightfully expect to receive.
The homemaker can glorify God in doing the work which is an accepted part of her duty. It would not be in accord with divine Principle for her to waste energies on other engagements during time which belongs to the home. Even the study of our precious textbooks, the Bible and "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mrs. Eddy, should not and need not interfere with the performance of other duties.
The student at school or college needs to engage in prescribed study in order to receive the grades which enable him to pass. For him to neglect the human duty and then to expect some miracle to give him the knowledge he should have obtained from his own studying is not the proper use of Christian Science.
Money which has been reserved for the payment of some specific obligation, such as the rent, should not usually be spent for something else, if one would keep his finances in order. To spend money unwisely on some frivolous thing and then expect to replace it by heroic truth-knowing is to misunderstand and misuse the Christ, Truth.
Christ Jesus' parable of the man who asked his two sons to work in his vineyard on a certain day brings out the need for carrying out our duties. It will be remembered that when the father in the parable asked the first son to go and work in the vineyard, he replied (Matt. 21:29), "I will not." But we read that "afterward he repented, and went." On the other hand, the second son said (verse 30), "I go, sir." But he "went not." The son who did the work requested of him, even though his verbal reply to his father was a negative one, is commended by the Master. We too shall deserve commendation when we faithfully discharge our human duties.
It is reasonable to assume that Jesus had special reference to spiritual things in telling this parable; but it also seems reasonable to see its application to such human affairs as we have been discussing. One could surely draw this conclusion from the following words of Mrs. Eddy (Miscellaneous Writings, p. 166): "This spiritual idea, or Christ, entered into the minutiae of the life of the personal Jesus. It made him an honest man, a good carpenter, and a good man, before it could make him the glorified." Since we consider Jesus to be our Way-shower, must not the Christ enter into the minutiae of our life?
The human need, whatever it may be, can always be met through the understanding of God and of man in His image. While it replaces the discords of personal sense with harmony, this understanding satisfies the inclination toward spiritual light. As Jesus declared (Matt. 5:6), "Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled."
God is able to make all grace abound toward you; that ye, always
having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work:
. . . being enriched in every thing to all bountifulness, which
causeth through us thanksgiving to God.—II Corinthians 9:8, 11.
