Good bylaws in branch Churches of Christ, Scientist, while they concern human action, have their basis in divine law, which has been revealed to mankind through ages of spiritual progress. The bylaws governing a branch church are adopted by a required majority or plurality vote of the membership and, according to the democratic process, should be obeyed. Mary Baker Eddy says in "The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany" (p. 203), "Church laws which are obeyed without mutiny are God's laws."
An important effect of obedience to church laws is to unify the action of the membership. And united action in church work is conducive to strength and progress in taking the truth of being, or Christian Science, to a community. But to bring the greatest wisdom to church laws, one must have an understanding of divine law, must see it as the resistless force of God's will, which acts consciously to express the highest good.
In God's realm, the kingdom whose presence Christ Jesus came to reveal, absolute good is maintained in all action through the divine government. In fact, heaven is the state of consciousness in which God's will is fully enforced. This state of thought is the ideal toward which church memberships advance, and it is also the acknowledged basis of prayerful metaphysical work for the church. For in Science one declares and realizes that God's kingdom is the only kingdom and that man is entirely subordinate to the divine will.
