Dreams! Daydreams! Night dreams! Are they real? Should we believe them? Should we let our lives, our health, our happiness, be governed by the deep darkness of dreams? Few people think of what goes on in a night dream as actually happening. And flimsy daydreams are seen as mainly flights of fancy.
But there is a dream with which we live consciously or unconsciously each waking and sleeping hour, and from which we all need to wake up: the dream of material existence. From this dream of belief come all the discords of our lives, including fear, lack, sickness, sin, disease, death.
The Apostle Paul says in his Epistle to the Romans, "Now it is high time to awake out of sleep." Rom. 13:11; And so it is if we are to enjoy happy, harmonious, healthful lives. It is time to acquaint ourselves more fully with God's creation of man in His perfect image and likeness—man who neither sleeps nor dreams, because God neither sleeps nor dreams. Mrs. Eddy writes in the textbook: "The history of error is a dream-narrative. The dream has no reality, no intelligence, no mind; therefore the dreamer and dream are one, for neither is true nor real." Science and Health, p. 530;
Christian Science teaches that man is forever conscious—never asleep, never a dreamer! As the perfect expression of God, the ever-conscious divine Mind, man is awake, alert, perceptive only of good— of all that truly exists. As a being coexistent with infinite Mind, man—yes, each individual's true, present being—is necessarily as awake as God is.
It is generally conceded that sleep is normal and necessary. If our sleep is truly normal and results from a peaceful sense of rest, then we are not so much hypnotically asleep as intelligently in repose. Our spiritual senses remain conscious of reality. They are receptive to the ever-present and ever-operative goodness of God, and we are benefited by His goodness, whether asleep or awake. The Psalmist puts it this way: "I will both lay me down in peace, and sleep: for thou, Lord, only makest me dwell in safety." Ps. 4:8;
A materialistically-minded individual is asleep to reality even when, to human sense, he is apparently wide-awake. And one who is spiritually receptive can be responsive to Truth even as he sleeps restfully.
The awakening called for in Paul's epistle has nothing to do with mere conscious alertness to material circumstances around us. Rather, it is a call to awake to the recognition of God as the exclusive and supreme power of the universe and to the knowing of man as God's servant or expression. It is an admonition to abandon the Adamic dream that life originates from worldly dust and to accept the true sense of spiritual origin and existence. It is a call to accept the Christ, Truth, the light of the world, which enables us to be awake to the presence of good in our lives.
In an address to The Mother Church in 1902, Mrs. Eddy issued a rousing call to humanity in these words: "Many sleep who should keep themselves awake and waken the world."Message to The Mother Church for 1902, p. 17; Through the acceptance of Christ as the true guiding influence in our lives, we can effectively answer this call, thereby blessing ourselves and others.
Some individuals, because of illness, age, accident, or some other deficiency, may appear to be able to contribute little to the progress of humanity. God is infinite good and does not afflict His own creation. Restricted ability, therefore, is a false belief about man, and not God's will. As growth Spiritward goes on—as one becomes conscious of reality—restrictive deficiencies will fade and finally disappear, for they are completely unsupported by God.
The need to wake up is not alone for those who are troubled by visible mortal restrictions. All peoples, including those who are presently living normal, happy lives, need to grow in the understanding of perfect, eternal, spiritual being. As long as there is a single belief of physical existence, there is a need to rouse ourselves from sleep. The dream of pleasure and pain or life and death in matter needs to be superseded by the clear realization of spiritual existence. The awakening from material living to spiritual existence need not be accompanied by suffering of any sort. It is a happy journey away from the sense-dream into the joy-filled heaven of Soul, God.
One who is suffering from some illness is in that condition because of worldly sleep —because of the ignorant general acceptance of illness as a situation to be expected by all at some time. What a wicked dream this is! Need we accept it? Isn't it high time to wake up to reality?
What does one who is suffering from sickness need to wake up to? First in importance is that God, good, ordains and universally provides only perfection for His creation, and that this perfection includes health. Health, an eternal aspect of God's nature, is the genuine condition of every idea in His infinite universe. It is the true condition of anyone who has ignorantly accepted illness as real or, perhaps, even as incurable.
Man coexists with God, the source and maintainer of perfect health. Whatever God has in His being is included within the nature of each and every idea existent in Him. God's purpose and provision for each idea is health, and since health is God's will for all, anyone can learn in Christian Science how to claim its fullness here and now.
One does not enjoy health if his senses are dulled to its presence. His healing accompanies his awakening to the truth that he reflects of God perfect spiritual well-being as an eternal fact. His true condition is not to be gauged by what the illusive material senses visualize, but rather by what the awakened spiritual senses see of reality. Mrs. Eddy declares: "If sickness is real, it belongs to immortality; if true, it is a part of Truth. Would you attempt with drugs, or without, to destroy a quality or condition of Truth? But if sickness and sin are illusions, the awakening from this mortal dream, or illusion, will bring us into health, holiness, and immortality. This awakening is the forever coming of Christ, the advanced appearing of Truth, which casts out error and heals the sick." Science and Health, p. 230;
As we awake spiritually to the reality of being, we enjoy "the forever coming of Christ," and improvements take place in our human environment and bodies. Even as a musician performs better as he understands and demonstrates the true nature of harmony, so do bodily conditions improve as one becomes conscious of and understands the Science of spiritual health. Earnestly working and praying to understand and demonstrate the Science of Christianity, we truly follow Paul's counsel to awake and are thereby greatly blessed. During our growth Spiritward we can be cheered by the assurance of the Psalmist who sang, "I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with thy likeness." Ps.17:15.
