Supporting the services in a Church of Christ, Scientist, ensures individual spiritual growth. As we support them, we gain greater inspiration. We attain a better understanding of God and man. Truth is more real to us and the nothingness of error is clearer. Not only do we advance our own progress but we help to improve the world in which we live.
Christian Science services bless through their healing, uplifting, and saving influence. They bring out the truth that God is good, that He is All-in-all and includes no evil. They enable us to know Him better as divine Principle, Love. They dethrone matter and point out the way of total salvation through Christ, our Saviour. They unlock the eternal truths of the Scriptures and reveal the spiritual import of Christ Jesus' words and works. And they show how we can follow our Master as present-day disciples, casting out evil and healing the sick.
The services teach us to love. Supporting them, we love more and overcome hate. As we truly embrace the truth we hear and endeavor to live it, we become more unselfish, more compassionate, more considerate. We strive to be honest in business, kind in our relationships, and generous in our desire to help others. As the Word of God so blesses us, it blesses those we come in contact with each day. And so the spiritual influence of the services in our individual lives is felt in the community. As we support each service, our spiritual growth in the expression of divine Love helps to lessen evil in the world and to bring a little more of heaven, or harmony, to earth.
Individuals who have thoroughly studied the Lesson-Sermon during the week come to the Sunday service filled with spiritual truths, which bless and heal. They come to listen, but, more important, they come to participate. Their listening to the sacred Word from our impersonal pastor—the Bible, and Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mrs. Eddy—is coupled with a giving, a producing, attitude. By applying the Word to their daily activities they have done something constructive with it, and they bring to the service a spiritual understanding earned through demonstration. Their hearing and doing of the Word contribute to the healing message from the desk. Indeed, they feel God's nearness, and all in the congregation are touched by this pure, spiritual sense, or consciousness of the Christ-power.
When a member is supporting the service metaphysically, he or she brings to it a consciousness filled with Truth. Material thoughts are subdued. Spirit dominates. Criticism and condemnation are farther from thought, and personal sense is unimportant. Mind, unfolding perfect ideas, forms the focal point of interest in the service. This exalted state, this dwelling on the things of Spirit, does not minimize the importance of the letter. It spiritualizes thought so that the letter will best serve its purpose. Spiritual-mindedness magnifies good. It acknowledges the reading as evidence of the harmonizing presence of Life, Truth, and Love.
Like the Sunday service, the Wednesday testimony meeting also offers opportunity for participation. Testimonies that praise God and offer evidence from personal experience of healing, giving due credit to the words and works of our Master and the unselfish contribution of Mrs. Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, help not only those present but also, through them, find their way into the community. Genuine gratitude for the meeting and all it offers will prompt members to participate. Hearts filled with love overflow. This love guides the member rightly as he unselfishly contributes to the meeting, whether silently or audibly.
We can support the service by praying for it before, during, and afterward. Before the service, we can deny the influence of counterattraction, apathy, indifference. When we see the service as divinely authorized, we will make every effort to be in our right place, come Sunday and Wednesday. We will know that Truth attracts. Realizing that man is Mind's idea, never mesmerized, we will remain alert to error's subtle ways and not be tempted to become complacent or to be diverted to other less important interests. We will not be hoodwinked by mortal mind when it whispers in the guise of our thought: "I can get out my books and have my own church service here at home." We will not allow sports events, pleasures, even necessary chores that can be done at other times, to interfere with a more important responsibility to ourselves and to the world we live in. We will remember that by attending and supporting the church service we can make a special and effective contribution to the cure and prevention of every ill on earth.
During the service, our prayers are offered for the congregation in obedience to the Manual of The Mother Church by Mrs. Eddy: "The prayers in Christian Science churches shall be offered for the congregations collectively and exclusively."1 And after the service, we can help to protect its blessings by holding to the truth that God's work is done, that it is complete, permanent, and that it has infinitely good results.
Our support of the service may offer opportunity to provide assistance to the Readers. If we hear what we believe to be a mistake in the reading, we can pray about it with a sincere desire to be helpful and take human steps only when we are sure that Mind is guiding us. A kind word giving correct information concerning a certain point need not be offensive if our motive is to support and not to tear down. Our first obligation, however, is to pray about any need for correction. Readers generally catch their own mistakes. Often, they notice them when members of the congregation do not. And so our contribution to correcting imperfections can often begin and end with our own thought. We can realize that perfect Mind is guiding and governing every activity.
Our motive in attending determines, to some degree, our contribution to the service. If our desire is to gain understanding, we attend church to imbibe the spiritual import of the message. Through mental self-discipline—an important responsibility of listener-participants—we cast out undue preoccupation with reading techniques and grasp the Christ-idea, which heals. Then the letter is subordinated to the healing truths, which uplift and inspire.
Looking for the highest spiritual meaning in the reading is a support to the service. We are uniting with its spiritual purpose to elevate thought from the mortal to the immortal. Thus, at each service we testify to the purpose of our church membership. Mrs. Eddy writes, "We can unite with this church only as we are new-born of Spirit, as we reach the Life which is Truth and the Truth which is Life by bringing forth the fruits of Love,—casting out error and healing the sick."2
At some time or other during his term, a Reader may be tempted to wish he did not have to read on a particular day. Perhaps mortal mind tells him he really doesn't enjoy being there. This happened to me while serving as First Reader, but in my case it wasn't for only one day or one service—it went on for several weeks. A personal tragedy in my home threatened my enthusiasm for the work. It seemed a burden to carry on under this strain. Soon after, a physical illness developed. Even though others did not notice it, on a couple of occasions I was so weak that it seemed it might be impossible to remain standing through the service.
One Sunday morning before the service, when the situation was most difficult, I prayed fervently for the desire to love the task before me. The lines from Mrs. Eddy's poem came to me: "Father, where Thine own children are, /I love to be."3 Finally, I could say with conviction, "I love to be here today and to do God's work." Then I saw that the work was on God's shoulders, not mine. A great sense of burden left me, but I still seemed quite weak. During the first hymn I looked out at the individuals in the congregation and was almost surprised at the indication on their faces of their loving support for the entire activity and purpose of the service. Immediately I forgot self. I was completely oblivious of the mechanics of my duties. The words I read inspired and uplifted me. I was conscious only of the truth. During the service I was healed of both the physical illness and the grief I had struggled with for so many weeks. It was proved to me that what supports the service supports the Readers also. The members' support enabled me to attain the healing, and it provided the most spiritually uplifting service of my term up to that time. I truly enjoyed every moment of reading. From that day forward, needless to say, the reading and the services improved.
When thought in our church auditorium is fastened on the Christ, Truth, the service truly satisfies the heart hungering for spiritual insight. Such services will reveal the eternal unity of Mind and idea, perfect God and perfect man. Members of the congregation will experience the transforming and healing power of the Christ in their own individual lives, and this will have its healing effect in the community and the world.
Whether our post is in the congregation or on the platform, our support contributes meaningfully to the success of every aspect of the holy work. Fulfilling our duty, we earn the rewarding benediction, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord."4
