Often when we've completed a certain type of work, it's helpful to look back and consider what we've learned. This is particularly true when the duties we've finished have been in the service of the Church of Christ, Scientist. Our work has been successful if we can honestly say that we treasure the Church and its organizational method of making Christian Science available to mankind more than we ever did before.
Whether we're completing a term as Reader in a branch church, finishing a position as a committee member, concluding successful years as a Sunday School teacher, or completing some appointed task for The Mother Church, our increased appreciation for all that the Church means to humanity's welfare is the best reward we could possibly have. Such gratitude and love show that we're outgrowing self-centered personal aims and becoming more caring about the deep needs of others. And isn't this what our Church commitment should be doing for us?
We may have originally joined the Church because we were grateful for what it had done for us personally in enabling us more fully to understand and demonstrate the healing Christ, Truth. Yet as we grow spiritually, we find that something larger than even our personal welfare is involved. The Church of Christ, Scientist, and its branches exist to help people everywhere understand the allness of God, divine good, and the complete unreality of all evil, of all that does not bear witness to God's perfection and majesty.
Membership and activity in the Church do bring healings of the most profound and varied types to individuals. Yet the Church's larger purpose includes the aim of so lifting human consciousness above the false belief that matter has any life or intelligence that people begin to recognize Spirit as the only reality. The Science of Christ, which the Church bears witness to, isn't meant to be the comforter of matter. It destroys the belief in matter and leaves the individual free to be the man he truly is, God's incorporeal, spiritual idea.
When we see the holy influence that the Church is meant to exert in human consciousness for all people—and if we truly love mankind—we treasure the Church. We're willing to work both in it and for it, and we are grateful for the lessons this work brings us.
The Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, Mary Baker Eddy, perceived the true, spiritual meaning of Church, which she defines in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures as "the structure of Truth and Love; whatever rests upon and proceeds from divine Principle."Science and Health, p. 583.This spiritual structure, demanding obedience to divine Principle, has many ways of entering our lives and redeeming us degree by degree from the belief in matter's reality. And some of the lessons that Church has for us become clearer as we look back with honest eyes on a duty just completed. For instance, have the lessons we've learned while working with other members helped us to gain a broader, more loving view of humanity? Then, we may be sure that our concept of man as an erring mortal is fading. We're seeing our neighbor with a deeper appreciation of his or her true selfhood as the spiritual expression of divine Love.
Can we honestly say that expressing patience, compassion, forgiveness, self-discipline, lovingkindness—all qualities that proceed from God, divine Love— has become crucially important to us? More important than self-justification, self-importance, or self-will? If so, the claim of a personal ego is yielding to the one Mind, God. Also we might ask ourselves if our church activity has strengthened our recognition of the exact Science Mrs. Eddy's work has established. A humble willingness to appreciate the letter of divine Science (as well as its spirit) shows our recognition that Christian Science is the precise revelation of the only true Science there is.
If these are some of the lessons we've been learning, we can indeed be grateful. While these lessons at times may be challenging, they are also deeply rewarding, for they help us master the belief of having a mind apart from God.
No church member can honestly claim that it's always easy to demonstrate the spiritual harmony and unity that have their source in the one Mind. But the test of our love for Christian Science itself is often measured by our love for the Church. This love is expressed by the consistent affection we maintain for fellow church members, by our obedience to and support of the By-Laws in the Manual of The Mother Church by Mrs. Eddy, and by our increasing consciousness of the Church's ministry to all mankind.
Such spiritual growth indicates that a personal sense of self is being dissolved under the tempering and purifying influence of the Christ. The one divine Mind that is God—and that is reflected in our true, spiritual selfhood as God's likeness, spiritual man—has been having its practical effect in our lives.
This practical effect is a vital aspect of Mrs. Eddy's spiritual comprehension of Church in its mission to humanity. Science and Health states, "The Church is that institution, which affords proof of its utility and is found elevating the race, rousing the dormant understanding from material beliefs to the apprehension of spiritual ideas and the demonstration of divine Science, thereby casting out devils, or error, and healing the sick." Ibid.
A clear vision of the practical, healing effects of the divine idea, Church, shows us that not only should we treasure Church but that it is a treasure—a treasure for everyone who will seek it. Christ Jesus spoke of the kingdom of heaven as a treasure. He said, "The kingdom of heaven is like unto treasure hid in a field; the which when a man hath found, he hideth, and for joy thereof goeth and selleth all that he hath, and buyeth that field."Matt. 13:44.
At times, some may find it difficult to think of the Church as pointing toward the kingdom of heaven. Yet beneath the soil of misconceptions about it—the misconception, for example, that Church is just a group of people trying to work in a material organization—lies its deep spiritual meaning as the holy "structure of Truth and Love." Our need is to exchange the misconceptions for the spiritual ideal. We do this as we treasure the Church by loving its actual substance as tangible evidence of the kingdom of heaven. And we yield the mortal concept of each member as just another limited human being by praying to discern each one's true nature as God's idea, spiritual man—the man who expresses the Godlike qualities of purity, love, wisdom, and holiness, which are characteristic of God's reflection.
When the Church is a treasure to us, we will lovingly guard its reputation for the benefit of others. Repeating stories about other church members not only depreciates both our own and others' worth in the eyes of those who are beginning to look upon Christian Science with respect; it would also claim to devalue the worth of Christian Science itself. Of course, because Christian Science has its source in God, it cannot actually be devalued. Its worth and purpose stand forever as living testimonies to God's great love. And if we love Christian Science, we will also love the Church that represents it, by sacredly caring about the organization and all those who are working to demonstrate the purpose of Church.
If this growing love for the institution that makes Christian Science available to mankind has been taking place while we've been actively working in a church position, the work has been successful. But that doesn't mean we're through! It only means that the infinite reach of the divine idea, Church, has new avenues for us to explore and learn from. The opportunity to treasure Church is forever. And its joys are forever available to bless mankind individually and collectively.
