One morning after reading the Bible Lesson, outlined in the Christian Science Quarterly, I felt truly inspired. I rejoiced in the love I was feeling from God and in the knowledge of His spiritual creation as it unfolded to me from the pages of the Bible and of Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy. How I longed to share this joy.
As I pondered these feelings, I wondered why more people were not rushing to learn about the things of Spirit. What could hinder the natural attraction to a more spiritual life? If some are pursuing such a life, what tends to block their spiritual progress? Isn't it natural to want to learn about man's true nature and his relation to God?
Mrs. Eddy's writings pointed me to the answers. In Science and Health she says, "If we regard matter as intelligent, and Mind as both good and evil, every sin or supposed material pain and pleasure seems normal, a part of God's creation, and so weighs against our course Spiritward."Science and Health, p. 307. We need to be willing to change our concept of matter. If we continue to look to matter as the source of creation, as the substance from which man springs and of which he is made, we have begun from a wrong basis. Because God is Spirit and the only creator, man's origin and being aren't material but spiritual. God is not in matter, nor does He have anything to do with matter. Our premise must be that God is the sole creator, the originator and source of all that is good and true, and that man is His spiritual creation. Then we begin to recognize that matter isn't intelligent or substantial and that neither sin nor any belief in material pain or pleasure is normal; they're not a part of God's creation. To the degree that we understand this, that which would "[weigh] against our course Spiritward" is removed.
