A SECRET SERVICE AGENT who guards the president. A United Nations employee who helps world leaders understand the importance of protecting and preserving their countries' endangered animal and plant life. A military intelligence officer. An air marshal. Each of these individuals is engaged in the act of protection. Yet my conversations with each of them eventually brought us to a surprising point of agreement: There is something bigger than ourselves that guards and maintains the universe.
Call that "something" what you will: Omnipotence, divine intelligence, a spiritual life force. Through my study of Christian Science, I'm learning that it's God who is responsible for every facet of creation and that, by virtue of the fact that God is All, there is no other power at work within His universe than the power of supreme good. Mary Baker Eddy put it this way: "In divine Science, God is One and All; and, governing Himself, He governs the universe." Miscellaneous Writings 1883–1896, p. 258.
I like to think of this divine guarding, maintaining force as an example of the ultimate kind of quality control. But unlike the concept of quality control that exists within the manufacturing industry, the version I'm talking about isn't a process of identifying and weeding out the damaged goods. The very nature of God—His perfection, wholeness, purity, and permanence—precludes contamination or imperfection of any kind. The Allness of God means that there is nothing in His universe unlike Him. In other words, quality control in its highest sense is God cherishing and maintaining the glory of His eternal being, through and as His own idea.
