About 30 years ago, while practicing law in California, I was enjoying some success, and my wife and I were happily raising our young daughter. However as time passed, I wondered if I was missing out on something important, or if I had really found my right place in life. As a student of Christian Science, I began spending extra hours studying the Bible and Mary Baker Eddy’s writings—hoping to find answers and guidance. As much as anything, I wanted to have a greater impact for good on society.
One afternoon, this passage from Mary Baker Eddy’s writings struck me forcefully: “Moses advanced a nation to the worship of God in Spirit instead of matter, and illustrated the grand human capacities of being bestowed by immortal Mind” (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 200). While the whole passage seems full of meaning now, the portion that then seemed most prominent was the reference to Moses advancing a nation. At that time, I tended to identify with the part of Moses’ story about toiling in the backside of the desert and suffering self-doubt. But this arresting observation of Mrs. Eddy’s about Moses—a seemingly misplaced self-doubter, eventually promoting the good of a whole nation—was inspiring because it pointed toward man’s God-given capacities, which are beyond the limits implied by one’s current activities, education, or background.
Another statement was also tremendously inspiring at that time: “From the interior of Africa to the utmost parts of the earth, the sick and the heavenly homesick or hungry hearts are calling on me for help, and I am helping them” (Mary Baker Eddy, The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, p. 147). This vista of wide-ranging impact for good was breathtaking. But the greatest inspiration was Mrs. Eddy’s own history of meekness and might, her overcoming through divine means a frail physical constitution and related personal difficulties, discovering and publishing for the world the Science of Christ-healing and establishing an international church to make the blessings of this discovery permanently available to mankind.
