Love is expressed through affection, caring, compassion, support, devotion, tenderness, and many other qualities necessary to our everyday living. God, ever-present Love, is with us, and is the source of all these supporting qualities. His love is purely spiritual, and it bears us up under all conditions and circumstances. This is the truth I’ve learned since my husband’s passing after 52 years of marriage.
As Christian Scientists my husband and I knew and understood that God’s love is expressed spiritually. But after his passing, I found myself longing for the physical affection as well. I finally realized I must be healed of sensual longing. In Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, Mary Baker Eddy gives us this direction: “Sensualism evolves bad physical and moral conditions.” She continues, “Selfishness and sensualism are educated in mortal mind by the thoughts ever recurring to one’s self, by conversation about the body, and by the expectation of perpetual pleasure or pain from it; and this education is at the expense of spiritual growth” (p. 260).
I needed to learn that my real desire was to know my spiritual status as God’s pure, perfect, satisfied, and fulfilled child. My real longing was for purity of thought and action, and for the peace of knowing that I am never alone. Through prayer, I began to feel this assurance and contentment.
