Can God give us a BMW?
At one point in my life this was not a hypothetical question. I was being given a ride in a fully functioning but run-of-the-mill family car when the driver said in all earnestness that he was praying for a BMW.
I was a relatively new student of Christian Science at the time, yet I’d had heartwarming experiences of my needs being met when I had prayed. Sometimes the need had been met by a thing (such as a suit I couldn’t afford at the time), at other times by unexpected cash or through unsought work opportunities. But I had never prayed for things or funds. There wasn’t anything in the teachings of Christian Science that suggested I should do that.
I’d received the needed things or funds in ways I couldn’t have anticipated as I’d grasped a little more of what Christ Jesus had proved with such consistency, that we always have everything we need as children of God, who never withholds good from any of His offspring. Clarifying how that spiritual perception of ourselves makes a practical difference, Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer of Christian Science, once wrote, “God gives you His spiritual ideas, and in turn, they give you daily supplies” (Miscellaneous Writings 1883–1896, p. 307).
I never saw the driver again, so I don’t know if he ever got his wish. But my own efforts in “pursuit of happiness,” which the United States Declaration of Independence calls an unalienable right, have convinced me that it cannot be found in material things or circumstances. And while establishing the right to pursue happiness was undoubtedly a step of progress for humanity, it cannot guarantee the ability to find happiness. The key for each of us is to individually understand what kind of path actually leads to true joy and satisfaction. To that end I have been grateful to be introduced to the path pointed out by Christ Jesus, who said, “But the gate is small and the road is narrow that leads to life” (Matthew 7:14, New International Reader’s Version).
In this day and age the word “narrow” has a negative connotation. It’s used to describe attitudes or beliefs that are “limited in range and unwilling or unable to appreciate alternative views.” But the “strait” and “narrow” way (as the King James Version of the Bible puts it) is the opposite. It is the way of humility, patience, forgiveness, and childlike obedience to God, good. It is the spiritual perception and experience of life as God and of oneself and everyone else as a daughter or son of God, as explained in Christian Science. This results in an outcome that unlimits our thinking and our lives, as Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mrs. Eddy says: “A knowledge of the Science of being develops the latent abilities and possibilities of man. It extends the atmosphere of thought, giving mortals access to broader and higher realms. It raises the thinker into his native air of insight and perspicacity” (p. 128).
This heightened spiritual sense of being makes a huge difference at any point in our careers, and in our relationships, and leads us step by step to emulate the life of healing love that Jesus lived. But further following in the way Jesus pointed out, and gaining the sense of peacefulness, satisfaction, and purpose that following Christ brings, takes a growing commitment to moral and spiritual self-discipline. That discipline can seem “narrow,” or restrictive, to any self-centeredness that is not yet uprooted from our human nature. But it’s that very nature that truly limits and restricts us. In a letter to one of the early branch Churches of Christ, Scientist, Mrs. Eddy points out the need to keep gaining in our expression of Godlike qualities. She says: “Press on. The way is narrow at first, but it expands as we walk in it” (The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, p. 202).
I’ve been so grateful to experience exactly that since being introduced to Christian Science. The pursuit of material happiness promised me so much, but step by painful step experience clamped down on one avenue of hope after another. Spirituality, on the other hand, does the opposite. The more faithfully we pursue an understanding of God and gain ground in living the unselfed, healing love that reflects His nature, the more hope blossoms and expands into the fulfilment of happiness, health, and the conscious self-worth of “seeking [one’s] own in another’s good,” as Science and Health puts it (p. 518).
And while a spiritual life is sometimes stereotyped as giving up human good for piety, Christian Science pinpoints the coincidence of genuine piety and practical good as an unalienable spiritual law. It describes it this way: “Divine Love always has met and always will meet every human need” (Science and Health, p. 494).
I’ve sometimes heard it suggested that this says “meets every need,” not “every want,” but that seems to suggest a grouchy God rather than the giver of all good. The way I have experienced it time and again—in career developments, home moves, and yes, even transportation—is that God knows our hearts better than we do. The way Love meets our human need might not give us what we thought we wanted (or even coveted!), but it does give us what we truly want—the fruits of spiritual purity and goodness that ultimately turn out to be more satisfying.
There’s a passage in Science and Health that I feel indicates the nature of the strait and narrow way and its profound rewards: “Spiritual living and blessedness are the only evidences, by which we can recognize true existence and feel the unspeakable peace which comes from an all-absorbing spiritual love” (p. 264).
God’s goodness, sought and found, way outweighs the best that life otherwise has to offer. We find it while following along the ever-expanding way of working in humility and prayer, and in healing love, to bring out the spirituality inherent in humanity.
Tony Lobl
Associate Editor
