With a gentle laugh, a friend asked if, after reading the Bible all my life, there was some reason I didn’t know it by now. How could I get anything new out of it? His questions were sincere.
One answer to my friend’s questions lies in the inexhaustible nature of the spiritual ideas conveyed by the words of Scripture. These words are pored over daily by millions of seekers for truth—words powerful, comforting, lyrical, and, when understood, healing.
There’s another answer in a parable Christ Jesus told of a sower. The seed, Jesus explains, symbolizes God’s Word. So, it’s good seed. The point is the quality of the soil it falls into. Some seed falls by the wayside and is eaten by birds—stolen from people’s hearts. Some falls on stony ground, where it’s unable to take root and survive trials. Some falls among thorns—is choked by materialism. But some falls on good soil and bears fruit (see Mark 4:1–20).
I glimpsed as never before that the Bible is not a book about God, but God revealing Himself through His Word.
Shortly after telling this story, Jesus says, “Take heed what ye hear: with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you: and unto you that hear shall more be given. For he that hath, to him shall be given: and he that hath not, from him shall be taken even that which he hath” (Mark 4:24, 25).
If we yearn to understand the Bible better, we might gently ask ourselves: What have I heard (in thought) when I read it? If we perceive the spiritual meaning of the words, we gain the understanding that heals. If, however, we only take the material measure of the words, the true meaning, and its healing power, will be lacking.
The Bible’s essential message is spiritual. Yet, far too often when I’ve read it, I’ve narrowly interpreted the words to try to fix some problem. The real need is to allow the Word to lift thought away from self, until human consciousness—the place where every problem is met—yields to the heavenly peace of God’s presence. Then we experience healing.
A few years ago I experienced a major step of progress, resulting in more consistent healing, when I grasped the divine sense of these familiar words of Jesus: “Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (John 8:32).
I’d always thought of those words only in terms of being healed, or freed, of some problem and was so focused on ending up with “better matter” that I wasn’t seeing the words’ true promise. But this approach, I came to understand, is not Christian Science healing. It rises no higher than an uncertain trust in God (rather than an understanding of Him), as it doesn’t depart from the belief of life in matter. And so, the assurance of present spiritual reality is not attained.
While the Master’s healing work appeared to the material senses as restoration of physical health, his mission wasn’t to overhaul matter, but to overcome the deception of belief in its reality—and through this bring about healing. Jesus’ healing works proved that there is one reality: God and His infinite manifestation. His works revealed spiritual reality in the way light dissolves a heavy fog and shows what was always present but wasn’t seen.
I now saw that if the Master’s words aren’t taken to their full spiritual conclusion, it results in a misunderstanding of his holy mission. He said: “I am come that they might have life [in God], and that they might have it more abundantly” (John 10:10).
Understanding the God-given meaning of the Word changed what I felt as I read. I felt a new closeness to God. I glimpsed as never before that the Bible is not a book about God, but God revealing Himself through His Word. The power of God’s Word to heal is not based on chance. The Word is God’s very presence speaking to us, meeting our specific needs. I glimpsed what must have been Mary Baker Eddy’s conviction in urging the daily study of the Bible and Science and Health—that God would speak to each of us specifically and clearly, even as the Word had spoken to her and given her the revelation of Christian Science.
In establishing her Church, Mrs. Eddy gave its first tenet: “As adherents of Truth, we take the inspired Word of the Bible as our sufficient guide to eternal Life” (Science and Health, p. 497). She makes plain throughout her writings that only the spiritual meaning of the Word heals. It reveals the Science of the Bible, in which life is held in God’s care.
After his resurrection Jesus was not recognized by two of his disciples until their understanding of the Scriptures was restored. The two disciples were clearly familiar with the Scriptures, but doubt, discouragement, sorrow, and fear had blinded them until the inspired meaning once again filled their hearts.
It is well to remember that the eternal Christ, “the true idea voicing good, the divine message from God to men speaking to the human consciousness” (Science and Health, p. 332), is here today opening to us the Scriptures, assuring us of what is true. We can’t be deprived of spiritual understanding—nor can the Word become less understandable with the passage of time—because Christ is “the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever” (Hebrews 13:8).
Mrs. Eddy explains: “The winds of time sweep clean the centuries, but they can never bear into oblivion [Jesus’] words. They still live, and to-morrow speak louder than to-day” (Miscellaneous Writings 1883–1896, p. 99).
A friend’s experience illustrates this. He was largely raised by his grandmother. Although it was against the law at that time in their country to attend church or teach children from the Bible, his grandmother was deeply religious. When he was young, she would quietly read the Bible out loud as he was playing nearby. She was not reading to him (thus not breaking the law); she simply sat and read it in the same way one might sing softly to one’s self when someone else is in the room. Every day, when he went off to school, she told him the same three words: “God is Love.”
Well into adulthood, he didn’t believe in God. Yet, he couldn’t forget those three words or how he felt when he heard them. One day, those words came to him unexpectedly, and suddenly he was sure that God is. It was impossible, he said, to believe otherwise. The most memorable part of his telling me this was the sheer joy and conviction in his voice. In short, a lifetime of contrary teaching couldn’t stop the Word from making God’s love known.
We can rest assured that the Word and its power will never fail, for “God is His own interpreter, / And He will make it plain” (William Cowper, Christian Science Hymnal, No. 399, adapt.).
