Articles

The gospel of the kingdom is the best news the world ever received, and for this reason Jesus the Christ proclaimed it, lived it, demonstrated it. From the altitude of his undimmed spiritual vision he discerned the kingdom as God's perfect creation,—a manifestation of Mind, in which the crowning glory is loving submission to the divine will, in response to the perpetual outgoing of Love's choicest blessings.

Grouped around the central figure of Christianity, Jesus the Christ, and inseparably associated with his life work, being closely identified with the most intense experiences of his career, stand a company of disciples or students whose records, as given by the evangelists, command attention. To them the great Teacher gave personal instruction in divine law; in their presence he demonstrated its sacred power; upon them he placed the solemn responsibility of extending and perpetuating the healing knowledge of that law.

If one does not recognize and in some degree understand the relation of cause and effect, he cannot reasonably expect to succeed in any undertaking. Nothing comes by chance.

When one considers for how many centuries the vast resources of the American continent were hidden from the civilized nations of the earth, and how long the useful energies of steam and electricity were imprisoned in undiscovered realms of thought, a feeling of awe arises to think what power, what wealth must still lie out of sight, waiting through countless ages for some gifted eye to pierce the mask of ignorance and see beyond. The diamond waits in the dark of the earth, the pearl in the depth of the sea, until some one, braver than most, shall find them hidden there.

In that strangely beautiful story of the father and two sons narrated in the fifteenth chapter of Luke's gospel and commonly referred to as the parable of the prodigal son, interest centers almost exclusively about the profligate, the dutiful son all but escaping attention. This is not surprising, for the evenness of the ways of the obedient son presents few striking incidents for portrayal, while the life of the prodigal embodies those sharp experiences with which human existence abounds and which lend themselves so spontaneously to the thought or pen of him who would "point a moral, or adorn a tale.

That the account of creation as given in the first chapter of Genesis cannot be, as is generally conceived, the production or bringing into existence of that which never had before existed, is evident from the fact that the nature of God must be eternal, and whatever exists must have been known to Him from all eternity. On page 518 of Science and Health Mrs.

On page 241 of Science and Health Mrs. Eddy says, "The error of the ages is preaching without practice.

The practice of attributing virtues and vices, together with physical qualities and characteristics, to persons and material things, which has been in vogue continuously since time began, is found in the light of Christian Science to be but one of the many forbidden fruits of "the tree of knowledge of good and evil. " This practice, while resulting in no perceptible benefit to the human race, is being perpetuated today in the name of modern science and is taught in advanced institutions of learning under such various titles as ethnology, physiology, psychology, phrenology, and the like.

Back of every right activity in the Church of Christ, Scientist, is a spiritual idea to be discerned and demonstrated; and a business meeting with perfect divine intelligence understood and utilized therein, would be the expression of such an idea. Many human footsteps must be taken before this perfection is realized and demonstrated, and it may be profitable to consider some of them.

It is sometimes difficult for the beginner to understand that Christian Science does not destroy the doctrine of Christ Jesus' atonement upon which Christian churches strongly base the plan of salvation, especially in reference to the efficacy of the shedding of blood. In considering this subject it may be well to glance first at the place which the concept of blood holds in the human thought about life.