Articles

When a Hebrew religious leader asked Jesus, “Which is the first commandment of all?” he answered, “The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength” ( Mark 12:28–30 ).   That statement emphatically conveyed the foundation of the Master’s ministry.

My first memory of hearing about Jesus was my mother reading the story of the Master throwing the money changers out of the Temple (see Matthew 21:12, 13 ). I couldn’t have been more than three years old, but the story made a distinct impression on me.

In the prophetic book of Isaiah in the Bible we read, “With everlasting kindness will I have mercy on thee, saith the Lord thy Redeemer. For this is as the waters of Noah unto me: for as I have sworn that the waters of Noah should no more go over the earth; so have I sworn that I would not be wroth with thee, nor rebuke thee.

Oh, no! There it went—my friend’s brand-new cellphone—over the side of her kayak and into the lake. The water was only about five feet deep, but the lake floor was too soft to support the weight of a person, so we four friends in four kayaks gently searched the ground beneath us with our paddles.

The Journal  is pleased to offer readers the first in an occasional column from the office of Christian Science Practitioner Activities at The Mother Church in Boston. “Pathways to the practice” is autobiographical.

Ah, love. Isn’t it wonderful to be in the presence of someone who sees you as delightful, smart, talented! Who really sees and loves you.

I was on a family holiday when my granddaughter noticed that my eye was red. I thought that water had leaked into my mask while we were snorkeling.

As a teen, I learned to drive in a sports car. Exceeding the speed limit was of no concern.

I had to be out of my house in less than two weeks, but the rents in the area had skyrocketed, and when I found another possible place, I was told that forty other prospective tenants had applied for it. I am single and self-employed, and live in a military community where landlords prefer families with a regular paycheck.

Seen from space, the earth is beautiful, like a bright blue marble with white swirls encircling it amidst colors of brown, yellow, and green. It is amazing to think that we, as children of God, have been given loving dominion over it!  In Genesis, we read that God gave man “dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth” ( 1:26 ).