SPIRITUAL ASSURANCE

The Revelator, John, clearly discerned that all men would eventually be assured of the efficacy of divine Science. In the Bible we read (Rev. 3:9), "Behold, I will make them to come and worship before thy feet, and to know that I have loved thee."

Spiritual assurance comes from one's understanding of God and of spiritual man, the only man there is. The spiritual record of creation, as given in the first chapter of Genesis, forms the basis of Mary Baker Eddy's "scientific statement of being," which concludes (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 468): "Spirit is God, and man is His image and likeness. Therefore man is not material; he is spiritual."

Spiritual assurance always attends the perception and acknowledgment of man's at-one-ment with the Father. Assurance of divine reality precludes any belief that man could ever deviate from his true being or that he could ever be outside the divine presence. It enables one to know that man is always the loved of Love.

When he disproved the falsity of Baal worship Elijah the prophet brought to a doubting people assurance of divine power. Although invested with much ceremony and having royal sanction, the Baal worship was not true. When Elijah demonstrated the power of God or divine law, the people were so assured of God's presence that they fell on their faces and said (I Kings 18:39), "The Lord, he is the God; the Lord, he is the God."

The works of the Master were indigenous to his spiritual nature, derived from the Father. They gave such assuring evidence of his divine sonship with the Father that even his adversaries were put to shame (see Luke 13:11-17). The works of Jesus elicited from his disciples their assurance of his divine authority to dispel the ills of the world. His teaching caused the disciples to exclaim (John 16:30), "Now are we sure that thou knowest all things, and needest not that any man should ask thee: by this we believe that thou earnest forth from God."

Mrs. Eddy's own assurance that the presence of the Christ is as available today as in the time of Jesus is evidenced in her reply to an inquiring friend (Miscellaneous Writings, p. 180), "Christ is Truth, and Truth is always here,—the impersonal Saviour."

The impersonal Saviour comes into our consciousness to heal and bless when we are in the wilderness of some human need. Even though we wrestle with some problem through the night, as did Jacob of old, we can always be assured of the unreality of evil's every claim. But we must all come to the conviction, as did Jacob, of God's presence and power. Then we too shall be blessed and cry out that we have seen God face to face.

Healing is the natural result of assurance that the efficacy of divine Science will meet the human need. Healing which comes from the assurance that God constitutes all true being and that man is spiritual and perfect humbles the seeker. Such healing opens the door to a higher understanding of the presence and power of God; it brings to light the grace of Spirit, the purity of Soul, the fragrance of gratitude, the joy which comes of forgiveness.

At one time in my experience I had an instantaneous healing of a skin difficulty through the help of a Christian Science practitioner. Later, however, the same difficulty appeared again, and I realized that I had to work out the problem for myself, f worked constantly to know that God is all true consciousness and that there had never been an inharmonious condition in the spiritual universe. I studied very carefully Mrs. Eddy's statement in Science and Health (p. 301), "Delusion, sin, disease, and death arise from the false testimony of material sense, which, from a supposed standpoint outside the focal distance of infinite Spirit, presents an inverted image of Mind and substance with everything turned upside down." I saw that there was no focal distance outside of God from which such an image could be presented to me and that God's idea manifests nothing unlike God. My permanent healing resulted. The assurance that the spiritual man is the only man inevitably results in healing.

Christian Science has indeed come to this age as the great Comforter. It gives us the assurance that man is always in his right place, that he is always provided for, and that his joy and happiness are unassailable.

Ezekiel the prophet voiced God's promise of assurance, declaring (Ezek. 34:26, 30): "I will make them and the places round about my hill a blessing; and I will cause the shower to come down in his season; there shall be showers of blessing. . . . Thus shall they know that I the Lord their God am with them, and that they, even the house of Israel, are my people, saith the Lord God."