A BELIEF in immortality and in our progressive unfoldment in respect to all that is desirable and that promotes happiness, is sufficient reason for persistent effort to find and apply the healing truth. The truth as to any existing thing, creation, or condition, must reveal it in its perfection. Healing, or to use another form of expression, salvation, is mankind's highest desire, which will be realized when the "kingdom of heaven" appears in consciousness. Salvation is never a need of that which expresses perfect truth. The truth as to anything expresses its source, purpose, action, and effect; therefore the truth as to man created as the idea and image of God must express a perfect image of the creator. If we do not see and realize man as such, it is an error of perception, a false sense of man. Mortals are not free, because they do not know the truth. If God is good, and God is the creator of all things,—the All-in-all of all-inclusive reality,—then all that in fact has real existence is good, God expressed. Belief in evil therefore comes from a false sense of existence.
Heaven has been defined as a condition of consciousness, and it is clear that with our present beliefs we have not as yet attained a perfect realization of the kingdom of heaven within us. No question presented to suffering humanity is so important as this, "What shall I do to be saved?" Jesus' saying, "Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free," indicates that right education, the unfoldment of the consciousness of the truth, presents the only way of salvation. Salvation and redemption is therefore a mental process through which knowledge of the truth is attained, and error and the effect of error destroyed.
Humanity has suffered through the ages. Sin, sickness, and death have seemed realities of existence. Trouble, worry, weariness, and pain have been ever present as depressing and destructive influences which have made life a burden that at times seemed unbearable, and to escape which death has been awaited as a means of hoped for release from the ills to which flesh seems heir. Through all these years, during which evil and misery have seemed to be the heritage of man, brave and self-sacrificing men and women have made the attempt to mitigate and alleviate human suffering their life-work. Have they succeeded? and if not, why? Is it because the healing truth has not been understood? Is it because, to sense, error has been believed to be true? Does this saying of Jesus, "If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you," furnish an explanation?
Through the ages humanity has sought to find a way to avoid and destroy the asserted power of evil, denying its right to reign by attempted rebellion against it. The medical profession, with honest and untiring effort, has searched the mineral and vegetable kingdom for remedies, at times hopeful that at last they have found the priceless panacea— only to see their hopes blighted and their battle with sickness and death become an irrepressible conflict, in which they find their weapons relatively powerless in the face of a persistent and seemingly unconquerable enemy. Nothing has been found which proses a permanent specific, even after ages upon ages of devoted study and effort honestly made along the adopted lines of research. Is it not, therefore, well to seek another theory of salvation and healing, if one is possible, and having developed the theory to attempt its demonstration?
This is the question that Christian Science is presenting today. Jesus of Nazareth taught and practised a religion of healing power which Christian Scientists believe was based upon an understanding of the Science of being, and which is therefore a scientific religion. It is believed to be divine Science, therefore it is the Science of Truth understood. If it is divine Science, nothing real exists or can exist outside of its Principle and law, and it must be ever present in the availability of its infinite expression and application. If this be true, in order to experience its healing effect we must bring ourselves within the reach of its operation. We must come into harmony with Truth if we would realize its healing effects in our present need.
This thought awakens the question as to what this healing truth is, and we approach this subject in humility, because of humanity's continued failure in the struggle with disease and death. Continued suffering and defeat have destroyed our pride of opinion, we are watching in the darkness for a ray of light. Meanwhile we realize that the universal belief has been that matter, that disease, pain, and death, pertain only to false material sense. We also remember that the discovery and use of material remedies has been the mortal field of investigation and method of attempted cure. Wandering thoughts often stray into the field of consciousness, and in this receptive mood is recalled Macbeth's question to the physician, "Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased?" and as a seeming answer there comes to the Christian Scientist the thought of God, of Him in whom, as the apostle tells us, "we live, and move, and have our being."
The expression "mind and matter" has long been familiar —have we been looking too much to matter? too little to mind? Let us see if our thought was of God. What has God done in respect to man? Scripture tells us that "God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them." It is also written in Genesis that God gave man dominion in the earth. What, then, is man? If the image of God, he must express God, be like Him. Is God, then, expressed in matter? This is impossible, since God is infinite Spirit, immortal Truth,—"the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever." Matter is destructible, mortal, and finite in its expression and duration. Is God Mind? We find help in answering this question, because our Leader has made it a life-work to search for Truth, and her conclusion is expressed in these words: "All is infinite Mind and its infinite manifestation, for God is All-in-all" (Science and Health, p. 468).
As we reach this point, thought goes back in retrospection. The old thought was of physical birth with an anticipated physical death, and physical sense had been the recognized faculty of perception. What, then, do these sayings of Jesus mean? "Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again." Seemingly we were born of the flesh, and to sense are of the flesh, with a consciousness of a physical sense of perception. Spiritual birth must mean the birth or dawning of another mode of being, a realization that as God is Mind and Spirit, not matter, so His image and likeness, man, is also spiritual. It follows that ignorance of the truth of being, and a belief in evil which has virtually been a denial of God, are responsible for our distressing dream of mortal and finite life in matter. False sense is responsible for the nightmare of mortal illusion,—"as he thinketh in his heart, so is he."
Thought coordinates and externalizes our concepts and presents the objects of its action. The seeming phenomena of life are therefore a series of mental pictures held in consciousness. The character of these mental pictures or impressions which constitute the sense of present existence, determines our beliefs and the seeming condition of life. This being true, and it being also true that the character of thought is determined by that which holds attention, and because desire is the guiding impulse which directs attention, we should know that desire, in order to bring good into our lives, must be. "Thy will be done," for good alone can express and demonstrate God's will.
Mrs. Eddy tells us that "desire is prayer" (Science and Health, p. 1); and desire, if directed aright as the aspiration of a pure and loving heart with faith in God, accomplishes that oneness with God, good, in present consciousness which will bring a realization of the truth of Jesus' promise: "What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them." To the degree that we realize in thought what infinite good is. we find it present for our use and enjoyment. It can never be present in our consciousness when our thoughts rest upon evil and our attention is occupied with distressing fear. Wisely has Mrs. Eddy warned us to "stand porter at the door of thought. Admitting only such conclusions as you wish realized in bodily results, you will control yourself harmoniously" (Ibid., p. 392).
In reply to the question of Thomas, "How can we know the way?" Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me." The life of Jesus demonstrated healing (salvation) through faith in God, right thinking, right acting, right living. It was a manifestation upon the plane of mortal existence of the supremacy of divine Principle and law. He demonstrated man's immortality by commanding, "Lazarus, come forth," and evidenced his faith in God by the words, "Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me." His life expressed obedience to the law of Love, and on the cross he revealed his knowledge that ignorance of Truth was responsible for mortal error, when he said, "Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do."
Before he began his recorded work for humanity's redemption, Jesus sought the seclusion of a desert place, the silence of material barrenness, where no sound or manifestation of physical life or action could disturb or distract attention. His desire for Truth lifted his thought into the realm of spiritual reality, into communion with God. It was then that the "Mind of Christ" (Ibid., Pref., p. ix.) took full possession of the consciousness of Jesus, and enabled him to say, "I am the resurrection and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live."
Jesus knew and declared that of himself he could do nothing; he realized that Truth and Love, the divine law of immortal Life, expressed through him and realized in his consciousness, was the healing truth which breaks the bonds of error and makes men free from the mortal law of sin and death. If we become like-minded with Christ Jesus, we also can say with him. "Father. I thank thee that thou hast heard me;" and we shall be able to demonstrate the healing truth.
