THE Lord's Prayer embodies the revelation of the human and divine coincidence. This coincidence is an important point in the theology of Christian Science, for in revealing the allness of God, Christian Science reveals the nothingness of matter and declares with infallible logic that all that exists here, now, everywhere, is God and His idea. There are not two states of existence. Christian Science proves the fallacy of material sense testimony at every point. It causes us to see that the human is not an imperfect state of existence which will sometime become spiritual, but is an imperfect sense of the divinity which is here and now the actual, the real, the tangible, the true. That which is divine is imperishable, perfect, complete. Nothing can be added to it nor anything taken from it.
In "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, says (p. 561), "John saw the human and divine coincidence, shown in the man Jesus, as divinity embracing humanity in Life and its demonstration,—reducing to human perception and understanding the Life which is God." And she adds,"In divine revelation, material and corporeal selfhood disappear, and the spiritual idea is understood." Making God the starting point and reasoning from cause to effect, Christian Science proves with scientific certainty that man, God's image, is wholly spiritual and exists forever at the standpoint of perfection.
So when the Lord's Prayer starts with "Our Father which art in heaven" (Matt. 6: 9), it is not saying that God is the Father of mortals. Rather is it saying that because God, Spirit—revealed in Christian Science as Father-Mother—is the Father of man, man is wholly spiritual; and there are in reality no mortals, for like begets like. And so in the light of this great prayer, we can look up and say: No, I am not a little finite mortal, aging, frail, and hastening toward death. My individuality and identity are spiritual, here and now, held forever in the conscious harmony, perfection, and perpetuity of Life.
We can further claim for ourselves the truth that man is not the result of a long line of human ancestry; that he is not the offspring of human will, nor has he inherited disease or weakness of temperament from an endless line of human forebears. He was never born into matter, and he does not have to die out of matter. He is God's immediate offspring, God's idea. This truth applies to all men everywhere, and the Science of Christianity is daily proving it in healing the sick and reforming the sinner. Here is the basis of brotherly love, love based upon the concept of God's allness, not of an erring human brother.
"Our Father which art in heaven" establishes man as expressing the nature, substance, and character of God. Man cannot be matter if God is Spirit; he cannot be finite if God is infinite; he cannot be dying if God is Life, nor can he be hateful, or cruel, or sick. He cannot be dishonest, and he cannot be a failure. He is here and now the immediate reflection of God's glory.
In Science, God and man are correlated. We cannot think of God without including man; nor can we think of man except in terms of his relation to God. There is no division, no separation between God and His idea, between Mind and its manifestation, between cause and effect. God is the term which always means cause, while man is the term which means effect. Cause and effect are forever distinct, yet forever one, for neither can exist separate from the other.
In "Unity of Good," Mrs. Eddy makes this arresting statement (pp. 51, 52): "The Ego is revealed as Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; but the full Truth is found only in divine Science, where we see God as Life, Truth, and Love. In the scientific relation of man to God, man is reflected not as human soul, but as the divine ideal, whose Soul is not in body, but is God,—the divine Principle of man."
Christian Science reveals the completeness of God, and the completeness of God includes the completeness of man. God could not possibly have an incomplete idea of Himself. So there is no incomplete man. The aggressive mental suggestion which argues, I am incomplete, I am a failure, I lack success, companionship, health, or supply, is absolutely untrue, because it does not represent the nature of the Father-Mother God. Since there is no separation between Mind and Mind's idea, there is no possibility of the son's experiencing loss or lapsing into imperfection. The understanding of God as Father-Mother banishes the beliefs of birth and death with their attendant limitations. This divine state is not far off. It is the present fact discernible through spiritual sense, a fact to be demonstrated, a truth to be experienced.
In the human and divine coincidence, God's kingdom is come, His reign is established. The reign of a sovereign enforces the law of that sovereign day in and day out, every hour of every day, everywhere in his realm. So the reign of Life, Truth, and Love in our lives is not something that can be turned off and on. It is the unfluctuating activity of God's law in consciousness, imparting peace and satisfaction. This reign dawns in utter humility; it demands the absolute surrender of every sinful sense of a self apart from God and the acknowledgment of God alone as the universal Father-Mother.
Every so-called law antagonistic to divine law surrenders in the reign of Life, Truth, and Love. Every physical law is rendered null and void, every law of penalty and condemnation, of age and death. There are no such laws, for God never made them. Only that is law which divine Mind proclaims as law, and this spiritual law is self-enforcing, compelling, inevitable. We cannot escape it. It annihilates everything unlike God. It is a law of healing, regeneration, fulfillment, and of wondrous joy. It silences human will. It annuls blind force. It dissipates fear. It establishes harmony.
The demonstration of the human and divine coincidence in our lives means that divine Love must so transform our natures and permeate our affections that we are found worthy to partake of the bread of heaven, the truth of being, which enriches the affections and feeds the world's famine. We partake of this bread through consecration, through daily study of the Bible and of the writings of our Leader, Mrs. Eddy, through prayerful pondering, through self purification and deep self-searching.
Christian Science has not come to give us ease in matter. It has come to destroy matter. Regardless of what the physical senses may say of defeat, of death, of separation, of physical and financial problems, the fact is the actuality of Spirit, of Life, right here, right now. Nothing but Spirit is real; nothing but the unbroken harmony of being is going on. Proportionately as our concessions to matter are closed, our belief in matter destroyed, we partake of the morning meal, the substance of Truth, in the wonder of resurrection and the revelation of eternal Life.
Are we letting divine Love reflect itself in our life? Are we living love? Are we being love? Let us ask ourselves these questions. Is our thought so pure that, like the Master, Christ Jesus, we behold in divine Science the man of God's creating instead of the sinful product of corporeal sense? Nothing less pays our debt to divine Love; nothing less fulfills the demand of Love.
Demonstration of the coincidence of the human and the divine lifts us to the very throne of God, above the sordidness of sense to the undimmed radiance of Soul. In the stillness of Soul, the senses are silent.
We enter this Holy of Holies unshod. The resentment, the bitterness, the grief, the pettiness of human life vanish, washed away in the crystal clearness of the river which flows from this throne. In the sanctuary of Soul, the Father is saying to each one of us (Luke 15:31), "Son, thou art ever with me, and all that I have is thine." In the oneness of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, God, the one Mind or Ego, expresses His own infinite individuality, eternally identifying Himself in the countless forms of Mind's reflected grandeur.
In the so-called space age of today, mankind is expending its utmost effort toward breaking its self-imposed barriers, and the limitations of matter are receding. Yet for all the phenomenal developments in material discovery and research, for all the extraordinary power mankind is wielding, men still believe themselves mortal—helpless victims of disease and death.
Nearly two thousand years ago, according to human reckoning, Christ Jesus demonstrated the power of Spirit. This spiritual power was not new. It was announced in the first chapter of Genesis. It runs like a thread through the Old Testament. The advent of the Master came like a blaze of glory. Here was a power that rolled back the frontiers of sin, disease, and death. It broke all material laws; it was a power the like of which had never been known, the power of Spirit.
Jesus said (John 5:30) "I can of mine own self do nothing," and (John 14:10), "The words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works." When he said "our Father," he showed that this power is available to all men everywhere when they understand God as he did. In the ensuing centuries, through ritualism, creed, and dogma, this power was obscured but not extinguished.
Today Mrs. Eddy has through her discovery restored this power to humanity. Her work as Discoverer and Founder fulfills Scriptural prophecy. She not only discovered, she explored the realm of Spirit. She demonstrated the power and availability of Spirit as no one but the Master had ever done before her. Mrs. Eddy tells us that Science and Health, the textbook, contains the full statement of the final revelation of Truth. Her name cannot be separated from this revelation. She has made clear the human and divine coincidence. She has made the Lord's Prayer live for us by giving us its spiritual meaning. The greatest force in the world today is the Science of this prayer. What but the Science of Christ can solve the universal race problems, satisfy the heart's desire, and liberate mankind?
Science reveals the forces of the universe as forces of Mind, forces of Spirit, forces of Love. In the radiation of Spirit false human concepts and classifications disappear, and the universe and man are apprehended in their spiritual nature. This is the new heaven and the new earth. "For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever" (Matt. 6:13).
In the sheer beauty of this human and divine coincidence, where divinity tenderly embraces humanity in Life and its demonstration, we find our individuality, our identity, our origin, our purpose. And in the scientific demonstration of this coincidence lies the answer to all the world's problems.
