There is a phase in a child's development which is familiar to many parents and provides food for thought in considering our progress as we ourselves grow up in the understanding of Christian Science.
This particular phase comes when a little child is eager to do things for himself. "Let me do it" has been the call to many a busy mother to exercise patience and to recognize that this is a natural and necessary development, one to be encouraged and cherished. Wisely she will realize that it is not such a very serious thing if the first attempt to button up a coat unaided results in wrongly matched buttonholes!
Well-meaning or impatient interference with those first attempts could well hold up for a time the child's progress toward proper independence. There has probably been many a mother who, seeing the glowing satisfaction of achievement reflected in her child's face, has curbed the impulse to rebutton the coat herself. Instead she has praised the attempt and rejoiced in this evidence of progress. Experience teaches that the child's budding sense of the fitness of things will spur him on to master the task. He will surely work out for himself that each button needs a matching buttonhole.
But during this development the child needs a sense of security to have a fearless approach to achievement, that confidence which the availability of a helping hand provides. "Show me—don't do it—just show me!" he may insist.
Sometimes as we progress along the way in our study of Christian Science, we may want to prod and push before we have grasped the basic facts. We may become impatient with what we feel to be slow progress in our own and even our neighbor's budding comprehension of the Science of being. Maybe we are busy watching to see just how our neighbor is getting along, measuring our progress by his. Or perhaps we resent what appears to be interference with our fumbling attempts to work out a problem. Sometimes we sink to depths of discouragement if problems are not solved immediately.
One might call these experiences growing pains, but is there any law that growing must necessarily be painful or frustrating? Christ Jesus pointed out the effortless growth of the flowers of the field.
The fourth chapter of Ephesians contains a wealth of instruction and encouragement for the student seeking to establish his identity as the son of God. One verse which has helped the writer many times to rise above a feeling of inadequacy is, "Unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ."Eph. 4:7;
To grow in grace is to grow in Love's way; and since grace is "according to the measure of the gift of Christ," it cannot be linked with pain, suffering, or frustration. These have their origin only in ignorance of the gift, reluctance to exchange our mistaken concepts of what is needed to promote progress, or in the stubborn determination to follow misleading trails.
Mrs. Eddy makes a powerful declaration which refutes the necessity of painful growth and emphasizes the basis for confidence: "Know, then, that you possess sovereign power to think and act rightly, and that nothing can dispossess you of this heritage and trespass on Love."Pulpit and Press p. 3;
The Master insisted on a childlike approach to the kingdom of heaven. He said, "Except re be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven."Matt. 18:3; Like the child who wants to try his own wings, so to speak, we can insist that it is within our power to achieve, "to think and act rightly." The Bible and our textbook, Science and Health by Mrs. Eddy, show us the how and why, and it is our joyful privilege to obey the mandate of the one Mind, to respond to the will of God. It is indeed a scientific fact that man as God's reflection can do nothing except at God's command.
Our study of Christian Science brings an awareness of the ever-available, allembracing presence and power of divine Love. Soon, in moments of doubt or fear, we learn to turn quickly to the tender Father-Mother and to claim the dominion of right thinking and acting which is ours, thus overcoming diffidence or discouragement. As we recognize each individual's "sovereign power to think and act rightly," we dismiss the temptation to trespass on Love's prerogative by pulling apart the petals of our own or another's budding thought in a mistaken attempt to direct or hasten the unfoldment of God's plan for each of His little ones.
In three short but profound sentences Mrs. Eddy describes Jesus' example for humanity: "Through the magnitude of his human life, he demonstrated the divine Life. Out of the amplitude of his pure affection, he defined Love. With the affluence of Truth, he vanquished error."Science and Health, p. 54; With this sublime example before us we shall better prepare ourselves to exercise our inherited right, and our own example will do more than any amount of prodding or preaching to encourage others in taking steps to claim the inheritance of the sons of God.
A child watches to see how those around him button up their coats, and when he has mastered this task, it becomes part of his way of life. Soon he may forget that it ever seemed a task or a difficulty, and he may be a little impatient with a small brother's fumbling attempts, though more often one sees a tender eagerness to share his own experience in a helpful way.
As we progress, we may sometimes find that we too have forgotten our own early struggles with those other "buttons" and the blunders we made as we started out to claim our "sovereign power to think and act rightly." And so, from our present position, we may feel tempted to hustle others in what we believe to be their best interests, instead of knowing that they too possess this sovereign power with which to learn that progress is matched with understanding.
Progress comes as we grasp the fact that this power is our inheritance by reflection and is therefore something of which we can never be dispossessed. We grow in confidence as we recognize that spiritual power is a natural and normal characteristic of God's children and therefore that all evil's claims to dispossess us of this heritage are invalid and powerless.
The more positively and vigorously we claim our sonship and identify ourselves and our neighbors as inheriting dominion, the less possible does it become for us to be tempted to interfere with another's budding thought.
Just as a mother recognizes the child's need to learn at his own pace, so we learn not to meddle with the thought that is unfolding as understanding of man's true birthright dawns. In Science and Health, under the marginal heading "Unfolding of thoughts," Mrs. Eddy shows us that only God is responsible for the unfolding process and its ultimate purpose in bearing witness to His perfection. She writes, "Spirit, God, gathers unformed thoughts into their proper channels, and unfolds these thoughts, even as He opens the petals of a holy purpose in order that the purpose may appear."p. 506;
The urge to enter uninvited into another's mental home, however near and dear the human relationship may be, is checked when seen as a "trespass on Love." To yield to this temptation is to deny Love's purpose and function in supplying all that is needed for the proper unfoldment of His ideas. To recognize lovingly another's individual right to lean wholly on God, to claim for himself his "sovereign power to think and act rightly," is to demonstrate the Golden Rule.
If we become troubled by other people's problems, peace of mind comes only when we let go what may well be termed an overextended sense of responsibility. Any obsession with such problems may well be but a projection of our own heartache, our own misconceptions of the situation, or our own acceptance of the suggestion that the Father is not always at hand to sustain His beloved children.
At such times let us see with Paul that we are all "heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ."Rom. 8:17; Let us see that we are all equally beloved and cherished of the Father. These clearer visions may well reveal that our neighbor's problem is being solved quietly and gently in a way that need not disturb our peace.
Paul himself was at first mistaken in his concept of right activity, but this did not dispossess him of the power to repent and reform when spiritual enlightenment brought understanding of Christ Jesus' mission and teaching. After his experience of letting go misconceptions and accepting his inheritance of dominion, he taught and spoke with authority based on experience. This fact is illustrated in his words to the Philippians: "Wherefore, my beloved . . . work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure."Phil. 2:12, 13.
What comfort, strength, and assurance come with the understanding that nothing can dispossess us of the precious heritage of responding to God's activity! As we claim consistently our "sovereign power to think and act rightly"—the power that is God working in us—we shall see that neither self-will, domination, or interference can trespass on Love's responsibility for unfolding thought as we grow up in our understanding of the Father's love and purpose for His children.
