Get the facts
People want the free flow of information more than ever today. In order to make the best decisions, they know they need full access to the facts. Financial disclosure laws, ingredient lists on processed food, required warnings on potentially dangerous products, and environmental impact statements are evidences of this demand. In countries where such "sunshine legislation" is not even a dream, the desire for freedom of information may take form in listening to foreign radio broadcasts or supporting underground publications.
Like all legitimate human rights, the desire for undistorted information is spiritually based. It is a sign that humanity refuses to remain in the darkness of ignorance. And it hints at the deeper desire to know God, supreme Truth.
The Bible tells us, "The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein." n1 because the universe is governed by God, Spirit, the real facts of man and the universe -- and the ones most important to everyone -- are spiritual. REgardless of the political, economic, or physical conditions we face, our access to spiritual facts can never be denied. It is dependent on man's unchangeable relation to God.
God is infinite Mind, the origin of all that really exists. Mind's creation is infinite ideas. Man himself is idea, the reflection of God. Since divine Mind supplies the entire substance or identity of each individual idea, man cannot originate information or truth. Rather, he expresses God's intelligence.
n1 Psalms 24:1.
Christ Jesus proved the power available to one who fully understands his inalienable relation to the all-knowing Mind. He said, "I can of mine own self do nothing: as I hear, I judge: and my judgment is just; because I seek not mine own will, but the will of the Father which hath sent me." n2 The ability to base judgment solely on the information learned from God enabled Jesus to discern the needs of those who came to him for healing and make them well. It enabled him to find money to pay taxes and feed himself and others when there was scarcity.
n2 John 5:30.
Listening to God in this way takes study and practice, for mankind is generally more accustomed to information coming from the five physical senses. Just as some governments try to jam radio broadcasts offering opposing views, so these senses would interfere with the communication from divine Truth to man.
For instance, the material senses may tell us that the welfare of man is subject to tyrants or unpredictable weather, dependent on market conditions or medicines. Since these limitations would be impossible to God's creation, the senses inform us that man is instead a physical being with a material mind.
Within the framework of errors, access to true information is lost. To regain it, spiritual sense is needed. Mary Baker Eddy n3 writes, "What is termed material sense can report only a mortal temporary sense of things, whereas spiritual sense can bear witness only to Truth." She further explains, "Spiritual sense, contradicting the material senses, involves intuition, hope, faith, understanding, fruition, reality." n4
n3 Mrs. Eddy is the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science.
n4 Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,m p. 298.
How can we gain spiritual sense? Studying the Bible is an ideal place to start. The histories of many Bible characters are stepby-step instruction in learning to replace the material with the spiritual sense of things.Abraham, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, Paul, and Peter are just a few of the people who freed themselves from binding traditions, character weaknesses, injustice, slavery, and fear. They learned that the truth of God is powerful to correct the discords of physical sense.
The emergence of freer access to information in the world is welcome. The real freedom to be gained is the understanding that access to spiritual sense is never obstructed. DAILY BIBLE VERSE His truth endureth to all generations. Psalms 100:5
