Are You Looking For Peace of Mind?

It would be great if our thoughts could always be undisturbed and peaceful. Regardless of what someone said, a mistake we have made, fear, resentment, illness - disturbed thoughts are never wanted and bring only confusion and unhappiness.

There is something we can do to destroy such thoughts. And to replace them with ideas that bring peace. That something is first of all to see a basic fact: good is always more powerful than evil; in fact, it is the only real power. Evil thoughts, troubled thoughts, must disappear before our insistent holding to good ideas.

The Apostle Paul said, "Whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report ... think on these things" (Phil. 4:8). The Principle by which disturbance is cast out of our lives is clearly explained by Christian Science.

This Science, taking its authority from the Bible, recognizes that the one omnipotent God is all-knowing and the source of all intelligence; therefore God is Mind, or Principle. There is but one Mind because there is but one God.

This Mind is eternally providing us with true thoughts that are Godlike in nature. Evil thoughts have no source in or power from God, and therefore no real authority or truth. As a person accepts good, right ideas from God, he or she sees the reality of them - as well as the unreality of erroneous thoughts. Then the evil thoughts, which come only as suggestions, disappear for lack of recognition. Only that which is good remains.

Mary Baker Eddy once told members of the Church she founded: "Beloved Christian Scientists, keep your minds so filled with Truth and Love, that sin, disease, and death cannot enter them. It is plain that nothing can be added to the mind already full. There is no door through which evil can enter, and no space for evil to fill in a mind filled with goodness" ("The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany," Pg. 210).

Our thought becomes disturbed because we believe something is not the way it should be. Sometimes we're clearly aware of what seems wrong; sometimes we're not. In either case, the way to eliminate troubled thoughts - and the difficulty itself - is to pray to hear God's thoughts. This involves turning away from the human picture long enough to seek what is spiritually true.

We each have the ability to understand that God has never made a disturbing condition; divine Love never afflicts its child. The disturbance has no source in God; therefore, it is only a lying suggestion that an intelligence exists in opposition to the one divine Mind. Disturbance is destroyed, and thought is calmed, as the individual accepts the truth of being and denies any truth to the erroneous proposal. Peace is restored on the basis that the one good, all-controlling Mind maintains harmony for eternity.

Yes, troubling thoughts seem so real at times that we feel unable to defy them. But that is the very time to stick persistently to the basic fact that God, omnipotent good, the one supreme Mind, is providing harmony right then.

Christ Jesus taught his disciples the secret of peace. He said, "Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me" (John 14:1). The truth he taught, including our unity with God, inevitably cancels out every disturbing thought and brings healing.

Great peace have they which

love thy law: and nothing shall

offend them. Lord, I have hoped

for thy salvation, and done thy commandments. My soul hath

kept thy testimonies; and I love

them exceedingly. I have kept

thy precepts and thy

testimonies: for all my

ways are before thee.

Psalms 119:165-169