Momentum that forwards progress

Strengthening, meaningful experiences in our lives so often bring about more good experiences. We then find ourselves animated not only to keep going forward and progressing, but to help others do the same.

Take an experience I had about eight years ago, after having had the job of pitching to my son’s baseball team. By the end of the season, I was unable to use my shoulder. The front part of it burned. I couldn’t lift the arm or lie on that side in bed.

There might have been a material treatment I could have tried, but I had seen prayer bring about complete healing with so many things. And what if I coached soccer and had to kick the ball? Maybe then a problem with my knee? I didn’t want to be defined by physical, material limits and efforts aimed at patching up matter. Rather, I wanted to see more of the constantly revitalizing life that God brings out in each of us.

So I prayed, and felt great momentum. My prayers started with a recognition that it’s God’s spiritual qualities – such as grace and love and intelligence – that define us, and not physical conditions or atoms or circumstances. God created us as spiritual, not mortal. As we welcome God’s good qualities into our consciousness, this brings a strength of thought that has a very positive effect.

Through praying along these lines, I recognized life as stemming from God, Spirit – as being about living, expressing, God’s nature, rather than about a material existence. It felt like a rebirth, realizing that we are not defined by limits or a physical body, and can’t be brought down by whatever would seem to hide the divine qualities inherent in us. And gradually, all problems with the shoulder disappeared.

The Bible, pointing us to God as Spirit and to everyone’s true nature as Spirit’s expression, states, “Thou sendest forth thy spirit, they are created: and thou renewest the face of the earth. The glory of the Lord shall endure for ever: the Lord shall rejoice in his works” (Psalms 104:30, 31). I’ve continually seen how, as we continue to grasp this more clearly, we’re able to overcome the problems that seem to limit us.

To the extent that this spiritual strengthening is magnified, it can relieve suffering and prevent troubles on a collective, not just individual, level. There is such benefit in understanding that the essential nature of our lives is spiritual and reflects God’s intelligence, love, and so on. We’re created to express the Life that is God.

Seen in this light, our life isn’t driven by or constituted of physical substances. Despite how strong and troublesome a material sense of life can seem to be, true life is not set forth by material laws or atoms mandating disease, injuries, and limitations. It is set forth by God, and is about the expression of God’s qualities.

There are solid examples we can turn to in our prayerful efforts to find the way past limitations and troubles. There’s Christ Jesus’ healing ministry and victory over physical problems of all kinds. And there’s what Mary Baker Eddy did, following in the way Jesus pointed out. She was the first person to really articulate the idea that ultimately all scientific, dependable understanding of our lives is based on the spiritual nature of God and His creation; she saw that the laws and activity of the universe have their source in God.

In her book “Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,” Mrs. Eddy wrote, “Many years ago the author made a spiritual discovery, the scientific evidence of which has accumulated to prove that the divine Mind produces in man health, harmony, and immortality. Gradually this evidence will gather momentum and clearness, until it reaches its culmination of scientific statement and proof” (p. 380).

Experiences of healing, through prayer, the difficulties that arise from a physical sense of life, continue to stir me to find more of a spiritual view of life – one that stems from defining existence by spiritual qualities. At the same time, we can see individual progress as contributing to a gathering of a larger momentum. This kind of divinely inspired momentum carries forward not only individuals, but the world around us, too.