Keep pedaling!
When I began mountain biking, my biking partner taught me a few invaluable lessons. First, when you get to a rocky obstacle, pedal through it. Your bike will roll right over it. Second, when you’re facing a daunting ascent, walk if you must, but keep moving. And third, trust your bike. It’s engineered to conquer the terrain.
So, in essence – just keep pedaling.
For me, this has become a solid analogy for life. It serves as a reminder not to push through things but to pray through things. When we approach a difficulty, how often our instinct is to halt in our tracks. But in the Apostle Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians, he called on Christians to “pray without ceasing” (I Thessalonians 5:17) – to keep pedaling.
Praying unceasingly means praying before, during, and after meeting a challenge. Even if the obstacle feels too great and the inspiration too small, we can turn to God in prayer at any point. The experiences of many in the Bible show us we are never without support. God is forever with us.
David proved this again and again. The psalms he authored indicate that it was his palpable sense of God’s nearness that enabled him to meet numerous trials. Psalm 139 captures this: “Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence? If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me. If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me” (verses 7-11).
Our unity with God enables us to have this same confidence. We are never dealing with any difficulty unaided; divine Love has already filled every seeming void, and we feel this through Christ, the true idea of Love, which shows us the way forward. The Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, Mary Baker Eddy, writes, “Out of the gloom comes the glory of our Lord, and His divine Love is found in affliction. When a false sense suffers, the true sense comes out.... We are then wedded to a purer, higher affection and ideal” (“Miscellaneous Writings 1883-1896,” p. 276). The fortitude, unselfishness, and honesty needed to meet trials are already within every heart.
Facing challenges isn’t always fun. Overcoming them, however, not only gives us a feeling of accomplishment but can awaken us to the infinite possibilities of our true, spiritual nature as the expression of God, Spirit. Sometimes our ideal may be too small – bounded by a sense of our personal happiness being dependent on others or restricted by what we believe would make life easy or attractive. Then such seeming obstacles break us out of complacency and call us to go deeper. They wed us to a higher ideal than self-seeking or self-satisfaction.
To gain this higher ideal, we can’t avoid issues or resist the leadings of Truth. Suffering is never brought about by God but is instead removed by a better understanding of God as Love itself. Suffering is the result of our ignorance of God’s goodness and power and our ability to reflect that goodness and power. It is the fear that something other than God is in control. So when we triumph over challenges, we are proving the efficacy of God’s care. We find that Love is far superior to any difficulty that might arise.
Self-pity, resentment, and inertia would stand in the way of our progress. Harboring fear and bemoaning our situation would keep us from feeling God’s care. The way out of such discord is to see ourselves as we truly are – the wholly spiritual expression of God, Spirit. Impartial divine Love stops suffering in its tracks, not the other way around. Nothing can stop the power of ever-present Love from being available to us at all times.
It may not be evident to us in the moment, but if we continue to pray – to keep pedaling – we break through the crust of a supposed material existence to find the blessing and redemption of spiritual practice that Christian Science illuminates. The resistance to taking on challenges is the belief that existence and our identity are material, but divine Truth shows us how to find what is real. Then we discover life as beautiful, health-giving, and full of goodness – we see God’s love proved.
Adapted from an editorial published in the April 29, 2024, issue of the Christian Science Sentinel.
