Have You Read All The Instructions?
03/05/92
INSTRUCTIONS come with almost everything. Yet have you ever had the feeling that they're written in invisible ink? The writing never quite becomes visible until we've tried to get along without the instructions and haven't succeeded!
This is true in regard to a child's toy, specially chosen to make a youngster's Christmas happy, or in regard to the complex circuitry that makes up high-speed, modern computers. The interesting thing is, much of the time when we know what to do, the actual doing isn't nearly as difficult as we might have thought it would be. Overcoming a sin or some physical ailment can be like this. When we're thinking about a particular wrong or are fearful of a certain physical condition, reform and healing may seem far off. But this is always how challenges look when viewed from "inside the difficulty.
What's needed is a new kind of "outsider's perspective, a spiritual standpoint that sees from a less restricted vantage point. This can begin with something as simple as being willing to read the instructions. The Bible is the perfect instruction book, but it's not just a conglomerate of rules. What it's really presenting is a new, progressive view of man that is spiritual. When one begins to see man as God's spiritual creation, tremendous things happen. It's a whole new way of seeing and living.
This new way has everything to do with a Christianity based on understandable law--divine law. This is what one discovers in Christ Jesus' life. When confronted with human hurt and discord, the Master didn't simply hope that God would help out. He understood that God is the very Principle of man's life. And he showed that it is the yielding to this divine Principle that brings healing and causes reform. An understanding of this divine law permeated his life.
To the Master, the fact of God's perfect government of man was an aspect of the love of God--constant, ever present, active, not limited. The Master's prayer for Lazarus was uncomplicated but totally in agreement with the law of God. "I knew, he said as he prayed to God, "that thou hearest me always. Immediately Lazarus regained consciousness and was restored to life.
The instructions, or rules, of the Science of Christ are not complicated. They rest upon an understanding of God as infinite Life and Love, for which there is no true equal or opposite power. Do we need to read the instructions of Christian Science? Undeniably yes. Our need to read them arises from the fact that Science shows who we truly are as God's offspring and what we're truly capable of. Writing of the potential of the student of the Christ Science, Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Ch ristian Science, says in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, "If the student adheres strictly to the teachings of Christian Science and ventures not to break its rules, he cannot fail of success in healing.
She continues, "You should practise well what you know, and you will then advance in proportion to your honesty and fidelity,-- qualities which insure success in this Science . . . .
Christ Jesus never taught that we should resign ourselves to sickness or sin. The Science of Christ shows how this is practical today. Christian, scientific healing is definitely within our reach as the heart becomes willing to obey the instructions.
This is a condensed version of an editorial that appeared in the February 3 issue of the Christian Science Sentinel.