Safety from threats large and small
A Christian Science perspective.
In the wake of the largest, most torrential rains in half a century, the people of Thailand find themselves facing not just concerns about flooding: They are bracing for yet another onslaught – one of mosquito-borne illnesses, dengue fever in particular.
Much of a caring world may find it a little too easy to relate to Thailand’s troubles. The idea that something small, almost undetectable, and seemingly uncontrollable can plague the human body and threaten one’s health isn’t foreign. For instance, parts of the United States are labeled as tick-prone areas where the fear of Lyme disease and its resulting symptoms threaten an individual’s health.
But to buy into such a view would be to overlook the spiritual resources that are already close at hand and that can make a transforming difference, that can have a permanent healing impact. These spiritual resources are really, at their core, no different than the resources Christ Jesus, and other spiritual thinkers from the Bible, drew on.
Throughout his ministry Jesus addressed adversities, sometimes huge ones, that cycloned through his life, threatening to destroy him and his companions. One memorable instance was when he faced a storm at sea and, with a single command, stilled it. But he also healed individuals of ailments – such as contagious forms of leprosy – that may have appeared to spring from something undetectably small. Too often, though, without spiritual intervention, the “small” and inconsequential threaten to evolve into the terrifying and seemingly uncontrollable. Time and again Christ Jesus drew on those spiritual resources and established health and harmony for those who needed them so much.
But whether a challenge is storm-large or insect-tiny, the fact is, there is a God. This God, the one all-knowing Mind, outsizes any threat, no matter how large, and addresses any detail, no matter how slight. He knows His creation as in truth totally benign, totally free of harmful components, totally subject to His control. The fact is, God’s Christ – God’s message of His ongoing power and provision and protection for every one of His offspring – reaches humanity on a day-by-day, moment-by-moment basis. The fact is, the Holy Comforter – which fulfils the promise of endless care from the Divine – can’t be held back. It is perpetually at hand, its presence a scientific certainty. It sweeps across the landscape of thought to wherever the need appears. The Comforter then tenderly delivers the scientific assurance that all is well. Healing happens. These few facts, when realized in prayer as actual, are among the countless spiritual resources that originate with the Divine and that are forever a blessing to humanity.
Monitor founder Mary Baker Eddy used the phrase mortal mind in much the same way that the Bible uses the phrase carnal mind. That is, she used mortal mind to represent a supposititious and fear-based mentality. This supposititious mentality, with all its idiosyncrasies and foibles, is the source of troubles whatever their size. But this mentality can be reined in and kept from planting fearful pictures in a person’s thought. And once those fearful pictures are forbidden entrance to thought, they simply can’t show up on a person’s body.
Mind, divine Mind – ever active on humanity’s behalf – causes us to know, to detect, and to act in ways that defeat the very conditions that so frighten humanity. In “Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,” Mrs. Eddy wrote, “The transmission of disease or of certain idiosyncrasies of mortal mind would be impossible if this great fact of being were learned, – namely, that nothing inharmonious can enter being, for Life is God” (p. 228).
The spiritual resources that will do the world good are as near as your thought. Draw on them now and change for the better can’t help but commence.
From an editorial in the Christian Science Sentinel.
To receive Christian Science perspectives daily or weekly in your inbox, sign up today.