Power
August 1, 2002
The power of Christian Science and divine Love is omnipotent. It is indeed adequate to unclasp the hold and to destroy disease, sin, and death.
As the meeting got underway one member exclaimed, "Thank God for Con Ed." As New York sweltered through another summer evening, this brought us right to the point about Power. What would our lives be like at that moment without electric energy for lights, air-conditioning, subways? When New York lost all electric power in 1977, there was looting and mayhem.
We went forward with the readings but returned to the Con Ed remark long enough to work it out in Christian Science that power must not be viewed as merely a valuable material commodity which may or may not be available. It must be traced to its root and seen as a manifestation of the omnipotence of Deity, ever-present, always available.
A member pointed out that we each have some personal sense of power over our environment. Are we attractive, rich, smart, a good listener? Perhaps we're debilitated in such a way that we can cause others to come to our rescue. These can be seen as our talents, which biblically we must use for the glory of God. "Talents, fine," said another member, "but here too we'd better see them as derived from the divine all-Power."
One member told us that when he reads or hears the word "God" he automatically replaces it with one of the Christian Science synonyms: Mind, Spirit, Soul, Principle, Life, Truth, Love. He then read us a statement from the current Christian Science Quarterly Bible Lesson on Love: "If Spirit or the power of divine Love bear witness to the truth, this is the ultimatum, the scientific way, and the healing is instantaneous." (Science and Health, p. 411:10) So, it's Love, God, not a person, who effects a Christian Science healing. As this member once struggled with a bad cold, he found it suddenly gone after he got the point clear that God does the healing.
Another member told of her experience at an ushers' meeting the evening before at her branch church. The readings were on meekness and included the Beatitude "Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth." (Matthew 5:5). The meekness of our personal ego is an essential concomitant of accessing the power of God.
We went on to testimonies of healings.
1) As one member prepared to leave his home for the meeting, he found himself on the phone being enticed by a former lover (who is now married to a woman) to engage in phone sex. He had to exert "loving care and wisdom, based on the power of God" to prevent the event from running a full course.
2) Another member after hearing the weather report of heat, humidity and ozone decided to skip the meeting and stay home in air-conditioning as recommended by his doctors, in order to avoid an asthma attack. He had been at home a lot lately because of weather conditions and was quite depressed by his confinement. He called another member to say he was sorry they would not get to see each other. They talked a bit about our topic, how power was entirely from God and underlay all aspects of being. After they hung up, he felt well enough to start for the meeting, gathering strength as he went. He made it all the way, participated fully in the meeting and went to dinner with us afterwards.
3) One member brought his wife to the meeting. They have been married for more than twenty five years. A few years ago, after Christian Science class instruction and intense study, he discovered that he is Gay. He and his wife, also a student of Christian Science, worked on the situation and have made quite a demonstration. There is still pain and uncertainty, but they're working with a devoted Christian Science practitioner and are also in couple's therapy. They now live apart and date others but see each other often. They are best friends. The children have made a good adjustment and find their father's new pursuits an area of fascination and intrigue. The wife said, "I feel the loss sometimes but I also feel the excitement of a new life unfolding before me."
4) This reminded our member recovering from the grief associated with the death of his roommate how much security he lost with that death, but also how much insecurity. (The roommate was an alcoholic with attendant dangers like doors left unlocked or passing out while cooking.) Would he be able to stand the new tranquility? He also mentioned his feelings of gratitude for all this man represented for him. It is "true gratitude, experienced only after one reaches Melanie Klein's so called depressive position. It's not a placatory or manipulative prayer technique styled to move Deity." He found this statement from the Lesson on Love in which to ground his demonstration: "Love fulfils the law of Christian Science, and nothing short of this divine Principle, understood and demonstrated, can ever furnish the vision of the Apocalypse, open the seven seals of error with Truth, or uncover the myriad illusions of sin, sickness, and death." (Science and Health, p. 572:12)
5) Another member continued to work during the week on living the divine nature. As she has done this, business has gone well and the various minutiae of her life have unfolded harmoniously. She discovered she no longer has sad or angry feelings about old love affairs gone badly. "They were all divine Love."
We finished with some areas to work on with insights gained from our consideration of Power.
1) One member's request for prayerful support for her mother, institutionalized in Texas.
2) The US as "sole superpower".
3) Dealings with Iraq.
4) The economy's slow recovery — or is it a "double dip"?
5) The Massachusetts Gay marriage referendum struggle. One activist said, "Civil rights should not be placed on the ballot for popular vote. ...the tyranny of the majority should never be allowed to take away the rights of the minority."
For next week a member who is having a birthday requested we look at Birth.
Truly my soul waiteth upon God: from him cometh my salvation. He only is my rock and my salvation; he is my defence; I shall not be greatly moved.
My soul, wait thou only upon God; for my expectation is from him. He only is my rock and my salvation: he is my defence; I shall not be moved. In God is my salvation and my glory: the rock of my strength, and my refuge, is in God. Trust in him at all times; ye people, pour out your heart before him: God is a refuge for us. Selah. Surely men of low degree are vanity, and men of high degree are a lie: to be laid in the balance, they are altogether lighter than vanity. Trust not in oppression, and become not vain in robbery: if riches increase, set not your heart upon them. God hath spoken once; twice have I heard this; that power belongeth unto God.
And he entered into a ship, and passed over, and came into his own city. And, behold, they brought to him a man sick of the palsy, lying on a bed: and Jesus seeing their faith said unto the sick of the palsy; Son, be of good cheer; thy sins be forgiven thee. And, behold, certain of the scribes said within themselves, This man blasphemeth. And Jesus knowing their thoughts said, Wherefore think ye evil in your hearts? For whether is easier, to say, Thy sins be forgiven thee; or to say, Arise, and walk? But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins, (then saith he to the sick of the palsy,) Arise, take up thy bed, and go unto thine house. And he arose, and departed to his house. But when the multitudes saw it, they marvelled, and glorified God, which had given such power unto men.
No hypothesis as to the existence of another power should interpose a doubt or fear to hinder the demonstration of Christian Science.
You render the divine law of healing obscure and void, when you weigh the human in the scale with the divine, or limit in any direction of thought the omnipresence and omnipotence of God.
The powers of this world will fight, and will command their sentinels not to let truth pass the guard until it subscribes to their systems; but Science, heeding not the pointed bayonet, marches on. There is always some tumult, but there is a rallying to truth's standard.
To reduce inflammation, dissolve a tumor, or cure organic disease, I have found divine Truth more potent than all lower remedies. And why not, since Mind, God, is the source and condition of all existence? Before deciding that the body, matter, is disordered, one should ask, "Who art thou that repliest to Spirit?
Jesus established what he said by demonstration, thus making his acts of higher importance than his words. He proved what he taught. This is the Science of Christianity. Jesus proved the Principle, which heals the sick and casts out error, to be divine.
Seek the Anglo-Saxon term for God, and you will find it to be good; then define good as God, and you will find that good is omnipotence, has all power; it fills all space, being omnipresent; hence, there is neither place nor power left for evil. Divest your thought, then, of the mortal and material view which contradicts the ever-presence and all-power of good; take in only the immortal facts which include these, and where will you see or feel evil, or find its existence necessary either to the origin or ultimate of good?
Asserting a selfhood apart from God, is a denial of man's spiritual sonship; for it claims another father. As many as do receive a knowledge of God through Science, will have power to reflect His power, in proof of man's "dominion over all the earth." He is bravely brave who dares at this date refute the evidence of material sense with the facts of Science, and will arrive at the true status of man because of it. The material senses would make man, that the Scriptures declare reflects his Maker, the very opposite of that Maker, by claiming that God is Spirit, while man is matter; that God is good, but man is evil; that Deity is deathless, but man dies. Science and sense conflict, from the revolving of worlds to the death of a sparrow.
The Word will be made flesh and dwell among mortals, only when man reflects God in body as well as in mind.
In the first century of the Christian era Jesus went about doing good. The evangelists of those days wandered about. Christ, or the spiritual idea, appeared to human consciousness as the man Jesus. At the present epoch the human concept of Christ is based on the incorporeal divine Principle of man, and Science has elevated this idea and established its rules in consonance with their Principle. Hear this saying of our Master, "And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me."
The ideal of God is no longer impersonated as a waif or wanderer; and Truth is not fragmentary, disconnected, unsystematic, but concentrated and immovably fixed in Principle. The best spiritual type of Christly method for uplifting human thought and imparting divine Truth, is stationary power, stillness, and strength; and when this spiritual ideal is made our own, it becomes the model for human action.