A friend shared the following insight on the importance of putting all your faith in the truth of being, and not a lesser percentage.
She explained:
When you get into an elevator on the 1st floor and want to rise to the 20th floor, you must put your whole body into the elevator and go “all out,” to get there. You can’t keep one foot on the 1st floor and expect everything else to rise to the 20th floor. ALL of you needs to make the trip up! The same rules apply to knowing God’s absolute control. Go ALL OUT!! Don’t keep one foot on the 1st floor of believing something else other than God is in control and expect everything else to rise to the 20th floor where only God is in control! You can’t have it both ways. Go for the best. God is All, and always in control. Nothing else is ever in control. Go ALL OUT!
This is a good lesson! I love the analogy. Sometimes fear and doubt keep us hovering on the 1st floor rather than going all in to the top floor, with the result of getting trapped between floors, neither in or out, up nor down. Thanks Evan. I will be pondering this today and checking my thoughts!
We demonstrate what we can without demands that force us to give up whatever medical or material supports we feel we still need. If diagnosed with cancer for instance, it is not an all or nothing demand. Whatever the individual is ready to do in trusting God’s control is not to be burdened with guilt. To demand that a patient or student immediately go all the way to the 20th floor or not even get on the elevator is unloving, unkind, judgemental and lacking in any form of compassion. I’ve been asked from time to time to pray for friends who are under the care of physicians and always gratefully accept the opportunity to do so. And I’ve seen wonderful results as those prayers bring thoughts to a higher level of Life. I don’t demand that anyone puts all their trust in Spirit if that is not their choice. If they can even get on the elevator and make it to the first floor, then that too is proof of God’s care. Step by step we grow and gain that trust.
This is about thought. How we think. Material supports are not mentioned. There is nothing here that is unloving, unkind or judgemental.
Absolutely agree. It is entirely a mental exercise, and what to the human senses appears as physical then reflects the Truth. I remember a practitioner saying to a friend: “You can be as afraid as you like, take the medicine you think will cure you, but God doesn’t care as He only knows you as His perfect child.” it took the burden away and also trust in the physical was seen as superfluous to God’s allness.
Mrs. Eddy only says with “radical reliance.” so, I think at some point you have to jump on the elevator completely. Now what gets you to that point is prayer. I don’t think it is self-will or blatant determination. At some point you just know that God is all power, Love is all power, and then you can make that commitment. Sometimes you don’t even realize you have made the commitment. The error just dissolves from your thought. It is totally between you and God.
Nancy Thayer what a brilliant and loving prayer and a way for one to reach for the top floor. Gail
Amén.. trust in God is one step at a time..I really relate to David who needed to face the lion and the bear before he faced the Giant..
We need to experience God to have more trust in God..
For me the whole idea is to make it to the fifth floor..
Some may want to jump right on and take the non-stop elevator..
For me I’ll take the stairs..I may stop on the way up to learn live’s lessons.
Mrs Eddy does mention some gain good rapidly while others gain good slowly and yield not to discouragement..
This is what I nead to hear daily! Also going up and an instant later going down forgetting all about the top floor.
What better commitment can one make than an all out commitment to divine Love as a Truth of our own being as an expression of God, good? Thank you, Evan for this excellent post and Nancy for your loving expression of support. As expressions of God, we are all innocent of any false idea.
Today this is very helpful for me. I see this as describing a mental demand. And then from the top floor of putting all my faith in God, I will know what to do today regarding needs and demands in my personal life.
Thanks for the great reminder, Evan! No doubts – yes, it’s a full commitment to “… all is Spirit and spiritual.” (Science and Health 331:24-25)
“In order to apprehend more, we must put into practice what we already know. We must recollect that Truth is demonstrable when understood, and that good is not understood until demonstrated.” Science and Health p 323: 13-16. In this week’s lesson.
I think these are very important ideas. it does take time, being the porter of your thoughts, and prayer. You are actually going nowhere as you are already there. It is your thought that moves.
Thank you, Evan, for posting this. As I see it, the message goes perfectly with today’s Daily Lift about praying for animals in wildfires, and praying to see Love’s control of our nations’ governments and the health of all mankind.
This is just great for me today. Those of us in the USA who are not wanting to be put to confusion with this impeachment going on are being challenged. As I continue to pray for Civil discourse and the TRUTH, today I choose not to listen to the two aided arguments and go right to the Bible for lessons on confusion and truth. I will put my trust there and rest with my love of TRUTH.
What if the intention of this message is that -if the truth is we are extensions of pure Source energy or God – whatever you choose to call it – and each being guided perfectly by our inner beingness in this our individual personal human experience (ie. by which we grow and expand as spiritual beings and all that is “God”) – then what can really only satisfy is trusting and allowing that guidance by our inner being. It alone knows how to give us our desires – by whatever vehicles we are best suited for at the time. Jesus tried to show us that we are “gods” and the only authority we are to recognize is that of our inner being.
Jesus taught but one God. “Love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, mind and soul,” he instructed. There is only one God. But God is expressed in an infinite number of ways, and you are one of those ways! Me too…
Thanks to all for your comments and especially Susan with your very helpful thoughts regarding the impeachment. I also decided not to listen to all of the arguments but to hold to the FACT that God is ALWAYS in control and put my trust in Him completely.
Thank you Lori. Yes, that is where my trust continues to be, right along side yours❣️
Evan and Nancy, thank you for your comments.
I’ve been holding to this for a long time…it’s never been more important,
“Let Truth uncover and destroy error i.n God’s own way and let hiuman Justice palter the divine.”
Of course it’s in this week’s outstanding lesson.
That’s pattern the divine.
Thank you, Evan for your so crystal clear and wonderful christly explanation!
That so important sentence, Evan mentions what Christ Jesus said, that we shall love the Lord our God with all our heart, mind and Soul I had twice in my Wed reading tonight.
Our real and only being is in and from God. He is the wanting and doing in us to His delight, the Bible says as well.
The today’s analog is clear. Going up to the 20th store means of course, to rise to spiritual hight in our understanding of our divine being in God, Life, Truth , Love etc.
Thank you very much, Evan for this inspiring SpiritView!
Just want to ad a favorite truth, Evan gave us here: “God is all, an always in control. Nothing else is ever in control. ” For me that is most comforting! Thanks Evan, also to your friend!
At first, it might seem as though one who has a terminal disease like cancer is putting in 100% of faith by calling a practitioner and asking for help. In St. Mark 17:16-21, Jesus put the blame on his disciples for not being able to heal the man’s son. But, I recall an article that stated that Mary Baker Eddy had said a healing had not taken place because either the practitioner or the person seeking treatment still believed in a material past (that caused the condition). Here is the article;
https://sentinel.christianscience.com/shared/view/2dghl0iwvku?s=e
That’s a really good article. Thanks for sharing Kirsten.
yes, thanks very much for the link to that article. Am glad I can read the whole Sentinel article. 🙂
I wanted to further comment on material histories because it is so interesting. St. Matthew 19:16-29. This story has always confused me because it started out by the rich man calling Jesus “good.” Jesus is quick to say it is God that is good. Ok, but why? Why is that relevant to this story? Maybe because people who have “bad” material histories are quick to give them up. The poor would be happy to give them up. Those with “bad” parents or backstabbing friends would be happy to give them up. Unloading bad memories or memories of failures – sure, happy to do it! But, a rich person could be clinging to what “they” have accomplished in life, how much money “they” have made, the wonderful experiences, the supportive family and friends. I always thought the point of this story was that a man who made his foundation wealth was building on a false foundation. But I believe Jesus was quick to discard the “good” tag because it created a material history. It created an “i” instead of him reflecting the great “I am.” A man clinging to his “good” history is going to be hard-pressed to give it up. And yet, it wasn’t hard for Jesus to give it up at all. Seems as though it could be easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. Just wondered what you thought about that Evan.
What i think Jesus replay of calling him good was a scientifically statment about cause and effect, God is the cause and we are the effect.