A doubting teenager was questioning her mother’s faith in God. “How can you say there is a God when so many bad things happen in the world?” She exclaimed.
The mother replied, “God is what gives me hope that there is something better than all those bad things you see in the world!”
It’s a common and mistaken notion that God created a material world filled with evil and suffering. As Christian Science thoroughly explains, God did not create a material world. God is Spirit, not matter. God created a spiritual universe, and Jesus Christ came to show us how to find it.
As we faithfully follow Jesus’ teachings to put off material sense and engage with spiritual sense, we discover more of God’s goodness and love right where we stand. We are empowered to conquer evil and suffering. We can find peace and health. We can prove for ourselves that there is a God by the good effect that comes our way from understanding and honoring God.
When we look around and evil appears real and powerful materially, it would seem reasonable to many people to doubt the Allness or even the very existence of God, good.
But here is an antidote and an explanation from the article J shared with us yesterday titled ‘God is All-in-All’ (thank you J).
—“Only to darkened mortal sense does the universe seem to be material. Only under the mesmerism of mortal mind does evil seem to be real and man a sinner. The steps we take out of this darkness, this mesmeric dream of material sense, are evidences of spiritual awakening. They are steps that Christian Science makes plain.”
Thank you Evan for this post,
And thank you, Rose – I only just saw your quotation by William Blake from
yesterday’s SpiritView – he was very metaphysical in his approach to life which is
depicted in his art and words, and this particular quotation
is a lovely and very apt quotation for yesterday’s topic.
And today, your comment that the steps we take our of
this mesmeric dream of life in a material existence, is what
we are striving to achieve as Christian Scientists, and are
very necessary to wake us up.
If we complety trust in God with all our heart, how can we believe anything else?
God fills all space and that is enough.
This means that He is forever with us, through all circumstances.
The HUG is the answer!!! Thank you.
What is the HUG?
Hi RB, I think she is talking about the loving hug we see in the picture above. The Love exchanged there is a wordless expression of God’s qualities of kindness, compassion, comfort, affection.. Goodness of every sort is a proof or demonstration of the existence of God, This becomes clearer as we view more and more things (hopefully everything) through a spiritual lens.
Thank you ❣️
Thank you so much !
D
I woke from a dream this morning to realize that Life is not in matter as the song played is not in the instrument used to play it.
So where is the song?
On the sheet music?
in the musician playing it?
in the idea which thought of it?
Where?
If not in the manifest expression of it execution? (The demonstration thereof)
Josef, that is very inspirational to me, thank you. We can’t do
anything of ourselves, as Jesus said of himself We are the
manifestation of the divine Mind and are His beautiful music
that He is expressing as us. We therefore need to be always
receptive – like keeping our violin in tune, as Mrs. Eddy said.
These wonderful inspiring thoughts, dear Josef and Maggie, along with
all of the inspirations above are so beautiful this morning! Along those
lines, something I had seen and written down:
A bell is not a bell unless you ring it
A song is not a song unless you sing it
Love in you heart is not put there to stay
Love is not love until you give it away.
The warm hug in the photo is so sweet endearing and loving…
((Hugs)) to everyone here!
Thank you, Carol, for expanding the thoughts from Josef and my thoughts –
that is all very good to accept and think about for all sorts of things – everything
that is beautiful and good emanating from God and glorifying Him – anything
that is not good is powerless to prevent God’s goodness from being
made manifest.
“Proof that God exists” by Nate Talbot:
https://sentinel.christianscience.com/shared/view/11pnrsemog4
(In case you can’t access it, this is the article referred to in “Proof that God exists”):
“How long?” by Nate Talbot:
https://sentinel.christianscience.com/shared/view/9z48bgqy34?s=e
Thank you, dear J , for both articles. They are great. A few more thoughts
on God it is – what gives us hope:
– Hope is seeing light in spite of being surrounded by darkness..
– When the sun goes down, the stars come out…
– Hope is like the sun which, as we journey toward it, casts the shadow
of our burden behind us..
– Hope sees the invisible, feels the intangible and achieves the impossible
[that is, material senses overcome] … and
– Hope is a wakened dream – Aristotle
Neat…thank you Evan and all. I love Nate Talbots’ articles too. Thank you for sharing.
Thank you Evan . Thank you all. Yes Josef as you have rightly said, “the song is not in the instrument”. The body can only act when Spirit God causes it to do so.
Thank you “J” for the 2 very helpful articles by Nate Talbot!
These days I pondered the thought what is real in religion. The thought came to me very clearly that the Holy Bible is, must be real. For all the prophets, spiritual leaders and mainly Christ Jesus really lived in their times and acted there. And I am very grateful that Christ Jesus lived and healed and preached and demonstrated the greatest on earth, i.e. that life is endless, eternal. But the most comforting thing is, that Jesus really lived and and blessed the world through his being here on earth. And we can everyday celebrate the everpresence of the Christ, whom Jesus expressed so lovingly and perfectly. We can believe in God, because all these good things written in the Bible happened really and happened in Mrs. Eddy’s times and do happen today – dear God we thank You and we praise You that You hast made everything very good! I love the hymn # 374.
Thank you dearly, Evan for the spiritual clarification of today`s topic !!
The thoughts you shared here are so true, dear Uta. And that hymn… so
appropriate for Thanking God for all His blessings. Thank you.
The Nate Talbot article reminded me of a rare time many years ago, I was at
the beach where dogs were allowed because it was off season. I had left my
jacket and chair and took the dog for a nice walk. When we returned, the
jacket was still there but the chair was missing. There was no one around and
It was not windy, so I just accepted that whomever had taken it needed it more
than I did. (It was not that great of a chair anyway and old and not worth
getting upset about, which wouldn’t have done any good anyway).
A short while later, we had gone to a worthy fundraiser and though I normally
would not “bet” on or take “chances” on things, one item that they “happened”
to have among many other items and were taking donations for (and picking a
number on the items), was a much better foldable chair. I was the only one
having an interest in it, whereas the other items were very popular, so I was
provided for, by “winning” it. It proved to me that by not having bad feelings for
whomever stole the chair, I think I was rewarded for this forgiveness. It was
just a small example of God’s meeting our needs, be they large or small. Nate’s
examples reminded me of this.
Thank you, dear Carol for your very lovely experience, how seeming error turns into good with your right forgiving thoughts.
Forgiveness is always healing!
Have a nice day or afternoon.
Here it is after midnight, and I’ll “jump” into bed, into God’s arms of Love. ♡
Thank you, dear Uta. Good morning, good afternoon, good
evening – wherever you are …
(with varying time zones) – never know and difficult to keep up.
Btw, haven’t been on a vacation since, so haven’t had use for
the “new” chair and it is now just another mortal “thing”, along
with other stuff in the basement, but the experience helped
realize that God does provide for us in oft times better than
what we had. That was the lesson learned.