Recently, I began to recount blessings that have come out of the pandemic. They are many!
One of the greatest blessings has been an opportunity to understand Christian Science better than ever. To understand how I am spiritually protected from a virus, how to neutralize and prevent infection through prayer, and how to stay healthy by demonstrating a right state of Mind. I feel much stronger in Truth today than a year ago.
I’m grateful that I have not felt isolated during the pandemic. Yes, my family stayed home more, and circulated in the public much less for several months, but our life-activity did not decrease by any means. If anything, it went up. We found many ways to stay engaged, in close contact, and supportive of each other. Individually, my practice has been more active than ever, and continues to be. Opportunities to talk with others, share healing ideas, remove fears, and comfort thought abound day after day. We have been far from isolated. We have been lively engaged! There are so many ways to demonstrate community, closeness, and togetherness, that isolation is not a requirement. Thought is always free to go anywhere. It cannot be held down, locked up, or confined.
The pandemic is an awful event from a worldly point of view, but from a spiritual point of view, it is a call on everyone’s spiritual practice to prove the unreality of evil. It is an opportunity to demonstrate that good triumphs over evil, that good has the upper hand and the final say. It’s a lesson that no matter how bad things look outwardly, they can be mastered inwardly, with Spirit. We do not have to cower or bow before evil. We have spiritual means to conquer it and prove the reality of God’s omnipresent goodness.
When I first read years ago Mary Baker Eddy’s words, “Trials are proofs of God’s care” (Science and Health, p. 66), I did not understand them, for I did not see how a trial could prove God’s care. One day, a respected peer said, “Trials are proofs of God’s care, because they send us to God, and there we find His care.” Aha! That made sense, and that’s what the pandemic has inspired me to do. It has forced me to go to God more than ever, and find His care. I’m grateful for all the blessings.
So true, I did also experienced this lately, and more we count blessings the more we find ! thank you Evan for this post comforting and full of wisdom.
GRATITUDE FOR TRIALS
https://journal.christianscience.com/shared/view/6eervx77ba?s=e
Excellent article Martine. Thank you for sharing it. I came across this blog in March, 2020, and have learned and grown so much in my understanding of Christian Science. Much gratitude and appreciation to Evan and all. I love the explanation that trials send us to God; as I never really understood that statement either, and sometimes wished that God didn’t care so much… 🙂
Thank you Martine for this wonderful article – thank you for sharing
So glad to have had Science to lean on.
My mum, a life time CS’st, my family and I were separated.
She was 1 mile away in a care home. Though we couldn’t visit her, we kept in touch with phone calls.
The staff were wonderful and when the time came for her to pass we were all able to visit within the restriction guidelines and spend precious last moments with her.
I was with her as she passed and was able to reassure her of the one Life, beautiful blessings indeed ♡
Beannachd
Shelagh
Dear Shelagh. I believe I met both you and your Mum when staying in Scotland a couple of times. I too am grateful you were able to be with her.
Thank you Linda.
As someone who is surrounded with much opposition to the teachings of Christian Science I have found much peace in the prolonged periods of ‘isolation’ during the pandemic. It’s given me time to study and learn unobtrusively which in turn has changed my priorities permanently. This ‘ silver lining ‘
Keeps shining…..
Gratitude for this mornings offering. Surviving the pandemic that never was there. Guided through that valley. With constant reminders of our immunity. With reinforcing positive ways to keep the belief from entering. Keeping all our neighbors by prayerful application of truth safe as well. A reinforcement that comes from experiencing freedom from fear. Evan has taught a great class and brought many through the “Red Sea” of fearful belief. We love you for all you share, Evan. We love one another too, for the sharing each day of enlightening articles like Martine extended this early morning. And we feel the experiences like Shelagh had the heart to share as well. Mother means everything. Mother is Love. God is Love. Thank you for comfort, Shelagh. Scotland was the home of Christian Science’s Mother, Mary Baker Eddy. It must be a very grand, beautiful home.
Oh Evan what a disciplined listener to the Truth you are! Thanks for sharing your most intimate inspiration with us. So helpful with its healing messages.
Thanks Martine for the article, it really is very simple and clear to understand, I forwarded it to my sister who is struggling, I just know its ideas and quotes by Mrs. Eddy will help her.
Thanks to all to share their healing thoughts of Love.
This post is so heartfelt and beautiful Evan, and such a joyous expression of the abounding contentment and fulfillment of spiritual sense. Thank you for your friendship and love, and for the great spiritual uplift and momentum you bring to my life. Spiritview is one of my life’s greatest discoveries and Blessings.
Do you know that the word “prayer” was googled more during the pandemic than any word has ever been googled the entire life of this search engine? That says a lot!!! People are hungry to learn about spirituality and the power of prayer.
Lisa, glad you mentioned this, I had read the same statistic. Also read of a sharp increase in online bible sales during this time. With the overwhelming level of worldly fear and uncertainty, there was nowhere else to turn but deeper and higher, spiritward, to find peace, comfort and truth.
As for the statement, “Trials are proofs of God’s care,” it can be confusing. I think that God doesn’t cause trials or pain or difficulty, but when we seem to have these challenges, He is waiting there with open arms with the proof that He loves us.
I’m so grateful to have discovered the SpiritView blog around April 2020 and it has become very precious to me. Like so many people, the fear I appeared to be absorbing from world thought and news reports etc. caused me to turn and lean on God and Christian Science in a way I never have before. I learned that God, good is ALL, and NOTHING can change the facts of Being. My understanding, humility and trust in God have grown greatly and continue to grow. Thank you God and thank you Evan and all my dear SpiritView friends, I am blessed by all of you.
As are we blessed by you dear Rose.
Dear Susan, thank you for your kindness, it felt very good to read your reply.
First to start with I want to thank Uta for her response to my comment at the end of yesterday’s Spiritview. The jarring testimony of the material senses can be screaming so loudly that it is very difficult to be absent from the body and present with the Lord. This is still a work in process.
One of the blessings from this Pandemic has been the evolvement of Zoom church meetings, as well as lectures, talks, etc. I have been in several Christian Science nursing facilities during this time and have been blessed to attend church regularly.
Shelagh, thanks for sharing your experience and how grateful we should be for the loving care provided by Christian Science nursing facillities.
On a practical level another benefit is the work from home movement. My son and his wife had their first child in September of 2020. Instead of a 90 minute commute from New Jersey into the city each way, my son was able to work from home instead of leaving at 7:30 in the morning and returning at 7:30 at night. His wife got a break during lunch time, and my son had more time with his beloved son.
Now in the fall he will work Monday-Wednesday in the city, and Thursday and Friday at home as will co-workers. Many companies are doing this hybrid schedule which is wonderful for employees. It’s a revolution.
Being able to take classes at home instead of going out at night in cold or sketchy weather is a plus. Our French class decided to keep having classes on Zoom in the comfort of our homes. It’s better for commuting and traffic to have fewer people on the road in rush hours. Perhaps better for the environment, too.
It’s Saturday and I am just reading this wonderful post. It would have been helpful to have read it yesterday as I spent time with a friend who bless her insisted to fill me in on all the latest scientific findings of The Covid scene. I kept asking her not to discuss this with me but she insisted that it was important. I said to her that I refuse to dwell on this and that I am not afraid. She knows my stand as a Christian Scientist as I have shred with her many times but kept insisting that she wasn’t afraid but this new information cancelled the old facts and she was concerned for those who refuse to listen.. She and I have been close and loving friends for many years. She can’t seem to get off this track. I know she sees this way of thinking as caring. She is a loving caring person. I am trying to see her in the way God sees her. This is a trial. I love that “Trials are proofs of God’s care as they send us to God.” God is our help in every situation.
Thanks Martine for the great article. Thanks Evan for the subject in this blog.
ooops shared with her many times.
Thank you very much, dear Evan for your love, giving us so clearly your spiritual experience during these special abt. 2 years.
And it is very interesting how that utterance by Mary Baker Eddy in SH “Trials are proof of God’s care” is to be understood namely to side with God more closely then ever, and we are protected and cared for. Wow a wonderful revelation! .
Evan, you make me be aware that I can be very grateful that I not either felt ever isolated during this time. That is because my Second Church in Hamburg, Northern Germany, except April and May 2020 , always had the doors of our Readingroom wide open and we had always our services in person, of course with the neccessary restrictions of distancing. And we also held membership- and bordmeetings. So no Isolation, which is most normal for God’s children!
I am very grateful for this and for your awakening spiritual views, dear Evan!♡
O yes, and I feel very blessed. And we all are blessed by Evan’s healing SpiritView. And I think we all cherish it very much and love you therefore, dear Evan, thank you very much!♡♡♡
this time in my life stripped away a lot of distractions. Things I had prayed about to understand more deeply came in surprising ways. I became aware more clearly how attached in my thought I was to mortal mind. I learned more to lean on the Truth for understanding than running from fear, which is fine. I am not yet to what I have glimpsed in my thought but the way to Truth is opening and the door on the relentless mortal mind closes more and more quickly. It has been an interesting time. thank you for this blog and all who participate.