Editorial April 3, 1920 Issue

Youth

Gustavus S. Paine

In order to be able to declare so positively, "Before Abraham was, I am," Christ Jesus had to understand the exact nature of eternal youth. He knew that the age of the true man, in the divine likeness, can be measured neither in years nor even in æons of mortal time. Being coexistent with the creator, the activity which constitutes the real man is as old and as young as God. On page 244 of Science and Health Mrs. Eddy says: "Man in Science is neither young nor old. He has neither birth nor death." All there is to his spiritual and genuine existence is immortal now. Only by rejoicing that the divine idea lives indestructibly in Mind, not in matter, can one experience thorough vigor and enthusiasm forever. The wholeness of Spirit and its manifestation is quite apart from any supposition of a material body. Hence the actual youth of Spirit has nothing whatever to do with any belief in matter.

Always, in one sense, therefore, the sincere seeker for the truth as revealed through Christian Science must prove himself to be a ceaselessly "young student." The perfect ardor, fearlessness, and buoyancy produced by the divine Mind must be continuous. To this only Mind that can really know anything, every right quality is both immediate and permanent. This verity every one turning to Principle is entitled to prove for himself. Whether the proving seem rapid or slow, it is ever the process of spiritually young energy, which is not affected by any hypothesis of mortal time. The one who considers himself an "old student" of Christian Science, a paragon of attained virtue, forgets Paul's statement to the Philippians, "Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. Let us therefore, as many as be perfect, be thus minded: and if in any thing ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto you."

Though the so-called mortal is a mere belief that there could be an opposite to perfection, the truth is that the immortal idea is even now experiencing the complete joy of infinite youth. Before the absolute harmony of the divine action, every supposition of mortality simply has to vanish. If the belief in mortality could be conceived of as turning at all toward the light, it would necessarily have to disappear in the presence of the allness of Principle and its idea. From a supposedly mortal standpoint, this disappearance is all the pressing forward there is. Of course that very hypothesis is mere counterfeit of the boundless unfoldment going on in the divine consciousness. Alertness in expressing spiritual intelligence alone is the sign of true youth. The age of righteousness in living cannot be gauged by years. Its vitality is in the eternal now. Instead of whatever may seem to be, the sturdy doing caused by the one Mind actually is.

Send a comment to the editors

We'd love to hear from you!

Easily submit your testimonies, articles, and poems online.

Submit

Youth

We'd love to hear from you!

Sign up for unlimited access