Editorial November 25, 1961 Issue

Confident Thanksgiving

Helen Wood Bauman

We need not wait until the material senses change their evidence before giving thanks to God for His blessings. We should thank Him before a healing of sin or sickness or want takes place. Christ Jesus did this at the tomb of Lazarus. He said (John 11:41, 42): "Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me. And I knew that thou hearest me always." These confident words preceded the Master's cry, "Lazarus, come forth." John tells us that Lazarus rose and came forth, although he had lain lifeless in the tomb for four days. Even mortality could not defy the power of such an outpouring of thanks for good as yet unproved.

This record is an exalting illustration of the place that confident thanksgiving plays in bringing the evidence of the material senses into subjection to Christ, God's pure ideal. Mary Baker Eddy says in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (pp. 493, 494): "If Jesus awakened Lazarus from the dream, illusion, of death, this proved that the Christ could improve on a false sense. Who dares to doubt this consummate test of the power and willingness of divine Mind to hold man forever intact in his perfect state, and to govern man's entire action?"

The Christ can improve on any aspect of the false sense, for, according to Christian Science, the Christ is universal Truth and includes every right concept, every manifestation of divine Mind. Accepting this divine fact, one can be confidently thankful for the transforming ideas of God whether he has risen to prove their presence or not. Because divine ideas are perpetually present, gratitude for them should be perpetually active. This is one step in the demonstration of spiritual ideas.

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