In the Christian Science Bible Lesson March 3, 2014 Issue

Our pure, spiritual nature—one with God

For the Lesson titled “Man” from March 3–9, 2014

Christa Kreutz

God’s man—the man and woman created in His image—exemplifies pure goodness. Purity, to a chemist, for example, is something composed of one substance, and nothing else. This week’s Christian Science Bible Lesson, titled “Man,” describes the essence of our being as pure, just like a pure mineral. Recognizing the purity of our composition, we can be freed from the beliefs of heredity, sin, or anything that would suggest separateness from God, Spirit.

The author of First John, writing at the end of the first century, about 100 AD , was passionate that Christ’s purpose is to show us that we are the pure children of God. “Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God: ... And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure” (I John 3:1–3, Responsive Reading). This Bible verse is read at the end of every Christian Science Sunday service. The New International Version (NIV) translates the first part of verse one this way: “See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!” It is worth noting that the original Greek word tekna here is “children,” not the masculine “sons,” as translated in the King James Version (KJV). It is a non-gendered word and specifically means “that which is born,” to emphasize that we are born to God and God alone! In the third verse, the Greek word for pure is hagnos, which also means sacred and hallowed. Hagnos is also related to the specific word for holy, hagios. So, the writer understood our nature, like Christ’s, to be sacred, pure, and holy.

Problems stemming from heredity, sin, sickness, and so forth can be seen as illusions that there could be a power independent of God, that humanity can make mistakes and suffer from them. That belief is at the heart of the disciples’ question, “Who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind?” Jesus did not look for a cause within a person, but through his understanding of man’s true nature as united with God’s, the man was healed. He went on to tell those questioning him about his healing, “If this man [Jesus] were not of God, he could do nothing” (see John, chap. 9, cit. 11).