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Your life belongs to God
On a recent Saturday, I was rushing to get my morning chores completed. I was due at church to help prepare for the next morning’s Sunday service, and I needed to leave soon. My last chore was feeding the horses. As I was hurriedly cutting some carrots to add to the horses’ feed, I suddenly felt a sharp pain and saw some blood on the carrot pieces. In my rush to finish, I had sliced the end of one of my fingers.
I rinsed the finger but did not stop my activities. I immediately remembered something my Christian Science teacher had told me: “The bottom line is that your life is not just your life. It belongs to God. And God is bringing it about in the right way.” I had been thinking about that since he had shared it with me the previous afternoon. I had initially considered what it meant in relation to supply. In Christian Science, we understand that God is Life itself and that man is created in God’s image and likeness. As a reflection, or image, of God’s being, my life could lack for nothing. A spiritual sense of Life includes an ample supply, not just “getting by.”
As I walked out to feed the horses, I realized that as a reflection of divine Life, I could be confident that not only was my supply complete, but my life was also protected from any harm. That knife could no more cut or hurt my real spiritual being than it could cut God’s being. God is not subject to accidents. As God’s image, I could not include any belief of an accident.
My sense of being rushed was replaced by calm. I got my final chores done efficiently, without feeling that I was racing the clock. I was not concerned about being late because I knew that my life was being brought about in the right way and was under God’s protection. I didn’t have to just “get by” and go through the morning’s activities dealing with a wounded finger.
When I got back into the house, I saw that the finger had stopped bleeding and the wound had closed. Instead of rushing out the door at the last moment, I had a few minutes for breakfast with my wife. As we sat down to eat, there was not a mark left on the finger. There was absolutely no evidence of the accident or cut.
I’m grateful for this immediate healing and for this demonstration that God is bringing about my sense of Life in the right way—free from accident or harm and amply supplied with good. And I’m particularly grateful for the provision Mary Baker Eddy made in the Manual of The Mother Church for Christian Science teachers, and for their loving and uninterrupted support of their students.
—Jeff Shepard, Norco, California, US