Article May 1, 1909 Issue

THE CHRISTIAN SCIENCE PRACTITIONER

WENTWORTH BYRON WINSLOW

One of our Lord's greatest utterances is found in the 3d chapter of John's Gospel, where he says to Nicodemus, "God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved." This statement may be pondered daily by every student of Christian Science, with profit to himself and others. Not infrequently we hear reasons assigned by Christian Scientists as to why such and such a case was not healed while under Christian Science treatment. The failure is seldom laid at the door of the practitioner, but is often attributed to the unreceptivity of the patient's thought, to his environment, perhaps to the antagonism of his family, or mayhap the prejudice of old orthodoxy in the town wherein he lives; but the teachings of the Bible as understood in Christian Science prove conclusively that such statements will not bear careful analysis.

It goes without saying, that if we give power to aught but good, then that other seeming thing (evil) immediately becomes powerful to us in belief; and therefore, just to the extent that we allow it, no more and no less, both ourselves and our patients are subject to this belief in the power of evil. St. Paul says, "To whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness." It is doubtless true, that when we first learn of Christian Science we have less understanding than in later years, but that does not excuse the practitioner nor put the blame on the patient. It is far better manfully to acknowledge one's failure, and resolve to fast from materiality more, and to pray more constantly, rather than to attempt to justify oneself by giving outside reasons for failure.

Jesus met the same conditions that we meet, but we never read that he blamed others for his Galilean experience, concerning which it is related that "he did not many mighty works there because of their unbelief," he healed the ear of Malchus, the servant of the high priest, in the very teeth of the malice, venom, hatred, and unbelief of the Jewish mob. From the foregoing it seems probable that Jesus was not as conscious of the omnipotence, omnipresence, and omniscience of God in the earlier years of his ministry as he was in the latter, and from the same records it may be deemed proven that the surrounding thought made no difference whatsoever to Jesus when he more fully understood God; hence it becomes the practitioner's duty so to understand and know God as to overcome the opposing belief even as the Master did. These are his words, "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect."

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