Article July 31, 1909 Issue

THE WEDNESDAY EVENING MEETING

GEORGE SHAW COOK

According to the "explanatory note" found in the Christian Science Quarterly, "The Bible and the Christian Science text-book are our only preachers." As is well known by those who are accustomed to attend our Sunday services, Lesson-Sermons prepared by a duly appointed committee, and made up of citations from the Bible and "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," are read at these services. It is provided in the Church Manual (Art. III., Sect. 6) that the Readers in our churches "shall make no remarks explanatory of the Lesson-Sermon at any time." The impersonal word of Truth contained in these Lesson-Sermons and read from the desk at our Sunday services, without personal explanation or interpretation, not only elucidates the teaching of Christian Science, but it heals the sick, reforms the sinner, and comforts the sorrowing.

The selections from the Bible and from Science and Health read—also without explanation—at our Wednesday evening meetings augment and reinforce the effect of the Sunday Lesson-Sermons. It should therefore be evident to all that there is no need and little excuse for personal preaching or teaching in our Wednesday evening meetings. These meetings are primarily for the inquirer who has the need and the desire to learn whether Christian Science heals sickness and sin. He is not at first so much concerned with methods as he is with results. Therefore he is entitled to and should receive from those who have experienced something of the healing power of Truth, an honest answer to the question, "Does Christian Science heal?" This answer should be straightforward, direct, concise, and should be couched in such terms as to make it easily understood by the "wayfaring man." For this reason it is obvious that any attempt on our part to preach, teach, or talk in technical terms at these meetings is not only out of place but is an imposition upon the "stranger" within our gates, who has come perhaps for the first time to learn what Christian Science does for those who are in need of relief. No one can question that a statement of benefits received, whether these are mental, moral, or physical, has a much greater effect upon those present than any attempted exposition of the teachings of Christian Science, although a brief statement as to the spiritual thought which came with the healing is often very helpful.

There may be those among us who are in need of teaching, but even so, they should be allowed the privilege of choosing their teacher. Let our testimonies therefore be brief. Let us confine ourselves to a recital of the benefits derived from the study and practice of Christian Science. Teaching may be more safely undertaken in the classroom by authorized teachers, and such explanation of Christian Science as may be deemed necessary can better be made in the home, at the lectures given by members of the official board of lectureship, and otherwise gained through the literature of our denomination, with which our Leader has so abundantly supplied us.

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THE WEDNESDAY EVENING MEETING

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