Article August 21, 1909 Issue

The second tenet of the Christian Science church reads...

Gray Montgomery

Denver (Col.) Republican.

The second tenet of the Christian Science church reads: "We acknowledge and adore one supreme and infinite God. We acknowledge His Son, one Christ; the Holy Ghost or divine Comforter; and man in God's image and likeness" (Science and Health, p. 497). The Holy Ghost is the understanding of Truth, the same unfoldment of Life, Truth, and Love that enabled the prophets of old to write the Scriptures.

The Bible informs us that the conception of Jesus was of the Holy Ghost. Mary's understanding of God as the only Father enabled her to give to the world its long-expected Saviour. The Bible also tells us that "Zacharias was filled with the Holy Ghost, and prophesied;" that "Peter, filled with the Holy Ghost," taught Christianity to the "elders of Israel;" that "Saul, filled with the Holy Ghost," rebuked Elymas the sorcerer. Jesus, filled with the Holy Ghost, that is, possessing the perfect understanding of God, reformed the sinner, and healed the helpless invalid by awakening him from the dream of life in matter to the fact of his real life in God, thus changing his thoughts from fear to a realization of God's protecting love and power. By restoring the dead to life, and by his own resurrection, he proved that the understanding of Truth, the Holy Ghost, can overcome even the last enemy. And today Christian Scientists, accepting all of the Bible teaching, are again performing, in a measure, similar reformative, regenerative, and healing works.

By the power of divine Science, the understanding of perfect God and His perfect universe, Jesus lifted the thought of his disciples above the material concept of existence to that spiritual sense which enabled them to repeat their Master's wonderful deeds. At his ascension, our Master's human body disappeared, and his spiritual individuality, the Christ-embodiment, appeared as his real spiritual self. This teaching is not a denial of Christ, but rather a confirmation of the eternal or real substance of Christ. Jesus was the highest human concept of the Christ, and when the human element disappeared from mortal sight his real spiritual entity, the Christ-man in the image and likeness of God, dawned upon the consciousness of his followers; and as Mrs. Eddy teaches (Science and Health, p. 31), "it is the living Christ, the practical Truth, which makes Jesus 'the resurrection and the life' to all who follow him in deed."

Send a comment to the editors

We'd love to hear from you!

Easily submit your testimonies, articles, and poems online.

Submit

The second tenet of the Christian Science church reads...

We'd love to hear from you!

Sign up for unlimited access