Article June 4, 1910 Issue

SUNDAY SCHOOL WORK

CLARA M. DARLINGTON

Some year's experience in Sunday School work has led to the desire to express my gratitude for the by-laws in our Manual governing Sunday Schools. This is particularly true with reference to the by-law which outlines the subject for lessons, and more particularly that part described as "first lessons;" that is, the Ten Commandments, the Lord's Prayer and its spiritual interpretation by Mrs. Eddy, and the sermon on the mount, as it has become so evident that this study supplies the foundation and necessary preparation for the work to follow.

After working with a class of small children for a short time on the "first lessons," I found myself looking forward to the time when I would be given a class old enough to study the Lesson-Sermon, or as stated in the Manual, "the next lessons," thinking that in this work would be found the great opportunity for the pupil's advancement as well as my own. As I, however, had been asked by the superintendent to remain with this class until the first of the year, which was some months hence, I found myself under the necessity of making a deeper research in the Bible and Science and Health for the spiritual interpretation of the commandments, beatitudes, etc., being told that there was much in these which would unfold when prayerfully studied. It was with this thought that I took up the Concordance, and starting with the question on page 465 of Science and Health, "What is God?" I found in addition to the answer to this question many clear, concise statements which brought out the thought of God as Mind, Love, Principle, etc.; and I saw that, first of all, the pupil entering the Christian Science Sunday School should be given a correct concept of God, even though this concept might be quite limited in the beginning. It was then that I began to comprehend something of the reason why Mrs. Eddy in her great wisdom had provided the commandments as the first lesson for every pupil entering our Sunday Schools, and also why this work is just as important for the young people in their teens who now enter our Sunday Schools as it is for the smallest child, since nothing else could be given to the pupil intelligently until this foundation is established and the pupil has gained some glimpse of the one creator, the infinite Mind that is good only.

Then, in taking up the word "idolatry," which was suggested through "graven image," I found (Science and Health, p. 146) that "the first idolatry was faith in matter;" and since idolatry is the attributing of power or being to some other source than the one true God, it is plain that the second commandment strengthens the first one by declaring that man shall not make unto himself another creator, that is, believe that matter is a creator. Here, then, is the thought that came: Thou shalt have (know) one God who is Love, Mind, good. Thou shalt not have (not know) matter, evil, sin, disease,—anything that is unlike God; and that to fail to have the active thought which declares the reality of good and denies the reality of evil is to "take the name of the Lord thy God in vain." Invariably the claim is presented that there is evil and matter, because mortals seem to see it with their eyes; an argument which may be met with the question, What are you honoring in your thought,—your Father-Mother God, who created all things spiritually, or are you believing in another creator? This line of thought continues to unfold throughout the Lord's Prayer and its spiritual interpretation by Mrs. Eddy, and then follows the comforting beatitudes, which add to these commands, or divine laws of life, the preparation of the heart so necessary for true obedience.

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