Editorial June 11, 1910 Issue

GOD'S LAW OUR DEFENSE

Annie M. Knott

With wonderful wisdom and foresight our revered Leader has directed that the first lessons of the children in our Sunday Schools shall be the Ten Commandments, the Lord's Prayer with its spiritual interpretation (as found in Science and Health, p. 16), and the beatitudes from the sermon on the mount, It is seen at once that the Ten Commandments are the basis of all human law which aims to establish justice among men and to give security to human life. It is, however, very significant in this connection to remember the declaration in the Westminster Confession of faith, that "No mere man, since the fall, is able, in this life, perfectly to keep the commandments of God; but doth daily break them, in thought, word, and deed." This would seem to be supported by St. Paul's words in the eighth of Romans, that the carnal mind is "not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be;" yet we have, on the other hand, the unqualified demand of Christ Jesus, in his sermon on the mount, "Be ye ... perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect." To this demand we may add the words from I John 5:18: "We know that whosoever is born of God sinneth not; but he that is begotten of God keepeth himself, and that wicked one toucheth him not."

In the chapter already quoted St. Paul makes it clear that as we cease to "mind the things of the flesh," and instead come to mind "the things of the Spirit," we cease to be lawbreakers, for we become "conformed to the image of his Son," who fulfilled the law of God at every point. In "Miscellaneous Writings" (pp. 66, 67) Mrs. Eddy shows the vital relation between obedience to the law of God and the healing of sin and disease. She lifts thought above the merely material sense of the Decalogue, up to its spiritual sense and infinite demand, and shows that the one who disobeys the commandments actually forfeits his own sense of life and happiness. On the other hand, we learn in Christian Science that each commandment, spiritually understood and faithfully obeyed, becomes a weapon of defense against all the allurements or the assaults of evil. It requires, however, constant practice to use the spiritual weapons with which to vanquish every foe. The one who indulges in hate cannot say to error, "Thou shalt not kill;" nor can he who tramples upon another's rights and ignores the divine demand for entire honesty, say, when his own interests are assailed, "Thou shalt not steal."

In this age, no less than at the dawn of Christianity, there are mighty wrestlings "against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places;" and no one can "stand," to use Paul's forceful word, who does not wear "the breastplate of righteousness," which includes righteous thinking about God, man, the Cause of Truth and its God-appointed Leader, as well as holy living. Having this breastplate, and the shield of faith, we are assured that we can "quench all the fiery darts of the wicked."

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