THE FRUIT OF RIGHT ENDEAVOR

Archibald McLellan

In the early experience of most Christian Scientists there comes a time when they are so wonderfully impressed with the healing work that is being done for them and for others,—when they awaken to the realization that the power of Truth to heal is available today as it was in the time of the Master and his disciples,—that they simply bubble over with enthusiasm in their happiness over this new-found faith, and are eager to right every seemingly wrong condition in health or in morals among their friends, believing that all there is to do in order to accomplish this is to tell them of what they have themselves seen and heard.

Sometimes the awakening is a rude one, and they are grieved at the repulse which their well-meant efforts have met, forgetting that not all are ready to give credence to the word of even a very dear friend, if what is said tends to upset a preconceived and cherished belief of the one who is addressed. Even as the husbandman does not cast his seed in the unprepared ground, so the young Scientist must wait until favoring conditions have opened the way for the seed of Truth, until his friends, roused to the inadequacy of their present belief when material means have failed them in their extremity, will welcome the truth that makes free from the bondage of sin and sickness.

Again, the enthusiast may find that objection is made to Christian Science on the ground that it demands too much of its adherents,—that they are expected literally to work out their own salvation. Then comes the temptation to make Christian Science so easy that it will be accepted in what might be termed a sugar-coated form. We do well if we firmly resist this temptation, which is one of the most subtle with which Christian Scientists have to deal. Christian Science controverts many of the most cherished beliefs of mankind, beliefs into which they have been educated by generations of thinking along materialistic lines instead of spiritual, and we forget that the process of sugar-coating Christian Science—modifying this or that condition—to make it acceptable to the person who seems wedded to such beliefs, is really an adulteration which, like most adulterations, does harm instead of good.

The best service we can render our friends is to let them see what Christian Science has done and will do for humanity, and especially what it is doing for us personally in making us better and healthier men and women, kinder to and more thoughtful for others, than we were before this influence came into our experience. In other phrasing, we shall plead our cause more eloquently if we modestly let our actions tell the story of the efficacy of this healing truth, rather than our words; not designedly so, but because our actions are the natural and normal outcome of our inward thinking, those with whom we come in contact cannot fail to see the change that has been wrought in us.

When they really wish to know the "reason of the hope" that is in us, then we can tell them what Christian Science is and what it is doing for the race, and in no such instance will our time and efforts be wasted. If, however, we try to arouse their interest by persistent and unsolicited talk about Christian Science, we are quite likely to defeat our purpose. Every man is entitled to his own views on or about both medicine and theology, and while we believe that we hold the right views on these subjects, this does not excuse our intruding them where they are not wanted and will not be accepted.

But when the proper time comes for us to bring the subject of Christian Science to the attention of others, we must be careful to present it in the same spirit in which Mrs. Eddy wrote Science and Health, and which she so concisely states in these words: "The author has not compromised conscience to suit the general drift of thought, but has bluntly and honestly given the text of Truth" (Science and Health, Pref., p. x.). Then our endeavors will no longer be barren, but even as the seed which "fell into good ground, and brought forth fruit, some an hundredfold, some sixtyfold, some thirtyfold."

Archibald McLellan

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