Article August 5, 1911 Issue

FAITH IN GOD

HELEN WARD BANKS.

OUT of the humblest events of life, sometimes, we learn our deepest lessons. I had one day occasion to drive a horse that was said to be afraid of automobiles. Before going out, I remembered to declare that, as we learn in Christian Science, fear has no authority. When we had finished the drive and were approaching home without having met a motor-car, I was conscious of a sense of relief and thankfulness. Then the thought flashed into my mind, "There are two ways of making this demonstration; one by avoiding automobiles, the other by meeting them and proving that fear has no power over man or beast." I was conscious that I had been glad the easier method was mine on this occasion.

It is perhaps a bit of inherent laziness in human thought that makes us desire the easiest way of working out our problems, though we all know that harder work brings greater gain. When Principle, in its unswervingness, leads us through the experience instead of around it, we bring out of it always treasures of faith and love and confidence that we would not have gained merely by escaping a hard experience. Did the three young Israelites whom Nebuchadnezzar cast into the fire lament that their proof of God's power did not consist in escaping "the burning fiery furnace"? Yet, behold, in the furnace, the only thing burned was their bonds, and they walked through the flames free, in company with the Comforter whom they had not fully known till then. Would they ever fear fire again, however close it might come to them?

Human sense cries out for escape from the fiery furnace, but if we need to go through the flames to prove their powerlessness to harm us, let us be grateful for knowing that the very depth of the experience shows us the power of God. Purified, "as by fire," we come out with a faith that is not a blind belief, but a sure confidence in the "Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning."

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