Article November 2, 1912 Issue

"GOD SO LOVED THE WORLD."

AVE GALBRAITH.

IT has frequently been remarked by those interested in the study of Christian Science, that it throws a wonderful search-light over old and well-loved texts and passages in the Bible, and thus makes it seem a very different book. Though it may have been pored over before, the spiritual aspect of it has remained more or less hidden, until thought was illumined to perceive it. Such an experience recently came to the writer as she was pondering the deep saying of Jesus as recorded in John's gospel, "God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life."

The old thought of this passage was of course that of a stern but just Father, who, in order to appease His wrath because of the sins of the people whom He Himself had made, required that His dearly loved and perfect Son should be sacrificed. The love for the world was entirely lost to our thought, in the wonder that such an extraordinary sacrifice should be either required or desired. Even after the writer had gained some knowledge of Christian Science, this text seemed to be a stumbling-block in the way of the understanding that God does not know the evil of the world which must be atoned for and blotted out. At length, however, the light dawned on her thought, as light always will if we realize that there is only one Mind which radiates infinite intelligence, and from which we may gather ever new increments of truth.

The spiritual meaning of the passage became clear in the realization that as "divine Love always has met and always will meet every human need" (Science and Health, p. 494), so through the ever-presence of that Love which knows only perfect being, at the exact time when the world was in some measure ready for it, the impersonal Christ came to the earth, through the pure consciousness of Mary and through the perfect thought of her sinless son, who demonstrated the Christ to those who could understand his words, Thus Christ, Truth, will ever continue to come to the awakened thought of men, to heal, purify, save, and make prac tical the at-one-ment with divine Love which the whole world needs.

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November 2, 1912
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