Article January 31, 1914 Issue

The Lectures

with contributions from H. M. Sparboe, Mayor Lunn, William E. Brown, J. C. Lindsey, R. W. Kane, Walter M. French, Mr. May

The sixteenth annual lecture on Christian Science, given under the auspices of the local church, was delivered at the Armory Opera House by Virgil O. Strickler. The speaker was introduced by H. M. Sparboe, who said in part:—

Christian Science is not a new religion ; it is the reawakening of a slumbering race to the truth demonstrated by Christ Jesus and his followers over nineteen hundred years ago. I take it that those who believe in the Bible, believe that Jesus healed and taught his followers to heal the sick and the sinner contemporaneously. We believe that the same simple teachings of the Scripture are being better understood today, and are being given a more practical application to the needs of humanity. If, as the Scriptures claim, God is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent, can we believe that He leaves us to shift for ourselves and that He is either unwilling or unable to relieve us of our physical ills? Is it not more reasonable to believe that His unchanging spiritual law, if properly and scientifically understood, will protect us against and relieve us from the seemingly inharmonious conditions that surround us?

The critics of Christian Science cite an occasional failure to heal as a reason for condemning it. The same line of reasoning would condemn every church denomination for failing to convert every person with whom it comes in contact. It would condemn the laws of mathematics because some student failed properly to demonstrate its rules. To say that the age of Christian healing has passed because Christians as a rule have ceased to practise it, is as unreasonable as it would be to assume that God's forgiveness of sin has passed because there are so many sinners who do not avail themselves of it. We believe that the saving and healing power demonstrated by Jesus and his followers is present with us today just as surely as is the power of electricity, which until recently has been an unused force and has been little understood.

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