Article July 13, 1918 Issue

The Joys of Childhood

AMANDA COLBATH

One cannot long be a student of Christian Science before his attention is directed to the numerous references in Scripture comparing the spiritual progress of the adult to that of a little child. The question then arises, How is this to be made practical? There comes a time in the life of the adult when he can no longer depend on human parents for protection and guidance. He has reached the milestone which is termed the age of accountability. The responsibilities which confront him may cause him to recall the freedom which attended his childhood, and a desire goes out to experience again the joy of former years when childish confidence and trust in human parents to care for him shielded him from present care as well as from anxiety for the future.

It is a well-known fact that no one would wish to return to his childhood, with all which the word implies; but he feels the need of something outside of himself on which he can rely, and his thought therefore goes out to the days of his childhood when his burdens were largely borne by human parents. Mrs. Eddy has written in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," on page 74: "In Christian Science there is never a retrograde step, never a return to positions outgrown." It is, therefore, impossible to reach again the joys of childhood or the joy of any past experience through the beliefs of the flesh. This can be done only through an understanding of God and of man's relationship to Him.

In the third chapter of John's gospel we have these significant words: "Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." But without the light of spiritual understanding one may exclaim in the words of Nicodemus, "How can a man be born when he is old?" Jesus answered this question when he said, "Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God." Mrs. Eddy has given to the world throughout her writings a spiritual sense of the new birth as a mental change, whereby the joys of childhood become a present possibility to the adult, not through a return to material childishness, but through childlike faith and trust in God. We also have a wonderful article by Mrs. Eddy entitled "The New Birth," which begins on page 15 of "Miscellaneous Writings." In this she says: "The new birth is not the work of a moment. It begins with moments, and goes on with years; moments of surrender to God, of childlike trust and joyful adoption of good; moments of self-abnegation, self-consecration, heaven-born hope, and spiritual love." When an individual takes up the study of Christian Science he has begun to experience the new birth, and from that time his growth in spiritual understanding goes on. He now relies upon spiritual sense and strives to lift his thought up to spiritual apprehension. He recognizes man's real origin as a child of God, and his position may well be likened to that of a little child. As he progresses spiritually he finds many changes taking place in his thinking and likewise in his environment. He experiences a continuous dropping off of the old and putting on of the new.

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