Editorial June 28, 1919 Issue

Holding the Initiative for Good

William P. McKenzie

There is a man who can invent machines for the most delicate operations, where exactness to almost unmeasurable fractions of an inch is required. Some one spoke to him of the thief who might find out the secret of one of his machines and imitate it. His reply was to the effect that by the time the imitator would have any such machine in effective operation he as an inventor would have already invented a better machine rendering the other comparatively valueless. He did not therefore seek for protection by means of patents but trusted to the resources of his ingenuity, feeling sure that he would be able to hold the initiative through his skill and experience. In like manner the Christian Scientist looks upon good not as something accumulated like gold in a vault and needing to be guarded, but as something endlessly available,—and found available just in proportion as it is trusted, utilized, and loved. God is Love and God is good. So the actuality of life is goodness or Godlikeness; consequently Jesus' words about his coming in order that men "might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly," can be well understood, especially when he gives the definition, saying, "This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent."

Aggressive mental suggestion is the attempt of error to hold the initiative so that the object of its attack shall begin his thinking at the point of some claim of error, either believing it and obeying it, or else fearing it and wondering how to meet it, and so resenting it and being troubled. "Let not your heart be troubled," said Jesus; "ye believe in God, believe also in me." If we believe in God why not follow in the way of the Son of God? If we be followers, then Christ Jesus will have many brethren accepting the initiative of good. "We know," says Paul, "that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren." Mrs. Eddy writes in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 288): "Science reveals the glorious possibilities of immortal man, forever unlimited by the mortal senses. The Christ-element in the Messiah made him the Way-shower, Truth and Life."

Christ Jesus persistently maintained the initiative of good. On the very cross, when tempted to begin his thinking with pain and grief, or anger at the cruelty of men, he was able to make love the starting point of his thought, and prayed for his persecutors, saying, "Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do." At that time was manifested the fact that the prince of this world coming had nothing in him, no hold, no initiative, no power. Evil mental suggestion claiming sin and death as reality was banished in the glory of the resurrection, for thus our Master "brought life and immortality to light through the gospel."

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