Editorial August 23, 1919 Issue

The Exalting Vision

William P. McKenzie

Everything beautiful which has blessed the world through the lives of the apostles, martyrs, and saints has been the outcome of their vision. What they saw of divine Principle they became obedient to and through this obedience became the manifesters and reflectors of Principle. It is evident that what they declared to mankind they first had to see. They exercised what Wordsworth called the "inner sight." Then they obeyed their vision and brought its beauty and harmony into expression, some as preachers and teachers, some as patient endures of human brutality, some as exemplary workers in lowly places; but whether as saints or sages, martyrs or prophets, teachers of righteousness or healers of the sick, they all have been capable of understanding what Paul meant when he said at the time he was pleading his case before the king, "O king Agrippa, I was not disobedient unto the heavenly vision."

At the time of Pentecost there was an unusual influx of light breaking in upon the minds of men and making them see new things. Explaining this inspiration, which the materialists said was intoxication, Peter, in his sermon, repudiated the idea that they were drunken. "But," he went on to say, "this is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel; and it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh: and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams: and on my servants and on my handmaidens I will pour out in those days of my Spirit; and they shall prophesy."

Let us be aware that this present day is also a time of vision. The times when men believed in the absence of the Christ, the centuries when healing of the sick by Mind was not understood, are now over. The second coming so long expected is now understood as the forever presence of the Christ, according to that promise, "Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world." To-day the sick are healed by Mind as in the pristine time of Christianity's appearing, and men are learning to know God directly as Savior from sin and healer of the body, without the dogma of the denominational priest or the drug system of the materialist medicine man. Mrs. Eddy says in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 326): "We must forsake the foundation of material systems, however time-honored, if we would gain the Christ as our only Saviour. Not partially, but fully, the great healer of mortal mind is the healer of the body. The purpose and motive to live aright can be gained now. This point won, you have started as you should. You have begun at the numeration-table of Christian Science, and nothing but wrong intention can hinder your advancement." It is indeed the time of vision, when many having learned purity by sacrifice are in the true sense fulfilling the beatitude, "Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God."

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