Article June 26, 1920 Issue

The simplicity that is in Christ

The Christian Science Monitor, May 3, 1920

One of the most inveterate tendencies of the human mind is the tendency to elaboration. The reason is not far to seek. It is the direct result of the fact that, the very essence of this mind being limitation, its idea of growth, whether in wisdom or in substance, is necessarily accumulation. It is impossible to conceive of divine Mind, as God is revealed in Christian Science,—all-presence, all-power, all-knowledge,—as seeking to accumulate anything. Where all things are infinitely available accumulation has no meaning. Jesus the Christ recognized this great fact in its fullness, and this recognition, coupled with the further recognition of man in the image and likeness of God as forever reflecting the activity of God or Principle, enabled him to avail himself, at all times, of Principle's infinite resources. Did he need tribute money? The supply was unlimited. It could be found anywhere, for instance in a fish's mouth. Did he need the wherewithal to feed the multitude? The supply was again equally unlimited and immediately available. Did he need safety in the storm or from the stones of the multitude? Both were equally unable to touch him who understand that he lived and moved and had his being in Principle or the reality of things.

Now the very essence of "the mind of Christ," as Paul calls it, is its simplicity. Jesus, confronted with the problem of paying the tribute money, did not set about thinking where he could raise the money or how he could raise it. Jesus, confronted with the storm on the lake, did not resort to any one of the human expedients which the world would have considered necessary. Jesus, faced with the necessity of providing food in the wilderness for a multitude, never thought of reckoning up with Philip how many pennyworths of bread would be sufficient. Jesus, faced with a sick man, never prescribed a drug or a material remedy. In every case his recourse was the same, and in every case it was instantly successful.

Now how did Christ Jesus do these things, and what was this universal remedy, the application of which he evidently so fully understood? Again it is very simple. Consider these few sayings out of many: "God is a Spirit," or, as the revised version more correctly translates it, "God is Spirit." "I and my Father are one." "I ascend unto my Father, and your Father." "It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing." "Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it." "I am the way, the truth, and the life." "If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you."

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