Article August 7, 1920 Issue

Persistence

LESLIE M. KNAPP

WHAT a wonderful thing Christian Science is to the person who, befogged in sin, worried over financial difficulties, disappointed in the failure to find joy and peace in some human relationship, or clogged by the pain and weariness of some belief of physical ill, hears the joyous message of divine Love and the good which it brings to all the world, in the inspired words of Mary Baker Eddy: "The notion that both evil and good are real is a delusion of material sense, which Science annihilates. Evil is nothing, no thing, mind, nor power" (Science and Health, p. 330). When the joyous realization of what all this means—release from pain, release from sorrow, release from fear and worry—brings the happy knowledge that good alone is the only real experience that the children of God can ever have; when we learn that there is a way out, and a sure way out, of all our difficulties, we look upon a new world, a larger world, a brighter world. Enthusiasm for Christian Science, desire to master quickly this knowledge of God's laws which enables one not only to solve his own problems but to usher happiness and harmony into the lives of others, must abound.

We soon learn in Christian Science, however, that it requires work and patience to keep permanently this joyous conception of the wonderfulness of God's goodness, for mortal mind seems always busy endeavoring to suggest material concepts of life and being. Sometimes, too, when a beginner's problem seems difficult and its perfect solving does not appear instantaneous, discouragement may creep in, and for a while a mighty struggle against doubt and failure may take place. This is the testing time to the student of Christian Science. To understand God's law and to make the demonstration thereof is not a work to be haltingly undertaken. True demonstration requires a steady, persistent knowing, the deep, ever immanent prayer of Truth, which will yield not one inch to error, let error assume what proportion it may. In this struggle, in which the victory must rest on the side of invincible Truth, we are encouraged when we remember the words of Mrs. Eddy (Science and Health, p. 22): "If your endeavors are beset by fearful odds, and you receive no present reward, go not back to error, nor become a sluggard in the race. When the smoke of battle clears away, you will discern the good you have done, and receive according to your deserving. Love is not hasty to deliver us from temptation, for Love means that we shall be tried and purified."

After all, there is no real difficulty in overcoming any condition which the beginner meets, whether it be discouragement, fear of lack of understanding, belief in sickness, or any other suggestion of discord. Then is the time to cling more steadfastly to the simple teaching of Christian Science —that God is good, that He is Love, that He never made sin, sickness, or lack; that He is the Father and the Mother of all; that divine Love is so infinite that men's thought cannot compass it, and that in the full warmth and affluence of this Love there is no such thing as discord. Then, through one's knowing that this Love is ever present, the thought of discouragement will flee away; perhaps instantaneously a demonstration is made, and the discord, no matter what its name and nature, vanishes into its native nothingness. Then indeed do we begin to realize what our revered Leader meant by the sentence previously quoted, "The notion that both evil and good are real is a delusion of material sense, which Science annihilates."

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