Article December 1, 1923 Issue

The Motive of Thanksgiving

FRANCIS LYSTER JANDRON

ALL citizens should rejoice in the moral enlightenment which has led to the setting apart of an annual season of Thanksgiving in the United States. Christian Scientists, in particular, are grateful for every opportunity to discern the happy concurrence of national proclamation and divine law. They are learning how invincible is the power of thanksgiving, demonstrated not merely through observance of a designated festival, but through constant, humble recognition of the all-encompassing presence of divine Love. The globe is being encircled and assuredly illumined, as, one by one, Christian Scientists in every land echo and reecho their prayer and praise. And in our thanksgiving we emphasize the triumphant fact recorded by our beloved Leader in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (pp. 149, 150): "To-day there is hardly a city, village, or hamlet, in which are not to be found living witnesses and monuments to the virtue and power of Truth, as applied through this Christian system of healing disease." It is no small thing that, through individual, scientific thought linking heart to heart in common obedience and good-will, the whole earth is being redeemed.

When the disciples returned with joy to recount the triumphs of healing accomplished through their understanding of the Christ, Truth, the Master took occasion to indicate unmistakably the genuine motive of thanksgiving. "Behold, I give unto you power. . . . Notwithstanding in this rejoice not, that the spirits are subject unto you; but rather rejoice, because your names are written in heaven." Here all may read the needed warning to distinguish sharply between the effects of spiritual understanding and material phenomena. Since time began, the only possibility of error's successfully palming off its false pretensions has lain in the willingness of its intended dupes to accept it as an entailment of divine law. Not otherwise could a lie continue to deceive, since, being no part of God's creation, it is for all time literally and utterly nothing. Christian Scientists are constantly being tempted to admit that discord has being and intensity, and that it can develop. So much admitted, the cognate allurement to acquiesce in material measures as an aid in the removal of the disorder claims to follow. The endeavor to practice Christian Science may then be in danger of becoming neutralized by a medley of drugs and human will.

The effect of Christian healing is the demonstration of the Christ here and now: fundamentally, it is the recognition of God as All. That is the corner stone of our thanksgiving. Such a recognition can come only to one uplifted in thought to the plane of communion with the divine Mind; for to this plane, that which is not of God cannot approach. The redemptive purpose of Christianity can appear to be frustrated only by attempting to hold it down to a level with erroneous human thinking. There was no selfish thought of physical safety in the sublime faith which impelled the early Christians to face the lions in the Roman arena, rather than surrender their new-found hope in Christ. The carnal mind thereupon successfully sought to dilute Christian power by offering the protection of its "law" to the church, making it for centuries the vassal of state policy. Thus, the church forfeited the healing unction which only spiritual reliance can inherit.

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The Motive of Thanksgiving

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