Editorial March 15, 1924 Issue

If the Spirit of the Christ Dwell with You

Albert F. Gilmore

In the familiar eighth chapter of Romans, Paul contrasts the works of the Spirit with the beliefs of the flesh, emphasizing both the power of the Spirit over the flesh, and the necessity for the followers of Christ Jesus to gain and exercise the ascendancy which the Spirit confers. "But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you," he declared. To rise above the beliefs of the flesh—that is, through spiritual understanding to gain dominion over materiality in order to share the deeper things of God—is the Christian's necessity.

How the spirit of the Christ may dwell with us, then, is the all-important question! Christian Scientists know that the spirit of the Christ, the ideal of Truth, is ever ready to possess the receptive mentality. In this connection the definition of the Christ, which Mrs. Eddy gives on page 583 of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," is significant: "The divine manifestation of God, which comes to the flesh to destroy incarnate error." Is it not the Christ coming to the so-called human consciousness of which Paul promised such wondrous things? Spiritual consciousness is gained only by the acceptance of the ideas which emanate from divine Mind. The test as to the source of thought which all may apply is this: Did a given thought which claims recognition emanate from divine Mind, or did it have its origin in the counterfeit, the so-called mortal mind? The answer to this query classifies thought as spiritual or material, and determines whether or not the Spirit dwells with us.

Paul's vision of the power of the Spirit was very clear. Few of the early disciples of the Master, apparently, had so comprehensive a grasp of the great necessity for men to gain the Mind of Christ; that is, to gain spiritual understanding. He saw salvation from the errors of materiality to be the all-important experience; and he attempted no compromise between Spirit and matter. He drew his distinction with startling clarity, leaving no slightest comfort to him who would build a halfway house, wherein to dwell in the expectation of winning salvation from the penalties due to sin, while still holding on to the pleasurable senses as real and worthy.

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