Editorial December 26, 1925 Issue

Opportunity

Ella W. Hoag

Some one has said that opportunity is that which invites to action. It offers the occasion to take definite steps in a given direction. In "Christian Healing" (p. 19) Mrs. Eddy has written, "Tireless Being, patient of man's procrastination, affords him fresh opportunities every hour; but if Science makes a more spiritual demand, bidding man go up higher, he is impatient perhaps, or doubts the feasibility of the demand." Not only has our Leader here revealed infinite possibilities for good, but she has also shown the temptations which would prevent the acceptance and utilization of such infinite opportunities to demonstrate spirituality.

Men have not always understood that God is continually giving them new opportunities. Because they have so frequently regarded opportunities from a material standpoint, they have believed them to be as limited as matter itself. Seeking to add to a personal and physical sense of good, they have found occasions for such an accumulation elusive and evanescent. Since there has been no true stability in their desires, the results have been proportionately unsatisfactory. In the degree that their vision has been material, opportunity has seemed but a "will-o'-the-wisp,"—here to-day and gone to-morrow,—leaving them with little but vain regret for what they have called their failure to grasp occasion for advantage and progress.

The Christian Scientist is freed from all erroneous thinking about opportunity. He knows that he has entered the path of Christian Science for the holy purpose of advancing as rapidly as may be towards the heaven of Soul, that heaven which is the abiding place of all that is spiritual and truly good. Then he joyously accepts Mrs. Eddy's assurance, "Tireless Being . . . affords him fresh opportunities every hour." He also speedily learns the wisdom of obeying the spiritual demand of Science that he "go up higher." He is therefore wise if he press patiently forward, grasping every occasion as a God-given opportunity whereby he may rise out of matter by laying hold of Spirit and things spiritual.

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