Article February 7, 1925 Issue

Faithful Work

MABEL KNAPP HOLLIS

In the springtime season, when on every hand is seen the growth of bud and blossom, are we not prone to take but small account of the labor that has been necessary in preparing the soil for the seed, in pruning tree and bush, and in the removal of all useless and waste matter that would in any way hinder growth or prevent full fruitage?

One is reminded of the Lord's command to Moses in the plains of Moab, as related in the thirty-third chapter of Numbers, where the children of Israel were commanded to pass "over Jordan into the land of Canaan." They were told to "drive out all the inhabitants of the land, ... and destroy all their pictures, and destroy all their molten images, and quite pluck down all their high places." And we may well pause to consider the definition of Canaan as given on page 582 of the Glossary of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mary Baker Eddy: "Canaan (the son of Ham). A sensuous belief; the testimony of what is termed material sense; the error which would make man mortal and would make mortal mind a slave to the body." Through the unfoldment of Truth, as revealed by our textbook, we perceive that this command is for us of to-day also; that indeed a part of the foundation work in Christian Science is to "drive out all the inhabitants of the land;" that is, to challenge and destroy every least thought which would bind us to the belief that man exists apart from God. The testimony of the material senses, whether of pain or joy, is to be cast out and replaced with the understanding that man is spiritual, not material.

The command that follows the casting out of the inhabitants is that they should "destroy all their pictures, and destroy all their molten images, and quite pluck down all their high places." Here, again, is definite counsel to the student of Christian Science; for, after taking up this study and, perhaps, to his great joy experiencing a long-sought healing or release from bondage to sin and limitation, he finds there is still much work to be done. All the pictures are to be destroyed! There may be the picture of a past wherein he has experienced in belief much suffering, injustice, or hatred. Or there may be the picture of a past looked back to with regret because of the material joy or gain that seems to have been swept away. Whatever the picture, if it still binds us to a material past or links us with a material future with its changing, fleeting joys and sorrows, it must be destroyed. In the third chapter of Ecclesiastes we read, "That which hath been is now; and that which is to be hath already been; and God requireth that which is past."

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