Article March 20, 1926 Issue

Joy in Temptation

ARTHUR G. STEVENSON

How often have Christian Scientists allowed themselves to be puzzled and discouraged because, although they had done their metaphysical work as well as they knew how, the material problem seemed still to be unsolved. Let them take courage. God's law will put things right, at the right time and in the right way; it has only to be properly understood and obeyed. The promise is clear. As Mrs. Eddy writes in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 248), "Let unselfishness, goodness, mercy, justice, health, holiness, love—the kingdom of heaven—reign within us, and sin, disease, and death will diminish until they finally disappear."

We must beware, however, of turning to matter to test the operation of Spirit, by outlining material results. It is our business "to destroy the foe, and leave the field to God, Life, Truth, and Love, remembering that God and His ideas alone are real and harmonious" (ibid., p. 419). It is not our business, as soldiers of the cross, to say when the warfare shall cease. We may be fighting a bigger battle than we know; and there may be higher victories before us than we can at the moment see.

Who can doubt that Daniel had done his work faithfully when, in spite of the king's decree, he prayed at his open window, "and gave thanks before his God, as he did aforetime"? And yet, it seemed necessary that he should go down into the den of lions. His enemies felt sure, and the troubled Darius feared, that the lions would destroy him; but Daniel knew that he was safe in God's keeping. Surely, during that night of temptation, and when he came up out of the pit in the morning, he gave God the greater thanks for that further manifestation of His power and love. So, too, when the news of Lazarus' illness came to Jesus, the lie of sickness and death was then and there denied by the Master. Yet, to the human beliefs of the sisters at Bethany, Lazarus died and was buried. But the divine law was in operation all the time, and in due course Lazarus was restored, "for the glory of God, that the Son of God might be glorified thereby."

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