Article December 28, 1929 Issue

Salvation

OLIVIA A. HOMER

In his epistle to the Romans Paul makes the emphatic statement, "There is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God." On pages 224 and 225 of the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," Mary Baker Eddy writes: "What is this supposed power, which opposes itself to God? Whence cometh it? What is it that binds man with iron shackles to sin, sickness, and death? Whatever enslaves man is opposed to the divine government. Truth makes man free." Surely a clear realization of the truth set forth in these two declarations must utterly destroy the belief in any power which claims to oppose itself to omnipotence!

Christian Science is in strict accord with the Biblical declaration that "all things were made by him [God]; and without him was not any thing made that was made." Happily, Christian Science has exposed as false the belief that sin, sickness, and death are real, just as Christ Jesus exposed the falsity of the belief in a personal devil when he said, "He is a liar, and the father of it."

Among thinking people to-day it is becoming more generally understood that God does not actually send sickness, sorrow, or any of the ills that beset mankind; but there are many who still cling to the superstition that He permits these evils to exist! Would it not logically follow that if God permitted evil He would be responsible for it? For is not God omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent? Why should one attempt through material means to rid one's self of something which the All-wise permits? But God, being infinite good, could neither create nor permit evil in any form. The prophet Habakkuk gloriously glimpsed this truth when he said, "Thou art of purer eyes than to behold evil, and canst not look on iniquity." The belief in a power opposed to God is the supposititious basis of all evil; hence the way of salvation lies in overcoming that false belief.

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