Tenderness

ALFRED MARSHALL VAUGHN

What a wonderful picture of tenderness is presented by Isaiah in the following verse: "He shall feed his flock like a shepherd: he shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom, and shall gently lead those that are with young"! It would be difficult to convey with words a more beautiful sense of our Father-Mother's tender care for all His little ones. The prophet had said of the power of God, "Behold, the Lord God will come with strong hand, and his arm shall rule for him;" and he immediately followed this thought of God's power and government with the thought of God's tenderness; for He ever rules with love.

The thought of strength must ever be associated with tenderness, for God, divine Love, is the only power; and we can never think of the power of Love without thinking also of the tenderness of Love. This consciousness of the tenderness of God destroys fear; but if we think of the all-power of God without understanding His unchanging love for all His creation, fear may remain. The best way to become conscious of the tenderness of God is to strive to manifest tenderness ourselves, for we understand only what we demonstrate; and for us to comprehend God's tender care, spiritual tenderness must be reflected in our thoughts and acts.

Jesus, the one who was most conscious of God's omnipotence, and who most fully demonstrated this wonderful power, was ever conscious of God's tenderness; and he demonstrated spiritual strength by tenderly dealing with all with whom he came into contact. The Master depicted the tenderness of God in the parable of the prodigal son, which presents the father going to meet the repentant son when he was "a great way off" and tenderly forgiving him; and in the parable of the good Samaritan Jesus brought out the need for each one to reflect the Father's tenderness by lovingly caring for all who need help. Mrs. Eddy says in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 518), "The rich in spirit help the poor in one grand brotherhood, all having the same Principle, or Father; and blessed is that man who seeth his brother's need and supplieth it, seeking his own in another's good."

When healing the one who had the palsy, Jesus first forgave his sins. When working for others, we find that we must first forgive, destroying our own thought of sin, before we can gain that vision of the perfect man which heals. To gain the understanding of the tenderness of God, and to realize that this wonderful tenderness is ever expressed through righteous thinking, is to be able to forgive, to see the real man as having always dwelt in sinless perfection, at-one with the Father; and we can then truly say, "Go, and sin no more," as the Master said in freeing the sinful woman. We are sure that this woman was regenerated; and as we gain somewhat the vision of the Father's tenderness which Jesus had, we shall feel with certainty that those for whom we may be working in Science will also be regenerated, and will go forth to express purity and goodness.

The many stories in the Sundial Column of The Christian Science Monitor telling of the loving-kindness expressed by one person to another, show how this idea of the tenderness of God as revealed by Christ Jesus and again discerned and demonstrated by the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, Mary Baker Eddy, is leavening human consciousness.

The millennium presented by Isaiah in the prophecy, "The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them," depicts the reign of tenderness, of omnipotent Love. Each one of us can hasten this by ever tenderly thinking of, and dealing kindly with, our fellow-men, and with the lesser creatures as well. The hate and animality seemingly presented by mortals, and the carnivorousness of the beasts, are only the seeming absence of the tenderness of God; and they will disappear before the steadfast realization of the loving and tender fatherhood and motherhood of God.

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