Article April 26, 1930 Issue

Praise and Thanksgiving

EDITH M. SHANK

Throughout the book of Psalms, praise to God is greatly emphasized; and, with the Psalmist, every consecrated Christian knows of a surety that "it is good to sing praises unto our God." That this spirit of praise and thanksgiving strikes a responsive chord in the heart of mankind is indicated by the fact that the Psalms are so frequently read by lovers of the Bible.

Students of Christian Science recognize the importance and necessity of obedience to the admonition repeatedly found in the Scriptures to praise God; and as they gain some clearer concept of the Supreme Being, they awaken to the fact that ritualistic worship of God does not beget true praise, for praise, is an affirmative state of thought inseparable from spiritual understanding. Through study of the Bible and the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mary Baker Eddy, they learn to discern, accept, and acknowledge God's allness and almightiness, with thanksgiving and songs of rejoicing. This is not necessarily audible or verbal praise, but a joyous consciousness of the omnipresence, omnipotence, and omniscience of God, good.

In considering the expressions of praise recorded in the Scriptures, it is found that they were frequently uttered by individuals who had turned away from serving gods many to the worship of the one true God. Moses, David, the prophets, and other noted characters of Biblical history, in marked contrast to the darkened thought of many in the periods in which they lived, discerned that there was one mighty power, which they designated as God; and they proclaimed their recognition of His supremacy in songs of praise. So, to-day, as down through the ages, every sincere seeker after the things of Spirit is rewarded by gaining a clearer and ever more definite knowledge of God, in comparison with which the value of all else is as naught. This quickened sense of the reality of true being and profound appreciation of the might, majesty, and glory of the creator result in a praiseful attitude of thought, an abiding consciousness of good, into which suggestions of evil cannot enter. Is not this spiritually rising to resist error as our beloved Leader repeatedly counsels us to do? The seeming reality of so-called mortal mind and its multifarious claims can be resisted and seen as nothing only by lifting thought to God, Spirit, and acknowledging His eternal supremacy.

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