The Everlasting Strain

LENA HULME

Mrs. Eddy writes in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 568): "For victory over a single sin, we give thanks and magnify the Lord of Hosts. What shall we say of the mighty conquest over all sin? A louder song, sweeter than has ever before reached high heaven, now rises clearer and nearer to the great heart of Christ; for the accuser is not there, and Love sends forth her primal and everlasting strain."

The ages resound with the song of praise and thanksgiving to God for His deliverance, protection, guidance, and healing. Noah built an altar to the Lord to express his gratitude for deliverance from the desolating experiences of his time. Moses and the children of Israel sang, "and spake, saying, I will sing unto the Lord, for he hath triumphed gloriously."

How often we read in the New Testament that "they glorified God" after seeing, or experiencing, the unparalleled healing power manifested by Christ Jesus. He thanked God for the seven loaves and the few fishes, and was enabled to feed four thousand. Jesus reached sublime heights of gratitude by giving thanks for the cup, which he knew symbolized the cross he was to bear, before he drank of it. He gave thanks for the experience he knew awaited him in Gethsemane and on Calvary. What an example for us! It is easy to give thanks after release from the thralldom of sin, sickness, or lack, but it does not seem easy to do so while suffering from these erroneous beliefs. Obedience to the teachings of Christian Science makes it possible to follow our Way-shower. Adverse circumstances may be rightly regarded as opportunities to prove what we know about God. as occasions for rejoicing, not for sadness or self-pity. "God is ... a very present help in trouble," sang the Psalmist.

However difficult or distressing a situation may seem to be, it is not of God, neither is it a part of man, nor can it separate man for one moment from the love and care of the Father-Mother, God. Thought lifted in gratitude for this truth results in untold benefits, and often in complete and quick healing.

When founding the Christian Science church, Mrs. Eddy was divinely guided to establish a testimony meeting as a regular service of The Mother Church and its branches. At these meetings a suitable part of the time is allowed for the giving of testimonies to the healing and regenerating power of Christian Science. Who can measure the healing power radiating from these meetings? We know not how many suffering ones are relieved, how many sorrowing ones comforted, how many sin-enslaved ones glimpse the unsatisfying nature of evil and turn from it to God when they are touched by the rays of loving, grateful thoughts, expressed or unexpressed.

The same may be said for the annual Thanksgiving Day service. The Church Manual provides for it, and there is a Lesson-Sermon prepared for Thanksgiving in the Christian Science Quarterly. All Christian Science churches and societies are privileged to hold the Thanksgiving Day service. The deep glow of thanksgiving for innumerable benefits, care, and love during the year makes it a universally glad day, loosening the world's mesmeric belief in a power apart from God, that man in His image and likeness shall be revealed.

"More glorious still, as centuries roll,
New regions blest, new powers unfurled,
So Truth reveals the perfect whole,
Its radiance shall o'erflow the world,—

"Shall flow to bless but not destroy;
As when the cloudless lamp of day
Pours out its floods of light and joy,
And sweeps the lingering mist away."

Christian Scientists have a glorious heritage in their church services, one to be greatly cherished. No personal preaching or adulation enters to becloud the Word of God or prevent it from accomplishing that which He pleases, and prospering in the thing whereunto He sent it. "Thanks be unto God for his unspeakable gift"—Christian Science.

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