Article December 5, 1936 Issue

A Gaining Process

[Written Especially for Young People]

JOYCE HARRINGTON LUNDBERG

A young girl said to the writer not long ago, "I think there is a lot of good in Christian Science, but it seems that I shall have to give up so much if I become a student of this Science." No doubt she referred to worldly activities and undesirable habits which do not coincide with Christian Science. In the first place, let us understand once and for all time that there is not a single bit of good that we have to give up. Good is our heritage as the children of God. In fact, good is all that we can ever expect or receive from an infinitely good God, the only cause and creator. God does not ask that we should give up any good, and how happy we should be to give up all evil!

In walking up a stairway we do not reach the fifth step until we have taken the four steps preceding it. Because we have taken the first step we are able to take the second step, and so on. As we consciously live the good we have acquired at each step in our understanding, we find that we are dropping the false, in other words, outgrowing belief in the reality of evil. All the reality there is to evil, to false desire, is what we give it in belief.

In studying mathematics, we certainly should not make any headway if we spent our time wondering about the advanced rules of trigonometry before we had mastered the rules in simple arithmetic. We start with the simplest rules and study them until we can prove them by demonstration. Working out the simpler problems unfolds to us the way to work out the higher problems. So it is with the study of Christian Science. As we prove or demonstrate today the truth we understand, we are ready to understand more tomorrow. We find that as we put forth our efforts to this end, many things we once thought necessary to our happiness disappear, and perhaps without any conscious effort on our part.

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