When "a certain rich man" in the parable was faced with a surplus harvest, the only remedy he could think of was to build greater barns in which to store his harvest. Because rigid selfishness barred the way, the thought of sharing it with others did not occur to him. "So is he that layeth up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God."

How is it possible to be "rich toward God"? How can the recipient be rich toward the Giver? Jesus' life of obedience to the Father and selfless devotion to humanity gives the answer. Likewise does the life of Mary Baker Eddy. Instead of storing away the heavenly, healing vision which had come to her, she lavishly shared it through her healing work, her writings, her class teaching, and her establishment of the organization. As a result, Christian Science is carrying its message of healing and redemption to the ends of the earth.

We are "rich toward God" through loving and living the teachings of Christian Science, and through our readiness to "speak a word in season to him that is weary." We should be poor in receiving and in giving if the main purpose of our study should be to benefit ourselves. We multiply the riches of spiritual understanding through proving the healing power of Truth on behalf of individuals. We further multiply our riches by constant true thinking for the general good. Thus we avoid the possibility of selfishly hoarding the verities of being we are perceiving in the "barn" of our consciousness, by confining our efforts to demonstrating harmony and healing for ourselves and our immediate environment. It is essential that each Christian Scientist should bring out harmony in his own experience and his own home. This he may the more readily accomplish by dwelling on the government of universal Love on behalf of all humanity, and, with this end in view, keeping himself well informed as to its unfolding needs.

Then again, the organization of Christian Science provides for endless sharing. Strangers oppressed by defined or undefined needs are drawn to the services in our churches. They look there for the love and unity, the health and harmony, which may have been missing in their own lives. Newcomers are apt to receive their first impressions of Christian Science teaching according to the behavior of Christian Scientists, and this is reasonable. Those who know little about real happiness or prosperity are quickened and encouraged when they see the divine nature expressed through others in health, purity, harmony, and loving-kindness. Hope is born anew in them as they learn that every gift of God is available to them, and that Christian Science enables one to prove this fact.

At the close of our services, may not our eyes seek out those who, about to leave the church with loneliness in their hearts, greatly need a word of encouragement and love? Our primal purpose is not to draw those in trouble to ourselves, nor to our church in order to increase the attendance. Our primal purpose is to draw them to God, the one Giver of good, with the assurance that they will be spiritually enriched and comforted as we ourselves have been. "Love ye therefore the stranger: for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt."

We are "rich toward God" in so far as we give evidence of the unity of good in our churches. As fellow members and fellow workers in the one vineyard, we need to remember that "charity begins at home." We need to be rich in love toward one another, forbearing, full of faith in goodness, true-hearted, in order that we as Christian Scientists may invariably present a united front in contrast to the strife and division prevalent in the world. Human differences there may be among Christian Scientists, but these differences weigh nothing in the scale with the understanding of Truth which unites them in the bond of perfectness. When writing to members of the Laodicean church, as recorded in Colossians, Paul speaks of their being "knit together in love," and refers to "all riches of the full assurance of understanding."

These riches of spiritual understanding, utilized for the general good, give promise of world-wide fruitage, "for the same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon him." In proportion as members of the Christian Science church meet the needs of others through their own consecrated lives, their churches' needs and their own needs will be abundantly supplied. When the desire to share the benefits of Christian Science is really awakened, the means for its right expression will appear. "A faithful man shall abound with blessings."

In the consciousness of the alert, active Christian Scientist there is no sense of frigidity or narrowness; there is a constantly clearer outlook which embraces the healing of the nations, a constantly widening view of the perfection of being. Thus are the riches of God bountifully manifested in human experience. In her article on "Harvest" (The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, p. 269) our Leader writes: "This hour is molten in the furnace of Soul. Its harvest song is world-wide, world-known, world-great."

Violet Ker Seymer