Article October 1, 1938 Issue

"The law of the possession of the land"

HENRY P. CAYLEY

The sufferings of the Israelites in Egypt, and the hardships that they encountered during their wanderings in the wilderness before entering the promised land, were due to their ignorance of God's law, or else to their failure to obey it. Bible history shows that tribulation invariably follows such ignorance and disobedience. As then, so today, it is axiomatic that in our human experience ignorance of or disobedience to God's law brings suffering; while intelligent adherence to law results in peace and harmony when this law is the law of God. And to some extent we experience harmony through our compliance with an improved sense of human law.

In the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," Mrs. Eddy defines "wilderness," in part, as "the vestibule in which a material sense of things disappears, and spiritual sense unfolds the great facts of existence" (p. 597). The wanderings of the Israelites in the wilderness and their eventual entry into the promised land are typical of humanity's experience through the ages. Today many thousands throughout the world are being guided into that promised land, "the land of Christian Science, where fetters fall and the rights of man are fully known and acknowledged" (ibid., pp. 226, 227). They are blessing the name of Mary Baker Eddy, that pure and loving woman who lived so close to God that she was enabled to reveal Him and His eternal law to all who are receptive to spiritual truth. As "the land of Christian Science" is entered, we find that the wilderness in which we may have suffered so much, and in which we may have wandered for so long, is indeed the vestibule leading into that "house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens."

We may therefore rightly look upon the time of wandering as a time of preparation; and many are grateful today because, through learning in Christian Science how to triumph over difficulties, they have found God. Our beloved Leader described the earlier part of her life as a time of preparation, when she wrote (ibid., p. 107): "In the year 1866, I discovered the Christ Science or divine laws of Life, Truth, and Love, and named my discovery Christian Science. God had been graciously preparing me during many years for the reception of this final revelation of the absolute divine Principle of scientific mental healing."

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