Article July 2, 1938 Issue

The Spiritual Nature of Substance

ROZIER BRUNDEGE

On page 468 of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" Mrs. Eddy writes, "Substance is that which is eternal and incapable of discord and decay." This statement rules matter out of the realm of substance, and leaves within this realm of the real only that which is spiritual or divinely mental. As students of Christian Science begin to understand this scientific fact, they transfer their interests and their hopes from the material to the spiritual; also their dependence for health, supply, and happiness. They have belief in the limited for understanding of the unlimited, the changing and discordant for the eternally perfect and harmonious.

One of the names for substance given by our Leader is Love. So, as we gain some measure of spiritual love we can truthfully say that this is substance which cannot decay; this is a glimpse of glory, a gleam of the never-failing light, a hint of heaven. And being uplifted by its holy influence, we feel something of the peace which passes understanding. Having left the insubstantial, we find the substantial and learn that the first was unreal, while the second is satisfyingly real and good.

In the epistle to the Hebrews we read of the voice that once shook the earth, proclaiming, "But now he hath promised, saying, Yet once more I shake not the earth only, but also heaven." The text continues, "And this word, Yet once more, signifieth the removing of those things that are shaken, ... that those things which cannot be shaken may remain." This prophecy of the destruction of all belief in that which is not truly substantial accords with the declaration of Jesus, "Every plant, which my heavenly Father hath not planted, shall be rooted up." Students of Christian Science rejoice in the blessed assurance that those things of the Spirit which cannot be shaken are the eternal realities of being. They know, further, that both the shaking and the shaken are only temporary experiences of the so-called human mind, which will ultimately be lost in the calm of changeless, all-encompassing Truth.

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