Article August 31, 1940 Issue

Perfection

RAYMOND D. HEINE

The great need of the world today is for a better understanding of God and of man's relationship to Him. Men try in various ways to improve human conditions. Their concepts of what they are accomplishing differ according to individual experience. However, all will agree that without health and harmony there is little joy, even in our human sense of good. Lack of understanding of God, and of man made in His image and likeness, prevents the realization of right desires.

Christian Science clearly explains the unity of God and man; and all who study its textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mary Baker Eddy, may obtain an understanding of this fact. The truth about God and man is so simple that even young children readily grasp its meaning and apply it in their experiences. The Bible indicates that God is Mind, Truth, Love, and that He is good. We also learn in the first chapter of Genesis—that chapter which gives the spiritual record of creation—of man made in the image and likeness of God. Jesus, in his Sermon on the Mount, admonished all mankind, "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect." We need to claim our true selfhood; by so doing, through all our changing experiences, spiritual power will operate to establish harmony in our lives. Man, as the reflection of God, expresses God's perfect qualities in unlimited measure.

A study of the life of Jesus shows that he overcame all the arguments of the material sense through his understanding of God and of man's relationship to Him. In Science and Health (pp. 476, 477) Mrs. Eddy says of Jesus' ability to heal: "Jesus beheld in Science the perfect man, who appeared to him where sinning mortal man appears to mortals. In this perfect man the Saviour saw God's own likeness, and this correct view of man healed the sick." These statements indicate the necessity of our knowing the truth about God, because without this knowledge it would be impossible for us to have "this correct view of man."

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