Article July 31, 1943 Issue

God-derived Power

KATE W. BUCK

A Student of Christian Science, while reading the familiar statement, "My soul, wait thou only upon God: for my expectation is from him." began to wonder if she was really practicing obedience to that demand, which, in the reading, had brought a sense of confidence and peace. Was she looking trustfully to God and expecting all needful good from Him alone, or was she looking to persons, to material things and possessions, to supply her wants and desires? An honest answer to her questioning brought humiliation and disappointment through awakening her to see that her good intentions, coupled with a rather smug belief that she was approximating divine requirements, were not sincere. As she shook off her chagrin, there was born a determination to watch out and do better. This uncovering therefore proved to be a saving grace.

The urge to better things in the glorious fight to overcome unworthiness is a never-failing prompter to all who truly seek to obey the First Commandment and to trust the power of an all-wise, all-loving creator to meet every need of His offspring. Success is assured the very instant that one becomes conscious of the presence and power of God as the sole reality of existence. All Life, intelligence, Truth, Love, power, must needs be God-derived, since there is no other universal cause. Man and the universe naturally derive all the sustenance and activity they have directly from God—apart from Him, nothing at all is since He is all-inclusive Being.

One definition of the word "derive" is "to proceed from;" and in "Unity of Good" by Mary Baker Eddy is found this powerful and reassuring message (p. 6): "Sooner or later the whole human race will learn that, in proportion as the spotless selfhood of God is understood, human nature will be renovated, and man will receive a higher selfhood, derived from God, and the redemption of mortals from sin, sickness, and death be established on everlasting foundations." Perfect individual Life and perfect functioning of that Life are independent of anybody's thought or belief about them. Individual being is individual identity. The Father would be unidentified without the son, and the son would have no existence without the Father. When thought is lifted to the true state of being, it expresses spiritual sense instead of material sense, or false belief, and this spiritual sense is what Paul referred to as "the mind of Christ."

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