To earnest Christians of every age and clime the glorious fact of Christ Jesus' resurrection has brought untold blessing and consolation, comfort for the present, and hope for the future. To students of Christian Science the resurrection means all this, and more, for Christian Science has revealed the full meaning of the demonstration our Master made not only for himself, but for all mankind.

The resurrection of Jesus is more than the overcoming of beliefs of matter as substance, more than the vanquishing of death, more than the divine assurance of the eternality of good. It is the great regenerating truth proclaimed by Paul to the Colossians (Col. 3:3), "For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God." The old, the unreal concept of self, is being dispelled through the knowledge that it has never really existed because it is not of God's creating.

A student of Christian Science was once reminded of this truth when a loved one passed on. The practitioner from whom she asked help sought to turn the student's thought away from the dark shadows which seemed to have been cast over her days. "I know that this experience is unreal," said the student, "but its shadows keep impinging on my consciousness."

"But you are not there, that is, your true selfhood is not in matter," replied the practitioner. "Your 'life is hid with Christ in God,' where no shadows can ever come."

The realization of this fact at the time was sufficient to lift the student's consciousness into the light of God's eternal day.

Years later the same message came to the student when she was struggling with an overwhelming sense of resentment, disappointment, and jealousy. She had striven valiantly not only to put ugly thoughts out of consciousness, but to keep them out. She tried to realize man's immunity from hurt, and to forgive those she believed had caused her to suffer. At times it would seem as though the victory were accomplished, but, when least expected, the thoughts of jealousy and resentment would return, perhaps at a church service or in the quietness of the night, robbing her of peace.

"Why do I have to struggle like this! " she cried. Then she saw that it was because she believed in an unhappy past. Because of certain traits which had been identified with her by her friends and relations, and which she had accepted as personal characteristics, she had been seeing herself as a jealous, passionate being whose life had always been subject to violent emotional storms.

She turned to God, the ever-present Mind, omnipotent good, to show her how to overcome this seemingly tenacious and weighty sense of error. The words spoken to her long ago came back to her with renewed meaning: "You are not there... Your 'life is hid with Christ in God.'"

A great sense of peace flooded her consciousness when she no longer saw herself as the prey of emotions, as the victim of unlovely thoughts. She recognized that her false concept of self was dead: that her true selfhood was one with Christ; that her consciousness was had with Christ in infinite good. She further realized that the true man, dwelling in divine consciousness, could not be assailed by false suggestions or identified with false concepts. No machinations of mortal mind could enter that holy place where she eternally dwelt.

At last she was able to use with authority the words of Christ Jesus, "Get thee behind me. Satan" (Matt. 16:23), and to see good triumph over evil. Then there swept into her thought the joyous truth proclaimed by the Apostle Paul in Romans 8:1,2. To her it meant no condemnation: no erroneous concept about herself or others; no sensibilities to hurt or to be hurt.

To Mary Baker Eddy is due the world's gratitude for her discovery of Christian Science, and for her selfless, unremitting toil, which brought forth her book, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures." In this textbook of Christian Science she says (pp. 288, 289): "The eternal Truth destroys what mortals seem to have learned from error, and man's real existence as a child of God comes to light. Truth demonstrated is eternal life. Mortal man can never rise from the temporal débris of error, belief in sin, sickness, and death, until he learns that God is the only Life." This is the scientific way, and the only way whereby error is completely destroyed. This is the true resurrection.

To those who may feel discouraged or disappointed, who may feel they are fighting an uneven battle with temptation; to those who may fear that outgrown beliefs of ill-health or of sin may return; to those who are striving to throw off bad habits grown tenacious from long indulgence—to all such Christian Science speaks its message of cheer and encouragement. It reaffirms the words of the Master (John 5:24). "He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life."

Thus it is that mortals are able to cast off the clinging graveclothes of error, the false sense of self, and step forth into the sunlight of Truth, knowing that man is the pure, unfallen child of God. Mrs. Eddy says in one of her messages to branch churches (The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, p. 191), "This glad Easter morning witnesseth a risen Saviour, a higher human sense of Life and Love, which wipes away all tears." And she continues farther on: "Spirit is saying unto matter: I am not there, am not within you. Behold the place where they laid me; but human thought has risen!"

Man, the true selfhood, the pure reflection of God's being, was never a finite person. The unreal concept of self cannot cast a shadow from the past into the future of that life which is "hid with Christ in God." Paul writes (II Cor. 5:17). "Old things are passed away"—old beliefs, old sins, old mistakes, all that claims to constitute the counterfeit self—"behold, all things are become new."

Copyright, 1946, by The Christian Science Publishing Society, One, Norway Street, Boston 15, Massachusetts. Entered at Boston post office as second-class matter. Acceptance for mailing at a special rate of postage provided for in section 1103, Act of October 3, 1917, authorized on July 11. 1918. Published every Saturday. Cost of remailing within the United States: 1 cent for each two ounces or fraction thereof. Foreign, including Canada, Newfoundland, and Pan-American countries; 1½ cents for each two ounces or fraction thereof.