Article March 1, 1952 Issue

WE MUST RISE HIGHER

J. BUROUGHS STOKES

It was a bleak November day as our plane prepared to take off. Soon the signal was flashed from the control tower; then we were roaring down the runway; now we were air-borne and in the midst of the black, menacing clouds which had blotted out the sun for several days. Suddenly the plane emerged through the clouds into a glorious, sun-drenched, cloudless sky. The clouds through which we had just risen no longer looked leaden and threatening. Observed from above, they appeared beautiful, like white, soft, feathery beds of down reflecting the sunshine. As we rose higher, no clouds obscured the sunlight, and we could see the distant countryside. With visibility clear our plane now speeded toward its goal.

What a magnificent lesson this was to a Christian Scientist who was aboard the plane! For here, vividly portrayed, was the answer to his problem: he must rise high above the evidence of the material senses into the spiritual realm of the real. He had allowed himself to become disturbed by the press of business activities. Although he had prayerfully turned to God for guidance and wisdom to direct his thought to unsee the so-called clouds of false responsibility, doubt, and lack of time which were hovering over him, the material sense of pressure seemed to increase when lie was asked to make a hurried trip by air to another part of the country. He was about to refuse, but suddenly a verse from Isaiah came to his thought (30:21): "Thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, This is the way, walk ye in it, when ye turn to the right hand, and when ye turn to the left." This was closely followed by the words of Mary Baker Eddy in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 574), "The very circumstance, which your suffering sense deems wrathful and afflictive, Love can make an angel entertained unawares."

Thanking God for these messages, the Scientist readily agreed to make the trip. And each step, from the time he boarded the plane until it had gained altitude and headed for its destination, became meaningful and helpful to him in the light of Christian Science.

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