Article July 12, 1952 Issue

"RUNS GOOD"

MARVIN STEWART GILBERT

Painted on the windshield of a decrepit-looking automobile standing in a used-car lot were the words "Runs good." This grammatical slip brought to the thought of a passer-by a mistake he had often made—that of acting upon the notion that he "runs good." He had frequently planned with great zeal how he might bring about good in his own life or in the lives of others, to that illusion he had virtually set himself up as the one who would create the good and put it into operation. He appointed himself the very engineer of goodness, making himself responsible for it.

Christ Jesus had an answer for those who have the false impression that human beings run good when he said to one who had addressed him as "Good Master" (Matt. 19: 16), "Why callest thou me good? there is none good but one, that is, God." With gracious humility the Master stepped aside and pointed to God not only as the one source of all goodness, but as actually the only-good there is.

On page 3 of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" Mary Baker Eddy says, "We admit theoretically that God is good, omnipotent, omnipresent, infinite, and then we try to give information to this infinite Mind." The writer has found that in yielding to this temptation to give information to infinite Mind he has often been very generous, that is, he has attempted to give God the whole course of action designed along lines laid out by his so-called human mind. It seems to be a mortal failing to turn momentarily to God, infinite Mind, for guidance or for the supply of all good and then to outline the way this guidance is to be carried out or this good is to come. All this assumes that infinite intelligence is a bit weak at times and needs human support.

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