Article November 20, 1954 Issue

THE SUFFICIENCY AND EFFICACY OF GRACE

MARY E. COOK

As Moses tended the sheep of his father-in-law in the wilderness, his dearest desire must have been for the liberation of the children of Israel from the bondage of Pharaoh. Evidently it was years of constant prayer that enabled him to turn aside more and more fully from the evidence of the senses to proofs of God's presence. He gained the necessary grace to hear God's directives and to be strong enough to follow them. He was told that God would go with him and be his voice. In the Biblical story of the wanderings of Moses and the children of Israel we find that in every crisis they were given sufficient grace to meet every need, no matter how overwhelming it appeared to be.

The grace that was so abundantly available then is at hand to help in the same way today. Mary Baker Eddy writes in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 67), "Grace and Truth are potent beyond all other means and methods." Mrs. Eddy, like Moses, yearned for the liberation of men from the bondage of false beliefs, and her great love is shown in her unselfed efforts to make plain to them the way of salvation. Every student of Christian Science can learn to prove in his own experience that "grace and Truth are potent beyond all other means and methods;" and he can help others to gain their freedom.

Grace is a free, spontaneous, and unlimited quality of Soul. It is the irradiant reflection of divine Love. Its presence is evident in spiritual light, graciousness, tenderness, strength, in the myriad qualities that constitute Mind's ideas. Grace is not to be gained by striving for it through human will. It is a gift from God. It becomes evident through prayer—deep, earnest, importunate. In "Miscellaneous Writings" Mrs. Eddy says (p. 127), "When a hungry heart petitions the divine Father-Mother God for bread, it is not given a stone,—but more grace, obedience, and love." Grace and humility pierce the veil, or mist, of mortal conceit, which hides God's omnipresence and effulgence; and they heal our blindness to spiritual reality.

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