Article June 18, 1955 Issue

THE IMMEDIATE ANSWER TO HOPELESSNESS

ROBERT DOLLING WELLS

A child may look at an arithmetic problem he has labored to solve, and say: "It is hopeless. I just cannot do that." But the teacher knows better and shows him how he can solve it. Sometimes unyielding problems in human experience seem to defy all our best efforts —the sickness, sin, and distress remain apparently untouched by all our courage and yearning for the truth. But this happens when our vision is not wholly clear, when the actual, spiritual situation is not understood. There is always a healing answer. This is the message of Christian Science to the world.

Mary Baker Eddy writes in "Pulpit and Press" (pp. 3, 4): "Perchance some one of you may say, 'The evidence of spiritual verity in me is so small that I am afraid. I feel so far from victory over the flesh that to reach out for a present realization of my hope savors of temerity. Because of my own unfitness for such a spiritual animus my strength is naught and my faith fails.' O thou 'weak and infirm of purpose.' Jesus said, 'Be not afraid'!" And she continues farther on: "Who lives in good, lives also in God,—lives in all Life, through all space. His is an individual kingdom, his diadem a crown of crowns. His existence is deathless, forever unfolding its eternal Principle."

The immediate answer to hopelessness is a simple one. It is to appreciate all the evidences in human experience of divine Life and of the kingdom of heaven. It is to enjoy the spiritual good we now recognize and to endeavor to discern more. Gratitude and hope are necessary because they help to clear the vision, to open the way for healing. There is always a way out of trouble, a way to the joy of present achievement. Hopelessness and ingratitude are dark clouds. We need a clear sky and an open view.

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