Article February 11, 1956 Issue

WHAT IS YOUR THOUGHT OF GOD?

FLORENCE G. SCHELL

If individuals from different religious backgrounds and different walks of life were asked. "What is your thought of God?" probably each one would give a different answer. In her book "The People's Idea of God" Mary Baker Eddy writes of false concepts of God (p. 8), "If changeableness that repenteth itself; partiality that elects some to be saved and others to be lost, or that answers the prayer of one and not of another; if incompetency that cannot heal the sick, or lack of love that will not; if unmercifulness, that for the sins of a few tired years punishes man eternally, are our conceptions of Deity, we shall bring out these qualities of character in our own lives and extend their influence to others." How important, then, is a correct concept of God!

In Christian Science, God is defined as Mind, Spirit, Soul, Principle, Life, Truth, and Love. These terms are synonymous and reveal the changeless, impartial, infallible, and merciful nature of our heavenly Father.

The acceptance of this spiritual, scientific definition of Deity has a decided effect on the character of the individual. For instance, the understanding of God as Mind and of man as His spiritual idea begins at once to free thought of belief in a corporeal being, a belief which tends to bind mankind to matter and its limitations. With the concept of God as Soul, one sees through the material sense of existence and adopts into his thinking, and therefore into his living, the spiritual sense of man and his God-given dominion.

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