After the children of Israel had been delivered from the pursuing Egyptians, they were so grateful that they sang praises to Almighty God for making their escape possible. Shortly thereafter they came to the wilderness of Shur and the waters of Marah. Here they found that they could not drink the waters, they were so bitter. However, God showed Moses a tree which, when cast into the waters, made them sweet and fit to drink.

Many of us today, when confronted by adversity, may taste the bitterness of mortal mind's frustrations. However, through an understanding of God in Christian Science, those of us who will may turn a bitter experience into a sweet one. Like the children of Israel, we may be tempted to react to a crisis by questioning God's ability to resolve human problems intelligently and justly. The Christ Science, however, has come to enthrone God, good, and His Christ in human consciousness. Bitterness and frustration may be proved to be unnecessary, unreal, and impotent. Having no place in the divine Principle, God, they have no place in His likeness, man.

Enthroning God, the one loving Mind, we dethrone personal sense, the illusion of many minds. We lay upon the altar of a higher worship our own egotism, impatience, and pride. We exchange the sophistry of intellect for the infallibility of divine revelation. We allow true spiritual perspective to express itself in applied integrity, applied meekness, and even applied cheerfulness.

Mrs. Eddy writes, "It is error even to murmur or to be angry over sin." ^{Science and Health, p. 369:} What to do, then, should we taste bitter water, see evil and its supposititious activity going unchecked? Does the Christian Scientist stand ineffectually by? No. He is always privileged to correct and deny evil's claim to power in his own thought. He may freely take a stand for what is right and have the moral courage to state his views, should need and wisdom so dictate. Upon the waters of bittering differences, he may cast the sweetness of God-bestowed faith and self-forgetfulness. He may humbly pray, even as Jesus did in Gethsemane, "O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt." ^{Matt, 26:39;}

It is easy for mortals to blame others for their bitter waters. The children of Israel murmured against Moses' leadership. Yet in a report of one of Mrs. Eddy's sermons an Editor of The Christian Science Journal says, "So, also, she spoke of the hades, or hell of Scripture, saying, that we make our own heavens and our own hells, by right and wise, or wrong and foolish, conceptions of God and our fellow-men." ^{Miscellaneous Writings, p. 170;}

Having the ability to make a heaven for oneself necessarily includes the ability to overcome disappointment when one doesn't have one's own way. To trust God is to trust Him all the way, beyond one's personal likes or dislikes. It is to strive to see the larger purpose in the divine plan.

Trusting God's complete control, acknowledging the power of His Christ to rule even within the so-called physical sphere, one is buoyant and free. One is not trusting God's control of human affairs if he keeps picking at a problem mentally. The spiritual sense that knows that all is well in heaven and in earth is relaxed in sweet confidence in God's goodness and control and cannot respond to bitterness. To trust God is to place oneself under the law of complete freedom, freedom to do His will, freedom to express more of one's own spiritual individuality and originality.

The bitter waters of mortal existence, the illusion of a life apart from God, are made sweet by spiritual truths. In the only real Life, the universe of Mind, there are no divisive wills, no thwarted aspirations. God's ideas are content, forever knowing fulfillment. As one allows spiritual truths to sweeten consciousness, he will not be tempted to challenge bitterness with more bitterness. Knowing that only good is real and active opens the door for limitless possibilities for good. As sons and daughters of God, who is Love, we are committed to glorify Him by being loving. Following the Christ-example Jesus has set for us, allowing all that is bitter to pass away, we take part in the sweetness of resurrection.

Throughout her writings Mrs. Eddy shows us how to sweeten the bitter waters of Marah. Nowhere do we find her blessed guidance more practically expressed than when, after speaking of the need of remembering the millions of different backgrounds of people, she says: "Then, we should go forth into life with the smallest expectations, but with the largest patience; with a keen relish for and appreciation of everything beautiful, great, and good, but with a temper so genial that the friction of the world shall not wear upon our sensibilities; with an equanimity so settled that no passing breath nor accidental disturbance shall agitate or ruffle it; with a charity broad enough to cover the whole world's evil, and sweet enough to neutralize what is bitter in it,—determined not to be offended when no wrong is meant, nor even when it is, unless the offense be against God." ^{p. 224 .}