Article December 16, 1967 Issue

Being "present with the Lord"

HERBERT F. BIRTWISTLE

In an Epistle to the Corinthians, St. Paul makes a statement which is of great significance to the student of Christian Science. It reads: "We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord."^{II Cor. 5:8;}

Since, as Christian Science teaches, we are the spiritual children of God, we are in reality always "present with the Lord." There is nowhere else for us to be, for Spirit is omnipresent. What does this fact mean to us in terms of practical Christianity? In Science and Health, Mrs. Eddy writes: "To be 'present with the Lord' is to have, not mere emotional ecstasy or faith, but the actual demonstration and understanding of Life as revealed in Christian Science. To be 'with the Lord' is to be in obedience to the law of God, to be absolutely governed by divine Love,—by Spirit, not by matter."^{Science and Health, p. 14;}

Humanly speaking, we do not always feel that we are "present with the Lord," nor do we always give the impression that we are. On the contrary we often seem to be present with a finite and material sense of being, looking for small and personal pleasures in matter, for satisfaction in possessions and position, and trying to be competitively at least as good as our neighbor. Of this mean sense of soul, which is not our true sense of self at all, we must at some time rid ourselves. It is a false sense, which, if not denied, seems to shut us out from a great deal of good.

Send a comment to the editors

NEXT IN THIS ISSUE

Poem

THE COMING OF THE CHRIST