Turning to God with Confidence
Everyone wants a way of life that triumphs over disease, lack, failure. Christ Jesus, by precept and example, showed us how it is to be achieved. He lived perpetually conscious of his spiritual identity as God's Son, and he turned to God with complete confidence and expectation for the healing answer in every situation, whether it was to feed the hungry or raise the dead.
God's purpose for each one unfolds as we are ready to take each step. It manifests itself in precise direction, perfect order, unrestricted progress. "Prove me now herewith, saith the Lord of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it." Mal.3:10 ;
A single proof of God's allness proves the Science of His allness, and opens our thought to a greater understanding of Him, so that we turn to Him with increasing confidence. Evidences of divinity in our lives establish and expand our consciousness of God's presence, His infinite goodness, His love for His children, and the dominion He gives them.
God is Love, and Love does not forsake or neglect its own or place them in a realm outside its care. Nor can Love's children be lost in a vacuum. God could not be unaware of the very expression, the emanation, of Himself.
Man lives and has his being in God. We can prove this step by step through deep, conscientious study and prayer, and by unwavering trust in Love's care. In the proving, we lose the false sense of man as mortal and rise in the glorious assurance that he is spiritual. With every step we take upward in our emergence from darkness to light, from ignorance to understanding, mortal mind, or false material consciousness, loses credibility and attraction.
In the human scene, we sometimes come up against difficulties that would steal away our joy, disturb our peace, threaten and intimidate us. These are times to turn wholeheartedly and confidently to God, listen for His direction, trust His love, then hasten to do His will. There is no greater joy than to feel God's love leading us in the right path.
The illness that seems prolonged and unyielding does not become more real, more unyielding, with time. Time, being a mortal measurement, has no power to obstruct or delay healing, since health is the changeless condition of man, God's image. There is never a break in this continuity.
The business problem that seems stalled, the human relationship that defies solution, do not become insoluble because they have persisted over a period of time, even years. When the problem is removed from the time element, exposed to the light of Truth, the solution will appear and the need be met. This is not a glib statement. It is provable fact.
The Bible admonishes: "Cast not away therefore your confidence, which hath great recompence of reward. For ye have need of patience, that, after ye have done the will of God, ye might receive the promise." Heb. 10:35,36 ; We do the will of God when we confidently take our stand for Truth and refuse to be moved by the arguments of material sense.
A recent instantaneous healing in Christian Science points up this fact. I had experienced constant pain in my arm and shoulder, and days of consecrated prayer had failed to bring healing. The insidious suggestion that this condition might trouble me indefinitely and that I might have to learn to live with it nagged at the back of my thought.
Mrs. Eddy states in Science and Health, "Unfathomable Mind is expressed." Science and Health, p. 520 . I reasoned that unfathomable Mind, being expressed, had to include my perfection, which could in no way be circumvented, disturbed, or delayed. I recalled numerous healings of my own and of others. While this brought encouragement, it did not break the mesmeric belief of sensation and substance in matter.
One morning, a great surge of urgency filled me. I declared with every ounce of strength I possessed, "I will not move from this desk until there is a change in my thought!" Apparently I recognized that the error had been in my thought—that it was there that the healing had to take place and would take place.
In less time than it takes me to write it, the assurance of God's love for me flooded my consciousness. I heard myself say, "Why, God loves me!" And I knew without a shadow of doubt that He did. All sense of weariness vanished and with it all pain and discouragement. I saw with absolute clarity that my freedom had been there all along, undiminished, undisturbed, safe in the Father's care.
In that time of clear knowing, standing on the mountain top, I saw that in God's world of imperishable goodness all His children are forever safe and beloved. I have since proved this to be true many times. Whenever and wherever we confidently seek Him with our whole heart, He will be found. We can know this and be joyful.
