Article October 13, 1980 Issue

Peck open that shell

ELIZABETH DE LOOS MEIJER

What would happen if a little bird didn't peck open its shell? It would never fly or sing. Until the bird cracks its shell, that enclosure is its entire world. However, when it makes the effort to emerge, the little bird finds its tiny world has disappeared and given place to a vast scene of trees, flowers, sky, and sun. No wonder it sings!

What about you and me? Do we accept the shell of mortality? Are we complacent in it, comfortable with the way things are? Or, if our world seems to be all wrong, do we think that we can't do much about it? Perhaps we have accepted the materialistic view of development, peak years, and eventual decline and emptiness. We can break open this limited concept with Christian Science, with the free and present knowledge of God and His eternal creation. We can glimpse a fresh, new world of useful ideas, available to all of us from God, here and now.

A sense of materiality is sometimes very subtle in its attempt to keep us from pecking open our own shell. In my own life, I had to break through a false sense of motherhood. A few years ago, one of my eyes troubled me. Although nothing could be found in my eye, pain and the feeling that a foreign object was lodged there persisted. I prayed about this for many months. One day I couldn't open my eye. I called a Christian Science practitioner to help me through prayer. She pointed out that whenever I spoke of my son, I emphasized the word "my." What I really needed to see, she said, was that he was God's child. I then caught a glimpse of the true fatherhood and motherhood of God. I saw that what I could do for this boy was to see what God had already done for him as his divine Parent. By letting go of the false, material sense of man, I pecked open the shell of material motherhood with the spiritual understanding of God. Then I was healed of the eye problem— which was really an "I" problem. False responsibility and pride faded. Mrs. Eddy says, "Fixing your gaze on the realities supernal, you will rise to the spiritual consciousness of being, even as the bird which has burst from the egg and preens its wings for a skyward flight." Science and Health, p. 261;

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October 13, 1980
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