Few, if any, invitations throughout history have resulted in quite the response Christ Jesus has received to his call "Follow me." ^{See Matt. 16:24;}

For centuries, people have left behind other interests in an effort to follow this call. But how to follow in the most meaningful way has always been seen by those who love what Christ Jesus taught and want to let the Christ lead them. We need to understand just what it means to relinquish everything and follow Christ.

Touching on this wide-ranging question, Mrs. Eddy refers to a point Jesus made in his Sermon on the Mount: "More than profession is requisite for Christian demonstration. Few understand or adhere to Jesus' divine precepts for living and healing. Why? Because his precepts require the disciple to cut off the right hand and pluck out the right eye,—that is, to set aside even the most cherished beliefs and practices, to leave all for Christ." ^{Science and Health, p. 141;}

Simply parting with people or places or things will not in and of itself free us to follow. The real demand is one that brings a great deal of joy into our lives; it is the willingness to leave behind materialistic attitudes and thoughts for deeper spiritual qualities that are virtuous, pure—Christly. Christians need first a fundamental recognition that man is the perfect reflection of God, eternally inseparable from Him: that man is wholly spiritual, and that the Christ is made manifest in man's pure spirituality—a fact Jesus so thoroughly demonstrated.

What practical steps can be taken to move more effectively toward the Christ and relinquish more fully whatever would hold us back? There are few activities that don't give us at least some opportunity each day to abandon whatever is unchristly. What about a bit of gossip we may pick up? Do we give it fertile mental ground to grow and spread, or do we let it die by refusing to water it with our curiosity and interest?

We can lay chatter and rumor aside and move toward a Christliness that acknowledges the allness of divine Principle and its pure idea, man, instead of placing an emphasis on finite personality. And what about those instances when someone does or says something that might ordinarily offend us? Do we have the Christ-impelled stamina to refuse reaction and to demonstrate Love's supremacy?

If we really are serious about leaving all for Christ, we won't miss the opportunity to begin shedding doubts and fears, angers and frustrations, selfishness and thoughtlessness. We will desert such elements for the more Christly characteristics of spirituality: goodness, perceptiveness, integrity.

These are radical requirements. But only by following them can we actually demonstrate the Science of Christ. "I cannot be a Christian Scientist except I leave all for Christ,"  ^{The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, p. 138;} confessed Mrs. Eddy. It is not too large an order to join her in such an honest admission.

Each day we can take an important step in fulfilling this goal. Such fidelity implies something quite different from being a fanatical religionist. As we deepen our desire to surrender all for Christ and begin cultivating purity, joy, spiritual intelligence, we are step by step demonstrating man's real selfhood.

By leaving facets of mortality behind, we are not giving up goodness or life, substance or peace. We are actually finding a much firmer basis for existence. We are sacrificing all that is not our true selfhood; and increasingly demonstrating something of a genuine relationship to God—our true sonship."  ^{See Science and Health 331:28-31 .}

All of us, whether we've admitted it or not, have an inherent longing to express more of man's eternal nature as God's perfect child, made in His image. Leaving all for Christ does not disrupt our sense of home and family and work. It brings stability and fulfillment to normal human activities. Yet it does more. It opens our view to substance and identity and action—the reality of being. As we depart from mortal concepts, we see much beyond what the limited material senses reveal of existence.

Our true selfhood is beautifully Christly. Real being is the true idea of God, undistorted by ignorance or fear. Jesus was not an impractical man. His goals were thoroughly realistic. He demonstrated man's true selfhood—the Christ, genuine sonship with God. He revealed the pathway that all ultimately must take in winning a full sense of true being.

As we refresh our gratitude for the birth of Jesus this Christmas, we can remind ourselves that every individual on earth will finally discover the Christ, his genuine selfhood as the eternal idea of God. We can speed this time for the world by doing a more vigorous job today of leaving all for Christ.

NATHAN A. TALBOT

Ye . . . have taught . . . as the truth is in Jesus:
that ye put off concerning the former conversation
the old man,
which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts;
and be renewed in the spirit of your mind;
and that ye put on the new man,
which after God
is created in righteousness and true holiness.
Ephesians 4:21-24