Article September 27, 1982 Issue

Throw out the "old rockin' chair"!

NANA WOLAVER

An old song begins, "Old rockin' chair's got me." ROCKIN' CHAIR Words and Music by Hoagy Carmichael © 1929, 1930 SOUTHERN MUSIC PUBLISHING CO., INC. © Renewed 1957, 1958 FRANK MUSIC CORP. International Copyright Secured. All Rights Reserved. Used By Permission. It implies that the singer has become so old and decrepit that all he can do is sit in his rocking chair and rock. This represents the world's belief that people become decrepit with age and lose their abilities and faculties until they can no longer care for their affairs or even themselves. This concept of man as material and aging is disproved by Christian Science.

We are told in Genesis, "God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him."^{Gen. 1:27.} If you look in a mirror, the image you see is exactly like you. In divine Science we see man imaging God, Life—eternal, ageless. This man, our true being, is the reflection of Mind, unending intelligence. Man is spiritual, the image of Spirit; he is not physical. Right now we can begin to know ourselves as in reality the man God knows—the eternal, whole, and unchanging expression of Himself. Thus we can turn away from the false concept of ourselves as material, aging, decrepit. We can recognize the reality of our spiritual substance, which is always at the point of perfection. In this way we throw out the "old rockin' chair" concept and put in its place the truth of man as God sees him.

Moses was a humble servant of God. His obedience enabled him to express, in a remarkable degree, the agelessness of his creator. The Bible tells us, "Moses was an hundred and twenty years old when he died: his eye was not dim, nor his natural force abated."^{Deut. 34:7.}

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