Wrong number

Mary F. Broadwell-Barr

Have you ever made a phone call, maybe to your friend Billy, and heard a voice at the other end of the line say, "Wrong number. Billy doesn't live here"? Or maybe someone called your house, and you had to say, "Wrong number." You can say "Wrong number" if something tries to tell you that you are angry or sick or in trouble. You can say something like, "Wrong thoughts can't talk to me, because I am God's perfect child. There's no unhappy boy at this number."

One time a boy named Gary did a good job of talking back to a wrong thought (error) when it tried to call him. He was at the park playing ball with his friends when a bumblebee stung him. He became afraid and started to run home, but about halfway he remembered something he had learned in the Christian Science Sunday School. He had learned how to talk back to error with the truth that God gives us. So Gary said, "Why should I leave the ball game when we are having a good time? You can't talk to me, error, and I'm going right back and finish the game."

That was like saying, "You've got the wrong number" and hanging up. Gary went back to the game and never thought another thing about the hurt. The lump just went away, and that was the end of it.

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