How often we hear someone say, "You've got to face the facts," meaning you've got to face up to reality; you must be practical and deal with the situation on that basis. It's good advice—if you understand what the facts really are.

For example, we get information from many sources—but can we rely on it? We can all think of instances when the five senses have been fooled by appearances, and friends or associates may be mistaken. How do we determine the "real" facts?

Christian Science helps us answer this question; it shows us that the only true facts are spiritual. It explains that God, who is infinite Spirit, can create only that which partakes of His nature. Therefore, God's manifestation, His man, is spiritual; he is not a physical creature. And there's nothing more practical than relying on the fact that God, good, is All when you understand why this is so. This understanding is gained through letting spiritual sense, not the material senses, guide our thinking.

Even though it appears to be real and substantial, materiality—being the opposite of spirituality —has never been a fact of creation and never can be. Believing existence is material is believing a lie about a fact. This believing is the source of all that would make us afraid. We need to disbelieve the suggestion that existence is filled with disease and danger. We need to trust Spirit's care for its own.

The five material senses claim to give us the truth of ourselves, but, not being of Spirit, they cannot present truth. They must be no more than an illusion, a self-deceptive belief that matter has intelligence. This state of a supposed matter-based consciousness, or mortal mind, as it is termed in Christian Science, is the supposed opposite of the one immortal Mind, Spirit. It holds in itself all wrong beliefs about God, man, and the universe. As we're willing to give up these false views, to reach out and grasp the true concept of all things, we find ourselves letting go of fear, selfishness, envy, depression, and sorrow.

To see the universe as spiritual, as the creator conceived it, is to face the fact of universal good. This brings a wonderful sense of release, the beginning of a spiritual rebirth, an appreciation of all that is evidence of God's goodness, here on earth. We find there's nothing to fear in Truth, the one infinite Spirit, in which "we live, and move, and have our being," ^{Acts 17:28.} as St. Paul told the men at Athens. This fact, realized, frees us from bondage to false concepts.

We find our true health and happiness in expressing the spiritual qualities of our real being as sons and daughters of God. False, material sense cannot blind us to the good that comes from God when we acknowledge our Father-Mother as the only source of power and mentally hold firm to this truth.

In facing the facts, we are recognizing and claiming the presence of divine power, the very power Christ Jesus knew made possible his healing work. This power is as available today as it was then, and it always will be. Spiritual truth is eternal. Time cannot touch it. Jesus proved this when he healed the man who had been a cripple for thirty-eight years, the woman who had had an abnormal flow of blood for twelve years, even Lazarus, who had been dead four days. ^{See John 5:1–9; Matt. 9:20–22; John 11:1–44 .} The fact of their spiritual wholeness was brought to light on the human scene through the divine Life that Jesus was expressing. The power of the Christ was the impetus of Jesus' work, "healing all manner of sickness and all manner of disease among the people." ^{Matt. 4:23.}

Jesus wasn't deceived by the mistaken sense that would have us believe we live in matter instead of in Spirit. He consistently lived spiritual qualities. He was truly the Son of the Father, divine Spirit. And yet, giving the glory entirely to God, he humbly said, "The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do." ^{John 5:19.} He taught the people the facts of God's love and of man's unity with Him. Our gratitude for the Master's ministry should reach to the heavens.

Profound gratitude for the Master is evident in the efforts of the Discoverer of Christian Science, Mrs. Eddy From childhood she loved the Bible, and she constantly turned to it for spiritual enrichment. The vicissitudes of her human experience through more than four decades were disciplining her thought to rely on nothing but God to sustain her. At a point of near despair regarding her health, she opened her Bible to an account of one of Jesus' healing works. She tells us: "As I read, the healing Truth dawned upon my sense; and the result was that I rose, dressed myself, and ever after was in better health than I had before enjoyed. That short experience included a glimpse of the great fact that I have since tried to make plain to others, namely, Life in and of Spirit; this Life being the sole reality of existence." ^{Miscellaneous Writings, p. 24.}

This spiritually-minded woman then applied herself to finding and proving the Science, or demonstrable laws, that she was convinced must be the basis of Jesus' cures. What she was proving was the deceptive nature of matter; in fact, its unreality. As radical as this fact was, the example of Christ Jesus gave her the courage to face it, live it, and proclaim it to the world in the textbook of Christian Science, Science and Health.

In this book we read her statement "The spiritual reality is the scientific fact in all things." ^{Science and Health, p. 207.} Anyone who accepts the truth of this statement can prove it step by step. But we must be prepared to leave the material basis of mortal thinking and start from the fact of Spirit as All-in-all. Then the true idea of Life, God—the saving Christ—takes over in our consciousness. Wrong concepts are eliminated, and we feel the joy and peace of the healing truth. Man's rightful dominion asserts itself over false beliefs. Just as humanly we can see ourselves in a mirror, in the mirror of Science we see our incorporeal selfhood, the pure reflection of Spirit. We see ourselves as God's image. We are facing the fact, not the lie, about man. Divine Love gives us the courage to live this truth of our being, in spite of what the physical senses are saying.

Gradually, as we learn more of the Science of Christianity, we can prove that life is not mortal, as it seems to be, but spiritually immortal, entirely good, maintained by our loving Father-Mother.

In a time of need a few years ago, I was able to prove in a modest way how practical it is to have an understanding of spiritual facts. After a busy morning attending to household chores, I decided to bring in the dry washing from the line and to walk to the shops for some errands. As I started to bound down the steps, my foot slipped over the edge of the second step and I fell heavily, twisting my ankle. In severe pain, for a few moments I crouched on the concrete. Then, summoning spiritual strength, I faced the facts as I'd learned them in Christian Science. I told myself, out loud and with vehemence, that I wasn't an injured mortal. In truth I was God's immortal idea, free from any belief in pain or hurt. A false sense of my real identity couldn't make me believe otherwise.

It was a struggle not to give in to the physical evidence, but I persevered. The spiritual fact of my incorporeal wholeness, given and maintained by God, who is Love, Spirit, became uppermost in my thinking. "Well, since you know that you are God's idea," I told myself, "what are you doing, still huddled on the ground?" I rose and slowly made my way up the garden steps to the line.

Feeling freer every minute, I gathered in the washing, folded it, tidied myself, then set off for the shops about a mile away. By this time I was almost completely free of any painful sensation in the ankle. My heart was singing with praise and joy as I strode along. There was no further evidence of injury. Facing the facts and claiming their power and presence in my life had brought healing.

Ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.

Galatians 3:26–28