Article November 7, 1988 Issue

Number one for one and all

In the jostle to be better than others are we losing sight of the fact that each of God's children is perfect, spiritual?

Sylvester Mouyale

Do you ever feel that those around you are all "number one" and you are second best? Humanly, not everyone wears the crown of success. Yet Christ Jesus explains how real success is to be gained—and this is true for all and can be gained by all. In Mark we read his message: "If any man desire to be first, the same shall be last of all, and servant of all."^{Mark 9:35.}

To accept feelings of inferiority to others is to believe that God plays favorites—that He has given more good to one of His children than to another. This state of thought is corrected as we understand God's universal, impartial love for all His creation and recognize that each individual's purpose is divine.

The Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, Mary Baker Eddy, speaks of this in her book Pulpit and Press: "Is not a man metaphysically and mathematically number one, a unit, and therefore whole number, governed and protected by his divine Principle, God?" Then she helps us see the importance of each individual: "You have simply to preserve a scientific, positive sense of unity with your divine source, and daily demonstrate this. Then you will find that one is as important a factor as duodecillions in being and doing right, and thus demonstrating deific Principle."^{Pul., p. 4.}