Editorial February 25, 1991 Issue

Don't let the senses deceive you

Ann Kenrick

A friend of mine who is a pilot told me about "the vertigo effect" in flying. She said that the physical senses often tell you that your plane is climbing when the instruments show you that actually you are descending, and vice versa. If you are taken in by what the body is telling you, of course, you could be on your way to disaster. But pilots soon learn not to be deceived by the senses!

My friend, who is a Christian Scientist, finds this analogy especially helpful when she is piloting a small plane in thick clouds or in a storm. While she values the instruments in the aircraft for giving her a correct reading of the situation, she has frequently had to look beyond even them in order to know what to do in difficult situations. By turning to God in prayer and relying on her spiritual sense rather than the material senses to guide her, she has learned of God's wisdom and infallible direction, and this has kept her safe from harm.

If we would learn to fly, we have to trust ourselves to the air. We have to abandon accustomed earthbound modes of thought and find the determination and courage to leave solid earth and trust ourselves to a new dimension that our ordinary habits of thought would make us feel is unsafe and impractical. Similar intelligence and courage are needed if we are to find the true spiritual freedom that comes as we abandon our dependence on material sense to tell us what is true and use our God-given spiritual sense to reveal man's real nature as the child of God.

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February 25, 1991
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