Article May 4, 1992 Issue

Being faithful to what we're entrusted with

Our most sacred trusts deserve and require a faithfulness that cannot be shaken or forsaken.

Cynthia Howland

Across the street from my office is a modest house. It is the immaculately kept home of a woman who was entrusted with the monies of the parish. As bookkeeper she paid the bills, made deposits, and managed the financial affairs. Her fellow members were devastated when it came out that this hard-working and well-respected mother had stolen from the church accounts more than half a million dollars during an eighteen-month period. Authorities discovered that she had given almost every penny of the money to her son, who, in collusion with his wife, spent it on drugs, trips, cars, and extravagance of every sort.

This case has been instructive. It showed how love untempered with wisdom is vulnerable to manipulation.

One thing that stood out to me from this incident was that we have a charge to be what God made man to be. The Bible speaks of man as made in the "image and likeness" of God, but this likeness has been generally understood to be mortal and material. Christian Science understands that the image of God must be like God. And since God is Spirit, since He is Truth, and Life, and Love, this likeness is truthful, perfect, sinless, whole, and entirely spiritual. God didn't make man to be His unlikeness, to be a mortal wrongdoer. We have to prove this fact and work to rid ourselves of what is unlike God so that what is good and true can flourish to His glory.

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