Article June 10, 1996 Issue

The torch of spiritual understanding

Margaret Coleman Brown Poyser

In earlier days it was a common sight at twilight to see a lamplighter with his torch going through the town lighting street lamps for others to see by. This is one image that comes to thought when the word torch is used to symbolize a means of spreading enlightenment and inspiration. Referring to spiritual enlightenment as humanity's great need, Mary Baker Eddy observes in Science and Health: "If men would bring to bear upon the study of the Science of Mind half the faith they bestow upon the so-called pains and pleasures of material sense, they would not go on from bad to worse, until disciplined by the prison and the scaffold; but the whole human family would be redeemed through the merits of Christ,—through the perception and acceptance of Truth. For this glorious result Christian Science lights the torch of spiritual understanding" (p. 202).

I will always remember the occasion when someone offered me this torch at a time when I was in gloom and darkness. My whole world seemed to be going "from bad to worse" with no apparent way out. Filled with fear, I prayed, "Dear God, show me what to do."

The answer came in what I thought at the time was a strange way. It was an inner prompting to go to see someone who had lived next door to me five years earlier but with whom I had had no recent contact. After about a week of trying to ignore this insistent inner voice, I finally found myself in the back room of her lamp shop, pouring out my heart to her. With tenderness, she handed me a stack of copies of the Christian Science Sentinel and said: "Read these. They can't hurt you; they can only help you." I shall never cease to be grateful for the love that opened to me the door of Christian Science, which revealed a bright new world filled with the light of spiritual understanding. Through the illumination it throws on Christ Jesus' life and teachings, my life has been redeemed.

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