A LESSON THAT ENDURES

I DID PRETTY WELL in high school—but I did not enjoy chemistry and made the mistake of falling behind in the assignments.

Toward the end of the grading period, my teacher said that if I did not score well on the final exam, I would fail the class. That was a wake-up call! I knew I had to get busy studying, or else. I also realized that I'd been wrong in not studying my class assignments, and I felt sorry about that.

So I began right away to improve. I stayed up late each night and studied. But more important, I thought about my relationship to God as His image and likeness (see Gen. 1:26, 27). I'd learned from Christian Science that God is the all-knowing Mind, and that each one of us has the ability to express the infinite intelligence of that Mind. Here was my opportunity to prove it. So I continued to pray and to study to feel more confident about taking the final exam.

On the day of the test, I found that I knew the answers to every question except one. That particular question related to material that I'd never studied and about which I knew nothing. So I began by answering the questions I did know. While I did so, I kept affirming to myself that all I could possibly express was God's infinite, absolute intelligence.

After completing the questions I was familiar with, I returned to the one for which I had no answer. But as I continued to pray, I wrote down the ideas that came to me, which I knew had come from Mind because they were totally new to me. Then I finished and handed in the exam.

About a week later the teacher asked to see me, this time with wonderful news—I was the only student in the class to give the correct answer to that difficult question. And I was the only one to receive an "A" on the exam. I was overjoyed about the good grade, but even better, I knew I'd received that answer from God, the all-knowing divine Mind, to whom I could always turn. This was a lesson I never forgot.

I learned too that no matter what mistake I might make, it could be corrected by turning to God, whose omnipotent law of good enlightens, adjusts, and corrects. This profound lesson gave me the realization that this truth applies to everyone, enabling me to be more caring and forgiving. Further, I've seen that since God does not make mistakes, His expression can't either. CSS

Leon Gleaves III
Williamsburg, Virginia

HEARING THE VOICE OF TRUTH

SIX MONTHS AGO I took a trip from Tokyo to the US to do some business. After my stay, I went to the busy Portland International Airport to catch my flight back to Tokyo. I had a cellphone, in which I'd stored all my important phone numbers. On my way to the boarding gate, I hurriedly decided to go to the bathroom and accidentally left my cellphone sitting on a shelf. It wasn't until I'd passed through the security check that I discovered that I did not have my phone and realized my mistake. I asked a security attendant to go back to the bathroom and see if my cellphone was there.

After five minutes, she came back and told me she'd announced in a loud voice in the bathroom that a cellphone had been lost and had anybody found it. There was a woman in the bathroom who appeared to have possession of my cellphone, but would not answer. So the security attendant came back and told me that she had no authority to retrieve it.

Hearing those words, I began to be overcome with feelings of hopelessness. I was upset at myself for not being more careful in the first place and for having allowed myself to make such a mistake. Then I began to pray, as I'd learned to do in studying Christian Science, affirming that there were no mistakes in God's kingdom and trusting that God was able to adjust this situation in the right way. A "still small voice" told me that nothing that was rightfully mine could be taken away from me and that there could not be a dishonest or deprived man, or woman, because God made all of us good, as it states in Genesis (see 1:31). God made us upright and free.

I had intended to call a friend to say goodbye, but with no cellphone, I sat down, opened my computer, and e-mailed her, telling her about the phone. My friend wrote back, "Why don't you call your cellphone number?" I immediately called using Skype through my computer, but no one answered. I decided to try a second time, and as I dialed, I prayed to know that in God's creation there could be the desire to do only what was right. A woman answered the phone and started talking in a foreign language. It appeared she could not understand me. It came to me to tell her with spiritual authority that as reflection of God she was honest and wanted to do what was right. I kept telling her this over and over, and as I did so, I began to feel such an overwhelming sense of compassion for the woman.

Finally, in broken English, the woman said she was giving my phone to another woman whom I could talk to. But it sounded like the same voice. I again told her that the phone belonged to me and that I needed it and that it was in her true nature to want to do what was right. The woman told me that she would leave my phone at the ticket counter at a boarding gate in another terminal. I thanked her and ran to the other terminal. And there I was able to retrieve my phone.

Psalm 37 says, "Mark the perfect man, and behold the upright; for the end of that man is peace" (verse 37). It is wonderful to know that no matter where we are, we can see and experience the peace that comes from seeing everyone, including ourselves, as the perfect creation of God. As a result of this understanding, I was freed from believing that I had made a mistake and was responsible for that mistake. It also allowed me to see integrity and purity as the spiritual heritage of all humankind everywhere. css

Kathy Bird
Yokohama, Japan

MY INNOCENT MISTAKE

I COACH STUDENTS AT MY BUSINESS SCHOOL in Suna-Migori, Kenya. One day a student approached me for coaching. He had an assignment requiring him to research America's recreational vehicles industry and was supposed to look into the topic and then design an advertisement. I told the student that I had never heard about these vehicles, but he insisted I help him. He was in a hurry to finish, since the project had been on delay for lack of ideas. He agreed to pay a coaching fee, and I further agreed to provide a design sample of how he might proceed.

First, we searched for the meaning of "recreational vehicles" from the dictionary, without success. I did, however, find that the term "recreation" was linked with "leisure." Innocently, I associated recreational vehicles with cars used for racing, such as rally cars. We didn't check the Internet—the student avoided it because of inadequate time and money, since it would cost him to go online. Within a day, I finished the design sample and handed it over to the student.

Two weeks later, this student walked into my office with the printout of a discouraging e-mail. He'd taken my work and submitted it for evaluation to an overseas tutor, claiming it as his own. I would never accept dealings of that kind.

Since we'd misinterpreted what the vehicles were, the tutor said the student "hadn't followed instructions" and the work couldn't be graded. I felt I'd been tricked. I found myself in a moment of crisis and began to pray. First, I resisted the temptation to argue in defense of the work or retreat from this challenge because the student had tried to gain marks unfairly. I prayed to be free from the thought that trusting him had been a mistake. And also to forgive myself for accepting payment in exchange for my flawed work. I'd been motivated by the desire to help, and so I prayed to be assured that divine Love would show us the way forward.

I knew I needed to review the assignment again and align my thoughts with God, divine intelligence. I affirmed that the ability and wisdom God gives us is infinite, and I welcomed the tutor's criticism as an opportunity to see how God would bring about a solution.

As I flipped over the work again, the student suggested that he do some Internet research at his own cost. The following morning, he brought information to me on a disk. I gained knowledge about recreational vehicles and discovered that they are often used as traveling homes, called "RVs." We talked about how all assignments are manageable when we approach them with mental calm and confidence in our basic capabilities. The student was then thankful he could finish the project by himself. I know it is possible, when we pray, to claim our freedom from the mental anguish associated with innocent mistakes. css

Daniel Otieno Okello
Suna-Migori, Kenya