IN THE CHRISTIAN SCIENCE BIBLE LESSON November 29, 2010 ISSUE

AN ENTIRELY SPIRITUAL CREATION

MICHAEL HAMILTON

THE ELEVEN SECTIONS that make up this week's Bible Lesson, titled "God the Only Cause and Creator," are a spiritual framework for describing and discovering God's spiritual and good creation.

The Lesson begins with this Golden Text from John 1:3: "All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made." Section I includes this verse in its opening passage, which announces, "In the beginning was the Word." The Gospel of John begins with a hymn-like prologue that summarizes the themes of the book (1:1-18). "The Word" was a concept probably familiar to both Jewish and non-Jewish readers, and philosophers had used the term to describe the causative Mind of God.