In the Christian Science Bible Lesson August 8, 2011 Issue

The blessings of a Soul-filled life

For the lesson titled "Soul" from August 8-14, 2011

By Madelon Maupin

Studying this Bible Lesson, titled “Soul,” is like taking a long, cold drink of water on a hot day. We get to luxuriate in one of the great stories and character portraits in the Old Testament. After an introduction in the Responsive Reading that explains how Soul, God, satisfies His people “with my goodness” (Jer. 31:14), the remaining five sections illustrate how Soul transforms the intertwined lives of Ruth, Naomi, and Boaz, paving the way to the Messiah centuries later. Woven throughout is how God provides for every need, changing even the bleakest circumstances to joy as we journey from “sense to Soul” (Science and Health, p. 266, citation 7).

Who hasn’t experienced “a broken heart” (Ps. 34:18, cit. 3), or needed God’s love to lift them out of desolation? These are the circumstances of Naomi after she and her husband, Elimelech, leave their native Israel’s famine conditions to find food and work in neighboring Moab. With their two sons, they end up staying for a number of years, and the boys marry Moabite women. Naomi becomes disconsolate after the death not only of her husband but of both sons, and encourages their respective wives to return to their family homes.

One of the daughters-in-law leaves, but the other, Ruth, commits herself to staying with Naomi, illustrating a joy-deriving facet of Soul, God: “Happiness is spiritual, born of Truth and Love. It is unselfish; therefore it cannot exist alone, but requires all mankind to share it” (Science and Health, p. 57, cit. 8).