At the entrance to the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art in North Adams is a sculpture installation by the artist-experimenter, Natalie Jeremijenko, titled “Tree Logic.” This is part of an artists’ collective called the Bureau of Inverse Technology, which is concerned with creating devices and situations for the purpose of gathering overlooked facts.

But what is unique about this installation is that the six trees are hanging upside down! The shape of the tree in nature is the result of the tree growing away from the earth (gravitropics) and toward the sun (phototropics). This experiment proved that even when turned upside down, the branches still grow upward toward the sun—appearing unnatural, perhaps at first glance, yet not really so.

In the Glossary of Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, Mary Baker Eddy describes sun as “the symbol of Soul governing man,—of Truth, Life, and Love” (p. 595). And our lives are naturally governed by and attracted to the light and warmth of Soul. This natural attraction is present even when the material picture has us turned upside down. And writing elsewhere of inverted images, Mrs. Eddy said, “Delusion, sin, disease, and death arise from the false testimony of material sense, which, from a supposed standpoint outside the focal distance of infinite Spirit, presents an inverted image of Mind and substance with everything turned upside down” (Science and Health, p. 301).

Through spiritual sense we experience heightened awareness of God's power.

A Bible verse supports this logic further, “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning” (James 1:17). As I see it, this refers to God’s constancy. As we turn from shadow into light, the shadow doesn’t follow us. The tree may be upside down, but the branches will have none of it. They shoot up, out of the shadows, to the unobstructed light. The downward tendencies, or earthward pull, cannot pattern the higher nature that turns the branches upward.

This is analogous to healing in Christian Science in which we turn from the shadows of sickness and sin to the light of Truth, holding to our true nature as the reflection of Life, God. We view our own and others’ natural Godlike qualities in contrast to the opposite picture the material senses paint of fear, lack, sickness, disease, or death. 

We don’t ignore the human condition when denying power to a problem. Rather, through spiritual sense we experience heightened receptivity to God’s power. God’s love, which is always present—as light is always present—comes as inspiration, gently drawing thought from a false acceptance of sickness to a realization of health, from fear to calm expectation, from lack to abundance, and from death to life. It’s as though the doors and windows of a dark room have opened up to allow the light to flood in. We can’t help but turn toward it. 

I once had just such an experience. While on a family ski trip, I became so ill and overcome with fear that I was unable to speak. I asked my wife to phone a Christian Science practitioner for help through prayer. My wife put the phone to my ear while I listened to the practitioner’s firm but loving assurance that I couldn’t manifest a single quality contrary to my true nature as a child of God. As the practitioner turned my thought to the divine Truth and Love that embraced me, I was gradually released from fear’s pull and within half an hour felt myself “coming home” to a mental environment that was familiar and natural. The sickness and pain left me, and I knew I was healed. I entered the living room, where we were joined by friends who were visiting for the weekend, and together we gave joyous acknowledgment of the immediacy of Christian Science treatment. I then skied all weekend without a shadow of the complaint. 

That experience confirmed for me that when our world seems to be turned upside down, no earthward gravitation can interrupt or block out, even for an instant, what is really going on—our God-given freedom from the false testimony of the material senses and our natural attraction to the spiritual light of the Christ.