Love's transparency and the diamond ring

Over the years I have found many misplaced items, having learned that there is only one divine Mind, God, who is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent. One of the earliest lessons I learned, being raised as a Christian Scientist, is, “To those leaning on the sustaining infinite, to-day is big with blessings” (Mary Baker Eddy, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. vii ). And nothing can really be lost to the one, omniscient Mind. I recently had a fresh glimpse of the fact that understanding this is a “two-way street.” In other words, if we “stand porter at the door of thought” (Science and Health, p. 392 ), we are always poised as a transparency for God’s wisdom, and we bring blessings to others as well as to ourselves.

One day I found a beautiful platinum ring studded with diamonds on the sidewalk a block or so from my apartment building in New York City. It had a Tiffany trademark, and I immediately thought of the owner who surely missed it, but felt quite strongly that, at least for a time, I was entrusted as its steward. 

We are always poised as a transparency for God's wisdom.

I had been working on other matters through prayer using this statement: “The faithful steward is to be rewarded, but not in a way to constitute him a proprietor or owner at the end of his stewardship. His reward, or compensation, is the becoming fitted to be entrusted with a larger stewardship” (“The Saviour’s Joy,” The Christian Science Journal, July 1892, p. 136). I had been praying to include all whom I encountered in person, as well as those I held in my thought, as God’s progeny, and to be a stronger transparency for divine Love. I slipped the ring on my finger for safekeeping—a perfect fit—declaring there could be neither loss nor gain at anyone’s expense. 

Two weeks later, as I entered my building’s lobby, I ran into my next door neighbor who offered to hold the elevator for me. I said no thanks and went to retrieve my mail, but he insisted and held the door anyway. As we rode up together, I spontaneously remarked, “I found the most beautiful ring on the street.” (I remembered he worked at Tiffany before retirement). Before I could finish my sentence, he blurted out, “Platinum with variegated diamonds?” I nodded, and he said: “It’s my wife’s. She lost it three months ago, and we’ve looked everywhere, every day since!” I said, “Come right now to my apartment and let me show it to you.” He did, and it was indeed his wife’s. 

His wife was out of town, but when she returned, she was amazed and overjoyed as it had been a 25th anniversary gift. She left a generous department store gift certificate on my door handle, which at first I refused to take. I told them there was no recompense required for behaving in a moral fashion, but they were so moved to have the ring returned, they insisted I keep the certificate. We settled on giving it to my 20-something daughter, a solution that satisfied all.

I am still smiling from the occurrence—the perfect symmetry of Mind’s all-inclusive design and the fresh insight that there is clear evidence we are Love’s transparency.