Article May 18, 2015 Issue

The one true power

Rachel F. Henderson

“I can of mine own self do nothing” (John 5:30). Christ Jesus made this profound statement after healing the man at the pool of Bethesda, declaring God to be the source and cause of all his healing works. The man had been lying helpless and infirm for 38 years, and Jesus healed him in a moment. Jesus knew God was his Father and the source of his ability to heal the sick and raise the dead. And through his example, he paved the way for all of us to know and glorify God too, because God is the source of everyone’s ability.

Could there ever be a moment when God, Love, Mind, is not expressing Himself, when there is a power other than the allness of God, good? In Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, Mary Baker Eddy explains that there cannot: “There is no power apart from God. Omnipotence has all-power, and to acknowledge any other power is to dishonor God” (p. 228).

For example, if we feel we might lack something, or believe that we can be unwell, or think that someone else is separate from God because he is not expressing Godlike qualities, we are acknowledging a force, power, law, or mind besides God. But in my study of Christian Science, I’ve learned that such thoughts are never actually my thoughts; rather, they are temptations of a mortal sense of mind—the carnal mind that Paul talks about in the Bible (see Romans 8:7). This mind is not the reflection or expression of the one Mind that is God, which we express as His spiritual reflection.

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