Article June 3, 2019 Issue

Finding promise for the future

Deborah Huebsch

A version of this article was published in The Christian Science Monitor’s Christian Science Perspective column, July 30, 2018.

Sometimes, in the middle of the night, I’ve awakened in a sheer panic. Often the fear is specific; at other times, just a general foreboding that bad things are going to happen. Or it might relate to something I heard on the news. But here’s the common thread: fear of the future. Is there any way we can feel secure about what lies ahead in our lives—for ourselves and for the world?

Something that helps me is a growing understanding that I can depend on God’s loving presence, no matter what the situation. Through my study of Christian Science, I’ve begun to see that God’s hand is at the helm. During fearful moments, one thing that’s been especially helpful is a statement made by the Discoverer of Christian Science, Mary Baker Eddy, in one of her poems. She wrote, “O Life divine, that owns each waiting hour” (Poems, p. 4).

What a promise for the future lies in that statement! Instead of fearing the worst, we can begin to trust that Life, another name for God, is not only present now, but actually always has been, and it “owns” our future. One definition of own is to recognize as having full claim, power, authority, and dominion over something.

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