Listening to reports in the news recently about job redundancy and people being laid off during this lockdown period, I was reminded of a time when I faced redundancy, with all the distress and uncertainty this experience often brings.

In the early 1970s I was working in a local real estate office. I had been there for quite a while and was very happy in my work. One day, out of the blue, I was told my position was no longer needed and I was being made redundant. Instinctively, I reached out to God to help me deal with the shock and fear that tried to engulf my thinking. Immediately, these words came clearly to thought: “There is no redundant drop in the cup that our Father permits us” (Mary Baker Eddy, Message to The Mother Church for 1902, p. 19).

I realized that as a child of God, I could never be redundant or useless, and that He is always caring for me and everyone and meeting our every need. I recalled another of Mrs. Eddy’s statements, that God “guides every event of our careers” (Unity of Good, pp. 3–4). That meant I could trust my Father-Mother God to place me where I was most needed. As Christ Jesus’ words assure us, “I go to prepare a place for you” (John 14:2).

Mrs. Eddy’s description of man, the true identity of each of us, in the Christian Science textbook, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, states in part, “He is the compound idea of God, including all right ideas” (p. 475). As I prayed about the apparent loss of employment, it came to me clearly that as the “compound idea of God,” I included all the ideas and qualities associated with employment, such as activity, purpose, intelligence, honesty, communication, integrity, loyalty, and so on. As the child of God, I am always fully employed in expressing His qualities, and those qualities can never be threatened or wiped out.

As I prayed along these lines, I felt a deep peace, knowing that God is my only employer, and that I am always engaged in my Father’s business. My employment at the real estate office was duly terminated, but instead of frantically looking around for another job, I remained at home, quietly confident that God was working His purpose out and that only good was in store for me.

A week later, the phone rang, and I found myself talking to the head of a school founded on the principles of Christian Science. After a brief conversation, she asked me where I was working. I explained that I had recently been made redundant and was hoping to find another job before long. 

She then said: “We have a vacancy here for an assistant housemother, and your name keeps coming to thought. I feel you have just the qualities we are needing in the Home Department, caring for our young boarders. Would you consider applying for the job?”

I knew immediately that this was the answer to my prayers. Without hesitation, I said I would love to work at the school, especially as I had been a pupil there some years previously, and it held a very special place in my heart. Within a few days, I started my new job, where I remained for eight very happy and rewarding years, until the birth of our first son.

Mrs. Eddy writes “The ‘divine ear’ is not an auditory nerve. It is the all-hearing and all-knowing Mind, to whom each need of man is always known and by whom it will be supplied” (Science and Health, p. 7). I am so grateful to have seen clear proof of this statement.

Cathrine Hogg 
Leatherhead, Surrey, England