The temperatures were  in triple digits on a dry, windy Wednesday afternoon this past July when the report came of a wildfire burning 25 acres of grassland in a wilderness park near town. Before that evening’s testimony meeting in our branch Church of Christ, Scientist, a church friend who was out of town texted me, asking for calming thoughts. She had heard about the fire, and her house was in the path of the blaze, which had now spread to around five hundred acres. 

I reminded my friend that the nature of evil is to distract us—to attempt to substitute fear for peace in our consciousness. In this case, evil was tempting us to be drawn into the drama—to get reports on the size and nearness of the fire and to fear for the safety of firefighters, our homes, and so on. But underlying all of the fears was the suggestion that there could be a power apart from God, good. 

Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy says: “We must learn that evil is the awful deception and unreality of existence. Evil is not supreme; good is not helpless; nor are the so-called laws of matter primary, and the law of Spirit secondary” (p. 207).