A woman entered a Christian Science practitioner’s office in tears. He guessed that she was a prostitute, and later found that that was, in fact, the case. While she pulled herself together, he waited quietly, praying to be guided how best to help her. When she was finally able to speak, her first words were, “I know I shouldn’t have come into the office of a holy man such as yourself.” From the bottom of his heart, he vehemently responded, “I need the Christ every bit as much as you do. The only difference between us is that I know it.”

To acknowledge that our need for salvation is equal to others, as this practitioner did, is not to suggest that we are hiding sins that others are unaware of. But as we strive to live our lives to express only Godlike qualities, it’s natural to remain conscious of ways in which we are not yet meeting that goal. We can also be keenly conscious of the factors that keep us from expressing the good we want to express—perhaps circumstances, lack, a sense that it’s too demanding to be good all the time, or even just inertia. 

But we can also understand that, in reality, each of us is created by and expresses God, Spirit, and that the true nature, the true being, of every single individual is spiritual, not material. We can recognize that not only our ability to overcome evil but our worthiness to be lifted out of it is God-given and ever present. And we can know that this is equally true for everyone, no matter who they are or what their situation.