ONE WITH GOD
Love must triumph over hate.—Science and Health, p. 43.
That "one with God is a majority" has been proven throughout all Bible teaching and in all time. Elisha's implicit confidence and dependence upon God was so great that, although entirely surrounded by the world-weaponed armies of the Syrians, perceiving the power and presence of God he was comforted and felt a serene repose, though apparently in great danger. Not only did he realize this safety, the peace "which passeth all understanding," for himself, but he was able to open the eyes of the young man who was with him so that he also saw "the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire" which were to free them from all their enemies.
Students: Get
JSH-Online for
$5/mo
Every recent & archive issue
Podcasts & article audio
Mary Baker Eddy bios & audio
Every recent & archive issue
Podcasts & article audio
Mary Baker Eddy bios & audio
Why did the king of Syria withdraw his armies from following after the children of Israel and devote his energy to the endeavor to take the life of this one great and good man? Because Elisha through his spiritual living had been able to see and point out to the children of Israel their enemy's plans, methods, and avenues of attack, and when heed was given to the warning of this God-chosen leader the Israelites saved themselves in those very places "not once nor twice." Therefore was the king of Syria angered against Elisha. The king's thought was actuated and controlled by a desire for the enlargement of material dominion; it was avarice, love of human power, which impelled him to slay the highest messenger of Truth of that time.
When the hosts of the king of Syria came close to Elisha their eyes were inflamed with envy, avarice, and greed, and being unaccustomed to the brightness of his character they could not see. This blindness caused them to fall into a pathway which would have meant self-destruction at the hand of the king of Israel, who said to Elisha, "Shall I smite them? Shall I smite them?" Then this very one whom they sought to slay said, "Thou shalt not smite them: ... set bread and water before them, that they may eat and drink, and go to their master." "So the bands of Syria came no more into the land of Israel." The young man and others knew of Elisha's Christlikeness, although his enemies did not; but this was to them a wholly convincing proof of the vast difference between a life which reflects Love and their own weapons of carnal warfare.
The Founder of Christian Science has reestablished in this age a lost element of Jesus' teaching. Her humble confidence in God and reliance upon Him enabled her to rise to spiritual heights whereon she realized God's protecting arm, though surrounded and assailed by all the weapons of malicious subtlety,—avarice, malice, religious intolerance, envy, hate. Not only has she perceived and rested upon the divine presence, but she has opened the eyes of thousands of others and has enabled them to attain that spiritual altitude where God protects and heals. She has illuminated and pointed a way which when heeded has saved thousands of mortals from submission to evil and from years of pain. To-day a vast number of beneficiaries of Christian Science are assured of the Christian living of their Leader, Mrs. Eddy, and many others will know as the desire for spiritual vision takes the place of their unconscious blindness. In no age can those who look through the eyes of envy or avarice behold the true concept of man or God. In her "Miscellaneous Writings" (p. 19) Mrs. Eddy says, "He who has named the name of Christ, who has virtually accepted the divine claims of Truth and Love in Divine Science, is daily departing from evil; and all the wicked endeavors of suppositional demons can never change the current of that life from steadfastly flowing on to God, its divine Source."
