Deepening my understanding

While I grew up in Christian Science, my fire of desire to learn more about it really began to burn in high school. I can recall speedily completing my work in one particular class so I could spend the duration of the period reading the Christian Science textbook, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy. In college, I read everything about Christian Science I could get my hands on. This led to an interest in going through Christian Science Primary class instruction.

However, when I would attend class and who my teacher would be did not come to light immediately. I had thought that I would take class instruction sooner than I did, but in retrospect I see clearly that I was led to wait until the soil of my thought had been perfectly tilled and I was ready for this step. This was a lesson to me: As we understand that God is always unfolding good, we increasingly see chance, human will, and personal desires yield to that unfolding good in our lives. 

After college, I was led to just the right teacher for me. Furthermore, everything fell into place to allow for a peaceful, harmonious environment during this period of vibrant exploration. I found myself in an unexpectedly ideal lodging situation during class. My job had a gracious decrescendo, calming down during the two-week period I was away. And all financial needs relating to my attending class were met as well.

Class instruction included concepts that were familiar to me, such as the synonyms for God; but my understanding of them deepened. I had not anticipated such a sharpening in my thought of the healing and regenerating truths found in Science and Health, and I realized that I had previously touched only the modest beginnings in my understanding of Christian Science. Yet class did not make Christian Science seem more complicated; rather, class elucidated its teachings, and I began to see the Science of being as elegantly simple. It’s profound, with vast room for discerning more and more of it as we grow in our spiritual understanding, but it’s based on the straightforward truth that God is All and there is no power but Him.

I’ve also discovered that the Christian Science students’ association meetings, held annually, are as valuable as the class instruction itself. They give an impulse of spiritual regeneration, and the inspiration and spiritual growth I’ve gained while attending them have impacted my life in tangible ways. 

Through these meetings, I’ve gained a renewed sense of discipline about having more dedicated study of Christian Science before beginning each day. And healings have come—including that of warts on my daughter’s foot some time ago. The warts, which had been there for several months, vanished completely as my wife and I considered during an association meeting the present truth of man’s identity as God’s pure expression. 

I love feeling united with pupils around the globe who have taken the important step in our study and practice of Christian Science of taking class, digging deeper into the spiritual truths that bring healing as we grow in our understanding of them. 

Mrs. Eddy writes, “The Christian Scientist has enlisted to lessen evil, disease, and death; and he will overcome them by understanding their nothingness and the allness of God, or good” (Science and Health, p. 450). I will always be grateful for Primary class instruction—and the ongoing association meetings—which have furthered my spiritual growth, aiding me as I work to fulfill this mission that Mrs. Eddy has outlined for us.