Article October 23, 1909 Issue

GOD IS GOOD

ETHEL M. ISAACS.

Every beginner in Christian Science knows how difficult it seems at first to answer the apparently puzzling questions which our acquaintances who have not studied this wonderful Science put to us, so I will relate one of my own experiences in this line, with the hope that it may help some one else.

On my making the positive assertion that God is good, and only good, a friend said he could not see how that was true in every case and at all times, and he put the following question to me: " Two little boys of the same age climb an apple-tree for the purpose of stealing the apples, and both fall down; one is badly hurt, and the other has no injury befall him. Now, if God is good and just, why should one be hurt and not the other ; or why, in fact, should either one be hurt?" At the time, I could not give a satisfactory answer, but I insisted that God is good and that He does not cause evil. With the enlarged understanding which has come to me through the study of Christian Science, I now find the answer perfectly clear.

Wrong-doing brings its own punishment, until "reformation cancels the crime" (Science and Health, p. 404) ; but God's law is the only law, and it is good, perfect, and eternal. The boy who fell and was hurt learned his lesson then and there, and would not again attempt to steal apples, but Science and Health (p. 40) also teaches that "another's suffering cannot lessen our own liability," and the boy who was not hurt would not see so clearly the evil in stealing and would be tempted to do it again until he learned that "escape from punishment is not in accordance with God's government, since justice is the handmaid of mercy" (Ibid., p. 36), and then he would give up his evil ways, knowing that like brings like and that only through doing the right thing could he expect good results.

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