Sorrow Overcome

LESTER B. MC COUN

IN Science and Health (p. 304) our Leader has said: "This is the doctrine of Christian Science: that divine Love cannot be deprived of its manifestation, or object; that joy cannot be turned into sorrow, for sorrow is not the master of joy; that good can never produce evil; that matter can never produce mind nor life result in death." This statement, emanating from one whose purity of thought and whose love for God and humanity were sufficient to give her work the vitalizing impulse and responsiveness so necessary to those who realize divine aid alone to be their recourse, is as a beacon-light in times of sorrow.

Like any other inharmony, grief is based on ignorance of God, on the supposition that in some instances divine Love either is not operative or else is effective in a different degree than in other situations. Only sense-testimony supports the contention that there is an unknown influence existing in opposition to God which can check legitimate endeavor, and only ignorance supports the contention that God, the Life of the universe and man, has decreed that life is an undefined something to be projected or withdrawn according to the changing view of the creator. The seeming helplessness engendered by such admissions is corrected by the understanding, established through the study of Christian Science, of the universal activity and supremacy of divine Love as unchanging Principle, the infinite Life.

In Christian Science, individual achievement of good is seen to be the manifestation of the divine nature. What is recalled, therefore, as the love and loyalty of those whose companionship we once enjoyed, is more than memory, it is the evidence of the immortality of good,—and can we doubt the unfailing purpose of God to care for His own? God's idea has not changed. Immortality is not a vague, visionary belief, too sublime and vast to be comprehended, relating to time and chance and to be experienced in a manner yet unknown. Immortality includes the complete and ever-present expression of God's allness, the realization of and full dependence on self-sustaining omnipotence. Grief cannot withstand the joy which rises in a heartfelt prayer of gratitude to God for the light which reveals His tender love and care for those removed from our sight.

Evil undertakes to include with the belief of death certain conditions calculated to cripple the capacity of those remaining behind, so as to secure a widespread acknowledgment of "the last enemy." Strange as it may appear, onlookers who are not in possession of the truth of being unwittingly pass sentence upon themselves by contending in favor of the claims of evil and directly against the efforts of those who have suddenly assumed unusual responsibilities. To prove through Christian Science that these evil prophecies are not fulfilled, is to overcome "the king of terrors" now, for these predictions with reference to the living constitute a part of the illusion of death.

Instead of starting with the admission that evil has anything to do with the conditions under which Truth is to be demonstrated, it is proper to recognize that Truth creates its own conditions and requires adherence thereto. Love and Truth are everywhere, and man in God's image can be depended upon to reflect Him; hence man can have no unsupplied need. Supported by God's omnipotence, the Christian Scientist rises in righteous rebellion against the claim that death can deprive some of life and simultaneously create circumstances to hang as millstones about the necks of others. By living close to Christ, Truth, the way is illumined, and the privilege of proving the adequacy of Christian Science to provide tangible comfort and assurance is accepted.

Christian Science frees the thought from the impulses and emotions which like "a thief in the night" may have previously deprived one of the true appreciation of loved ones. It is not too late to love God supremely and our neighbor as ourselves, and this we are always called upon to do. The purification of self is necessary to silence grief. The realization of God's omnipotence, the recognition of our own individuality and opportunity as made clear in Christian Science, the willingness to stand squarely before the world on the platform of righteousness and all that this implies,—this supplies evidence of the fact that death and sorrow are overcome now by the right understanding of Life.

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