It is with joy that humanity learns that redemption from evil is a positive certainty. The rule that each individual must do his part in order to gain and enjoy this freedom progressively is reasonable, since nothing that is worth while is won without diligent effort. While the realization of complete freedom from belief in evil takes time, even a faint recognition of the perfect Science of Christianity which ensures this redemption brings hope and courage.

Many people today are finding comfort in the record of Job's victory over his difficulties. Step by step, as Job grasped the omnipotence and goodness of God, he proved practically the presence of divine Love, and redemption from his woes became for him a present fact. He regained his health, his possessions, and—more important than all else—he proved the value of a demonstrable understanding of God. He was able to exclaim with conviction, "I know that my redeemer liveth." Many today, by utilizing God's law, as revealed in Christian Science, are gaining conviction of God's supremacy, and are winning redemption. Can anything be more important, more valuable, than that here and now a growing measure of freedom from that which is unlike God, good, is assured?

Sooner or later each individual reaches the place where he sees his need of redemption. One needs to be healed of disease; another needs deliverance from some form of sin. Still another needs freedom from financial lack or limitation. Others are trying to solve a problem in the home, or in business. Whatever the need may be, each one eventually comes to the point at which he has to resort to something outside of himself, even to the unfailling law of divine Mind, for his redemption. In "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" Mrs. Eddy writes (p. 151), "Infinite Mind could not possibly create a remedy outside of itself, but erring, finite, human mind has an absolute need of something beyond itself for its redemption and healing."

A man who believes that intoxicating liquor is necessary for his happiness suffers from the belief, because it seems to be a law to him. It apparently binds him with fetters. In many instances such an error has been destroyed in a moment through Christian Science. The afflicted one awakens to see that this false so-called law has no power over him, and he loses all desire for liquor. What has happened? Simply this: The new understanding which Christian Science brings, that man is spiritual, subject to the law of God alone, and that man derives from divine Mind all joy and satisfaction, has redeemed him from bondage to a false so-called law. The true law, the divine law, now demonstrably controls his thought and his experience.

It is from something more than a mere outward slavery that one needs to be released. Isaiah clearly shows the nothingness of evil and the power of good when he declares, "Ye have sold yourselves for nought; and ye shall be re deemed without money." This redemption is plainly a mental, moral, and spiritual process. To the extent that they have accepted erroneous suggestions, all mortals have been more or less in a state of mental slavery. A reverse process brings the needed freedom. In the light of Christian Science one is enabled to detect erroneous beliefs, challenge them, and see them for what they claim to be. Then by rejecting these beliefs as powerless, and excluding them from consciousness, one wins freedom. In an article entitled "A Word to the Wise" in "The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany" Mrs. Eddy writes (p. 139), "Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for so doth the divine Love redeem your body from disease; your being from sensuality; your soul from sense; your life from death."

The doctrine is preached by some religionists that mere acceptance and confession by word of mouth of the fact that Jesus came to earth to save men, is enough to redeem them. Can anyone wonder that this theory does not confer true joy? This impractical belief regarding salvation may have turned many away from endeavoring to gain the true sense of the redeeming Christ. The clear light that Christian Science sheds on the redemptive law of divine Love, which Christ Jesus utilized, appeals to honest thinkers. It replaces the erroneous concept of redemption which a false sense of theology has engendered in human thought. It shows how each one needs to do his part; and it enables him to do it intelligently, by patiently thinking his way out of evil beliefs through utilizing the practical law of Truth and Love. It gives to all of us a real work to do, calling forth the best of which we are capable. Here indeed is true redemption.

It is observable that the individual who is responsive to divine law is a law-abiding citizen, with a clear sense of the amenities and proprieties of normal living. He knows that the spiritualization of thought which is going on in his own experience and in that of others cannot fail to affect presentday legislation beneficially. He recognizes that the entire lump of human thought is being leavened by the law of God as operative in Christian Science. He is alert to obey Mrs. Eddy's wise counsel to the effect that one should obey the laws of the land, while appealing to and relying on the gospel of Christ.

Those who have in some measure experienced the redemptive power of Christian Science know what it is, and the blessedness which goes with it, and they are impelled to strive to help others as they themselves have been helped. To the student of Christian Science, redemption, which literally means a buying back, or repurchase, denotes that continual process whereby thought is spiritualized and man's true individuality comes to light—harmonious, free, spiritual, perfect, and eternal. The prophet Isaiah fittingly describes the harmony attending this true redemption through divine law when he declares, "Therefore the redeemed of the Lord shall return, and come with singing unto Zion; and everlasting joy shall be upon their head: they shall obtain gladness and joy; and sorrow and mourning shall flee away."

Copyright, 1936, by The Christian Science Publishing Society, One, Norway Street, Boston, Massachusetts. Entered at Boston post office as second-class matter. Acceptance for mailing at a special rate of postage provided for in section 1103, Act of October 3, 1917, authorized on July 11 1918