"Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth"

MARGARET SCOTT FINN

In Genesis we are told that God blessed His children and told them to "be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth." Mary Baker Eddy explains this passage in the textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," in these words (p. 517): "Divine Love blesses its own ideas, and causes them to multiply,—to manifest His power."

Studying the life of Jesus, our Exemplar, we find many instances of his meeting the needs of those around him through manifesting the power of Truth and Love, and this was accomplished through multiplication, not through division. He supplied the needs of others not by depriving himself or anyone else, but by recognizing the ever-presence of good in all its abundance. Thus he was able to satisfy every right demand. He never tried to comply with the demands of mortal mind, but he saw through these demands to the spiritual need of those seeking his help.

The Master's understanding of the illimitability of spiritual ideas enabled him instantly to behold the answer in Mind. An instance of this is given in his immediately providing sufficient food to feed five thousand people. While his disciples were wondering how a few small loaves and fishes could be divided among so many, Jesus lifted his thought to the realm of Spirit, where substance is infinite and indivisible, and from this standpoint he was able to demonstrate the power of Truth to destroy the lie of lack.

It is equally possible for us today to solve our problems by realizing the allness of infinite Mind and its ideas rather than accepting the hopelessness of mortal mind. This was recently proved in the experience of a Christian Scientist who was confronted with the problem of helping someone who seemed in great need of a holiday. She began by looking at her own slender resources to see how they could be divided to give the other woman the needed rest. A check due her from her employer she felt unwilling to accept because his resources were at a low ebb. So she turned to Truth for an answer, and read through the Bible Lesson, which was on the subject of Substance.

As she did so this statement from the Christian Science textbook (p. 335) stood out: "Spirit is the only substance, the invisible and indivisible infinite God." At once she saw that her employer's real substance did not have to be divided to provide for her, nor did her own God-given substance have to be divided to give someone else a holiday, because substance is indivisible and universal. She also recognized that fear, strife, and hate are what divide, and that Love is that which multiplies. The thought of unlimited, indivisible substance, forever manifested through Love, filled her thought, and she felt that the solution of the whole problem lay in her clear realization of this great truth.

The next morning, the first thing she heard when she went to her work was that a wealthy customer had come in and offered to take into her home anyone who was needing a holiday. This woman had a lovely estate in the country and was as desirous of having someone stay with her as anyone could be to go there. Thus the need was perfectly met for both women. The employer was also blessed because this customer placed a large order for books. Here was human proof that substance is infinite, indivisible, and ever available, and that our faith in good unites us to the substance of that good. Whatever is entertained in thought is inevitably manifest in our experience.

It was Love which lifted thought to see the true facts that were afterwards manifested in human experience. As we steadfastly meet all our problems with Love, we shall inevitably experience the multiplication of good in our lives, and all that would seek to divide, deplete, and destroy will then begin to disappear.

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