What God is, man manifests or expresses because of his indissoluble unity with the Father, the source of all true being. Man is God's—divine Mind's—idea. On page 468 of the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures." Mary Baker Eddy says, "All is infinite Mind and its infinite manifestation, for God is All-in-all."

It is plain that man, the manifestation or representative of God, his creator, has no initiative of his own upon which he needs to depend for life and activity. "Man is not God, but like a ray of light which comes from the sun, man, the outcome of God, reflects God," says Mrs. Eddy (ibid., p. 250). Thus man in God's likeness is not a human being, subject to material conditions; rather is he the constant, eternal, spiritual outcome or reflection of God, expressing in quality the infinite good that is God. Man can never get outside of infinity. He is inseparable from his divine source; consequently he is forever established and maintained.

Think what it means that our true selfhood abides forever in Him in whom we "live, and move, and have our being"! What blessings are in store for humanity when it awakens to the fact that all that the Father has belongs to man by reason of his indissoluble unity with God! Jesus' unfaltering purpose was to awaken mankind to an understanding of true being, of what God actually is, and of man's relationship to Him. At the grave of Lazarus, Jesus assured Martha (John 11:40), "Said I not unto thee, that, if thou wouldest believe, thou shouldest see the glory of God?" Then turning his thought to God in grateful acknowledgment of all that God meant to him, he said: "Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me. And I knew that thou hearest me always."

Unaware of man's true relationship to the Father, mankind has implored a far-away God to intercede in its behalf and overcome erroneous conditions, little realizing that God is a God at hand, and that He is the Principle, the very source and condition, of man's being. Such pleading assumes a separation of God and man and indicates ignorance of God's allness and of man's indestructible relationship to Him. Only by exemplifying God, good, in actual daily living does the individual give positive evidence of what God means to him. Such exemplification results alone from an enlightened understanding of the complete oneness of God and His idea, man.

Before the writer glimpsed the true nature of God as infinite and perfect, which Christian Science proves Him to be, he suffered years of semi-invalidism. Like the Athenians, he was worshiping an unknown God, of whose presence and availability he was quite unaware. Finally, through the loving help of a practitioner, the full radiancy of Christian Science began to dawn on his thought, and he awakened to a clearer understanding of the Scriptural promise (I Cor. 13:12), "Then shall I know even as also I am known." Through the spiritual understanding that God is divine Life, Truth, and Love, and that man is ever one with Him, came the complete healing of the physical difficulty, and God was gratefully acknowledged to be the ever-sustaining cause of man's perpetual well-being.

To understand God is to know Him as All-in-all, to be aware of His spiritual law. We utilize this law, in human affairs in somewhat the same way that we make use of the rules of mathematics. We must first understand these rules and then apply them to the problem. Likewise, to solve correctly the problem of being, we must first gain an understanding of God's allness, infinity, and perfection through Christian Science and then apply this understanding of divine law in our daily lives. Thus we shall discover the spiritual identity, or consciousness, "whose builder and maker is God" (Hebr. 11:10). In the measure that this true consciousness is recognized as constituting man's real selfhood will our lives visibly evidence God. The forever unity of God and man is the fundamental reality of being. The realization of this fact is the objective of all demonstration. It is evidenced in increasing harmony in human experience and is the essence of life and brotherhood. Our Leader states in Science and Health (pp. 465, 466), "Principle and its idea is one, and this one is God, omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent Being, and His reflection is man and the universe." This omnipresent Being is Mind, infinite intelligence—the only Mind there actually is, the one and only consciousness.

Through the study of Christian Science the nature of God is becoming clearer to humanity, bringing about the new birth to which the Master referred when he said to Nicodemus (John 3:3), "Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." One cannot truly know God and man as His image without understanding man's at-one-ment with God. This understanding reveals God's loving care, guidance, and protection. God's work is finished and complete. This fact is set forth in the first chapter of Genesis. To understand the allness of God brings to light man's life, identity, and eternal sonship with the Father and reveals God as his substance and consciousness.