Anyone who understands that he is God's child, under the infallible government of his divine Parent, and who reveals himself progressively as God's offspring in the way taught by Christian Science, receives guidance. Such an individual inevitably sees the dissipation of schemes or hopes by which willful human sense would limit him under the guise of bringing him good. Simultaneously or ultimately he will be aware of his unobstructed, onward march towards his divine destiny as the individual spiritual idea by which God expresses Himself. Implied in this awareness is the sense of satisfying, useful, and rewarding activity befitting his true individuality.

This is in accord with the promise of Christian Science eloquently stated b Mary Baker Eddy in "Miscellaneous Writings" (p. 19): "He who has named the name of Christ, who has virtually accepted the divine claims of Truth and Love in divine Science, is daily departing from evil; and all the wicked endeavors of suppositional demons can never change the current of that life from steadfastly flowing on to God, its divine source."

Perhaps the chief reason why humanity believes itself beset by the sense of floundering from lack of guidance lies in the unwillingness of the so-called human mind to accept "the divine claims of Truth and Love." And this unwillingness may be, in turn, the objectification of the human mind's tragic ignorance of the fact that "the divine claims" are precisely what it should most desire to accept. Everyone desires health, unobstructed use of his talents, love, removal of fear from his thought, joy, substance, and abundant life. And these, and kindred effects, are what he receives, or rather finds belonging to himself, when he accepts "the divine claims of Truth and Love."

What are these claims? "What," as the Bible puts the question and answer, "doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?" (Micah 6:8.) In other words. God requires man to be himself, to express the qualities by which the presence of divine Mind is made manifest. For these qualities, appearing as individualized consciousness, constitute the man God made.

He who knows himself to be this child of God has guidance. As the outlined, or formed, idea of Deity, God's child is outside the supposititious range of material babble. Thus he is forever within the range of the voice of his divine source and in that status he hears God's voice continually. "Spirit, God, is heard when the senses are silent," says Mrs. Eddy (Science and Health, p. 89). It was the consciousness of Christ Jesus, in which the senses were silent, that heard, and through the power of its presence enabled those near by to hear the voice of his divine Father saying at the beginning of his ministry, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased" (Matt. 3:17). And it was this consciousness, in which material sense was silent, that recognized the Father's uninterrupted voicing of His will to him as executor of that will. Did he not say (John 5:30), "I can of mine own self do nothing: as I hear, I judge: and my judgment is just; because I seek not mine own will, but the will of the Father which hath sent me"?

Similarly, it was consciousness in which material sense had found little accrediting that enabled Mrs. Eddy, when a child, to hear her name called of God. And after that experience it was the same consciousness, in which material sense remained silenced, that heard God's voice guiding in multifarious ways through a long life of tremendous achievement, including bringing to men the divine Comforter predicted by Christ Jesus. It was Mrs. Eddy's understanding of this guidance that enabled her to admonish us, "He [God] must be ours practically, guiding our every thought and action; else we cannot understand the omnipresence of good sufficiently to demonstrate, even in part, the Science of the perfect Mind and divine healing" (Retrospection and Introspection, p. 28).

God expresses Himself in terms of truth, that is, in terms of what He is; and this expression is man. God is whole, complete; therefore man is whole, healthful. God is unopposed Love; therefore man expresses unimpaired love. God is Truth; therefore man is real. God is Soul; therefore man reflects perfect consciousness. God is Spirit, or Mind; therefore man is spiritual idea. This man, this spiritual idea, this delineation by the divine Father of His own nature individualized, receives His outlining as unerring guidance. He hears it as the still, small voice of Truth, as God declaring man perfect. And under Truth's direction the unfolding selfhood of man is revealed, displacing all misconceptions of man and relegating them to the nothingness they are. All sickness, sin, debility, defeat, and confusion gives way before the clear understanding of what man is and does.

Guidance is not from corporeal person to person. Only spiritual consciousness cognizes the voice of the creator. Guidance is from God. Mrs. Eddy is definite on this point. "The opinions of men," she warns, "cannot be substituted for God's revelation" (Miscellaneous Writings, p. 92). In the solving of human problems each hears Truth for himself. Another may help him bring consciousness into line with Truth, but it is his individual consciousness, when brought into line, that receives guidance for himself.

Sometimes this guidance comes as sound formed in words, as it did to some of the prophets in the Bible. Sometimes it comes as a flash of wisdom in consciousness. Sometimes it comes as hard-won judgment and sound appraisal achieved through toil without ceasing. Sometimes it comes as frustration of human desires, only to be recognized later by the obedient heart as God's will bringing a blessing.

But come it does, unmistakably and continuously, to him who understands he is in true being the son of God, and who accepts into his consciousness only the spiritual qualities by which God expresses Himself.

George Channing