Mark records that when the disciples rebuked those who were bringing little children to the Master to bless them, he said (10:14, 15): "Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of God. Verily I say unto you, Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child, he shall not enter therein."

A friend told the writer that one winter her small grandson was living with her while his parents were away. One morning she noticed that he was manifesting the symptoms of a cold. Praying to say the right thing to him, she commenced to reason with him about his real selfhood as a beloved child of God and about God's constant care and protection. She explained at length that since God is everywhere present and fills all space, there is no room or place for a cold to get into and express itself. She pointed out among other things that in reality everyone dwells in the atmosphere of Love and therefore cannot be robbed of his joy, happiness, or health. She assured him that he would be able to go to school free and well.

The lad listened very intently during breakfast and while being helped on with his snowsuit and boots. Then as he went out the door he looked up at her and with the sweetest smile said: "Yes Grandmother, I know. God is. Error is not. And that is that." Then he went whistling down the street. When he came home that afternoon there was not the slightest trace of a cold.

The grandmother later told the writer that while her lengthy explanations had all been true, they had not covered the ground so thoroughly and completely as the Child's four short statements to her had done. "Surely," she said, "such purity, simplicity, and confidence belong to the kingdom of heaven."

With his childlike purity and simplicity the boy had understood and accepted without reservation or quibbling that God is the only presence, the only power, and the only lawgiver. He had accepted the truths of the kingdom of heaven, thereby proving practical Christ Jesus' statement (John 8:32), "Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free."

In the Christian Science textbook,

"Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," our beloved Leader, Mary Baker Eddy, writes (P.236): "Children are more tractable than adults, and learn more readily to love the simple verities that will make them happy and good. Jesus loved little children because of their freedom from wrong and their receptiveness of right. While age is halting between two opinions or battling with false beliefs, youth makes easy and rapid strides towards Truth." She also says in her "Miscellaneous Writings" (p. 53): "The teachings of Jesus were simple; and yet he found it difficult to make the rulers understand, because of their great lack of spirituality. Christian Science is simple, and readily understood by the children; only the thought educated away from it finds it abstract or difficult to perceive."

The premises and reasoning of Christian Science are profoundly simple. They are based on the unalterable fact that God is omnipresent, omnipotent, and omniscient. This fact precludes the possibility that anything impure, imperfect, unstable, sinful, or warlike can exist and proves conclusively that there is only His spiritual and completely perfect creation.

When there is some problem lacing us that we do not seem to solve, let us remember Jesus' remark to Nicodemus (John 3:3), "Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a, man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." When Nicodemus questioned how this could be, Jesus replied, "Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God."

Perhaps our need is to go to the Father with the simplicity, trust, unaffectedness, innocence, purity, and obedience of the little child. Maybe we have wanted to lead God, instead of being led of God. Pride, egotism, and determination may have blinded us to the point that we could not see how to take His hand. Possibly so-called intellectualism and higher education have superseded and dwarfed our spiritual development. While academic education is very fine and to be desired and used, it does not constitute the most important element for spiritual growth and development. The most important requirement is the desire to emulate the Master in purity, humility, teachableness, obedience, and in the spontaneous acceptance of and reliance on the all-encompassing love of our heavenly Father.

Another point to be remembered is that a mortal has nothing to do with bringing God's laws into operation. The action of God's laws is never dependent on a mortal. God always was and always will be the propelling force of all right action. The ever-operative laws of God are soonest recognized by the childlike thought, whose affections and aims are set not on carnality but in spirituality.

We need never feel humiliation in the meekness that bows the head and bends the knee with gratitude, trust, and obedience. We should feel strength, power, and vigor in humility. In Science we know that egotism, self-will, self-justification, pride, and the like have nothing in common with the child of God. Man is never more or less than the express image of God; therefore we exist only to express Him. We should not identify ourselves with the carnal: the temptations, foibles, and fables of the world, the flesh, and the devil. Like Christ Jesus, we should identify ourselves with God as His beloved sons, constantly reflecting and manifesting the spiritual dominion of Life, Truth, Love, Spirit, Mind, Soul, and Principle. Then childlike trust and obedience will be ours always.

As we thus identify ourselves with God we shall be aligning ourselves with true spirituality, and it will be demonstrated in our daily living, because more of God's presence will be evidenced in our consciousness. This will open the door to the kingdom of heaven, which Mrs. Eddy defines thus on page 590 of the textbook: "The reign of harmony in divine Science; the realm of unerring, eternal, and omnipotent Mind; the atmosphere of Spirit, where Soul is supreme."

All who love God can know that, in reality, no one is left out of the kingdom of God, wherein all are controlled and governed by His law of universal harmony. In His kingdom only the language of Love is known, and this language includes no word that can provoke ill feeling or cause dissension, for there peace, progress, justice, mercy, and righteousness abound. There God is the only ruler, the supreme judge, the beneficent Father of all, who is understood by all, worshiped by all, and known by all.