Many problems in our human lives defy solution because of the narrowness of our field of vision. We see clearly what the problem appears to be, and we take appropriate measures to solve it. But the solution does not come, because we have not reckoned with the whole of the error confronting us. A scientific approach to the problem requires a broader view.

Christian Science shows us that disease is not merely a local physical disturbance, but the phenomenon of material belief as a whole. To heal disease, one must deny this total material belief in consciousness where it appears, and we deny this belief by applying the truth of the allness and perfection of the divine Mind, God.

As a photographer uses a wide-angle lens to take in more of the scene he is shooting, so the progressing student of Christian Science learns to face more and more of the human picture before him with the cleansing, freeing truth. On page 331 of Science and Health, Mrs. Eddy writes: "The Scriptures imply that God is All-in-all. From this it follows that nothing possesses reality nor existence except the divine Mind and His ideas. The Scriptures also declare that God is Spirit. Therefore in Spirit all is harmony, and there can be no discord; all is Life, and there is no death. Everything in God's universe expresses Him."

A few years ago I was traveling in a military aircraft, when the weather became extremely rough. About half of those aboard appeared to be suffering from airsickness, and I found myself fighting the symptoms of this disorder. I made many declarations of spiritual truth, in handling these symptoms, protesting my exemption from suffering, but I did not seem to feel any better.

When it appeared that I might finally lose the battle, I prayed with a deep desire for understanding, and these words suddenly came to my thought: There is no turbulence! My first reaction was a mental objection, What can I do about the weather? But the words came again: There is no turbulence—no turbulence among men, among nations, in the atmosphere, in my body or in any body anywhere. Love governs every detail in perfect harmony! As I rejoiced in this newly unfolded truth, I became free from all suggestion of airsickness, and the aircraft stopped bouncing. In a short time all aboard were happily eating lunch.

In "Miscellaneous Writings," Mrs. Eddy says (p. 194), "The lens of Science magnifies the divine power to human sight; and we then see the supremacy of Spirit and the nothingness of matter." During my experience in the aircraft the healing did not come at first, because I did not really use "the lens of Science." That lens takes in the entire scene, not just the small area of local disturbance. In fact, its scope includes the universe.

The specific cause of my suffering was my tacit acceptance of turbulence as a fact. The specific correction of that error was the truth that in the All-in-all there is no turbulence. Declarations of my exemption from disease were correct, but they did not deny the specific cause of the suffering. No real correction had taken place until the truth of God's complete government of the universe in perfect harmony was applied, and my narrow thinking widened to include all in Science.

When mentally viewing a scene in which one seems ill, it may seem clear that a certain false mental trait is the cause. If we declare the nothingness of the disease while seeing the patient as a mortal needing to change his thought, and attempt, perhaps, to persuade him to do so, we may be making a reality of the disease instead of curing it. We need to widen our spiritual vision to include the spiritual reality which negates the false mental trait, recognizing and magnifying the divine power in this specific area of consciousness. We may further widen the angle of the mental lens to include our own thought, to realize that we do see perfection here, no disease, no evil cause, no one believing it. Then we must behold Mind as seeing all but seeing no evil. The teachings of Christ Jesus were not fragmentary; he said (John 18: 37), "For this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth."

Paul wrote in II Corinthians (5:6-8), "We are always confident, knowing that, whilst we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord: ... we are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord." Here is a beautiful leading of thought away from self, away from the narrow view of the circumstances in which we find ourselves, into active knowing as a reflection of omnipresent, divine Mind, Love.

The solution to the problem at hand, whatever it may seem to be, however complex, however time-entrenched, can be found through using "the lens of Science." This lens indeed has a wide angle. In fact, it is limitless, seeing through all space, throughout eternity. Its image is undistorted; its view is completely accurate. And it reveals the goodness of divine Love right where the evil in the problem seems to be. All is good! As we use this lens, we gain the correct view, and our problem is solved.

Carl J. Welz