The Importance of the First Commandment

[Of Special Interest to Young Men and Women]

ELIZABETH K. BRISCOE

Mrs. Eddy writes on page 340 of Science and Health: "The First Commandment is my favorite text. It demonstrates Christian Science." And farther along in the same paragraph she adds, "The divine Principle of the First Commandment bases the Science of being, by which man demonstrates health, holiness, and life eternal."

To demonstrate "health, holiness, and life eternal" is a most desirable goal. To attain it, we must thoroughly understand and obey the First Commandment, "Thou shalt have no other gods before me" (Ex. 20:3). To understand and obey this commandment, we need to know God.

Christian Science teaches that God is divine Love, Mind, Principle, Life, Spirit. As we ponder the qualities implied in these names for God and strive to exemplify them in our lives, we shall gain an ever-clearer understanding of what it means to have no other gods but the one God. Christ Jesus said (Matt. 22:37), "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind."

To love the Lord our God with all the heart is our guide in all our affections. Are we loving the Godlike qualities of justice, integrity, perfection, and mercy whenever and wherever we see them expressed? Or are we loving person and clinging to person instead of to Principle? If we are loving God and His qualities and holding them in thought continually, we see that the real man reflects these qualities. Thus we see ourselves and others as Love's ideas, not as mortals with material personalities. This is the love that is needed to establish peace in the home, in the school, and in the world.

Knowing that Life is Spirit, God, we know that there is no life, substance, or intelligence in matter, for matter is the opposite of Spirit. Therefore we do not look to the material body, expecting it to express intelligence, action, or substance for us. Accepting God as all substance and the source of all intelligence and action, we shall be ready to follow the demand made by Mrs. Eddy on page 393 of Science and Health, "Take possession of your body, and govern its feeling and action."

A pupil in a Christian Science Sunday School who was a member of his school track team learned to follow this demand by studying the First Commandment. While he was competing in a race, his leg muscles cramped. Thereafter whenever he ran, the pain returned, and he had to stop. He confided to his Sunday School teacher that he was afraid to race because of this. They reviewed the First Commandment and also John's statement (I John 4:18), "There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear."

The pupil prayed earnestly to love God sincerely, for he saw that if he feared, he was not truly loving God, not keeping the First Commandment. He realized that the fear was caused by the erroneous premise that muscle, instead of Mind, governs action. He corrected this lie by dwelling on the truth that God is the only Life of man, His idea, and that all action proceeds from the divine Mind. As he did so, the fear vanished. He resumed his place on the team and suffered no further pain in the leg.

We keep the First Commandment as we know that there is only one Mind, God. This prevents us from accepting a mind or an intelligence apart from God. We know that we do not have a mind separate from God, acting on its own, but that we are in reality the ideas through which God, Mind, is ceaselessly expressing Himself.

Truly the First Commandment is the foundation upon which to build. As we love and obey it, harmony, peace, love, joy, and dominion will fill our lives, and we shall have begun to demonstrate "health, holiness, and life eternal."

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