A young woman sat by the hearthside late one night, watching the fading flames from a last log settle into embers. Her husband was overseas and was to be away for many months; their families lived in another city. Suggestions of loneliness, depression, and self-pity swirled in her thought like snowflakes.

Christian Scientists are taught to look away from material evidence of sickness and sorrow to the true, perfect concept of man as God created him. The young woman realized she should be turning wholeheartedly to God and to His knowledge of man instead of letting her thought dwell on the mortal self and its woes.

Endeavoring to gain a more comprehensive standpoint from which to pray, she found herself asking, "What's happening in the world right now?" Quickly the answer came: "In the Christian world many people are thinking about the crucifixion of Jesus and the suffering it implies, because it's the beginning of Lent."

For a moment she found herself reacting, "No wonder I feel I have to give up friends and joy and be cut off from what is dear and comforting!" And then she remembered something Mrs. Eddy says in the Christian Science textbook, Science and Health: "If Christ, Truth, has come to us in demonstration, no other commemoration is requisite, for demonstration is Immanuel, or God with us; and if a friend be with us, why need we memorials of that friend?" ^{Science and Health, p. 34;}

Already feeling better, she began to read on in the textbook with renewed enthusiasm. On the very next page, referring to Christ Jesus' last spiritual breakfast with the disciples and their fresh perception of Christ, Truth, Mrs. Eddy says, "This spiritual meeting with our Lord in the dawn of a new light is the morning meal which Christian Scientists commemorate." ^{ibid., p. 35;}

"Of course!" the young woman thought. "Christian Scientists don't dwell on the suffering of the crucifixion. They are deeply grateful for Jesus' unparalleled sacrifice and its lessons. But they commemorate the resurrection—the risen Christ! This season becomes one of hope, joy, and fulfillment when we give up a false sense of it."

During the next several weeks she made a continuing study of crucifixion and resurrection in the Bible and in the writings of Mrs. Eddy. She took time to make a mental list of states of thought associated with the crucifixion and also qualities that belong to the resurrection.

The list kept growing, and each day she would ask herself, Where is my thought right now? Am I dwelling on the crucifixion? Am I believing in the reality of suffering, separation, and heartache, or am I moving beyond the crucifixion and holding fast to the joy of the resurrection?

It became an ongoing project for her to challenge every thought that presented itself: Do you belong to the harshness and burden of the crucifixion, or do you speak to me of the resurrection and its promise of renewal, regeneration? She faithfully replaced every suggestion of suffering with the spiritual fact of man's whole, deathless being and acknowledged the validity of the present Christ, Truth, and the real man. She knew that in reality God sends only good thoughts and that true communication is always from God to His idea, man. What seem to be erroneous thoughts are only suggestions of a supposititious finite mind, the opposite of the one divine Mind.

She read again Paul's words "I die daily," ^{I Cor. 15:31;} reminding herself that the old man—the false, material concept of oneself and others—must be put off daily. That is all that ever needs to be or can be crucified. She also recalled Paul's counsel to the Christians in Rome, "Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord." ^{Rom. 6:11;}

She realized that it is good to know that the false sense of oneself is all that can disappear. We can become dead only to sin.

By this is not meant indifference or blindness to the claims of sin but their utter destruction. The effort to let go of false concepts doesn't have to be painful or prolonged, because whatever is not inherent in God's man was never true in the first place.

Pain, anguish, lack of recognition, a sense of desertion and betrayal—all the suffering and sorrow that seem a crucifixion in our experience—belong not to God's man and universe. Even though we may face such obstacles, we can see them as impelling us beyond the erring sense of mind and life in matter to an understanding of spiritual reality. To the resurrection consciousness, that risen spiritual sense that Christ Jesus so fully exemplified and demonstrated, belongs all that means true comfort. This is the consciousness of perfect God and perfect man, of the allness of God, good, and the nothingness of evil.

As the young woman daily watched her thought, there came a deep conviction of "Immanuel, or God with us," and this satisfied her. About that time, which was near Easter, she received word that her husband was being transferred within a few months to the very city where their families lived. The true commemoration had come in demonstration!

Like Paul, the Leader of the Christian Science movement wrote letters to her churches. In one such letter Mrs. Eddy says: "It is the purpose of divine Love to resurrect the understanding, and the kingdom of God, the reign of harmony already within us. Through the word that is spoken unto you, are you made free. Abide in His word, and it shall abide in you; and the healing Christ will again be made manifest in the flesh—understood and glorified." ^{Miscellaneous Writings, p. 154.}

This is what happened to some extent in this woman's experience. She discovered, as each of us can, the friend that is ever with us. Christ, Truth, is commemorated by present demonstration, by the crucifixion of every false sense of self and the resurrection of our understanding of man's here-and-now unity with God.