Man and the universe are spiritual, not material. God, divine Principle, governs the universe with precision and love. Man reflects the quality of dominion from his perfect Principle, and we can exercise control as we yield to Principle's absolute authority.

It may seem paradoxical to say we control by yielding, but the master Christian demonstrated this. Jesus said, "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." ^{John 5:30;} Yielding, then, means relinquishing human will to God's will and renouncing human egotism for spiritual selfhood, God's expression—our true self. This yielding alters our perspective and shows us how to cope with the anxiety often accompanying change.

When relationships are severed or we begin a new job or graduate from school, the future may appear quite indefinite—even foreboding. Often it is difficult to let go of a cherished plan, or to refrain from despair if our outlining is frustrated by some circumstance that seems beyond our control. In the play Julius Caesar, Shakespeare's character Cassius questions the human tendency to blame outside sources for our frustrations and failures: "The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, /But in ourselves, that we are underlings."

It is with ourselves that we must begin. We can make our present productive and ensure the security of the days to come by realizing that our experience is subjective. We determine the outward trend of our lives by exercising authority over our thoughts. What we admit to be true and powerful tends to become so in our experience. In reality, there is only one Mind—God—and as we find our true identity as Mind's expression, we are in charge. Every step of identification with good develops this authority. When compassion, faith, wisdom, and so on, occupy our thinking, inevitably we approach nobility of spirit. Our Leader, Mrs. Eddy, offers this assurance: "Hold thought steadfastly to the enduring, the good, and the true, and you will bring these into your experience proportionably to their occupancy of your thoughts." ^{Science and Health, p. 261;}

We are not, then, at the mercy of chance, irrational circumstance, astrological design, or any other mortal rationale. If we are not watchful, however, self-centeredness, discouragement, or willfulness may enter thought. The course of our life could then become erratic and follow no constructive goal. Our fears and anxieties may be compounded. But if we realize that God, Mind, constitutes all true consciousness, we feel the peace of divine Love. Then we find our lives following a clearly progressive path.

How comforting to be assured, through the Christ, of the constancy of divine Love! Christian Science brings the deep conviction that God, Love, always has been, is now, and ever will be in control of man and the universe. The orbits of Love, holding each idea in Love's plan, are fixed.

If one looks at his life, his country, or his world from the objective posture of mortal mind—the fictitious opposite of divine intelligence—uncertainties may appear to obliterate the omnipresence of Love. But Love can never be obscured; it is synonymous with true intelligence. If we exercise dominion by realizing our unity with divine Mind, we can, in a sense, "think out from" this Mind, glimpsing the perfect spiritual universe of Love's creating right where a matter-bound world is appearing to material sense. Doubt and fear fall away from such spiritualized consciousness. Therefore, dire predictions about impending war, nuclear disaster, energy shortage, or rampant inflation need not cast a pall of despair over our outlook.

An enlightened concept of time helps enormously. Prognoses about the coming months or years are sometimes bleak, sometimes optimistic. At best, they are indeterminate. The tendency of humanity is often to wait for future good (or to fear predicted evil) and therefore to overlook present opportunities for action. To do this is to live inertly in the only time in which any of us can work— the eternal now. It is with today's thinking that we begin to shape days to come.

Divine Mind energizes our use of today as a springboard for a vigorous and resilient tomorrow. Mrs. Eddy wisely states, "Success in life depends upon persistent effort, upon the improvement of moments more than upon any other one thing." And she counsels, "If one would be successful in the future, let him make the most of the present." ^{Miscellaneous Writings, p. 230;}

The quality of our future depends on the trust we freely place in God's wisdom and on our fervent cultivation of spiritual understanding. These give us confidence in our ability to prove that time is actually not a factor in the Science of being. God operates in eternity, not in a time frame. As we learn that God's universe is changeless, pressureless, unfluctuating, including no cyclical element, concern for developing trends dissipates. And we begin to feel the joy and vitality of living in the ever-present now.

The three-year career of Christ Jesus is an example of the farreaching effect produced by devotion to the task at hand. Although we know almost nothing of his life between the ages of twelve and thirty, it is evident from "I must be about my Father's business" ^{Luke 2:49;} —a fact he recognized as a boy—that he was conscious of his unique mission.

But during the eighteen years of spiritual preparation for this mission, he must have learned and practiced Joseph's trade of carpentry. Of this phase of Jesus' life, Mrs. Eddy says, in explanation of the incorporeal Christ: "This spiritual idea, or Christ, entered into the minutiae of the life of the personal Jesus. It made him an honest man, a good carpenter, and a good man, before it could make him the glorified." ^{Mis., p. 166.} Jesus secured triumphant immortality by demonstrating the Christ day by day and year by year.

Honesty and goodness demonstrated daily, and spiritual growth manifest in habitual yielding to the will and wisdom of God, discerned through prayer, are the Christly way to dominion and security. Each day provides ample opportunity to express the future-securing qualities of integrity, dedication, trustworthiness, and so on. Hour by hour we grasp these opportunities and leave what's to come to God's unerring, benign plan. The future is simply the "today" of tomorrow.

If we have a discerning attitude toward coming events, we can stay ahead of the prophets of doom. But a hopeful outlook must be a cut above human optimism. To be permanently in control of the direction of our lives, we must take a still firmer stance. We must uncompromisingly acknowledge that God is All, that in His universe there is no random occurrence; everything is under absolute divine guidance. Consistency in maintaining this stand requires spiritual courage and humility.

When we have reached the altitude of genuine confidence in Mind's specific purpose for us, even though as yet we may not see that purpose, we know we are waking up from the dream of mortality. Spiritually winning control over our consciousness (experience) by realization of man's unity with divine Mind, we prove that in the timeless spiritual cosmos Love's government is supreme. Love alone constitutes all environment, substance, and activity. Our firm trust in God's faultless control of His creation splendidly embraces our present and our future.

My son, forget not my law; but let thine heart keep my commandments.... Let not mercy and truth forsake thee: ... so shalt thou find favour and good understanding in the sight of God and man. Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.

Proverbs 3:1, 3–6