Last year we ran an item from The Boston Globe in our "Second Thought" column. It related what Dr. Robert Coles had discovered almost thirty years ago when he was studying the case of a young girl who had become the first black student to attend the public school in her community. After a desegregation order in 1960, Ruby Bridges, at six years of age, found herself facing an angry mob each day on her way to school. There were obscenities. There were threats that she would be killed.

Yet instead of the trauma one might expect, the girl was at peace. The reason? Her response had been to pray. She had prayed for herself and for her persecutors—and did it every day, three times each day. Dr. Coles was quoted: "We must never forget how much a child like Ruby has to teach us." ^{The Boston Globe, June 4, 1985 .}

I've continued to see other articles about Dr. Coles in the press this past year. It's often noted that he has received wide praise as a teacher, and his Christian of Crisis books won a Pulitzer Prize. But there was something else in one of the recent magazine reports about this man's work. The article spoke of his efforts this way: "He had traveled thousands of miles, recorded miles of tape, and written a million words, all of which pointed right back to the Sermon on the Mount. ... He had learned that what matters most comes not from without—the circumstances of life—but from within, inside the heart of an individual man or woman or child." ^{See Philip Yancy, "The Crayon Man," Christianity Today, February 6, 1987, p. 19 .}

Unquestionably, there is a great need to get back to basics—to the simple yet profound and life-changing spiritual discipline of the Sermon on the Mount.

Among many of the important lessons in the Sermon on the Mount, Christ Jesus taught: "Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God ... Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; that ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven." ^{Matt. 5:9, 44, 45.}

When I read those words, I can't help seeing the example of Ruby Bridges. I think she was truly doing this remarkable thing of love and prayer that Jesus calls his followers to do. This must be what saved her joy, her peace, and maybe her life.

Sometimes our own wrestlings with our purpose in life, with all the complexities and strife in the world around us, can leave us feeling as though we've been pinned beneath a heavy load of imponderables. There may be other times when failing health or some other desperate turn of events can leave a person confused and afraid, uncertain of how to proceed. And there may be times when one is feeling the sting of animosity, envy, or misunderstanding, and can't see any way of healing. Those are all times to get back to the basics of the Sermon on the Mount.

As presented in Matthew's Gospel, this message of Jesus to his disciples includes the well-known Beatitudes, the Lord's Prayer, and important parables, such as that of the wise man who builds his house upon the rock and the foolish man who builds on sand. And undergirding all of these teachings is the Master's profound understanding of man's relationship to God. Jesus lived the unity of Father and Son and proved the immediate fact of the ideal spirituality and purity that constitute each individual's true identity as God's reflection. He healed the sick, restored the sinner to new life, raised the dead.

Christian Science explains the Master's works from the standpoint of divine reality. It reveals man's spiritual nature. It demonstrates man's undefiled wholeness and intelligent goodness as the expression of God, who is divine Love, pure Spirit, infinite Mind. And our spiritual understanding of this present divine reality is what gives forward impetus, and meaning, and immediate practicality to our own efforts at fulfilling each of the fundamental demands of Christ's Sermon.

When we would shine a light to the world, or love those who would be enemies, or pray "Thy will be done," or serve God and not materialism, we are getting back to the most important basics. And in so doing, we find that the imponderables are lifted off, resolved. We're released from confusion and uncertainty. There are healing answers for failing health, marriage, or career. And any hurt of animosity or envy is taken away through a new love.

There are a lot of philosophies, theories, and methodologies today that tell us all sorts of things except how actually to live our lives day to day. And what we're told usually offers precious little of how to find healing or to work out our salvation. The need, however, remains straightforward. For example, in a message to her Church at the turn of the century, Mary Baker Eddy, who founded the Church of Christ, Scientist, wrote: "To my sense the Sermon on the Mount, read each Sunday without comment and obeyed throughout the week, would be enough for Christian practice." ^{Message to The Mother Church for 1901, p. 11.} Mrs. Eddy also refers to Jesus' Sermon as "that divine digest of Science." ^{Rudimental Divine Science, p. 3.}

The message of the Sermon on the Mount surely presents the essence of Christian practice and the inspired digest of Christianity's Science. It shows the what, the how, and the why of living each day as a follower of Jesus.

Yet perhaps it does take a childlike heart to see the simple truth and the power in these basics. And perhaps the sophisticated materialist will feel he wants nothing of this thing of Christian love and selfless, healing prayer. I think someone like little Ruby Bridges would go on praying just the same.

The spiritual rationale, the power, of the Sermon on the Mount will continue to capture people's hearts, stir up thought, and change lives. The world can only be a better place for every humble effort to hear the message and learn the lessons—to get back to the basics of a scientific Christianity.

William E. Moody