How do you think of law? Does it seem to you something rather abstract and complicated, shrouded in special terminology, varying from country to country, and often bewilderingly bureaucratic? If this is all that law means to us, then no wonder it often seems difficult to turn to it with any confidence.

The Bible gives a much higher sense of law as God's provision for the guidance of His people. Many instances are recounted where obedience to the law of God brought order and progress, while disregard of it led to disorder and decline. A cornerstone of God's law is the Ten commandments, and in a number of countries these were the original basis of civil law.

Christ Jesus summarized the essence of the Ten Commandments: loving God and loving one's neighbor.

From this standpoint, law is seen to be more than a human system devised to make people do the right simply through fear of penalty. Instead law and order are features of God's kingdom and are seen to be protective and progressive. They are aligned with the spiritual forces of goodness and rightness and justice that are the hallmark of divine authority, which can always be appealed to expectantly to meet human needs.

This is what makes us want to be law-abiding—not just to keep out of trouble but because we inherently respect integrity for its own sake and want to bring it to everything we do. This doesn't mean we ignore civil law, but rather through our own integrity we reinforce and invest it with added power and impetus for good, much like the effect of an appeal court judge's decision when he or she called upon as a higher authority to arbitrate some legal question.

But how can we help enforce beneficial civil law? First, by a clearer sense of the spiritual nature of man, to whom integrity, dignity, worth, and purpose are intrinsic as the image of God. True man is not a fallible mortal, subject to criminal tendencies that sometimes seem compulsive. In reality, man is wholly spiritual, upright, and good. We must also be turning willingly to God for direction at every step.

This makes it possible for us to face lawlessness wherever it seems to be, while holding in thought the true view of man as God made him. Then we can expose and put down criminality without losing sight either of the true, spiritual nature of man or of the profound capacity people have for reformation. Christian Science brings our the concept of spiritual law by defining God as divine Principle and impartial Love—thus revealing that real justice is without indulgence.

In answer to the question "How would you define Christian Science?" Mrs. Eddy writes, "As the law of God, the law of good, interpreting and demonstrating the divine Principle and rule of universal harmony." ^{Rudimental Divine Science, p. 1.} One significance of any principle is that it can be turned to confidently. And for divine Principle, God, this is supremely true, as many people have proved since Bible times.

Understanding this has a marked effect on human situations. A couple I know recently found this to be true.

They were on holiday, and the day before they were to return home they got back from the beach to find that their car had been broken into and their passports, travel documents, and credit cards had been stolen. They reported the loss to the police, who treated them courteously and gave them the documentation necessary for their journey back.

Then they telephoned a Christian Science practitioner and asked her to pray for them. She did so and reassured them of the ever-presence and power of divine law, governing everyone. They got home safely and continued to pray for the full enforcement of God's law for everyone everywhere.

About two months later an insignificant-looking letter dropped through their mail slot one morning. When they opened it, out popped two familiar driving licenses, credit cards, and family photographs. Their passports arrived a little later. The documents had been returned by the embassy concerned. To my friends this was a proof of how effective our confidently appealing to divine authority is in rebuking lawlessness and enforcing order.

Mrs. Eddy writes: "No evidence before the material senses can close my eyes to the scientific proof that God, good, is supreme. Though clouds are round about Him, the divine justice and judgment are enthroned. Love is especially near in times of hate, and never so near as when one can be just amid lawlessness, and render good for evil." ^{Miscellaneous Writings, p. 277.}

The Ten Commandments may be taken as simple moral requirements not to kill or steal or commit adultery. But they also represent a prophetic promise of the gradual emergence in each of us of the true nature of man, who has no proclivity to do any of these things. As God's creation, cared for by divine law and Love, man has no need to steal. He is a man of integrity in the fullest sense, completely satisfied. So he doesn't have to rob anyone else, or want to do so.

Appealing to God as Principle, praying for and recognizing the permanence and authority of divine law and order, is the most effective method of law enforcement we can ever hope to find.