We are all blessed with the ability to be spiritually-minded and to express spirituality generously in our daily lives.

Spiritual ability is independent of material conditions or circumstances. It is not a material endowment. The ability to understand and express spiritual qualities and ideas is bestowed on all by infinite Spirit, God, and can be utilized by anyone, anywhere, anytime. This talent is discovered through prayer and developed through use. To begin, we can cherish within ourselves the sincere desire to know God's true nature. And we can earnestly strive to reflect His nature in all that we do. Christ Jesus, through his teaching and example, helps us with this.

Jesus fully realized God's unlimited goodness and man's unlimited capacity for expressing God's goodness. His confidence in our spiritual aptitude is evident in the fact that his teachings specifically direct us to be Godlike in all our ways. In the Beatitudes (see Matt. 5:3–12), for example, Jesus commends for our admiration and adoption such holy attitudes of thought as humility, meekness, a perpetual yearning for righteousness, mercifulness toward all, purity of heart, a reconciling spirit that promotes peace and salvation, and rejoicing in the midst of persecution. The word beatitude means "perfect blessedness or happiness." And in the King James Version of the Bible, each of Jesus' Beatitudes begins "Blessed are...."

God blesses the qualities embodied in Jesus' teachings. They are blessed because they are holy, sacred, consecrated to the glorification of God. They reflect God's nature as divine Truth, Life, and Love. God expresses and blesses these qualities without interruption throughout all space eternally. So when we put them into practice in our lives, we feel God's blessing—which makes us want to express them more and more. And "blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled" (Matt. 5:6).

"Filled." How this result differs from the discontent that is perpetually on the heels of our yearnings when we think happiness is dependent on personally outlined circumstances! Note, however, that the beatitude doesn't go on to say "and when you are filled you won't hunger after righteousness anymore." The fact is that Spirit is eternally unfolding, and the pursuit of spiritual expression is so satisfying, we can't get enough of it. That's because we are created for one specific purpose—to express Spirit. As Mary Baker Eddy says in the Christian Science textbook, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, "Man is the expression of God's being" (p. 470).

What makes spiritual expression truly blessed is that it is not a selfish pursuit. Because spirituality glorifies God, not self, it blesses everyone. It brings divine Love's healing and transforming power to bear on us and everyone within the range of our thought and experience. This knowledge adds immeasurably to our happiness and thus impels us to persist in our spiritual endeavors. As we do, God, being the only power, empowers us to love as we've never loved before. And through the love of Love we prevail over any supposed obstacle to our spiritual progress.

Happiness is inherent in the blessedness of spiritual love. As Mrs. Eddy says, "To do good to all because we love all, and to use in God's service the one talent that we all have, is our only means of adding to that talent and the best way to silence a deep discontent with our shortcomings" (The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, p. 195). The more we develop our God-bestowed capacity for expressing Truth and Love, the more we will experience feelings of contentment. No doubt that is why some modern translations of the Bible begin each beatitude with "Happy are...."

Happy are you when you hunger to express God's love!

Barbara M. Vining