'Thus far and no farther'

MAIKE BYRD, CHILDREN'S EDITOR

The severest weather conditions I've ever experienced happened while I was a schoolgirl living in northern Germany. Growing up in a small town two kilometers from the North Sea, I'd heard many stories about the fierceness of the sea and people's efforts over generations to build ever stronger and better dikes to protect themselves from storm tides. But all of the stories of broken dikes had taken place in the past, and I never imagined it could happen in our time.

Then one day in February the wind started picking up, and hurricane-strength gusts whipped through our area, wreaking havoc in its path. The raging sea tore holes in dikes all along our coast. The whole region went into a state of emergency. People living in the immediately endangered lowlands behind our dikes were evacuated. The military was called in for assistance, and many volunteers, including my dad, were trucked out to the shore to strengthen crumbling dikes with sandbags.

In the middle of all this, I remember my mother taking care of customers who made it, through this weather, to our grocery store, comforting fearful evacuees, and encouraging all to trust in God's good power, despite what appeared to be happening. High winds continued through the following morning, when the noon tide was expected to be at its highest and it was feared that the dikes would break.

My mother had stayed up praying most of that night. She felt a deep sense of peace and trust in good when, as she told me later, the simple conviction of God's unerring control filled her with these words from the Bible: "Thus far and no farther" (see Job 38:11; Science and Health, p. 124). As it turned out, just before the water crested, the winds stopped. The tide receded and the dikes, although heavily damaged in many places, held. Many people at the time felt that a higher power had been at work to save us at that 11th hour. Churches held thanksgiving services.

People often ask where God is when natural disasters happen. Divine Love is never absent and never gives up control of its creation to any material force. Back then, that North Sea experience gave me a conviction that, yes, prayer does have an effect on Earth's weather. As this week's Sentinel shows, each one of us can witness God's irresistible force for good in our natural environment today.

WHAT I SAY UNTO YOU I SAY UNTO ALL, WATCH.—JESUS

The Christian Science Sentinel was founded in 1898 by Mary Baker Eddy, and its mission remains the same: "to hold guard over Truth, Life, and Love." The Sentinel continues to report on the unlimited ways that the healing power and presence of the Christ activates, uplifts, and transforms the lives of everyday people around the world.

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