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CSEC ON-LINE REFERENCE LIBRARY |
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SUE HARPER MIMS, CSD
Christ, the true idea of God, was expressed through Jesus, who in his humanity cognized the unreal or illusory sense of existence and overcame it through his realization of the truth which makes free. Having the Christ-mind, Jesus was the first great overcomer, to whom is promised glory, blessing, and dominion; as we read in the Apocalypse: "To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as I also overcame, and am set down with my Father in his throne." This conquest of false sense, or unreality, all that is opposed to the divine reality and perfection, alone enables us to attain that unity with God, eternal Life, for which Jesus prayed, saying, "that they may be one, as we are." This entering into the true, divine consciousness effects the annihilation of all error; it is, indeed, the heavenly Jerusalem or "tabernacle of God," that wondrous city, "coming down from God out of heaven," in which there shall no longer be a consciousness of death; where there shall be "neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain," for God Himself "shall wipe away all tears from their eyes." One reason for the human acceptance of sin, disease, and death, instead of its denial and overcoming, is this, that the human mind has been taught to be reconciled to them because sent from God; yet Jesus would surely not have healed the sick and raised the dead, if sin and death had been part of the Father's plan. He came doing and to do the will of the Father. In Hebrews we read: "Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil; and deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage." The author of this remarkable epistle to the Hebrews certainly did not consider death a part of the divine plan, for both he and St. John clearly taught that sin brings death. Paul says that "by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin;" and James tells us that "when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death." Again Paul declares that Jesus Christ "hath abolished death, and hath brought life and immortality to light through the gospel." The teaching of all these passages is clear, and the last selection, Paul's statement to Timothy, is very scientific, implying as it does that life and immortality were and are the eternal realities of being, brought to our understanding through the gospel. In Science and Health (p. 427) Mrs. Eddy writes: "The tenor of the Word shows that we shall obtain the victory over death in proportion as we overcome sin." If this were merely a theory, without the fruits of demonstration, it would not be worthwhile to give it serious thought, but because it vitally concerns the health, harmony, and morals of mankind here and now, it is of the deepest import. Again our Leader says (p. 426): "The relinquishment of all faith in death and also of the fear of its sting would raise the standard of health and morals far beyond its present elevation, and would enable us to hold the banner of Christianity aloft with unflinching faith in God, in Life eternal. Sin brought death, and death will disappear with the disappearance of sin . . . . The human concepts named matter, death, disease, sickness, and sin are all that can be destroyed." Death, then, is only a phase of the belief that existence is material instead of spiritual, an experience of the human mind, and we have but to awake from the dream of materialism to the joy and fruition of spiritual understanding. As we learn that mind makes its own embodiment and cannot die, the change called death is seen to be neither corrective nor transforming; the body must be redeemed by the spiritualization of thought. Jesus was appreciable to human view after the resurrection, and bore in his hands and side the print of the nails and the spear wound; but he finally rose beyond human vision through the absolute putting off of the fleshly consciousness and the perfect realization of spiritual substance or consciousness, thus coming into perfect at-one-ment with the Father, Spirit. This is the important thought with respect to death; namely, that we "die daily," as St. Paul puts it, to sin. Should death seem inevitable upon this plane, the true preparation for it would be made in learning so to live that we shall have acquired the assurance of David when he said, "As for me, I will behold thy face in righteousness: I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with thy likeness." Throughout the Scriptures it is seen that the poets and prophets caught glorious glimpses of the continuity of Life. Enoch was translated, Elijah was transfigured, and doubtless the angels beheld Moses' transfiguration, — all these foreshadowing Jesus' triumphant victory over death and the grave. For our enlightenment Jesus took each step in the ascending way, to show the universality of eternal life and its possible demonstration. Transfiguration and ascension became for him, as they are to become for us, the logical steps to divine Life. Mrs. Eddy has said that "during the sensual ages, absolute Christian Science may not be achieved prior to the change called death" (Science and Health, p. 254); but she calls for the evangelization of mortals, she demands that they awake to the consecrated unworldly work of destroying sin in themselves and others, on the basis of their unreality, as revealed in the Scripture declaration that "God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good."
Christian Science Sentinel, October 26, 1912 |
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