LOVE YOUR PROBLEMS

by

Martha Wilcox

The subject of this lesson is “Love Your Problems.” And in connection with this
subject, we shall consider how it is possible for one to love his problems and
the result in so doing. We shall take the position that to love our problems is
synonymous with the command of Jesus, “Love your enemies.”
In Miscellaneous Writings, Mrs. Eddy says to “Love thine enemies” is identical
with “Thou hast no enemies.” So to love your problems must be identical with
thou hast no problems. She continues: “Can you see an enemy, except you first
formulate this enemy and then look upon the object of your own conception? We
must love our enemies in all the manifestations wherein and whereby we love our
friends; must even try not to expose their faults, but to do them good whenever
opportunity occurs.”
We may wonder how Mrs. Eddy could make these statements. She could make such
statements because she had demonstrated that an enemy, when rightly understood,
was found to be its original - a friend. So, I take it that we must love our
problems in all the manifestations wherein and whereby we love our perfect
experiences. I take it that we are not to destroy or evade the problems that
confront us, but instead we must translate them into their present originals - a
perfect thing or a perfect universe.
Speaking of Jesus in Miscellaneous Writings, Mrs. Eddy states: “His earthly
mission was to translate substance into its original meaning, Mind. He walked
upon the waves; he turned the water into wine; he healed the sick and the
sinner; he raised the dead, and rolled away the stone from the door of his own
tomb. His demonstration of Spirit virtually vanquished matter and its supposed
laws.”
Yes, Students, Jesus’ sense of a thing, or a person, or a circumstance, was the
opposite of what mortals entertain of them. Jesus is our Wayshower, and today
when working out a problem, we are trying to do just what Jesus did. We take the
erroneous sense that we entertain of a thing, a person, or a circumstance, and
translate it into its original and actual. Then the question of our having a
problem resolves itself into the obvious conclusion - that any so-called problem
is nothing other than an original established fact at hand, but erroneously
interpreted by us.
It is not difficult to love our problem when we know that it has an original
value. It was this true understanding of the original value of things that
caused the Master to entreat his followers to “put up thy sword.” Jesus knew
that the individual confronted with a so-called problem needed the understanding
to translate it, and not a sword with which to decapitate it. Jesus said, “Agree
with thine adversary quickly, whiles thou art in the way with him.” Yes, at the
very instant when the problem is presented to you, make the agreement. There is
already the perfect agreement in that your adversary, or your problem, is even
now the original fact at hand. Then make your translation quickly, and do not
allow the false sense, or the opposite of the spiritual fact, to have place in
your mind.
Jesus, of whom it was said, “Never man spake like this man,” reached the climax
on the subject of problems when he said, “Love your enemies.” It does seem that
those who seem to be “enemies” do make us many problems and sometimes very
serious ones. Further, he said, “Bless them that curse you, do good unto them
that hate you, and pray for them who despitefully use you, and persecute you.”
We can bless and do good to those who seem to oppose us only as we know how to
pray for them. Prayer, in its true sense, is a treatment. A treatment is the
acceptance and acknowledgement of the actual fact in our own mind that all men
and things are one being. ur prayer for our enemies is a translation of our
material sense into the truth of being, and when we have done this, we have
friends and not enemies.
Jesus also gave the reason why we should love our enemies - these objects of our
own conceptions which we have formulated - and why we should pray for them. He
said, “Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good unto them that hate
you, and pray for them who despitefully use you, and persecute you; that ye may
be the children of your father which is in heaven.” Yes, we love our enemies and
pray for them that we may be the children of Mind - that we may be Mind’s
particular, definite idea of Himself. And since it is impossible for the idea to
be unlike the Mind that is consciously being the idea, then we, like the Master,
should have a correct sense of the person, or thing, or circumstance at hand,
and we gain this correct sense by translating the object of our conception into
its original.
Someone is thinking, “Are we to bless and do good and pray for all the criminals
and extortioners? I’d get rid of them if I had my way.” Yes, students, we should
rid our land, and let us bear in mind, that our land is our
consciousness - we should rid our land of criminals and extortionists - these
enemies, these conceptions which we have ignorantly formulated. We should get
rid of them in the only way we can get rid of them and in the only place where
they are. When we do this, there will be no criminals and crime will cease.
In our textbook, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, Mrs. Eddy says,
“Those who discern Christian Science will hold crime in check. They will aid in
the ejection of error.” It does seem that much of the condemnation of criminals
is justifiable. It is essential that society be protected from criminals, and
there are legitimate ways and means that must be used to protect society from
crime. But let us remember that condemnation of a criminal will not prevent his
being a criminal, neither does condemnation of a criminal lessen crime. The only
thing that will save a criminal, or prevent a criminal from being a criminal, is
Christ, active in consciousness. And this Christ, Truth, must become active in
our consciousness first, and in the criminal’s consciousness later.
Let us consider the crimes committed by Saul of Tarsus, and the method used by
the disciples to rid their land, their consciousness, of the belief in crime and
of this criminal. In the Book of Acts we read: “As for Saul, he made havoc of
the church, entering into every house, and haling [hailing] men and women
committed them to prison. And Saul, yet breathing out threatenings and slaughter
against the disciples of the Lord, went unto the high priest, And desired of him
letters to Damascus . . . that if he found any of this way [the Christ faith]
whether they were men or women, he might bring them bound unto Jerusalem,” to
cast them into prison or stone them as they had the righteous Stephen.
And as Saul journeyed to Damascus to execute acts of crime and extortion equal
to any of our modern times, “suddenly there shined round about him a light from
heaven . . . .” (And as heaven is within us, this light that appeared to Saul
was the Christ, or Reality of his own being.) Saul “fell to the earth, and heard
a voice saying unto him, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?”
The disciples of the Lord, filled with the Holy Ghost, or Christ, Truth - that
is, filled with an enlarged understanding - were praying, treating, realizing,
knowing that every individual man, in his real being, is the Son of God. The
disciples recognized that this misinterpretation was not objectified, but wholly
an assumed condition, or wholly a false belief in their own mind about
individual man. They knew that individual man had no power underived from God.
The disciples recognized that the only power, and all power was in God, Mind,
and the power in Saul must be coincident with conscious Life-action. The
disciples knew that the Christ, active as their consciousness, was the same
Christ that was active everywhere and was active as the consciousness of Saul.
There is only one consciousness. And, to this almighty, active Christ, Truth,
threatenings and cruelties and injustices had no place, and no Life behind them
to enact them and carry them on.
In Science and Health Mrs. Eddy says, “The greatest wrong is but a
supposititious opposite of the highest right.” She also states in Miscellaneous
Writings, “You must find error to be nothing: then, and only then, do you handle
it in Science. The diabolism of suppositional evil at work in the name of good,
(as in the case of Saul) is a lie of the highest degree of nothingness: just
reduce this falsity to its proper denomination, (nobody and nothing) and you
have done with it.”
The Christ will never begin to save a criminal (formulated in our own mind only)
unless we first have the Christ active in our own consciousness. The Christ or
Saviour within us sees that all being is the only being, no matter what the
appearance. The active Christ - realized by the disciples to be the only
consciousness - was Saul’s consciousness, as well as their own, and was the
light that took up the false belief. And Saul found himself at hand in his own
character. Saul, the unreality, yielded up and Paul, the Reality, stood revealed
as a “star of the first magnitude.” Paul’s reality has stood out as has no other
character in history except that of Christ Jesus.
Here is set forth a clear example of the method and the result of rightly
handling malicious malpractice. Fundamentally, the question of handling
malicious malpractice resolved itself into these facts: The work of the
disciples was not to remove or destroy Saul of Tarsus. Neither was their work to
prevent crime or cruel enactments. Their work was to prove individual man to be
the presence of God - to prove all action to be God, or Life.
The original of not only our lesser problems, but also of our extreme problems
of today, is found through love of our problem, and the translation of it, by
means of the active Christ within ourselves, into its reality. We need to
understand the nature and character of what is called a problem or enemy. But it
is only as the active Christ in us clears away materialism, dishonesty, greed of
gain, and place and power, that we can translate our problems into their
original.
Students, I want to help you to see that the person, or thing, or circumstance,
which appears to us as a problem, is not a problem, but a spiritual fact, and
this spiritual fact is demonstrable. I want to help you to see how it is that a
spiritual fact can be erroneously interpreted and where and how we correct an
erroneous interpretation. I may seem to repeat many things, many times, but I do
this in order to establish the thought of those who are more or less beginners.
You who are workers please carry the realization of these statements. I shall
use an illustration - one that we have used many times. The illustration of the
false appearance of the earth.
At the very time when everyone was believing that the earth was flat, they were
considering the only earth there was, which was a round earth. So, we, as
students of Christian Science, take the position, and rightly so, that at the
very time when we are believing that we are mortals, sinful and ignorant, we are
considering the only man there is, individual man, who is functioning in accord
with Mind. We take the position, and rightly so, that at the very time when we
are believing that the body is sick, imperfect, or aged, we are considering the
perfect body - the only body there is and the only body there ever will be. We
take the position, and rightly so, that at the very time when we are believing
in a condition of limitation, loss, and the absence of good, we are considering
the unvarying condition of infinite good, the only condition there is, and the
only condition there will ever be.
Those individuals who honestly believed that the earth was flat, were unaware
that this belief was only an assumed condition on their part about the earth.
The flatness was formulated in their mind and was a condition of their own
conception - it was never a condition of the earth. Those individuals believed
in the flatness because they were insufficiently enlightened as to the truth
about the earth.
We who honestly believe that man is mortal, sick, aged, and limited, are unaware
that this belief is only an assumed condition on our part about individual man.
We are also unaware that there are no such conditions as mortality, sickness,
age, and limitation present as individual man at any time. Just as the flatness
of the earth was assumed about the earth, so materiality, sickness, age, and
limitation are entirely assumed conditions on our part about ourselves. They are
formulated in our mind, conditions of our own conceptions. They are never
conditions of individual man. We believe these assumed conditions about
ourselves to be real because we are insufficiently enlightened as to the truth
about individual man.
It is very clear to us that the conception of flatness was wholly a mistaken
sense about the earth, wholly an erroneous interpretation of the earth. It is
very clear that this conception of flatness was formed in the mind of the
individual and was entirely a mental conception. The flatness had no connection
with the earth at any time. It should be just as clear to us that the conception
of mortality, sickness, age, limitation, is wholly an erroneous interpretation
about individual man.
It should be clear to us that these conceptions of mortality, sickness, age, and
limitation are formulated in the mind of the individual and are wholly mental
conceptions, and that they have no connection with individual man, body or
supply at any time. These erroneous interpretations are the result of our
ignorance about individual man, body and supply. What we need is spiritual
enlightenment, spiritual understanding, about God and His presence - Man.
Those individuals who erroneously interpreted the earth were unaware that their
false conception constituted a state of false belief in their mind, and that
this false belief governed their entire action, relative to the earth. They
never would go around the earth as long as they believed it to be flat. We who
are believing in a selfhood apart from God, a sick body and a depleted supply,
are unaware that our false interpretations constitute a state of false belief in
our mind, and this false belief governs our own entire action. We cannot do the
things we want to do as long as we believe these erroneous things to be true.
Students, it is perfectly clear that the condition of the earth, which is always
round, needed no correction, but the false belief in the mind of the individual
needed to be corrected. If we understand individual man, body and supply as they
actually are, we could not believe in a selfhood apart from God, in sickness and
in limitation, and we could not be governed by them. We first formulate
erroneous interpretations of individual man, body and supply in our mind, and
then look upon these objects of our conceptions before we can believe in them,
and be governed by them. If we knew that we had assumed these conditions because
of ignorance, if we knew that these assumed conditions were wholly deceptive
picturings in our mind, if we knew they were wholly mental states, we would be
better able to deal with them.
When the student understands that these assumed conditions of mortality,
sickness, age, and limitation are in no way connected with individual man, body
and supply, any more than the assumed flatness is connected with the earth, then
he can intelligently and scientifically deal with these so-called conditions.
When the student understands that what he calls erroneous conditions are only
false pictures of thought, and when he perceives these erroneous conditions axe
in his mind only, and when he learns to correct these erroneous conditions by
understanding the Truth about the things at hand, then he will see “Satan as
lightning fall from heaven” - and he will see error instantly cast down.

Identity Remains Unchanged

Students, the earth being flat to one person, and the same earth being round to
another person, was only a matter of true or erroneous interpretation - the
earth remains as the earth is. Erroneous interpretation was based upon the
individual’s ignorance of the true condition of the earth. True interpretation
was based upon the individual’s understanding of the earth as it is. But no
matter how it was interpreted, the earth remained as the earth eternally is. The
earth is an identity of Mind, and is never affected either by true or false
interpretations. The true or erroneous interpretations of the earth affected the
individual only.
Think of the untold blessings of universal living resulting from one person’s
insight and understanding. Someone took the position that the earth was not flat
as it appeared to be, but round and proved it to be so. The correct
interpretation and proof of the earth’s roundness, has meant to the world
freedom and an enlarged sense of living. Compare this enlarged sense of our
world today with the limitations, the boundary, and the localization which would
have resulted from a continued interpretation of the world as flat.
Since either true or erroneous interpretations affect the individual only, we
can readily see how much depends upon our individual viewpoint. Our erroneous
interpretations of individual man, body and supply, based on ignorance, always
result in sorrow and woe. But, true interpretations based upon the individual’s
true understanding of individual man, body, and supply, result in joy and
blessedness.
If the earth were flat, we could not change it. Neither do we try to make a flat
earth round. It is already round, and always has been round. Neither do we try
to make individual man spiritual, or make a body whole, or make supply
unlimited. No. We understand them to be spiritual, whole, unlimited, and with
our active understanding, we prove them to be so.
We turn entirely away from earth as it seems to be, and we deal with the
illusion of flatness in the mind. We correct our erroneous perception of the
earth as flat by executing in the mind the true understanding of the earth as
round. In the same manner, we turn entirely away from individual man, body and
supply as they seem to be, and deal entirely in the mind with the illusion about
these things. We correct our erroneous perception of age and mortality and
sickness and limitation by executing in the mind the true understanding of
individual man, body and supply.
The truth that all identities correspond to their originals is a demonstrable
truth, and it is demonstrated wholly within the mind. But in order to
demonstrate truth, we must make it active in our consciousness. We take the
false sense of these identities and with the understanding of Christ, Truth, in
consciousness, we translate the false sense until consciously the identity
corresponds with the original. This is the Word made flesh.
It is clearly seen, then, that any problem that confronts us is because we
misunderstand the character of the thing which we are considering. It is this
misunderstanding about creation or spiritual facts, which causes the
misinterpretation to take place. And misinterpretation causes us to believe that
things are other than they are. Then we are governed by our own states of
belief.
Let us take for example the man who sees and feels himself to be unemployed, who
believes business activities have ceased to function and that they must again be
set in motion. Since infinite good is omnipresent, surely this man’s belief
is based upon his ignorance of the character of individual man, and of his
relation to God. All action is the action of infinite Divine Mind, and in its
character is perpetual and uninterrupted action. Individual man is omni-action,
because God’s idea of Himself is coincident with conscious action. Human action
is as perpetual and uninterrupted as God-action. Human action, as a degree of
action, is the action that God, or Life, is - even if we do interpret it
erroneously at times.
The Lord’s Prayer is already answered - Heaven and Earth are one entity. The
things that are in heaven, or the kingdom of God, are the same things that are
on earth as human consciousness. All human action is God, or Life-action,
apparent in some degree as the quality of action. Our ignorance of this fact,
that all human action is God, or Life-action, has caused us unwittingly to
assume that action can be in a condition of inaction, or unemployment, and then
has fastened these assumed conditions upon ourselves and upon all business
activities.
We do not have to change an inactive, unemployed mortal into an active employed
mortal, but is this not just what many are trying to do - to change unemployed
mortals into employed mortals? This, of course, is a much better belief. But we
need to understand that man is an immortal, and because man is an immortal, he
is at this very instant, reflection, conscious Life, as perpetual action and
employment.
An inactive, unemployed mortal man is never an objectified thing at all, but is
always the misconception of an ever-active, immortal man. And when I remove from
my mind the false conception of inaction and unemployment, I do not get rid of
man or action -- no more than when I remove from my mind the ignorant conception
of flatness do I get rid of the earth or roundness. We keep our vision of Truth.
We let this vision govern our thinking, and as nearly as possible we act as what
we are, active and employed.
Someone says, “Give me the chance and I’ll act. All this Science talk about
action going on now, and all good being present, sounds well but I’d like to see
the actual, concrete, visible thing at hand.” Students, no doubt there is too
much talk without the corresponding demonstration, and at this present time, our
measure of understanding has seemed inadequate of proof. But how could we have
done without the small understanding that we now have when, as at the present,
there seem to be so many painful and discouraging things to be overcome.
Let us watch that we do not allow ourselves to become embittered, and unloving,
and discouraged, and filled with doubt and fear. Let there be no hardness of
heart or bitterness of spirit. God is not responsible for these seeming
troubles. Let us have more of Job’s humility and loyalty to the Truth of things.
Job said, when tested beyond endurance, “Though he slay me, yet will I trust in
him,” meaning, yet will I trust what is true. And Job received his proof that
Truth is true. He found that he had all that he had before and seven times more.
John wrote: “Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth
alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.”
Unless this erroneous conception of ourselves as mortals, with all the
accompanying errors of mortality, be utterly wiped out through truth, it abideth
alone, or abideth in a sense of a falsehood separated from God or separated from
all good. And when this false sense of a separate self dies, nothing dies but
false sense, and with the realization that the false sense of a separate self is
nothing. Then understanding becomes active, translation begins, transformation
takes place, and the perfect man - the only man we are in our oneness with all
good - is revealed at hand.
All good already exists. And we cannot, either by prayer or by treatment,
increase any good or increase activity. In the universe of God, everything
exists in completeness and perfection. But through prayer and treatment, we do
find at-one-ment with all good and activity, and accept and acknowledge and show
forth this good and activity. The infinity of God does not require for Himself
any demonstration. Everything is already accomplished according to His infinite
purpose and His invariable plan.
We who have glimpsed these wonderful truths should, through humility and love
and understanding, more nearly translate these seeming trying experiences into
their original conditions - harmonious Mind. We should better know things and
conditions to be as they already are. We need the vision that reveals the thing
or condition which seems material and inharmonious to be as it already is -
spiritual and harmonious.
We find in Science and Health this statement: “The very circumstance, which your
suffering sense deems wrathful and afflictive, Love can make an angel
entertained unawares.” We can readily see why we should love our problems and
why we should be mentally active and earnest and untiring in translating our
problems into their original. We should not allow ourselves to be indifferent
and apathetic about them, neither should we evade working them out. Recall
Malachi’s words: “Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be
meat in mine house, and prove me now herewith, saith the Lord of hosts, if I
will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there
shall not be room enough to receive it.”
The prophet Jeremiah wrote, “Neither say they in their heart, Let us now fear
the Lord our God, that giveth rain, both in the former and the latter, in his
season: he preserveth unto us the appointed weeks of the harvest. Your
iniquities have turned away these things, and your sins have withholden good
things from you. And in Science and Health Mrs. Eddy says, “God only waits for
man’s worthiness to enhance the means and measure of His grace.”

Doing Our Own Work

We must do our own work to a great extent. Another can help us only in so far as
our thought is receptive. Jesus healed many instantaneously, but many he could
not help because of their unbelief. One may present the fact of Truth to another
that the earth is round, but that one must accept this fact in consciousness and
act upon it in order to have the experience resulting from this Truth.
In order to have results in any science, we must first accept a truth in
consciousness, we must keep this truth active in consciousness, and we must
demonstrate it. Too many of us are not using Christian Science as a science.
Instead of accepting a basic truth of Christian Science in consciousness and
keeping this basic truth active and demonstrating it, we too often begin with
the misinterpretation or with the assumed condition which has no Life-action
behind it, and try to restore that assumed condition to the Truth of Being. Too
many of us are trying laboriously to heal our false beliefs, instead of yielding
them up through understanding and demonstration.
In working on our problems, we do not gain anything by going back to the
evidence of the senses and saying, “The healing is not yet accomplished. I am no
better. It is not met yet.” This is only going back to the assumed conditions.
This is not the true practice of Christian Science. Mrs. Eddy tells us in the
textbook, “The starting-point of divine Science is that God, Spirit, is All-in-
all, and that there is no other might nor Mind.”
If you begin with the assumed condition and want someone else to bring that
assumed condition into a state of perfection - as though it were an object or
something that could be brought into a higher state of perfection - then that
will be so much time wasted. But if your attitude of thought is a willingness to
yield up the assumed condition as nothing, then another shall be able to help
you translate this erroneous form or mode of conception into the medium of its
actuality. Then you attain a Truth which can be utilized.
It is the Christ understanding, or the Saviour within us, that holds within
Himself the answer to all problems. Our greatest aim should be to gain more of
this understanding, more of this Christ Mind which was in Jesus - more of this
original Mind that sees reality and can translate all things into their
originals. Paul wrote, “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ
Jesus . . . it is God [Mind] which worketh in you both to will and to do of his
good pleasure.” And he wrote that this Mind “is able to do exceeding abundantly
above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us.”
When our experience is harmonious, we usually say, “That was a demonstration,”
but when something inharmonious, discordant, or disturbing comes to our
attention, then we should begin to work within our thought. We should clear the
false sense which the mind has assumed and allow the actual good which we know
is at hand to appear as the only thing at hand. We should dismiss as untrue the
disturbing report that seems to appear in the mind, and we should dismiss as
untrue the discordant situation that seems to appear as something external to
the mind. Then we should exercise our spiritual vision.
Look beyond the so-called sense testimony and perceive the truth behind the
experience. We recognize that back of the false sense testimony there is the
genuine fact of the experience. We keep the vision and prove that as in heaven
so it is on earth, because heaven and earth is one entity. As is the original,
so must the human expression be.
Heaven and earth is one Entity. Earth is heaven expressed. In the textbook Mrs.
Eddy writes, “. . . the heavens and earth to one human consciousness, that
consciousness which God bestows, are spiritual, while to another, the
unillumined human mind, the vision is material. This shows unmistakably that
what the human mind terms matter and spirit indicates states and stages of
consciousness.” (Science and Health)
What we call matter is only a misinterpretation of that which is actual,
spiritual and true. When our vision is material, we interpret individual man as
mortal and material, but when our vision is spiritual we interpret immortal man
as he is, divine and perfect.
Looking through the mist of material sense things appear inverted, but rising
above the mist of material sense, we perceive things as they actually are.
Looking at the actual and interpreting it erroneously, one may call his
erroneous interpretations matter, illusions, or counterfeit. And while it is
relatively true that the erroneous interpretation named matter is not Spirit,
and the erroneous interpretation named mortal, is not an immortal, yet it is
true that the only thing at hand is spiritual and perfect. While it is
relatively true that the universe of illumined vision is not the kingdom of
heaven, yet one must recognize the fact that no matter how men and the universe
appear relatively, they are the actual at hand and the only thing at hand.
In No and Yes Mrs. Eddy writes, “This Science [of Jesus] demonstrated the
Principle of all phenomena, identity, individuality, law; and showed man as
reflecting God and the divine capacity.” No matter what be my state or stage of
spiritual thought, my identity of all things remains the same, uninterrupted,
constant, eternal. When we misinterpret man and the universe erroneously, it is
because our consciousness is unillumined, because we have not spiritualized our
thought sufficiently.
What we call the material universe, mortal man and physical body, are never
objectified things. No, they are wholly false beliefs - they are wholly
misinterpretations of spiritual ideas at hand. Mrs. Eddy writes, “ . . . matter
must disappear, for Spirit to appear. To the material sense, everything is
matter; but spiritualize human thought, and our convictions change: for
spiritual sense takes in new views, in which nature becomes Spirit: and Spirit
is God, and God is good.” (Miscellaneous Writings)

The Universe as It Is

The universe is the expression of God, Mind, and is as perfect, changeless,

immutable, immortal and indestructible as the Mind which sustains it. The
universe is eternally God’s presence. The universe as it actually is, is the
universe that is present now - whether we interpret it as material and
discordant or interpret it as heaven expressed, heavenly and glorious.
Casting aside erring perception and executing spiritual vision, one sees that
the universe before him is none other than the kingdom of heaven. The one with
unillummed vision may call the beautiful, glorious, heavenly universe in which
we now live, matter, illusion, falsity, and he may follow up this false view of
the universe by denying matter, evil and falsity. But it is only the right
perception of the thing at hand which shows us that nothing is gained by denying
a condition that does not exist.

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Notes on the Tares and Wheat

In this parable in Matthew 13:24-30 and 36-40, we are presented with a

picture that follows the pattern of the first two chapters of Genesis.
First we have a state of affairs where the householder has sowed the
field entirely with wheat. As we read in Genesis 1:31: "God saw
everything that He had made, and, behold, it was good." Second we find
the appearance of the tares which originated "while men slept,"
reminiscent of the description in Genesis of the mist that went up from
the earth and became the origin of a false sense of man and the
universe, and of the deep sleep in which the Adam story then unfolded.
Jesus' explanation of this parable was that the field is the world and
the good seed, and the tares represent the "children of the wicked one."
"Children" refer entirely to thought. They pertain to the thoughts or
ideas that emanate from the divine Mind and to those that presume to
emanate from a mind that is not divine, and so is not mind at all but
illusion. Science and Health further explains that "Mortal belief (the
material sense of life ) and immortal Truth (the spiritual sense) are
the tares and the wheat, which are not united by progress, but
separated." (p 72: 13-16)
It is only within the dream of a material SENSE of the one universe that
good and evil seem to mingle. The human instinct then tends to accept
that only the good seed is the truth, but also to accept the picture of
another apparent power and presence to be dealt with. It thus seeks to
rationalize it all by giving it a cause and thus, so to speak, attempt
to explain why 2 x 2 = 5.
Science and Health shows that it is impossible to try and separate evil
from good within the dream where they appear to mingle. "The Science of
Christianity comes with fan in hand to separate the chaff from the
wheat." But this "separator of fable from fact" (p 586:10) works from
the premise that the Life divine is now and eternally separate (and not
to be separated) from the belief and dream of material living. (See S&H
14: 25-26)
The servants in the parable who wanted to gather up the tares were
warned that this would result in rooting up the wheat also. The reason
is that it is the acceptance of a premise of duality that is itself
evil, and not just that part of the duality which is called evil. It is
not possible to retain the false premise and then attempt to remove
those aspects of the duality one does not like. As we read, "The mistake
of thinking that error can be real, when it is merely the absence if
truth, leads to the superiority of error." (ibid 92:29-31) The basic
error is the belief that "man originates in matter and has beginning and
end, that he is both soul and body, both good and evil, both spiritual
and material (that) terminates in discord." (ibid 338:1-8)
Belief and truth are not separated by time or struggle but by that
altitude of thought, symbolized by the harvest, that never knew an
alternative to the allness of good. The harvest is always now, and not
four months off. And this is why we read that "these opposite qualities
are the tares and wheat, which never really mingle, though (to mortal
sight) they grow side by side until the harvest; then Science separates
the wheat from the tares through the understanding of God as
ever-present and of man as reflecting the divine likeness." (S&H
300:17-22)
In this harvest consciousness the angels, or thoughts, of God contain
nothing that is offensive, and the children of the wicked one have never
entered this presence to mingle with it. At harvest time there is only
wheat, and what was thought to be tares was simply wheat misconceived,
for "the greatest wrong is but a supposititious opposite of the highest
right." (S&H 3681-2)
Hence the reassurance that "Truth, Life, and Love are a law of
annihilation to everything unlike themselves because they declare
nothing except God." (S&H 243: 27-29) And surely the operative word is
"because".

The Bent Stick

When we look at the reflection of a stick in the water it may appear to

be bent. The more disturbed the water, the more distorted the reflection
of the stick will appear. The distortion, however, is a factor of an
imperfect relationship to the light -- a wrong view -- and not of the
stick, and is caused by the medium through which it appears. In order to
find out what is true about the stick, it is necessary to turn away from
the reflection, no matter how it appears, to the original. And, having a
clear idea of what the stick is really like, it would be futile to try
and tinker with the distorted image to "unbend" it because there is
nothing wrong with it in the first place. That which perceives from a
standpoint that is not in a true relation to the light together with
what is perceived from this standpoint are equally irrelevant if the
truth is to be discovered. When we turn from the reflection to the
original, the image may still be present within is own terms of
reference, but is not part of the knowledge of the truth. Indeed, we
could walk away from the water altogether, in which case there would be
no reflection at all, yet we would still have the original in our hand.
In Science we learn that the universe including man is the idea, image,
reflection of the divine Mind. In this case, reflection does not imply
an image that is separate from this Mind, as might be in the example of
the mirror image of something, but rather denotes the spiritually mental
activity of Mind reflecting upon and knowing itself by the ideas that
express it. In this sense, we can say that man, the manifestation of
God, represents all that God is knowing about Himself. In fact, man IS
the understanding, or knowledge of God, for man is God in
self-expression as understanding and knowing. This understanding of God
never departs from the Mind that is God. Knowing God is being man, and
to know anything about man as reflection, it is necessary to look at
God, not reflection. Science and Health says that "everything entitled
to a classification as truth, or Science, must be comprised in a
knowledge or understanding of God, for there can be nothing beyond
illimitable divinity." (p. 127; 4) Here "truth" is spelled in lower
case, thus signifying man, or effect. Man cannot find man because
reflection cannot know reflection, nor can idea have an idea. Man IS
idea, and thus we read in the definition of Bride in Science and Health,
"Conceiving man in the idea of God". (582: 14-16) Man is God's
conception or idea of Himself, remaining in Mind.
To return to the analogy of the bent stick, if some distorted picture of
man and the universe presents itself to the senses, we do not reason
backwards from the distortion to Truth. There is nothing wrong with man
and the universe any more than there was ever a bent stick. The truth
does not lie in what we think we know about the distorted image, nor in
what we think that God may know about it, but solely with what Truth is
knowing of itself -- its own straightness, its own unblemished sense of
itself, in place of the picture. The sense testimony that says that the
image is bent or straight, sick or well, poor or rich, unhappy or happy,
remains outside of Truth's own knowledge of itself, and remains in the
dream of material existence. There is no bentness, sickness, poverty,
sorrow. These things do not exist, nor is there a mind to hold such
pictures.
The true stick is the one you hold in your hand. You can walk away from
the water and there will be no reflection left at all, but the idea
called "stick" remains in the Mind that conceives it and is unaware of
any external interpretation of what is true. Science and Health says
that "The divine Mind that made man maintains His own image and
likeness." (151:23-24) This word maintain comes from the French and
means to hold in one's hand. Every idea of God remains in God -- is held
in God's hand -- and cannot be distorted. What mortal mind is saying
about what is held in Mind is of no concern at any point, whether for
better or worse.
The first commandment is to love the Lord with all thy heart and soul
and mind: in other words to let all affection, feeling, and knowing be
God-oriented. When all awareness emanates from and goes to God, that is,
when God's consciousness of Himself constitutes all awareness, thought
is not WATCHING reflection. It is BEING it. Mind cannot be without its
reflection, or self-evidence, but the concern for and upkeep of this
reflection remains in God. That which has appeared to take place in the
waters of mortal mind is not our concern because it is not God's.
Leaving reflection in the hands of infinite Love, we can understand that
"This is the doctrine of Christian Science: that divine Love cannot be
deprived of its manifestation, or object." ( S&H 304: 9-11)
The difference between this statement and the belief that man has to
tend and care for himself is seen as belief yields to the spiritual fact
that infinite Love is already doing this job, and doing it perfectly.