Subject: Holy Spirit
Golden text: John 14: 26-27*
[Jesus said,] “I’m telling you these things while I’m still living with you. The Friend, the Holy Spirit whom the Father will send at my request, will make everything plain to you. He will remind you of all the things I have told you. I’m leaving you well and whole. That’s my parting gift to you. Peace. I don’t leave you the way you’re used to being left—feeling abandoned, bereft. So don’t be upset. Don’t be distraught.
I Chronicles 28:11-19
Then David presented his son Solomon with the plans for The Temple complex: porch, storerooms, meeting rooms, and the place for atoning sacrifice. He turned over the plans for everything that God’s Spirit had brought to his mind: the design of the courtyards, the arrangements of rooms, and the closets for storing all the holy things. He gave him his plan for organizing the Levites and priests in their work of leading and ordering worship in the house of God, and for caring for the liturgical furnishings. He provided exact specifications for how much gold and silver was needed for each article used in the services of worship: the gold and silver Lampstands and lamps, the gold tables for consecrated bread, the silver tables, the gold forks, the bowls and the jars, and the Incense Altar. And he gave him the plan for sculpting the cherubs with their wings outstretched over the Chest of the Covenant of God—the cherubim throne. “Here are the blueprints for the whole project as God gave me to understand it,” David said.
I Chronicles 29:10-19
10-13 David blessed God in full view of the entire congregation:
Blessed are you, God of Israel, our father
from of old and forever.
To you, O God, belong the greatness and the might,
the glory, the victory, the majesty, the splendor;
Yes! Everything in heaven, everything on earth;
the kingdom all yours! You’ve raised yourself high over all.
Riches and glory come from you,
you’re ruler over all;
You hold strength and power in the palm of your hand
to build up and strengthen all.
And here we are, O God, our God, giving thanks to you,
praising your splendid Name.
14-19 “But me—who am I, and who are these my people, that we should presume to be giving something to you? Everything comes from you; all we’re doing is giving back what we’ve been given from your generous hand. As far as you’re concerned, we’re homeless, shiftless wanderers like our ancestors, our lives mere shadows, hardly anything to us. God, our God, all these materials—these piles of stuff for building a house of worship for you, honoring your Holy Name—it all came from you! It was all yours in the first place! I know, dear God, that you care nothing for the surface—you want us, our true selves—and so I have given from the heart, honestly and happily. And now see all these people doing the same, giving freely, willingly—what a joy! O God, God of our fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, keep this generous spirit alive forever in these people always, keep their hearts set firmly in you. And give my son Solomon an uncluttered and focused heart so that he can obey what you command, live by your directions and counsel, and carry through with building The Temple for which I have provided.”
From 21st Century Science and Health
Spirit, God, gathers unformed thoughts into their proper channels and unfolds these thoughts, even as Love opens the petals of a holy purpose in order that the purpose may appear.
Existence is eternal. Temporal life is a false sense of being.
Human-made theories make the same mistake regarding Soul and body that René Descartes[1] made regarding the brain as a complex fixed machine. Adherents of Descartes theories culminates in localizationism, the belief in a hard-wired brain in which each mental function has a strict location. However, modern brain science is showing, “[Brain] plasticity is a normal phenomenon, and brain maps are constantly changing.”[2] Christian Science shows that mind is not subject to the brain or matter, and that soul is not in the body. The order of Science can’t be reversed, even by human theories that assign to matter the power and prerogative of Spirit—a bad assignment that causes people to become weak and pitiful creatures. Scientific blunders can’t affect the harmony of being.
The truth of Mind shows conclusively how it is that measurable units and forces seem to be, but are not. Divine Science, rising above physical theories, excludes matter, resolves things into thoughts, and replaces the objects of physical sense with spiritual ideas.
For this revelation, I introduced the term CHRISTIAN SCIENCE to designate the scientific system of divine healing. The revelation consists of two parts:
- The discovery. The discovery of Mind-healing through a spiritual sense of Scriptures and through the teachings of the Counselor,[3] as promised by Jesus.
- The proof. The proof by present-day demonstrations, that the miracles of Jesus did not specially belong to a privileged few or at a time now ended. Miracles illustrate an ever-operative divine Principle which indicates the ongoing scientific order and continuity of being.
Divine Science differs from the hard and soft sciences, but is preeminently scientific because it’s based on Truth, the Principle of all science.
The hard and soft sciences are human knowledge; beliefs; human inventions; a shaved Samson[4] without strength. When human beliefs lack organizations for support, their foundations disappear. Not having moral might, spiritual basis, or a holy Principle of its own, a belief mistakes effect for cause and seeks to find life and intelligence in symptoms, thus limiting Life and adhering to disorder and death. Human beliefs are blind conclusions made from baseless reasoning. A mortal sense of things is forever silenced by immortal Spirit.
Holy Spirit. Holy Ghost; divine Science; the development of eternal Life, Truth, and Love; that which interprets divine Mind.
We can interpret and understand the universe and its inhabitants through Science by its divine Principle, God. But, when explained on the basis of physical sense and represented as exposed to change, accumulation and decay, the universe and its inhabitants are enigmas.
To human perception, divine Science seems at first obscure, abstract, and dim, but a bright promise crowns its brow. Divine Science understood, is the prism and praise of Truth. An honest view of divine Science enables you to heal by its means. Science has for you a light greater than the sun, for God “is its lamp.”[5] Its fiery legs are the foundations of Love and Truth. It brings the baptism of the Holy Spirit, whose flames of Truth were prophetically described by John the Baptist as consuming error.
Matthew 3:7-17
7-10 When John realized that a lot of Pharisees and Sadducees were showing up for a baptismal experience because it was becoming the popular thing to do, he exploded: “Brood of snakes! What do you think you’re doing slithering down here to the river? Do you think a little water on your snakeskins is going to make any difference? It’s your life that must change, not your skin! And don’t think you can pull rank by claiming Abraham as father. Being a descendant of Abraham is neither here nor there. Descendants of Abraham are a dime a dozen. What counts is your life. Is it green and blossoming? Because if it’s deadwood, it goes on the fire.
11-12 “I’m baptizing you here in the river, turning your old life in for a kingdom life. The real action comes next: The main character in this drama—compared to him I’m a mere stagehand—will ignite the kingdom life within you, a fire within you, the Holy Spirit within you, changing you from the inside out. He’s going to clean house—make a clean sweep of your lives. He’ll place everything true in its proper place before God; everything false he’ll put out with the trash to be burned.”
13-14 Jesus then appeared, arriving at the Jordan River from Galilee. He wanted John to baptize him. John objected, “I’m the one who needs to be baptized, not you!”
15 But Jesus insisted. “Do it. God’s work, putting things right all these centuries, is coming together right now in this baptism.” So John did it.
16-17 The moment Jesus came up out of the baptismal waters, the skies opened up and he saw God’s Spirit—it looked like a dove—descending and landing on him. And along with the Spirit, a voice: “This is my Son, chosen and marked by my love, delight of my life.”
From 21st Century Science and Health
.Jesus demonstrated Christ. Jesus proved that Christ is the correct impression or interpretation of God—the Holy Spirit or Counselor, revealing the divine Principle, Love, and leading into all truth.
Jesus’ holy motives and aims were blamed and condemned by the sinners of that period, as they would be today if Jesus were personally present. We approach God, Life, as our fidelity to Truth and Love expands; and in that ratio, we can know all human need and discern the thought of the sick and the sinning for the purpose of healing them. Error of any kind can’t hide from the law of God.
The careless doctor, the nurse, and the curt visitor may be sympathetic, but do they know the thorns they plant in the pillow of the sick and the heavenly homesick looking away from earth? Oh, why don’t they know? Being aware of this unawareness would do much more toward healing the sick and preparing for the midnight call, rather than piteous cries of “Lord, Lord!” The benign thought of Jesus, found in such words as “Do not worry about your life,”[6] will heal the sick and so enable them to advance past the supposed necessity of taking thought for and doctoring the physical; however, the unselfish affections must be plentiful. Common sense and common humanity are to be highly regarded; otherwise, what mental quality remains with which to call forth from the extended arm of righteousness a satisfying healing or dignified passing?
If the Scientist reaches the patient through divine Love, the healing work will be achieved at one visit. In the presence of Love, disease and fear vanish into their native nothingness like dew before the morning sunshine. In any case, it is necessary for the Scientist to have enough Christly intent to win their own pardon and to receive praise similar to that which Jesus gave the woman who had lived a sinful life. Spirituality must be pure in order to practice scientifically and deal with patients compassionately. Results correspond to the spiritual intent.
The would-be healer is obligated not to bring hypocrisy, false hopes, inhumanity, or bad habits into the patient’s environment. If these traits were present, the environment would be converted into a “den of robbers.”[7] The un-Christ-like practitioner does not give to mind or body the joy and strength of Truth. Vanity and negativity desecrate the temple of the Holy Spirit, and the patient’s spiritual power to resuscitate themselves is damaged. The poor suffering heart needs its spiritual nutriment, such as peace, patience in distress, honesty, and a priceless sense of the dear Father-Mother’s loving-kindness.
To cure a patient, the practitioner must first dismiss their own moral evils. Purification allows the practitioner to attain the spiritual freedom and ability to drive physical evils out of the patient. Healing will not radiate from someone who is so spiritually unproductive that they are unable to give drink to the thirsty or reach the patient’s thought. Mental poverty alienates faith and understanding.
Hold perpetually this thought—that it is the spiritual idea, the Holy Spirit and Christ, which enables you to demonstrate with scientific certainty, the rule of healing, based on its divine Principle, Love, underlying, overlying, and encompassing all true being.
We are secured by God, Spirit, and by nothing else. God’s being is infinity, freedom, balance, and boundless happiness. “Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.”[8] Like the archpriests of long ago, we are free “to enter the Most Holy Place”[9]—the realm of God.
*Scripture taken from The Message. Copyright © 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group.
**Text from 21st Century Science and Health can’t be reproduced in part or as a whole without the written permission of Healing Science Today
[1] René Descartes, (1596–1650) French mathematician, scientist and philosopher.
[2] The Brain that Changes Itself: Stories of Personal Triumph from the Frontiers of Brain Science Norman Doidge, M.D. (Viking Penguin Books, New York, 2007)
[3] John 16:7
[4] Judges 16:19
[5] Rev. 21:23
[6] Matt. 6:25; Luke 12:22
[7] Jer. 7:11; Matt. 21:13; Mark 11:17; Luke 19:46
[8] II Cor. 3:17
[9] Heb. 10:19
Christian Science Bible Lesson-Sermons 