Subject: Restoration
Golden text: Mark 9:50 J.B. Phillips New Testament, copyright by J.B. Phillips
“Salt is a very good thing; but if it should lose its saltiness, what can you do to restore its flavour? You must have salt in yourselves, and live at peace with each other.”
Luke 18:35-43
Then, as [Jesus] was approaching Jericho, it happened that there was a blind man sitting by the roadside, begging. He heard the crowd passing and enquired what it was all about. And they told him, “Jesus the man from Nazareth is going past you.” So he shouted out, “Jesus, Son of David, have pity on me!”
39 Those who were in front tried to hush his cries. But that made him call out all the more, “Son of David, have pity on me!”
40-41 So Jesus stood quite still and ordered the man to be brought to him. And when he was quite close, he said to him, “What do you want me to do for you?” “Lord, make me see again,” he cried.
42-43 “You can see again! Your faith has cured you,” returned Jesus. And his sight was restored at once, and he followed Jesus, praising God. All the people who saw it thanked God too.
21st Century Science and Health, Copyright by Cheryl Petersen
When human beliefs lack organizations to support them, their foundations are gone. 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 matter, thus limiting Life and adhering to disorder and death. Basically, human beliefs are blind conclusions made from unreliable reasoning. A mortal sense of things is forever silenced by immortal Spirit.
We can interpret and understand the universe and its inhabitants by Science from 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.
Gravitational, electromagnetic, and nuclear forces are properties of Mind. They belong to divine Principle and support the equilibrium of that same thought-force which launched the earth in its orbit and said to the proud wave, “this far you may come and no farther.”[1]
Spirit is the life, substance, and continuity of all things. We move on forces. Withdraw them and creation must collapse. Human knowledge calls them forces of matter. Divine Science restores the forces by classifying them spiritually and by declaring them inherently and wholly to belong to divine Mind.
The elements of the physical world and the functions of the physical body will change as human mind changes its beliefs.
When darkness comes over the earth, the physical senses have no direct evidence of a sun. The human eye doesn’t know where the light of day is, or if it exists. Astronomy gives the desired information. The physical senses accept the authority of astronomy. If our eyes see no sun for a week, we still understand that there is solar light and heat. Natural science advances human thought past the crude theories of the human mind, and dissolves fear.
Along the same train of thought, divine Science explains the effect of human mind on the body, though the cause is unseen, and advances thought past crude theories and fear. The sins of other people should not make good people suffer.
Life is discovered by breaking human thought barriers with Truth both before and after that which is called death. There is more spirituality in seeing and hearing objectively, than seeing and hearing with the bias of human knowledge and experiences. There is more Science in the perpetual exercise of the Mind-faculties than in their loss. The true perceptions cannot be lost while Mind remains. This comprehension gave sight to the blind and hearing to the deaf centuries ago, and it will repeat the wonder.
James 5:1-6, 13-20
6 And now, you plutocrats, is the time for you to weep and moan because of the miseries in store for you! Your richest goods are ruined, your hoard of clothes is moth-eaten, your gold and silver are tarnished. Yes, their very tarnish will be the evidence of your wicked hoarding and you will shrink from them as if they were red-hot. You have made a fine pile in these last days, haven’t you? But look, here is the pay of the reaper you hired and whom you cheated, and it is shouting against you! And the cries of the other labourers you swindled are heard by the Lord of Hosts himself. Yes, you have had a magnificent time on this earth, and have indulged yourselves to the full. You have picked out just what you wanted like soldiers looting after battle. You have condemned and ruined innocent men in your career, and they have been powerless to stop you.
13 If any of you is in trouble let him pray. If anyone is flourishing let him sing praises to God.
14-16a If anyone is ill he should send for the Church elders. They should pray over him, anointing him with oil in the Lord’s name. Believing prayer will save the sick man; the Lord will restore him and any sins that he has committed will be forgiven. You should get into the habit of admitting your sins to each other, and praying for each other, so that if sickness comes to you, you may be healed.
16b-18 Tremendous power is made available through a good man’s earnest prayer. Do you remember Elijah? He was a man like us but he prayed earnestly that it should not rain. In fact, not a drop fell on the land for three and a half years. Then he prayed again, the heavens gave the rain and the earth sprouted with vegetation as usual.
19-20 My brothers, if any of you should wander away from the truth and another should turn him back on to the right path, then the latter may be sure that in turning a man back from his wandering course he has rescued a soul from death, and his loving action will “cover a multitude of sins”.
21st Century Science and Health
Jesus said, “You are the salt of the earth…You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden.”[2] Let us pay attention and participate in spirituality. Let us pray that this salt doesn’t lose its saltiness, and that this light is not hidden but radiates and glows into the glory of the sun at noon.
The infinite Truth of the Christ-cure has come to this age through a “gentle whisper.”[3] The beneficial effects of spirituality accelerate and develop through silent communications and divine anointing.
James 3:2-18
We all make mistakes in all kinds of ways, but the man who can claim that he never says the wrong thing can consider himself perfect, for if he can control his tongue he can control every other part of his personality! Men control the movements of a large animal like the horse with a tiny bit placed in its mouth. Ships too, for all their size and the momentum they have with a strong wind behind them, are controlled by a very small rudder according to the course chosen by the helmsman. The human tongue is physically small, but what tremendous effects it can boast of! A whole forest can be set ablaze by a tiny spark of fire, and the tongue is as dangerous as any fire, with vast potentialities for evil. It can poison the whole body, it can make the whole of life a blazing hell.
7-12 Beasts, birds, reptiles and all kinds of sea-creatures can be, and in fact are, tamed by man, but no one can tame the human tongue. It is an evil always liable to break out, and the poison it spreads is deadly. We use the tongue to bless our Father, God, and we use the same tongue to curse our fellow-men, who are all created in God’s likeness. Blessing and curses come out of the same mouth—surely, my brothers, this is the sort of thing that never ought to happen! Have you ever known a spring to give sweet and bitter water simultaneously? Have you ever seen a fig-tree with a crop of olives, or seen figs growing on a vine? It is just as impossible for a spring to give fresh and salt water at the same time.
13-16 Are there some wise and understanding men among you? Then your lives will be an example of the humility that is born of true wisdom. But if your heart is full of rivalry and bitter jealousy, then do not boast of your wisdom—don’t deny the truth that you must recognise in your inmost heart. You may acquire a certain superficial wisdom, but it does not come from God—it comes from this world, from your own lower nature, even from the devil. For wherever you find jealousy and rivalry you also find disharmony and all other kinds of evil.
17-18 The wisdom that comes from God is first utterly pure, then peace-loving, gentle, approachable, full of tolerant thoughts and kindly actions, with no breath of favouritism or hint of hypocrisy. And the wise are peace-makers who go on quietly sowing for a harvest of righteousness—in other people and in themselves.
21st Century Science and Health
If divine Science takes away the popular gods—sin, sickness, and destruction—it is Christ, Truth, who destroys these evils, and so proves their unreality.
Any hypothesis that assumes life is in human mind is an educated belief. Beliefs, in their infancy are like an infant, not able to guide the hand to the mouth. As spiritual consciousness develops, belief goes out and yields to the reality of everlasting Life.
Physical senses defraud and lie; breaking the Ten Commandments to meet their own demands. How then can measurable, chemically-based perceptions be the God-given channel of divine blessings or understanding? How can we, reflecting God, be dependent on human mortal mind as a means for knowing, hearing, and seeing? Who dares to say that the senses of person can be at one time the medium for sinning against God and at another time be the medium for obeying God? An affirmative reply would contradict Scripture, for the same fountain does not send forth both fresh and salt water.[4]
Mortal perceptions, or more correctly stated, mortal misperceptions, are the only source of evil or error. Divine Science shows they are false, because even though the misperceptions organize into material organs, they still aren’t the medium of Mind, they can’t hear or see. Outside the material sense of things all is harmony. A wrong sense of God, us, and creation is non-sense, want of sense. Human perceptions would make the physical senses sometimes good and sometimes bad. Human mindedness swears that there is real pleasure in sin, but the grand truths of divine Science dispute this error.
We can expect to receive enlightenment as a result of Christ in action. The Christ-spirit comes now as of old, preaching the good news to receptive minds, healing the sick, and destroying that which violates our dignity. Can materiality, human intellect, or any human invention, restore the essential element of spirituality—namely, apostolic, divine healing? No, the Science of Christ is restoring it, and is the light shining in darkness, a darkness that does not overcome the light.
[1] Job 38:11
[2] Matt. 5:13–14
[3] I Kings 19:12
[4] James 3:11
The Lord’s Prayer with a Christian Science interpretation (in italics) from 21st Century Science and Health:
Our Father in heaven,
Our Father-Mother God, all-harmonious,
Hallowed be Your name,
One sacred nature,
Your kingdom come,
Your government is come; You are ever-present,
Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
Enable us to know—as in heaven, so on earth—God is omnipotent, supreme.
Give us this day our daily bread.
Give us grace for today; feed the famished intentions.
And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.
And Love is reflected in love.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.
And God does not lead us into temptation, but delivers us from sin, disease, and death.
For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.[1]
For God is infinite, all-power, all Life, Truth, Love, over all, and All.
Christian Science Bible Lesson-Sermons 