Sunday July 18th, 2021 Roundtable
We are on the Eternal Road of Life
This week’s Lesson Sermon Subject: Life
Click here to play the audio as you read:
Morning Prayers
Abide in the 91st Psalm and know that such abiding is treatment and protection. There is nothing that can make laws or influence you. There is but one Mind and that is Love. Do not give life to evil by attaching it to a person or thing. It cannot live without a body. Man is immortal, one. There is but one infinite manifestation. No error can attach itself to man and why deceive ourselves by thinking it can do so? Every manifestation of life is ever-present and omnipresent good and this carries within itself all healing, sustaining. Know that the kingdom of heaven is within you and this is your armor.
Oh, may the light that is never dim so encompass you, that no night is there. May His angels hold thee in their power, and Songs of Science be heard in the intuitions of thought, till your life is in tune with the rhythm of God.
— from Divinity Course and General Collectanea, (the “Blue Book”), by Mary Baker Eddy, page 222 and 224
Discussion points
226 — WATCH lest you believe that the influx of Life to man can ever be lessened, or cut off. In fact man himself is the efflux of life. Mrs. Eddy once said, “I am the ceaseless intake of God’s eternal giving.” A diver might find his imagination playing him a trick, suggesting that the supply of air coming down to him from his friends on the deck of the boat was lessening. He might believe that they were forgetting him, and ceasing to pump the air that he needed. He might even suffer as a result of this trick of his imagination. When reason corrects this mistaken belief, and subdues the rising tide of fear, he is freed from any bad physical effects; then, of course, he discovers that, while he was entertaining his little private nightmare, his friends were sending him all the fresh air needed.
Once an invalid who was left alone in her home fancied that she smelled escaping gas. She was helpless to do anything about shutting it off, but she did manage to telephone for help before she was overcome by the fumes. When the helpers arrived there was no gas leak to be discovered, and the lady soon recovered. Later she was able to laugh at the way her imagination had tricked her.
In line with this, Science declares that man never dies, never grows old, never has a lessening of life and vigor. Thus such things are no more than tricks of the imagination. Mrs. Eddy once said, “There is nothing gained by waiting for death, for it never comes. We must individually lift ourselves above the claims of the senses.”
— from 500 Watching Points by Gilbert Carpenter
GOLDEN TEXT: Romans 6 : 23
“The gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.”
What are we to understand from the account of the translations of Enoch and Elijah?—E. J.
The translation of Enoch and Elijah proved that it is possible for one to pass on to the next experience without going through the belief of death; but still the belief in death as a reality remained. Jesus allowed (to the world’s sense) the belief of death to pass upon him. The purpose of his resurrection was to prove the nothingness of the king of terrors. He destroyed its false claim; robbed the grave of its supposed victory. The declaration of Christian Science, “There is no death,” is based upon Jesus’ demonstration.
— “Questions and Answers” Christian Science Journal, July 1890 By W. B. J.
“And the evening and the morning were the third day.” On page 508 of Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, Mrs. Eddy says, “The third stage in the order of Christian Science is an important one to the human thought, letting in the light of spiritual understanding.” This stage is not to be measured by material time, or seventy-two hours, but rather is the third day symbolic. She further adds, “This period corresponds to the resurrection, when Spirit is discerned to be the Life of all, and the deathless Life, or Mind, dependent upon no material organization. Our Master reappeared to his students, — to their apprehension he rose from the grave,—on the third day of his ascending thought, and so presented to them the certain sense of eternal Life.” It is a mental state wherein man is found to enjoy harmonious eternal life, and is to be gained now, according to Christ Jesus, through constructive thinking and consistent living. What is more important to-day than letting in the light of spiritual understanding?
— “The Third Day” Christian Science Journal, August 1921 by Louis J. Lewis
“For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.” This knowledge came to me in an hour of great need; and I give it to you as death-bed testimony to the daystar that dawned on the night of material sense. This knowledge is practical, for it wrought my immediate recovery from an injury caused by an accident, and pronounced fatal by the physicians. On the third day thereafter, I called for my Bible, and opened it at Matthew ix. 2. As I read, the healing Truth dawned upon my sense; and the result was that I rose, dressed myself, and ever after was in better health than I had before enjoyed.
— from Miscellaneous Writings by Mary Baker Eddy, page 24
And, behold, they brought to him a man sick of the palsy, lying on a bed: and Jesus seeing their faith said unto the sick of the palsy; Son, be of good cheer; thy sins be forgiven thee.
— Matthew 9: 2 from the King James Bible
If the disciple is advancing spiritually, he is striving to enter in. He constantly turns away from material sense, and looks towards the imperishable things of Spirit. If honest, he will be in earnest from the start, and gain a little each day in the right direction, till at last he finishes his course with joy.
— Citation 12 in this week’s Lesson from Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy, page 21
Song — “A Closer Walk with Thee” Performed Laura, Faith, Jared, Criag, and Bruce
For the Lord GOD will help me; therefore shall I not be confounded: therefore have I set my face like a flint, and I know that I shall not be ashamed.
— Isa. 50:7 from the King James Bible
Forum post — Powerful Article on Elisha by Parthens
One thing have I desired of the Lord, that will I seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to enquire in his temple.
— Psalm 27: 4 from the King James Bible
Forum post — Jesus revives Lazarus’s Corpse by JC
Forum post — “Time-tables of birth and death” by Joanne from FL
Final Readings
After Mrs. Eddy’s return to Concord, New Hampshire, Mr. Knapp was asked to search again for the home which Mrs. Eddy knew God had prepared for her. Early in December, 1891, she herself was led to a beautiful tract of land on the outskirts of Concord, which she purchased. She named her home “Pleasant View”; and in writing to Mr. Knapp about it, she said that she had longed for a home by the seaside, but instead God had prepared it on a hillside. She wrote, “My house here stands upon a very sightly hill, and the sides remind me of the Galilean slopes where my brother walked, and wept, and prayed.”
This and other excerpts were read from Destiny of the Mother Church By Bliss Knapp