What joy…what peace! to know “God the Only Cause and Creator” Bible Lesson Application Ideas for May 30 – June 5, 2005

Editor’s Note: The following background information and application ideas for the Christian Science Bible Lesson for this week are offered primarily to help CedarS campers and staff see and demonstrate the great value of daily study of the Christian Science Bible lessons year-round, not just at camp. If more information or the text of this Lesson is desired, please see the Director’s Note at the end. The citations referenced in the “met” (metaphysical application ideas) are taken from the King James Version of the Bible and the Christian Science textbook, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy. The Bible and Science and Health are the ordained pastor of Churches of Christ, Scientist. The Bible Lesson is the sermon read in Christian Science church services throughout the world. (Other reference books are fully noted at the end.)

What joy…what peace! to know “God the Only Cause and Creator”
Application Ideas for the Christian Science Quarterly Bible Lesson for May 30 – June 5, 2005
by Kate Christie Mullane Oyer, C.S. (St. Louis, MO)

Golden Text: 
This is it….God is the only Cause and Creator, He is great, He only does wondrous things and only He has the power to cause or create anything.  Period!

Responsive Reading:
And since He, who is good, loving, and all-powerful, is the only Cause and Creator, even of the earth and all that dwells therein, our only “job” or responsibility is to praise Him, rejoice, and give thanks….

Or as Mrs. Eddy says in Science and Health “All that is, is the work of God and all is good. (imperative statement…not optimistic suggestion) We leave this brief, glorious history of spiritual creation (as stated in the first chapter of Genesis) in the hands of God, not of man, in the keeping of Spirit, not matter, — joyfully acknowledging now and forever God’s supremacy, omnipotence, and omnipresence.: (521:5)

With God as the only Cause and Creator…what more is there for us to do than to “Be glad, give thanks, rejoice!” (Hymn 342)

If it’s so simple, what do we need the rest of the lesson for?  To remind us of all the ways we should be convinced that there in no other creative power…no other  cause which then confirms for us  “the spiritual fact”….that God is All-in-all.  (A fun word study in Concord or with a the concordance is to look up all the ways she talks about “the fact” or “the spiritual fact”)

Section I
This section is all about remembering “the wonderful works that He hath done”.  Demanding that we not forget all that He has already shown us of His trustworthiness.  No amnesia in the kingdom of heaven.  No forgetfulness.  Why?  Because God is continually reminding us, by His works, that He is All-in-all.  The only “animating divine Principle of all that is real and good” (and since He is the only Cause of anything that “is”…all is good!)
And not only is there nothing but good that is causative, the only effect can be GOOD!  Phew…what a relief.  Our only responsibility “is to see, and acknowledge this fact, yield to this power, and follow the leadings of truth.” (S&H 151:29)

Section II
I love this story…Hannah could have come up with a million (or at least a dozen) other reasons that she had finally become pregnant.  But from the very start she knew that only God could put the desire for a child in her heart (nothing makes less human sense than wanting to give up the right to self-absorbed living to give one’s heart and daily devotion to another), bring that child  forth, and she knew that the child would never be the product of anything but God’s purpose for both of them.  She realized even before the child was “conceived” that he had a divine mission and purpose.  What are the “good” desires of your heart?  Do you trust that only God could “cause or create” your desire for good, for selflessness, and the expression of beauty, harmony, order, peace, love, strength, etc.  Mrs. Eddy says “Desire is prayer…” and she also says that “Prayer is God’s gracious means for accomplishing whatever has been successfully done for the Christianization and health of mankind.”  (S&H 1).  Do you see your desire for good, for purpose, for the expression of love as “God’s gracious means”? Or, do you wrestle with having two creators, two causes…God…and your own will???  Can you create your own desires?  Can you cause a longing for….anything? Are you a creator?

In citation 7 Mrs. Eddy states, “A material world implies a mortal mind and man a creator.  The scientific divine creation declares (whereas the former just implies) immortal Mind and the universe (come from the compound uni and verse…one version…there is just one version of all that really is) created by God.  Infinite Mind creates and governs all, from the mental molecule to infinity.”  This is a pretty definitive statement (not a suggestion).  It doesn’t say Infinite Mind ought to create and govern all…and would if only you would concede your control.  No, it says that Infinite Mind DOES create and govern all.  Any other suggestion of another creator or governor is a lie.  Period!

Section III
Hiram was not a worshipper of the one God that Solomon and his father David before him worshipped.  Hiram worshipped more than one God.  But did that stop God from being all powerful in his life and moving him to assist Solomon in his mission to build a temple? No!

God didn’t need Hiram’s permission to work in his heart to “dwell together in unity” with Solomon and his people.  God didn’t need Hiram (or all those that must have cooperated with his decree to help Solomon) to consent to Him,  God being the only God…for God to use Hiram and his people in the way that served God’s larger purpose. 

Unity is a power and a presence that is Self-assertive and causative in the hearts and minds of men.  Not because they agree to it, but because God is the only power and presence operating in their lives, absolutely and imperatively.  Unity is not the absence of division, peace is not the absence of war, cooperation is not the absence of dissent, harmony is not the absence of discord….unity, peace, cooperation and harmony are a self-assertive, causative and self-promotive power that does not need human consent or permission to reign “as in heaven, so on earth…”

God is not sitting back with His hands tied until humanity gives its consent to His government.

Mrs. Eddy’s familiar statement in citation 15, “One infinite God, good, unifies men and nations; constitutes the brotherhood of man; ends war….”  Note that this statement doesn’t say, “One infinite God, good, if understood, ought to, or could, unify men and nations, end war, etc.  But that one infinite God, good DOES unify men and nations, end war, etc..  A direct, declarative statement, not a suggestion or a recommendation.  God, one infinite God, good, who DOES unify men and nations because He is the only cause and creator without opposition.

Section IV
The story of the woman with the issue of blood is one of the wonderful stories of Jesus recognizing God, good as the only Cause and Creator.  Women in Jesus’ time with an “issue of blood” would have been secluded from contact with men.   She would have been isolated so that she would not “curse” a man of God with her “touch”.   Jesus knew what was causative and had power.  Rather than a curse going out of her, he saw only that a virtue was going out of him to bless and to heal.  He KNEW what was creating her experience…and his.  The same with Peter’s assertion that Jesus was the “Son of the living God”….he knew that this was a truth, a fact that God and not man, had revealed to Peter and this God had shown Peter all that he needed to know.  THIS was the Rock that Jesus built his church on.  That God was the only cause for anyone’s knowledge, understanding, insight, inspiration or intelligence,  Mrs. Eddy, says it with such power in the Daily Prayer, “….And may Thy Word (not my, his, hers or theirs…but Thy) Word enrich the affections of all mankind and govern them.”  As we see that God moves in the individual heart to enrich his/her affections for good, for harmony, unity, beauty, honesty…we rest upon this Rock and find peace.

Section V
No one worried whether or not there would be seven men ready and willing to be appointed to do the work that the disciples realized needed to be done.  They didn’t check qualifications, read resumes, test their knowledge of Scripture…they KNEW that God was the only cause and creator of each man’s wholeness.  That each had what was needed and required at any given moment to carry out the tasks of their appointment with the anointing of those qualities of wisdom, humility, grace, affection, joy that were inherent in the appointing. 

The very fact that they were “among” them (the disciples) was enough to make them qualified for the tasks at hand.

Do we see “all having the same Principle or Father…” (citation 24) and that our brother’s need supplies our desire to be our better selves.  To be the generous, faithful, loving, compassionate “brother” we long to be.  We can only discover our own best selves in seeing another’s good.  We will never be as wonderful as when we are seeing (and revealing) the good in another.  I think this is why the Lord’s Prayer is all written in “fellowship”.  There is no I, me, mine…but all we, our, us.  We can only be Christians in the context of how we treat each other and what we reveal of God’s perfection, His All-in-allness,  in one another.  I can only be my best when I am revealing, celebrating, shining the light of Love on you and your perfection.

Do you love your neighbor as yourself (as citation 25 refers to)?  Because it is only in loving your neighbor that you can be your best self.  As you love your neighbor you are that self that is so one with God, with Love, that it knows no separation and sees only one cause for existence, one creation of each moment as the opportunity for expressing that self, that love of Love.

This section also gives us some powerful insights on the nature of prayer as desire, which Mrs. Eddy then identitifes as “God’s gracious means”.  Do we pray to create a mental environment in which God can be God, all-powerful good?  Do we think that until we get this environment right He, God,  is sitting back with His hands tied unable to bless our lives and cause only goodness?  No, God is omnipotent good and prayer is His message of His all-present goodness to each of our hearts.  His promise is of abundant grace and tender care.

Section VI
And here you have it.  The benediction on this life of celebrating what God is doing, causing creating each moment.  Celebrating in fellowship, sharing the gospel of the kingdom of heaven within each and every heart with everyone we meet knowing that this is the same message that is ringing in their heart.  Never seeing or expecting anything but the “unity of the faith”, only expecting the “man of God” greeting you at every turn.  Seeing God in “whatever rests upon and proceeds from divine Principle” not judging or condemning, but celebrating with all that we are and all that we can be, God as the only Cause and Creator.

Jesus said, “I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil” (Matt 5:17).  Since God is the only Cause and Creator and there is no effect from any other cause, we can join Jesus in living lives that are the fulfillment of God’s presence and power rather than seeking out that which has no cause in order to destroy it.  As Mrs. Eddy says in the final citation from this week’s celebration of God’s power, “Christian Science takes naught from the perfection of God, but it ascribes to Him the entire glory.”  In I Thessalonians (5:18) Paul tells us what we get to do, what God’s will for us is: “In everything give thanks, for this is the will of God, in Christ Jesus, concerning you.”

What joy…what peace!

Camp Director’s Note: The above sharing is the latest in a long series of CedarS Bible Lesson “mets” (metaphysical application ideas) contributed weekly by a rotation of CedarS Resident Practitioners and occasionally by other metaphysicians.  This document is intended to initiate further study as well as to encourage the application of ideas found in the Weekly Bible Lessons as printed in the Christian Science Quarterly and as available at Christian Science Reading Rooms.* Originally sent JUST to campers, staff and CedarS families who wanted to continue at home and in their home Sunday Schools the same type of focused Lesson study and inspiration they had felt at camp, CedarS lesson “mets” are in no way meant to be definitive or conclusive or in any way a substitute for daily study of the lesson in the books. The thoughts presented are the inspiration of the moment and are offered to give a bit more dimension, background and daily applicability to some of the ideas and passages being studied. The Lesson-Sermon speaks individually through the Christ to everyone, providing unique insights and tailor-made applications for each one. We are glad you requested this metaphysical sharing and hope that you find some of these ideas helpful in your daily spiritual journey, in your deeper digging in the books and in closer bonding with your Comforter and Pastor.)