Sift thru lots of Christ’s forward-looking GEMs & Claim each as YOURS to be able to do ALL THINGS through His Strength!
Sunday, February 19th, 2023
By Warren Huff (with insights from Cobbey Crisler)
Sift thru lots of Christ’s forward-looking GEMs & Claim each as YOURS to be able to do ALL THINGS through His Strength!
Let God Expressed Meekly/Mightily in you sparkle brightly with insights from Cobbey & others
as inspired by The Christian Science Quarterly Bible Lesson on
“Christ Jesus”
for Sunday, February 28, 2023
(Cobbey Crisler’s insights are shared with the blessing of Janet Crisler janetcrisler7@gmail.com)
by Warren Huff, CedarS Executive Director Emeritus, warren@cedarscamps
REALIZE (or “real-eyes”) the POWER of Paul’s advice to the Philippians TO BE FORWARD-LOOKING INSTEAD OF BACKWARD-LOOKING TO HELP RESOLVE ANY MISTAKE EVER MADE.
How heavenly it would be to rise above all partisan politics for unity around the common good! Getting caught-up in a polarized “blame game,” is “mental quackery” and only postpones real solutions. Paul tells us plainly to “do…this one thing” to come out “perfect” on the other side of any seeming disaster – “…forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things that are before…” Philippians 3:13, 14/Responsive Reading)
[A Cobbey Crisler insight relating the story of Stephen’s stoning in Acts 6 & 7 to Phil. 3:13, 14/Responsive Reading:]
[Cobbey:] “Was Stephen’s martyrdom in vain? (“No.” From member of audience) It was probably always in the memory of Paul.
(It) may have something to do with the “thorn in the flesh,” which he says reminds him continually, of his past.
II Cor 12:7 And lest I should be exalted above measure through the abundance of the revelations, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I should be exalted above measure.
“Paul had to forget his past. Can you imagine that anyone here in this room, and I think all of us have a past that we would like to forget. If we dwell on a past that we’d like to forget, we’re not going to forget it. And Paul’s approach to that might be good advice for us.
“Because, remember he said, “Therefore forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark….” (See Philippians 3:13, 14 below)
Phil 3:13 Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before,
Phil 3:14 (citation B11] “I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.”
“So, he went forward despite what he had done.”
“After the Master What? – The Book of Acts,” by B. Cobbey Crisler**
[Warren Huff:] Mary Baker Eddy echoes this life-lesson in Science & Health: “When we learn that error is not real, we shall be ready for progress, “forgetting those things that are behind.” (SH 353:22)
Here’s a past CedarS application activity to bring new life to Paul’s advice in Philippians 3:13 that we’d love to bring back as part of our hands-on, Bible Outdoors curriculum in CedarS Bible Lands Park. Hundreds of campers and staff have happy, hands-on memories of doing a fun, spiritual growth, “Tire Traversal” activity at CedarS in the 1980s and ‘90s. Using two, side-by-side sets of 19 tires suspended on aircraft cables between a double set of big trees on opposite shores of a Crown Lake cove, we challenged campers to race a friend (or themselves) using the one piece of advice that Paul gives to perfection-seekers in his day and in ours. To get from to their destination on the far side of the cove, perfection-seekers needed to swing freely from the tire they were on and eagerly release it as they reached out for the next one — symbolically dropping the past and seizing the now in line with Paul’s Philippians 3:13 tip on how to be perfect.
We were forced to discontinue this fun, hands-on application of this Bible message because one winter a visiting beaver community chewed through the supporting trees and used them to make a home on Crown Lake! We have “forgotten” that loss in favor of “reaching out” to demonstrate an even better dream. We hope to re-build twin, side-by-side Tire Traversals in our Bible Lands Park near Philippi. (This time we’ll use power poles, treated so as to NOT be tasty to beavers.) These Tire Traversals will again be spiritual-growth teaching-tools, this time—and will serve as a fun element in a future, hands-on-learning tour of Paul’s journeys. We’ll keep our eyes on this prize and develop other Biblical life-lessons in fun, hands-on ways as both the right manpower and funds are loved into view!
TO PLEASE GOD, WELCOME INSIDE OF YOU CHRIST’S “DRY-CLEANING” SPIRITUAL BAPTISM!
Lift-up every mixed-up mess to God to let his Holy Wind/Spirit and FAN be the “Separator of fable from fact.” (preview of God’s benediction in Matt. 3:16, 17; S5, 586:7; Isa. 41:16)
Insights on Matt. 3:11-17 by Cobbey Crisler shared with the blessing of his widow, Janet Crisler
as an Inspirational Blog by Warren Huff, CedarS Executive Director Emeritus warren@cedarscamps.org
[Warren:] Before starting his healing ministry, Jesus came to his cousin, John the Baptist, for a water baptism. Like Jesus —according to Matthew 3:12—let us come “with FAN in hand, to thoroughly purge” (or meticulously eliminate) every trace of the “fable” of a bad virus that would aggressively appear to be mixed-in with the God-ordained and maintained “fact” of an all-harmonious universe and all-good creation.
Mary Baker Eddy defines this “FAN” – that we are to have “in hand” so as to be ready to use early and often (or “promptly and persistently” SH 273:32 )– as “Separator of fable from fact; that which gives action to thought.” (SH 586).
Below are some Cobbey Crisler insights on the baptism of Jesus that have helped me often to lift up a humanly-unsolvable situation to the Spirit of God to separate out and permanently eliminate the mess! [The baptism of the Holy Ghost & fire can be found in Matthew 3:11-17.]
[Cobbey Crisler: Verse 11, John the Baptist speaking) “I am baptizing you with water: but the one who is following me (Jesus)… He is going to baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire.”… Let me just suggest something… I think it does help to clarify how we can learn from these illustrations by going beneath the surface as much as possible. For instance, in the separation of the chaff from the wheat there are innumerable things that are required for the thresher to do before the results can be successful… We want to get rid of the chaff and get to the useful wheat. Why must we separate them? They’re all mixed. Take that symbolically. If this is all to be happening within us, this kind of baptism, Holy Ghost and fire, is there anything mixed up in us? Of course not, we’re not mixed up. We’re never confused. We never have arrived at a point where we can’t tell the difference between right and wrong. If some of us, a few of us, have that problem of being mixed up on occasion, then the chaff and wheat are together. Is there a way you and I can get out of that mixed up state? Is this the baptism then that is required as far as our thinking is concerned? In order to begin to sort this process of separation, the thresher must first locate a threshing floor. The threshing floor has certain requirements to it for maximum results. What are they? It has to be high, and certainly as level as possible. Why high? Because it needs to be unobstructed. You can’t have structures around it. It would have to be open with minimum obstruction. Hopefully none at all. Open to the wind.
“Here we are on our threshing floor with all the mixture at our feet. Our first responsibility was to get it up to the highest point where there are no obstructions. That’s very interesting because for anyone who is at some mixed-up point in his life, the first requirement is to get up to that point.
“Second, what must be done? What’s the next thing the thresher does? Now he’s up there. It’s a beautiful wind. Is he going to put up a hammock and swing in it? He’s got to do something about the mess at his feet. It’s very exact this illustration. What does he do? He uses a fan. What is termed a fan in the King James Version is not the Madame Butterfly fan [or our electric fan] variety, but is like a fork, a pitchfork. He goes right into the mixture of the chaff and wheat and throws it into the air.
“So far, responsibility number one has been ours, to get to the high level in thought, locate the threshing floor. The second responsibility is also ours. To make sure we have that fan in hand to separate the chaff and wheat, to actually dig into that pile and throw it up into the air. But the actual separation occurs by the wind. Not ours. Do you see the difference in the responsibility? The Divine takes care of the separation after the human had gotten to the level where it is willing to work for the Divine and yield to it. The wind, or pneuma, or Holy Ghost, has that defined responsibility of separating the chaff from the wheat in our own thinking.
“Where does the fire come in? If you want to get rid of the chaff, it will be very important to destroy it completely. Because the chaff could, with a change of wind, be mixed back into the wheat. To eliminate that possibility, a thresher will build a fire downwind, the chaff will blow right into the fire and be consumed simultaneously…
“It is through this process of baptism, the meeting of the Holy Ghost and fire, that this deep spiritual cleansing goes on within us. This baptism of thought which requires the fan…
(Verse 13) “At this point, John the Baptist having announced this, Jesus appears and come to be baptized.” (Verse 14) ‘But John says, No, it should be the other way around. I’ve just been talking about this new baptism.’ (Verse 15) ‘Jesus said, permit it for the moment.’ Implying that the human mind has to swallow things piecemeal… the progress of man’s spirituality is a step at a time. Jesus, therefore, receives the water baptism. (Verse 16) But almost immediately we are told that water-baptism is to be superseded, we find that “the Spirit of God descends like a dove upon Jesus…Perhaps that dove was indicating… that the water-baptism is past. Spirit’s baptism must take over in this radical change of thought being required by this new era. (Verse 17) “In the middle of this great event, ‘A voice is heard that says, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.’”
“Book of Matthew, Auditing the Master, A Tax Collector’s Report,” by B. Cobbey Crisler**
[Warren: Consider the lifelong, spiritual confidence for each of the beloved children who God has “familied” with us, from our prayerfully (and ideally audibly) saying to each of them each night the blessing of the heartfelt, absolute message that we and God are well pleased with them.]
[Cobbey again: “Remember the consistency of the Scripture. This is what turns us into students. The consistency of the Scripture would force us to study in depth how we please God. Here is ‘My beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.’ How do we please God? Do you remember any particular Scriptural statements on that?… One of the things that Paul says about it in Romans 8:8 is, ‘They that are in the flesh (they that are earthly minded, who obey the lower nature) cannot please God.’ “
What Mark Recorded,” by B. Cobbey Crisler**
[Warren again: The preceding verses, Romans 8:5-7, with other translations shed more light on the challenge of earthly-minded body worship that seems prevalent today in obsession with fitness, diet, revealing “selfies”… (Verse 5) “For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh: but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit.” (“People who are controlled by the physical think (most) about what is physical: and people who are controlled by the spiritual think (most) about —give their (undistracted) attention to—what is spiritual.” Goodspeed (Verse 6) “For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.” (“But to set the mind on the flesh brings death, whereas to set the mind on the Spirit brings life and peace.” The New Testament: A New Translation (Olaf M. Norlie)
These passages and several from Mary Baker Eddy have helped heal body-worship and lots of resulting ills and issues: “Paul said, ‘Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh.’ Sooner or later we shall learn that the fetters (handcuffs) of man’s finite capacity are forged by the illusion that he lives in body instead of in Soul, in matter instead of in Spirit.” S&H 223:3
“There is no life, truth, intelligence, nor substance in matter. All is infinite Mind and its infinite manifestation, for God is All-in-all. Spirit is immortal Truth; matter is mortal error. Spirit is the real and eternal; matter is the unreal and temporal. Spirit is God, and man is His image and likeness. Therefore man is not material; he is spiritual.” (Science & Health with Key to the Scripture (& KEY to unlock the handcuffs) 468:9)
These ideas from Miscellaneous Writings describe the form, color, light, beauty of our world being loved promises and representatives “of the beauty, grandeur, and glory of the immortal Mind.” (87) “My sense of the beauty of the universe is, that beauty typifies holiness, and is something to be desired. Earth is more spiritually beautiful to my gaze now than when it was more earthly to the eyes of Eve. The pleasant sensations of human belief, of form and color, must be spiritualized, until we gain the glorified sense of substance as in the new heaven and earth, the harmony of body and Mind…
“Even the human conception of beauty, grandeur, and utility is something that defies a sneer. It is more than imagination. It is next to divine beauty and the grandeur of Spirit. It lives with our earth-life, and is the subjective state of high thoughts. The atmosphere of mortal mind constitutes our mortal environment. What mortals hear, see, feel, taste, smell, constitutes their present earth and heaven: but we must grow out of even this pleasing thralldom, and find wings to reach the glory of supersensible Life; then we shall soar above, as the bird in the clear ether of the blue temporal sky.
“To take all earth’s beauty into one gulp of vacuity and label beauty nothing, is ignorantly to caricature God’s creation, which is unjust to human sense and to the divine realism. In our immature sense of spiritual things, let us say of the beauties of the sensuous universe: ‘I love your promise; and shall know, some time, the spiritual reality and substance of form, light, and color, of what I now through you discern dimly; and knowing this, I shall be satisfied. Matter is a frail conception of mortal mind; and mortal mind is a poorer representative of the beauty, grandeur, and glory of the immortal Mind.’” (Miscellaneous Writings. 86:14- 87:14)]
PLEASE GOD BY DOING DEEP-CLEANING IN CHRIST’S WAY—FROM THE INSIDE OUT!
Try Christ’s ultimate “DRY-cleaning” baptism method! Cobbey Crisler on Mark 1:8+, corelary to Matt. 3:12, citation B2
[Cobbey:] Mark 1:8 “I indeed have baptized you with water: but he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost”… John the Baptist never healed the sick as part of his theology. Here it’s not baptism with water that is ultimately going to count on earth, but baptism with the Holy Ghost… We find John the Baptist… removing the focus from physical cleanliness as being the means by which we would enter a heavenly state… You know water can’t reach what’s within, what is in consciousness, what is mental and really needs cleaning…
Mark 1, verse 10… “the Spirit like a dove descends upon him” in this baptism. It shows he is coming out of the watery baptism into the higher sense of baptism of the Spirit. The spiritual sense of man is what emerges after the carnal sense is washed from consciousness…
Mark 1:11 The announcement comes, “Thou art my beloved son in whom I am well pleased,” shows that sonship and relationship to God is not in a fleshly context… It is a very emphatic point of our relationship to God.” [Warren: Consider the lifelong, spiritual confidence given to the dear ones in our care when we nightly say a blessing over them, and to them, that they are beloved children, in whom God and we are well-pleased.]
[Cobbey again:] “Remember the consistency of the Scripture. This is what turns us into students. The consistency of the Scripture would force us to study in depth how we please God. Take “Here is My beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.” How do we please God? Do you remember any particular Scriptural statements on that?… One of the things that Paul says about it in Romans 8:8 is, “They that are in the flesh (they that are earthly minded, who obey the lower nature) cannot please God.”
What Mark Recorded, by B. Cobbey Crisler**
[Warren: The preceding verses, Romans 8:5-7, with other translations shed more light on the challenge of earthly-minded body-worship that seems so accepted and prevalent in today’s obsession with fitness, diet, revealing selfies… After the King James in italics is Goodspeed’s translation of Romans 8:5 “For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh: but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit.” = “People who are controlled by the physical think of what is physical: and people who are controlled by the spiritual think of—give their attention to—what is spiritual.” Goodspeed]
For a couple of Mary Baker Eddy’s insights that I’ve found helpful to shine a Christ-light light on trending bodily-mindedness, click on my P.S. at the end of a January 2014 Met on “Sacrament,” by Kathy Fitzer, at https://www.cedarscamps.org/metaphysical/articles/2014/1/sacrament/
In this 2014 Met —at the bottom under Download— you can also click on a pdf file that outlines Matthew’s version of Jesus’ baptism of “the Holy Ghost and fire.” It – and BETTER YET Cobbey’s full talk transcript available below through his wife, Janet Crisler—give a hands-on way to separate any mixed-up mess of good (facts) and bad (fables) by taking them up to the highest point (God). That allows Spirit, God, the Pneuma or Wind—NOT you with tweezers—to sort out any mixed-up mess and to put an end to the fables. In the Glossary of Science and Health with Key to the Scripture, Mary Baker Eddy defines FAN as “Separator of fable from fact; that which gives action to thought.” SH 586
At CedarS Bible Lands Park where thought is put into action, we take a separating “fan in hand” and climb our miniature Mt. Nebo where an actual fire is built downwind. There—using the wind of Spirit and a separating “FAN in hand”—we let the wind sort-out the fables —written on folded-up scraps of papers —and let the fire burn them up. We pray to be see that this will put an end to every mixed-up mess that would attempt to fool and discourage us and so keep us from being the best versions of ourselves that God made and maintains.
In my inspirational talk for Arden Woods’ May 1, 2022 Annual Meeting, in the second half of the meeting, you can hear many application examples and see a time-traveling Moses reenact the separating of chaff from the wheat on Mt. Nebo in CedarS Bible Lands Park. For an audio/video link click on https://www.ardenwood.org/events/annualmeeting22/ .
You can also read or print excerpts from the transcript by clicking on the Download at the bottom of the online version of these GEMs.
DISCOVER THE INDESCRIBABLE JOY OF FOLLOWING THE RULES OF HEAVENLY HAPPINESS AS JESUS SHARED THEM FROM THE ALTITUDE OF INSPIRATION IN HIS SERMON ON THE MOUNT.
Section 2 in this week’s Bible Lesson features three Beatitudes (Matthew 5, verses 5, 6, 8/citation B4) The fourth Beatitude (Matt. 5:6) deals directly with our society’s temptations to think most about food and drink – and so worship them, instead of the one, true God – to seek comfort in “comfort food” instead of the Comforter.
Mary Baker Eddy gives us “crumbs of comfort” and diverse, satisfying menu items to “chew on” in citation S11/SH 234:4 where she says: “Whatever inspires with the wisdom, Truth, or Love — be it song, sermon, or science – blesses the human family, with crumbs of comfort from Christ’s table, feeding the hungry and giving living water to the thirsty.”
Elsewhere in Science & Health she challenges food worship with advice like: “cherish nothing which hinders our highest selfhood” (68:4); “neither eat to live nor live to eat” (388:12); and, find “rightful nutriment, such as peace, patience in tribulation, and a priceless sense of the dear Father’s lovingkindness.” (365:31)
In addition, we have the scripture that Jesus used to counteract hunger after 40 days of fasting in the wilderness: “man doth not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord doth man live” (Deut. 8:3, cit. B9). And, we also get Jesus telling us what does satisfy and fill our hunger in his 4th Beatitude: “Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.” (Matt 5:6, cit. B11).
In addition, we have the scripture that Jesus used to counteract hunger after 40 days of fasting in the wilderness: “man doth not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord doth man live” (Deut. 8:3, cit. B9). And, we also get Jesus telling us what does satisfy and fill our hunger in his 4th Beatitude: “Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.” (Matt 5:6, cit. B13).
“Hungry? bring out the spiritual importance of Christ Jesus’ promise, ‘Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness.’ Click the link below to Beatitude #4 in an audio series available by clicking it and/or the other Beatitudes from a pick-list on Christian Science.com HERE. Or, for the 4th Beatitude (recoding #5 in the series) paste the address below into your browser:
https://www.christianscience.com/media/youth-media-except-images/audio/beatitudes-podcast-series/the-beatitudes-blessed-are-they-who-hunger-and-thirst-after-righteousness
This podcast by Bible scholar, Barry Huff, and former Christian Science Lecturer, Susie (Rynerson) Jostyn, is one of a nine-part, (Mother Church sponsored) audio series on the spiritual basis of the Beatitudes. You can hear the other eight podcasts at https://www.christianscience.com/youth/preteens
More resources to become supremely happy!
Take a Beatitude-themed, “supreme happiness hike” at CedarS Bible Lands Park up our Bible Chronology “Time Travelers Trail.” Trace together the way that Bible characters have proved their worthiness to be divinely blessed long before Jesus summarized their acted-upon mindsets as the Beatitudes. You can make these divine blessings your own, now and forever, with these 8 Beatitude Pledges to make and cherish from CedarS Bible “A.P. History” Trail.
[Cobbey Crisler on Jesus’ Beatitudes and their connections to the Commandments as also featured in GEM#3:] “The beatitudes, the blessings. The word “blessed” in our sermon on the mount is not really the accurate translation of the Greek. The word is “makarios” which means “happy.” Just think of the search for happiness among humanity. Here are rules laid down by Jesus simply stating that happiness can be obtained in the following ways…
… we should remember that Jesus never uttered anything that he hadn’t practiced.
The Sermon on the Mount is in essence a description of the life of Jesus…
“… As you go down the Beatitudes, read them all, scan them as they are in front of you. See if you can find results in every one of them. See if you can analyze them for those results. The Beatitudes become a very practical clue for how to lead one’s life.
The Commandments and Beatitudes have often been placed side by side.
Many parallels have been used…
For instance, we are told in the Book of Revelation that those who have overcome the beast will stand on the sea of glass with harps. … Those who have overcome are said to be singing two things: the song of Moses and the song of the Lamb. That sounds like they’re inseparable. They operate together. Do you know why? Because it’s part of the heavenly mathematics.
Why did the Commandments say, “Thou shalt not,” taking care of the minus aspects in human nature? And the Beatitudes, “happy are they” that do certain things, are plus? What do you do with the minus in thought, the chaff? It is dealt with by fire. You deal with the plus in thought through the Holy Ghost.
They operate together for a single purpose and a unique commitment to the totality of One infinite, God, good. The Beatitudes must be considered in conjunction with the Commandments in your study.
These Beatitudes took the same forty days preparation of Jesus in the wilderness as the Commandments took forty as of preparation in the wilderness for Moses. It may take the same wilderness experience for you and me to appreciate what really is there behind the Commandments and the Beatitudes. They are really the staff on which we lean. If we try to go very far without that staff, it must discipline us. The same root of the word as disciple. We must come back and learn how to deal with the plus factors and the minus factors in our own thinking. That’s the baptism of the Holy Ghost and fire.
[Cobbey on parts of The Sermon on the Mount:] “Matthew 5, Verse 21, “You have heard that it was said by them of old time, “Thou shalt not kill.” He has gone right back to the Commandments. “You’ve been taught that you shouldn’t kill.” The Hebrew word definitely means “murder.” Thou shalt not murder.
(Verse 22). “But I say unto you,” notice his interpretation of it, “That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment.” In some early manuscripts, the phrase “without a cause” is not present. What is Jesus obviously interested in? The act of murder or the motive behind it? Does anger often lead to murder? If one could stop at the anger stage, would we have murder? Do you see the basic psychology in its right sense that Jesus is using here?
(Verse 22). He also says, “If you say to your brother, Raca” which means sort of “empty head” or “vain fellow,” you “shall be in danger of the council.” You’ll be judged for what you think of your brother, and what you say to your brother. “But even worse is to say, Thou fool,” the Greek word there is “more.”
The word we have that is related is “moron.” “If you say to your brother he’s a moron.” Why should that have such an affect? We undoubtedly all do it at some point. “You know so-and-so is stupid for having done that.” Yet, if we were in the same circumstances, chances are we probably would have done the same thing.
If we condemn our brother, is it also a condemnation of ourselves and of man in general. That man is capable of being moronic.
Jesus who had a revelation that he was the beloved son of God could hardly accept that man could be a moron. If man could he a moron, and was the image of God, what would that make God? His whole theology is wrapped up around what seems like a tiny point, and something that we would tend to excuse. But Jesus said, “No, it goes right to the root of theology. You cannot have the two. You can’t serve two masters.
If we condemn our brother, is it also a condemnation of ourselves and of man in general. That man is capable of being moronic.
Jesus who had a revelation that he was the beloved son of God could hardly accept that man could be a moron. If man could he a moron, and was the image of God, what would that make God? His whole theology is wrapped up around what seems like a tiny point, and something that we would tend to excuse. But Jesus said, “No, it goes right to the root of theology. You cannot have the two. You can’t serve two masters. ·
In Verse 27, you see the formula coming in again. “You have heard that it was said by them of old time, “Thou shalt not commit adultery.” How about that? Here’s another commandment.
The Commandments are divided into halves. Your first five Commandments are our duty to God, allowing that fifth Commandment in there, which may be a transitional one. And the second five, our duty to man.
So, human relationships have to do with the second five, “thou shalt not murder” (Exodus 20:13), “thou shalt not commit adultery” (Exodus 20:14). He’s dealing directly with the human relationship commandments. He knows what they are. He’s the one who for the first time, even in Hebrew history, as far as we know, divided them into two sections. He said the Commandments fulfilled two things, loving God, and loving our neighbor. His own insights summarized the Ten Commandments that way. So, “thou shalt not commit adultery.” We ought to already know what he’s doing. He’s going back to the motive. Don’t be angry and you might not end up murdering. Adultery has its motive, too.
(Verse 28). “But I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust…” Before the physical act, we see the motivation occurring in thought. Inward purity, meeting the temptation in thought before it can be expressed in action, would eliminate adultery. (Refer back to the 6th Beatitude on purity.)
Interestingly enough, the word “fornication,” which is repeated throughout the Bible, is the word porneia. It’s the root of Pornography. The book of Revelation (9:21) gives four major things that will identify themselves as crime in later ages.
We’re living right in the midst of them. One of them is porneia, or fornication. One of them is theft. One of them is murder. The other one is called “sorcerery” in the King James Version. But the Greek word is pharmakeia, drugs and drug purveying. It’s translated “sorcerery” in our version of Revelation.
Just think of those four things. They compose most of our headlines, don’t they? They also would compose much of what is human thought in our own thinking, trying to break up the integrity of man into fragments, the wholeness of man…
(Verse 37). We have communication problems today. Look what Jesus says, “Let your communication be, Yea, yea; Nay, nay:” Not even “perhaps,” or “maybe.” Just “Yea, Yea” or “Nay, Nay.” The yes-no consciousness. Isn’t that what the Commandments and the Beatitudes are? “Thou shalt not” and “Blessed are you who do.” The plus and the minus. The chaff and the wheat. “Yes,” because we know that’s right to accept and do. “No.” because we know equally strongly that it is something we should not do. Knowing the difference between right and wrong is the greatest gift we can possess and exercise.
ANTI-AGING BONUS: COUNTERACT THE BELIEF OF AGING, BY NOT LETTING UNSOLVED PROBLEMS ACCUMULATE! (Verse 23). Jesus says; “If you bring your gift to the altar, and remember anything your brother has against you.” That’s tough self-examination…
(Verse 25). “Agree (come to terms) with your adversary quickly, while he is in the way with ‘us.” Solve the problem when it confronts you. Don’t put it off. I once heard a lecturer describe old age in a novel way. He decided that old age might just be an accumulation of unsolved problems: Problems in which you and I might not be different from anyone else. That’s the beautiful revelation of Scripture, that no temptation comes to you or me that isn’t common to man. But we kind of think that the devil is going to treat us more exclusively than he does others. And that if he gives us baggage to carry around at least it has our gold initial stamped on it, just for us.
Do you know how Jesus handled it? “You’re nothing special,” he said to Satan. He just quoted the law book (first Deuteronomy 8:3, as in citation B9) and got rid of it. That same kind of disposal of such temptations is obviously implicit in what Jesus is telling humanity. With love resident in his heart that embraced all, every generation, even Jesus’ last prayer publicly, includes not just his present followers, but those who would follow him down through the centuries. I have never ceased to be touched by the 17th Chapter of John. Before his own crucifixion, he not only prays for himself and for his disciples but he prays for us as well. I’m not so sure we would pray for people centuries ahead of us if we were going out to our own crucifixion. But Jesus would not have done it, if he didn’t think that prayer was still effective. And that we would pick up the benefits of his prayer when we arrived on the human scene.
The Master has already prayed for us. How are our results? He’s giving humanity the rules to live by, so we must agree (come to terms) with our adversary quickly…”
“Book of Matthew, Auditing the Master” by B. Cobbey Crisler**
CHERISH a CHRISTLY COMPASSION to HEAL & FEED OTHERS—& have DOMINION!
Cobbey Crisler on Matthew 14:14-21 (citation B6)
[Cobbey:] Matthew 14: Verse 14 (similar to Matt. 15:30) “But the multitudes followed him.” Instead of saying, “Look, will you let a man be alone for once,” he turned around with compassion and healed their sick.”
(Verse 15-20). And out comes the famous loaves-and-fishes incident in which everyone is fed, with a balance left over despite the fact that we’re dealing with thousands of people. …
And, right after this (Verses 24-33) we have the walking-on-the-sea incident.”
“Book of Matthew, Auditing the Master, A Tax-Collector’s Report,” by B. Cobbey Crisler**
[Warren:] A concomitant idea: Find in divine economics that our Shepherd’s supply is inexhaustible, because “LOVE IS, LIKE 5 LOAVES AND 2 FISHES—ALWAYS TOO LITTLE, UNTIL YOU START GIVING IT AWAY!” (In a Download at the bottom of the online version of these GEMs see this message on my t-shirt above an artist’s representation of it in ceramic tile. I got it in January 2020 on a Principia Lifelong Learning trip to the Holy Lands, led by our Bible professor son, Dr. Barry Huff.)
Cobbey Crisler on Mark 6:35-44 (similar to Matthew 14:14-21, cit. B11 and Matt. 15:30-38)
[Cobbey:] “The only so-called miracle in all four gospels is the feeding of the “five thousand,” (and also one this week of the feeding of the four thousand”) Mark, Verses 35-44. I put it in quotes because they were only counting the men. Out of the little boy’s lunch box comes five loaves and two fishes. We hear that from the gospel of John Chapter 6, Verse 13. They feed a multitude. Now we have a lesson on economics given to us by the Master. He didn’t regard that as a problem either. No Malthusian limitation on man that we’re going to outgrow our supply, and, therefore, we should kill off sectors of the human race in order to meet the supply. That’s Malthus and his philosophy of necessity. But we find Jesus saying instead in Matthew 14:16, “They need not depart.” Malthus says they need to be killed, but Jesus is saying, “They need not depart.”
“Mark 6.37. The disciples say it would be impossible to feed the multitude, that it would take about “two hundred pennyworth.” The group was considerably more than five thousand if you count the women and the children.
“What Jesus said to all the disciples made them become part of the remedy. Twelve baskets were taken around. There were twelve disciples. Each one was made to participate in the abundant result and learn from it. They started out with only five loaves and two fishes. They ended up with more fragments left over than they had when they started out. More available. That’s divine economics. It doesn’t exhaust.”
“What Mark Recorded,” by B. Cobbey Crisler**
“BE STRONG &… FEAR NOT” UNREALITY & LET ITS “SORROW AND SIGHING FLEE AWAY…” WITH CONVINCING PROOFS OF GOD’S CARE! Read, hear & see (using links in Isa. 35:4, 7 below) a sampling of testimonies and applications ideas proven at CedarS for Isaiah 35 (citation B7) as part of CedarS divinely-defined purpose.
Each verse and word of the 35th chapter of Isaiah have been treated as CedarS divinely-given “marching orders.” Since 1962 Isaiah 35’s guidelines and promises have been passed along to CedarS staff by Ruth E. Huff, CedarS Founder and Executive Director for the first 16 summers, its second Executive Director for 42 summers, Warren Huff, and its current Executive Director for the last 4 summers, Holly Huff Bruland.
[Ruth E. Huff wrote of CedarS purpose and Isaiah 35:] “In asking God what His/Her purpose was in founding CedarS Camps near Lebanon, Missouri, I (Ruth) opened the Bible “at random” for a divine answer and the first words that I saw were “the glory of Lebanon.” (Isaiah 35:2) Since that first summer in 1962, every Counselor Training course has featured the vital importance of putting into practice each word of all ten verses of Isaiah 35 as CedarS divinely-given “marching orders.”
Putting into practice Isaiah 35:1:“The wilderness* and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose” CedarS staff work together to put a full stop to the three opening, negative parts of Mary Baker Eddy’s definition of “WILDERNESS. Loneliness; doubt; darkness.” and to replace these temporary dark aspects with the lasting joys of her spiritual definition of wilderness as: “Spontaneity of thought and idea; the vestibule in which a material sense of things disappears, and spiritual sense unfolds the great facts of existence.” (SH 597) CedarS Bible Lands Park (BLP) features the great growth that all major Bible characters experienced in the wilderness when they had to go outside their “comfort zones” to find their “spiritual growth zones.” This stretching and growth happens intentionally every day and really every hour with CedarS Mets that kick-off each activity with a spiritual sense of it and of every participant.
Solos are another tradition for older campers and staff that feature a sacred, “solitary place” and set-aside time to commune one-to-one with God. In BLP, what was a deserted place has been transformed into the lush land of Sharon, even with blooming roses of Sharon.
Putting into practice Isaiah 35:2: “It shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice even with joy and singing: the glory of Lebanon shall be given unto it, the excellency of Carmel and Sharon, they shall see the glory of the Lord, and the excellency of our God.”
The blossoming “excellency” of all at CedarS is celebrated with unique Quality Awards;
our 5th Fundamental is “We expect to make camping at CedarS fun!”;
every meal includes singing; and, at every Wednesday Testimony meeting all see and hear amazing testimonies to the glory and excellency of our God.
Putting into practice Isaiah 35:3, “Strengthen ye the weak hands, and confirm the feeble knees.” Above and beyond the physical healings of weak hands and feeble knees that could be related here, shine the examples in every camper and staff member (as part of their God-ordained purpose at CedarS) to strengthen their grasp on Truth through hourly Mets and more as well as to quicken and firm-up their resolve to take a “stand for right especially when it’s not the popular thing to do.” [part of CedarS Torchbearer pledge]
Putting into practice Isaiah 35:4 (cit. B7), a big part of each CedarS counselor job is to lovingly “Say to them that are of a fearful heart, be strong, fear not…” Throughout each day CedarS staff members constantly accentuate “Christ’s keynote of harmony, ‘Be not afraid!’” (SH 410:30)
Putting into practice Isaiah 35:5, “Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened. And the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped.” [A wonderful, instantaneous healing happened at CedarS ~20 years ago when a workman was blinded by an accidental splash of acetone. A healing of a preexisting hole in a camper’s ear drum happened a few years ago. Above and beyond these “miracles”, we witness daily shining examples of campers and staff awakening to the “gratitude that outlaws blindness to present good” as well as to a new openness to hear and obey our guardian angels that are either whispering or thundering in our ears “This is the way, walk ye in it!” [Isaiah 39:21, Misc. 539:23]
Putting into practice Isaiah 35:6, “Then shall the lame man leap as an hart, and the tongue of the dumb sing…” We have also witnessed physical healings at CedarS of a Division 1 football player on the day he broke a foot being able to leap & run — eager for Football Camp — as well as a kindergartner who had not talked for over a year being able to open up and speak at CedarS.
But the day to day fulfillment of these promises comes in symbolic ways as campers and staff leave behind a crippling, “material sense of things…” that mutes the expression of their true spiritual identities which “break out” as “spiritual sense unfolds the great facts of existence.” (Definition of Wilderness, SH 597)
Putting into practice Isaiah 35:7, “And the parched ground shall become a pool…” This prophesy was fulfilled, six days before the opening of CedarS 50th season, when our promised, under-construction “Mediterranean Sea” was parched and would have remained so all summer without divine help. Warren was impelled to quickly obey divine guidance to have a drain sealed-off and to transfer runoff from a record storm that filled the lake before Opening Day 2011 with 60 million gallons of “holy water.” [Hear details related by Warren about this and other “miraculous” demonstrations including a life-saving hymn sing healing as told to staff in CedarS June 2018 precamp. Or see a YouTube version in a 5-6-18 Inspirational talk. My Hymn Sing healing is 19 minutes in on YouTube and the 60-million gallons in 6 days is at 31 minutes into my 2018 Principia Parent Association inspirational on YouTube.]
Putting into practice Isaiah 35:8, “And an highway shall be there, and a way, and it shall be called The way of holiness;” This promise from God was fulfilled in “concrete” terms by the completion of Interstate 44 a few years after CedarS opened in 1962. This reduced trips from St. Louis to CedarS from 5 hours on 2-lane ‘Route 66,’ with its hills, curves and trucks to a beautiful and smooth 2.5-hour drive. But the deeper, daily meaning comes from the time and effort one always saves by taking “The way of holiness.” This is God’s “alias” for CedarS that we strive to demonstrate as we work to fulfill our purpose to “give each camper an appreciation of spiritual sense.”
Putting into practice Isaiah 35:9, “No lion shall be there, nor any ravenous beast…but the redeemed of the Lord shall walk there.” Our little piece of heaven in the Missouri Ozarks is free of all ravenous beasts, and by design, free of strife-filled thoughts, words and ways. Time traveling campers and visitors walking on CedarS Time Travelers’ Trail in Bible Lands Park, are redeemed from beastly, strife-filled thoughts when they pledge (like Daniel in the Lions’ Den) to ‘win without a fight’ – and (like David) to be quick to forgive, and so be forgiven and redeemed.
Putting into practice Isaiah 35:10, “And the ransomed of the Lord shall return… they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.” In addition to welcoming new family members, over a thousand campers and staff return to CedarS year after year to experience the nonstop joy of “Spontaneity of thought and idea” (another spiritual aspect of “Wilderness,” SH 597) and to put a “full stop” (period) to the “sorrow and sighing” of fables like “Loneliness; doubt; darkness” that they may “flee away.” (Let these aspects of a merely material view of “Wilderness” vanish as a dream. SH 597)
STRIVE TO “TOUCH THE FRINGES OF ETERNITY” (Hymn 64:3) TO FIND PERFECT WHOLENESS WITHIN YOU!
Cobbey Crisler on a prelude to Mark 5:35-42 (cit. B9) of Mark 5:25-34 where an issue of blood was healed before a dead 12-yr.-old raised
Click on links below to see helpful images and video reenactments of these healings that the Christ means for you too!
- Heal longtime “issues” – Reach out to “touch the fringes of eternity” (Hymn 64) as in a Mark 5:28 reenactment and a more dramatic one as reenacted in ”The Chosen” Season 3, Episode 5
- As in a double-header healing put out all mourners to raise the dead like Jesus did with Jairus’ daughter as in a Mark 5:21…42 reenactment
[Cobbey:] “A woman, hemorrhaging 12 years, was healed by touching the “wings” of Jesus’ garment. (Cobbey Crisler (CC) on the version in Luke 8:41) “The woman… is at the absolute desperate end of a rope. Here we find receptivity. Blessed are those are in this state. Happy are those because this state of mind can be changed. “This radical change of thought was in the presence of the Christ-correction that Jesus was exercising in the mental realm. It’s going to be sufficient and the woman feels that it will help her. She’s lost all her money on physicians. [No health insurance…] Mark even tells us that she’s worse because of that choice. [Mark 5:26] All she does is touch the border of his garment. The issue of blood, the continuous hemorrhaging, had occurred for twelve years, had kept her out of the temple, kept her out of worship and made her as unclean as the lepers, …
(CC on version in Mark 5:34) Verse 34. Jesus calls the woman, “Daughter.”… Jesus is using daughter in an entirely new way… The woman’s problem is blood. He even lifts the term “daughter” out of a blood relationship and defines a divine relationship… The dignity of womanhood is demonstrated.”
(CC on version in Luke 8:48) “Daughter, be of good comfort” (Verse 48). Look at how he’s addressing the thought of that woman. Not only the precious relationship to God, but the comfort. She hasn’t experienced that in twelve years. She’d lost all her money. She was about to be thrown on the society. There was nowhere to go when you were thrown on society. That may have happened to the woman who had been a sinner. Prostitution was the only open career for many women when they were simply thrown out and discarded from normal humanity…
“Jesus refuses to allow that woman to walk away from the scene thinking that physical contact with his robe had anything to do with the healing. He says, again, “Your faith hath made you whole.” The word “whole” and the word “heal” in Anglo-Saxon have the identical root. It implies that disease is something less than wholeness, that it is a fragmentation of our being. Healing is the condition of being made whole.”
“What Mark Recorded” and “Luke the Researcher,” both by B. Cobbey Crisler**
Warren’s ADDED BACKGROUND NOTE, THAT RELATES to APPLYING the 10 Commandments GEM ABOVE:
“In Numbers 15:38-40, God tells Moses to have Hebrew men attach fringes to the border or wings of their prayer shawl garments —like the one pictured in a Download in the online version of these GEMs —to remind them to abide by God’s Ten Commandments (See GEM on 1st and all Commandments) and to ‘be holy unto your God’ (Numbers 15:40). The woman healed of her 12-year issue was rewarded for exercising her faith that Christ Jesus was fulfilling this prophesy in Malachi: “But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings; (Mal. 4:2). Many others in Jesus day were also rewarded for exercising their faith in Jesus being the fulfillment of the scriptural promise of the healing power connected to the keeping of God’s law represented by the 10 Commandment fringes on the borders of his garment… Mark 6:56 records of Christ Jesus’ healing that “whithersoever he entered, into villages, or cities, or country, they laid the sick in the streets, and besought him that they might touch if it were but the border of his garment: and as many as touched him were made whole.” (or “perfectly whole” in the account in Matthew 14:36) Here’s to perfect wholeness for you in your faithfully following of the science of the Christ and in fulfilling God’s laws.
WHEN SIMULTANEOUS PROBLEMS ARISE, PRIORITIZE RECEPTIVITY & HEALING OVER RANK, LIKE JESUS DID.
Cobbey Crisler on Jesus dealing with time management of 2 urgent appeals (Mark 5:21-42/cit. B13 & Luke 8:41-55)
[Cobbey on the Luke version of this healing “double-header”:] “In this case we have something that might present a problem. Two people that need attention simultaneously. What do you do?… Here’s how Jesus deals with it. He is first summoned by a ruler of the synagogue with a great deal of human priority. Jairus has the rank and he asks first. He’s got a more urgent need. His daughter is on the verge of dying (Luke 8:41). But Jesus can’t even get to the location where this girl is because of the crush of people in the narrow lanes of the Palestinian villages. The Greek word for “thronged” is often used to describe how close these groups got to one another. Jesus was nearly suffocated by the crowd.
“Later the disciples rebuked Jesus, in Verse 45, for asking “Who touched me?” To them it was ridiculous. Everybody was touching him. The Greek verb that’s used is a verb that means what happens to grain kernels between two grinding stones. They were ground really together. The people were that crowded.
“What happens? The woman does not wish to delay Jesus’ mission, but she is at the absolutely desperate end of a rope. Here we find the receptivity. Blessed are those who are in this state. Happy are those because the state of mind can be changed.
“This radical change of thought was in the presence of the Christ-correction that Jesus was exercising in the mental realm. It’s going to be sufficient and the woman feels that it will help her. She’s lost all her money on physicians. [No health insurance…] Mark even tells us that she’s worse because of that choice. [Mark 5:26] All she does is touch the border of his garment. The issue of blood, the continuous hemorrhaging that had occurred for twelve years had kept her out of the temple, kept her out of worship and made her as unclean as the lepers. With all sorts of legislative rules around her, she herself could not be touched because it would make the individual who did it unclean. But we find that Jesus welcomed that dear woman from the standpoint of God’s welcome, because he said, “the Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the father do.” (John 5:19).
“In Luke 8, Verse 48 he calls that lady, “Daughter.” Whose daughter? Certainly, not his. In fact, he lifts that word “daughter” entirely out of any sense of blood relationship. That was the woman’s problem. He lifts even her identity out of blood.
“Daughter, be of good comfort” (Verse 48). Look at how he’s addressing the thought of that woman. Not only the precious relationship to God, but the comfort. She hasn’t experienced that in twelve years. She’d lost all her money. She was about to be thrown on the society. There was nowhere to go when you were thrown on society. That may have happened to the woman who had been a sinner. Prostitution was the only open career for many women when they were simply thrown out and discarded from normal humanity. She could not get a living unless her family supported her, and there is no indication of that happening.
“Jesus refuses to allow that woman to walk away from the scene thinking that physical contact with his robe had anything to do with the healing. He says, again, “Your faith hath made you whole.” The word “whole” and the word “heal” in Anglo-Saxon have the identical root. It implies that disease is something less than wholeness, that it is a fragmentation of our being. Healing is the condition of being made whole.
“We understand that equation when Jesus said, “If your eye be single” Matthew 6:22), indivisible, not shared, no divisions in it and no double vision. It is single-mindedness and persistency, as we see Jesus requiring later in our book, which results in man being whole as God views him.
“The other half of the time crunch demand and Christ’s use of humor to clear out funerial thought:
When Jesus goes to the raising of Jairus’ daughter, we don’t find any reason to bemoan the delay in getting there. Even though the news comes back that the daughter has died in the meantime (Verse 49). That is the human news. Jesus goes right in and clears the environment out (Verse 51). Notice, again, this must be telling us something about what is required in order to heal.
“The thought of death is so weighted down with its inevitability and grief that Jesus has to clear it out. Notice how he does so, incisively and brilliantly. He couldn’t clear them out while they were weeping. That was acceptable at a funeral. Jesus would have occupied the villain’s role.
“So, he simply tells them something that was an absolute fact to him, “That maid, right there that you see horizontal, no movement, no breath, no pulse, no anything, that little girl, she’s really not dead. That appearance that you see there is like sleep (Verse 52). And I am going to awaken her life.” All the paid mourners who were earning their salary for conducting a funeral service, and everybody else who had witnessed the tragedy associated with this little girl passing away laughed (Verse 53).
“Can you clear laughers out of funerals? There is certainly more justification from a social standpoint than with weepers. It also showed how deeply their grief had run. Forgetting every reason why they were there, they turned to laughing him to scorn. He put them all out.
“He went to the little girl, “Maid arise” (Verse 54). “Her spirit came again, she arose straightway” (Verse 55). And that beautiful practicality of Jesus, “Give her meat,” give her something to eat (Verse 55). What else would a twelve-year-old girl want anyway? It was also an announcement that everything was quite normal.”
“Luke, the Researcher,” by B. Cobbey Crisler**
TAKE TIME TO PRAY FOR YOURSELF, FOR THOSE DEAR FRIENDS WHO WILL FOLLOW YOU & for ONENESS, AS JESUS DID! Cobbey on John 17:1, 6, 9, 20, 21/prelude to citation B11
[Cobbey Crisler:] “In Chapter 17 of John’s gospel, Jesus is praying audibly. If we’ve ever wanted to be present when Jesus is praying, this is a very moving prayer indeed. It’s divided into three sections. To whom does the prayer, represented in the first five verses, refer? Himself. It’s a prayer for himself. Jesus did take time out for himself. This is just before Gethsemane. So you know what’s in his thoughts.
John 17:1. It’s in this prayer he says, “These words spake Jesus, and lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, Father, the hour is come; glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee.”
John 17:2, “As thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him.”
John 17:3, “This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.”
John 17:4. Imagine being able to say at the end of an earthly career, ”I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do.” It would be wonderful if we could say that in any given day. But this is an entire career.
John 17:5, “Glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was.” Look at the emphasis there. Again, on nativity and Spirit, the before-Abraham concept.
He ends his prayer for himself there. Beginning in Verse 6 and going all the way through Verse 19, he prays for the disciples, “I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world.”
John 17:8, “I have given unto them the words.” This is the beginning of Christianity, then, the prayer for the emergence of Christianity. “I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me.” Now what are they going to do with it?
In John 17:15, Jesus prays not for monasticism, nor to have the disciples remove themselves from the world. “I do not pray that you should take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil.” What a prayer! That was the prayer the disciples operated under from Pentecost onward.
Then John 17:20 begins the third section of the prayer. For whom? For us. That is, if we believe. “Those which shall believe on me through the disciples ‘word.”
Can you possibly envision the kind of character required to spend the very evening of Gethsemane praying for us? Is there a shepherd motive? Its ultimate is being exemplified there. “Those that believe on me through their word.”
Has that prayer terminated? Has any communication between God and man, ascending or descending angels, terminated? Does that prayer still rest on the Son of Man, on you and me?
John 17:21. The prayer is, “that they all may be one.” Look around and see what the major target is. To keep “all men from being one.” If one can keep man from being at-one, then you’re stuck with a divided God as well. It wrecks and ruins basic theology, that is, for the ones participating. No fragmentation, no separation. Jesus’ prayer, as one of the hymns says, “For all his brethren, Father, that we may be one.” That prayer extends way down to our age. If that were Jesus’ prayer, it better be ours, especially if we claim to be his followers. The prayer “that we all may be one, as thou, Father, art in me.” There’s the standard of measurement. With that, Jesus ends his audible prayer.
“Book of John, A Walk with the Beloved Disciple,” by B. Cobbey Crisler**
MIND-HEAL LIKE JESUS BY KNOWING the NOTHINGNESS of MATERIAL LIFE & the ALLNESS OF GOD! Be “armed with Love… (both of) “the cardinal points… of Christian Science” (SH 52:21, cit. S25) – “the prayer and fasting” that Christ Jesus told his disciples to use to heal an impressive, difficult case of seizures (Matt. 17:14-21)
[Warren:] Isaiah prophesied in chapter 53 (verse 3) John’s account of many of Jesus’ followers rejecting and unfollowing him after he denounced the profitability of the flesh (see GEM above on John 6:66, cit. B18). Chapter 53 of Isaiah also accurately foretold many details of a suffering Messiah — of “my righteous servant (shall) justify many, for he shall bear their iniquities” (Isa. 53:11). As prophesied in this chapter of Isaiah, Jesus was whipped (“with his stripes we are healed” v. 5); was silent as a lamb before Pilate (v. 7); crucified (“numbered with the transgressors” (v. 12); buried in a never-used rich man tomb (v. 9); and “despised and rejected … a man of sorrows” (as in Verse 3). Mary Baker Eddy picks up Isaiah’s prophesy and expands upon it when she writes: “of The ‘man of sorrows’ best understood the nothingness of material life and intelligence and the mighty actuality of all-inclusive God, good. These were the two cardinal points of Mind-healing, or Christian Science, which armed him with Love.” (SH 52:19-21, cit. S25)
This “prayer and fasting”—allness and nothingness – model, contains the sole two parts featured in the “Scientific Statement of Being” (SH 468). Every good Christian Science treatment includes BOTH of “the two cardinal points of . . . Christian Science . . . the nothingness of material life and intelligence and the mighty actuality of all-inclusive God, good.” (S&H 52:19)
Here’s a YouTube version of “All ‘Er Nothing” from the Musical “Oklahoma” that for me is a fun and helpful reminder whenever some kind of mixing seems tempting: https://youtu.be/jVz5K63iYDs
To make more memorable this Bible Lesson concept, I take the liberty (in my head) to modify the lyrics to the chorus of “All ‘Er Nothing” from the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical “Oklahoma” like this:
“To heal it’s ALL and Nothin’
Is it ALL and Nothin’ with you?
It can’t be in-between
It can’t be now and then,
No half-and-half God-love will do!”
——————————————————————-
IT’S TIME TO UNDERSTAND WHAT’S ALL AND WHAT’S NOTHING
Count up all the times in this Christian Science Bible Lesson where these terms are mentioned: “all” or “all-ness” versus “nothing” or “nothingness” – or “somethingness” versus “nothingness”. In these two sentences of citation S25 alone it’s eight times!
“It is sometimes said that Christian Science teaches the nothingness of sin, sickness, and death, and then teaches how this nothingness is to be saved and healed. The nothingness of nothing is plain; but we need to understand that error is nothing, and that its nothingness is not saved, but must be demonstrated in order to prove the somethingness – yea, the all-ness of Truth.”
(Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, Mary Baker Eddy, p. 346:6–11)
The need to understand what’s ALL and what’s NOTHING is a break-through scriptural concept in the Science of Christian healing that is featured, amplified and clarified by Mary Baker Eddy’s “Scientific Statement of Being” (SH 468). Every good Christian Science treatment includes BOTH of “the two cardinal points of . . . Christian Science . . . the nothingness of material life and intelligence and the mighty actuality of all-inclusive God, good.” (S&H 52:19)
Here’s a YouTube version of “All ‘Er Nothing” from the Musical “Oklahoma” that for me is a fun and helpful reminder whenever some kind of mixing seems tempting: https://youtu.be/jVz5K63iYDs
To make more memorable this Bible Lesson concept, I take the liberty (in my head) to modify the lyrics to the chorus of “All ‘Er Nothing” from the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical “Oklahoma” like this:
“To heal it’s ALL and Nothin’
Is it ALL and Nothin’ with you?
It can’t be in-between
It can’t be now and then,
No half-and-half God-love will do!”
[Warren’s PS.] I apologize for the quantity of all the above content and its lateness. During the workweek I’m joyously and thoroughly occupied with “loving into view” the big blessings of sustainably-powered, comfortably-insulated and conditioned cabins with two windows for every bunk! Hope you can come enjoy it for yourself and loved ones!
