English
DeutschGEMs to Help YOU BE God’s Expression by truly loving EVERYONE!
God Expressed Meekly/Mightily in you sparkle brightly in this PARTIAL SHARING of insights from Cobbey Crisler & others
as inspired by The Christian Science Quarterly Bible Lesson on
“Love”
for Sunday, July 30, 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• 314-378-2574 (text too)
Know deep within* that the 10 Commandments are all about BRINGING YOUR GENEROUS, BEST SELF TO LIVE LOVE!
This Bible (life-) lesson about Love is introduced by Golden Text & Responsive Reading selections for 1st John: “The commandment that God has given us is ‘Love God and love each other!’” (1st John 4:21, G. Text, CEV)
“By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God, and keep his commandments.” (I John 5:2/ Responsive Reading)
JESUS ILLUSTRATES THE MOST IMPORTANT LIFE-LESSON ON LOVE when he shares with “a certain lawyer,” who questions him about how to inherit eternal life, that the way is to actually live the commandments (which the lawyer freely summarized). This includes embracing an expanded sense of our neighbors that includes anyone in need (like the man beaten by thieves) as well as anyone viewed as lesser (like the Samaritan who did all he could to help the victim as Jesus illustrated in Luke 10:25-37/citation B19).
*“I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts, and I will be to them, God, and they shall be to me a people.” Hebrews 8:10/citation B4
The greatest of the two great Commandments is to “love God with all your heart… soul & … mind” (as Jesus says Matt. 22:37). It’s lived by whole-heartedly putting into practice the 1st Commandments, summed up here:
#1. I pledge to: Celebrate examples of Love’s freeing power whenever tempted to be worried!** (Worry is really just ingratitude in advance.) (Jews’ Commandments start w/thanks for being freed from slavery. Exodus 20:2)
#2. I pledge to: Quit thinking most on material things & bodies that’ll never be “up to the job” of being God. (Exodus 20: 3 AND 4)
#3. I pledge to: NOT say O.M.G. (“Oh, My God!”) unless I’m praying God’s name & expecting a quick answer!
#4. I pledge to: Remember (give loving attention to) God’s Sabbath & work out from perfection, not up to it!
To “love your neighbor as yourself” (Matt. 22:39) is lived by practicing Commandments, summed up below:
#5. I pledge to: Respect and obey all RIGHT authority figures and boundaries in my life.
#6. I pledge to: Refuse (re-fuse) to get angry, make fun of or put anyone down!
(Such unchecked “supposed superiority” leads to killing as Jesus tells us in Matt.5:21+)
#7. I pledge to: Seek deep satisfaction in all God’s given and keep my promises
(Unchecked looking with lust is adultery and leads to it… as Jesus tells us in Matt.5:27+)
#8. I pledge to: Stop trying to GET happiness & instead try to GIVE it!
(“to impart truth, health and happiness… is… my reason for existing… …” My. 165)
#9. I pledge to: Stop saying what’s not REALLY true of others or myself (To bear true witness: “I swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help me God!”)
#10. I pledge to: Feel & say of others’ good “Thank You God! That’s Mine Too!
(T.Y.G.! T.M.T.! Is more powerful than T.N.T.! (And, that’s dynamite)
BONUS RESOURCE! If you have a few minutes to watch short, video clips, all will likely love learning more about each Commandment by clicking on each red # below for animated, fun background on that Commandment offered by our son, Barry Huff, who is now a Bible professor at Principia College. As a grad student, Barry did this podcast series on The 10 Commandments for TMCYouth that’s still hosted at ChristianScience.com. His animated First Commandment of the series starts with https://www.christianscience.com/youth/resources-lists/sunday-school-teachers-teaching-resources/the-first-commandment-animated-tr Links to the rest of the series can be accessed by clicking on the red numbers here (and below)–ideally before first making each pledge:
#1. #2. #3. #4. #5. #6. #7. #8. #9. #10.
SEE LOVINGKINDNESS DRAWING ALL MANKIND to God & to SATISFYING GOODNESS for SOLUTIONS to WORLD PROBLEMS! Cobbey on Jeremiah 31 (citation B1/ Jer. 31:3+)
[Cobbey Crisler:] “In Chapter 31, which is Jeremiah’s greatest chapter, he predicts the new covenant will come. He defines it. In Verse 3 he shows that the new covenant is definitely based on the comprehension of God as love. It’s that very “lovingkindness” that will draw all mankind to God for the solution of the world problems.”— [to make “their soul (spiritual sense) as a watered garden.” (Jer. 31:12)
Jeremiah 31:14 “… my people shall be satisfied with my goodness, saith the Lord.”
Jeremiah 31:33, 34 “… this shall be the covenant that I make… I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts… for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest…”
“Heal the Sick”: A Scriptural Record, by B. Cobbey Crisler**
CLAIM AS YOURS GOD’S DAILY-ASSURED, LOADED “BENEFITS PACKAGE!” It includes
SINS REMOVED, ALL DISEASES HEALED, DEATH OUTDONE!
Ps. 68:19/cit. B5 as listed in Ps. 103:2+ & shared by Cobbey:
“Blessed be the Lord, who daily loadeth us with benefits, even the God of our salvation.” Psalm 68:19/cit. B5
[Cobbey Crisler highlights the list of daily benefits:] “Psalm 103, Verse 2, “Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits:” We’re all covered by insurance policies, perhaps life and health insurance. The Canadian spelling is probably better, “assurance” as far as biblical therapy is concerned.
If you’ve ever wanted to know what benefits we have, Psalm 103 lists them: Verse 2, “Forget not all his benefits.” We have “Forgive us iniquities,” that’s sin removed from man. “healeth all thy Disease,” all of them, Verse 3. Removed from man’s experience and nature.” Verse 4, “Redeemeth thy life from destruction,” death no longer the arbiter of man’s potential and capability. Those are the benefits. They’re not only individual; they’re collective because verse 6 says, “The Lord executeth righteousness and judgment for all that are oppressed.”
“Leaves of the Tree: Prescriptions from the Psalms”, by B. Cobbey Crisler**
AMAZING HEALINGS WILL BE YOURS TOO, WHEN YOUR “STRUGGLING HEART…CEASES TO SIGH OVER THE WORLD AND BEGINS TO UNFOLD ITS WINGS FOR HEAVEN.”
Science & Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 57:28/cit. S11
[Warren Huff:] This line from Science and Health citation 11 in this week’s Bible lesson, remind me a precious time when it appeared in a Christian Science Bible Lesson as an answer to prayer for me during final exam week my Freshman year at Princeton University.
Besides working out in daily spring training for the football team and working about 20-hour a week in University food service and mail delivery, and in daily recess coaching at Miss Mason’s School (right across from the Christian Science church in Princeton), I had a course load of five demanding classes. What made my upcoming finals week even tougher that year was having all five of my 3-hour finals in a row in the first two days of the week. The first was 9am-noon Monday morning, the second 2-5pm Monday afternoon, the third 7-10pm Monday evening, the fourth 9am-noon Tuesday morning and the fifth 2-5pm Tuesday afternoon. To top that off, I had already fallen behind on the heavy reading assignments in a couple of the courses. So, on the Saturday morning before these finals, I thought, “How am ever going to be ready to humanly read, study and prepare for these exams with no real study time between them?”
Just as I started to ponder my seemingly impossible situation, a dull pain in my right side that I’d been aware of overnight suddenly became very sharp and did not go away. A roommate, whose dad was a doctor, suggested that it looked like my appendix had burst and that I was having an appendicitis attack. I chose to handle this suggestion with prayer just as I’d had done successfully to meet many other challenges. These ranged from making hard decisions to experiencing very quick healings of broken bones, severe wounds, sprained ankles, torn cartilage… When this very aggressive problem refused to yield quickly to my own prayers, I tried to reach out for help from a Christian Science Practitioner. I struggled to get to the privacy of a pay phone booth on campus … (this was B.C.— Before Cell phones). I was seeking the uniquely powerful, prayerful support known as a Christian Science treatment which is given with professional warmth and principled love by wonderful Christian Science practitioners (who are normally readily available worldwide).
When none of the practitioners I knew from camp and from church picked up, and no human help seemed to be instantly available, I hobbled my way – still doubled over in pain— to a Christian Science Reading Room. Its “quiet precincts” were just a few blocks away on Nassau Street and this proved to be a perfect place to reach out directly to God for angel messages and my healing.
For about six spiritually supported hours that Saturday I was the only visitor to the private study area in the back of the Reading Room. That sacred secrecy enabled me to feel free enough to stretch out on the floor whenever sitting up was nery comfortable… Whenever I physically struggled, I spiritually snuggled up to apply passages that the Comforter was indelibly teaching me from that week’s Christian Science Bible lesson. I kept coming back to an uplifting assurance in a sentence near the end of page 57 in Science and Health. This promise is also in this week’s Christian Science Bible Lesson at the end of citation S11 and reads: “… Love supports the struggling heart until it ceases to sigh over the world and begins to unfold its wings for heaven.” (I added underlining under until because that’s what I mentally underlined.)
I saw clearly that as long as my heart was sighing (moaning, groaning, complaining…) over the world—over exam-based concerns, time-based pressures and body-based pains… or over today’s worldwide economy and other concerns — it could not begin “to unfold its wings for heaven” and healing.
Part of my beginning to unfold the wings of my heart for heaven was cherished other profoundly significant truths to the infinite possibilities of being at one with the one, all-knowing, divine Mind. Included in the lesson was the account of Joseph’s divine intuition that enabled him to know and share the humanly unknowable dream of Pharaoh (Genesis 41:1-57). I reasoned that this was mine too and that God would give me the healing, angel insights I needed to cherish as well as what I needed to study and what to write on my upcoming exams. I loved that Joseph shared the way to humbly do this by telling Pharaoh, “it is not in me: God shall give … an answer of peace.” (Genesis 41:16).
I also distinctly remember feeling great relief in affirming for myself the truth that, “When man is governed by God, the ever-present Mind who understands all things, man knows that with God all things are possible.” (SH 180:25-27) More lessons from the Comforter that I cherished during my Reading Room study came back to bless me big-time after I got my healing and was taking my finals.
That private Reading Room study area also gave me a perfect place to feel free enough to seek and find the Comforter’s comfort by wholeheartedly belting out favorite hymns. I knew by heart not only all of Mary Baker Eddy’s hymns from years of singing them in Sunday School, but also scores of others from CedarS Hymn Sings every Sunday night. On this Saturday I was forced to study for my exams in the unconventional way of cherishing and singing each word of every hymn as if my comfort and my grades and my very life depended on it. (And, I think they all were transformed and immeasurably by that unique and powerful preparation.)
I’ll always remember that as spiritual sense gave me more and more peace, I closed my healing hymn sing by cherishing each word of “Christ My Refuge” hymn (254-258) by Mary Baker Eddy. At about 3pm my tears of pain changed to tears of joy! The pain lifted off as I let my heart sing the following lines/laws, “O’er waiting harps strings of the mind, there sweeps a strain, Low, sad, and sweet, whose measures bind The power of pain… And wake a white-winged angel throng of thoughts illumed By faith, and breathed in raptured song, With love perfumed. Then His unveiled, sweet mercies show Life’s burden’s light. I kiss the cross, and wake to know A world more bright… I see Christ walk and come to me and tenderly divinely talk. Thus Truth engrounds me on the rock (Matt. 7:24-29) … whereto God leadeth me. (Christian Science Hymnal #254)
With refreshed freedom, I was inspired to RUN back to my Dodd Hall dorm room, to eat eagerly at Commons and to prepare with peaceful inspiration Saturday night and Sunday for my three final exams on Monday and the fourth one on Tuesday morning. I was full of gratitude, both for my healing, and for being divinely led to review in advance just what I needed to know –at least for my first four exams.
However, when I turned over the fifth exam on Tuesday afternoon, my heart sank as did Elisha’s servant’s when they were surrounded by enemy horses and chariots and said, “ Alas, my master! How shall we do?” (II Kings 6:15) I felt surrounded by unbeatable foes when I read the exam questions which all ask me to compare and contrast several books that I had intended to read over the weekend but had not read, given the time I needed to spend in the Reading Room having my healing. I was seriously tempted at first to just go up to the exam proctor and turn in the exam with a note that I’d had a health challenge and was unable to adequately prepare for the exam and to ask to take the course on a Pass-Fail basis so that my B+ grade going into the sociology final could at least get me a “Pass” on my transcript for the course.
As I stood to walk up and give up, rather than try to write about books that I hadn’t even read, an angel message stopped me saying “I am the same Mind that made this test and that helped write every book and I am with you to take this test and tell you everything you need to know.”
Then, I remembered citations from the Christian Science Bible lesson that I’d mined in the Reading Room as cherished gems to apply to myself. This included the account of Joseph humbly knowing it was not in him, but in God to give him the right answer. (Genesis 41:1-57)
I gained confidence from this and from remembering other ideas from the Bible lesson that I had cherished and made my own during my healing study time in the Reading Room.
They included these passages from Science and Health:
“It is the prerogative of the ever-present, divine Mind, and of thought in rapport with this Mind, to know the past, the present, and the future. Acquaintance with the Science of being enables us to commune more largely with the divine Mind… to be divinely inspired, yea, to reach the range of fetterless Mind.” (84:11-18)
“A knowledge of the Science of being develops the latent abilities and possibilities of man. It extends the atmosphere of thought, giving mortals access to broader and higher realms. It raises the thinker into his native air of insight and perspicacity.” (128:14)
“This (spiritual) understanding is not intellectual, is not the result of scholarly attainments, it is the reality of all things brought to light.” (505:26-28)
I sat back down with a joyous, confident motive to glorify God by being a clear transparency, a scribe under orders. I was determined to not try myself to make up what I humanly didn’t know, but to merely make it welcome. Ideas flowed and I effortlessly wrote them down. The three hours seemed to fly by and I handed in the exam with deep sense of joy, gratitude and dominion. In totally humble amazement the next day I found out that my course grade actually improved to an A-. All glory to God!! What cannot good do for you too when you, like Joseph, know that “it is not in me. God shall give (me every) … answer” that I need, and I know it!
[This is a rough draft of a testimony that I intend to send into the Christian Science periodicals]
GAIN A CLEARER SENSE OF THE CORRELATIVE RELATIONSHIP OF 1ST JOHN 3:2, 3/cit. B12) and its coupling with the “Scientific Statement of Being” (SH 468)
Kathy Fitzer wrote in her “Met” on the 3/21/21Bible Lesson on “Matter”:
“I found a couple of articles that were helpful to me in gaining a clearer sense of the correlative relationship of 1st John with the Scientific Statement of Being. One was an article written by a student of Mary Baker Eddy’s, Hermann S. Hering. He asked her for approval before it was published, which, of course, was granted. https://sentinel.christianscience.com/shared/view/mk544razg2?s=copylink
A more recent article, https://journal.christianscience.com/shared/view/2pl5sjxfsyk?s=copylink, included this statement: “By indicating the correlative nature of the I John verses in respect to “the scientific statement of being,” Mrs. Eddy shows us that the Bible verses themselves indicate both the unreality of matter and the present spiritual sonship of all, however much the deceptive corporeal senses would try to obscure this sonship. It is instructive to read the whole of I John with these points in thought.”
There is also a helpful Sentinel Watch podcast that addresses the question, How Can I Better Understand the Scientific Statement of Being? with Janet Clements. Here’s a link: https://sentinel.christianscience.com/shared/view/wccxxsky6?s=copylink . From it an audio version is available from a headphone icon on the top menu.
“LOVE into VIEW” the INEXHAUSTIBLE SUPPLY that FLOWS when we delight to pass it on from our heavenly SHEPHERD!
[Warren:] To frequently remind me of this, I brought home from my January 2020 trip to the Holy Land a T-shirt & spoon cradle both with the graphic of an ancient mosaic of the loaves and fish. (Download online a pic at the bottom.) The T-shirt has this reminder that’s perfect for CedarS workers & supporters (& all Christians) to live by:
“LOVE IS LIKE FIVE LOAVES AND TWO FISH.
ALWAYS TOO LITTLE UNTIL YOU START TO GIVE IT AWAY”
Below are Cobbey Crisler’s insights on Mark’s version of the feeding of the multitude and the welling up of compassion in Jesus recorded right before this which is a helpful prelude to his mindset that made this miracle possible. [Cobbey Crisler on the start of CITATION B14 THAT COMES RIGHT BEFORE HIS FEEDING THE 5,000:] “Mark 6, Verse 34. And he sees that “they were as sheep not having a shepherd.”
“Look up that comment and you will find it in the Old Testament. Then read around it in the Old Testament to get the context of it. You will hardly find a statement by Jesus that does not have an Old Testament root or precedent, which is why he is always saying, “It is written.” But, many of the times when he doesn’t say it-is-written, it is implied.
“The only so-called miracle in all four gospels is the feeding of the “five thousand,” 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. [To visualize the scene and Jesus’ conversation with the disciples and internalize the inspiration of “what cannot God do?” consider clicking here to watch on YouTube its reenactment by The Chosen.] or click on https://youtu.be/dMlKgUQ7qnI
[Cobbey continues:] “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**
JESUS SHOWS HOW TO CROSS NATIONALITY BOUNDARY TO SHARE HEALING with the RECEPTIVE Mark 7:24-30/cit. B15
Christie Hanzlik, CS. recently commented in a Met that included a lesson on the Beatitudes: “The beatitude , “Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.” (cit. 19, Matthew 5:4) is illustrated with the story of the Gentile woman begging for help because her daughter was “grievously vexed with a devil.” (Mark 7:24-30/cit. B15) At first, Christ Jesus said he wouldn’t help her because he said that he was sent to “the lost sheep of the house of Israel,” and perhaps he said this because he was testing her receptivity and faith. But the mother pleaded with him and said that she, like a dog, would be willing to accept any crumbs of comfort “which fall from their masters’ table” and whatever he could offer her in her moment of needful mourning. Christ Jesus heard her humble willingness to accept healing, and to gain by her faith a wider and more expanded understanding. And of course, the daughter was healed at that very moment. (cit. B15, Mark 7:24-30 also in Matthew 15:21-28)
“Her loss of human will that she gained during mourning and her willingness to receive the Comforter, blessed her for all times. Christ Jesus heard her willingness to accept healing, and gain a wider and more expanded understanding.
“Mary Baker Eddy’s words help explain how this woman’s willingness to receive even crumbs of comfort transformed her loss turned into gain. She writes, “Whatever inspires with 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 waters to the thirsty.” (cit. S17, 234:4)
You can find the illustration above with insights on Jesus’ testing, and seemingly rude, words about it not being right “to take the children’s bread, and cast it to the dogs” (non-Jews) at https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/guides/zkrf8xs/revision/9
[Christie continues:] “Note that in this account of healing, Christ Jesus does not interact with the woman’s daughter. The woman’s humility and willingness to accept healing resulted in the daughter’s being healed. Mary Baker Eddy explains about healing children that, “If the case is that of a young child or an infant, it needs to be met mainly through the parent’s thought, silently or audibly on the aforesaid basis of Christian Science.” (cit. S25, 412:13-31)
[Christie continues:] “To me, it has been crucial to remember not to mix-up this sentence and reverse its meaning. A parent’s calm and Christlike thought is receptive to healing. Yes. But this does not mean that the parents are to blame when a child is unwell. If a parent is feeling guilty or a stirred-up sense of false responsibility because a child is unwell, then this is what needs to be healed…the guilt. Heal the false feeling of guilt and anxiety. The child is innocent. Parents could feel like they are stepping onto a never-ending merry-go-round of self-blame if they accepted that every challenge a child faced was their fault. To break free from this cycle of guilt, the simplest prayer is to turn the child over to the divine Parent, with humility and meekness. The child is God’s child. And, the parent is also God’s child. I’ve witnessed many healings with my children as I realized that I was not the parent in charge…God is the Parent of my children and me and everyone.
“In the story of Christ Jesus and the woman, it was the Christ that healed. Like the mother in this story, all parents can turn their children over to Christ, the Comforter, and experience healing. And we know that, “Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.”
