[PYCL: Reflect God’s seven synonyms in every detail & app!]
CedarS PYCLs–Possible Younger Class Lessons for:
"MAN"
The Christian Science Bible Lesson for March 10, 2013
by Kerry Jenkins, CS, House Springs, MO (314) 406-0041 [Bracketed inserts by Warren Huff]
[PYCL #1: Break out mirrors (w/o breaking them) to show the simplicity of reflecting Mind.]
For working with this week's lesson we can really make use of a mirror. There is so much use of reflection and likeness throughout the lesson that talking right away about what a reflection is, how it “behaves” and so on, will help us to get a clearer understanding of divine Mind and man's relationship to that Mind. With the littler ones, help them understand what an “image” is. Also how a “likeness” must act like its model as well as be like it in other ways. If you can get a hold of enough hand-held mirrors for each pupil, it will be helpful for them and fun (unless you think your class will be too distracted). I found little compact mirrors for a dollar at Target…
[PYCL #2: Ask pupils to describe friends (& shields) using spiritual vs. physical descriptors.]
Maybe you can spend some time talking about man, how would you describe man? Do they use only material attributes? Can they think of ways to describe a friend, for example, that only include descriptors that have nothing to do with physique? We've talked about this before, I know, but it's a helpful reminder that man, in Spirit's likeness, is not made of matter at all, so we might want to get a little bit of a handle on what he/she is made of. In doing this, you can take a look at the (Golden Text (G.T) and notice that the writer speaks of how God has made our feet like “hind's feet:” and has given [us] the “shield of salvation”. A hind is a female deer… don't know why it is important that it is a female… but I watch the deer in the field below our house and it is simply amazing how agile they are. They don't need a running jump to clear the nearly five-foot barbed wire, they walk up to it and then they just pop over it, with apparently no effort. What a lovely analogy for us to keep in thought. And the shield of salvation is maybe even more apropos, as it is even more spiritually symbolic. Talk about what a shield does. How does it protect? What might a shield of salvation protect us from and what would be its source? What is salvation? Once again, looking at the details of citations can really be interesting and lead to a greater understanding of our subject. If man is spiritual, then what does the shield of salvation do for that man?
[PYCL #3: Train pupils to enlarge their capacity to notice Soul’s perfection reflected in all.]
Memorizing citation B4 [“Mark the perfect man…”Ps. 37:37] is easy and a great reminder to us at all times. Again, ask the obvious, what do they mean here by “mark”? And how do we implement this demand? Do we just ignore the things about people that bother us? Citation S22 [“Jesus beheld in Science…” 476] tells us how Jesus did this. Can we do this as he did? How does this lesson help us do this? I think the lesson brings to light how essential it is to know God well in order to know man, or to know ourselves. If we feel removed from God, or like God is a mysterious force in our lives, then we can feel more removed from the people around us. If we “see” God in everything good around us, we start to notice the perfect man that springs from Soul more often. Interestingly, the more we do this the more our “capacities are enlarged” and, hence, the more we see of God. (S4)
[PYCL #4: Sculpt harmony (not of play dough) but by understanding God as Principle. S16]
[To show the point behind mental sculpting,] bring in some play dough for the littler ones and try having them shape little pots out of them, or whatever they want to shape. Then read in your own words, citation B6 [about “… Shall the clay say to him that fashioned it…” Isa. 459-18]. Talk about what that means and ask them if the object they made can talk back to them and tell them they did a “bad job”? That's kind of like how it is with God and us. We can't accurately say that we are somehow less than the wonderful creation that God made, because He/She knows what She's doing and only makes that perfect creation. (A lot better than what we can make out of play dough)! They may get a kick out of the idea that their “creation” could tell them anything about itself. Of course we are not inanimate objects, but nonetheless, this analogy might hold some insight into ourselves as creations of Mind. With the older ones, you could still use the play dough actually, and bring a keener light to the subject by pairing it with citation S7 [about how they can “lay off mortality and find the indissoluble spiritual link…” 491:12]. Think about how MBE is saying that by recognizing God as supreme, we wipe out the claims that matter tries to make about man being limited, mortal, chained to chance. Acknowledge means to recognize the authority of, see if that helps to break down this passage a bit.
[PYCL #5: Share how to “advance more rapidly” in Life, and never see death. S19, 430:8.]
I love how in section 5, citation S19, we are told that we advance more rapidly towards God by giving up the belief in an opposite to God. Think about that idea. When we hold in thought the “reality or substance” of matter, we can't really move towards God because God has nothing of matter in Him/Her. The nobleman in this section let go of matter quickly when Jesus accused that he wouldn't believe unless Jesus showed him “signs and wonders”. We can be just as rapid in leaving these material notions as this man was. We can quickly recognize Life's authority to govern every situation. These thoughts are linked to the later portion of that same citation where Paul is talking about Christ “appearing”. The Christ or truth appears, when matter is disappearing.
[PYCL #6: Show how & why to be Truth’s unfogged reflection. Connect to Zacchaeus.]
Section 6 gives us an opportunity to talk about the mirror and the sun and clouds if you want to extend your work in that area. You can talk about the story of Zacchaeus and then about how doing things that God is not helping us do is like fogging the mirror. Try breathing together on your mirrors and see how it becomes hard to see our reflection. The fog is like that thing that we are doing that isn't from God (I always hesitate to use the word “sin” with kids). Citation S25 [“The purification of sense and self is a proof of progress.” 324] uses purity as the “clear” mirror. When something is pure it isn't “muddied” up, or mixed with good and bad. Just so, if we keep the “mirror”, in this case our thought, unfogged by material ideas of ourselves, we get a better view of ourselves. Think of this as an exercise of having our thought be a really clean window for God to shine through. Or maybe a window is one too many analogies? In this way, at any rate, we can understand citation B21 [“satisfied when I awake in thy likeness…” Ps. 17:15] better and see that the only reflection in our mirror that will satisfy us is the reflection where we see God's likeness looking back! As long as we see our mortal quirks and faults, we are not seeing the pure likeness.
[PYCL #7: Revel in being a reflection of Love!]
The seventh section gives us the opportunity to just revel in how amazing man as divine Love's reflection really is. He is absolutely perfect, wonderful, amazing! I don't know how we can best transmit this to our pupils, but it might be worth a try. We are working to understand God just so we can understand how wonderful He and His creation are. That includes every one of us, without exception.
So get those mirrors unfogged and have some fun!
