12 GEMS to unveil the Unreality of lies and stop their seemingly nonstop curses.

12 GEMS to unveil the unreality of lies and to stop and reverse their seemingly nonstop curses!
Insights from Cobbey Crisler, Ken Cooper & others for The Christian Science Quarterly Bible Lesson on

“Unreality"
for October 4, 2020

prepared by Warren Huff, CedarS Executive Director
warren@cedarscamps.org 314-378-2574

GEM#1: Let’s reason together about humanity’s cures being beyond merely medical solutions (Golden Text) Cobbey Crisler on Isaiah 1-2:22 (citation B16): “Cease ye from Adam”
[Cobbey on the next verses:] Isaiah 1:5 and 6. Isn’t this a question of Isaiah asking all humanity, “Why should you be stricken any more? You will revolt more and more: the whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint. From the sole of the foot even unto the head [there is] no soundness in it: [but] wounds and bruises, and putrefying sores.” That’s Job’s problem written right out there. That’s his record that he that he didn’t want to have as his witness any more when he said [in Job 16:19] “my record is on high.” They must not have been closed, neither bound up, neither mollified with ointment.” Here is even Isaiah bearing witness that the application of medicine has not cured what humanity needs to have cured.

In Isaiah 2:22 (citation B16) maybe this is part of the solution? What’s the recommended solution? “Cease ye from man.” That word in Hebrew is actually the Hebrew word “Adam.” It literally reads, “Cease ye from Adam whose breath [is] in his nostrils: for wherein is he to be accounted of?”
“Heal the Sick”: A Scriptural Record, by B. Cobbey Crisler**

GEM#2: Turn to your true ID! Pray it aloud in SONG with healing, light-hearted joy!
Cobbey Crisler insights on Psalm 30:2-5 (part of Responsive Reading)
“Psalm 30:2 Again, the appointment with the physician, the Great Physician, in the Bible is very often this, “O Lord my God, I cried unto thee.” It does not take our being attuned to God to make the appointment. Just as the prodigal son suddenly decided that his really right place was not in that pig pen when he came to himself [Luke 15: 16-18]. There’s a whole new view of one’s identity. He decided that his father’s house held much more. Then you notice the father did not go to the man with the swine to save the son. The son had to do something. Then, the father ran to meet him as he was coming [Luke 15:20].

With your back to the Father, you’re not even heading in that direction. With your face toward the Father you’re looking at the Father’s face, which is part of the cure biblically, [that] is to see the divine nature. Then of course, you want to be nearer the source of your nature. Step by step the light grows brighter around your feet. We know where we’re heading. We may not have arrived yet, but it’s getting brighter, and lighter, and our problems are dropping away, our burdens, and the divine nature is becoming applicable nearer and nearer. “O Lord my God, I cried unto thee; you have healed me.”
“One of our modern hymns [#425] has been made out of verse 5, “weeping may endure for a night, but joy [cometh] in the morning.” That word “joy” in the Hebrew is “singing.” Take weeping as the symptom and notice singing is the remedy. Sing, do we do much singing? It doesn’t have to be even with an audible or perceptible sound. It’s in our hearts, the song…. All the things that Jesus mentioned. They have to make room for the joy. It’s fullness of joy. It’s God’s dosage. Everything else has to be eliminated, removed, uncontained. That’s quite a prescription for depression, adversity. It seems difficult to SING in a trial, in a crisis. The Bible is just saying, try it, you might like it.** [Laughter] Because it might solve [any and all issues].
“Leaves of the Tree: Prescriptions from Psalms,” by B. Cobbey Crisler

**Try a virtual CedarS 365 Zoom Hymn Sing! (Sundays at 7pm Central Time.) You might like this healing CedarS tradition as a happy, worldwide “chorus” does every week. We’ve LOVED welcoming at-home singers from all 50 states as well as from 18 countries!

GEM#3: Be transformed from feeling like an exile suffering from "very bad" aloneness to
feeling the "very good" ALL-Oneness of spiritual togetherness and baptism! —
[transcribed from W’s notes on Cobbey Crisler talks on Genesis 1:31 (B2)]:

[CC:] “Genesis chapter 1 was written in response to the Hebrew people’s crisis of exile.

“Verse 2 attempts to explain how creation occurred as well as how a new beginning could occur out of the vacuity of the nothingness of the exile (W: Think about what a super-severe quarantine being exiled to a conquering enemy’s homeland would be, to be taken away from your home, family and all that's familiar.) To the post-exilic authors of Genesis 1 “the earth was without form and void” – or “Toe-who” and Boe-who” – the translated names of the Babylonian mythical leviathan-like, sea monster and their mythical behemoth-like, land monster. The modern-day myth is that we evolved from the sea to be dry land creatures with a further refined way of animal thought and life. Human thought was dark much like “darkness on the face of the waters.” … Spirit is the root of the whole word inspiration… No advance can occur in life without inspiration—so “the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.”… This happens also when Jesus is baptized, coming “straightway out of the water,” as part of a divine announcement. He sees “the Spirit of God descending like a dove and lighting upon him.” (Matthew 3:16) Consequently, one recognizes that if Spirit represents the motive of his career, it’s an inspired career…

“It’s how the entire Bible begins (Genesis 1:2) because “the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.” It’s almost as if in Jesus’ baptism, we’re getting this genesis of God’s creation, that first chapter, applied on earth. The Spirit is moving on those waters in which Jesus is standing. There is a Spirit genesis here. Look at what happened in Genesis 1 in those brief verses when creation is depicted for us.”

Verse 3 (from a bumper sticker that I enjoyed seeing): “The Big Bang theory: “Let there be light” and BANG! It happened!”) …

[transcribed from Warren Huff's notes on Cobbey Crisler talks on Genesis 1]

GEM#4: Open your spiritual sense eyes and know with scientific certainty to drop all heavy burdens! Cobbey Crisler on God’s command for light to shine in your heart for the divinely natural glory of God in Christ Jesus and in you! II Corinthians 4:6, 17-18 (B7)
[Cobbey:] Chapter 4, verse 6 of 2 Corinthians. Here is a commandment from God. This commandment was for “light to shine out of darkness,” and to shine where? [Voice: “in our hearts.”]. Where is the finger of God at work? Where has Christ written his letter, his epistle? If that’s shining, if we’re facing God, face-to-face, Mind-to-Mind, if our mentality is taking on the likeness of God Himself, then that light is showing. But it’s a light that knows. It’s a mental light, “the light of the knowledge.” In the Latin Bible, do you know what that word is? It’s our word for science, scientiae. It is the light of the knowing in a sense of disciplined science “of the glory of God.”

We have the ability, therefore we are without excuse, to know God because he has revealed Himself, His nature, to us. We can call upon our divine nature. We can begin the answer the question, “What is natural?” with the response, “The divine is natural for me.” That “light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ Jesus” leaves not one slight dark spot of Adam’s amnesia left on the disc of our consciousness.”

Verse 17 of Chapter 4 (of 2 Corinthians) stresses the meaning of the Hebrew word “kabod”— even though we’re in the Greek New Testament. Because it says “our light affliction.” Lightness here is the opposite of heaviness. [W: see the blessing below* of being “spiritually lighthearted.”] “Our light affliction” we don’t consider our afflictions light, do we? I mean, our shoulders are bent over, and if only our relatives knew what we were assuming as burdens for them. Our relationships would be happier, if the United States tackling so much of the economic burden of the world, and the military burden. Are our shoulders bending nationally as well as under such weight? According to the Bible, this is “light affliction” and it’s “for a moment,” and it’s going to work out for us “a far more exceeding [and] eternal weight of glory.”

Remember “kabod” means heaviness and weight. This weight suddenly turns out to be something that’s substantial. We’re talking about substance, the real weight. We’re not talking about an abstraction.

We’re talking about concrete being here in this “exceeding and eternal weight of glory” [2 Corinthians, Chapter 4, Verse 17]. Yet in Verse 18 we are told it’s not something you’re going to open your eyes and see. We have to cultivate the spiritual sense of appreciating what the physical sense do not tell us about.

Of what value, of what validity, of what reliability are our bodily senses if not one of can tell us there is a God? Because if God exists, as the Bible reveals He does, and we can see His effects appreciably in our lives, and none of the senses tell us that God exists, who needs the senses? They are not bearing witness to facts that exist, even though unseen.

We can’t bow down to our bodily senses as giving us correct information, can we? We know how deceived we are all the time. We also how limited the senses are we know that some of our pet animals can detect things occurring through their senses that are completely unappreciable to ours. So, why have we been so satisfied with the data coming to us from these five channels?”
“Glory: Divine Nature in The Bible,” by B. Cobbey Crisler**

Being spiritual light-hearted on our Prayer Watch for Worldwide Well-Being enables us to “turn the tables” on the isolation fables of “loneliness, doubt, darkness.” These are among the burdens that a Prayer Watch with “no opposing element” calls you and me to drop. "I drop my burden at His feet, and bear a song away." Christian Science Hymnal 124:3]

Principia's Founder Mary Kimball Morgan, CS, has great advice for us as Prayer Watchers: ”If you ever feel that your work is becoming burdensome, just stop and place the responsibility where it belongs – in your Father's hands. Get rid of the sense of burden before continuing your work, for heaviness of thought cannot glorify God." This is part of an awesome, one-page treatment on how to be "equal to every demand placed on you" and "be deeply in earnest and at the same time spiritually light-hearted." (Education at the Principia (EAP), page 222)

We are to be light-hearted (early and often) because from the beginning we know the happy ending that “He is risen!” This blessing reverses the curse, enabling us and others “to kiss the cross and wake to know a world more bright” (Hymn 253:3, 550:3) This brighter world view can come right in the midst of otherwise dark weeks for the world: with thought focused on mounting covid-19 cases, confinements and deaths; along with economic bad news and concerns about re-opening of schools, travel, businesses….

GEM#5: Learn the Christly way to deal with lies and opposition to all good work and right endeavors by listening to a great article about Nehemiah building the wall despite great resistance. [Warren Huff:] I love this eye-opening article from the March 1982 Christian Science Journal and think you will too in connection with Section 3 in this week's lesson.

It was written by a dear, Kansas City friend and a past CedarS practitioner in the 1970s and 80s, Carolyn Holte, CS. It's easy to listen to by clicking on the following link and then on the headset. https://journal.christianscience.com/shared/view/1ebpbgd529s?s=e

The article’s title of “Evil: ‘No portion, right or memorial’” comes from Nehemiah 2:20 which is featured in this week’s Christian Science Quarterly Bible Lesson in citations B10 and B11 (Neh. 2:1-20 and Neh. 6:15, 16). Because this article is being shared by me as a JSH-Online subscriber, you can read it, even without your own JSH-Online subscription—which I HIGHLY recommend!

To read or listen to “Evil: ‘no portion, nor right, nor memorial’ by CAROLYN E. HOLTE just click here: https://journal.christianscience.com/shared/view/1ebpbgd529s?s=e

JSH-Online is the official website of The Christian Science Journal, Sentinel, and Herald.

GEM#6: Reverse the dust-record curse of mob thinking, of adulterous acting and even of lustful “looking.” (as in Matt. 5:28) Cobbey Crisler on Christ Jesus saving the woman taken in adultery in John 8.3-32 (B13):
“John 8:3 Suddenly here is “a woman taken in adultery.” One should at least ask the question, where is the husband who would usually make the charge, and where is the fellow she was with? How come only the woman is here?

The event takes place in the area of the temple. If the stones suddenly start flying, both Jesus and the woman were there. Who did they really care about eliminating?

John 8:5 They face him with a rabbinical question. “Moses said that this “lady” should be stoned. What do you say?…

John 8:6, While they’re all saying this, Jesus has disappeared from view, which would actually happen to those in the rear rows if they’ve encircled. You have to look around. Where did he go? He just disappeared. He’s writing on the ground. A record about as evanescent as the material in which he’s writing. Is that the permanent record of womanhood? It’s a dust record. A dust record that can be dominated by the first foot that walks over and decides to change it or trample it.

John 8:7, “They keep asking him,” because he’s doing nothing but writing on the ground. This is a brilliant way to control a mob. It was a method that was successful. He has kept the mob from being an unthinking gang. He’s kept them all as individuals because they’re thinking, “What’s he doing? What’s he doing?”

“So, they continue asking.” He says “He that is ‘anamartetos’, that is, above error, who never erred or who cannot error or sin among you, let him first throw a stone.” He hasn’t objected to Moses’ sentence. He hasn’t set himself apart. He simply returned the sentence to everyone’s individual conscience and let it be established in the mental courtrooms of those present. You can’t have a mob scene when conscience is at work individually. That’s what destroys a mob.

John 8:8, “Again he stoops down and writes on the ground”— giving them a chance for it to work. It’s an impersonal treatment of the situation for all concerned. No condemnation. No anything.

John 8:9, What happened? “They filtered out and they began at the eldest.” This is a significant start. The custom in the Sanhedrin… was that after a decision of any major import was made, the youngest left first. The honor was for the eldest to be the last one you saw.

Not in this case. The eldest were the first you saw leaving. This is not surprising when you think since they had been around longer, they likely had accumulated more sin. So, the eldest left first. “The woman is left standing in the midst.”

John 8:10 What is Jesus going to do? Is he for permissiveness? He said, “Woman” again, “womanhood”, “Where are your accusers? No man hath condemned you?”

John 8:11, “I’m not in that business either. But,” and you can imagine the authority that went behind this, “go, and sin no more.” Terminate that link to the flesh.”
“Book of John: A Walk with the Beloved Disciple” by B. Cobbey Crisler**

GEM#7: Contemplate how to terminate your own past links to the flesh with the new light Ken Cooper’s YouTube monologue read by his wife, Sue, shines with a woman’s voice shines on "Go and Sin No More" (John 8:1-12, cit. B13).
[Ken writes:] The Golden Text this week, taking the full verse, “I, the Lord, invite you to come and talk it over. Your sins are scarlet red, but they will be whiter than snow or wool”, CEV, builds so well on the assurances from last week’s lesson and the story of the three Hebrews. They had been found guilty of disobedience to Nebuchadnezzar’s decree, caught in the very act of praying to their God and not to the idol the king had created. They were therefore sentenced to death. However, in holding fast to their love of the one God, they were saved, and the king was forced to acknowledge the power of their God. The smell of fire did not touch them. With the woman caught in the very act of adultery, the sentence was the same, – death, but this time under the Mosaic law. However, as with the Hebrew boys, the Christ was present to save her. There was no condemnation, not even the smell of accusation, and she was healed.

The monologue, "Go and Sin No More", read by Sue, traces the thoughts of the condemned woman. Jesus addresses her accusers, turned the lie upon itself. He recognized her true nature. His knowledge of man’s purity, his expression of Love, washed through her thoughts, cleansed the past so that it was no longer part of her, and left her renewed, — whiter than snow! She saw the man / woman of God’s creating, in which is complete freedom, the desire to be good and do good.

Communing with God, we discover our inherent purity, for our prayers shut the door on materiality and behold all that God sees and is.

When we behold the reality, the all-inclusiveness, of Love we see the powerlessness and unreality of anything unlike Love. We see our existence as Love’s reflection of Itself, and there is nothing that can harm us, nothing that can separate us from the love that Jesus knew, experienced and shared. The unreality of all so-called forms of error is the consequence of the reality of the Allness of Truth, Love, Mind, the ever-present excellence of God, here and now.

The printable PDF versions of this offering (for color and black printers) are located under Downloads in the upper right of CedarS GEMs webpage.

GEM#8: Grow your concept of church as serving those in desperate need and feeling repentant. Cobbey Crisler on Mark 2.15-17 (citation B14)

Mark 2, verse 15. Church membership consisted of those not generally being viewed as the most highly regarded communicants. It included publicans and sinners. There is where the need was. It also is where the need often was recognized first. You and I are ready usually when we become desperate. This is probably why Jesus was able to say that the publicans and sinners were nearer heavenly consciousness than the scribes and Pharisees who thought that they were. It's almost as if we have everything upside down just as we do optically. It all has to be inverted. Maybe this is what repent means. To change your concept is a complete inversion of concept.

Verse 17. Jesus calls himself a physician. Since both sickness and sin are mentioned, we find that he considered himself to be a physician of both disease and sin.”
“What Mark Recorded,” by B. Cobbey Crisler**

GEM#9: Stop sitting around your pool of Bethesda waiting for something to happen! Do you want to “sin no more?” Tune-in so nothing obstructs your at-one-ment with God. Cobbey Crisler on John 5:2-20 (B20):
“John 5:2 We’re now at the famous incident at the “Pool of Bethesda”. Near what serves as an occasional sheep market today, there is still a pool that has been excavated, that has archeological remnants that suggest the five porches. There is apparently, if this is the correct location of the pools, a structure that had two pools, each with two porches. Down the middle was a fifth porch with pools on either side. It may have been the ancient equivalent of a hospital.
John 5:4 There’s some indication that it might have at some point in its history a spot that might have been associated with Aesculapius, the pagan founder of medicine, and that this superstition may have gotten to the point “that those who stepped into the pool when the water was troubled would be instantly healed.”
John 5:3 At least “an awful lot of people were waiting around for that event,” so the news must have spread that this occurred.
John 5:5 Here we run into a man that doesn’t seem to be going anywhere. “He’d been there for thirty-eight years.” I’m sure that many of us would feel for him. We all have been sitting around our own pool of Bethesda waiting for something to happen, something miraculous, something fateful. We have all waited for something unexpected from the outside to lift us out of a condition that we haven’t made too much of an effort to do anything about.
There was an environment there that did not help the problem. As a matter of fact, here’s how Professor Dodd describes it. I like this:
‘There is another story about a man who had given way to a chronic disability, and for years had nursed a grievance which excused him from doing anything about it.’
John 5:7. “Someone else always gets in before me.” If that sounds like a familiar excuse, then Bethesda isn’t so far back in history. So he translates Jesus’ statements this way. Do you want to recover? That pinpoints it, doesn’t it? Do you see how that translation exhibits Jesus dealing with the thought of the patient? Where must it happen?
If communication from God to man must work, where must we work? In the thought of the receiver. Do we want to recover? That almost sounds silly to people who have been in a longtime condition, but it may very well be the core of the issue. Do we really want to be healed? Or have we become so settled into our condition that for thirty-eight years, we just sit there with our friends and talk about our operations? Misery loving company is a quality that attaches itself to human nature.
John 5: 6. Here’s how Dodd again translates Jesus’ question and then his demand on the patient. “Do you want to recover?”
John 5:8, “Then, pick up your bed and walk.” Jesus wasn’t about to volunteer to pick up his bed for him.
That says a lot. How else do we know Jesus, but to study his thoughts, his words, his methods, his messages, his intent, the logos, not but the word, but the thought behind it? What is required for the healing of a paralytic condition that has lasted practically a generation? It’s the very thing that he thought he couldn’t do, to pick up his bed and walk. Do you want to be healed? ‘Let there be light!’ (Genesis 1:3) That’s permission. Let it in.
John 5:9, “Immediately the man was made whole.” We don’t have any sense that there was a convalescence period. “He took up his bed and walked.”

Notice in John 5:13 Jesus is saying: “Behold, thou art made whole: sin no more.” This was another aspect to healing before it was complete, dealing with the thought of the patient. Jesus often views himself in the role of physician. Remember, he said, “A man that is whole needs not a physician” (Matthew 9:12; Mark 2:17; Luke 5:31). “Sin no more” was something which that man had to comprehend in thought to avoid a recurrence.

Notice the priority with what he dealt with the patient’s thought. “Do you want to recover?” OK great, we’ve got something we can work with.

Do you really want to?

Do you want to give up this 38-year record of horizontalism?

We have an even longer record of that. Stop and think how the “bed” dominates our lives, especially after a long day. All the way from birth to death, in sickness and in sleep. There is so much happening and looming so large in this concept of bed, that when Jesus healed the man, he made him take up what had dominated him for thirty-eight years. He said, “You dominate that bed and get out of here!” Jesus spoke with some degree of authority. And that’s just what happened.

Jesus responds to the debate on the Sabbath (verse 16) with a brilliant exegesis of the seven days of creation.
In John 5:17, “Jesus said, you’re stopping me for healing on the Sabbath day. But my reading of the Scripture is this, My Father worketh hitherto and I work.” If the original works, what can the image or reflection do?

Notice also John 5:19 is Jesus’ famous statement, “The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do.” Taking this apart, it really gives you what man’s role is. What is it? It’s reflection. It’s image.
Man is not original in what he does. What he does stems from the original which is God. Then it reflects originality. Otherwise there would be competition for the job of Creator. Under monotheism there is no possibility for such competition (“For what things soever he doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise.”)
He took the Son of Man through every problem that the world could hurl at him and proved that even the Son of Man can be victorious and not a creature of circumstances when the understanding of his true nature as the Son of God can be applied.
Our understanding of the Son of Man and the Son of God, and the difference, might be heightened by realizing that the Christ comes to the Son of Man. The Christ doesn’t come to the Son of God because the Christ really presents the Son of God.
We’re on the human side of things, who feel the foot of domination on our necks from outside circumstances. Is that where the Son of Man belongs? Notice the argument of Bildad in the book of Job… It uses the very same phrase that Jesus does, elevating him way above the outlines of fleshly domination. So, “The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do.” Why?

John 5:20, “The Father loves the Son.”
John 5:30. The same point is repeated, “I can of mine own self do nothing.” Is this false humility or is Jesus actually giving us the facts straight out? What is the secret and source of everything he thought or did? What is the obstacle then between us and following Jesus? There’s something in there. Some kind of different concept of our selfhood than what he had. His was so transparent that there was nothing obstructing his at-one-ment with God, even on earth. His summons to us is to follow his example and shows his own expectation that we’re equipped to do it. So, we’re equipped to receive and to act on the instructions given us via communication. All we need to do is tune-in.
We’re coming to understand Jesus’ view of himself, and where he thinks this authority originates, “The Son of Man can do nothing of himself. (John 5:19)]

“John, the Beloved Disciple,” by B. Cobbey Crisler**

GEM#10: Constantly re-Mind yourself of Genesis 1 origin facts vs. Genesis 2 genetic fables! Refuse to accept the flesh as the container, of your individuality! Cobbey Crisler on freedom from the flesh according to Paul from Romans 8, Verses 5 (citation B17): “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.” (plus verse 6 bonus—“For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.” (KJV)

[Warren] The Contemporary English Version (CEV) translates this citation as “People who are ruled by their desires think only of themselves. Everyone who is ruled by the Holy Spirit thinks about spiritual things. If our minds are ruled by our desires, we will die. But if our minds are ruled by the Spirit, we will have life and peace.”

[Warren] The Living Bible (TLB) renders these verses: “Those who let themselves be controlled by their lower natures live only to please themselves, but those who follow after the Holy Spirit find themselves doing those things that please God. Following after the Holy Spirit leads to life and peace, but following after the old nature leads to death.”

Cobbey Crisler writes about how Paul continues to develop this theme in Romans 8, Verse 9. “How many auditoriums would empty in ridicule if Paul stood before them today and announced, “You are not in the flesh”? That’s an invitation to laughter, isn’t it? “You are not in the flesh,” Paul said. Flesh is not the container, then, of our individuality. We [are encouraged to think that] we are [our bodies]. We’re proud of that “fact”. We have turned the glory into shame by thinking out from the basis of flesh. We suffer from the incurred problems of an evolution that traces itself back through dust-like levels, so that heredity becomes a problem in health. We take pride in those “designer-genes” that form our genetic code.

In the Bible it’s a case of choosing between Genesis or genetics. Genesis (1:1, 25) has us in the beginning created by God with dominion and in God’s image. So, flesh cannot be part of that image. Where are we seeing ourselves? “Adam, where art thou?” (Genesis 3:9)

Where are we instead of in the flesh according to Romans 8, Verse 9? We’re “in the spirit” That’s home, then. Do we really feel at home in the Spirit? To be inspired is to have Spirit within, literally, in Latin. Do we enjoy living in an inspired state? Everything moves aside. Everything is subordinated to that inspiration. “we’re in the Spirit, if the Spirit of God dwells in us.”…

(bonus verses from Romans 8)
In Verse 19 would you agree with Paul that “the earnest expectation of the whole human race is waiting for this manifestation of the sons of God”? That it could be manifested, this sense of glory?

“Verse 21 mentions “the creature itself.” Look what is going to happen to the human body as the result of the evangelization of our mentality. As our mentality becomes more and more like God, the human body, “the creature itself, also shall be delivered.” There’s freedom, freedom from “every ill that flesh is heir to,” as Shakespeare says. “Delivered from the slavery,” literally in Greek, “the bondage of corruption,” “the slavery of decay into,” literally, “the freedom of the children of God.” The divine mode of being, as one dictionary says glory is, “into the freedom of the glory of the divine mode of being, of the divine nature, of the radiant thought of the children of God.”

If (only) all our thoughts could be at the level of such radiance. We’ve seen light come out from a human expression. We’ve met people who radiate a sense of insight… That’s in the fleshly. That’s simply an outward manifestation of what’s going on within. More should be going on within. And we’re spending most of our time trying to dress the without.”
“Glory: Divine Nature in The Bible,” by B. Cobbey Crisler**

GEM#11: Follow an affirm-and-deny pattern in prayer to achieve your goals TODAY! — Affirm your God-like nature; Deny the claims of life & intelligence in matter! Perceive & PROVE these scientific facts!

Dr. Albert Einstein is said to have called Mary Baker Eddy’s “Scientific Statement of Being” (SH 468:12+, citation S29) “the most profound statement ever uttered by mankind.”

As in the following 12-word portion of “The Scientific Statement of Being” (which is included in this week’s lesson as citation S6) to the end of the Statement re-printed below, the cadence of the whole, 60-word statement alternates between
(Affirmation) “Spirit is the real and eternal;
(and Denial) “matter is the unreal and temporal.” (citation S29) and its conclusion as follows

(Affirmation) “Spirit is God, and man is His image and likeness.
(and Denial) “Therefore, man is not material;

(& affirmation) he is spiritual.”

This affirmation/denial pattern follows the method used by rowers in a row boat who reach their desired destination only by pulling equally on both oars. (When they just pull on one oar, they go in circles!)
As united Prayer Watchers & Demonstrators, let’s be alert to follow her system of both affirming the facts and denying the fables. Such balanced prayer will enable us to reach the desired goal of demonstrating “a higher and more permanent peace”—in ALL conditions.

Mary Baker Eddy further said of her Scientific Statement of Being:
**“St. Paul said to the Athenians, ‘For in Him we live and move and have our being.’ This statement is in substance identical with my own: ‘There is no life, truth, substance, nor intelligence in matter.’ It is quite clear that this great verity has not yet been fully demonstrated, but it is nevertheless true. If Christian Science reiterates Paul’s teaching, we, as Christian Scientists, should give to the world convincing proof of the validity of this scientific statement of being. Having perceived, in advance of others, this scientific fact, we owe to ourselves and to the world a struggle for its demonstration.”
Retrospection & Introspection, p. 93: 17, Mary Baker Eddy’s quote & comment on Acts 17:28.

GEM#12: [Warren;] Let us close with the following divine directives to memorize from citation S30. [As a memory device, I think of this happy call to healthy action as our “Model Lettuce diet” or as our “Excellent Let-us plan”]:

“Let us accept Science, relinquish all theories based on sense-testimony, give up imperfect models and illusive ideals; and so let us have one God, one Mind, and that one perfect, producing His own models of excellence.

“Let us rejoice that we are subject to the divine ‘powers that be.’” (SH 249:1,8-9)

“Understanding the control which Love held (holds) over all, …” we can feel as safe in the pandemic as “…Daniel felt safe in the lions’ den” and can prove the virus to be as harmless, as “Paul proved the viper to be harmless.” (SH 514:26)

Let-us joyously affirm together that God is in charge of our country and of our leaders and of the whole wide world. It’s uplifting to know that “He’s Got the Whole World in His Hands.” The preceding imbedded link to the original version shares a heartfelt spiritual written in World War II by Obie Philpot, a Cherokee Indian. It speaks of God as our creator and protector. You might also enjoy an add-on version of soulful, prayer-filled, black voices that I found inspiring in these two YouTube video offerings. )

Lastly, in an attempt to replace a deceased Supreme Court justice (Judicial branch) with a more conservative judge nominated by the President (Executive branch), we are likely to have contentious hearings in the U.S Senate (Legislative branch) in the weeks before our coming November Election Day in the U.S. With that in mind, I find this Bible promise from Isaiah very reassuring in my prayers. Note that it specifies that God, Love, is in control of, or in charge of, all three branches of our government: the Judicial, the Legislative, and the Executive.
So, let-us keep faithful to our “Model Let-us diet:” let-us affirm that “…the LORD is our judge, the LORD is our lawgiver, the LORD is our king; he will save us.” (Isaiah 33:22)

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Of Special Note!

• Invite family, friends and neighbors to join us by Zoom for CedarS Sunday Hymn Sings: To start each week we’ve loved singing our prayers and praise to God for 30 minutes with friends of all-generation from all 50 of the United States as well as from 16 more countries! They include Australia, Brazil, Canada, Democratic Republic of Congo, England, Ghana, Ireland, Italy, New Zealand, Pakistan, Philippines, Puerto Rico, Scotland, Spain, South Africa, and Switzerland.

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• Thank you for clicking here to electronically share your tax-deductible support that is especially needed during this reduced-income year.
• or for MAILING gifts to our camp office address:
  The CedarS Camps Office 410 Sovereign Court #8, Ballwin, MO 63011
• or for calling CedarS support team at 636-394-6162 (Gay, Kim or Jennifer) to share your credit card support over the phone.
• CedarS is a not-for-profit, 501-C-3 organization with a Federal ID # 44-0663883.