Los Angeles herald., 1908-09-27

plished, for all religioniRts largely
agree about the state OF divine grace
which shall be the individual outcome
of the atoning process.
Belief May Be Fatal
The creeds teach tht Jesus suffered
and died on the cross that the world
might be saved. Christian Science
suffering and death of the cross, that
the world might be saved. The creeds
hold that God needed to be appeased
by this crucifixion of the innocent, for
the sins of world. Christian Science
declares that an all-good God, holding
the Christ in an unbroken, eternal
sense of Life, acted directly upon the
consciousness of Christ Jesus to the
bringing about of his resurrection and
ascension in spite of the crucifixion
which malice and hate, in defiance of
God, hurled upon Jesus. The creeds
suggest that whatsoever believes that
Jesus died on the cross for the sins of
the world is saved by such belief.
Christian Science takes the position
that believing in anything, however
good, has of itself never saved any
one; that mentality which believes
itself saved because 1t accepts church
history and doctrine concerning Christ
Jesus, may at the same time be buried
in self-complacency. delaying its saliva
is saved; and that the actual process
of living Christ's teachings day by
day, hour by hour, is the only method
by which thought and life can be
made "at-one" with God, the Father.
In short, Christian Science announces
that the true import of the atonement
can never be discerned. nor it's vital
helpfulness appropriated, until thought
is disentangled from believing that God
required Jesus suffering, or that Jesus
work excuses the rest of mankind
from working out similar problems In
the same way Through boyhood and
youth and young manhood the indi-
vidual known as Jesus of Nazareth
was about the business of extinguish-
ing all suggestions of eyil-about his
Fathers business.
The mental process of harmonizing
his thoughts with his Maker went
steadily on, even the concentrated evil
of the crucifixion spending itself only to
melt away before the brightness of
Loves appearing, until. at the SUI
preme hour Of the ascension, this
Master Christians whole conscious
ness blended completely with the divine
Mind, and the experience of earth was
ended.
Must Overcome Evil
What did the atonement, in its en-
tirety, require of Christ Jesus? This,
namely, that he realize such an exalta-
ton of human consciousness day by
day, hour by hour-so rise above the
din and discord of material living,
with its strife and woe and untrue
sense of pleasure, as would interdict
his intimidation, temptation, or control
by any argument of earth.
1t was required of Christ Jesus that
he reverse the evidence of the ma
terial senses so thoroughly and per-
sistently that where sin clamored for
recognition, holiness stood forth to
silence 1t; where sickness and sorrow
and want argued for their existence,
health and joy and divine boun-
ty, spiritually possessed, hushed their
voices; where malice and hate would
say man or community, or a race
could be an enemy, divine Love tri-
umphantly asserted and proved that
Love alone is power, that Love alone
endures, that Love can under all cir
cumstances protect and save its own.
And. finally, 1t was required of Christ
Jesus that he walk with God and talk
with God, and so know and do the will
of God that even maliciously planned
disgrace and death, designed to de-
molish his life work. could only spend
it's force in Its own destruction, over
taking him not at all.
Dark as was the hour of the cruel
fixion, from the human standpoint, It's
assault wrought out the climax of the
Saviour's at-one-ment with divine
Mind; for it forced that complete as
cension of thought which has extended
beyond the individual down through
out all ages, to become the Saviour,
the great Example, of all who enter
upon the mental journey which leads
thought and experience in the path
way trod by this beloved Master
Christian.
What does the atonement require of
the Christian today? If merely believ-
ing that this great TRANSPORTATION of
thought and experience came to Christ
Jesus is not of itself sufficient unto
salvation, what is? A spectator may
admire the Masters ethical teaching,
his forgiveness of his enmies, his pow
err over sin and disease, may believe
all Jesus spiritual endowment to have
been of God, yet this onlooker Is in
no sense a Christian and has no least
part in the atonement until he himself
begins by the actual overcoming of
evil to acquire somewhat of the Mind
(which was also in Christ Jesus" and
thereby to be himself, in some meas
ure, "at one' with God, good. AS a
material sense of existence afforded
no resting-place for the Master, so 1t
offers none to his followers.
Be Faithful to Ideals
Christ sets before humanity IAN open
door," and all who will ascend,
thought by thought, deed by deed
from evil thinking and doing into
right thinking and doing, may enter
into a oneness with divine Love
which provides effectual escape from
the material level where pain and sor-
row so continuously multiply their
woe. Individual thought Is at each
instant associating with good or with
evil, with Truth or with error, with
Love or with selfishness. Every thought
which is not one with good, is "at-one''
with some form of error. Furthermore
every selfish, debased, diseased, dis
couraged, timid. unrighteou5 and
earth-tainted thought can be reversed
by the action of Christian Science APP
piled in individual consciousness, a
right thought substituted for every
wrong one, a saving thought dislodging
each destroying one. until the mental
ity of the twentieth century disciple
becomes alight with some measure of
that divine effulgence which illumined
the experiences of the Master
Happy is that individual who can
rightly call himself a Christian Scien-
fist! Such a one is animated by a
thought process which is daily and
hourly severing him from the mental
association with evil, and linking him
to all that is good and desirable. At the
springs of his own thinking, in mental
and moral experience whose heights
and depths are known only to himself,
he is going through purifying, trans
forming renewals which mold his ideals
to the Christlike and demand that his
performances shall be faithful to the