The Birmingham age-herald., 1920-12-20
Christian Science Lecture By The Rev. Andrew j. Graham

1 words the mist that seems to separate
 man from God rises from the earth. 1t i is not curtain let down from heaven.
 Now to the sick and sinful and trcl- bled, breeding over the thought of an
 unknowable God Christian Science comes
 and says: Your sores and sicknesses and sins and broken hearts may be healed
 here and now. The veil which seems to | shut one from God may be destroyed | through the aid of healing. coming di- ! rectly through Christian Science treat , ment through the reading of it's text book. Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" The only Comforter n the universe is God. and Jesus Christ said: This is life eternal, that they might Know Thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast sent"
 The puzzle to the human mind has always been this: Since God is ln- finitely great and man seems so small. how can man expect the Omnpotent One to take note of him? The psalm ist voiced this when he exclaimed When I consider the moon and ] the stars, which thou hast ordained,
 what is man that thou art mindful of him."
 For his comfort and encouragement
 man needs something concrete, in dividual He needs something which he is capable of understanding and
 this concreteness we find in the teach ing of Christian Science Mary Baker Eddy in using the abstract noun, good" in opposition with the worl God, has bequeathed to mankind an Illuminating thought. By it she en-
 ables us to make active and real a religious expression which had been to a large extent a dead letter for practically fifteen hundred years, namely ito love God" The pulpit has preached that to love God is absolute ly necessary to salvation and the pew has silently answered: How can I love God unless I know Him? I can love a friend because I know him; this is con
 crete experience and can understand it,
 but to love God without knowing Him
 appears to be impracticable." Now
 Christian Science individualizes God.
 good. St. James says: Every good gift
 and every perfect gift is from above. and
 cometh down from the Father of lights v
 All absolutely good motives. aspirations.
 thoughts; all kind. gentle loving words
 and deeds come from God. There is
 nothing in the whole universe which is loving. protecting, saving or compass
 sionate but comes from God and cen-
 ters in God. Any of these qualities
 manifested in men and women are
 positive proofs of the presence of
 God. Therefore. we repeat, that when Mrs. Eddy employs the word good in opposition with the word God. she causes us to see at once how simple and
 practical it is to recognize and to know God; and therefore to love Him. To
 love the manifestation of anything which is true, honest, just, pure, lovely and of good report is to love God. Hence, in the wilderness of darkness and fear wherein one feels that he is without God ir the world. comes the voice of Chris ton Science. and through it's treatment, it's services. or the reading of it's au- thcrzed literature. one is assured of the wonderful fact that he can know God here and now with as much certainty as he can know the truth of mathe- matirs cnd l-nowsrG Ui.r coo 'ova Him. EVIL NEVER BENEFICENT ,, The only chance that evil has to sue ceed is by stimulating good. Under this pretense of good for mankind old the ology and materia medica have been busy, for ages. in making pictures. the main feature of which has been the claim that good can be born out of evil. One of the Christian churches has a hymn beginning 70! felix cuba" "Ol happy fault that is, I am so glad that I have sinned for by repenting of it Out of wretched teaching like this comes such apothegms as the following.-"a young man must SOW his wild oats. Is that true? Must one be dishonest and hateful before knowing how to be honest and loving? Paul says: Shall we do evil that good may come? God forbid
 l Beginning with about the fourth century | of the Christian era the teaching that the only way or method by which man could securely attain to holiness was to withdraw himself from the rest of man