The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1936-09-25
Excerpts from
A Lecture
Christian Science
Entitled
Christian ScienceM Gods
Law of Freedom and NJ
Dominion
by
William Duncan Fitzpatrick, c. s. B.
of Detroit, Michigan.
Member of the Board of Lectureship Of The
Mother Church, The First Church of Christ,
Scientist, in Boston. Massachusetts,
God

Tod
The religious error of the GEN.
turtles has been circumscribed,
localized, and humanity personalized
concept of God; and this in spite of
Bible so filled with exact state
ments as to God and His nature
that it would seem almost humanity
impossible for anyone familiar with
Bible teachings to go as far astray
as erudite theology has gone in its
concepts and conclusions about God.
In the twentieth chapter of the
book of Exodus we find this most
illuminating and unequivocal COM
mand: "Thou shalt have no other
gods before me. Thou shalt not
make unto thee any craven image,
or any likeness of any thing that is
in heaven above, or that is in the
earth beneath, or that is in the
water under the earth; thou shalt
not bow down myself to them, nor
serve them;" which, of course, not
only includes ban against the wor-
ship of idols or images but includes,
also, a ban against the worship of
any likeness, either mental or mate
rial, of which an image or an idol
might be a supposed counterpart or
replica. In other words, an idol or
an image could not possibly repre-
sent or express the God which man.
kind should worship. God could not
only not be an image but an image
or an idol could not represent God.
If God is not something of a
finite or circumscribed nature; if
He is not a humanity conceived God,
what is He? What does the Bible
tell us about Him? It would be
rather useless procedure for the
Bible to tell us so definitely what
God is not, and then leave us to
blind conjecture to determine what
He is or what He is like. Jesus, the
best authority we have, stated in
no unmistakable terms exactly what
God is and how we are to worship
Him. Jesus said that God is Spirit,
and, "They that worship him must
worship him in spirit and in truth"
This all-embracing term Esprit"
as signifying God includes many
synonymous terms used by other
Bible writers to define God, such as
the term "Life." In the book of
Deuteronomy we are told that God
is Life. II God is Life and God is
Spirit, Life, then, must be spiritual
filling all space and ever present.
One would not think of making
craven image or likeness of Life.
St. John furnishes us with an
other synonym for this infinite God
in the term Love" st. John plain
ly states that God is Love. Now
just how anyone could think of
making craven image or likeness
of Love 1 do not know. Yet this is
practically what men have been do
ing for ages; trying to localize,
fnitize, materialiZe and humanity
personalize a God who is Love.
Love is something that you and l
must express in thought, is it not?
St. Paul uses another term to de-
fine this infinite God where he re-
fers to Him as Mind-as the Mind
which was in Christ Jesus. The
term mind" thus used by st. Paul
to define God must indicate Mind
which is infinite, which fills all
space, and which is ever present
and ever available. An infinite Mind
which is God must have existed
throughout all time, regardless of
persons or localities, and could only
find expression through the think
ing of individuals.
Thus we see that the Bible not
only tells us what God is not, but
it also tells us in no unequivocal
terms just exactly what God is,
what His nature is, and how He is
to be expressed or realized by man.
Man
In the first chapter Of Genesis we
find that man is created in the
image and likeness of God. 1t is
obvious that this image or likeness
could not be unlike God; otherwise
it would not be an image or like
ness. If God is Mind and Life and
Love and Spirit, and so forth, then
man must be the exact image of
Spirit and Mind and Life and Love.
So the man of Gods creating is
not made up of flesh and blood and
bones; he is not subject to birth,
growth, maturity, and death. He is
co-eternal and co-existent with
God, dwelling as a divine idea in
the consciousness of the Mind Great
ing him. He is idea-divine, pure,
indestructible, eternal; never sub
ject to matter or the vagaries OF
matter; never fallen; never subject
to sin, sickness, poverty, want, I'M
happiness, or death. To the extent
that you and / admit into our con-
seriousness and express in thought
those ideas which constitute the
Christ, those ideas which are the
sons of God, to that extent, and to
that extent only, are we becoming
Gods children and bringing our
selves under Gods eternal laws of
health, happiness, freedom, and
spirituality. Love, kindness, ODE
dience to good, spirituality in
thought, purity, honesty, forgive
ness, forbearance, patience, and the
like, are all children of God, and
you and I may avail ourselves Of
their blessing to just the extent
that we admit and entertain them
in Individual consciousness. We
havn the nrivilaop here and now