First Church of Christ, Scientist, La Cañada Flintridge
Wednesday Meeting Readings
- Gen. 1:31 (to 1st .)
31And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good.
- Gen. 2:2 (to ;)
2And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made;
- Prov. 12:28
28In the way of righteousness is life; and in the pathway thereof there is no death.
- Deut. 30:16 I (to :), 19, 20 (to 2nd :)
16I command thee this day to love the Lord thy God, to walk in his ways, and to keep his commandments and his statutes and his judgments, that thou mayest live and multiply:
... 19I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live:
20That thou mayest love the Lord thy God, and that thou mayest obey his voice, and that thou mayest cleave unto him: for he is thy life, and the length of thy days:
- Gen. 1:11
11And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so.
- Ex. 14:13-15
13¶ And Moses said unto the people, Fear ye not, stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will shew to you to-day: for the Egyptians whom ye have seen to-day, ye shall see them again no more for ever.
14The Lord shall fight for you, and ye shall hold your peace.
15¶ And the Lord said unto Moses, Wherefore criest thou unto me? speak unto the children of Israel, that they go forward:
- I Kings 17:1, 8, 9, 17-24
1And Elijah the Tishbite, who was of the inhabitants of Gilead, said unto Ahab, As the Lord God of Israel liveth, before whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain these years, but according to my word.
8¶ And the word of the Lord came unto him, saying,
9Arise, get thee to Zarephath, which belongeth to Zidon, and dwell there: behold, I have commanded a widow woman there to sustain thee.
17¶ And it came to pass after these things, that the son of the woman, the mistress of the house, fell sick; and his sickness was so sore, that there was no breath left in him.
18And she said unto Elijah, What have I to do with thee, O thou man of God? art thou come unto me to call my sin to remembrance, and to slay my son?
19And he said unto her, Give me thy son. And he took him out of her bosom, and carried him up into a loft, where he abode, and laid him upon his own bed.
20And he cried unto the Lord, and said, O Lord my God, hast thou also brought evil upon the widow with whom I sojourn, by slaying her son?
21And he stretched himself upon the child three times, and cried unto the Lord, and said, O Lord my God, I pray thee, let this child’s soul come into him again.
22And the Lord heard the voice of Elijah; and the soul of the child came into him again, and he revived.
23And Elijah took the child, and brought him down out of the chamber into the house, and delivered him unto his mother: and Elijah said, See, thy son liveth.
24¶ And the woman said to Elijah, Now by this I know that thou art a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in thy mouth is truth.
- John 9:39 (to ;)
39¶ And Jesus said, For judgment I am come into this world, that they which see not might see;
- John 10:1-3, 7, 9, 10
1Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber.
2But he that entereth in by the door is the shepherd of the sheep.
3To him the porter openeth; and the sheep hear his voice; and he calleth his own sheep by name, and leadeth them out.
... 7Then said Jesus unto them again, Verily, verily, I say unto you, I am the door of the sheep.
... 9I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture.
10The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.
- Luke 7:11-16
11¶ And it came to pass the day after, that he went into a city called Nain; and many of his disciples went with him, and much people.
12Now when he came nigh to the gate of the city, behold, there was a dead man carried out, the only son of his mother, and she was a widow: and much people of the city was with her.
13And when the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her, and said unto her, Weep not.
14And he came and touched the bier: and they that bare him stood still. And he said, Young man, I say unto thee, Arise.
15And he that was dead sat up, and began to speak. And he delivered him to his mother.
16And there came a fear on all: and they glorified God, saying, That a great prophet is risen up among us; and, That God hath visited his people.
- Phil. 2:5, 6, 12, 13, 15, 16 (to ;), 18
5Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus:
6Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God:
... 12Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.
13For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.
... 15That ye may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world;
16Holding forth the word of life;
... 18For the same cause also do ye joy, and rejoice with me.
Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures
by Mary Baker Eddy
- SH 259:6
6 In divine Science, man is the true image of God. The divine nature was best expressed in Christ Jesus, who threw upon mortals the truer reflection of God and lifted 9their lives higher than their poor thought-models would allow, — thoughts which presented man as fallen, sick, sinning, and dying. The Christlike understanding of 12scientific being and divine healing includes a perfect Prin-ciple and idea, — perfect God and perfect man, — as the basis of thought and demonstration.
- SH 261:21-27
21 Detach sense from the body, or matter, which is only a form of human belief, and you may learn the meaning Immutable identity of manof God, or good, and the nature of the immu-24table and immortal. Breaking away from the mutations of time and sense, you will neither lose the solid objects and ends of life nor your own iden-27tity.
- SH 244:7-28
If we were to derive all our conceptions of man from what is seen between the cradle and the grave, happi-9ness and goodness would have no abiding-place in man, and the worms would rob him of the flesh; but Paul writes: “The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath 12made me free from the law of sin and death.”
Man undergoing birth, maturity, and decay is like the beasts and vegetables, — subject to laws of decay. If 15Man never less than manman were dust in his earliest stage of exist-ence, we might admit the hypothesis that he returns eventually to his primitive condition; 18but man was never more nor less than man.
If man flickers out in death or springs from matter into being, there must be an instant when God is without His 21 entire manifestation, — when there is no full reflection of the infinite Mind.
Man in Science is neither young nor old. He has 24neither birth nor death. He is not a beast, a vegetable, Man not evolvednor a migratory mind. He does not pass from matter to Mind, from the mortal to the im-27mortal, from evil to good, or from good to evil. Such admissions cast us headlong into darkness and dogma.
- SH 245:32-8
The infinite never began nor will it ever end. Mind 246 246:1 and its formations can never be annihilated. Man is not a pendulum, swinging between evil and good, joy and 3Man reflects Godsorrow, sickness and health, life and death. Life and its faculties are not measured by calendars. The perfect and immortal are the eternal 6likeness of their Maker. Man is by no means a material germ rising from the imperfect and endeavoring to reach Spirit above his origin.
- SH 246:10-13, 17-20 Chronological, 23-31
The measurement of life by solar years robs youth and gives ugliness to age. The radiant sun of virtue and truth 12coexists with being. Manhood is its eternal noon, un-dimmed by a declining sun.
Chronological data are no part 18of the vast forever. Time-tables of birth and death are Undesirable recordsso many conspiracies against manhood and womanhood. ... Man, 24governed by immortal Mind, is always beautiful and grand. Each succeeding year unfolds wisdom, beauty, and holiness.
27 Life is eternal. We should find this out, and begin the demonstration thereof. Life and goodness are immortal. True life eternalLet us then shape our views of existence into 30loveliness, freshness, and continuity, rather than into age and blight.
- SH 283:1-20
As mortals begin to understand Spirit, they give up the belief that there is any true existence 3apart from God.
Mind is the source of all movement, and there is no inertia to retard or check its perpetual and harmonious 6Source of all life and actionaction. Mind is the same Life, Love, and wis-dom “yesterday, and to-day, and forever.” Matter and its effects — sin, sickness, and 9death — are states of mortal mind which act, react, and then come to a stop. They are not facts of Mind. They are not ideas, but illusions. Principle is absolute. It 12admits of no error, but rests upon understanding.
But what say prevalent theories? They insist that Life, or God, is one and the same with material life so-15called. They speak of both Truth and error as mind, and of good and evil as spirit. They claim that to be life which is but the objective state of material sense, — 18such as the structural life of the tree and of material man, — and deem this the manifestation of the one Life, God.
- SH 289:14, 25
The fact that the Christ, or Truth, overcame and still 15overcomes death proves the “king of terrors” to be but Death but an illusiona mortal belief, or error, which Truth destroys with the spiritual evidences of Life; and this 18shows that what appears to the senses to be death is but a mortal illusion, for to the real man and the real universe there is no death-process.
The spiritual fact and the material belief of things are contradictions; but the spiritual is true, and therefore the 27Spiritual offspringmaterial must be untrue. Life is not in matter. Therefore it cannot be said to pass out of mat -ter. Matter and death are mortal illusions. Spirit and 30all things spiritual are the real and eternal.
- SH 305:22
In the illusion of life that is here to-day and 24gone to-morrow, man would be wholly mortal, were it not that Love, the divine Principle that obtains in divine Science, destroys all error and brings immor-27tality to light. Because man is the reflection of his Maker, he is not subject to birth, growth, maturity, de-cay. These mortal dreams are of human origin, not 30divine.
- SH 491:12
- SH 471:17-18
- SH 519:22-23 (to ;), 25 (only)
- SH 520:5-7 Human, 9
3Human language 6can repeat only an infinitesimal part of what exists. ... Principle and its idea, man, are coexistent and eternal. The numerals of infinity, called seven days, can never be reckoned according to the calendar of time. 12These days will appear as mortality disappears, and they will reveal eternity, newness of Life, in which all sense of error forever disappears and thought accepts the divine 15infinite calculus.
From the Christian Science Hymnal:
Hymn 343: “… Thou art the Way, the Truth, the Life; Grant us that Way to know”
Hymn 440: “… For Love is Life eternally, Whose blessings never cease”
Hymn 579: “Take my life, and let it be, Consecrated, Lord, to Thee”
