Sunday, January 26th, 2020 Roundtable

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Morning Prayers

May this little sanctum be preserved sacred to the memory of this pure purpose, and subserve it. Let the Bible and the Christian Science textbook preach the gospel which heals the sick and enlightens the people’s sense of Christian Science. This ministry, reaching the physical, moral, and spiritual needs of humanity, will, in the name of Almighty God, speak the truth that today, as in olden time, is found able to heal both sin and disease.

— from Miscellany, by Mary Baker Eddy, page 147

Discussion points

107 — WATCH lest you permit a human estimate or attitude to blind you to the true and divine significance of your human experiences. This is an important point, since it is your attitude towards anything that determines how it will affect your progress. A postman who complains and grumbles about the long distances he has to walk, gets no benefit from the walking. But if he regards it as training for a marathon, he will rejoice in it, and thus profit by it.

It is our attitude toward every experience that matters. If we whine, complain, or wonder why God is picking on us, when we get into hot or cold water, then we will get little spiritual growth. Once a man was thrown into a pit. Instead of becoming angry, when people threw stones at him, he used the stones to build steps, on which he climbed up to freedom.

What would be the value of a consciousness of God, and an understanding of Christian Science, that had not been toughened and strengthened so that it could endure to the end? When one has the right attitude toward human persecution and affliction, he will never be ashamed of his problems, nor will he personalize the channels through which such experiences come to him. Rather will he rejoice at whatever plunges him into a hot or cold experience. He will perceive that it is Love’s plan and Truth’s way of training him to endure. A prospective aviator is put through gruelling tests to develop and test his stamina. Love knows that we need to be trained for our spiritual flights, and it provides tests for the pilgrim all along the way.

— from 500 Watching Points by Gilbert Carpenter




Golden Text — ““Teach me thy way, O Lord; I will walk in thy truth.”” — Psalm 86 : 11




Give ear, O ye heavens, and I will speak; and hear, O earth, the words of my mouth.

My doctrine shall drop as the rain, my speech shall distil as the dew, as the small rain upon the tender herb, and as the showers upon the grass.

— Deuteronomy 32 : 1-2 from citation 1 in the Bible portion of this week’s Lesson




Contagion

Whatever man sees, feels, or in any way takes cognizance of, must be caught through mind; inasmuch as perception, sensation, and consciousness belong to mind and not to matter. Floating with the popular current of mortal thought without questioning the reliability of its conclusions, we do what others do, believe what others believe, and say what others say. Common consent is contagious, and it makes disease catching.

People believe in infectious and contagious diseases, and that any one is liable to have them under certain predisposing or exciting causes. This mental state prepares one to have any disease whenever there appear the circumstances which he believes produce it. If he believed as sincerely that health is catching when exposed to contact with healthy people, he would catch their state of feeling quite as surely and with better effect than he does the sick man’s.

If only the people would believe that good is more contagious than evil, since God is omnipresence, how much more certain would be the doctor’s success, and the clergyman’s conversion of sinners. And if only the pulpit would encourage faith in God in this direction, and faith in Mind over all other influences governing the receptivity of the body, theology would teach man as David taught: “Because thou hast made the Lord, which is my refuge, even the most High thy habitation; there shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling.”

The confidence of mankind in contagious disease would thus become beautifully less; and in the same proportion would faith in the power of God to heal and to save mankind increase, until the whole human race would become healthier, holier, happier, and longer lived. A calm, Christian state of mind is a better preventive of contagion than a drug, or than any other possible sanative method; and the “perfect Love” that “casteth out fear” is a sure defense.

— from Miscellaneous Writings by Mary Baker Eddy, page 247




Article — Body by Mary Baker G. Eddy




MICROBES; GERMS; BACILLI; RATS; INSECTS; PESTS: Declare the usefulness of all God’s created ideas, and further declare that none of these ideas desire to harm or destroy your house, goods, or flesh. This de- mesmerizes the insect or the animal. God does not kill. Love does not kill.

Illustration given: Worms on vines. Complaint made, and I declared the usefulness and harmlessness of all God’s ideas. Worms departed; do not know where.

— from Teaching and Addresses by Edward Kimball, page 154




Understanding the control which Love held over all, Daniel felt safe in the lions’ den.

— from Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy, page 514




Holy Father, Thou hast taught us
We should live to Thee alone;
Year by year, Thy hand hath brought us
On through dangers oft unknown.
When we wandered, Thou hast found us;
When we doubted, sent us light;
Still Thine arm has been around us,
All our paths were in Thy sight.

We would trust in Thy protecting,
Wholly rest upon Thine arm,
Follow wholly Thy directing,
Thou our only guard from harm.
Keep us from our own undoing,
Help us turn to Thee when tried,
Still our strength in Thee renewing,
Keep us ever at Thy side.

— Hymn 116 from the Christian Science Hymnal




And God saw every thing that He had made, and behold, it was very good.

— Genesis 1: 31 the King James Bible




It is more important to know what sort of person has a disease than to know what sort of disease a person has.

— Hippocrates




Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. Amen.

— Matthew 28: 20 from the King James Bible




Chronic anixiety and anger are the root cause of nearly all chronic pain cases.

— Dr. David Janscom, renouwned spine surgeon at Swedish Medical Center in Seattle Washington




Almost everything will work again if you unplug it for a few minutes encluding you.

— Anne Lamott




Forum post — for all his ways are judgment by Jeremy from NJ




We must remember that the smallest truth is mightier than the greatest lie the world has ever known.

— from Divinity Course and General Collectanea, (the “Blue Book”), by Mary Baker Eddy, page 233




Dear Lord and Father of us all,
Forgive our foolish ways;
Reclothe us in our rightful mind;
In purer lives Thy service find,
In deeper reverence, praise.

In simple trust like theirs who heard,
Beside the Syrian sea,
The gracious calling of the `Soul`,
Let us, like them, without a word
Rise up and follow thee.

Breathe through the pulses of desire
Thy coolness and Thy balm;
Let sense be dumb, let flesh retire;
Speak through the earthquake, wind and fire,
O still small voice of calm.

Drop Thy still dews of quietness,
Till all our strivings cease;
Take from us now the strain and stress,
And let our ordered lives confess
The beauty of Thy peace.

— Hymn 49 from the Christian Science Hymnal




Forum post — The Form of the Fourth by Parthens




Forum post — No Variableness by Nancy from NJ




Forum post — Belief instead of demonstration. by Lynda from PA




Final Readings

The Man of Integrity

The man of integrity is one who makes it his constant rule to follow the road of duty, according as Truth and the voice of his conscience point it out to him. He is not guided merely by affections which may some time give the color of virtue to a loose and unstable character. The upright man is guided by a fixed Principle, which destines him to do nothing but what is honorable, and to abhor whatever is base or unworthy; hence we find him ever the same, — at all times the trusty friend, the affectionate relative, the conscientious man of business, the pious worker, the public-spirited citizen. He assumes no borrowed appearance. He seeks no mask to cover him, for he acts no studied part; but he is indeed what he appears to be, — full of truth, candor, and humanity. In all his pursuits, he knows no path but the fair, open, and direct one, and would much rather fail of success than attain it by reproachable means. He never shows us a smiling countenance while he meditates evil against us in his heart. We shall never find one part of his character at variance with another.

— from Miscellaneous Writings by Mary Baker Eddy, page 147







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