Theme: “Harmony”
Hymn 236
Irving C. Tomlinson
O peace of the world, O hope in each breast,
O Bethlehem star that ages have blest,
A day of fresh promise breaks over the land,
Gaunt warfare is doomed, and God's kingdom at hand!
From cannon and sword shape tillers of soil,
No more let dire hate man's spirit despoil,
Let Truth be proclaimed, let God's love be retold,
That men of good will may their brethren uphold.
As stars in their courses never contend,
As blossoms their hues in harmony blend,
As bird voices mingle in joyful refrain,
So God's loving children in concord remain.
Our God is one Mind, the Mind we adore;
Ineffable joy His love doth outpour;
Let nations be one in a union of love,
God's bountiful peace, all earth's treasures above.
Readings from the Bible.
Psalms 119:129-135
Thy testimonies are wonderful: therefore doth my soul keep them. The entrance of thy words giveth light; it giveth understanding unto the simple. I opened my mouth, and panted: for I longed for thy commandments. Look thou upon me, and be merciful unto me, as thou usest to do unto those that love thy name. Order my steps in thy word: and let not any iniquity have dominion over me. Deliver me from the oppression of man: so will I keep thy precepts. Make thy face to shine upon thy servant; and teach me thy statutes.
I Corinthians 14:40
Let all things be done decently and in order.
Isaiah 28:16-18 thus (to ;)
thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste. Judgment also will I lay to the line, and righteousness to the plummet: and the hail shall sweep away the refuge of lies, and the waters shall overflow the hiding place. #And your covenant with death shall be disannulled, and your agreement with hell shall not stand;
II Corinthians 6:14-16
Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
Readings from Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy
vii:1
To those leaning on the sustaining infinite, to-day is big with blessings. The wakeful shepherd beholds the first faint morning beams, ere cometh the full radiance of a risen day. So shone the pale star to the prophet-shepherds; yet it traversed the night, and came where, in cradled obscurity, lay the Bethlehem babe, the human herald of Christ, Truth, who would make plain to benighted understanding the way of salvation through Christ Jesus, till across a night of error should dawn the morning beams and shine the guiding star of being. The Wisemen were led to behold and to follow this daystar of divine Science, lighting the way to eternal harmony.
2:8-16
God is not moved by the breath of praise to do more than He has already done, nor can the infinite do less than bestow all good, since He is unchanging wisdom and Love. We can do more for ourselves by humble fervent petitions, but the All-loving does not grant them simply on the ground of lip-service, for He already knows all.
Prayer cannot change the Science of being, but it tends to bring us into harmony with it.
76:18-31
Suffering, sinning, dying beliefs are unreal. When divine Science is universally understood, they will have no power over man, for man is immortal and lives by divine authority.
The sinless joy,--the perfect harmony and immortality of Life, possessing unlimited divine beauty and goodness without a single bodily pleasure or pain,--constitutes the only veritable, indestructible man, whose being is spiritual. This state of existence is scientific and intact,--a perfection discernible only by those who have the final understanding of Christ in divine Science. Death can never hasten this state of existence, for death must be overcome, not submitted to, before immortality appears.
130:9,26
It is unwise to doubt if reality is in perfect harmony with God, divine Principle, --if Science, when understood and demonstrated, will destroy all discord,--since you admit that God is omnipotent; for from this premise it follows that good and its sweet concords have all-power.
If thought is startled at the strong claim of Science for the supremacy of God, or Truth, and doubts the supremacy of good, ought we not, contrariwise, to be astounded at the vigorous claims of evil and doubt them, and no longer think it natural to love sin and unnatural to forsake it,--no longer imagine evil to be ever-present and good absent? Truth should not seem so surprising and unnatural as error, and error should not seem so real as truth. Sickness should not seem so real as health. There is no error in Science, and our lives must be governed by reality in order to be in harmony with God, the divine Principle of all being.
134:21-26
The true Logos is demonstrably Christian Science, the natural law of harmony which overcomes discord,--not because this Science is supernatural or preternatural, nor because it is an infraction of divine law, but because it is the immutable law of God, good.
208:20
Let us learn of the real and eternal, and prepare for the reign of Spirit, the kingdom of heaven,--the reign and rule of universal harmony, which cannot be lost nor remain forever unseen.
214:26
How transient a sense is mortal sight, when a wound on the retina may end the power of light and lens! But the real sight or sense is not lost. Neither age nor accident can interfere with the senses of Soul, and there are no other real senses. It is evident that the body as matter has no sensation of its own, and there is no oblivion for Soul and its faculties. Spirit's senses are without pain, and they are forever at peace. Nothing can hide from them the harmony of all things and the might and permanence of Truth.
228:11
The enslavement of man is not legitimate. It will cease when man enters into his heritage of freedom, his God-given dominion over the material senses. Mortals will some day assert their freedom in the name of Almighty God. Then they will control their own bodies through the understanding of divine Science. Dropping their present beliefs, they will recognize harmony as the spiritual reality and discord as the material unreality.
241:31-14
It is "easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle," than for sinful beliefs to enter the kingdom of heaven, eternal harmony. Through repentance, spiritual baptism, and regeneration, mortals put off their material beliefs and false individuality. It is only a question of time when "they shall all know Me [God], from the least of them unto the greatest." Denial of the claims of matter is a great step towards the joys of Spirit, towards human freedom and the final triumph over the body.
There is but one way to heaven, harmony, and Christ in divine Science shows us this way. It is to know no other reality--to have no other consciousness of life--than good, God and His reflection, and to rise superior to the so-called pain and pleasure of the senses.
253:9
I hope, dear reader, I am leading you into the understanding of your divine rights, your heaven-bestowed harmony,--that, as you read, you see there is no cause (outside of erring, mortal, material sense which is not power) able to make you sick or sinful; and I hope that you are conquering this false sense. Knowing the falsity of so-called material sense, you can assert your prerogative to overcome the belief in sin, disease, or death.
260:31
If we look to the body for pleasure, we find pain; for Life, we find death; for Truth, we find error; for Spirit, we find its opposite, matter. Now reverse this action. Look away from the body into Truth and Love, the Principle of all happiness, harmony, and immortality. Hold thought steadfastly to the enduring, the good, and the true, and you will bring these into your experience proportionably to their occupancy of your thoughts.
276:12
The realization that all inharmony is unreal brings objects and thoughts into human view in their true light, and presents them as beautiful and immortal. Harmony in man is as real and immortal as in music. Discord is unreal and mortal.
280:1
In the infinitude of Mind, matter must be unknown. Symbols and elements of discord and decay are not products of the infinite, perfect, and eternal ^All^. From Love and from the light and harmony which are the abode of Spirit, only reflections of good can come. All things beautiful and harmless are ideas of Mind. Mind creates and multiplies them, and the product must be mental.
304:16
Harmony is produced by its Principle, is controlled by it and abides with it. Divine Principle is the Life of man. Man's happiness is not, therefore, at the disposal of physical sense. Truth is not contaminated by error. Harmony in man is as beautiful as in music, and discord is unnatural, unreal.
331:11 The
The Scriptures imply that God is All-in-all. From this it follows that nothing possesses reality nor existence except the divine Mind and His ideas. The Scriptures also declare that God is Spirit. Therefore in Spirit all is harmony, and there can be no discord; all is Life, and there is no death. Everything in God's universe expresses Him.
381:20
Think less of the enactments of mortal mind, and you will sooner grasp man's God-given dominion. You must understand your way out of human theories relating to health, or you will never believe that you are quite free from some ailment. The harmony and immortality of man will never be reached without the understanding that Mind is not in matter. Let us banish sickness as an outlaw, and abide by the rule of perpetual harmony,--God's law. It is man's moral right to annul an unjust sentence, a sentence never inflicted by divine authority.
390:4
We cannot deny that Life is self-sustained, and we should never deny the everlasting harmony of Soul, simply because, to the mortal senses, there is seeming discord. It is our ignorance of God, the divine Principle, which produces apparent discord, and the right understanding of Him restores harmony. Truth will at length compel us all to exchange the pleasures and pains of sense for the joys of Soul.
412:16
To prevent disease or to cure it, the power of Truth, of divine Spirit, must break the dream of the material senses. To heal by argument, find the type of the ailment, get its name, and array your mental plea against the physical. Argue at first mentally, not audibly, that the patient has no disease, and conform the argument so as to destroy the evidence of disease. Mentally insist that harmony is the fact, and that sickness is a temporal dream. Realize the presence of health and the fact of harmonious being, until the body corresponds with the normal conditions of health and harmony.
418:12
It must be clear to you that sickness is no more the reality of being than is sin. This mortal dream of sickness, sin, and death should cease through Christian Science. Then one disease would be as readily destroyed as another. Whatever the belief is, if arguments are used to destroy it, the belief must be repudiated, and the negation must extend to the supposed disease and to whatever decides its type and symptoms. Truth is affirmative, and confers harmony. All metaphysical logic is inspired by this simple rule of Truth, which governs all reality. By the truthful arguments you employ, and especially by the spirit of Truth and Love which you entertain, you will heal the sick.
423:8
The Christian Scientist, understanding scientifically that all is Mind, commences with mental causation, the truth of being, to destroy the error. This corrective is an alterative, reaching to every part of the human system. According to Scripture, it searches "the joints and marrow," and it restores the harmony of man.
492:7
Being is holiness, harmony, immortality. It is already proved that a knowledge of this, even in small degree, will uplift the physical and moral standard of mortals, will increase longevity, will purify and elevate character. Thus progress will finally destroy all error, and bring immortality to light. We know that a statement proved to be good must be correct. New thoughts are constantly obtaining the floor. These two contradictory theories--that matter is something, or that all is Mind--will dispute the ground, until one is acknowledged to be the victor. Discussing his campaign, General Grant said: "I propose to fight it out on this line, if it takes all summer." Science says: All is Mind and Mind's idea. You must fight it out on this line. Matter can afford you no aid.
521:12 (only)
The harmony and immortality of man are intact.
Silent prayer followed by the audible repetition of the Lord’s Prayer.
Hymn 371
Margaret Morrison
We lift our hearts in praise,
O God of Life, to Thee,
And would reflect in all our ways
Thy purity.
Thy thoughts our lives enfold,
And free us from all fear;
All strife is stilled, all grief consoled,
For Thou art here.
We lift our hearts in praise,
O God of Truth, to Thee,
And find within Thy perfect law
Our liberty.
We bless Thy mighty name
In this exalted hour,
And to the world in faith proclaim
Thy healing power.
We lift our hearts in praise,
O God of Love, to Thee,
With joy to find through darkened days
Thy harmony.
O Father-Mother Love,
We triumph 'neath Thy rod,
We glory in Thy light, and prove
That Thou art God.
Experiences, testimonies and remarks by members of the congregation.
Hymn 263
From the Swedish of J. O. Wallin
Only God can bring us gladness,
Only God can give us peace;
Joys are vain that end in sadness,
Joy divine shall never cease.
Mid the shade of want and sorrow
Undisturbed, our hearts rejoice;
Patient, wait the brighter morrow;
Faithful, heed the Father's voice.
As the stars in order going,
All harmonious, He doth move;
Heavenly calm and comfort showing,
Comes the healing word of Love.
Who the word of wisdom heareth
Feels the Father Love within,
Where as dawn the shadow cleareth,
Love outshines the night of sin.
So we find the true atonement,
Know in God the perfect Friend;
For in Love is our at-one-ment,
Where all hearts in Him may blend.
Here from prisoning pain and sorrow
Have we all a sure release,
Only God can bring us gladness,
Only God can give us peace.
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