Theme: Hope
Hymn 7
Bertha H. Woods – Based on hymn by H. F. Lyte
Abide with me; fast breaks the morning light;
Our daystar rises, banishing all night;
Thou art our strength, O Truth that maketh
free,
We would unfailingly abide in Thee.
I know no fear, with Thee at hand to bless,
Sin hath no power and life no wretchedness;
Health, hope and love in all around I see
For those who trustingly abide in Thee.
I know Thy presence every passing hour,
I know Thy peace, for Thou alone art power;
O Love divine, abiding constantly,
I need not plead, Thou dost abide with me.
Readings from the Bible
Job 11:13‑18
If thou prepare thine heart,
and stretch out thine hands toward him; If iniquity be in thine hand, put it
far away, and let not wickedness dwell in thy tabernacles. For then shalt thou lift up thy face without
spot; yea, thou shalt be stedfast, and shalt not fear: Because thou shalt
forget thy misery, and remember it as waters that pass away: And thine age
shall be clearer than the noonday; thou shalt shine forth, thou shalt be as the
morning. And thou shalt be secure,
because there is hope; yea, thou shalt dig about thee, and thou shalt take thy
rest in safety.
Psalms 16:1‑11
Preserve me, O God: for in
thee do I put my trust. O my soul, thou
hast said unto the Lord, Thou art my Lord: my goodness extendeth not to thee;
But to the saints that are in the earth, and to the excellent, in whom is all
my delight. Their sorrows shall be
multiplied that hasten after another god: their drink offerings of blood will I
not offer, nor take up their names into my lips. The Lord is the portion of mine inheritance
and of my cup: thou maintainest my lot.
The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places; yea, I have a goodly
heritage. I will bless the Lord, who
hath given me counsel: my reins also instruct me in the night seasons. I have set the Lord always before me: because
he is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.
Therefore my heart is glad, and my glory rejoiceth: my flesh also shall
rest in hope. For thou wilt not leave my
soul in hell; neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption. Thou wilt shew me the path of life: in thy
presence is fulness of joy; at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore.
Psalms 31:15‑17 (to :)
My times are in thy hand:
deliver me from the hand of mine enemies, and from them that persecute me. Make thy face to shine upon thy servant: save
me for thy mercies' sake. Let me not be
ashamed, O Lord; for I have called upon thee:
Psalms 42:5,8 the,11
Why art thou cast down, O my
soul? and why art thou disquieted in me? hope thou in God: for I shall yet
praise him for the help of his countenance.
the Lord will command his
lovingkindness in the daytime, and in the night his song shall be with me, and
my prayer unto the God of my life.
Why art thou cast down, O my
soul? and why art thou disquieted within me? hope thou in God: for I shall yet
praise him, who is the health of my countenance, and my God.
Psalms 71:1‑5
In thee, O Lord, do I put my
trust: let me never be put to confusion.
Deliver me in thy righteousness, and cause me to escape: incline thine
ear unto me, and save me. Be thou my
strong habitation, whereunto I may continually resort: thou hast given
commandment to save me; for thou art my rock and my fortress. Deliver me, O my God, out of the hand of the
wicked, out of the hand of the unrighteous and cruel man. For thou art my hope, O Lord God: thou art my
trust from my youth.
Psalms 119:113‑117
I hate vain thoughts: but thy
law do I love. Thou art my hiding place
and my shield: I hope in thy word.
Depart from me, ye evildoers: for I will keep the commandments of my
God. Uphold me according unto thy word,
that I may live: and let me not be ashamed of my hope. Hold thou me up, and I shall be safe: and I
will have respect unto thy statutes continually.
Psalms 130:5‑7
I wait for the Lord, my soul
doth wait, and in his word do I hope. My
soul waiteth for the Lord more than they that watch for the morning: I say,
more than they that watch for the morning.
Let Israel hope in the Lord: for with the Lord there is mercy, and with
him is plenteous redemption.
Jeremiah 17:7,8
Blessed is the man that
trusteth in the Lord, and whose hope the Lord is. For he shall be as a tree planted by the
waters, and that spreadeth out her roots by the river, and shall not see when
heat cometh, but her leaf shall be green; and shall not be careful in the year
of drought, neither shall cease from yielding fruit.
Lamentations 3:21‑26
This I recall to my mind,
therefore have I hope. It is of the
Lord's mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not. They are new every morning: great is thy
faithfulness. The Lord is my portion,
saith my soul; therefore will I hope in him.
The Lord is good unto them that wait for him, to the soul that seeketh
him. It is good that a man should both
hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord.
Acts 2:25‑28 I foresaw
I foresaw the Lord always
before my face, for he is on my right hand, that I should not be moved:
Therefore did my heart rejoice, and my tongue was glad; moreover also my flesh
shall rest in hope: Because thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, neither wilt
thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption.
Thou hast made known to me the ways of life; thou shalt make me full of
joy with thy countenance.
Romans 5:1‑5
Therefore being justified by
faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ: By whom also we
have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of
the glory of God. And not only so, but
we glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh patience; And
patience, experience; and experience, hope: And hope maketh not ashamed;
because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is
given unto us.
Romans 8:24 we,25
we are saved by hope: but
hope that is seen is not hope: for what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope
for? But if we hope for that we see not,
then do we with patience wait for it.
Romans 15:13
Now the God of hope fill you
with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the
power of the Holy Ghost.
I Peter 1:13
Wherefore gird up the loins
of your mind, be sober, and hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought
unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ;
Readings from Science and Health With Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy
9:5
The test of all prayer lies in the answer to
these questions: Do we love our neighbor better because of this asking? Do we pursue the old selfishness, satisfied
with having prayed for something better, though we give no evidence of the
sincerity of our requests by living consistently with our prayer? If selfishness has given place to kindness,
we shall regard our neighbor unselfishly, and bless them that curse us; but we
shall never meet this great duty simply by asking that it may be done. There is a cross to be taken up before we can
enjoy the fruition of our hope and faith.
14:12
Become conscious for a single moment that
Life and intelligence are purely spiritual,‑‑neither in nor of matter,‑‑and the
body will then utter no complaints. If
suffering from a belief in sickness, you will find yourself suddenly well. Sorrow is turned into joy when the body is
controlled by spiritual Life, Truth, and Love.
Hence the hope of the promise Jesus bestows: "He that believeth on
me, the works that I do shall he do also; . . . because I go unto my
Father,"‑‑[because the Ego is absent from the body, and present with Truth
and Love.] The Lord's Prayer is the prayer
of Soul, not of material sense.
40:31
The nature of Christianity is peaceful and
blessed, but in order to enter into the kingdom, the anchor of hope must be
cast beyond the veil of matter into the Shekinah into which Jesus has passed
before us; and this advance beyond matter must come through the joys and
triumphs of the righteous as well as through their sorrows and
afflictions. Like our Master, we must
depart from material sense into the spiritual sense of being.
55:15
Truth's immortal idea is sweeping down the
centuries, gathering beneath its wings the sick and sinning. My weary hope tries to realize that happy
day, when man shall recognize the Science of Christ and love his neighbor as
himself,‑‑when he shall realize God's omnipotence and the healing power of the
divine Love in what it has done and is doing for mankind. The promises will be fulfilled. The time for the reappearing of the divine
healing is throughout all time; and whosoever layeth his earthly all on the
altar of divine Science, drinketh of Christ's cup now, and is endued with the
spirit and power of Christian healing.
125:12
As human thought changes from one stage to
another of conscious pain and painlessness, sorrow and joy,‑‑from fear to hope
and from faith to understanding,‑‑the visible manifestation will at last be man
governed by Soul, not by material sense.
Reflecting God's government, man is self‑governed. When subordinate to the divine Spirit, man
cannot be controlled by sin or death, thus proving our material theories about
laws of health to be valueless.
190:14‑31
Human birth, growth, maturity, and decay are
as the grass springing from the soil with beautiful green blades, afterwards to
wither and return to its native nothingness.
This mortal seeming is temporal; it never merges into immortal being,
but finally disappears, and immortal man, spiritual and eternal, is found to be
the real man.
The Hebrew bard, swayed by mortal thoughts,
thus swept his lyre with saddening strains on human existence:
As for man, his days are as grass:
As a flower of the field, so he
flourisheth.
For the wind passeth over it, and it is
gone;
And the place thereof shall know it no
more.
When hope rose higher in the
human heart, he sang:
As for me, I will behold Thy face in
righteousness:
I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with
Thy likeness. . . .
For with Thee is the fountain of life;
In Thy light shall we see light.
297:32‑24
A mortal belief fulfils its own
conditions. Sickness, sin, and death are
the vague realities of human conclusions.
Life, Truth, and Love are the realities of divine Science. They dawn in faith and glow full‑orbed in
spiritual understanding. As a cloud
hides the sun it cannot extinguish, so false belief silences for a while the
voice of immutable harmony, but false belief cannot destroy Science armed with
faith, hope, and fruition.
What is termed material sense can report only
a mortal temporary sense of things, whereas spiritual sense can bear witness
only to Truth. To material sense, the
unreal is the real until this sense is corrected by Christian Science.
Spiritual sense, contradicting the material
senses, involves intuition, hope, faith, understanding, fruition, reality. Material sense expresses the belief that mind
is in matter. This human belief,
alternating between a sense of pleasure and pain, hope and fear, life and
death, never reaches beyond the boundary of the mortal or the unreal. When the real is attained, which is announced
by Science, joy is no longer a trembler, nor is hope a cheat. Spiritual ideas, like numbers and notes,
start from Principle, and admit no materialistic beliefs. Spiritual ideas lead up to their divine
origin, God, and to the spiritual sense of being.
420:10
Instruct the sick that they are not helpless
victims, for if they will only accept Truth, they can resist disease and ward
it off, as positively as they can the temptation to sin. This fact of Christian Science should be
explained to invalids when they are in a fit mood to receive it,‑‑when they
will not array themselves against it, but are ready to become receptive to the
new idea. The fact that Truth overcomes
both disease and sin reassures depressed hope.
It imparts a healthy stimulus to the body, and regulates the
system. It increases or diminishes the
action, as the case may require, better than any drug, alterative, or
tonic.
446:5‑23
A thorough perusal of the author's
publications heals sickness. If patients
sometimes seem worse while reading this book, the change may either arise from
the alarm of the physician, or it may mark the crisis of the disease. Perseverance in the perusal of the book has
generally completely healed such cases.
Whoever practises the Science the author
teaches, through which Mind pours light and healing upon this generation, can
practise on no one from sinister or malicious motives without destroying his
own power to heal and his own health.
Good must dominate in the thoughts of the healer, or his demonstration
is protracted, dangerous, and impossible in Science. A wrong motive involves defeat. In the Science of Mind‑healing, it is
imperative to be honest, for victory rests on the side of immutable right. To understand God strengthens hope, enthrones
faith in Truth, and verifies Jesus' word: "Lo, I am with you alway, even unto
the end of the world."
558:1‑31 np
St. John writes, in the tenth chapter of his
book of Revelation:‑‑
And I saw another mighty angel come down from
heaven, clothed with a cloud: and a
rainbow was upon his head, and his face was as it were the sun, and his feet as
pillars of fire: and he had in his hand
a little book open: and he set his right
foot upon the sea, and his left foot on the earth.
This angel or message which comes from God,
clothed with a cloud, prefigures divine Science. To mortal sense Science seems at first
obscure, abstract, and dark; but a bright promise crowns its brow. When understood, it is Truth's prism and
praise. When you look it fairly in the
face, you can heal by its means, and it has for you a light above the sun, for
God "is the light thereof."
Its feet are pillars of fire, foundations of Truth and Love. It brings the baptism of the Holy Ghost,
whose flames of Truth were prophetically described by John the Baptist as
consuming error.
This angel had in his hand "a little
book," open for all to read and understand. Did this same book contain the revelation of
divine Science, the "right foot" or dominant power of which was upon
the sea,‑‑upon elementary, latent error, the source of all error's visible
forms? The angel's left foot was upon
the earth; that is, a secondary power was exercised upon visible error and
audible sin. The "still, small
voice" of scientific thought reaches over continent and ocean to the
globe's remotest bound. The inaudible
voice of Truth is, to the human mind, "as when a lion roareth." It is
heard in the desert and in dark places of fear.
It arouses the "seven thunders" of evil, and stirs their
latent forces to utter the full diapason of secret tones. Then is the power of Truth demonstrated,‑‑made
manifest in the destruction of error.
Then will a voice from harmony cry: "Go and take the little book. .
. . Take it, and eat it up; and it shall make thy belly bitter, but it shall be
in thy mouth sweet as honey."
Mortals, obey the heavenly evangel.
Take divine Science. Read this
book from beginning to end. Study it,
ponder it. It will be indeed sweet at
its first taste, when it heals you; but murmur not over Truth, if you find its
digestion bitter. When you approach
nearer and nearer to this divine Principle, when you eat the divine body of
this Principle,‑‑thus partaking of the nature, or primal elements, of Truth and
Love, ‑‑do not be surprised nor discontented because you must share the hemlock
cup and eat the bitter herbs; for the Israelites of old at the Paschal meal
thus prefigured this perilous passage out of bondage into the El Dorado of
faith and hope.
Silent prayer followed by the audible repetition of the Lord’s Prayer.
Hymn 30
Love – Mary Baker Eddy
Brood o'er us with Thy shelt'ring wing,
'Neath which our spirits blend
Like brother birds, that soar and sing,
And on the same branch bend.
The arrow that doth wound the dove
Darts not from those who watch and love.
If thou the bending reed wouldst break
By thought or word unkind,
Pray that his spirit you partake,
Who loved and healed mankind:
Seek holy thoughts and heavenly strain,
That make men one in love remain.
Learn, too, that wisdom's rod is given
For faith to kiss, and know;
That greetings glorious from high heaven,
Whence joys supernal flow,
Come from that Love, divinely near,
Which chastens pride and earth‑born fear,
Through God, who gave that word of might
Which swelled creation's lay:
"Let there be light, and there was
light."
What chased the clouds away?
'Twas Love whose finger traced aloud
A bow of promise on the cloud.
Thou to whose power our hope we give,
Free us from human strife.
Fed by Thy love divine we live,
For Love alone is Life;
And life most sweet, as heart to heart
Speaks kindly when we meet and part.
Sharing of experiences,
testimonies and remarks by members of the congregation.
Hymn 148
Anna L. Waring*
In heavenly Love abiding,
No change my heart shall fear;
And safe is such confiding,
For nothing changes here.
The storm may roar without me,
My heart may low be laid;
But God is round about me,
And can I be dismayed?
Wherever He may guide me,
No want shall turn me back;
My Shepherd is beside me,
And nothing can I lack.
His wisdom ever waketh,
His sight is never dim;
He knows the way He taketh,
And I will walk with Him.
Green pastures are before me,
Which yet I have not seen;
Bright skies will soon be o'er me,
Where darkest clouds have been.
My hope I cannot measure,
My path in life is free;
My Father has my treasure,
And He will walk with me.
