Theme: Vision
Hymn 421
Violet Hay
From these Thy children gathered in Thy name,
From hearts made whole, from lips redeemed
from woe,
Thy praise, O Father, shall forever flow.
Alleluia!
Alleluia!
O perfect Life, in Thy completeness held,
None can beyond Thy omnipresence stray;
Safe in Thy Love, we live and sing alway
Alleluia!
Alleluia!
O perfect Mind, reveal Thy likeness true,
That higher selfhood which we all must prove,
Joy and dominion, love reflecting Love.
Alleluia!
Alleluia!
Thou, Soul, inspiring‑‑give us vision clear,
Break earth‑bound fetters, sweep away the
veil,
Show the new heaven and earth that shall
prevail.
Alleluia!
Alleluia!
Readings from the Bible.
Psalms 19:1‑14
The heavens declare the glory
of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork. Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto
night sheweth knowledge. There is no
speech nor language, where their voice is not heard. Their line is gone out through all the earth,
and their words to the end of the world. In them hath he set a tabernacle for
the sun, Which is as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber, and rejoiceth as a
strong man to run a race. His going
forth is from the end of the heaven, and his circuit unto the ends of it: and
there is nothing hid from the heat thereof.
The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul: the testimony of
the Lord is sure, making wise the simple.
The statutes of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart: the commandment
of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes.
The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring for ever: the judgments of the
Lord are true and righteous altogether.
More to be desired are they than gold, yea, than much fine gold: sweeter
also than honey and the honeycomb.
Moreover by them is thy servant warned: and in keeping of them there is
great reward. Who can understand his
errors? cleanse thou me from secret
faults. Keep back thy servant also from
presumptuous sins; let them not have dominion over me: then shall I be upright,
and I shall be innocent from the great transgression. Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation
of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, my strength, and my redeemer.
Proverbs 3:1‑8
My son, forget not my law;
but let thine heart keep my commandments: For length of days, and long life,
and peace, shall they add to thee. Let
not mercy and truth forsake thee: bind them about thy neck; write them upon the
table of thine heart: So shalt thou find favour and good understanding in the
sight of God and man. #Trust in the Lord
with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall
direct thy paths. #Be not wise in thine
own eyes: fear the Lord, and depart from evil.
It shall be health to thy navel, and marrow to thy bones.
Proverbs 20:12
The hearing ear, and the
seeing eye, the Lord hath made even both of them.
Isaiah 33:15‑17
He that walketh righteously,
and speaketh uprightly; he that despiseth the gain of oppressions, that shaketh
his hands from holding of bribes, that stoppeth his ears from hearing of blood,
and shutteth his eyes from seeing evil; He shall dwell on high: his place of
defence shall be the munitions of rocks: bread shall be given him; his waters
shall be sure. Thine eyes shall see the
king in his beauty: they shall behold the land that is very far off.
Isaiah 43:1‑7 now
now thus saith the Lord that created thee, O
Jacob, and he that formed thee, O Israel, Fear not: for I have redeemed thee, I
have called thee by thy name; thou art mine.
When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through
the rivers, they shall not overflow thee: when thou walkest through the fire,
thou shalt not be burned; neither shall the flame kindle upon thee. For I am the Lord thy God, the Holy One of
Israel, thy Saviour: I gave Egypt for thy ransom, Ethiopia and Seba for
thee. Since thou wast precious in my
sight, thou hast been honourable, and I have loved thee: therefore will I give
men for thee, and people for thy life.
Fear not: for I am with thee: I will bring thy seed from the east, and
gather thee from the west; I will say to the north, Give up; and to the south,
Keep not back: bring my sons from far, and my daughters from the ends of the
earth; Even every one that is called by my name: for I have created him for my glory,
I have formed him; yea, I have made him.
Matthew 11:1‑6
And it came to pass, when
Jesus had made an end of commanding his twelve disciples, he departed thence to
teach and to preach in their cities. Now
when John had heard in the prison the works of Christ, he sent two of his
disciples, And said unto him, Art thou he that should come, or do we look for
another? Jesus answered and said unto
them, Go and shew John again those things which ye do hear and see: The blind
receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf
hear, the dead are raised up, and the poor have the gospel preached to
them. And blessed is he, whosoever shall
not be offended in me.
Matthew 20:30‑34
#And, behold, two blind men
sitting by the way side, when they heard that Jesus passed by, cried out,
saying, Have mercy on us, O Lord, thou Son of David. And the multitude rebuked them, because they
should hold their peace: but they cried the more, saying, Have mercy on us, O
Lord, thou Son of David. And Jesus stood
still, and called them, and said, What will ye that I shall do unto you? They say unto him, Lord, that our eyes may be
opened. So Jesus had compassion on them,
and touched their eyes: and immediately their eyes received sight, and they
followed him.
Luke 4:16‑21 he
he came to Nazareth, where he
had been brought up: and, as his custom was, he went into the synagogue on the
sabbath day, and stood up for to read.
And there was delivered unto him the book of the prophet Esaias. And when he had opened the book, he found the
place where it was written, The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath
anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the
brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight
to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, To preach the acceptable
year of the Lord. And he closed the
book, and he gave it again to the minister, and sat down. And the eyes of all
them that were in the synagogue were fastened on him. And he began to say unto them, This day is
this scripture fulfilled in your ears.
John 9:1‑11 as
as Jesus passed by, he saw a
man which was blind from his birth. And
his disciples asked him, saying, Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents,
that he was born blind? Jesus answered,
Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents: but that the works of God should
be made manifest in him. I must work the
works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can
work. As long as I am in the world, I am
the light of the world. When he had thus
spoken, he spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and he anointed
the eyes of the blind man with the clay, And said unto him, Go, wash in the
pool of Siloam, (which is by interpretation, Sent.) He went his way therefore,
and washed, and came seeing. #The
neighbours therefore, and they which before had seen him that he was blind,
said, Is not this he that sat and begged?
Some said, This is he: others said, He is like him: but he said, I am
he. Therefore said they unto him, How
were thine eyes opened? He answered and
said, A man that is called Jesus made clay, and anointed mine eyes, and said
unto me, Go to the pool of Siloam, and wash: and I went and washed, and I
received sight.
Acts 17:24‑28
God that made the world and
all things therein, seeing that he is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in
temples made with hands; Neither is worshipped with men's hands, as though he
needed any thing, seeing he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things; And
hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the
earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their
habitation; That they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after him,
and find him, though he be not far from every one of us: For in him we live,
and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For
we are also his offspring.
Readings from Science and Health with Key to the
Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy.
215:11‑21
Spiritual vision is not subordinate to
geometric altitudes. Whatever is
governed by God, is never for an instant deprived of the light and might of
intelligence and Life.
We are sometimes led to believe that darkness
is as real as light; but Science affirms darkness to be only a mortal sense of
the absence of light, at the coming of which darkness loses the appearance of
reality. So sin and sorrow, disease and
death, are the suppositional absence of Life, God, and flee as phantoms of
error before truth and love.
301:5‑29
Few persons comprehend what Christian Science
means by the word reflection. To himself, mortal and material man seems to
be substance, but his sense of substance involves error and therefore is
material, temporal.
On the other hand, the immortal, spiritual
man is really substantial, and reflects the eternal substance, or Spirit, which
mortals hope for. He reflects the
divine, which constitutes the only real and eternal entity. This reflection seems to mortal sense
transcendental, because the spiritual man's substantiality transcends mortal
vision and is revealed only through divine Science.
As God is substance and man is the divine
image and likeness, man should wish for, and in reality has, only the substance
of good, the substance of Spirit, not matter.
The belief that man has any other substance, or mind, is not spiritual
and breaks the First Commandment, Thou shalt have one God, one Mind. Mortal man seems to himself to be material
substance, while man is "image" (idea). Delusion, sin, disease, and death arise from
the false testimony of material sense, which, from a supposed standpoint
outside the focal distance of infinite Spirit, presents an inverted image of
Mind and substance with everything turned upside down.
487:3
Life is deathless. Life is the origin and ultimate of man, never
attainable through death, but gained by walking in the pathway of Truth both
before and after that which is called death.
There is more Christianity in seeing and hearing spiritually than
materially. There is more Science in the
perpetual exercise of the Mind‑faculties than in their loss. Lost they cannot be, while Mind remains. The apprehension of this gave sight to the
blind and hearing to the deaf centuries ago, and it will repeat the
wonder.
535:29
In the first chapter of Genesis we read:
"And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the
waters called He Seas." In the
Apocalypse it is written: "And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were
passed away; and there was no more sea."
In St. John's vision, heaven and
earth stand for spiritual ideas, and the sea, as a symbol of tempest‑tossed
human concepts advancing and receding, is represented as having passed
away. The divine understanding reigns,
is all, and there is no other
consciousness.
572:19‑574:2
In Revelation xxi. 1 we read:‑‑
And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were
passed away; and there was no more sea.
The Revelator had not yet passed the
transitional stage in human experience called death, but he already saw a new
heaven and a new earth. Through what
sense came this vision to St. John? Not
through the material visual organs for seeing, for optics are inadequate to
take in so wonderful a scene. Were this
new heaven and new earth terrestrial or celestial, material or spiritual? They could not be the former, for the human
sense of space is unable to grasp such a view.
The Revelator was on our plane of existence, while yet beholding what
the eye cannot see,‑‑that which is invisible to the uninspired thought. This testimony of Holy Writ sustains the fact
in Science, that the heavens and earth to one human consciousness, that
consciousness which God bestows, are spiritual, while to another, the
unillumined human mind, the vision is material.
This shows unmistakably that what the human mind terms matter and spirit
indicates states and stages of consciousness.
Accompanying this scientific consciousness
was another revelation, even the declaration from heaven, supreme harmony, that
God, the divine Principle of harmony, is ever with men, and they are His
people. Thus man was no longer regarded
as a miserable sinner, but as the blessed child of God. Why?
Because St. John's corporeal sense of the heavens and earth had
vanished, and in place of this false sense was the spiritual sense, the
subjective state by which he could see the new heaven and new earth, which
involve the spiritual idea and consciousness of reality. This is Scriptural authority for concluding
that such a recognition of being is, and has been, possible to men in this
present state of existence,‑‑that we can become conscious, here and now, of a
cessation of death, sorrow, and pain.
This is indeed a foretaste of absolute Christian Science. Take heart, dear sufferer, for this reality
of being will surely appear sometime and in some way. There will be no more pain, and all tears
will be wiped away. When you read this,
remember Jesus' words, "The kingdom of God is within you." This spiritual consciousness is therefore a
present possibility.
586:3‑6 (to ))
EYES.
Spiritual discernment,‑‑not material but mental.
Jesus said, thinking of the outward vision,
"Having eyes, see ye not?" (Mark viii. 18.)
Silent prayer followed by the audible repetition of the Lord’s Prayer.
Hymn 287
Edith Gaddis Brewer
Prayer with our waking thought ascends,
Great God of light, to Thee;
Darkness is banished in the glow
Of Thy reality.
Lo, to our widening vision dawns
The realm of Soul supreme,
Faith‑lighted peaks of Spirit stand
Revealed in morning's beam.
Thus in Thy radiance vanishes
Death's drear and gloomy night;
Thus all creation hears anew
Truth's call, Let there be light.
Sharing of experiences,
testimonies and remarks by members of the congregation.
Hymn 265
Samuel Johnson – Adapted
Onward, Christian, though the region
Where thou art seem drear and lone;
God hath set a guardian legion
Very near thee, press thou on.
By the Christ road, and none other,
Is the mount of vision won;
Tread it with rejoicing, brother:
Jesus trod it, press thou on.
By thy trustful, calm endeavor,
Guiding, cheering, like the sun,
Earth‑bound hearts thou shalt deliver;
O, for their sake, press thou on.
