Wednesday Evening Readings 3/22/23
Christian Science Hymnals
64, 144, 329
Due to various copyright laws, only hymn numbers will be posted. Please be sure to read the hymns as they are very much a part of the readings.
These readings were inspired by the Scientific Statement of Being from Science and Health by Eddy
From the Holy Bible, New Living Translation
1. Deuteronomy 6:4,5
Listen, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord alone.
And you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your strength.
2. 1 Kings 18:20-25 Ahab, 26, (to 2nd .), 29, 30, 31-36, 38, 39
… Ahab summond all the people of Israel and the prophet to Mount Carmel 21 Then Elijah stood in front of them and said, “How much longer will you waver, hobbling between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him! But if Baal is God, then follow him!” But the people were completely silent.
Then Elijah said to them, “I am the only prophet of the Lord who is left, but Baal has 450 prophets. 23 Now bring two bulls. The prophets of Baal may choose whichever one they wish and cut it into pieces and lay it on the wood of their altar, but without setting fire to it. I will prepare the other bull and lay it on the wood on the altar, but not set fire to it. Then call on the name of your god, and I will call on the name of the Lord. The god who answers by setting fire to the wood is the true God!” And all the people agreed.
Then Elijah said to the prophets of Baal, “You go first, for there are many of you. Choose one of the bulls, and prepare it and call on the name of your god. But do not set fire to the wood.”
So they prepared one of the bulls and placed it on the altar. Then they called on the name of Baal from morning until noontime, shouting, “O Baal, answer us!” But there was no reply of any kind.
They raved all afternoon until the time of the evening sacrifice, but still there was no sound, no reply, no response.
Then Elijah called to the people, “Come over here!” They all crowded around him as he repaired the altar of the Lord that had been torn down.
He took twelve stones, one to represent each of the tribes of Israel, 32 and he used the stones to rebuild the altar in the name of the Lord. Then he dug a trench around the altar large enough to hold about three gallons. 33 He piled wood on the altar, cut the bull into pieces, and laid the pieces on the wood.
Then he said, “Fill four large jars with water, and pour the water over the offering and the wood.”
After they had done this, he said, “Do the same thing again!” And when they were finished, he said, “Now do it a third time!” So they did as he said, 35 and the water ran around the altar and even filled the trench.
At the usual time for offering the evening sacrifice, Elijah the prophet walked up to the altar and prayed, “O Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, prove today that you are God in Israel and that I am your servant. Prove that I have done all this at your command.
Immediately the fire of the Lord flashed down from heaven and burned up the young bull, the wood, the stones, and the dust. It even licked up all the water in the trench!
And when all the people saw it, they fell face down on the ground and cried out, “The Lord—he is God! Yes, the Lord is God!”
3. John 4:24
For God is Spirit, so those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth.”
4. John 1:17 the
...the law was given through Moses, but God’s unfailing love and faithfulness came through Jesus Christ.
5. John 9:1-3, 6, 7
As Jesus was walking along, he saw a man who had been blind from birth. 2 “Rabbi,” his disciples asked him, “why was this man born blind? Was it because of his own sins or his parents’ sins?”
“It was not because of his sins or his parents’ sins,” Jesus answered. “This happened so the power of God could be seen in him.
Then he spit on the ground, made mud with the saliva, and spread the mud over the blind man’s eyes.
He told him, “Go wash yourself in the pool of Siloam” (Siloam means “sent”). So the man went and washed and came back seeing!
7. John 11:1, 4 When, 7 he, 11 our, 17, 21, 23, 32, 34, 39 (to 1st .), 41-44
A man named Lazarus was sick. He lived in Bethany with his sisters, Mary and Martha.
…when Jesus heard about it he said, “Lazarus’s sickness will not end in death. No, it happened for the glory of God so that the Son of God will receive glory from this.”
…he said to his disciples, “Let’s go back to Judea.”
…Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but now I will go and wake him up.”
When Jesus arrived at Bethany, he was told that Lazarus had already been in his grave for four days.
Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if only you had been here, my brother would not have died.
Jesus told her, “Your brother will rise again.”
When Mary arrived and saw Jesus, she fell at his feet and said, “Lord, if only you had been here, my brother would not have died.”
“Where have you put him?” he asked them.
They told him, “Lord, come and see.”
“Roll the stone aside,” Jesus told them.
So they rolled the stone aside. Then Jesus looked up to heaven and said, “Father, thank you for hearing me. 42 You always hear me, but I said it out loud for the sake of all these people standing here, so that they will believe you sent me.” Then Jesus shouted, “Lazarus, come out!” 44 And the dead man came out, his hands and feet bound in graveclothes, his face wrapped in a headcloth. Jesus told them, “Unwrap him and let him go!”
8. Romans 8:1, 2, 6-9 (to 2nd .), 31, 35, 37-39,
So now there is no condemnation for those who belong to Christ Jesus.
And because you belong to him, the law of the life-giving Spirit has freed you from the power of sin that leads to death.
So letting your sinful nature control your mind leads to death. But letting the Spirit control your mind leads to life and peace. 7 For the sinful nature is always hostile to God. It never did obey God’s laws, and it never will. 8 That’s why those who are still under the control of their sinful nature can never please God.
But you are not controlled by your sinful nature. You are controlled by the Spirit if you have the Spirit of God living in you.
What shall we say about such wonderful things as these? If God is for us, who can ever be against us?
Can anything ever separate us from Christ’s love? Does it mean he no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death?
No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us.
And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,[a] neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. 39 No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.
9. 1 John 3:1-3
See how very much our Father loves us, for he calls us his children, and that is what we are! But the people who belong to this world don’t recognize that we are God’s children because they don’t know him. 2 Dear friends, we are already God’s children, but he has not yet shown us what we will be like when Christ appears. But we do know that we will be like him, for we will see him as he really is. 3 And all who have this eager expectation will keep themselves pure, just as he is pure.
From Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy
1. SH 521:12 We
We should look away from the opposite supposition that man is created materially, and turn our gaze to the spiritual record of creation, to that which should be engraved on the understanding and heart “with the point of a diamond” and the pen of an angel.
2. SH 504:3–4, 6–14
Genesis i. 5. And God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night.
All questions as to the divine creation being both spiritual and material are answered in this passage, for though solar beams are not yet included in the record of creation, still there is light. This light is not from the sun nor from volcanic flames, but it is the revelation of Truth and of spiritual ideas. This also shows that there is no place where God's light is not seen, since Truth, Life, and Love fill immensity and are ever-present.
3. SH 468:9–10 There, 25 What, 26–29 Life; 469:1–2, 3–5 (to 1st .)
There is no life, truth, intelligence, nor sub-stance in matter.
What is Life?
Life is divine Principle, Mind, Soul, Spirit. Life is without beginning and without end. Eternity, not time, expresses the thought of Life, and time is no part of eternity.
Life is neither in nor of matter.
Matter is a human concept. Life is divine Mind. Life is not limited.
4. SH 216:28–1
When you say, “Man's body is material,” I say with Paul: Be “willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord.” Give up your material belief of mind in matter, and have but one Mind, even God; for this Mind forms its own likeness.
5. SH 468:9–10 There
There is no life, truth, intelligence, nor sub-stance in matter.
6. SH viii:12–15
The question, What is Truth, is answered by demonstration, — by healing both disease and sin; and this demonstration shows that Christian healing confers the most health and makes the best men.
7. SH 117:27
Truth is a revelation.
8. SH 466:13–16
Truth is immortal; error is mortal. Truth is limitless; error is limited. Truth is intelligent; error is non-intelligent. Moreover, Truth is real, and error is unreal.
9. SH 371:30
Truth is an alterative in the entire system, and can make it “every whit whole.”
10. SH 380:4 (only)
Truth is always the victor.
11. SH 468:9–10 There; 469:7 What, 8 Intelligence
There is no life, truth, intelligence, nor sub-stance in matter.
What is intelligence?
Intelligence is omniscience, omnipresence, and omnipotence. It is the primal and eternal quality of infinite Mind, of the triune Principle, — Life, Truth, and Love, — named God.
12. SH 171:25
The so-called laws of matter are nothing but false beliefs that intelligence and life are present where Mind is not. These false beliefs are the procuring cause of all sin and disease. The opposite truth, that intelligence and life are spiritual, never material, destroys sin, sickness, and death.
13. SH 184:16–17
Controlled by the divine intelligence, man is harmonious and eternal.
14. SH 2:23–24 2nd God
God is intelligence.
15. SH 468:9–10 There, 16 What, 17–22 Substance
There is no life, truth, intelligence, nor substance in matter.
What is substance?
Substance is that which is eternal and incapable of discord and decay. Truth, Life, and Love are substance, as the Scriptures use this word in Hebrews: “The substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” Spirit, the synonym of Mind, Soul, or God, is the only real substance.
16. SH 468:9–11 There; 469:12 What, 13–21 Mind
There is no life, truth, intelligence, nor sub-stance in matter. All is infinite Mind and its infinite manifestation, for God is All-in-all.
What is Mind?
Mind is God. The exterminator of error is the great truth that God, good, is the only Mind, and that the supposititious opposite of infinite Mind — called devil or evil — is not Mind, is not Truth, but error, without intelligence or reality. There can be but one Mind, because there is but one God; and if mortals claimed no other Mind and accepted no other, sin would be unknown. We can have but one Mind, if that one is infinite.
17. SH 262:27–31
The foundation of mortal discord is a false sense of man's origin. To begin rightly is to end rightly. Every concept which seems to begin with the brain begins falsely. Divine Mind is the only cause or Principle of existence.
18. SH 109:4–6
Christian Science reveals incontrovertibly that Mind is All-in-all, that the only realities are the divine Mind and idea.
19. SH 43:28
The Science Jesus taught and lived must triumph over all material beliefs about life, substance, and intelligence, and the multitudinous errors growing from such beliefs.
20. SH 14:25–28
Entirely separate from the belief and dream of mate-rial living, is the Life divine, revealing spiritual understanding and the consciousness of man's dominion over the whole earth.
21. SH 471:13–20
The facts of divine Science should be admitted, — although the evidence as to these facts is not supported by evil, by matter, or by material sense, — because the evidence that God and man coexist is fully sustained by spiritual sense. Man is, and forever has been, God's reflection. God is infinite, therefore ever present, and there is no other power nor presence. Hence the spirituality of the universe is the only fact of creation.
22. SH 476:21–22
Learn this, O mortal, and earnestly seek the spiritual status of man, which is outside of all material selfhood.
23. SH 113:18
God, Spirit, being all, nothing is matter.
24. SH 468:8–15
Question. — What is the scientific statement of being?
Answer. — There is no life, truth, intelligence, nor sub-stance in matter. All is infinite Mind and its infinite manifestation, for God is All-in-all. Spirit is immortal Truth; matter is mortal error. Spirit is the real and eternal; matter is the unreal and temporal. Spirit is God, and man is His image and likeness. Therefore man is not material; he is spiritual.
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