Responsive Reading: Psalm 51 : 1, 10-13, 15

1.     Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy lovingkindness: according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my transgressions.

10.     Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.

11.     Cast me not away from thy presence; and take not thy holy spirit from me.

12.     Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation; and uphold me with thy free spirit.

13.     Then will I teach transgressors thy ways; and sinners shall be converted unto thee.

15.     O Lord, open thou my lips; and my mouth shall shew forth thy praise.

1. Jeremiah 31 : 33 (this)-34

33     …this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the Lord, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people.

34     And they shall teach no more every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the Lord: for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.

2. Luke 19 : 1 (Jesus)-10

1     Jesus entered and passed through Jericho.

2     And, behold, there was a man named Zacchæus, which was the chief among the publicans, and he was rich.

3     And he sought to see Jesus who he was; and could not for the press, because he was little of stature.

4     And he ran before, and climbed up into a sycomore tree to see him: for he was to pass that way.

5     And when Jesus came to the place, he looked up, and saw him, and said unto him, Zacchæus, make haste, and come down; for to day I must abide at thy house.

6     And he made haste, and came down, and received him joyfully.

7     And when they saw it, they all murmured, saying, That he was gone to be guest with a man that is a sinner.

8     And Zacchæus stood, and said unto the Lord; Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have taken any thing from any man by false accusation, I restore him fourfold.

9     And Jesus said unto him, This day is salvation come to this house, forsomuch as he also is a son of Abraham.

10     For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost.

3. Matthew 4 : 23 (Jesus)-25

23     Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all manner of sickness and all manner of disease among the people.

24     And his fame went throughout all Syria: and they brought unto him all sick people that were taken with divers diseases and torments, and those which were possessed with devils, and those which were lunatick, and those that had the palsy; and he healed them.

25     And there followed him great multitudes of people from Galilee, and from Decapolis, and from Jerusalem, and from Judæa, and from beyond Jordan.

4. John 21 : 4 (when)-14

4     …when the morning was now come, Jesus stood on the shore: but the disciples knew not that it was Jesus.

5     Then Jesus saith unto them, Children, have ye any meat? They answered him, No.

6     And he said unto them, Cast the net on the right side of the ship, and ye shall find. They cast therefore, and now they were not able to draw it for the multitude of fishes.

7     Therefore that disciple whom Jesus loved saith unto Peter, It is the Lord. Now when Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he girt his fisher’s coat unto him, (for he was naked,) and did cast himself into the sea.

8     And the other disciples came in a little ship; (for they were not far from land, but as it were two hundred cubits,) dragging the net with fishes.

9     As soon then as they were come to land, they saw a fire of coals there, and fish laid thereon, and bread.

10     Jesus saith unto them, Bring of the fish which ye have now caught.

11     Simon Peter went up, and drew the net to land full of great fishes, an hundred and fifty and three: and for all there were so many, yet was not the net broken.

12     Jesus saith unto them, Come and dine. And none of the disciples durst ask him, Who art thou? knowing that it was the Lord.

13     Jesus then cometh, and taketh bread, and giveth them, and fish likewise.

14     This is now the third time that Jesus shewed himself to his disciples, after that he was risen from the dead.

5. Psalm 116 : 1-9

1     I love the Lord, because he hath heard my voice and my supplications.

2     Because he hath inclined his ear unto me, therefore will I call upon him as long as I live.

3     The sorrows of death compassed me, and the pains of hell gat hold upon me: I found trouble and sorrow.

4     Then called I upon the name of the Lord; O Lord, I beseech thee, deliver my soul.

5     Gracious is the Lord, and righteous; yea, our God is merciful.

6     The Lord preserveth the simple: I was brought low, and he helped me.

7     Return unto thy rest, O my soul; for the Lord hath dealt bountifully with thee.

8     For thou hast delivered my soul from death, mine eyes from tears, and my feet from falling.

9     I will walk before the Lord in the land of the living.

6. Revelation 21 : 1-4

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.

2     And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.

3     And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God.

4     And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.

1. 99 : 23-29

The calm, strong currents of true spirituality, the manifestations of which are health, purity, and self-immolation, must deepen human experience, until the beliefs of material existence are seen to be a bald imposition, and sin, disease, and death give everlasting place to the scientific demonstration of divine Spirit and to God's spiritual, perfect man.

2. 248 : 26-32

We must form perfect models in thought and look at them continually, or we shall never carve them out in grand and noble lives. Let unselfishness, goodness, mercy, justice, health, holiness, love — the kingdom of heaven — reign within us, and sin, disease, and death will diminish until they finally disappear.

3. 166 : 23-32

Failing to recover health through adherence to physiology and hygiene, the despairing invalid often drops them, and in his extremity and only as a last resort, turns to God. The invalid's faith in the divine Mind is less than in drugs, air, and exercise, or he would have resorted to Mind first. The balance of power is conceded to be with matter by most of the medical systems; but when Mind at last asserts its mastery over sin, disease, and death, then is man found to be harmonious and immortal.

4. 317 : 16-23

The individuality of man is no less tangible because it is spiritual and because his life is not at the mercy of matter. The understanding of his spiritual individuality makes man more real, more formidable in truth, and enables him to conquer sin, disease, and death. Our Lord and Master presented himself to his disciples after his resurrection from the grave, as the self-same Jesus whom they had loved before the tragedy on Calvary.

5. 494 : 15 (Jesus)-24

Jesus demonstrated the inability of corporeality, as well as the infinite ability of Spirit, thus helping erring human sense to flee from its own convictions and seek safety in divine Science. Reason, rightly directed, serves to correct the errors of corporeal sense; but sin, sickness, and death will seem real (even as the experiences of the sleeping dream seem real) until the Science of man's eternal harmony breaks their illusion with the unbroken reality of scientific being. 

6. 429 : 31-11

Jesus said (John viii. 51), "If a man keep my saying, he shall never see death." That statement is not confined to spiritual life, but includes all the phenomena of existence. Jesus demonstrated this, healing the dying and raising the dead. Mortal mind must part with error, must put off itself with its deeds, and immortal manhood, the Christ ideal, will appear. Faith should enlarge its borders and strengthen its base by resting upon Spirit instead of matter. When man gives up his belief in death, he will advance more rapidly towards God, Life, and Love. Belief in sickness and death, as certainly as belief in sin, tends to shut out the true sense of Life and health.

7. 543 : 8-16

In divine Science, the material man is shut out from the presence of God. The five corporeal senses cannot take cognizance of Spirit. They cannot come into His presence, and must dwell in dreamland, until mortals arrive at the understanding that material life, with all its sin, sickness, and death, is an illusion, against which divine Science is engaged in a warfare of extermination. The great verities of existence are never excluded by falsity.

8. 395 : 6-14

Like the great Exemplar, the healer should speak to disease as one having authority over it, leaving Soul to master the false evidences of the corporeal senses and to assert its claims over mortality and disease. The same Principle cures both sin and sickness. When divine Science overcomes faith in a carnal mind, and faith in God destroys all faith in sin and in material methods of healing, then sin, disease, and death will disappear.

9. 253 : 9-17

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.

10. 572 : 19-25

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.

11. 573 : 19 (St.)-2

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.