Responsive Reading: Psalm 34 : 11-17, 21, 22

11.     Come, ye children, hearken unto me: I will teach you the fear of the Lord.

12.     What man is he that desireth life, and loveth many days, that he may see good?

13.     Keep thy tongue from evil, and thy lips from speaking guile.

14.     Depart from evil, and do good; seek peace, and pursue it.

15.     The eyes of the Lord are upon the righteous, and his ears are open unto their cry.

16.     The face of the Lord is against them that do evil, to cut off the remembrance of them from the earth.

17.     The righteous cry, and the Lord heareth, and delivereth them out of all their troubles.

21.     Evil shall slay the wicked: and they that hate the righteous shall be desolate.

22.     The Lord redeemeth the soul of his servants: and none of them that trust in him shall be desolate.

1. Psalm 97 : 1, 2, 4-6, 10, 12

1     The Lord reigneth; let the earth rejoice; let the multitude of isles be glad thereof.

2     Clouds and darkness are round about him: righteousness and judgment are the habitation of his throne.

4     His lightnings enlightened the world: the earth saw, and trembled.

5     The hills melted like wax at the presence of the Lord, at the presence of the Lord of the whole earth.

6     The heavens declare his righteousness, and all the people see his glory.

10     Ye that love the Lord, hate evil: he preserveth the souls of his saints; he delivereth them out of the hand of the wicked.

12     Rejoice in the Lord, ye righteous; and give thanks at the remembrance of his holiness.

2. II Chronicles 20 : 1-7, 10-12, 14 (to 1st ,), 14 (came)-16 (to :), 17, 20-22

1     It came to pass after this also, that the children of Moab, and the children of Ammon, and with them other beside the Ammonites, came against Jehoshaphat to battle.

2     Then there came some that told Jehoshaphat, saying, There cometh a great multitude against thee from beyond the sea on this side Syria; and, behold, they be in Hazazon-tamar, which is En-gedi.

3     And Jehoshaphat feared, and set himself to seek the Lord, and proclaimed a fast throughout all Judah.

4     And Judah gathered themselves together, to ask help of the Lord: even out of all the cities of Judah they came to seek the Lord.

5     And Jehoshaphat stood in the congregation of Judah and Jerusalem, in the house of the Lord, before the new court,

6     And said, O Lord God of our fathers, art not thou God in heaven? and rulest not thou over all the kingdoms of the heathen? and in thine hand is there not power and might, so that none is able to withstand thee?

7     Art not thou our God, who didst drive out the inhabitants of this land before thy people Israel, and gavest it to the seed of Abraham thy friend for ever?

10     And now, behold, the children of Ammon and Moab and mount Seir, whom thou wouldest not let Israel invade, when they came out of the land of Egypt, but they turned from them, and destroyed them not;

11     Behold, I say, how they reward us, to come to cast us out of thy possession, which thou hast given us to inherit.

12     O our God, wilt thou not judge them? for we have no might against this great company that cometh against us; neither know we what to do: but our eyes are upon thee.

14     Then upon Jahaziel the son of Zechariah, … came the Spirit of the Lord in the midst of the congregation;

15     And he said, Hearken ye, all Judah, and ye inhabitants of Jerusalem, and thou king Jehoshaphat, Thus saith the Lord unto you, Be not afraid nor dismayed by reason of this great multitude; for the battle is not yours, but God’s.

16     To morrow go ye down against them:

17     Ye shall not need to fight in this battle: set yourselves, stand ye still, and see the salvation of the Lord with you, O Judah and Jerusalem: fear not, nor be dismayed; to morrow go out against them: for the Lord will be with you.

20     And they rose early in the morning, and went forth into the wilderness of Tekoa: and as they went forth, Jehoshaphat stood and said, Hear me, O Judah, and ye inhabitants of Jerusalem; Believe in the Lord your God, so shall ye be established; believe his prophets, so shall ye prosper.

21     And when he had consulted with the people, he appointed singers unto the Lord, and that should praise the beauty of holiness, as they went out before the army, and to say, Praise the Lord; for his mercy endureth for ever.

22     And when they began to sing and to praise, the Lord set ambushments against the children of Ammon, Moab, and mount Seir, which were come against Judah; and they were smitten.

3. Psalm 91 : 1, 2, 4, 7-11, 14-16

1     He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.

2     I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge and my fortress: my God; in him will I trust.

4     He shall cover thee with his feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust: his truth shall be thy shield and buckler.

7     A thousand shall fall at thy side, and ten thousand at thy right hand; but it shall not come nigh thee.

8     Only with thine eyes shalt thou behold and see the reward of the wicked.

9     Because thou hast made the Lord, which is my refuge, even the most High, thy habitation;

10     There shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling.

11     For he shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways.

14     Because he hath set his love upon me, therefore will I deliver him: I will set him on high, because he hath known my name.

15     He shall call upon me, and I will answer him: I will be with him in trouble; I will deliver him, and honour him.

16     With long life will I satisfy him, and shew him my salvation.

1. 103 : 18-24

As named in Christian Science, animal magnetism or hypnotism is the specific term for error, or mortal mind. It is the false belief that mind is in matter, and is both evil and good; that evil is as real as good and more powerful. This belief has not one quality of Truth. It is either ignorant or malicious. The malicious form of hypnotism ultimates in moral idiocy.

2. 102 : 1-15

Animal magnetism has no scientific foundation, for God governs all that is real, harmonious, and eternal, and His power is neither animal nor human. Its basis being a belief and this belief animal, in Science animal magnetism, mesmerism, or hypnotism is a mere negation, possessing neither intelligence, power, nor reality, and in sense it is an unreal concept of the so-called mortal mind.

There is but one real attraction, that of Spirit. The pointing of the needle to the pole symbolizes this all-embracing power or the attraction of God, divine Mind.

The planets have no more power over man than over his Maker, since God governs the universe; but man, reflecting God's power, has dominion over all the earth and its hosts.

3. 104 : 13-22

Christian Science goes to the bottom of mental action, and reveals the theodicy which indicates the rightness of all divine action, as the emanation of divine Mind, and the consequent wrongness of the opposite so-called action, — evil, occultism, necromancy, mesmerism, animal magnetism, hypnotism.

The medicine of Science is divine Mind; and dishonesty, sensuality, falsehood, revenge, malice, are animal propensities and by no means the mental qualities which heal the sick.

4. 186 : 5-22

Christian Science destroys material beliefs through the understanding of Spirit, and the thoroughness of this work determines health. Erring human mind-forces can work only evil under whatever name or pretence they are employed; for Spirit and matter, good and evil, light and darkness, cannot mingle.

Evil is a negation, because it is the absence of truth. It is nothing, because it is the absence of something. It is unreal, because it presupposes the absence of God, the omnipotent and omni-present. Every mortal must learn that there is neither power nor reality in evil.

Evil is self-assertive. It says: "I am a real entity, overmastering good." This falsehood should strip evil of all pretensions. The only power of evil is to destroy itself. It can never destroy one iota of good. Every attempt of evil to destroy good is a failure, and only aids in peremptorily punishing the evil-doer.

5. 540 : 5-16

In Isaiah we read: "I make peace, and create evil. I the Lord do all these things;" but the prophet referred to divine law as stirring up the belief in evil to its utmost, when bringing it to the surface and reducing it to its common denominator, nothingness. The muddy riverbed must be stirred in order to purify the stream. In moral chemicalization, when the symptoms of evil, illusion, are aggravated, we may think in our ignorance that the Lord hath wrought an evil; but we ought to know that God's law uncovers so-called sin and its effects, only that Truth may annihilate all sense of evil and all power to sin.

6. 480 : 19 (God, or)-32

God, or good, never made man capable of sin. It is the opposite of good — that is, evil — which seems to make men capable of wrong-doing. Hence, evil is but an illusion, and it has no real basis. Evil is a false belief. God is not its author. The supposititious parent of evil is a lie.

The Bible declares: "All things were made by Him [the divine Word]; and without Him was not anything made that was made." This is the eternal verity of divine Science. If sin, sickness, and death were understood as nothingness, they would disappear. As vapor melts before the sun, so evil would vanish before the reality of good.

7. 178 : 18-27

Mortal mind, acting from the basis of sensation in matter, is animal magnetism; but this so-called mind, from which comes all evil, contradicts itself, and must finally yield to the eternal Truth, or the divine Mind, expressed in Science. In proportion to our understanding of Christian Science, we are freed from the belief of heredity, of mind in matter or animal magnetism; and we disarm sin of its imaginary power in proportion to our spiritual understanding of the status of immortal being.

8. 61 : 4-11

The good in human affections must have ascendency over the evil and the spiritual over the animal, or happiness will never be won. The attainment of this celestial condition would improve our progeny, diminish crime, and give higher aims to ambition. Every valley of sin must be exalted, and every mountain of selfishness be brought low, that the highway of our God may be prepared in Science.

9. 571 : 15-21

At all times and under all circumstances, overcome evil with good. Know thyself, and God will supply the wisdom and the occasion for a victory over evil. Clad in the panoply of Love, human hatred cannot reach you. The cement of a higher humanity will unite all interests in the one divinity.

10. 96 : 12-20, 25-4

This material world is even now becoming the arena for conflicting forces. On one side there will be discord and dismay; on the other side there will be Science and peace. The breaking up of material beliefs may seem to be famine and pestilence, want and woe, sin, sickness, and death, which assume new phases until their nothingness appears. These disturbances will continue until the end of error, when all discord will be swallowed up in spiritual Truth.

As this consummation draws nearer, he who has shaped his course in accordance with divine Science will endure to the end. As material knowledge diminishes and spiritual understanding increases, real objects will be apprehended mentally instead of materially.

During this final conflict, wicked minds will endeavor to find means by which to accomplish more evil; but those who discern Christian Science will hold crime in check. They will aid in the ejection of error. They will maintain law and order, and cheerfully await the certainty of ultimate perfection.