Responsive Reading: Acts 17 : 22-28

22.     Then Paul stood in the midst of Mars’ hill, and said, Ye men of Athens, I perceive that in all things ye are too superstitious.

23.     For as I passed by, and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with this inscription, TO THE UNKNOWN GOD. Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, him declare I unto you.

24.     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;

25.     Neither is worshipped with men’s hands, as though he needed any thing, seeing he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things;

26.     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;

27.     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:

28.     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.

1. Isaiah 43 : 1 (now), 10, 11, 21

1 ...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.

10     Ye are my witnesses, saith the Lord, and my servant whom I have chosen: that ye may know and believe me, and understand that I am he: before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me.

11     I, even I, am the Lord; and beside me there is no saviour.

21     This people have I formed for myself; they shall shew forth my praise.

2. Matthew 9 : 35-38

35     And Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people.

36     But when he saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion on them, because they fainted, and were scattered abroad, as sheep having no shepherd.

37     Then saith he unto his disciples, The harvest truly is plenteous, but the labourers are few;

38     Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth labourers into his harvest.

3. Matthew 10 : 1, 5-8

1     And when he had called unto him his twelve disciples, he gave them power against unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal all manner of sickness and all manner of disease.

5     These twelve Jesus sent forth, and commanded them, saying, Go not into the way of the Gentiles, and into any city of the Samaritans enter ye not:

6     But go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

7     And as ye go, preach, saying, The kingdom of heaven is at hand.

8     Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils: freely ye have received, freely give.

4. Matthew 11 : 1-6

1     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.

2     Now when John had heard in the prison the works of Christ, he sent two of his disciples,

3     And said unto him, Art thou he that should come, or do we look for another?

4     Jesus answered and said unto them, Go and shew John again those things which ye do hear and see:

5     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.

6     And blessed is he, whosoever shall not be offended in me.

5. John 5 : 1-9, 14-19, 30

1     After this there was a feast of the Jews; and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.

2     Now there is at Jerusalem by the sheep market a pool, which is called in the Hebrew tongue Bethesda, having five porches.

3     In these lay a great multitude of impotent folk, of blind, halt, withered, waiting for the moving of the water.

4     For an angel went down at a certain season into the pool, and troubled the water: whosoever then first after the troubling of the water stepped in was made whole of whatsoever disease he had.

5     And a certain man was there, which had an infirmity thirty and eight years.

6     When Jesus saw him lie, and knew that he had been now a long time in that case, he saith unto him, Wilt thou be made whole?

7     The impotent man answered him, Sir, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pool: but while I am coming, another steppeth down before me.

8     Jesus saith unto him, Rise, take up thy bed, and walk.

9     And immediately the man was made whole, and took up his bed, and walked: and on the same day was the sabbath.

14     Afterward Jesus findeth him in the temple, and said unto him, Behold, thou art made whole: sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee.

15     The man departed, and told the Jews that it was Jesus, which had made him whole.

16     And therefore did the Jews persecute Jesus, and sought to slay him, because he had done these things on the sabbath day.

17     But Jesus answered them, My Father worketh hitherto, and I work.

18     Therefore the Jews sought the more to kill him, because he not only had broken the sabbath, but said also that God was his Father, making himself equal with God.

19     Then answered Jesus and said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do: for what things soever he doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise.

30     I can of mine own self do nothing: as I hear, I judge: and my judgment is just; because I seek not mine own will, but the will of the Father which hath sent me.

6. John 10 : 30-34 (to 1st ,), 37, 38

30     I and my Father are one.

31     Then the Jews took up stones again to stone him.

32     Jesus answered them, Many good works have I shewed you from my Father; for which of those works do ye stone me?

33     The Jews answered him, saying, For a good work we stone thee not; but for blasphemy; and because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God.

34     Jesus answered them,

37     If I do not the works of my Father, believe me not.

38     But if I do, though ye believe not me, believe the works: that ye may know, and believe, that the Father is in me, and I in him.

7. Matthew 15 : 32 (to 2nd ,)

32     Then Jesus called his disciples unto him, and said,

8. John 15 : 1-5

1     I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman.

2     Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit.

3     Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.

4     Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me.

5     I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing.

1. 361 : 16-20

As a drop of water is one with the ocean, a ray of light one with the sun, even so God and man, Father and son, are one in being. The Scripture reads: "For in Him we live, and move, and have our being."

2. 475 : 5 only, 13-22

Question. — What is man?

Man is idea, the image, of Love; he is not physique. He is the compound idea of God, including all right ideas; the generic term for all that reflects God’s image and likeness; the conscious identity of being as found in Science, in which man is the reflection of God, or Mind, and therefore is eternal; that which has no separate mind from God; that which has not a single quality underived from Deity; that which possesses no life, intelligence, nor creative power of his own, but reflects spiritually all that belongs to his Maker.

3. 18 : 1-3

Atonement is the exemplification of man's unity with God, whereby man reflects divine Truth, Life, and Love.

4. 26 : 10-18

The Christ was the Spirit which Jesus implied in his own statements: "I am the way, the truth, and the life;" "I and my Father are one." This Christ, or divinity of the man Jesus, was his divine nature, the godliness which animated him. Divine Truth, Life, and Love gave Jesus authority over sin, sickness, and death. His mission was to reveal the Science of celestial being, to prove what God is and what He does for man.

5. 27 : 1-9

Jesus sent a message to John the Baptist, which was intended to prove beyond a question that the Christ had come: "Go your way, and tell John what things ye have seen and heard; how that the blind see, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, to the poor the gospel is preached." In other words: Tell John what the demonstration of divine power is, and he will at once perceive that God is the power in the Messianic work.

6. 37 : 20-25

May the Christians of to-day take up the more practical import of that career! It is possible, — yea, it is the duty and privilege of every child, man, and woman, — to follow in some degree the example of the Master by the demonstration of Truth and Life, of health and holiness.

7. 38 : 10-20

Jesus said: "These signs shall follow them that believe; ... they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover." Who believes him? He was addressing his disciples, yet he did not say, "These signs shall follow you," but them — "them that believe" in all time to come. Here the word hands is used metaphorically, as in the text, "The right hand of the Lord is exalted." It expresses spiritual power; otherwise the healing could not have been done spiritually. At another time Jesus prayed, not for the twelve only, but for as many as should believe "through their word."

8. 91 : 5-8

Let us rid ourselves of the belief that man is separated from God, and obey only the divine Principle, Life and Love. Here is the great point of departure for all true spiritual growth.

9. 90 : 24-32

The admission to one's self that man is God's own likeness sets man free to master the infinite idea. This conviction shuts the door on death, and opens it wide towards immortality. The understanding and recognition of Spirit must finally come, and we may as well improve our time in solving the mysteries of being through an apprehension of divine Principle. At present we know not what man is, but we certainly shall know this when man reflects God.

10. 295 : 16-24

The manifestation of God through mortals is as light passing through the window-pane. The light and the glass never mingle, but as matter, the glass is less opaque than the walls. The mortal mind through which Truth appears most vividly is that one which has lost much materiality — much error — in order to become a better transparency for Truth. Then, like a cloud melting into thin vapor, it no longer hides the sun.

11. 302 : 3-24

The material body and mind are temporal, but the real man is spiritual and eternal. The identity of the real man is not lost, but found through this explanation; for the conscious infinitude of existence and of all identity is thereby discerned and remains unchanged. It is impossible that man should lose aught that is real, when God is all and eternally his. The notion that mind is in matter, and that the so-called pleasures and pains, the birth, sin, sickness, and death of matter, are real, is a mortal belief; and this belief is all that will ever be lost.

Continuing our definition of man, let us remember that harmonious and immortal man has existed forever, and is always beyond and above the mortal illusion of any life, substance, and intelligence as existent in matter. This statement is based on fact, not fable. The Science of being reveals man as perfect, even as the Father is perfect, because the Soul, or Mind, of the spiritual man is God, the divine Principle of all being, and because this real man is governed by Soul instead of sense, by the law of Spirit, not by the so-called laws of matter.

12. 481 : 2-6

Man is tributary to God, Spirit, and to nothing else. God's being is infinity, freedom, harmony, and boundless bliss. "Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty." Like the archpriests of yore, man is free "to enter into the holiest," — the realm of God.

13. 14 : 6-11

To be "present with the Lord" is to have, not mere emotional ecstasy or faith, but the actual demonstration and understanding of Life as revealed in Christian Science. To be "with the Lord" is to be in obedience to the law of God, to be absolutely governed by divine Love, — by Spirit, not by matter.

14. 496 : 9-19

We all must learn that Life is God. Ask yourself: Am I living the life that approaches the supreme good? Am I demonstrating the healing power of Truth and Love? If so, then the way will grow brighter "unto the perfect day." Your fruits will prove what the understanding of God brings to man. Hold perpetually this thought, — that it is the spiritual idea, the Holy Ghost and Christ, which enables you to demonstrate, with scientific certainty, the rule of healing, based upon its divine Principle, Love, underlying, overlying, and encompassing all true being.