Responsive Reading: Matthew 5 : 13-16; Romans 8 : 28

13.     Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men.

14.     Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid.

15.     Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house.

16.     Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.

28.     And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.

1. Genesis 1 : 26, 27, 31 (to 1st .)

26     And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

27     So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.

31     And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good.

2. Psalm 8 : 1, 3-6

1     O Lord our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth! who hast set thy glory above the heavens.

3     When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained;

4     What is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him?

5     For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honour.

6     Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet:

3. Matthew 3 : 16, 17

16     And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straightway out of the water: and, lo, the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him:

17     And lo a voice from heaven, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.

4. Matthew 5 : 1-3, 5, 6, 8, 20, 43-45, 48

1     And seeing the multitudes, he went up into a mountain: and when he was set, his disciples came unto him:

2     And he opened his mouth, and taught them, saying,

3     Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

5     Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth.

6     Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.

8     Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.

20     For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.

43     Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy.

44     But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;

45     That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.

48     Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.

5. I Corinthians 12 : 1, 4-13

1     Now concerning spiritual gifts, brethren, I would not have you ignorant.

4     Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit.

5     And there are differences of administrations, but the same Lord.

6     And there are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which worketh all in all.

7     But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal.

8     For to one is given by the Spirit the word of wisdom; to another the word of knowledge by the same Spirit;

9     To another faith by the same Spirit; to another the gifts of healing by the same Spirit;

10     To another the working of miracles; to another prophecy; to another discerning of spirits; to another divers kinds of tongues; to another the interpretation of tongues:

11     But all these worketh that one and the selfsame Spirit, dividing to every man severally as he will.

12     For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body, being many, are one body: so also is Christ.

13     For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one Spirit.

6. Ephesians 4 : 1, 2, 13, 22-24

1     I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called,

2     With all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love;

13     Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ:

22     That ye put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts;

23     And be renewed in the spirit of your mind;

24     And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.

7. Colossians 3 : 11-15

11     Where there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free: but Christ is all, and in all.

12     Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering;

13     Forbearing one another, and forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel against any: even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye.

14     And above all these things put on charity, which is the bond of perfectness.

15     And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to the which also ye are called in one body; and be ye thankful.

8. Ephesians 2 : 10

10     For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

1. 76 : 20 (man is)-21

…man is immortal and lives by divine authority.

2. 475 : 7-13, 14-15 (to ;), 16 (the)-22

The Scriptures inform us that man is made in the image and likeness of God. Matter is not that likeness. The likeness of Spirit cannot be so unlike Spirit. Man is spiritual and perfect; and because he is spiritual and perfect, he must be so understood in Christian Science. … He is the compound idea of God, including all right ideas; … 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. 63 : 9-11

Spirit is his primitive and ultimate source of being; God is his Father, and Life is the law of his being.

4. 259 : 6 (The divine)-14

The divine nature was best expressed in Christ Jesus, who threw upon mortals the truer reflection of God and lifted their lives higher than their poor thought-models would allow, — thoughts which presented man as fallen, sick, sinning, and dying. The Christlike understanding of scientific being and divine healing includes a perfect Principle and idea, — perfect God and perfect man, — as the basis of thought and demonstration.

5. 476 : 32-7

Jesus beheld in Science the perfect man, who appeared to him where sinning mortal man appears to mortals. In this perfect man the Saviour saw God's own likeness, and this correct view of man healed the sick. Thus Jesus taught that the kingdom of God is intact, universal, and that man is pure and holy. Man is not a material habitation for Soul; he is himself spiritual.

6. 477 : 9 (To)-17

To the five corporeal senses, man appears to be matter and mind united; but Christian Science reveals man as the idea of God, and declares the corporeal senses to be mortal and erring illusions. Divine Science shows it to be impossible that a material body, though interwoven with matter's highest stratum, misnamed mind, should be man, — the genuine and perfect man, the immortal idea of being, indestructible and eternal.

7. 302 : 3-9

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. 

8. 254 : 19 (the)-23

…the human self must be evangelized. This task God demands us to accept lovingly to-day, and to abandon so fast as practical the material, and to work out the spiritual which determines the outward and actual.

9. 265 : 10-15

This scientific sense of being, forsaking matter for Spirit, by no means suggests man's absorption into Deity and the loss of his identity, but confers upon man enlarged individuality, a wider sphere of thought and action, a more expansive love, a higher and more permanent peace.

10. 317 : 16-20

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.

11. 128 : 6-19

From this it follows that business men and cultured scholars have found that Christian Science enhances their endurance and mental powers, enlarges their perception of character, gives them acuteness and comprehensiveness and an ability to exceed their ordinary capacity. The human mind, imbued with this spiritual understanding, becomes more elastic, is capable of greater endurance, escapes somewhat from itself, and requires less repose. A knowledge of the Science of being develops the latent abilities and possibilities of man. It extends the atmosphere of thought, giving mortals access to broader and higher realms. It raises the thinker into his native air of insight and perspicacity.

12. 491 : 9-16

Man's spiritual individuality is never wrong. It is the likeness of man's Maker. Matter cannot connect mortals with the true origin and facts of being, in which all must end. It is only by acknowledging the supremacy of Spirit, which annuls the claims of matter, that mortals can lay off mortality and find the indissoluble spiritual link which establishes man forever in the divine likeness, inseparable from his creator.

13. 519 : 14-21

Mortals can never know the infinite, until they throw off the old man and reach the spiritual image and likeness. What can fathom infinity! How shall we declare Him, till, in the language of the apostle, "we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ"?

14. 241 : 23-30

One's aim, a point beyond faith, should be to find the footsteps of Truth, the way to health and holiness. We should strive to reach the Horeb height where God is revealed; and the corner-stone of all spiritual building is purity. The baptism of Spirit, washing the body of all the impurities of flesh, signifies that the pure in heart see God and are approaching spiritual Life and its demonstration.

15. 337 : 16-19

In proportion to his purity is man perfect; and perfection is the order of celestial being which demonstrates Life in Christ, Life's spiritual ideal.

16. 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.