Roses along the fence

For several months I'd been looking for office space and finally found it in a beautifully restored building of the 20s. The place was ideal -- all except the view from the window.

If I looked far enough, I could see trees, a neat city park, and the river. But within 20 feet of my window was a high wire fence surrounding a blacktopped parking lot.

Very soon I realized that I couldn't be deprived of beauty. Can any of God's creatures have less than total divine goodness? Time and again, the teachings of Christian Science had shown me that environment reflects the quality of thought, and that because God is the only true Mind and cause, His loveliness can be vividly expressed anywhere.

Many times daily, I quietly acknowledged that man reflects divine Principle, the source of all true beauty and goodness. I realized man's oneness with God as His spiritual image. And I recognized that all-knowing Mind and all-embracing Love, or God, couldn't discriminate in His giving or delay in His expression of beauty, because God unstintingly manifests all good in man.

I remembered the Scriptural promise: "Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning." n1

n1 James 1:17.

Soon after, a young man began digging holes along the base of the fence.The next morning he planted a yellow rose-bush right in front of me. I called out and thanked him for dressing up the fence. Next day, he signaled with a shrill whistle to tell me that he's be planting roses every five feet along the fence -- and young trees in between!

What unmistakable proof this was that God blesses mankind with beauty, and that we can see this when we understand and apply His law. It was conclusive evidence that this law is infinite, changeless, and tenderly compassionate in the ways it reveals divine graciousness.

Anyone feeling unhappy or deprived because of ugly or noisy surroundings can have a profound influence for the better on the condition by turning for true evidence to the perfect source of all good -- God, Spirit. We feel His love and nearness in just one place: our own consciousness. Right there we find and know God, our Father-Mother, who regards each of His children as precious and complete. We can lack nothing needful because we're actually Love's offspring, and we exist to fulfill God's plan of good especially designed for each of His ideas.

Though human solutions sometimes seem out of reach, a spiritual remedy is right at hand to heal. As we realize that our need is really spiritual, and humbly acknowledge divine intelligence as managing and controlling every detail of our careers, we redeem our thinking from mistaken beliefs and let in God's liberating, fulfilling ideas.

The more we know of God's glorious nature and the more we express His qualities, the richer and lovelier our lives will become. Orderly, lawful, joyous, moral living is certain evidence that God is impelling our thoughts and actions.

Being Godlike doesn't deprive us of genuine delight or pleasure. Instead, living according to God's law replaces monotomy with rich variety, and drabness with brilliant beauty.

God's man, the true being of you and me and everyone, is destined to abide in loveliness. In the reality of God's allness, there is no other environment.

When asked about the validity of material objects, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, Mary Baker Eddy, replied: "My sense of the beauty of the universe is, that beauty typifies holiness, and is something to be desired." And she added: "The pleasant sensations of human belief, of form and color, must be spiritualized, until we gain the glorified sense of substance as in the new heaven and earth, the harmony of body and Mind." n2

n2 Miscellaneous Writings,m p. 86.

Limitless, universal, divine love is the source of true beauty. As we give God full credit for creating and maintaining His universe in harmony, our correct spiritual outlook takes from in surprising ways -- such as roses along a fence. DAILY BIBLE VERSE God giveth to a man that is good in his sight wisdom,and knowledge, and joy. Ecclesiastes 2:26