That's not fair!

At one time I had an office built out from the side of my house, and the local children, including my own, quickly discovered that the sheltered corner it provided made an excellent place for playing. Through my window I'd hear the sounds of their verses and jingles as they skipped and played games. But the thing that interested me most was the occasional little voice saying, ''That's not fair!'' Youngsters, not yet at school, were lodging a protest, straight from the heart, at what they felt was unfair treatment.

How did they know when and why something was unfair?

The answer, I felt, was in the Bible, in the book of Job: ''There is a spirit in man: and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding.'' n1 God, I understood, is one God - one universal source of truth and love - and it seemed to me these youngsters were simply responding without effort to the God-given spirit of truth.

n1 Job 32:8.

The right to protest against impositions, and for justice, is fundamental. We read in the Gospels of Christ Jesus' spoken rebukes to various forms of evil - to a fever, epilepsy, a destructive storm. He must have lodged a mental, spiritual protest whenever he was confronted by sickness or some other inharmony. And the result was healing. On one occasion, when he restored to wholeness a man's withered hand, he protested not only against this injustice but against the restrictive tradition that said he shouldn't heal on the Sabbath. n2

n2 See Mark 3:1-5.

In all that he did, Jesus demonstrated the healing power of divine Love and showed that the law of Love is never unjust.

Christian Science, in accord with the Bible, takes a firm stand for divine justice. This Science, declaring and demonstrating the law of God through healing, shows that the divine, all-loving Principle, by virtue of its infinitude, denies existence to anything evil, unfair. And it shows that we can each take part in proving this, even if in small ways.

Mary Baker Eddy, who discovered this Science and founded the Church of Christ , Scientist, writes: ''Justice is the moral signification of law. Injustice declares the absence of law. When the body is supposed to say, 'I am sick,' never plead guilty. Since matter cannot talk, it must be mortal mind which speaks; therefore meet the intimation with a protest.'' n3

n3 Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 391.

When we protest, we're denying the validity of what we're protesting against. If the something is a lie, and we meet it with the truth, the lie is seen to be sub-stanceless - nothing, in fact.

What is the basic truth we should use in making a healing protest?

The Bible explains it, and Jesus demonstrated it: the spiritual truth of God and man.

The Bible tells us that God made man in His likeness. It also reveals the nature of God, and therefore the true nature of man. Since God is Spirit and Love, man's true nature must be wholly spiritual and loving, without flaw.

Jesus' prayers were protests of Truth, of divine power over the supposed power of materiality and evil; of man's spiritual perfection superseding the discord reported by the material senses. Entirely loving and unselfish, Jesus denied the validity of evil in any shape or form through his expression of absolute goodness.

It is God, Truth, that destroys error. It is Love that destroys fear and hate. By identifying ourselves correctly as the freeborn children of God - and conforming our thoughts and lives to the divine standard embodied in the Ten Commandments and Jesus' Sermon on the Mount - we align ourselves with the power of absolute Truth and Love. Through this spiritual identification we can see clearly the difference between right and wrong, good and bad. We can draw a line of distinction between kindness and unkindness, justice and injustice. We can see the ungodliness - and therefore the powerlessness - of any cruel imposition.

The world needs our sincere protests of Truth. Faced with sickness, or any other imposition, we can make our protest on the basis of absolute spiritual fact - and take an important step toward healing. DAILY BIBLE VERSE Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, quit you like men, be strong. 1 Corinthians 16:13criptures, p. 391.