Order in our lives

THE house was a shambles. Every drawer had been pulled out, every cupboard searched. Furniture had been moved and bookshelves ransacked. Had we been robbed? No, we had been searching for an important missing document. It was still missing, but weary of the search, I sat down for a quiet moment with the Christian Science Hymnal. My eyes fell on these lines: Take from us now the strain and stress, And let our ordered lives confess

The beauty of Thy peace.1

An hour later, the house was back in order, the missing document had been found, and I had regained my peace.

Order can bring peace, because it expresses something of the divine nature, which is the only real source of harmony. But how can we bring more order into our life? By recognizing that our life is the reflection of the Life which is God, the divine Principle of the universe, the source of all true law and order. Our immediate need and a good first step may be to stop identifying ourselves as disorderly by nature and to start seeing that our true selfhood expresses the divine nature. We're not really jumbled or confused mortals but God's offspring. ``God's image and likeness can never be less than a good man; and for man to be more than God's likeness is impossible,''2 writes Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science.

The Apostle Paul wrote to the Christian disciples of his day, ``Though I be absent in the flesh, yet am I with you in the spirit, joying and beholding your order, and the stedfastness of your faith in Christ.''3 While order may not be rated as highly as some other qualities on a list of Christian virtues, its effect cannot help being appreciated. It increases efficiency, saves time, eliminates confusion and uncertainty, prevents pressure and loss. Best of all, it bears witness to the divine order, in which every idea is established in the divine Mind and is functioning properly. Even bodily disorders are subject to the divine laws of order and harmony, as Christ Jesus proved through his healing works. Fever, palsy, abnormal bleeding--whatever the difficulty--it invariably yielded to his confident application of God's spiritual law of unchanging perfection.

A worker in Mrs. Eddy's home observed: ``In the conduct of her daily ac tivities she lived the proverb, `Order is heaven's first law,' and she expected her church, its officers, and its members, to observe the same orderly procedure in the discharge of their official duties and in the conduct of their lives.'' And he said in another place, ``Because of the regularity of her life and the orderly manner in which she conducted her activities, she was able to accomplish what the ordinary worker would consider impossible.''4

As modern-day disciples, followers of the Way-shower, we can help, through prayer, to bring order to light wherever disorder appears to be, whether in our home, our business, our body, or the world. Through our clear recognition that God governs every aspect of man's being and that man is His spiritual likeness, the harmony of the divine order will become more evident.

1Hymnal, No. 49. 2No and Yes, p. 17. 3Colossians 2:5. 4Irving C. Tomlinson, Twelve Years with Mary Baker Eddy (Boston: The Christian Science Publishing Society, 1966), pp. 126, 165. You can find more articles like this one in the Christian Science Sentinel, a weekly magazine. DAILY BIBLE VERSE The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord: and he delighteth in his way . . . The law of his God is in his heart; none of his steps shall slide. Psalm 37:23, 31

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