Have a Good One!

IT seems to me that whereas people used to say, ``Have a good day'' they now frequently urge ``Have a good one.'' Recently I took this well-wishing literally and, as a result, saw a bad day turn into a very good one. What changed things around so dramatically? I started looking for what was spiritually true! I stopped accepting unhappiness, apathy, inefficiency, as ``normal.'' I claimed my ability -- man's right as God's child -- to express the good qualities that I seemed to need so urgently at the time: intelligence, inspiration, courage, perseverance. We all have the right to identify with good, the right to be what we really are: the sons and daughters of God. We find reason for this in the Bible's affirmation that we can live as God's children. Because God is good, he would certainly be providing good for His children. So why shouldn't it be possible to have not only a good day but a very good one?

Even though we may sometimes feel very unlike the man the Bible refers to as created in God's likeness, we need to understand that this spiritual identity is actually the true selfhood of each of us. And the ungodlike, mortal identity is not ours at all, but is a misconception or misunderstanding of who we really are. We gain glimpses of our true selfhood when we begin to look at ourselves from the standpoint that our identity is wholly spiritual, is created and maintained by our Father-Mother God. That's when we begin to learn the truth concerning what's really right and good about man and see how we can begin to live according to what we're learning.

The change that occurs when we understand what it means to say that man is the image and likeness of God takes place first in thought, though we also see its effects in every aspect of our lives. Such profound change comes through prayer that affirms the goodness and spirituality of God's work.

Christ Jesus taught his followers, and this applies to you and me, to pray. And he included in the prayer he taught his followers, the Lord's Prayer, this line: ``Give us this day our daily bread.''1 Can we not recognize our ``daily bread'' as our daily allowance of the spiritual understanding we need? Such understanding reveals who we really are and enables us to accept and express our innate goodness and spirituality in every aspect of our lives.

Anything that would cause us to act otherwise is a denial of God's allness and goodness. Good would not and could not create evil. Because God, divine Principle, created all and created it good, good is our divine heritage.

As Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, discovered through the Scriptures and through Christian healing experience, ``Good is the primitive Principle of man; and evil, good's opposite, has no Principle, and is not, and cannot be, the derivative of good.''2

The understanding of God as all-encompassing, infinite good comes to us in degrees. But we can begin to claim our right to good and to those spiritual qualities that embody it. Love, gratitude, integrity, and so on are ours by reflection from God. And as we strive to live them more fully, we find not only our day but our life increasing in harmony, joy, and the true success that is the result of expressing Godlike qualities in service to others.

1Matthew 6:11. 2Miscellaneous Writings, p. 14.

You can find more articles about spiritual healing in the Christian Science Sentinel, a weekly magazine.