Always Time for God

OF the many things that appear to be in short supply these days, time would be at the top of many people's list. It seems that there are not enough hours in the day for the things we have to do. So there's certainly not enough time for the things we would like to do.

When existence seems too fast-paced to us, there is something specific we can do that invigorates us and reorganizes our priorities more thoroughly than anything else. We can turn to God.

There is always time for this, as I learned years ago when I was a mother with three young children. During this stage of my life, prayer was of the utmost importance in order for me to maintain the spiritual basis for the care and compassion required to raise these children. Duties that might have become burdensome became, in the light of what I was learning from my study of Christian Science, a daily opportunity to prove this Biblical promise from Proverbs: "The blessing of the Lord, it maketh rich, an d he addeth no sorrow with it. With the many responsibilities and the different programs for the children that filled my life to capacity, I knew that to overcome the tensions and conflicts that arose I needed to find time for God on a regular basis.

I found much strength and spiritual encouragement from a passage in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy. She is the woman who discovered and founded Christian Science, and she writes of Christ Jesus: "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 tha t man is pure and holy.

At one point during this period, I had added to my ongoing problem of too little time a debilitating leg condition that threatened to curtail my activities severely. In order to confront this difficulty I felt it was even more important than usual to take time each day to be alone with God and learn more of Him and of my relationship to Him as His offspring. These times of prayer enabled me to carry out my duties for the day. And I constantly reminded myself that God had made me in His image and likeness , that He was with me, supporting every right activity of the whole family--our health and well-being included. During the darkest hours, I would turn again and again to the First Commandment, in Exodus: "Thou shalt have no other gods before me. This meant to me that I must have no "gods of discouragement or despair or uncertainty as to God's healing power. I knew that God, who the Scriptures say is Love, is all-powerful and always present. I prayed to understand that God, divine Love, was guiding me to rig ht decisions that would be helpful to my family; that God was maintaining me as He had created me--spiritual, made in His image, perfect, whole, unimpaired. I am happy to say that the leg condition was completely healed.

God is inexhaustible, ever-present, divine Love. When we come to realize that man is the very expression of God, made in His likeness, as the Bible teaches, we begin to see a spiritual basis for overcoming limited time, stress, fatigue-- even disease and bodily impairment.

Man--your real identity and mine--is not material; he is spiritual, because his creator is Spirit, God. This spiritual selfhood is characterized by such God-derived qualities as energy, strength, wholeness, vitality. It is uplifting to realize that our real nature already includes these qualities. And knowing how natural it is for us to manifest the strength and dominion God imparts can take some of the stress and strain out of life, lifting burden and tension from our day-to-day activities.

Whatever the demands being made on us, we can turn to God, the source of all intelligence and ability, and expect healing. Looking to God for the help we need opens up an entirely different view of the situation and of ourselves. We begin to glimpse something of the true, spiritual man--the man that the Bible says is God's perfect likeness. Since God, infinite Mind, is obviously not limited, anxious, or inadequate, neither is His reflection, man. And there is never a moment when the power of divine law i s not available to be called upon.

I don't know what I would have done without the benefit of spiritual truths like these, during those years as a young, very busy mother. This is, to me, one of the most gratifying aspects of studying Christian Science. We can pray anywhere--out in the backyard, on the way to the shop, in any circumstance at all. With the spir- itual understanding Christian Science gives of God's ever-presence, we can see that there is always time for God, always time to experience His healing care.

BIBLE VERSE

Where your treasure is,

there will your heart be also. . . .

Therefore take no thought, saying,

What shall we eat? or,

What shall we drink? or,

Wherewithal shall we be clothed?

(For after all these things

do the Gentiles seek:)

for your heavenly Father

knoweth that ye have need

of all these things.

But seek ye first the kingdom of God,

and his righteousness;

and all these things

shall be added unto you.

Matthew 6:21, 31-33

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