Connected with God

Almost anyone who has a computer will have seen this instruction when downloading and installing updates: “Please keep your computer on.” These updates ensure protection against viruses by closing potential security gaps in the software, and they improve the functioning of applications. They can be downloaded anywhere in the world where there is an internet connection.

It occurred to me that there might be parallels between this, and my growing understanding of God and my nature as His spiritual likeness. I was fascinated by the idea that through prayer I could see my connectedness to God anywhere, and get spiritual progress, healings, divine guidance, and protection.

Eventually I recognized that we don’t really need “updates” because, as ideas of God, our divine perfection exists without beginning and without end. The first account of creation in Genesis 1 says, “And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good” (verse 31). In Ecclesiastes we read, “I know that, whatsoever God doeth, it shall be for ever: nothing can be put to it, nor any thing taken from it” (3:14).

If we don’t need updates, what do we need?

We need a clearer understanding of our inviolable and ongoing completeness in God.

Error, or the mistaken concept that God is not All, doesn’t have a temporary type of power that needs to be eliminated. Error is simply what the word says it is – a mistake. Mary Baker Eddy writes in the textbook of Christian Science, “Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,” “Error is the contradiction of Truth. Error is a belief without understanding. Error is unreal because untrue. It is that which seemeth to be and is not” (p. 472). And elsewhere in this book, “Moreover, Truth is real, and error is unreal” (p. 466).

While the five material senses want to make it seem that error is real, we must not be misled. Truth is the only thing that is true and, as a synonym for God, fills all space; therefore, only Truth exists. Error never existed, since God made all that is made and made it good. Truth destroys our belief in error. It became clear to me that I didn’t need regular updates to express divine Truth.

When Jesus healed, he saw true, spiritual man where others perceived only the physical appearance. He didn’t overlay one picture on another, the spiritual over the material. He saw only Truth and the existence of God’s spiritual idea, man.

Mrs. Eddy writes in Science and Health, “The relations of God and man, divine Principle and idea, are indestructible in Science; and Science knows no lapse from nor return to harmony, but holds the divine order or spiritual law, in which God and all that He creates are perfect and eternal, to have remained unchanged in its eternal history” (pp. 470-471). Because God is All-in-all and is always present, it doesn’t matter where we are or what situation we’re in – we are always connected to God as His reflection, the eternal expression of His divine omnipotence. There can be no security gaps in God’s all-encompassing protection.

A short time later, I benefited from this expanded recognition of divine Truth. I was skiing with my sons, when one of them fell badly. I immediately turned my thought toward God, affirming that there can be no accidents in God, and I listened for spiritual thoughts. God, divine Truth, exposes, dissolves, and destroys error as a mere belief with no power.

Suddenly it occurred to me that I needed to take the final step, and concede that Truth has all strength and power. I had to fully trust Truth to destroy belief in error. This was not just theory. It was the faith and understanding that God is ever present and all-powerful. I was completely calm and confident that Truth possesses and exercises all power to destroy the false belief of an injury. I was able to calm my son, and we joyfully continued our day of skiing. A few days later, all signs that an accident had occurred had disappeared.

We are eternally connected with God. And we can always turn to God in prayer and seek guidance.

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Adapted from an article published on the website of The Herald of Christian Science, German Edition, March 20, 2023.