Learning to Trust Everything to God
A free Christian Science lecture series
Saturday, September 21, 2024 | 10:30 am
Alexandre Fischer, CS
How Spiritual Perception Brings Healing
Cleveland Park Library
Sunday, October 6 , 2024 | 1:30 pm
Mark McCurties, CS
Humility That “Overcomes the World”
Tenley-Friendship Library
What can we trust? (article)
We trust and depend on gravity even when we’re not conscious of it. Christian Science shows how we can similarly count on God as Love, Truth, and Life—as the foundation of our lives. This foundation supports and sustains all that we do, and as we rely on it, we find God to be completely trustworthy.
Surrender to God? Why? (podcast)
Is surrendering an act of weakness? Well, there’s a kind of surrendering that actually brings strength to whatever situation you’re in. This episode’s guest, Anna-Zoë Herr, has found that giving up her own ideas of how things should work out in favor of a divine perspective opens the way for better solutions.
One of the central themes of Christ Jesus’ ministry was to teach and show that the power of God’s love can help us to overcome the various injustices that we face in the world. In fact, Jesus fully proved the power of God’s might. He healed all kinds of disease, transformed the worst types of behavior, he stopped violent acts from occurring, and he forgave his enemies in order to save them, proving hatred to be powerless in the face of divine Love. Ultimately, Jesus showed that the power of God’s love doesn’t just help us to cope with the ills of the world; it helps us to conquer them.
Yet, for all the remarkable healing work that Jesus did, he never once took the credit. Instead he always gave the glory and honor to God, our Father in heaven. So sincere was Jesus in his expression of humility that he even said, “I can of my own self do nothing” (John 5:30). In other words, Christ Jesus, the Son of God, who overcame all the ugliness that the world could throw at him, said (in essence), the good that I do isn’t personal to me; it’s the Father working through me.
Mary Baker Eddy, the woman who founded the Christian Science church, perceived the powerful impact that Jesus’ humility had on his healing and saving mission. She wrote, “Great charity and humility is necessary in this work of healing. The loving patience of Jesus, we must strive to emulate.” (Miscellaneous Writings 7:7-9)
In this lecture, we will discuss how learning to follow the example of Christ Jesus, particularly his profound display of humility, can empower each one of us to heal and to overcome the hard problems that we face. We will discuss what true humility is, how it links us to God, and by extension, how it connects us with God’s healing and saving laws. There is great need for healing in the world today, and Christ-like humility can help us to meet that demand.
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Ever since he was a little boy, Mark had a deep love for the Bible. When he read about men and women in the Bible overcoming hatred, famine, war, physical disease, and other hardships, their triumphs inspired him. It didn’t matter what the odds were, or what conditions they faced, individuals in the Bible seemed to flourish in adversity based on one common theme: their deep love for God.
Growing up in a Christian Science household, there was another book that Mark loved to read daily: Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures written by Mary Baker Eddy. The very purpose of her book is to help unlock and reveal the deeper divine meaning and inspiration of the Bible. Together the Bible and Science and Health point to the practical healing and saving power of God and its present availability for all mankind. Mark knew that someday he wanted to share that healing message with the world.
As he grew into adulthood, experiences in the field of education as a summer camp director, outdoor educator, athletics coach, and resident counselor all helped to develop his understanding and practice of Christian Science. While working with young people, Mark had multiple opportunities to witness God’s healing power. These examples proved to him that the healing power of the Christ is just as alive and relevant today as for the men and women of the Bible. In 2010, with a desire to focus solely on healing through prayer, Mark entered the full-time public practice of Christian Science.
How can we move away from fear, sickness, and strife into something better? Prayer, as it’s explained through the lens of Christian Science, is a tool for bringing a different viewpoint, and ultimately healing, to any situation. Prayer is getting beyond surface level judgements to a deeper sense of God’s nature—all-good, all-loving—defining all things. It helps us see how natural health, wholeness and harmony are, here and now, in a way that not only benefits us, our family, our colleagues, and our friends, but also it benefits the world. Alexandre describes a number of specific experiences as he walks his listeners through how this prayerful perception of God brings healing in our lives.
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Practicing law in France and the United States for several years informed Alex’s practice of Christian Science. The law was not just his job, he says, it was his passion. To Alex, being a good lawyer meant exercising the ability to think precisely and feeling a desire to help others get out of trouble.
During his years as a lawyer, his interest in Christian Science grew. At first, he was impressed by its remarkable healings and resolutions, but as he dug deeper, he found a profound spirituality. He used to believe that religion and spirituality meant accepting a system of beliefs and letting go of discernment and critical thinking. But the more he studied and practiced this spirituality, the more he found that one’s relationship with God requires critical thinking to understand spiritual concepts. These concepts can in turn be applied to one’s life to bring healing.
Gradually, he gave up his law practice to become a full-time Christian Science practitioner. Alex still works to help others “get out of trouble,” that is, to overcome a sense of limitation and to find freedom.
Alex discovered that Christian Science is not just about feeling better or fixing problems. It’s about being willing to challenge one’s world view as entirely molecule-based and soulless, to be open to see the world as spiritually-based, and experience how this change in perspective brings inner peace and healing. Christian Science helps us understand our relationship with God, infinite good, more clearly. Its teachings help us see Christ Jesus' message in a non-dogmatic way, bringing healing, harmony and freedom to our life.