Spirit Law

If the Manual of the Mother Church is not divinely understood and humanly obeyed, the Mother Church simply does not exist to those ignorant individuals. The Manual is Truth and Love's Law written within, written in eternity. By recording the rules and by-laws of her spiritual temple, it became available for all to demonstrate. That temple is known as Mary Baker Eddy's Church.1

The pattern of Moses' sanctuary in the wilderness was also described to him in minute detail by the Lord. However, when the original meaning for the patterns of that sanctuary was overlooked, its material component did not survive - not one stone stood upon another. This rolling of stones, however, had no impact on the spiritual significance that the symbols represented. Likewise, Mary Baker Eddy knew the divine significance of her Manual and demonstrated it in stone - The Rock - Christ, Truth. If we see this, we cherish this practical law-as-Love and are one with it. If we do not understand the "structure of Truth and Love," our blindness is felt "until he come whose right it is" - until the right sense of the Manual is realized.

There is no sham church - no physical way to obey God's laws. Attempting to prop up or dissolve the material structure is like administering medicine to the body or committing suicide. A material organization is not church any more than the material body is man.

The Manual operates as spiritual law within the temple of the living God, which we are. If we do not understand this, we will not see the leaves of the tree healing the nations and bearing twelve manner of fruits. To understand the Manual is to love our neighbor and bring all men into our temple where they are clothed with garments fit for the wedding of Love to its idea. Mary Baker Eddy demonstrated this, but few, if any, saw it, even in her day. The invitation to see the operation of spiritual law still stands in the pure and perfect form that she gave it to us if we go and seek it out. Any feeble attempt to edit or interpret God's Word by dull disciples can only cloud and confuse the would-be followers of truth. Clear understanding requires spiritual vision. "The breaking up of material beliefs may seem to be famine and pestilence, want and woe" until Science is seen (SH 96:15). The best legal interpretation of how the Manual is to operate can only be true if that interpretation is based upon the divine Principle in which it was written. Without Spirit, no one can truly know its operation.

How much would you pay to protect and preserve God's law as it is recorded in The Manual of the Mother Church? Mary Baker Eddy paid the price of her so-called material body and demonstrated, in a practical way, the enduring supremacy of Spirit over mortal contrivance.1 If we give up our material interpretation of the organization and see spiritual operation instead, we will have the true meaning, and we will own the Mother Church beneficially.

1 "Also there shall be incorporated in all such deeds the phrase, 'Mary Baker Eddy's Church, The Mother Church or The First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston, Mass.'" (Man 102:18)

2 Repeated attempts by Pharisaical minds to remove the Manual or to convince her to edit it were squelched by her departure.

George Denninger ©