Watching Point 276

276 — WATCH lest you adopt the common conception of our branch church business meetings as being designed to enable the members to transact the business of the church efficiently. Spiritual growth is the vital thing in Science, and this can only come as one declares, “Not my will, but Thine be done.” Our business meetings will be constructive only as they represent the effort on the part of the membership to demonstrate God’s will, and to put out all human opinion, self-will and use of the human mind. Whatever business training or human experience a member possesses should be used only in subordination to Truth.

In Science we define the human mind as the avowed enemy of God. On Wednesday night we testify to the wonderful healings that result when we subdue this false sense of mind with the power of divine Mind. How contradictory and inconsistent it would be to bring this false mind into the business meetings, and insist upon using it to do the business, instead of recognizing such meetings to be an opportunity to enlarge one’s use of demonstration, so that divine Mind is recognized and proved to be not only the best healer, but the most efficient intelligence to use in doing the business of the church.

If the Sunday services carry us upward and the Wednesday evening meetings carry us forward, it follows that the business meetings should carry us outward. In other words Mrs. Eddy provided them for us, so that we might learn to broaden our use of demonstration to cover all the minutiae of human experience.