Sunshine is inevitable

Anyone who has ever been to New Mexico is familiar with the bright blue skies that stretch from horizon to horizon. The fluffy white clouds cast blotches of shadows on the rolling countryside. The clouds look like cotton candy; I’m sure they’re low enough to take a bite.

Every summer I make the drive from Colorado to New Mexico. I go to reconnect with friends and attend a one-day talk on Christian Science healing. It’s only a weekend, but it inspires me. I always see things in a new way when I head back home. 

A couple of summers ago, I was driving home in the bright sunshine when one of those mammoth white clouds turned an ominous gray, and I found myself in a cloudburst of torrential rain. I turned my windshield wipers to high, slowed down, but kept going. I saw some motorcyclists stopped by the side of the road. They were drenched and waiting for the storm to pass. In another thirty seconds or so, I found myself back in the sunshine. It felt like I had passed through a car wash.

I thought about the motorcyclists. If they had known that they were less than a minute from sunshine, would they still have stood in the downpour and waited? It seemed like a life lesson to me.

At times, we’ve all felt like we’re in the middle of a storm. The dark clouds of pain, fear, or lack seem to loom ominously over our heads. But, if you knew how close you were to clearing the storm, wouldn’t you keep moving forward toward the inevitable sunshine?

To me, God is like perpetual sunshine, always shining light on His creation. This light—the understanding of God’s goodness and power, and our unity with Him—is consistent, constant, and always at hand.

 How am I so sure?

 In the definition of God on page 587 in the glossary chapter of Science and Health, Mrs. Eddy uses “Truth” as one of the names for God. The qualities of Truth would have to be constancy, consistency, and permanency. When something is true, there’s no way it can ever change into something that isn’t. Truth always produces unchanging fact. A simple example would be the basic equation 3+4=7. This is fact. You could never sit down to balance your checkbook and find that 3+4 is suddenly 8! Truth maintains what is true.

God, being good itself, means that you—Truth’s creation—are good, like your Creator. (See Genesis, chapter 1.) As part of God’s creation, you can only manifest what Truth knows about you. Your health, abundance, and satisfaction, are the 3+4=7 of His creating. The fact of permanent health can’t ever morph into sickness. The fact of endless abundance can’t one day turn into emptiness. The fact of joyful satisfaction can’t suddenly become disgruntled disappointment. Again, Truth maintains what is true. He maintains the facts of His spiritually perfect creation.

The next time you find yourself in a storm cloud of misery, wondering if it will ever end, be willing to consider the fact that Truth is maintaining everything good about you. Mrs. Eddy shares this about the sunshine that certainly lies ahead: “The discoverer of Christian Science finds the path less difficult when she has the high goal always before her thoughts, than when she counts her footsteps in endeavoring to reach it. When the destination is desirable, expectation speeds our progress” (Science and Health, p. 426).

It may seem like you're sitting in the storm waiting for something good to happen, but you are always Truth's consistently good fact. What can be more desirable than the expectation of seeing yourself on the other side of the storm of sickness and sadness, enjoying the sunshine of health and happiness? And this expectation is sure to speed you on your way--out from under those clouds and into the promise of blue skies, from horizon to horizon.

More thoughts on inevitable goodness:
The Bible:
Genesis 1
Psalm 107
Psalm 84
Jesus stills the storm:
Mark 4

Thoughts from Mary Baker Eddy:
Science and Health:
page 299
page 548

Christian Science Hymnal:
Hymn 52