Responsive Reading: Acts 17 : 24-28 • Romans 11 : 33, 36

24.     God that made the world and all things therein, seeing that he is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands;

25.     Neither is worshipped with men’s hands, as though he needed any thing, seeing he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things;

26.     And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation;

27.     That they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after him, and find him, though he be not far from every one of us:

28.     For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring.

33.     O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!

36.     For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen.

1. Genesis 1 : 1-4 (to :), 26-28, 31 (to 1st .)

1     In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

2     And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

3     And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.

4     And God saw the light, that it was good:

26     And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

27     So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.

28     And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.

31     And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good.

2. James 1 : 17

17     Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.

3. Genesis 2 : 6, 7 (to ;), 21, 22

6     But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground.

7     And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life;

21     And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof;

22     And the rib, which the Lord God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man.

4. Genesis 3 : 16, 17 (to 1st ,), 19

16     Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.

17     And unto Adam he said,

19     In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.

5. I John 4 : 1, 4, 6

1     Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.

4     Ye are of God, little children, and have overcome them: because greater is he that is in you, than he that is in the world.

6     We are of God: he that knoweth God heareth us; he that is not of God heareth not us. Hereby know we the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error.

6. Matthew 15 : 21-31

21     Then Jesus went thence, and departed into the coasts of Tyre and Sidon.

22     And, behold, a woman of Canaan came out of the same coasts, and cried unto him, saying, Have mercy on me, O Lord, thou son of David; my daughter is grievously vexed with a devil.

23     But he answered her not a word. And his disciples came and besought him, saying, Send her away; for she crieth after us.

24     But he answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

25     Then came she and worshipped him, saying, Lord, help me.

26     But he answered and said, It is not meet to take the children’s bread, and to cast it to dogs.

27     And she said, Truth, Lord: yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters’ table.

28     Then Jesus answered and said unto her, O woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt. And her daughter was made whole from that very hour.

29     And Jesus departed from thence, and came nigh unto the sea of Galilee; and went up into a mountain, and sat down there.

30     And great multitudes came unto him, having with them those that were lame, blind, dumb, maimed, and many others, and cast them down at Jesus’ feet; and he healed them:

31     Insomuch that the multitude wondered, when they saw the dumb to speak, the maimed to be whole, the lame to walk, and the blind to see: and they glorified the God of Israel.

7. I Corinthians 15 : 22-25

22     For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.

23     But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ’s at his coming.

24     Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power.

25     For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet.

8. I John 3 : 1-3

1     Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God: therefore the world knoweth us not, because it knew him not.

2     Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is.

3     And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure.

1. 516 : 28 (God)-29

God made man in His own image, to reflect the divine Spirit.

2. 545 : 10-11

Man, created by God, was given dominion over the whole earth.

3. 258 : 9-15, 27-30

Man is more than a material form with a mind inside, which must escape from its environments in order to be immortal. Man reflects infinity, and this reflection is the true idea of God.

God expresses in man the infinite idea forever developing itself, broadening and rising higher and higher from a boundless basis.

Never born and never dying, it were impossible for man, under the government of God in eternal Science, to fall from his high estate.

4. 282 : 28-31

Whatever indicates the fall of man or the opposite of God or God's absence, is the Adam-dream, which is neither Mind nor man, for it is not begotten of the Father.

5. 579 : 15 (to 2nd ;), 16 (the)-17 (to 1st ;)

Adam. Error; a falsity; … the opposite of good, — of God and His creation;

6. 580 : 21-27

The name Adam represents the false supposition that Life is not eternal, but has beginning and end; that the infinite enters the finite, that intelligence passes into nonintelligence, and that Soul dwells in material sense; that immortal Mind results in matter, and matter in mortal mind; that the one God and creator entered what He created, and then disappeared in the atheism of matter.

7. 306 : 32-6

The parent of all human discord was the Adam-dream, the deep sleep, in which originated the delusion that life and intelligence proceeded from and passed into matter. This pantheistic error, or so-called serpent, insists still upon the opposite of Truth, saying, "Ye shall be as gods;" that is, I will make error as real and eternal as Truth.

8. 307 : 11 (I)-14

“ … I will put spirit into what I call matter, and matter shall seem to have life as much as God, Spirit, who is the only Life."

This error has proved itself to be error.

9. 523 : 3-13

Because of its false basis, the mist of obscurity evolved by error deepens the false claim, and finally declares that God knows error and that error can improve His creation. Although presenting the exact opposite of Truth, the lie claims to be truth. The creations of matter arise from a mist or false claim, or from mystification, and not from the firmament, or understanding, which God erects between the true and false. In error everything comes from beneath, not from above. All is material myth, instead of the reflection of Spirit.

10. 214 : 9-17

Adam, represented in the Scriptures as formed from dust, is an object-lesson for the human mind. The material senses, like Adam, originate in matter and return to dust, — are proved non-intelligent. They go out as they came in, for they are still the error, not the truth of being. When it is learned that the spiritual sense, and not the material, conveys the impressions of Mind to man, then being will be understood and found to be harmonious.

11. 338 : 30 (Adam)-32

Adam was not the ideal man for whom the earth was blessed. The ideal man was revealed in due time, and was known as Christ Jesus.

12. 259 : 6-21

In divine Science, man is the true image of God. The divine nature was best expressed in Christ Jesus, who threw upon mortals the truer reflection of God and lifted their lives higher than their poor thought-models would allow, — thoughts which presented man as fallen, sick, sinning, and dying. The Christlike understanding of scientific being and divine healing includes a perfect Principle and idea, — perfect God and perfect man, — as the basis of thought and demonstration.

If man was once perfect but has now lost his perfection, then mortals have never beheld in man the reflex image of God. The lost image is no image. The true likeness cannot be lost in divine reflection. Understanding this, Jesus said: "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect."

13. 470 : 16-20, 32-5

The children of God have but one Mind. How can good lapse into evil, when God, the Mind of man, never sins? The standard of perfection was originally God and man. Has God taken down His own standard, and has man fallen?

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.

14. 473 : 26 (to ,), 28 (He)-31

Jesus established what he said by demonstration, …     He proved what he taught. This is the Science of Christianity. Jesus proved the Principle, which heals the sick and casts out error, to be divine.

15. 476 : 29 (Jesus)-5

Jesus said, "The kingdom of God is within you;" that is, Truth and Love reign in the real man, showing that man in God's image is unfallen and eternal. Jesus beheld in Science the perfect man, who appeared to him where sinning mortal man appears to mortals. In this perfect man the Saviour saw God's own likeness, and this correct view of man healed the sick. Thus Jesus taught that the kingdom of God is intact, universal, and that man is pure and holy.

16. 200 : 9-19

Life is, always has been, and ever will be independent of matter; for Life is God, and man is the idea of God, not formed materially but spiritually, and not subject to decay and dust. The Psalmist said: "Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of Thy hands. Thou hast put all things under his feet."

The great truth in the Science of being, that the real man was, is, and ever shall be perfect, is incontrovertible; for if man is the image, reflection, of God, he is neither inverted nor subverted, but upright and Godlike.