One of the most frequently quoted statements of Christ Jesus’ teachings is: “Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (John 8:32). It is preceded by this qualifying statement: “If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed” (John 8:31). But what does knowing the truth really mean?
As a starting point, Jesus’ teachings were all based on the truth of perfect God and His perfect creation, including man. Knowing, or deeply perceiving, this fundamental truth inherently includes recognizing man’s total dependence on God.
The truth of our wholly dependent relation to God rests on God being our Father-Mother, our divine Parent, completely good, spiritual, all-knowing, ever-present, all-powerful, and certainly reliable.
One reason understanding this relationship is so crucial is that it flies in the face of much of what the world sees as a typical parent-child relationship. A human parent rejoices over the first steps of a child. These first steps are symbolic of the hundreds of ways in which each of us gradually learns to be independent.
And yet in so many ways, that independence is exactly the opposite of the way in which Jesus understood his relationship to God, and how we, too, should see our relationship to God as His children. Again in the Gospel of John, we read Jesus’ words: “I can of mine own self do nothing” (5:30).
Total dependence!
For the discoverer of the Science of Jesus’ teachings, Mary Baker Eddy, this aspect of man’s relationship to God is central to understanding who we really are. She explains, “The divine Mind that made man maintains His own image and likeness” (“Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,” p. 151).
This maintenance is perpetual, and we can continually depend on it. The terms Mrs. Eddy uses throughout her writings to clarify our relationship to God emphasize this reliance. God, the cause; man, the effect. God, the creator; man, the creation.
Is “knowing the truth” a mental activity we can just somehow turn on? Of course not. It is one of the most challenging, as well as rewarding, activities we can engage in. It’s not an intellectual effort. It’s more an effort of the heart than the head. To know is to understand what something truly is, to recognize its very essence. To know the truth of our total dependence on God is to feel our inseparability from our source, divine Love.
The truths we are to know about ourselves all flow from our consciousness of this dependence – truths that become increasingly apparent as a result of deepening our appreciation of God as our Mind, God as our Soul, God as our Life, and of valuing God as our defender, our provider, our sole Parent. Included in these truths is the fact of our spirituality and immortality as the reflection of divine Life.
To “know the truth” is to align our thought with the essence of Jesus’ teaching. Science and Health captures this essence, epitomized by three simple statements of his describing his eternal selfhood, the Christ. On page 333 it says, “Jesus referred to this unity of his spiritual identity thus: ‘Before Abraham was, I am;’ ‘I and my Father are one;’ ‘My Father is greater than I.’ ”
Oneness with God is the model Jesus gave for all of us. To be spiritually scientific we might even go so far as to say, “I and my Father is one” – underlining the total unity each of us has with our source.
At the beginning of my sophomore year in college, a broken ankle had me bed-bound. In my prayer, I began to wonder what that special truth was that Jesus promised would set me free. As I explored the book of John, I began to understand the deeper meaning which Jesus gave to the term “Father” – a term he used frequently for God.
Understanding that, as our Father, God is the continuing source of being, I began to understand what it means to be Godlike – never separated from my source, my Father-Mother, totally reliant on this source.
Along with this discovery soon came the complete healing of my ankle.
There isn’t just one “special truth” that sets us free. And, all healing truths flow from God, are rooted in God’s allness, and inherently include our total dependence on God.
Acknowledging God as the single source, and knowing the truth of our own identity as totally dependent on that source, sets us free.
Adapted from an editorial published in the July 2024 issue of The Christian Science Journal.
