“It was so simple. Singular thoughts, not long prayers.”

There are so many wonderful thoughts in the chapter on Creation, I kept looking for a common thread or theme going through it. Finally on my fifth reading returning on the plane from Association, I thought I could answer questions #1 and #2 together.
1.  Creation starts with “dropping off the mental swaddling clothes” which is Gen 1, “let there be light”.
2.  “Covenant with eyes to belittle Deity” is Adam (Gen 2).
3.  Progress takes off the shackles and thought rises: a. material sense to the spiritual b. scholastic to inspirational
    c. mortal to the immortal.
4.  Embellishment follows with the development of the Creation theme.
         a. Infinite Mind is the creator and creation is the imagine and likeness from this Mind, which is within and without all                things.
         b. Finite life is not sufficient to meet the demands of human want and woe.
         c. Infinite idea forever developing. What we know of God, we know of man. Capacities are enlarged.
         d. True likeness can’t be lost - mortal though transmits human illusion.
5.  Don’t distrust your ability / hold thought steadfastly.  Detach sense from body which is only a form of human belief (i.e. personality).

THE KEY: The foundation of mortal discord is a false sense of man’s origin (thus the importance of the chapter on “Creation”). “To begin rightly is to end rightly” - thus going back to Genesis I.    
1.  This is the natural development if we begin rightly:
          a. We act as possessing all power from Him.
          b. We enlarge our treasures of Truth and Love and we better understand spiritual existence.
          c. The truth of being is perennial - continual renewal going on.
          d. The allness of Deity is His oneness. I am at-one with His Allness.

I think this still just scratches the surface, but I have enjoyed the challenge of trying to understand it. This may seem a little analytical. I don’t usually do this. I usually just read for inspiration, but the assignment questions challenged me.

I did want to mention a healing (question 3) which took place a year ago that came about simply by my praying with Genesis 1, so it was so interesting to have the assignment on Creation.  

Last April I began having terrific pain in my legs. One night it seemed particularly intense and my prayers with the “scientific statement of being” and other statements from our textbook, Science and Health, by Mary Baker Eddy, did not seem to alleviate it and I could not go to sleep. I reached out to God, "What do I need to know?”  The answer came, "My nickname, start from the beginning".  To me, that meant Genesis 1 and to start re-reading Science and Health through.  I stayed in bed and mentally thought about, "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him…” (Gen. 1:27)  And that was it.  I awoke the next morning and realized I had rested through the night.

My husband and I were to leave the next week for a college graduation of one of our granddaughters, which meant a long flight to the other coast.  The leg argument seemed to want to rear up from time to time but not with the intensity of before, but still I was uncomfortable. We made the trip and were sitting in the grandstands on a hard bench with what was going to be two hours.  Standing during our national anthem and at the end of it, I thought "I have had enough of this!"  I sat down, and after our granddaughter's name was called early in the alphabet, I spent the next two hours claiming my dominion as stated in Genesis 1.  When graduation was over I was completely healed.

It was so simple. Singular thoughts, not long prayers.  And when the assignment on "Creation" arrived in January I felt like it had come full circle.