These Readings are comprised of selections from the Bible and the Christian Science textbook, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy. NO ROOM IN THE INN Luke 2 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) 2 In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered. …. 3 All went to their own towns to be registered. 4 Joseph also went from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to the city of David called Bethlehem, because he was descended from the house and family of David. 5 He went to be registered with Mary, to whom he was engaged and who was expecting a child. 6 While they were there, the time came for her to deliver her child. 7 And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn. Matthew 2 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) 2 In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, 2 asking, “Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage.” 3 When King Herod heard this, he was frightened, and all Jerusalem with him; 4 and calling together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born. 5 They told him, “In Bethlehem of Judea; …7 Then Herod secretly called for the wise men[e] and learned from them the exact time when the star had appeared. 8 Then he sent them to Bethlehem, saying, “Go and search diligently for the child; and when you have found him, bring me word so that I may also go and pay him homage.” 9 When they had heard the king, they set out; and there, ahead of them, went the star that they had seen at its rising,[f] until it stopped over the place where the child was. … 11 On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage. Then, opening their treasure chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. 12 And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road. 13 Now after they had left, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Get up, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you; for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him.” Matthew 8:20 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) Jesus said…, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” Matthew 21:42 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) “Have you never read in the scriptures: ‘The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; this was the Lord’s doing, and it is amazing in our eyes’? Isaiah 53:3 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) 3 He was despised and rejected by others; a man of suffering[a] and acquainted with infirmity; and as one from whom others hide their faces he was despised, Mark 12:13-17 New Living Translation (NLT) 13 Later the leaders sent some Pharisees and supporters of Herod to trap Jesus into saying something for which he could be arrested. 14 “Teacher,” they said, “we know how honest you are. You are impartial and don’t play favorites. You teach the way of God truthfully. Now tell us—is it right to pay taxes to Caesar or not? 15 Should we pay them, or shouldn’t we?” Jesus saw through their hypocrisy and said, “Why are you trying to trap me? Show me a Roman coin, and I’ll tell you.” 16 When they handed it to him, he asked, “Whose picture and title are stamped on it?” “Caesar’s,” they replied.17 “Well, then,” Jesus said, “give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar, and give to God what belongs to God.” His reply completely amazed them. John 5:39-43 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) 39 “You search the scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that testify on my behalf. 40 Yet you refuse to come to me to have life. 41 I do not accept glory from human beings. 42 But I know that you do not have the love of God in you. 43 I have come in my Father’s name, and you do not accept me;

John 14:8-17 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) 8 Philip said to him, “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.” 9 Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? 10 Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own; but the Father who dwells in me does his works. 11 Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; but if you do not, then believe me because of the works themselves. …15 “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. 16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you forever. 17 This is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, because he abides with you, and he will be in you. 2 Peter 1:17-19 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) 17 For he received honor and glory from God the Father when that voice was conveyed to him by the Majestic Glory, saying, “This is my Son, my Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.” … You will do well to be attentive to this as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts. Luke 21:15 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) 15 for I will give you words and a wisdom that none of your opponents will be able to withstand or contradict. Colossians 3:15-17 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) 15 And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in the one body. And be thankful. 16 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly; … and with gratitude in your hearts sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs to God. 2 Cor 4:6 For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

SCIENCE AND HEALTH SH 30:5 Born of a woman, Jesus' advent in the flesh partook partly of Mary's earthly condition, although he was endowed with the Christ, the divine Spirit, without measure. …Had his origin and birth been wholly apart from mortal usage, Jesus would not have been appreciable to mortal mind as “the way.” SH 52:9-17 Despised and rejected of men,” was Isaiah's graphic word concerning the coming Prince of Peace. Herod and Pilate laid aside old feuds in order to unite in putting to shame and death the best man that ever trod the globe. Their imperfections and impurity felt the ever- present rebuke of his perfection and purity. Hence the world's hatred of the just and perfect Jesus, and the prophet's foresight of the reception error would give him. “ SH 20:1-23 He rendered “unto Cæsar the things which are Cæsar's; and unto God the things that are God's.” He at last paid no homage to forms of doctrine or to theories of man, but acted and spake as he was moved, not by spirits but by Spirit. To the ritualistic priest and hypocritical Pharisee Jesus said, “The publicans and the harlots go into the kingdom of God before you.” Jesus' history made a new calendar, which we call the Christian era; but he established no ritualistic worship. He knew that men can be baptized, partake of the Eucharist, support the clergy, observe the Sabbath, make long prayers, and yet be sensual and sinful. Jesus bore our infirmities; he knew the error of mortal belief, and “with his stripes [the rejection of error] we are healed.” “Despised and rejected of men,” returning blessing for cursing, he taught mortals the opposite of themselves, even the nature of God; and when error felt the power of Truth, the scourge and the cross awaited the great Teacher. Yet he swerved not, well knowing that to obey the divine order and trust God, saves retracing and traversing anew the path from sin to holiness. SH 142:14–24 In vain do the manger and the cross tell their story to pride and fustian. SH 339:20–25 As the mythology of pagan Rome has yielded to a more spiritual idea of Deity, so will our material theories yield to spiritual ideas, until the finite gives place to the infinite, sickness to health, sin to holiness, and God's kingdom comes “in earth, as it is in heaven.” SH 132:14 The Pharisees of old thrust the spiritual idea and the man who lived it out of their synagogues, and retained their materialistic beliefs about God. Jesus' system of healing received no aid nor approval from other sanitary or religious systems, from doctrines of physics or of divinity; and it has not yet been generally accepted. To- day, as of yore, unconscious of the reappearing of the spiritual idea, blind belief shuts the door upon it, and condemns the cure of the sick and sinning if it is wrought on any but a material and a doctrinal theory. Anticipating this rejection of idealism, of the true idea of God, — this salvation from all error, physical and mental, — Jesus asked, “When the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth?” SH 346:29 Material beliefs must be expelled to make room for spiritual understanding. SH 146:20 Science is the “stranger that is within thy gates,” remembered not, even when its elevating effects practically prove its divine origin and efficacy. SH vii:10 The Wisemen were led to behold and to follow this daystar of divine Science, lighting the way to eternal harmony. SH 131:14 This Science has come already, after the manner of God's appointing, but the churches seem not ready to receive it, according to the Scriptural saying, “He came unto his own, and his own received him not.” … As afore-time, the spirit of the Christ, which taketh away the ceremonies and doctrines of men, is not accepted until the hearts of men are made ready for it. SH 343:21 It would sometimes seem as if truth were rejected be- cause meekness and spirituality are the conditions of its acceptance, while Christendom generally demands so much less. SH 130:15–19 Christian Science, properly understood, would dis- abuse the human mind of material beliefs which war against spiritual facts; and these material beliefs must be denied and cast out to make place for truth. SH 176:13 When the mechanism of the human mind gives place to the divine Mind, selfishness and sin, disease and death, will lose their foothold. SH 264:3–7 The crude creations of mortal thought must finally give place to the glorious forms which we sometimes behold in the camera of divine Mind, when the mental picture is spiritual and eternal. SH 285:17 The time has come for a finite conception of the infinite and of a material body as the seat of Mind to give place to a diviner sense of intelligence and its manifestations, — to the better understanding that Science gives of the Supreme Being, or divine Principle, and idea. SH 174:14 Whoever opens the way in Christian Science is a pilgrim and stranger, marking out the path for generations yet unborn. SH 254:31 Pilgrim on earth, thy home is heaven; stranger, thou art the guest of God. SH 109:24 When a new spiritual idea is borne to earth, the prophetic Scripture of Isaiah is renewedly fulfilled: “Unto us a child is born, . . . and his name shall be called Wonderful.” SH 463:11 The new idea, conceived and born of Truth and Love, is clad in white garments. Its beginning will be meek, its growth sturdy, and its maturity undecaying. …By this we know that Truth is here and has fulfilled its perfect work. SH 361:4-5 Christ, as the true spiritual idea, is the ideal of God now and forever, here and everywhere.

Hymn. 222:1–3 O little town of Bethlehem, How still we see thee lie; Above thy deep and dreamless sleep The silent stars go by; Yet in thy dark streets shineth The everlasting Light; The hopes and fears of all the years Are met in thee tonight.

O morning stars, together Proclaim the holy birth, And praises sing to God the King, And peace to men on earth; Where charity stands watching And faith holds wide the door, The dark night wakes, the glory breaks, And Christmas comes once more.

How silently, how silently, The wondrous gift is given; So God imparts to human hearts The blessings of His heaven. No ear may hear his coming, But in this world of sin, Where meekness will receive him, still The dear Christ enters in.

Hymn. 11:1, 2 Angels at the Saviour's birth Woke with music all the earth, Shepherds in the eastern sky Saw a pale star passing by, Guiding them at break of day Where the babe in meekness lay, Born the gracious news to tell, God with us, Immanuel.

Star of being, still thy light Shines before us in the night, By those radiant beams we find Christ, the Truth, for all mankind, Still the tidings angels bring With their joyful caroling, Telling that the dawn has come, God and man fore'er at one.

Hymn. 511:1–3 It came upon the midnight clear, That glorious song of old, The angels, bending near the earth, Their wondrous story told Of peace on earth, good will to men, From heaven's all-gracious King; The world in solemn stillness lay To hear the angels sing.

O ye beneath life's crushing load Whose forms are bending low, Who toil along the climbing way With painful steps and slow; Look now, for glad and golden hours Come swiftly on the wing; O rest beside the weary road, And hear the angels sing.

For lo, the days are hastening on, By prophets seen of old, When with the ever-circling years Shall come the time foretold; When the new heaven and earth shall own The Prince of Peace their King, And all the world send back the song Which now the angels sing.