Motive matters

A complicated situation at my workplace kept me up all night about a decade ago. It involved sensitivities, a new policy, a crosstalk among colleagues. I was trying to solve it and to see my part in the solution. Finally I gave up my figuring it out on my own and asked God for direction and help. I listened and listened some more, and after some time it came to me so clearly, that no one can ever misunderstand my motive. If my motive is in line with the two great commandments - Loving God and loving man as myself - I will always be safe, no matter how complicated the situation to solve, how difficult the challenge to overcome. It is all in the motive, not in the action or the words spoken. The motive is all that matters. Not only did this insight carry me and others through the aforementioned challenge safely, it stayed with me ever since. It encouraged me to always, under all circumstances, check my motive and see whether it is to a degree unselfish, humble, and meek.

The other day I was reminded of this insight. I had given a large gift, simply because it felt so right, and I was informed now that this could harm us financially in an unexpected way. Talking to my daughter she referred to this sentence in our favourite book "Science and Health with key to the Scriptures" by Mary Baker Eddy:

"A wrong motive involves defeat." (p. 446)

As every absolute statement in this book is universal and applies to everyone, everywhere, the reverse is also true:

"A right motive involves success."

This solved the last shadow of a doubt. We cannot make mistakes, and whatever we do out of pure goodness is a blessing, always - sometimes in the long run, but a blessing nevertheless. I can see the ramifications of this spiritual law already in my experience and I know without the shadow of a doubt that this has a healing effect. There are only good results from a good motive and the good motive is all we need to care about. The good motive, you might say, is the laboratory of your life, the motor of our consciousness. Mary Baker Eddy even states in the same book that "there is more life and immortality in one good motive and act than in all the blood, which every flowed through mortal veins." (p. 376)

The good motive is in and of itself not a power. It makes room for the divine all-power of infinite Love because the good motive expresses God. A good motive reflects God's nature, the source and origin of all harmonious action. A good motive reflects to some degree the oneness of God and man. It shows that only good has power. It reflects humility and meekness. This leads in the words, the right activity and experience. Mary Baker Eddy writes: "Right motives give pinions to thought, and strength and freedom to speech and action." (p. 454)

So the right motive is the entrance ticket that gets you on the train of divine Love. It aligns you with divine power, giving you authority, calm, and confidence. For "a right motive involves success".

Mary Baker Eddy writes in another fabulous book entitled "Miscellaneous Writings 1883-1896" (p. 354)

"A little more grace, a motive made pure, a few truths tenderly told, a heart softened, a character subdued, a life consecrated, would restore the right action of the mental mechanism, and make manifest the movement of body and soul in accord with God."