As a Christian Science nurse, I’ve often thought about something Mary Baker Eddy wrote in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures: “The nurse should be cheerful, orderly, punctual, patient, full of faith,—receptive to Truth and Love” (p. 395). Those are wonderful qualities—but when I came back into Christian Science nursing after taking some personal time off, they were certainly not what I was cherishing!
At that point I wasn’t really happy with anything in my life—not the state of the relationship I was in, nor the city where I lived. I felt lost, and I reached out to God in desperation with a prayer that was basically, “God, get me out of here!” Then, within a few weeks of returning to the Christian Science nursing ministry, I found myself on a home-care case. It gave me a wonderful opportunity to devote my time to God, the patient, and my own prayer, study, and spiritual growth.
A major change took place. I suddenly had a new, more spiritual perspective from which to pray about my life’s circumstances. I started to look at Christian Science healing in a different way as I realized that healing is not something that happens “out there,” but that it takes place within our own thinking as we begin to understand God’s creation.
Christian Science nursing is all about love and compassion. But it is so much more, too. Christian Science nurses and practitioners realize that the healing power is not personal but is of God. As a Christian Science nurse, I’m learning that everyone I meet is someone upon whom I can shine the reflected light of divine Love. After all, God’s love is the light we each reflect and express—and Christian Science nursing is all about letting that light shine so brightly that it becomes a beacon of divine Love. The result? Healing.
But that home-care case was a major turning point—it showed me that God’s love inevitably lifts me as well as my patients to new views that bring healing. Today my relationships are much more harmonious, and I love where I live—and I know there are many more blessings to come! Mrs. Eddy writes: “Happiness is spiritual, born of Truth and Love. It is unselfish; therefore it cannot exist alone, but requires all mankind to share it” (Science and Health, p. 57). God has certainly made this fact apparent in my life!
