ONE of the most difficult lessons to be learned in the school of Christian Science is that of patience and confidence in God. The sufferer may have been for months, or even years, under materia medica, may have "suffered many things of many physicians," but when the last remnant of hope in things material is gone and he turns to Christian Science for relief, he chafes at any possible delay. "Can I be healed in a week?" he asks the practitioner; or perhaps he has heard or read of some one who has been healed instantaneously, and is impatient that a like boon is not conferred on him. He may change practitioners many times and have multitudinous treatments, and then, if the healing is still delayed, feel that his confidence has been misplaced, that there is nothing in Christian Science after all.
However keen the sense of unfair discrimination may be, there is no justification for it, since God, who is infinite, unchanging good, is "no respecter of persons," and the prayer of faith is answered if the petitioner is asking aright. It is quite possible that the thought of the sufferer is only to be relieved from physical distress, or he may be trusting God in part and still clinging to some of his former medical beliefs, or he may make Naaman's mistake of outlining when and how he will be healed, instead of humbly and contritely waiting on God, ready to yield obedience to that gentle command, "My son, give me thine heart." If he will but take God at His word, know for a certainty that no good thing is withheld from those who keep His commandments, there is no reason why any needy one should not prove for himself the truth of that wonderfully inspiring promise, "To those leaning on the sustaining infinite, today is big with blessings" (Science and Health, Pref., p. vii). Not next week or next year, but today is Love ready to heal and bless those who, cutting loose from all else, put their trust wholly in the omnipotence of Truth, those who have swept and garnished their mental habitation that it may be ready for the coming of good, though the blessings may not present themselves in just the form finite sense had determined.
Instantaneous healing is of course the acme of Christian Science practice, but this may not be the patient's greatest need. In fact the healing of bodily ills pales into insignificance beside the spiritual regeneration of which it is the consequent. So many times we would miss the full measure of blessing if the delay in healing did not urge us on to gain for ourselves a clearer and firmer understanding of divine Principle. It may take a long time to discern wherein we are at fault, and when error is at length uncovered, pride or prejudice may stand in the way of its overcoming; but if we wait quietly and confidently on God, not outlining but trusting, the way of deliverance will surely be opened. "Love is not hasty to deliver us from temptation," Mrs. Eddy writes on page 22 of Science and Health, "for Love means that we shall be tried and purified."
