The paramount test of true Scriptural interpretation is the conscious ability to heal the sick. If one has no practical understanding of the healing power of divine Love, however learned or sincere he may be, he must fail to interpret the Scriptures in their Christianly scientific meaning. Theologians for centuries have been reading the Bible without any proof of having grasped its message of healing. They have read into the Book of books all manner of human opinions limiting the power of God and justifying human belief in the reality and lawfulness of the very things which the great Teacher proved to be "the works of the devil." Had this not been so, Christian healing would never have been lost sight of by the professed followers of Christ. There are multitudes of earnest Christian people to-day who believe that Christian healing should be a part of the activities of Christ's church but because they themselves have failed to grasp the full import of the Master's teaching, they are very loath to admit that Mrs. Eddy was the one to discover and to restore to the world in this age the lost art of healing.
Without any desire to enlarge upon this lamentable failure to recognize the presence of the healing Christ-idea in the world to-day, let us briefly examine into the foundational beliefs which form the matrix for all unbelief in God's willingness and ability to heal. In the first place the average professing Christian is a firm believer in matter, even going so far as to declare that God made matter. This very belief in the legitimacy and reality of that which contradicts the nature and presence of Spirit constitutes disobedience to the great First Commandment, "Thou shalt have no other gods before me," and necessarily shuts out the understanding of the all-power of Spirit. To the student of Christian Science belief in matter is synonymous with flesh and blood, or life in matter, and the Bible plainly teaches that "flesh and blood," the belief of life in matter, "cannot inherit the kingdom of God." Certainly that which cannot inherit the heavenly kingdom of Spirit cannot be relied upon to interpret the Scriptures in their true meaning.
In other words, he who clings to the belief that man is mortal, that flesh and blood is created by God, will fail to read the Bible from a spiritual or metaphysical standpoint, and cannot therefore present the true import of the Word to others. He will simply be presenting his own limited human opinions of the Word. He that names the name of Christ must depart from iniquity, must rise above the belief of life and intelligence in matter, else he cannot read the Bible understandingly. Unless he has some faint glimpse of the unreality of mortal existence, the veil of the flesh will prevent his separating the tares from the wheat. The literal presentation of the Word, without its spiritual meaning, has for centuries failed to heal mankind and to many church members is no longer proving even attractive. It is the spirit of the Scriptures that quickeneth, the fleshly concept of them profiteth nothing.
