I have many things to be grateful for, and wish to relate a healing which occurred in our family a few years ago. Our youngest child, a boy of two years, fell from a chair, striking his elbow on the floor with such force that he cried out in distress. I declared the truth immediately, and held him in my arms while I sang some of his favorite hymns and read aloud from the textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mary Baker Eddy. He quickly stopped crying, but made no further effort to use the arm. At the end of twenty-four hours, as his arm was still hanging limp at his side, swollen and discolored, my husband thought it best to have an X-ray photograph taken. This was done, and the plate revealed a crack, the beginning of a T-bone fracture. A loving and faithful Christian Science practitioner took up treatment at once for the child, and in ten days the arm was completely healed.
I was patiently helped through an attack of influenza and received a beautiful healing. On page 506 of Science and Health Mrs. Eddy tells us that God "opens the petals of a holy purpose in order that the purpose may appear." I had never thought that the presence of God could be manifested like that. Spiritual uplifting followed, and I felt a deep desire to progress and learn more about God.
In another case of sickness, much fear, impatience, and hate had to be overcome. I spent many sleepless nights "struggling with a mortal sense of life, substance, and intelligence" (ibid., p. 308). Then a change came about in the following way: I always sang our Leader's hymn commencing, "O gentle presence, peace and joy and power" (Poems, p. 4) to the baby at his bedtime, and one evening, after singing that hymn, I fell into a calm, peaceful sleep. I slept only one hour, but when I awoke I felt as refreshed as though I had had a whole night's rest. I had a wonderful feeling of the all-presence of divine Love, and the condition began to improve from that time on.
