I came into Christian Science because several doctors, one a noted specialist, said that I could not have a child or be a well woman without a major operation. I had gone to a large city to have this surgical work done. After my appointment with the doctor, I went into a practitioner's office in the same building, for the words "Christian Science" stood out in bold relief on the door, and they penetrated my darkened consciousness, bringing to me the remembrance of the many healings my mother had had through its ministrations. With a heavy heart I told the practitioner my troubles. She too had had the same difficulty. Christian Science had found her in a wheel chair because of three operations. Her healing was complete, as anyone could readily see.
I returned to our little town without the advised operation being performed and began a most earnest and joyous study, spending many hours with the Bible and my newly purchased Science and Health by Mrs. Eddy. The stories of Elisabeth (Luke 1) and of Sarah (Gen. 21) were pondered often. I had help from the practitioner for about a month. When our baby boy was born two years later, it was indeed a proof that God's promises are kept. He is a strong, fine lad now, doing a man's work, and I am a decidedly healthy woman, never having spent a day in bed since his birth twenty-three years ago.
During the so-called depression years, when loss seemed to be always present in our experience, black discouragement crept in, and our study of Science was dropped. This interval was terrible and without hope, for I knew that if Christian Science could not help us, nothing could. Truth would not let me go, however, and these words of Mrs. Eddy's from her Message to The Mother Church for 1901 (p. 2) proved indeed true in my case: "What Jesus' disciples of old experienced, his followers of to-day will prove, namely, that a departure from the direct line in Christ costs a return under difficulties; darkness, doubt, and unrequited toil will beset all their returning footsteps." The following experience proved this to be true.
Blood poisoning in an acute form caused me again to have to make the choice between the hospital or Christian Science. A practitioner in a distant city was called, and a terrific struggle followed. When I was willing to trust God and give up the material sense testimony, knowing that all was in God's hands, healing began. But the road back was not easy; and it was several months before this problem was entirely met, for wrong thinking, mainly resentment, had so permeated my consciousness that it took much time and study to get my feet again on the spiritual rock of Christ-healing.
I learned at the moment of my husband's passing that in reality there is no separation. The oneness of God and man was never so clear to me as at that instant. The work was so beautifully done by a practitioner, whom I had never seen until the night I called him to the hospital where my husband was, that strength came pouring over me like a flood of light. The many lovely incidents that took place in the handling of my business affairs were beyond human understanding, but I was beginning to touch the hem of this glorious healing truth and to learn the protecting care our Father-Mother God gives to His children who trust His unfailing guidance.
I prayed that my son might be in a Christian Science Sunday School. God's leading was in evidence when, against intense competition, I secured a teaching position which brought us to our present home, where that desire was fulfilled. "Desire is prayer; and no loss can occur from trusting God with our desires, that they may be moulded and exalted before they take form in words and in deeds" (Science and Health by Mrs. Eddy, p. 1). These words by our dear Leader were with me frequently as I worked over this problem.
The training my son received in the Sunday School surely helped him during the past few years when he was many hundreds of miles away from home and church and temptations were many. How grateful I was to learn on his return that he was unchanged. Recently he was healed of a broken hip incurred while riding a motorcycle. An ambulance was called, and he was taken to the hospital. I was then notified. Through the work of a practitioner he was brought home the same afternoon. No cast was used. He was not supposed to turn over for two weeks, and many other medical laws were placed on him. The third night I came to his room and found him on his side, sleeping like a baby. He was back in college in less than three weeks. His friends frightened him about possible complications, so he had an X ray taken. He had to show the doctor where the break had been. During this experience I held to the truth that since Love is One, there can be no separation.
A keen sense of belonging to and being a part of the greatest healing movement the modern world has ever known was mine when I joined The Mother Church twenty-three years ago. This is surely a wonderful provision, especially for people who live in the country and small towns. Seven years ago I had the joyous privilege of becoming a member of a branch church and of being called to serve in various places. My fastest growth has been since class instruction and since having a church home.
I could not close this testimony without expressing gratitude for loving friends and practitioners, who have never failed to give me the encouragement needed, and without rendering praise to our Father-Mother God for giving to us the promised Comforter, Christian Science, as brought to us by His messenger, Mrs. Eddy. I am also grateful for all the avenues which she so wisely provided for making Truth known throughout the world.— Topeka, Kansas.
