It is with a deep gratitude and a great joy that I feel impelled to give this testimony. Christian Science has brought me back to life and given me joy, peace, and blessings in full measure. Through many years I have often received much help in Christian Science for various diseases, among others a malignant disease of the kidneys, of which I was healed in three days. But what I here wish to tell is to me the greatest healing of all, for it has made me a free man.
For more than twenty years I was subject to the desire for strong drinks. They dominated me more and more, so that I finally became a complete slave to them. I did not feel normal without liquor and thought I must have it in order to live. I suffered much from this, but I slipped farther and farther down and was unable to come out of it, in spite of many desperate attempts. Among other things I stayed at a psychiatrical clinic and for a longer time at a home for alcoholics. I received continually admonitions from my superiors, but I could not be without alcohol and finally lost good positions, until at last I could get no work. One of the worst things was that I lost the confidence of my wife and children.
I was very miserable and wanted to get rid of life. I felt superfluous and useless and thought death was better than a life in sin and misery, and I also thought that it would be best for my family that I disappeared. They had only sorrow, shame, and disappointments because of me. Then, in the eleventh hour, some dear friends of mine who are Christian Scientists took hold of me. I had help from a practitioner and was drawn up out of the pit of darkness and received light, the light which Mary Baker Eddy has shown to the world and explained, the light which is the way to strength, healing, and forgiveness. I now understand Mrs. Eddy's words in Science and Health (p. 5), "Sin is forgiven only as it is destroyed by Christ,—Truth and Life." To see this, and know that it is so, is glorious.
