The beginner in Christian Science sometimes thinks of this Science simply as a panacea, which when brought to bear upon a discordant condition in human experience changes that condition to one of ease in his body and satisfaction in his affairs. That Christian Science does heal all manner of human ills has been proved many times; but the exchange of disease in matter for ease in matter is not the primary object nor the modus operandi of Christian Science treatment. It is true that the replacement of disease with health is a consummation to be desired; yet often the human effort to effect such a change may be the cause of delay in healing.
After stating that mortals cannot gain the understanding of Christian Science without striving for it, Mary Baker Eddy adds (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 323), "This strife consists in the endeavor to forsake error of every kind and to possess no other consciousness but good." In some instances it may be that the student has not quite understood these words and has unwittingly concentrated his attention on the discordant condition as if it were something having actual existence— something that could offer resistance to God's will.
"To possess no other consciousness but good" usually involves considerable mental house cleaning. The desire to be freed from some distressing physical condition is legitimate. But if the eagerness for physical healing just for its own sake so blinds the supplicant that he fails to see the need for eliminating some pet sins or for eschewing certain present-day forms of idol worship, the healing is liable to be delayed.
Not infrequently resentment, condemnation of self or others, fear, or pride may be hindering that illumination of consciousness which disperses the clouds of discord. In the consciousness filled with good—with Truth, Life, and Love—there is no room for discord. Since it is no part of all-inclusive divine Mind, discord of any name or nature has no part in man, who is created and maintained in God's image and likeness.
The inviolability of man's real self was one of the basic truths supporting the Master's practice. Evil—sin, sickness, and death—can seem to exist only in an unenlightened human consciousness which is accepting as real the false, mesmeric suggestion of mortal mind that there is an identity apart from God. St. John writes, "Now are we the sons of God" (I John 3:2); and Mrs. Eddy writes (Science and Health, pp. 476, 477): "Jesus beheld in Science the perfect man, who appeared to him where sinning mortal man appears to mortals. In this perfect man the Saviour saw God's own likeness, and this correct view of man healed the sick." Complete harmony is the normal, natural state of man reflecting God. Discord, which is but a mistake, has no place in God's creation. Healing is the correction of the mistake in human consciousness and the replacement of it with the true concept of being, namely perfect God and perfect man.
An early experience of the writer's demonstrates this truth. For several days he had been striving to heal a cold. The malady was particularly annoying at the time because the writer had found a few months earlier in his first attempt to apply Christian Science that a similar condition yielded very quickly. Grateful that he had applied Christian Science successfully, as he then believed, to overcome a type of discord which had long been a recurring occasion of distress, he had, nevertheless, been retaining the belief that the malady was a reality.
A letter from a friend who was more experienced in Christian Science arrived most opportunely. The following words of our Leader's were quoted from "The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany" (p. 249): "When error strives to be heard above Truth, let the 'still small voice' produce God's phenomena." A consideration of the passage proved revealing. It became clear to the writer that since God is the great and only cause, all phenomena proceed from Him and are wholly good; and that since God is the only Mind, there can really be no consciousness of aught but good. He saw that disease must be without a cause and therefore without existence, a figment of erring mortal mind, unreal; that it is not something that has identity and the power of resistance, but is wholly illegal, invalid, illusory. He realized that being healed was often like waking from a dream. With this illumination came a joyous sense of freedom and of gratitude for a better realization of God's allness. The cold simply disappeared.
Basically, this healing was not the change in physicality; the truths of being corrected and replaced the erroneous beliefs about God, about His creation and His laws. In place of the mistaken belief that man is material, subject to punitive material laws, there was an enlarged understanding of man's spirituality as the manifestation of divine Love, the perfect work of the perfect creator. Nothing had gone wrong with God's creation.
God's son is always God's son, the heavenly Father's inviolate expression. Said the Preacher (Eccl. 3:14), "I know that, whatsoever God doeth, it shall be for ever: nothing can be put to it, nor any thing taken from it." To declare this truth understandingly is to "let the 'still small voice' produce God's phenomena." The unceasing, irresistible operation of divine Principle, Love, is humanly manifested in harmony. Discordant conditions vanish like night's darkness before the sun. The acceptance and affirmation of Truth are fundamental in Christian Science treatment.
In the years that have followed, the writer has often found it helpful to recall the incident and to review the way in which the understanding which grew out of it has enabled him to detect the illusory nature of discord. He has learned how to deny and dismiss its clamor as wholly illegitimate and chimerical, how to devote thought to praise of omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, and ever-active divine Principle. Under this regimen of spiritualized thinking, he has had the joy of seeing Truth become manifest as harmony in a variety of experiences in human affairs.
Matthew records in the sixth chapter of his Gospel that Jesus warned his disciples against being unduly concerned over material, human needs. The Master added the assurance and direction (verses 32, 33): "Your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things. But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you."
The alert student will maintain the truth that complete and unvarying harmony is the only actuality of being, because there is only one all-creating and all-governing Principle, God. He knows that he is truly at one with deific power. He learns to exercise man's divine heritage of dominion and to see demonstrated the ever-presence of good.
