My first printed testimony appeared in the Christian Science Sentinel of December 9, 1967. In it I told of a healing of appendicitis accomplished a few years earlier with the treatment of a Christian Science practitioner. I have had a number of healings since then. I should like to relate one which taught me an important lesson in spiritual healing. I've been able to apply the insight I gained then several times since.
My forearms were itching as I undressed at night. After several nights of delicious scratching with increasing vigor, the skin broke. I began to wonder whether the laundry had started using a more caustic cleaning agent. But I challenged this suggestion by knowing that since matter is not a cause, matter cannot affect matter. However the torment continued.
Later it occurred to me that my grandfather, when I was a boy, had had a similar skin condition. At that time he had probably never heard of Christian Science. I suddenly recalled the smell of the salve that he used as a comforting balm. But I knew that a balm was not the answer for me. I remembered that in the Bible Jeremiah had rhetorically questioned (8:22), "Is there no balm in Gilead; is there no physician there?" No, I was convinced, as apparently was Jeremiah, that God is the only healer, not material remedies. So I challenged the belief of heredity in my attempt to heal myself. I went further and gave my grandfather some thought. I saw that as one of God's ideas he had never really been tormented by any such aggressive suggestion. I knew "the human history needs to be revised, and the material record expunged" (Retrospection and Introspection by Mrs. Eddy, p. 22).
