There are solid benefits to becoming less focused on the body and more conscious of God. One of these benefits is to our health and well-being.
A precedent for turning away from the body and to God for healing is found in the Bible, particularly in the life and works of Christ Jesus. He healed many who had physical troubles, showing that disease is a violation of an inherent right—the right of the children of God to experience harmony in every aspect of life.
Underlying Jesus' words and deeds was eternal divine law, which we can learn how to apply. Through prayer that springs from an understanding of God as the perfect Principle of the universe, and of our actual nature as His spiritual image, we can experience genuine health.
Despite the appearance that we're merely physical beings the true self of everyone is incorporeal, diseaseless, never helpless. We actually live in Spirit and are eternally above and apart from physicality and suffering. Wholeness is the very essence of God's nature, and His children express that wholeness. We can turn away from preoccupation with the body—with how to repair it, add to it, or subtract from it—and realize that Spirit is our true source and substance. Spirit is the sole maintainer of our well-being.
At any moment we can look to the truth that God is All.
Sickness, or inharmony of any kind, isn't a part of our real identity. And awakening to this fact results in healing. Science and Health says, "The Christlike understanding of scientific being and divine healing includes a perfect Principle and idea,—perfect God and perfect man,—as the basis of thought and demonstration." Science and Health, p.259.
Jesus didn't examine the body either to determine the cause of illness or to cure it. He was deeply compassionate with the sufferers he encountered. Yet his teachings turn us away from over-concern about the body to greater trust in God's care. Turning to God was what Jesus invariably did and taught and advocated.
Prayer begins with a quieting of fear. At any moment we can look away from matter to the truth that God, Spirit, is All. This dissolves fear. It empowers us to see things as they really are — perfect, whole, not needing to be changed—and to experience healing.
Again, Science and Health says: "If we look to the body for pleasure, we find pain; for Life, we find death; for Truth, we find error; for Spirit, we find its opposite, matter. Now reverse this action. Look away from the body into Truth and Love, the Principle of all happiness, harmony, and immortality. Hold thought steadfastly to the enduring, the good, and the true, and you will bring these into your experience proportionably to their occupancy of your thoughts." Ibid., pp. 260-261.
Yes, it's challenging at times to hold our thinking to spiritual truths. It takes a deep desire and discipline to keep thought aligned with God and His laws. But through every effort in that direction, every desire to keep thought on God, we're blessed by the regenerating power of Christ, which is Truth.
I learned once again how powerful Truth is early in my public practice of Christian Science healing. I was very new in this work, and one day received an urgent call from the son of a woman who was in a nearby nursing facility. I went over there right away, and when I went into her room, the scene was daunting. My heart went out with a great desire to help her. I read aloud some comforting spiritual truths from the Bible and Science and Health to calm the tumult. Then I turned and looked out the window. I prayed earnestly to witness right there God's absolute allness and the nothingness of matter, sickness, suffering. After a little while I had such a feeling of Love's presence that I turned around. The situation had changed markedly. The woman was sitting up in bed, and said she felt as though she could eat something. That was the end of her difficulty, which earlier had seemed overwhelming to those concerned.
I've seen over and over again that freedom from suffering comes as the truth of God's allness and of our perfection as His children becomes more real to us.
Another benefit of looking away from the body is that we can more readily help others when we're not so preoccupied with our physicality. It's understandable that this might happen if we're having a particular trouble. But it doesn't need to be this way. Many people have had a breakthrough in praying about their own situation when they were willing to pray for the welfare of others. Such unselfish prayer for the good of our fellow beings opens consciousness to the light of Christ. It aligns our thought with God, who is Love, and this helps us as well as others.
Our unselfish prayers for others will help us, too.
The world needs you and me. It needs us not with thoughts turned inward on ourselves, but outward toward the betterment of others. It needs what we all have to contribute to humanity's well-being.
When Jesus' parents found him conversing with the teachers in the Temple, he said to them, "Wist ye not that I must be about my Father's business?" Luke 2:49. Being about our Father's business is also our real business in life, our divine reason for being. We're here to do our Father's will and to bring the joy and comfort of His love to others.
Love permeated Jesus' teachings, motivated his every word and act. And this allpowerful spiritual force—God's great love, the love of divine Love—is still here to be expressed in kindness, forgiveness, tenderness, good deeds, warmth, self-forgetfulness, patience, generosity. Turning away from physicality and living Love more fully give us all the purpose and fulfillment any of us could ever want.
Since God alone gives us our purpose in life, changes in our personal circumstances have no real power to take away our usefulness. We'll find our particular ways to contribute to humanity, knowing that it is impossible for God's child to be without a reason to be. Each of us is needed by God to bear witness to His nature. Understanding this gives us confidence, an expectation of expanding good. It helps us lead a more worthwhile life.
Mary Baker Eddy points out in Miscellaneous Writings: "Too soon we cannot turn from disease in the body to find disease in the mortal mind, and its cure, in working for God. Thought must be made better, and human life more fruitful, for the divine energy to move it onward and upward." Mis., p. 343.
Look away from the body with the spiritual understanding of God and His creation. It will not only enhance your health and harmony, it will also increase your usefulness to all.
Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life,
what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink;
nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life
more than meat, and the body than raiment?
Matthew 6:25
