THE ELEMENTARY SCHOOL my daughter attended wanted to instill a love of science in the students. One of its initiatives, a science fair for the youngest grades, gave each child an opportunity to choose a project to present to the class and the parents. I'll never forget one seven-year-old boy. He wanted to prove that fire needs oxygen in order to burn. The teacher helped him light a candle, and he placed a glass over it. The flame continued briefly and then went out. Thrilled with the result, he shouted to the audience, "And it works every time."
The confidence was inspiring. What had so obviously captured his heart was the fact that the results of his experiment were reliable and consistent. At the time, I had just begun to focus my energies on the public practice of Christian Science healing and naturally wanted to understand better how Christ Jesus healed so quickly and simply. The boy's experiment gave me such a vivid picture of what takes place in Christian healing.
Jesus' understanding of God embraced humanity with such love it extinguished every "flame" of mortal suffering that crossed his path. Every individual Jesus prayed for must have felt God's love so tangibly that nothing remained in consciousness to fuel the fire, so to speak, of disease or suffering of any kind—no fear, doubt, self-condemnation, or sin. The Scriptures record that those witnessing his healing works were as amazed by his authority as they were by the cures. Jesus showed no hesitation or uncertainty about the outcome of his prayer. He expected healing every time. When a centurion told Jesus his servant was at home sick with the palsy, his response was "I will come and heal him" (Matt. 8:7), not "I'll see what I can do."
