Years ago, after graduating from high school, I entered a three-year training course for Christian Science nurses and then worked for several years as a floor supervisor and on-the-job instructor for other Christian Science nurses. Though the work was rewarding, after a time I began to feel that what I really wanted was to go to college.
My employer agreed to a leave of absence for a semester, but just as classes were about to begin, staffing problems arose and I began to think twice about leaving my fellow Christian Science nurses. At the same time I also developed a back problem—not just a pesky ache, but a debilitating pain so severe I could not stand up straight. One night, desperate for comfort, I reached for one of Mary Baker Eddy’s books. As I opened it at random, my eyes fell on this passage: “ ‘These are but parts of Thy ways,’ says Job; and the whole is greater than its parts” (Unity of Good, pp. 5–6). Instantly I knew there was a healing message for me in those words.
For the past nine years I had devoted myself to Christian Science nursing; it had been my whole life, my whole love. But I suddenly realized that Christian Science nursing is only part of a wonderful whole. Mrs. Eddy’s 1908 By-Law establishing Christian Science nursing fell into perspective as I grasped its relationship to the whole Church organization. The whole of the Church Manual is greater than any one By‑Law—although each of the By-Laws met a need for Mrs. Eddy’s growing Church.
