Many people have found that prayer not only brings healing in the sense of comfort and peace in the midst of suffering, but it also brings cure. But what happens if we pray, and it doesn’t seem to be working?
A number of years ago, I was facing a very challenging relationship problem. One day, I suddenly fell to the floor in excruciating pain. It felt as if something in my vertebrae had gone out of place, and as if my upper body were no longer attached to my lower body! The situation was frightening and very painful.
My daughter, who was with me, called a Christian Science practitioner and held the phone to my ear. The words of the practitioner, assuring me of God’s love for me and of His constant care, were very reassuring. As soon as the fear left, my back returned to normal, the pain went away, and I was able to stand again.
However, the following day, the same thing happened again. Although my prayers again brought relief, the condition began recurring with greater frequency. I’d had many quick physical healings through prayer alone, but this condition didn’t seem to be yielding. In fact, it got worse—until I was unable to stand or walk, and was flat on my back, being cared for by my mother at her home. My prayers had become focused entirely on enduring the pain whenever the picture of dislocation appeared.
So instead of praying about a condition with my back, I realized I needed to understand better what in my thinking was “unlike ‘the anointed’ ”—the Christ, God’s angel messages that come to us every moment (Mary Baker Eddy, Miscellaneous Writings 1883–1896, p. 355). Christ Jesus healed physical conditions people face today—acute and chronic, congenital, hereditary, contagious, long-standing. And he said that anyone who followed his teaching would be able to heal as he did (see John 14:12).
As I listened for the still, small voice of the Christ, I began to realize that I had been believing that my happiness, success, and self-respect could be controlled or undermined by another person. I had become very resentful and burdened by this picture. But Christ Jesus taught that God, Spirit, alone is the source of good and that God is all-powerful. Therefore, we can never be deprived of good. Our supply, our opportunities, and our respect all come from God and so can never be undermined, lost, taken away, or limited.
I also realized that my ability to stand and move with freedom was not controlled by muscles or bones, and so could not be undermined by a belief of disease or aging. We’re reminded by the Apostle Paul in Acts 17:28 that we “live, and move, and have our being” in Spirit alone, so all movement must be free, painless, and harmonious. This is our God-given inheritance, which we can never lose. As this became clear to me, the resentment, anger, and heaviness simply disappeared. I saw that God’s tender love embraced and sustained both of us.
However, I still could not sit up or move without pain, and the frightening picture of what appeared to be a dislocated vertebra continued, periodically bringing such excruciating pain that it was all I could do to hold on and pray through it.
Then one day, as I was thinking about the implication of the statement, “God, Spirit, is All-in-all” (Mary Baker Eddy, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 275)—the only Mind, communicating only good to each one of us—I realized that God would never communicate pain or malfunction or dysfunction. Therefore, these pictures of dislocation and pain were simply a form of hypnotism. I knew the five physical senses, human opinion, pharmaceutical ads, and medical diagnoses often have the effect of hypnotizing us with their fearful pictures.
I suddenly remembered an account of a hypnotist in India who could make people believe they were being bitten by cobras or being stabbed. If the person allowed his thought to be controlled, he actually saw, felt, and experienced whatever was being suggested, even though it wasn’t real. Mrs. Eddy explains: “Mortal mind sees what it believes as certainly as it believes what it sees. It feels, hears, and sees its own thoughts” (Science and Health, p. 86). Later, she writes: “Disease is always induced by a false sense mentally entertained, not destroyed. Disease is an image of thought externalized. The mental state is called a material state. Whatever is cherished in mortal mind as the physical condition is imaged forth on the body” (p. 411).
Like a hypnotist, the physical senses mesmerize us into believing we are controlled by matter. However, the hypnotist will tell you that he or she has no control over you, unless you give your consent. The same applies to mortal thinking.
Mrs. Eddy reminds us: “Stand porter at the door of thought. Admitting only such conclusions as you wish realized in bodily results, you will control yourself harmoniously. When the condition is present which you say induces disease, whether it be air, exercise, heredity, contagion, or accident, then perform your office as porter and shut out these unhealthy thoughts and fears. Exclude from mortal mind the offending errors; then the body cannot suffer from them. The issues of pain or pleasure must come through mind, and like a watchman forsaking his post, we admit the intruding belief, forgetting that through divine help we can forbid this entrance” (Science and Health, pp. 392–393).
Right then and there, I decided not for another second to give my consent to this lie of separation from God. A few moments later, the picture of dislocation and another wave of pain started to come, but this time I lifted my thought up to the understanding of “perfect God and perfect man” (Science and Health, p. 259) and said silently, “Thank you, Father! You are the only Mind, and You see and know only good, so that is all I can know or experience.” The picture of dislocation and the accompanying pain both went away immediately. I was very grateful!
However, I realized I needed to go further. Since God has always been my Life, then I have always been free, and I did not need to wait for a period of recuperation. This entire picture of having suffered for weeks was also just hypnotism. It never happened, I reminded myself, because God never stopped being my Life. Therefore, I had the freedom to stand and walk right now.
In spite of that declaration of truth, the fear tried to come back in. “What if you fall again?” it suggested, as if it were my own thinking. I responded, “Impossible! I live and move and have my being in Spirit alone. Thank you, Father.” I got up and began walking around the room, constantly keeping my thought lifted to the allness of God, Spirit, and the nothingness of matter. I began cleaning up my things and packing my suitcase.
The next day, I carried my suitcase to the car. That was the end of it! I returned home completely healed. And the healing has been permanent. Today, I am still able to do back flips off the diving board.
Scientific prayer, as demonstrated by Christ Jesus and explained by Mary Baker Eddy, is effective and reliable. Prayer cures when we realize that we cannot be controlled by fear or false material laws because God’s law of wholeness and perfection is the law of our being.
Jackson, Wyoming, and Bay Shore, New York, US
