On a Wednesday evening two summers ago, as I was walking through some tall grass, I suddenly felt a very sharp pain on the top of my toe. Immediately I began declaring truths of God’s goodness and allness out loud. I was certain I had just been bitten by a copperhead snake. We had been seeing an unusual number of them in the preceding months.
The pain was excruciating, and my foot was swelling rapidly. By the time I reached the house, I could hardly walk. Not wanting to look at the foot, I got into bed and covered up with the sheet. Trying to remain calm, I called a Christian Science practitioner and was very grateful to hear her loving, strong statements of truth. The one that really stuck with me was that in God’s kingdom there are no harmful or venomous creatures. And, she added, “That is the only kingdom there is.”
I still needed to quiet the panic just under the surface of my thought, but I realized it was almost time for the Wednesday evening Christian Science testimony meeting that I listen to by phone. I dialed in and listened with deep gratitude to the citations read from the Bible and Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, by Mary Baker Eddy, on the topic of the ever-presence and omnipotence of God. The whole meeting, including the testimonies of healing, really helped deepen my understanding that divine Love is All. Later the practitioner emailed a thought that was helpful: “Love is the antidote for poison, and you are the very expression of Love.”
I wasn’t comfortable enough to go to sleep, so I continued praying. I acknowledged that in reality I had never taken a step that was not directed by my divine Father-Mother. I affirmed that God is Principle, the only lawmaker there is, and that the only activity is divine Mind’s knowing and seeing and maintaining its own all-harmonious goodness everywhere. In the wee hours of the morning I just held firmly to Love in all my thoughts, loving everyone I could think of and seeing all as living right then in Love’s kingdom, where there is no venom or evil or harmful, destructive element at all.
The next two days I continued to work with the practitioner, and there was improvement, but being on my feet at all was still very uncomfortable. At one point I told her I had a niggling thought that perhaps the snakebite could have been treated with medicine more quickly and with less suffering. She replied that what we are really about is recognizing and appreciating the presence and power of the healing Christ, and that there was much more going on than just physical restoration.
That rang true to me. In my practice of Christian Science I have found that healing is so much more than a bodily “fix.” In my experience, whether quick or slow, healing has always been accompanied by an exquisite revelation from Christ, Truth, that has shown me that God’s love and goodness are present and powerful, and that my eternal spiritual identity as God’s beloved is ever safe and intact.
Saturday morning, I woke up with the thought of innocence—my innocence and the innocence of all God’s creatures. Then I had the wonderful realization that there is no source of harm—period! This truth washed over me, and I felt so relieved and blessed. There was much progress, both physical and mental.
The Bible Lesson from the Christian Science Quarterly for the week was “Love.” I had already found inspiration in this citation from Science and Health: “The depth, breadth, height, might, majesty, and glory of infinite Love fill all space. That is enough!” (p. 520). But the idea came to think deeper about each word in it, and look up definitions in the dictionary. I spent the afternoon affirming that everything in that statement was true, right then and always.
Sunday morning I gratefully drove myself to church, participating in all my usual ways, and that evening my husband and I went dancing. Although my dancing was a bit tentative at first, by the end of the evening I was dancing freely. Since then, I have had complete freedom, and I am very grateful for what I learned—and the ways I have been able to practice what I learned.
Laura Hausladen
Bourbon, Missouri, US
