Several years ago, during what many people call the “cold and flu season,” I came down with the symptoms of an aggressive cold. This was unusual for me. I usually stay healthy by turning to God, through an understanding of Christian Science, affirming that my Maker didn’t create sickness, so disease is not His will for mankind, and therefore neither I nor anyone else could suffer from it. God is Love, and all that He gives His children must express His tender lovingkindness. With this understanding, it was natural for me to trust that I couldn’t have or catch anything that God wasn’t giving me.
A strong prayerful protest along these lines normally sent any suggestion of illness I was facing packing, almost immediately. In Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, Mary Baker Eddy states: “Eradicate the image of disease from the perturbed thought before it has taken tangible shape in conscious thought, alias the body, and you prevent the development of disease” (p. 400). This indicates that it is the “image of disease” which must be expelled from thought, not a condition of sickness that needs to be removed from a physical body. The dis-ease is a mistaken thought, which is eradicated as we allow God’s thoughts to fill our consciousness with the light of Truth. However, this time I wasn’t feeling well at all. It felt as though sickness had somehow “gotten in,” and now I was suffering from it.
As a student of Christian Science, I had a firm conviction that I had never lived, even for a moment, outside of “the secret place of the most High” or out from “under the shadow of the Almighty.” Therefore, I had never been exposed to contagion. I fully trusted the Psalmist’s promise that “there shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling” (Psalms 91:1, 10). I knew I couldn’t possibly be separated even temporarily from God’s love and protection, and I knew I could turn to Him in prayer.
