Seeking wisdom from the departed was quite fashionable in the 19th century. People would go to a medium to have a séance, in which it was believed the spirit of someone who had passed on could be called up, to communicate with them and offer advice.
This was not a new phenomenon. There are a number of references in the Bible, in both the Old and New Testaments, to this practice. The twenty-eighth chapter of First Samuel relates the story of King Saul of Israel consulting a woman at Endor who had a “familiar spirit,” asking her to call up the late prophet Samuel for advice. This turning from God to a medium for help did not turn out well for Saul, and Israel suffered. By contrast, St. Paul, by the authority of Christ Jesus, healed a young woman considered a fortuneteller of her “spirit of divination” (see Acts 16:16–18).
Spiritualism and divination may seem like harmless superstitious nonsense in this age of science and reason. The advertisements for palm readers and horoscope prognostications may seem to offer a fun dalliance, but dabbling in the occult would insidiously ensnare us into believing its claims to influence our lives and even affect our health.
I saw the importance of debunking the subtle influence of spiritualism one year when our family was all gathered for Christmas. We had decided it would be fun to go to a movie together, but there was disagreement about which one and when to go. I found myself in the middle of a heated argument, trying to facilitate agreement, hoping to please everyone and keep a spirit of love in this supposedly fun outing.
When we finally arrived at the movie, I was feeling extremely ill with a headache. Not sure if I could even go in at that point, I stepped out of the ticket line to pray. As I listened earnestly to God for a healing message, I heard, “Handle spiritualism.” I understood that “handle” meant to debunk it, to uncover and see the powerlessness of a belief in mediumship, channeling, or consulting something other than God, or Life.
In this instance, I immediately saw that allowing myself to assume the position of mediator, buffer, or go-between for the family dynamics was like being an electrical conduit. The pain I was experiencing was the tension of trying to do God’s job of caring for and communicating with each of Her children directly.
A statement from the Christian Science textbook, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy, helped me yield this position back to God: “The intercommunication is always from God to His idea, man” (p. 284). In that sweet and humble moment when I stepped out of the role of being a medium, well-intentioned though it was, all pain stopped instantly. I got back in the line and enjoyed the movie with my family.
Later I found this passage in the textbook, which explained my healing more fully: “There is not so much evidence to prove intercommunication between the so-called dead and the living, as there is to show the sick that matter suffers and has sensation; yet this latter evidence is destroyed by Mind-science. If Spiritualists understood the Science of being, their belief in mediumship would vanish” (p. 81).
Looking to a human institution as the source of good government or our supply leaves us vulnerable to the inherent nature of finiteness.
Looking to a person as a source or medium for good is perhaps the most prevalent form of spiritualism. But whatever claims to be or require a medium that we must go through to get answers is a form of spiritualism. For instance, the notion that we have to go through a process of time in order to be healed is a form of spiritualism. It would prevent us from accepting the immediacy of the perfect and unerring care of God—the intercommunication that “is always from God to His idea, man.”
As we accept the truth from First John 3:2—“Beloved, now are we the sons of God . . .”—we debunk the medium of time and refute the lie against the present perfection of God and man. Because we are perfect now, we can experience the immediacy of this fact. We can stop trying to get to perfection through a medium called time, which even many physicists say is not a fixed fact but a perception, and practice the timeless, ever-present nowness of the kingdom of heaven.
Another subtle medium can be that of human institutions or governments, be they social, civil, political, or ecclesiastical. If we lean on some organization as the medium for all our good and are not fully leaning on God, then it is likely we will find that this channel can be blocked, disrupted, inadequate, or be the conduit for something unwanted or wrong. Looking to a human institution or anything finite as the source of good government or our supply leaves us vulnerable to the inherent nature of finiteness. Organizations and governments often struggle with problems such as corruption and limited resources.
But looking to God is looking to the infinite. The Bible illustrates the effect of looking directly to God for answers to problems of health, sustenance, and protection. There is the account in the Old Testament of Moses leading the children of Israel through the Red Sea and turning to God for their sustenance on the way to the Promised Land. And Christ Jesus’ major message in the four Gospels was that the kingdom of heaven, or divine government, is at hand and within each one of us, to be accessed directly. He demonstrated this by healing diverse diseases, feeding multitudes, and raising the dead. Science and Health assures us, “Soul has infinite resources with which to bless mankind, and happiness would be more readily attained and would be more secure in our keeping, if sought in Soul” (p. 60).
Handling spiritualism, then, is necessary, but not complicated. We can discern and debunk the claims of mediumship in their present-day iterations, and feel the liberating power of being forever held in rightful relation to God, as the effect of the one omnipotent cause. We can be relieved of the burden and suffering of being or looking to a personal medium for good; the frustration of being subject to the mediums of matter, time, or space; and the helplessness of being subject to inadequate, finite governments.
As St. Paul declares of God, “For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen” (Romans 11:36). No processes, no gaps, no eclipses, no delays, no burdens of mediumship, exist in God’s infinite self-containment; and in proportion as we realize this, we find healing answers more immediately.
