One day a teen-ager in my Sunday School class was troubled about a conversation she had had with a friend on the subject of Christian Science. She explained to me and the class that her friend was skeptical and had asked, "What would you do if you were really sick, and you weren't being healed?"
The Sunday School student had never considered the possibility. She and her family had always depended on Christian Science for healing, and it had never failed them. But her friend's disbelief nagged at her, and she wondered, "What if something came up that I couldn't handle? What if the problem were just too big, and my understanding too small?"
The class readily agreed that this was a question that needed to be dealt with. But I didn't have a quick answer. Wanting to share a thoughtful and honest response, I told the students I would need to pray about it. They agreed to pray, too, and we planned to discuss it the following Sunday.
Later that week a small lump on the back of one of my legs became swollen and inflamed. The lump was something that had bothered me intermittently for about a year, and occasionally I'd requested treatment from a Christian Science practitioner. This time, however, the problem was acute, making it painful to walk and difficult to sit or lie down normally.
For a couple of days I prayed to quiet fear. I also turned to the Bible, and Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy, for reminders of God's omnipotence and omnipresence. The condition seemed very real and threatening, however, and I became alarmed because it continued to worsen. I then called a Christian Science practitioner, who agreed to pray for me, and thus help me to see through the physical sense testimony to the truth of my perfect, spiritual being as God's offspring.
It became necessary to stay home from work, as I could barely move around. During this time almost every waking hour was spent studying the Bible and the writings of Mrs. Eddy, reading the Christian Science periodicals, and praying to know God better. I worked diligently, feeling an urgency to resolve the problem. My husband's calm, cheerful expectation of healing in contrast to my somewhat frenzied efforts was an invaluable support.
Over a week went by, and the problem seemed to be progressively worsening. My thoughts kept returning to the question raised by the pupil in Sunday School, "What would you do if you were really sick and you weren't being healed?" The question haunted me. I was supposed to be helping the students to answer it, yet I seemed to be in that very spot myself! I didn't at all doubt the efficacy of Christian Science. I'd been raised in a large family where God was the only physician we called upon, and He had always met our many needs. So I didn't even consider the possibility of medical help. But I was beginning to doubt my own understanding of Christian Science and to question my ability to demonstrate it in this instance. The suggestion came, "Maybe this problem is beyond your grasp of Science."
How anxious I was to get the whole thing over with, to be healed and get on with my normal activities! But I was missing the whole point of Christian healing— spiritual regeneration. I didn't realize at the time what a wonderful blessing awaited me.
One day I called the practitioner and poured out my desperation. I felt I had put every effort into the working out of the problem, yet I hadn't seen the slightest sign of progress. I didn't know what to do. I'll never forget this dear woman's quiet, loving response. She said that it is divine Principle, God, and not a person, to whom we turn for healing. It is not our own or another's personal understanding of Truth that heals, but Truth itself. Therefore, she assured me, healing was inevitable because divine Principle never fails. God wouldn't let me down, and He certainly wasn't neglecting me.
Then she explained that sometimes it seems to us that disease, or evil, is aggravated and has initiative and control of a situation. Actually, however, divine Truth alone has initiative. It is always having its way, forever revealing more of itself and exposing evil as illusion. Truth is at work, overturning some phase of mortal belief and making way for progress in our experience.
The hour had come for me to learn what it really means to trust God absolutely. I thought I'd been doing so, but then I realized that my faith had been largely in my own understanding of Christian Science, in a person, rather than divine Principle. Naturally, if I believed that personal understanding could bring about healing, I was also liable to the belief that a lack of understanding could prevent healing. What a mistake! God is all-knowing, He understands perfectly, and the true, spiritual man reflects that understanding but is not the source of it. This was all I needed to know and accept. And even if my grasp of these facts was slight, that couldn't interfere with the operation of God's law of healing if I honestly trusted that law without fear or doubt.
I continued studying and praying, now free of intellectual pride, of wanting to figure out how the problem should be resolved metaphysically. I felt a deeper love for God and growing confidence in His unfailing law of good. With humility I learned the meaning of Christ Jesus' words "I can of mine own self do nothing" (John 5:30) and "The Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works" (John 14:10). Though days passed and there was no improvement in the leg, wonderful spiritual growth was going on.
One morning I wanted very much to be at my job at the offices of The Mother Church. It seemed foolish (and almost impossible) to make this effort under the circumstances. But I really felt I should be there, and I began to get ready. While showering, I inadvertently caught sight of the condition on my leg, which I had not looked at in several days. The disfigurement I saw shocked me at first, then stirred me to rebel vigorously against the belief that it could really be a part of me. Suddenly it was clear that the problem was nothing more than a phase of the dream that life and intelligence are in matter. It was an illusion of the material senses, and not the truth about me at all. "I'm God's child. He made me perfect, spiritual, pure, and lovely, and He wouldn't allow such an ugly thing to exist in His allness," I said out loud, firmly. It was so bad, I thought, it couldn't possibly be true!
When I was ready to leave the house for work, fear was entirely gone. I felt safe in Truth, and full of joy. Not a thing had changed physically, but I was so sure of the spiritual facts and felt so close to God that it just didn't matter anymore.
After getting settled at my desk, I opened a copy of Science and Health and read this (p. 201): "Truth makes a new creature, in whom old things pass away and 'all things are become new.'" I accepted this statement as God's promise of healing.
In a little while I noticed a spot on the rug and realized that my leg was bleeding. I called the Christian Science nurse in our building, and she came right away. In an office that was usually teeming with people—employees and visitors—there was no one around at that moment. How grateful I was to be at work when this occurred, with the skilled, loving aid of a Christian Science nurse at hand. We stepped into an empty office, where she cleaned and bandaged my leg. I felt no discomfort. The nurse told me that something had passed out of my leg and that the area was draining. Then she added, "One thing's for sure, there's no fear in this patient!"
Immediately I could walk freely, for which I was certainly grateful. Overshadowing the evidence of physical healing, though, was the fact that I had never been as aware of the love of God and the presence of the Christ as I was at that moment. It was as if God were saying to me, "You are My dear child, always safe, always Mine, and I will forever love and cherish you as I do now. There's nothing to fear, ever."
The next day, a Saturday, I raked and hauled leaves from our yard with more enjoyment than ever before! The leg healed completely.
This proof of God's healing power has remained precious to me in the years since. But the real healing has been something much greater than simply the change in a physical condition. We read in the Bible (II Cor. 5:17), "If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new." For me this healing brought the passing away of "old things"—a tentative trust in God and the belief that healing depended on the human mind; and the making of "all things . . . new"—the realization that divine Principle is the only healer, and that we can safely trust every case to God. I truly felt like "a new creature."
What a great joy it was to meet with my class the Sunday following the healing. Together we saw that the premise of the question "What if the problem were just too big, and my understanding too small?" actually invalidated the question, since it was based on the belief that one's human understanding was the source of healing. Three weeks had passed since the question had been raised, but now I was able to share something I couldn't have shared before my healing—not just words but a spiritual conviction, gained through scientific demonstration that God, divine Principle, is the only healer and never fails. As Mrs. Eddy says (Science and Health, p. viii), "The question, What is Truth, is answered by demonstration,— by healing both disease and sin; and this demonstration shows that Christian healing confers the most health and makes the best men."
Wellesley, Massachusetts
