Sickness can be prevented

No one need feel helpless when symptoms of disease appear, just doing nothing while they develop into bodily discomfort or incapacity. Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, points out something we can do to maintain sound health. She writes in Science and Health with Key to the Scripturesm: ''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.'' n1

n1 Science and Health, p. 392.

One evening I began experiencing a sore throat, which in the past had sometimes signaled the onset of a severe cold. I had to leave the next morning to give a talk in another city, and for a moment a feeling of panic swept over me. ''I can't afford to get sick now!'' I exclaimed to myself. But at this point the words previously quoted from Science and Healthm came to mind, and I saw that I didn't have to submit even for an instant to further suffering but could prevent it altogether. With relief, I realized I wouldn't have to cancel my plans. I began to pray, to insist mentally on my perfection as God's beloved child, made in His likeness.

Christian Science, in accord with the Bible, teaches that God is the only genuine cause, the sole creator of the universe, including man, and that the true nature of creation is spiritual, wholly good, expressing God's nature. From the standpoint of absolute truth, all cause and effect are spiritual, and all is the perfect handiwork of God, divine Spirit.

As I reasoned and prayed along these lines for about an hour, the pain completely disappeared. The other difficulties never did develop, and I made it through the hours of driving, and my speech, in perfect freedom.

Christ Jesus emphasized the effect of what we entertain in thought. He said: ''Not that which goeth into the mouth defileth a man; but that which cometh out of the mouth, this defileth a man. . . . Those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart.'' n2

n2 Matthew 15:11, 18.

When one learns that thought affects every aspect of his life, he sees the necessity of replacing fearful, sickly thoughts with spiritual truths that uplift, transform, and keep one whole. He sees the importance of conforming to the Christly standard Jesus established for all mankind. No matter what others may be falsely believing about sickness and disease, we don't have to abjectly surrender our peace and harmony, but may instead exercise our God-given power over suffering.

Because you and I are actually the reflection of infinite, harmonious Spirit, and we include only those qualities Spirit imparts - peace, joy, health, dominion - the suffering and fear that may seem so real have no genuine power over us. They are misconceptions, false beliefs, not actual, God-created conditions. And being misconceptions, they can be corrected with the truth of man's inseparable relationship to God, of his uninterrupted well-being as God's reflection. This truth heals.

Mrs. Eddy writes in Science and Healthm, ''Instruct the sick that they are not helpless victims, for if they will only accept Truth, they can resist disease and ward it off, as positively as they can the temptation to sin.'' She continues further along: ''The fact that Truth overcomes both disease and sin reassures depressed hope. It imparts a healthy stimulus to the body, and regulates the system. It increases or diminishes the action, as the case may require, better than any drug, alterative, or tonic.'' n3

n3 Science and Health, p. 420.

Thousands of people today are experiencing regeneration and the healing power of Truth, of Almighty God. They are successfully warding off pain and disability - proving them to be untrue. Empowered with the Christly understanding of Truth, we can demonstrate the fact that sickness can be prevented. ? DAILY BIBLE VERSE The Lord will take away from thee all sickness. Deuteronomy 7:15